CHAPTER XI 

 THE POOL IN THE GARDEN 



When I bring to you coloured toys, my child, I understand why there is 

 such a play of colours on clouds, on water; and why flowers are painted 

 in tints — when I give coloured toys to you, my child. — Tagore. 



NOTHING so surely adds charm to the expression of 

 the garden as a pool, even of quite small dimensions. 

 Thoreau wrote: "A lake is the landscape's most 

 beautiful and expressive feature. It is the earth's eye." 

 A pool is the eye of the garden in whose candid depths is 

 mirrored its advancing grace. My own little pool is a half 

 moon against the garden wall. Into it, from the mouth of 

 a mild-faced lion, falls a garrulous trickle that threads the 

 heat of summer days with a strand of freshness and relief 

 and breaks in upon our consciousness with a sense of gay 

 companionship. It is a small affair, but in the bed about 

 its overflowing rim is room for many treasures. Here 

 grow water Irises of various kinds: the fine rich blue Iris 

 monspur, I. aurea with its fluted yellow blossoms, I. Snow 

 Queen, and the splendid gold-banded Iris, I. ochroleuca, 

 that sometimes reaches a height of six feet. Against the 

 wall is a clump of Loosestrife for July flowering and about 

 it are some plants of the little Spiraea japonica that bloom 



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