34 TOWN AND WINDOW GARDENING 



of school-gardens. The clever educationists of the 

 Fatherland have found out that book-w^ork, valuable as 

 it is and dear to the heart of a schoolmaster, is barren 

 and unproductive while divorced from the labour of the 

 hands. Garden-schools are established up and dovv^n the 

 country, v^ith courses of instruction ; elementary village- 

 schools are provided v^ith educational garden-ground, and 

 even tovv^n schools have their garden-plots. As usual, 

 these good and useful efforts are most successful where 

 personal practical influence is brought to bear on them. 



With regard to supplying the very poor of London and 

 other towns with plants for their little yards and gardens 

 and window-boxes, I have often thought how easily this 

 could be done if owners of large or even moderate-sized 

 gardens did not mind the little trouble of giving to them 

 of their abundance. We all know how hardy things come 

 up of themselves, and are thrown away as weeds by the 

 gardener unless we prevent it. Forget-me-nots among the 

 Cabbages, Violets under the Gooseberry bushes, Creeping- 

 Jenny, Foxgloves and Evening-Primroses wherever they 

 can find a footing. Why not at every change of season 

 send off hampers and baskets to those who would find 

 priceless treasure in our rubbish ? Better with them than 

 on the burn-heap. 



Londoners are surprisingly clever in cultivating flowers. 

 A poor woman in the City had a small plant given her, 

 and was not very sure what it was, but put it in a sunny 

 place on a parapet outside her garret window. It grew 

 six feet high, and turned out to be a Sunflower ! Even- 

 tually the best blossom was presented as a contribution 

 to the harvest decorations at a neighbouring church. 



Miss Jekyll, in Home and Garden^ tells the prettiest 

 story I know of plants given to the poor. A factory lad 

 in one of the great northern manufacturing towns had 

 advertised in a mechanical paper that he wanted a tiny 

 garden in a window-box ; he knew nothing— would 



