A GARDEN NOTE-BOOK 



who looks does not feel himself urged or driven; 

 yet is there a compelling force to equal that of 

 beauty ? 



This shrub-planting can be reproduced in little. 

 One of each of these things, with the possible ex- 

 ception of the hydrangea, where five or seven 

 shall be the least, would in ten years, arranged 

 loosely as I have suggested and given plenty of 

 room (a thing I never give to anything and am 

 always regretting too late !), will produce that 

 ravishing and reviving effect of white bloom that 

 I have endeavored to describe. If I were to re- 

 plant, I should leave out the lilac. It is interest- 

 ing enough, but would be better elsewhere, and 

 the coolness of white and green alone is unsur- 

 passable. The period of bloom in this border 

 covers at least a month, possibly more — from 

 May 20 to June 20 — in an average season and the 

 latitude of Boston. 



As I look about at the little we have accom- 

 plished in growing plants, shrubs, and trees in 

 sixteen years' work on two acres, some of it looks 

 so unutterably poor to me that I wish to cut down 

 and pull out much and begin again. There are 

 thin, ugly plantings, places where foliage sci-eens 

 should be yet none exist, bad masses of stuflF, 



92 



