DECEMBER 139 



am speaking only of the effects of frost and snow on 

 English gardens, and I feel sure, though I may not be 

 able to prove it, that much of the beauty of our English 

 gardens comes from our English winters ; for certainly 

 our fickle seasons must have been the determining 

 element in the character of our gardens, as, indeed, the 

 seasons must be everywhere throughout the world. 

 But however that may be, there can be no doubt that 

 the interest of our gardens, and that which has made 

 Great Britain a nation of gardeners, has been our fickle 

 and comparatively cold climate. I have never seen 

 tropical vegetation ; my ' At last ' has never come, and 

 almost certainly will never be anything but an un- 

 fulfilled wish ; but though I know that I should fully 

 admire the glorious vegetation, I can fancy nothing less 

 interesting from a gardening point of view. To have a 

 garden where nature and the climate do everything, 

 and man is called upon to do little more than scratch 

 the ground and gather the flowers and fruit, might be 

 very pleasant from one point of view, but it would take 

 away all that to me constitutes the real interest of 

 gardening, in its difficulties, and even its disappoint- 

 ments. 



And so we will try and make the best we can of our 

 English garden in December. 'The earth mourneth 

 and languisheth,' but it is not all barren. Even Cowper, 



