A GARDEN DIARY 79 
JANUARY 8, 1900 
WE have been enveloped all this morning 
in a cloud of smoke, not exactly battle- 
smoke, but nearly as thick, perhaps, in these days 
of smokeless powder, rather thicker. Our inde- 
fatigable Cuttle has decreed that we must at all 
costs get rid of those mountains of garden rub- 
bish, which seem to be for ever accumulating. 
Hence this smoke! Never in my life did I see 
such volumes! They rolled in blackish blue 
columns all about our leafless copse, till towards 
the afternoon, a wind getting up, they were swept 
finally westward, across the downs, somewhere in 
the direction of Guildford. 
Personally I like the smell, acrid though it 
undoubtedly is. The pile itself is moreover the 
nearest approach one ever gets in these de- 
generate days to a bonfire, for which I still 
retain the most infantile affection, and which 
never seems to be so familiar, or so endearing, 
as upon the afternoon of a winter's day. Who 
can explain those incredibly remote, yet at the 
