12 GARDEN-CRAFT. 



haunted the race with the solicitude of an inward 

 voice that refused to be silenced, and is satisfied 

 with nothing short of the best. 



And yet, as some may point out, this homage of 

 beauty that you speak of is not done for nought ; 

 there enters into gardening the spirit of calculation. 

 A garden is a kind of investment. The labour and 

 forethought man expends upon it must bring ade- 

 quate return. For every flower-bed he lays down, 

 for every plant, or shrub, or tree put into the ground, 

 his word is ever the same, 



" Be its beauty 

 Its sole duty." 



It was not simply to gratify his curiosity, to serve as 

 a pretext for adventure, that the gardener of old days 

 reconnoitred the globe, culled specimens, and spent 

 laborious days in studying earth's picturesque points ; 

 it was with a view to the pleasure the things would 

 ultimately bring. And why not ! Had man not 

 served so long an apprenticeship to Nature on her 

 freehold estate, the garden would not so directly 

 appeal to our imaginations and command our spirits. 

 A garden reveals man as master of Nature's lore ; he 

 has caught her accents, rifled her motives ; he has 

 transferred her bright moods about his own dwelling, 

 has tricked out an ordered mosaic of the gleanings of 

 her woodland carpet ; has, as it were, stereotyped the 

 spontaneous in Nature, has entrapped and rendered 

 beautifully objective the natural magic of the outer 

 world to gratify the inner world of his own spirit. 



