GARDENS OF THE NORTH AND SOUTH 7 



served to-day. There the members of his family 

 foregathered from their various occupations when 

 the shadows were lengthening and the hedge- 

 sparrows nesting in the thicket. 



After a time the yard became an adjunct of the 

 house so that one was rarely planned without the 

 other. The front-yard garden has been insepa- 

 rable from the English cottage since before the 

 time of Elizabeth, and it is from the cottage of 

 England that the cottage of New England in- 

 herited its bed of simples and its garlands of bloom. 

 It is found in some form in every class of dwelling, 

 from the stately homestead of broad acres to the 

 small, unpainted cottage of the farm labourer, and 

 generally owes its particular charms to the minis- 

 trations of the women who, in days gone by, were 

 associated in a more or less vague way in the mind 

 of man with flowers, and credited with many of 

 their attractive qualities. 



This characteristic of the New England home is 

 plainly in evidence as soon as the boundaries of 

 that area are approached, in many instances its 

 influences have overflowed beneficently into the 

 adjoining counties of New York. When the home- 



