TliG Garden in Spring 



If it has a fault it is that its splendid blooms 

 too quickly fade. 



It is more pleasant to chronicle such brilliant 

 and easy successes than to confess to failures. 

 It is perhaps not worth while where victory 

 in one direction can be so readily won to 

 strueele to avert defeat in another. But 



DO 



hope springs eternal, and suggests that even 

 where others have failed we may succeed. I 

 have made a valiant attempt to form a little 

 rock-garden on English lines, and it must be 

 owned with reluctance that it is a complete and 

 utter failure. I did not venture to hope that 

 many " Alpines " would put up with the con- 

 ditions of this climate, but I was not prepared 

 for the behaviour of some of the rock-plants 

 which are almost weeds in our rockeries at 

 home. Of the numerous kinds of sedum, 

 encrusted saxifrage^ sempervivum, veronica^ 

 thymey aubretia^ arabiSy cerastium, and such-like 

 plants which I imported, not many have sur- 

 vived the summer, and not one has really 

 flourished. To my surprise, gentians have 

 lived and looked fairly healthy ; but they 

 show no signs of flowering. Some plants 

 change their habits under the new conditions ; 



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