FEBRUARY 37 



however, still work usefully on young 

 limes and such -like, keeping the stems 

 smooth and free from buddings out of 

 leaves and twigs, and the Gardener is 

 lenient with my amusements in this line. 



In the Wilderness (so we name a rather 

 wild unkept grassy place outside the gates 

 of old Italian ironwork that enclose a 

 broad opening between yew hedges) we 

 have planted climbing roses, and Clematis 

 Jackmanni and Montana at the foot of 

 some useless apple and plum trees. Many 

 old roses are at their best only when thus 

 grown wild, as it were, without the least 

 restraint. Only in this way do they attain 

 their fulness of grace and beauty. And by 

 this kind of growth only can one imagine 

 the sleeping Titania, quite over-canopied 

 with musk roses. A white Noisette left 

 to itself to grow up the stem of our stone 

 pine has grown so immensely in the few 

 years since it was planted as to take com- 

 plete possession of the tree ; climbing in 

 the richest luxuriance up to the top, and 

 thence hanging down in long rosy wreaths 

 of exquisite lightness. Yet, although in 



