162 THE JOY OF GARDENS 



two of his choicest blossoms to present to a fellow enthu- 

 siast in the next office. As he gets on the train he thanks 

 his lucky stars that he has dahlias to comfort him, and 

 feels that a fairy godmother smiled over his cradle and 

 frowned on the unenlightened neighbors. 



Just as we have found it hard to convince others of 

 grounds for our enthusiasm in flowers, Friend K. has dis- 

 covered that dahlias "are Greek" to other men. His golf 

 chum, W., looks at him curiously as he comes in with a 

 lurking smile and whistles contentedly to himself. When 

 the world is at sixes and sevens in a financial way, Friend 

 K. wears a monster crimson dahlia on his coat and sits on 

 the sunny side of the car without grumbling. 



Has he dropped out of society, that he chooses a dusty 

 laborer for his companion*? And what can he find to say 

 to him, though he has a crushed dahlia in his buttonhole 

 which perhaps a child put there as she said "good-by"? 

 And as W. listens, his puzzle over Friend K.'s sanity 

 deepens, and the phrases are meaningless: "Seed in 

 March in boxes thirty-seven varieties bewildering col- 

 ors purest strain known madder red sunflower yel- 

 low perfect to a petal no sports," and so on. As the 

 voices rise above the rumble of wheels, W. observes that 

 others join the group, and the wordy war on the compara- 

 tive values of seedlings and tuber-grown sends him out 

 of hearing of such jargon. Of course, a man has a right 

 to a fad. 



