THE PRIVATE GARDEN 



a charming result out of what our judges de- 

 scribed as "particularly forlorn conditions." 



Does this seem hardly fair to the first garden ? 

 But to spread the gardening contagion and to 

 instigate a wise copying after the right gar- 

 deners these are what our prizes and honors 

 are for. Progress first, perfection afterward, is 

 our maxim. We value and reward originality, 

 nevertheless, and only count it a stronger neces- 

 sity to see not merely that no talented or hap- 

 pily circumstanced few, but that not even any 

 one or two fortunate neighborhoods, shall pres- 

 ently be capturing all the prizes. Hence the 

 rules already cited, which a prompt discovery 

 of this tendency forced upon us. 



About this copying: no art is more inoffen- 

 sively imitated than gardening but unluckily 

 none is more easily, or more absurdly, mis- 

 copied. A safe way is to copy the gardener 

 rather than the garden. To copy any perform- 

 ance in a way to do it honor we must discern 

 and adapt its art without mimicking its act. 

 To miscopy is far easier we have only to mimic 

 the act and murder the art. I once heard a 



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