SUBURBAN GARDENS 161 



shrubs, and if room allow, several small tubs or flower- 

 pots can stand to form a pattern and give height. Often 

 a dark green wooden covered way leads from the gateway 

 up steps to the front door, and thus enables friends to 

 reach the house without exposure to wind or rain. This 

 rather gloomy passage, which takes up a portion of the 

 little garden and looks dull beside the bright flower-beds, 

 needs something to help it. Little wooden boxes, painted 

 dark green, narrow and rather trumpet-shaped, can be 

 hung upon the wall. The opposite side of the passage is 

 open and admits sunlight ; therefore, if bright daffodils or 

 other bulbs and flowers are planted in the boxes, they will 

 give colour and be a great source of pleasure to passers-by 

 Many are the suggestions that suburban or town 

 gardens can glean from cottage ones, where a very small 

 space is made the most of. An eminent gardener once 

 asked a lady to let him wander round her small garden 

 alone, for he wanted to see all that it contained. It was 

 the apple of her eye, for she had tended it herself, and 

 therefore she waited anxiously for his return, wondering 

 meanwhile what faults he would find. As he strolled 

 back to her side, he said, " I have learnt a great deal." 

 And she, poor innocent, blushed with joy and said modestly 

 that it was quite impossible he, the great man, could learn 

 from her. " Do you not know," said he, " that we all can 

 learn from a cottage garden ?" From that day forward 

 the lady never passed a thatched-roof cottage without 

 looking over the wall at the contents of its garden, to see 

 what fresh idea she could carry home. 



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