SOME GARDEN VICES 



and stalk, staining the insects a harmonizing green or 

 brown, so that they are not to be distinguished until, 

 seizing the stem of a sweet-pea or a poppy, your hand 

 makes a smeary mess of myriads, each of which has 

 been sucking the life juice from the plant it helps to 

 encumber. Even the mildest and best-behaved of gar- 

 dens is liable to sudden lapses, to hideous indulgences. 

 Sometimes you are tempted to believe that only the 

 gardener is ever aware of the power and the omnipresence 

 of evil. Some gardens simply turn lazy. Encourage 

 them, prod them, feed them, and water them as you 

 will, they retain an obstinate inertness. They grow 

 nothing, they do nothing, they gape shamelessly in your 

 face throughout the radiant summer. Or else they turn 

 to weeds. Weeds are, of course, a constant tempta- 

 tion to gardens, even those of the strongest charac- 

 ter and finest manners. Hardly any garden but will 

 devote twice the time and trouble to raising some par- 

 ticularly ugly weed than it can be induced to bestow 

 on the up-bringing of your loveliest annuals or most 

 carefully cherished perennials. Human mothers are 

 said often to prefer their misformed or wayward chil- 

 dren to the good and beautiful ones. Gardens reveal 

 this trait to a dismaying extent. The pity and love 

 shown to its ugliest weed by the average garden is 

 touching, if it were not so infuriating. It will spare 

 no pains to convey to this voracious plant all the deli- 

 cately prepared food destined for your lilies or your 



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