FOREWORD 



cation as it progresses. In proportion as we 

 infuse into it a desire to make the most of any 

 and everything that will attract, and please, and 

 beautify, we reap the reward of our efforts. 

 Happy is the man who can point his friends 

 to a lovely home and say — " I have done what 

 I could to make it what it is. I have done it — 

 not the professional who goes about the country 

 making what he calls homes at so much a day, 

 or by the job." The home that somebody has 

 made for us never appeals to us as does the one 

 into which we have put ourselves. Bear that in 

 mind, and be wise, O friend of mine, and be your 

 own home-maker. 



Few of us could plan out the Home Beautiful, 

 at the beginning, if we were to undertake to do 

 so. There may be a mind-picture of it as we 

 think we would like it to be, but we lack the 

 knowledge by which such results as we have in 

 mind are to be secured. Therefore we must be 

 content to begin in a humble way, and let the 

 work we undertake show us what to do next, as it 

 progresses. We may never attain to the degree 

 of knowledge that would make us successful if 

 we were to set ourselves up as professional gar- 

 deners, but it doesn't matter much about that, 

 since that is not what we have in mind when 



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