4 A WHITE-PAPER GARDEN 



of warm waters, and the fit change in the heat 

 in winter-time cause a lily or a spring flower to 

 bloom?" If in the days of Seneca this were 

 wisdom why not in ours? January will give 

 us more than we dare ask, in a hemlock bough 

 strung with little shining brown cones, and 

 powdered with snow. Why should we care for 

 a midwinter rose ? A poor perverted thing it 

 needs must be, no matter how long its stem, 

 nor how thick its petals. Born in a stifling 

 atmosphere, shut out from the skies and the 

 winds by a roof of glass, with never a bee to 

 give it greeting, what can it know of rosehood ? 

 Better by far a brave spray of barberries holding 

 their colour against the cold. 



In the north I would have my garden, and 

 as this is not a time for petty things, but for 

 big ones and bold, let it be painted into the 

 landscape with wide washes of the tints that 

 belong to the season. Tints, not colours, save 

 for the heavy blackness of the evergreens, since 

 winter means reserve, and withdrawal, and 

 grey and white silences. No one is ever in- 

 timate with Winter. Even the children, who 

 pile fortresses of his snow, and riot in the deep 

 drifts with all the joyous abandon of young 



