28 AN ISLAND GARDEN 



joy at the thought that I may be the magician to 

 whom power is given to summon so sweet a pa- 

 geant from the silent and passive soil. I bring a 

 mat from the house and kneel by the smooth bed 

 of mellow brown earth, lay a narrow strip of board 

 across it a few inches from one end, draw a fur- 

 row firmly and evenly in the ground along the 

 edge of the board, repeating this until the whole 

 bed is grooved at equal distances across its entire 

 length. Into these straight furrows the living 

 seeds are dropped, the earth replaced over them 

 (with a depth of about twice their diameter), and 

 the board laid flat with gentle pressure over all 

 the surface till it is perfectly smooth again. Then 

 must the whole be lightly and carefully watered. 

 With almost all the seeds sown in this bird- 

 blest and persecuted little garden, I am obliged 

 to lay newspapers or some protection over the 

 planted beds, and over these again sheets of wire 

 netting, to keep off the singing sparrows till the 

 seeds are safely sprouted. Last year, one morn- 

 ing early in May, I put a border of Mignonette 

 seeds round every flower bed. When I came to 

 the garden again in the afternoon, it was alive 

 with flirting wings and tails and saucy beaks and 

 bright eyes, and stout little legs and claws scratch- 

 ing like mad; all white-throats and song-spar- 

 rows, and hardly a seed had these merry little 

 marauders left in the ground. Around the edge 

 of each bed a groove ran, nicely hollowed by their 

 industrious feet, and empty as my hopes. I re- 

 placed the seed from my store, and this time took 

 great pains to lay two laths side by side over the 



