MY OWN ACRE 



And now as to the single acre by measure, of 

 lawn, shrubs, and plants, close around my house; 

 for the reason that it was and is my School of 

 gardening. There was no garden here — I write 

 this in the midst of it — when I began. Ten 

 steps from where I sit there had been a small 

 Indian mound which some one had carefully 

 excavated. I found stone arrow chips on the 

 spot, and one whole arrow-head. So here no 

 one else's earlier skill was in evidence to point 

 my course or impede it. This was my clean 

 new slate and at that time I had never "done a 

 sum" in gardening and got anything like a right 

 answer. 



It is emphatically an amateur garden and a 

 book garden : a garden which to me, as to most of 

 us, would have been impossible in any but these 

 days when the whole art of gardening has been 

 printed in books and no amateur is excusable for 

 trying to garden without reading them, or for 

 saying after having read them that he has 

 planned and worked without professional advice. 

 The books are the professional advice, with few 

 drawbacks and with the great advantage that 



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