HODGE] PREP A RA TION OF TEA CHERS 295 



simply teeming, abounding, bursting with knowledge and possi- 

 bilities of life and education, all wholesome, all worthy and de- 

 lightful, and all worth while. We are only in the dawning fringe 

 of a new era of cleanly living and splendid good health, full of 

 beautiful homes, glorious, gorgeous and luscious gardens, teeming 

 fields and shady roadsides, green pastures and still waters. Verily 

 in this work is the Lord our Shepherd and we shall not want. 



Nothing gave me more pleasure and genuine satisfaction in my 

 travels of the past summer than the glimpses I got of children's 

 gardens everywhere. The world is surely moving in the right di- 

 rection. They were everywhere, roof gardens, window gardens 

 back-yard and front-yard gardens, school gardens, garden cities, 

 and everywhere there were children in them, standing and looking, 

 bending over and pointing out things to companions, gathering 

 vegetables and flowers. Among many others, I visited the gar- 

 den of one little girl in Cleveland ; it occupied part of a vacant lot 

 next door to her home and was fifty feet square. Early in August 

 it was a mass of bloom, asters and sweet peas, lilies and roses, with 

 wonderfully well-grown tomatoes, lettuce and other vegetables at 

 the rear. This was the third year she had had this garden and every 

 plant in it seemed perfect. The first year she had sold about $20 

 worth of flowers, plants and vegetables from her garden, the second 

 $60 worth, and so far this year she had actually sold $125 worth 

 and hoped to bring the amount up to $200 mark before winter; her 

 garden looked as if she would. Think of it! This is already at 

 the rate of $1975 per acre, and if she succeeds in her ambition the 

 yield will be at the rate of $3160 per acre — ^and by a slim, little 

 slip of a girl, fifteen years old. Mable Musser's garden record 

 for 1913 was $250.83 actually sold from a garden fifty-two feet 

 square. This is equal, as she figures it to eleven cents per square 

 foot, or $4791.60 per acre — possibly a world record by a child.] 

 But in all the garden the finest and best crop is the knowledge, and 

 interests, the ideals and ideas in the life of the girl herself. She 

 was glowing and sparkling with love of her garden. She has devel- 

 oped strength of body and of mind, power to concentrate and pa- 

 tience to persist until the result is in hand, resource and ability to 

 plan wisely and to work out the problems in her way. She 

 has made a good start on the road to knowing how to produce her 

 own living by fundamental and wholesome industry. No matter 

 where her lot is cast, she will be better able to surround her home 



