INTRODUCTION 193 



of the time to intervene before the holidays begin, that 

 he may have the daily delight of erasure but in its 

 perusal we shall find proofs, many and definite, of this 

 reality. He was his own gardener. He believed that the 

 golden rule, which prevailed in his day as a condition of 

 success in agriculture, that 



"He who by his plough would thrive, 

 Himself must either hold or drive," 



was to be observed in horticulture, and that no man will 

 work quite so well for another as he can work for himself. 

 He knew when, where, and how to perform all garden- 

 work, and when the process was important, he did it, or 

 saw it done. His nephew " John " and " Tull " were his 

 subordinates. He employs labourers two and three at a 

 time to do rough work ; " Dame Turner and her girls " come 

 in to weed the walks ; but he sows his own choice seed, 

 strikes his own cuttings, prunes his vines, transplants a 

 mulberry tree which he had raised from a layer, makes a 

 bed of aromatic herbs, superintends the grubbing, burning, 

 and planting in new ground added to his garden, the cutting 

 of the alleys, the levelling of his terrace. So he wins for 

 himself the chief joy of a gardener's life as he watches the 

 development from small beginnings and the sure success of 

 his labour. He who grows a conifer from a cone has a 

 delight in his tree which no imported specimen, cost what 

 it may, can bring. Not long ago I was admiring in one 

 of the Midland counties the most beautiful private collec- 

 tion of trees and shrubs which I have ever seen, and when 

 I had repeated to the owner again and again all the lauda- 

 tory epithets which I could remember, and had continually 

 insisted on his notice of special attractions, as though he 

 had never been there before, or had failed hitherto to 

 discern their merits, he said quietly, "No one can appre- 

 ciate this quite so dearly as I do, because, beginning fifty 

 years ago, I planted them all." 



He exercised the same supervision over all things great 



2 B 



