viii PREFACE 



seemed right that my garden should grow in my 

 way, mainly by my own endeavor. Incidentally, 

 and fortunately, it also was necessary that it should 

 so grow, if at all, for financial reasons ! 



This garden — my garden, our garden — has 

 grown for a half-dozen years under these con- 

 ditions. It has been my goK, in pleasurable exer- 

 cise; it has been my open-air school, in what it 

 has taught me; it has been my physical regener- 

 ation from the debility of overwork. 



It is only proper to mention the unusual con- 

 ditions surrounding the making of this book. I 

 have written it, but my family have Kved it with 

 me, and the print-shop which bears my name and 

 enjoys my garden has made of the book much 

 more than a perfunctory item of work. The pub- 

 Ushers, too, have let down all the bars, so that in 

 a very special sense the book has been hved, 

 written, designed, illustrated, printed, and bound 

 as the work of one man and those about him. 

 Whatever it is, therefore — and I am keenly con- 

 scious of its faults — it is mine, or ours; it is of the 

 man, the family, and the shop. 



J. H. McF. 



September 28, 1915 



