CHAPTER III 



A GARDEN OF WALL-FLOWERS 



I AM never tired of watching and observing how plants 

 will manage not only to exist but even to thrive in 

 difficult circumstances. For this sort of observation 

 my very poor sandy soil affords me only too many 

 opportunities. Now, on a rather cold afternoon in 

 April, I go to a sheltered part of the garden, and 

 almost at random place my seat opposite a sloping 

 bank thinly covered with Periwinkles. The bank is 

 the northern flank of a mound of sand, thinly surfaced 

 when it was made with some poor earth from a hedge- 

 bank that was being removed. This place was 

 purposely chosen for the Periwinkles, in order to 

 check their growth and restrain them from running 

 together into a tight mat of runners, as they do so 

 quickly if they are planted in better soil. This 

 poverty of soil and the summer dryness of their place 

 keeps them very much at home, and they make stout, 

 well-flowered tufts, with only a few weak runners. There 

 is something among them on the ground looking like 

 bright crimson flower-buds, about an inch long. I 

 look nearer and see that they are acorns, fallen last 

 autumn from a tree that overhangs this end of the 



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