THE UPPER GARDEN 



exclaims, "How fortunate you were to find a spring in 

 exactly the right place!" 



Sometimes we smile politely and say nothing, but 

 frequently we divulged our secret; for the truth is, it 

 is not a spring, but water piped from an artesian well! 

 Neither did we find the bowlder there half sunken 

 in the ground; it was given to us by a dear friend and 

 had been placed experimentally in half a dozen dif- 

 ferent spots before it found its permanent abode in 

 this shady dell. The gravelly hollow is really lined 

 with cement, and the apparently tumbled collection 

 of small granite rocks, pink and purple and mossy, 

 carefully conceals the irregular edge of the basin. 

 Does this remove the romance or make the place less 

 lovely? Not in our eyes at least. Wild violets make 

 a carpet between the flat stepping-stones ; our own 

 aralia droops her spray of dark-red berries over the 

 water; the veined leaves of the native smilax mingle 

 with the blue wood-aster; and from the earliest flower 

 of spring to the wych-hazel in October one may al- 

 ways discover a new interest in this charmed retreat. 



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