A GARDEN NOTE-BOOK 



above the fine smoothly tilled earth; these are the 

 first growths of all the beauties of early and mid- 

 summer in perennial flowers. All is in low relief, 

 but in perfect order, an order which is enchanting 

 because a living plan is spread out before one, 

 drawn in dazzling green and rich purplish brown, 

 with the surrounding hedges, shrubs, and trees 

 picked out in their own first greens, from Norway 

 maples' wondrous light yellow-green to the silvery 

 leaves of shadbush. On the old apple-trees there 

 are but pin-pricks of that sweetest of all greens, 

 their leaf-buds. Puschkinias and crocuses are 

 faint now, fading, and in unexpected places, under 

 delicately leaved shrubs, daffodils come into their 

 own. In one such spot to-day I foimd a colony 

 of narcissus Ariadne in full bloom over a group of 

 little mertensias of a much darker blue than 

 virginica. This must be, I think, Mertensia larice- 

 olata, very early; in the shadow, below shrubs, the 

 flower is almost like a sapphire. An interesting 

 flower this, about eight inches high with a deep 

 rose-colored bud, the whole panicle of bloom much 

 richer in color and effect than the commonly used 

 lungwort of Pennsylvania, Delaware, and Virginia. 

 But over the garden picture in late afternoon 

 come the long rays of a brilliant spring sun; then 



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