222 STUDIES IN GARDENING 



politics as well as gardening, must feel the iniquity 

 of this. He must feel that there is a higher law which 

 gives him some property in what he has made beauti- 

 ful; and the less he reasons about it the more deeply 

 he will feel it. 



But to the employer who is an enthusiast for the 

 new horticulture these tastes and ideas of his gar- 

 dener Avill seem the result of mere arrogant stupidity. 

 He will assume that the gardener wants to grow Gera- 

 niums and Calceolarias, because he can grow nothing 

 else. It is his business, as a gardener, to produce 

 whatever his • employer asks for. He has been gar- 

 dening all his life, yet he knows nothing about Alpines, 

 not even their names, and refuses to take an interest 

 in them. "The worst of him is," cries the employer, 

 "that he will not learn. He thinks he knows every- 

 thing and he knows nothing." And all the while that 

 is what the gardener is whispering to himself about 

 the employer. It would not matter if the employer 

 would attend to his own business, whatever it may 

 be, and leave the garden to its proper master. But 

 this he will not do. For some unknown reason he 

 must try his hand at a business for which he is con- 

 stitutionally unfitted. He blunders about the garden, 

 botching jobs which he has paid others to do for him 

 and demoralizing the under-gardeners with his messy 

 habits. It is impossible to see him at work without 

 despising him in your heart; and then precious time 

 has to be spent in repairing the damage which he 

 does. Meanwhile the employer is also watching his 



