MY GROWING GARDEN 



the garden, with its borders and the Arboretum 

 bed, its grass driveway, its almost concealed range 

 of coldframes facing the winter sun, its new plant- 

 ing of pet evergreens. That was a wreck of dead 

 pear trees five years ago ! Beyond, I see the bar- 

 berry hedge, now purely lovely because of the 

 way in which it carries its snow load, and I remem- 

 ber that when I came here there were fences that 

 were oflFenses — ^great scroll-sawed contortions of 

 pine boards — ^because they said plainly, "Stay 

 out !" This hedge, which is only a marking Hne 

 after all, says "Look in !" 



Walking out in the snow — and I love it more 

 than I did that first winter — ^I turn into the formal 

 garden which has taken the place of two broken- 

 down buildings — an ice-house and a greenhouse — 

 that made the place forlorn when I came. In it I 

 see the rose-arbor, now trebly covered with a mat 

 of prosperous rose-twigs, snugly protected with 

 the unused Christmas trees I have picked up, and 

 thick with this clinging snow. Under these nearby 

 flat white expanses I know there are perennial 

 plants of many sorts, ready to be born again in 

 spring; and they grow in what was formerly the 

 foundation of that greenhouse. 



A bit farther along, and there is a glimpse of the 

 fruit-garden, looking clean and trim, and also 



