82 A BOOK ABOUT THE GARDEN. 



teristic in and about his cottage home ; in his 

 delightful garden, which seems to contain everything 

 in miniature a diminutive stove, vinery, and green- 

 house, a small bed of American plants, a little 

 rockery, a wee fernery, a tiny fountain, an intricate 

 geometrical design on the most reduced of scales. 

 Pretty creepers, twining about his porch, stoop to 

 welcome you on your arrival, and the jasmine and 

 the climbing rose look at you lovingly through the 

 windows as you take your seat within. Passing 

 through the hall lobby would be more truthful, per- 

 haps you see, generally, a large bowl of wild 

 flowers, gathered and admirably grouped by the 

 children of the village school. In the study and 

 drawing-room are choicer bouquets, either culled 

 from his own Liliputian conservatory or offerings 

 from some brother Spade, and arranged, as only 

 ladies can arrange them, by his beautiful sister, Eose 

 Goodhart, who shares and gladdens the Curate's 

 home. At early morn, in the sweet summer-tide, 

 you may see him, with his scythe in his hand, sweep- 

 ing down the dewy grass, until the church bells call 

 him to his daily service (" the wust and incurablest 

 form o' Popery," according to Mrs. Verjuice), and he 

 goes through the quiet graveyard, carefully honoured 

 now, and ornamented with flower and shrub, and 

 through the chancel-door, by which the rose "Felicite 

 Perpetuelle " climbs heavenward in emblematic 

 beauty, into the hallowed courts of our dear old 

 church. These, too, sometimes are reverently decked 

 by our Curate and his little band of acolytes, and 

 "the king's daughter is all glorious within " upon her 



