CHAPTER XXVI 

 LESSONS FROM ENGLISH COTTAGE GARDENS 



We cannot re-produce the charm of Old English examples Our 

 labourers' homes a national disgrace The only way American 

 cottages and their gardens may become altogether lovely 



I 



CAN think of nothing lovelier of its kind than that passage in 

 "Aylmer's Field" in which Tennyson describes typical homes 

 of English labourers: 



"Here was one that, summer-blanched, 

 Was parcel-bearded with the traveller's joy 

 In Autumn, parcel ivy-clad; and here 

 The warm-blue breathings of a hidden hearth 

 Broke from a bower of vine and honeysuckle: 

 One looked all rose tree, and another wore 

 A close-set robe of jasmine sown with stars: 

 This had a rosy sea of gillyflowers 

 About it; this, a milky-way on earth, 

 Like visions in the Northern dreamer's heavens, 

 A lily-avenue climbing to the doors; 

 One, almost to the martin-haunted eaves 

 A summer burial deep in hollyhocks; 

 Each, its own charm." 



People who have travelled more than I, say that English 

 cottages and their gardens are the most beautiful in the world. I 

 saw thousands of them and they were endlessly delightful. Yet 

 there is almost nothing about them which I should care to have my 

 countrymen copy. 



This conclusion is so unexpected and disappointing that I must 

 defend it at considerable length, before setting forth what seems 

 to me a better scheme. In the first place, I must answer the 

 question which I am sure will spring into the minds of my readers 



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