THE GARDEN WEEK BY WEEK 



July Rambler is opening, Dorothy Perkins is laden with 

 pink trusses, not yet expanded. Sweet Peas have 

 clothed their sticks from top to bottom, and are gay 

 with bloom. Carnations are spindling up rapidly, and 

 fat buds are already visible. 



The Strawberry bed is a place of attraction, and yet 

 of bitter sorrow, for the blackbirds, which gaze hungrily 

 at rich red clusters that an entangling abomination of 

 black threads in the form of a fish net prevents them 

 from getting access to. Gooseberries and Currants are 

 yielding delicious material for tarts and stews. Early 

 Apples are already more than half-grown. Cherries 

 are taking on colour. 



The kitchen garden is providing new Potatoes, and 

 in spite of their comparative starchlessness they some- 

 how have a flavour which the best of old ones cannot 

 equal. The first dish of Green Peas has been picked, 

 eaten, and pronounced to be positively the greatest 

 vegetable treat in all history. Longpod Beans are only 

 awaiting a little gap in the Pea supply to prove that they, 

 too, have a wondrous flavour of their own. 



These are the joys of the July garden, and the reward 

 for much hard and possibly tedious work in the winter 

 and early spring. There are troubles, of course, and 

 disappointments ; these things come in everything, and 

 why should gardening be expected to be free from 

 them ? Some plants have failed of which much was 

 expected. Perhaps an unfortunate forgetfulness in 

 respect to watering has led to disaster with a frame 

 of Cucumbers, an oversight in connection with ventila- 

 tion has ruined a batch of young seedling Stocks, a 

 late frost has spoiled some of the fruit blossom, the 

 newly planted Crimson Rambler Rose looks feeble and 

 appears to be infested with mildew. These and other 

 272 



