I04B00K OF OLD-FASHIONED FLOWERS 



ised and are beginning to fade, it bends them aside so 

 that the seed vessels may rest in some suitable crevice 

 where the ripened seed may safely be born. The flowers 

 which stand out from the plant, therefore, always look 

 fresh and attractive. 



Not everyone can grow the Gentians, but certainly 

 everyone can grow — though not all of us can exter- 

 minate — those beautiful Veronicas, the Germander 

 Speedwell and the Field Speedwell, with their brightest 

 of blue flowers. Merely to name the dandelion, daisy, 

 plantain, convolvulus, dock, pheasant's eye, and even 

 the groundsel, is to remind ourselves of the great beauty 

 which our garden weeds possess, and of the essential 

 place which they occupy in the mental picture of a 

 homely garden. Yet is there one "weed" — or "good 

 plant in the wrong place," as a weed has been well 

 defined — more prevalent than all others, hardier than 

 most, and as beautiful as any. No garden, no road, no 

 wall or fence even, but grass does its best to drape and 

 to beautify it. And if gardening has made men blind 

 to the beauty of the grass leaf, so blind that they needs 

 must roll and cut it for appearance's sake, then is 

 gardening to be ranked with that spirit of vestrydom, of 

 which Mrs Meynell says such true, sarcastic things. But 

 gardening need have no such tendency. Rather should it 

 tend to make its devotees observant and admiring where 

 plant beauty is concerned. Still, with weeds, be they 

 ever so beautiful, ever so interesting, must the gardener 

 wage eternal war. Nature, like the artist she is, abhors 

 bare earth as much as she abhors a vacuum, and, where 

 she sees a piece of ground uncovered, there she sows 

 her seeds or projects her roots. One of the best ways 

 of keeping weeds within bounds, therefore, is to have 

 as little earth as possible uncovered by plants, for then 

 weeds have small chance of entry and smaller chance of 

 development. There is a hackneyed saying to the 



