THE OPPORTUNITIES OF THE YEAR 219 



shelter from scorching noontide sunshine under the 

 dim shade of some solemn yew or cedar and never 

 once think of sadness. But reverse the picture and 

 recall how all these look under a gloomy Novem- 

 ber sky, with fog clouds hanging low and chill 

 over the hilltops, and say whether we are not then 

 ready to confess that one and all are more or less 

 funereal. Exactly the same effect of gloom may 

 be given by many evergreen shrubs and conifers 

 when planted too close to house or windows. 

 Rhododendrons, for instance, are chief offenders, 

 for in hard frost they look very sorry for them- 

 selves, and communicate a sense of their misery 

 to all who look out at them. It is well to remem- 

 ber, therefore, that while evergreen shrubs placed 

 in middle distance or on the confines of a goodly 

 stretch of smooth green lawn are delightful, the 

 same close at hand may become intolerably op- 

 pressive. Near or far, however, holly is never sad 

 and dreary, nor ever out of character with English 

 scenery ; and no ornament of a lawn can be more 

 in keeping than a shapely specimen feathering to 

 the ground. 



After all, for work or rest, for recreation or for 

 interest, the garden is what we choose to make it, 

 and to each one it tells a different story in a lan- 

 guage of its own. Would that every Briton, man 

 or woman, rich or poor, might have some personal 

 share in the delight and benefit which a garden 

 has the power to confer on mind and body! 



Surely it is not without its age-long lesson that 

 the opening page of human history should picture 

 primeval man and woman placed in a garden to 



