ON SPECIALISING 



hours of disappointment. But even these will be foi- 

 gotten in the joy that arises at the sight of a plant that 

 is one's own especial creation. This more than compensates 

 for the poor quality of many of the resulting blossoms, 

 and the poor ones are always in the ascendant. Raising 

 flowers from purchased seeds possesses a great fascination, 

 not quite so pronounced perhaps as when the seed is home 

 saved from cross fertilised blossoms, but in neither case 

 does one know what will turn up. The great majority 

 of hardy plants and greenhouse plants ripen seed readily, 

 and one may, if one wishes, gather them in the home 

 garden. 



I have merely outlined a few directions in which the 

 home gardener, after some seasons of flower-growing 

 generally, may care to specialise. In a chapter I cannot 

 hope to do more, but there is plenty of gardening litera- 

 ture on special subjects, and those who contemplate such 

 a course will, upon inquiry, find their wants amply catered 

 for. It adds zest, I think, to gardening if one is able, 

 while not neglecting the many beautiful things that are 

 commonly grown, to indulge in the luxury of attempting 

 to meet the special needs of some warm favourite. If its 

 demands prove unusually exacting, the interested gardener 

 will merely consider the task so much better worth the 

 trouble. Moreover, in specialising in this way, one is 

 able to keep the plants under one's sole supervision and 

 constant care. The jobber never touches them, and 

 there is infinite joy and peculiar consolation in this. 



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