THE MEANING OF THE GARDEN 119 



"When the Nordic tribes roamed the earth, each nomad 

 saw the crocuses sweep up the hillsides, 'the slim narcissus take 

 the rain,' and smelled the lilies in the valley before his feet had 

 found their shady refuge. Into the eye and mind of each human 

 being came the beauty of flowers, as well as the stately compan- 

 ionship of trees, with their gifts of shade and shelter, their sturdy 

 virtues and whimsical graces. Nature offered her finest gift — 

 Beauty — and though, needing sustenance, man ' took a few 

 herbs and apples,' in less strenuous moments he felt the loveli- 

 ness which was not all for him. We, his descendants, no longer 

 wandering but chained to one small spot of earth, dream into 

 our garden plot all the beauty of our earliest tribal memories. 

 Perhaps that is a part of the reason for gardens; what memory 

 has recorded, art tries to reproduce. 



"The garden is to be an expression of our joy in natural 

 beauty, the small individual world where we come near to 

 creating something and try to show forth our personal happiness 

 in the treasures of gift-bearing Earth. 



"Each of us gardeners expresses in a different fashion his or 

 her personal feeling — wide horizons for one; enclosed and 

 shaded walks, and hidden corners for the unexpected wistfulness 

 of wild things, for another; glorious pieces of color and fountains 

 breaking in summer sunlight, scented beds of roses and berga- 

 mot and lavender and 'lilies in the garden, in the dark,' all 

 the varieties of delight which the grouping of growing and 

 flowering things may give us — these do we seek, each after his 

 owTi imagination. Our individual fancies change from time to 

 time. The gay little marigold gives place to violets. We hastily 

 discard the splendors of triple-doubleness for the more clearly 

 sketched single flower; at any cost we must express the sentiment 

 we have, and ask our garden to feel with us. 



"Long ago my great-grandfather, pioneering up from New 



