LARKSPURS AND HOLLYHOCKS 65 



the secret of it. Out in the great and wonder 

 ful world beyond my garden, nature works 

 her miracles constantly. She lays her riches 

 at my feet; they are mine for the gathering. 

 But to work these miracles myself, to have 

 my own little hoard that looks to me for tend 

 ing, for very life, that is a joy by itself. 

 My little garden bed gives me something that 

 all the luxuriance of woods and fields can 

 never give not better, not so good, perhaps, 

 but different. Once having known the thrill 

 of watching the first tiny shoot from a seed 

 that I have planted myself, once having fol 

 lowed it to leaf and flower and seed again, I 

 can never give it up. 



My garden is not very big nor very beauti 

 ful. Perhaps the stretch of rocks and grass 

 and weeds beside the house an expanse 

 which not even the wildest flight of the imagin 

 ation could call a lawn perhaps this might 

 be more pleasing if the garden were not there, 

 but it is there, and there it will stay. It 

 means much grubbing. Just putting in seeds 

 and then weeding is, I find, no mere affair of 

 rhetoric. Moreover, I am introduced through 

 my garden to an entirely new set of troubles: 



