IN MY LADY'S GARDEN 



music and the rising sun soon rouse them, and in half an 

 hour the concert is over, for the parent birds have begun 

 their long day's work of providing for the wants of their 

 families, and are then too busy too sing. 



Robins, with their large full eyes, are the earliest of all 

 to awaken, and also the latest of the birds at night to be 

 about, for they are almost like little owls in their power of 

 seeing things in the dusk. My tame birds come into the 

 darkened room before it is fully light, through the open 

 window, and fly across to the plate of biscuit crumbs which 

 stands ready for them by the bed ; for if their early break- 

 fast is forgotten, there is no peace until they obtain it, filling 

 their beaks with much food for their hungry nestlings from 

 the hand or the lips of their friend. Chaffinches, too, and 

 the exquisite little blue-birds (tomtits) come in a little later, 

 but the robins are always the first to arrive. 



In many a garden there is a spot where wild flowers 

 grow undisturbed, a corner which is more or less their 

 own, in which they can flourish in safety from the spade 

 of the gardener ; perhaps a small wood, or a shady, out-of- 

 the-way position quite unsuited to most of our garden plants. 

 Yet here we may make a delightful little retreat from the 

 summer sunshine, where we may bring our books and our 

 work, with a lounging chair or two ; or perhaps a hammock 

 can be suspended between two trees. There is a sense of 

 rest in such a place which is not always present in the most 

 perfectly ordered parterre, for 



" We may read 



And read again, and still find something new, 

 Something to please, and something to instruct, 

 E'en in the noisome weed." 



But all wild flowers are not " noisome " ; far from it, 

 indeed, are the primroses, the white violets, and the blue- 

 bells, which now abound in the half-wild garden, where the 

 great spikes of foxgloves are pushing up, and the little blush 

 wood anemone reinforced by the small blue variety from 

 the Apennines flings broad carpets of delicate tints under 



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