THE LURE OF THE GARDEN 



the finest. That youth is fortunate who can pour his 

 perplexities into the ear of an older man or woman, and 

 who knows a comradeship and an understanding ex- 

 ceeding in beauty the facile friendships created by like 

 interests and common pursuits ; and fortunate too the 

 girl who is able to impart the emotions and ideas 

 aroused in her by her early meetings with the world 

 and life to some one old in experience but comprehend- 

 ingly young in heart. Both of them will remember 

 those hours long after the garden gate has closed be- 

 hind their friend forever; as long, indeed, as they re- 

 member anything that went to the making of the best 

 in them. 



Besides all these, with whom the garden is so wel- 

 come as the fittest spot for converse, there is another 

 type of gossip to whom the garden is preeminently 

 suited, and that is the old. The old men and women 

 love it; its sheltered sweetness renews their youth for 

 them, and through its haze of green and gold the past 

 shines luminously, warm and fair. There they sit, the 

 two ancient cronies, rather toward the sunny end of the 

 bench, recalling a life, or at least all those pretty acts 

 and happy days that build up, in the memory, a 

 glorified retrospect of life, in which the harsher lines 

 and darker shadows have faded out. For the alchemy 

 of time has the fortunate faculty of preserving what is 

 radiant and happy rather than the reverse ; so that the 

 two old friends, preluding their remarks with, " Do you 



116 



