The Happy Garden 



His successor, the present Man of Earth, has a 

 better sense of the fitness of things. To him the 

 greenhouse serves the garden, and I have not yet 

 discovered any wayward ambition to show chrysan- 

 themums. He is in all things a worthy servant of 

 the garden. 



At one time there were lovely peaches on the 

 south wall of his cottage, but the privet hedge grew 

 up and blotted out the sun, and the trees died, 

 and, alas ! they cannot be induced to grow against 

 any other wall. But inside the hedge is our summer 

 dining-room, and the green wall shuts us in from 

 the wind, while the cherry trees shelter us from 

 the sun. 



And just here I must say a word in defence of 

 the much-maligned privet hedge. Mine was already 

 there, a straggling ill-kept row of sturdy bushes. 

 I hesitated for some time whether to demolish it, 

 but it held out such possibilities of a quick shelter, 

 that I decided against that ; and, instead, tried 

 what could be done to improve it. The despised 

 privet hedge is now ten feet high and four deep, 

 is cut into turrets, and has a door through it for 

 the maid to bring in the trays, etc. 



The way lies past the yew hedge, and the chest- 

 nut tree to the lawn and the main courtyard, where 

 the lions dwell, and the poppies grow in the cracks 



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