Robin Hood's Barn 



me that my hat has slipped back on my head — a 

 sure sign of advancing years — I will let you 

 bring it forward to the proper youthful tilt. 



But when it comes to pride in the appearance 

 of my garden, that is a different matter! You 

 had best not woimd it. There is no remedy to 

 bring quick healing and each slight will leave 

 a scar. I know ; for my vanity quite consciously 

 divides all visitors into those who show me garden 

 graces and those who show me garden airs. 



It is easy to tell one of the toplofty in her first 

 surveyal of my place. As I stand beside her, I 

 may watch the deadly working of her glance. 

 Each quarrelsome, bold color starts to blare its 

 challenge at her loudly. Each soft mediating 

 hue, in an effort to escape, goes colorless and 

 drab. And every plant at once becomes "vul- 

 garis," not "splendens" or "elegans" as I had 

 fondly hoped. Before her is a bed of Grcrman 

 iris, its pennants shifting out of saffron into 

 lavender, then deepening into purple and ma- 

 roon. There is, I know, nothing rare in these 

 varieties ; and yet I had not thought that princes 

 met in conclave lost anjrthing of royal blood. 

 [200] 



