98 WOMEN-GARDENERS 



I am sometimes secretly amused in watching a 

 dispirited instructor, his cloth overcoat shining 

 with rain, which, judging by a white and rather 

 pinched-looking face, is rapidly penetrating his 

 other clothes. In vain he seeks a reasonable 

 excuse for leaving the work he is engaged upon, 

 suggesting another important job which all could 

 join in, beneath the protecting roof of a green- 

 house. With every imaginable question that 

 feminine ingenuity can evolve, the intolerant oil- 

 skins, in other words, students, detain him out of 

 doors, and particularly is this so if there are roses 

 to be tied or some other necessary operation to be 

 done in one of the special ornamental gardens 

 which belong to individual students. In that 

 case, there is no hope of escape for him, and his 

 best chance is to join wholeheartedly in similar 

 enthusiasm for work. 



This callousness about bad weather, coupled with 

 genuine love of work, has a most inspiriting effect 

 upon the garden labourer. He is afraid to take 

 refuge in the carpenter's shed, where lies concealed 

 that ready excuse and never-failing boon of wet 

 weather, " the wheelbarrow with the broken handle 

 that must be mended." If ladies are able and will- 

 ing to brave storms, he too soon finds it advisable to 

 become indifferent to them and, having procured 

 an inexpensive black coat like theirs, is spared all 

 growls from rheumatism. Moreover, when every- 

 body is working for a united cause the individual 

 soon becomes forgetful of small personal discom- 

 forts in his desire to hasten on the general work. 



In gardens near the coast it is impossible to con- 



