A GARDEN DIARY 153 



a vigour, and a turn for colonisation hardly to be 

 exceeded by the very wildest of wild brambles. 

 There is the cut -leafed bramble ; there is the 

 bramble of the Nootka Sound ; there is the white- 

 washed bramble ; there is the salmon-berry ; the 

 cloudberry ; the bramble of the Rocky Mountains, 

 and others, all of which I already in fancy see 

 tossing themselves up and down the bracken, and 

 over their wilder brethren, in one delicious froth 

 of white or rose-coloured blossom. 



Another, and a yet more fascinating vision, 

 sweeping over the field of my mind, has for a 

 moment given it pause. What of a jungle, not 

 of brambles, but of roses ? None of your trim 

 standards, of course, but some of the freer kinds 

 Rosa alba, Rosa lucida, Rosa brunonis, with 

 some Ayrshires, some Dundee ramblers, and 

 one commanding thicket of the biggest of the 

 Polyanthas ? It is a heady vision, and as a por- 

 tion of the natural "wildness" might intoxicate 

 the brain of Lord Bacon himself. In gardening 

 it does not do, however, to be too easily in- 

 toxicated. We have to keep a sober head ; 

 we have to look at the matter from all its 

 points of view ; there is the question of aspect, 

 already touched upon ; there is the question of 

 soil ; above all there is the question of fertili- 

 sation dear, delicate word ! No, we must not 

 allow ourselves to be carried off our feet by 

 any vision, however roseate. We have always 



