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len 



and a larder for their appetite, they will spread the 

 news far and wide, and your fame will soar through 

 the skies. 



Of course most of the valuable knowledge a gar- 

 dener accumulates comes by the great law of accident. 

 I've learned to value the apple, cherry, peach and 

 pear trees not for their fruit alone. They lure to the 

 garden birds I would never otherwise see, small jewel- 

 like creatures who appear during blossom time and 

 are as fleeting as the blossoms, disappearing into the 

 infinite as the petals are blown earthward. 



On one thirteenth of May, when the air was so 

 thronging with birds that I did not have time to lunch 

 at all, I sat at a window which looked out on two 

 fruit trees and counted thirty-three different kinds 

 of birds. And of this number eleven were the will- 

 o'-the-wisps of blossom time, flitting into my life and 

 out again — only flashes of cerulean, gold and green, 

 but painting indelibly the tapestry of memory with 

 their magical hues. 



Then, too, the fruit trees insure us the company 

 of that feathered embodiment of spring, the oriole. 

 All through May his fife will startle the most sluggish 

 thought from the commonplace to a sudden realiza- 

 tion of the festival season. He gilds the air in his 



168 



