SPRING BUDS AND BLOOMS 81 



selves to make me glad for tliis hedge, but now the 

 long rows of pleasing little yellow flowers, hanging 

 like bells imder the twigs, strengthen my beUef 

 that this is a very worth-while shrub. It is plenty 

 good enough as a hedge, for no mortal wearing 

 trousers or skirt can get through it with clothing 

 whole; it runs a veritable gamut of greens in 

 earliest spring, and these dainty flowers follow; its 

 berries come soon, and red, and stay red for all 

 the fall and winter months; its foliage blazes early 

 into reds and crimsons, long before frost; and 

 after frost has taken the leaves, raindrops hang in 

 tears from the red berries; while the soft snows 

 and the sleet-storms do wonders with it aU winter. 

 It has no oflf days the whole year round. 



Here at the garden entrance stands that Pyrus 

 floribunda 1 have mentioned, and not far from it 

 the also previously mentioned Spircea arguta is 

 yet a white fountain of spraying branches — ^for it 

 ties April into May in some seasons. 



We walk into the garden along the iris border, 

 now a mass of purple. What a hardy, hearty 

 thing is this common "blue flag," the German 

 iris! Growing almost anywhere in any soil, it is 

 pleasantly formal when out of flower, and gor- 

 geously informal when in bloom. I use it harshly, 

 perhaps, fitting and filUng with it, giving away 



