52 THE CHRONICLES OP A GARDEN. 



Any mention of spring flowers would be incomplete with- 

 out the violet ; the double blue certainly needs more 

 care in its culture than the single, but the latter is quite 

 as fragrant, and seems to thrive best w^hen left pretty much 

 to its own devices. Both this plant and the lily of the 

 valley do not object to the shelter of a wall or to the sun- 

 shine ; a few plants of each may be put in on the southern 

 side of a fruit-tree wall, where they will bloom early, and 

 require little attention ; but the violet seems to thrive 

 at the roots of roses or shrubs, and should be allowed to 

 nestle securely there in all out-of-the-way corners. I am 

 not writing a book of gardening advice. I know well that 

 this plan of allowing one plant to grow at the root of 

 another is utterly wrong in a real gardener's idea ; but there 

 are many innocent heresies in the art, which give great 

 pleasure, and which I, for one, prefer greatly to the ortho- 

 dox routine. For instance, it is very wrong, I believe, to 

 admire a mossy lawn, or to allow daisies to spring up 

 among the grass ; now both are so delightful to me, that I 

 would not care half so much for the little lawns or grass 

 plots in the garden, if they were not soft with velvet moss, 

 and white as snow with goivans. For some days before 

 the fortnightly mowing takes place, it is like the renewal 

 of one's own happy childhood to see the delight with which 

 all children greet the daisy ; they 



" Gladly nature's love partake 

 Of thee, sweet daisy ! " 



It is their own flower, the one they may pluck without 

 stint or reproof; for, as the poet says — 



