82 GARDENS OF ENGLAND 



is a serious matter indeed, and the forecast should 

 be made, not without competent help if need be, 

 but also with personal thought, and care. The 

 ground plan and main outlines settled, let us pause, 

 and pause again, before taking in hand the details. 

 Because we do so the garden in the .interval need 

 not be a wilderness. Multitudes of quick-growing 

 climbers, gourds, and flowering plants wiU give 

 their little life to help bridge over this waiting time. 



How different this is from the fussy impatience 

 which must have its good things, or their coimter- 

 feit, at once — brooking no delay. "Life is too 

 short," says such an one, " to linger over detail ; let 

 the thing be done, and the sooner the better. 

 Money shall be no object, as long as all is in order 

 by August when the house wUl be full." We 

 come perilously near to a casting away of the finest 

 essence of gardening when we lose our hold of 

 patience. 



For patience in garden work as well as in all 

 else brings its own reward. Years pass on, and 

 the sapling, planted long ago, is rearing a lofty 

 head ; the climber hangs its kindly drapery over 

 the dead trunk we fain would hide, and makes it 

 a thing of living beauty ; and memories of friend- 

 ship lurk in every garden plot. 



