76 TOWN AND WINDOW GARDENING 



when pasture-land meant more to us than it does now, 

 and the coming or withholding of the green blade spelled 

 life or death. " The king himself is served by the field." 



The restful charm of the grassy garden appeals to me so 

 much, that with a tree or two, the simplest of flowers, 

 and a rose-bush here and there, I could content myself with 

 nothing else, so I (for once) cannot see eye to eye with 

 Mrs. Earle when she says, " I am all for reducing lawns 

 and turf except for paths in small gardens ; " and elsewhere 

 we are advised to have red gravel or a bricked or tiled 

 square to sit on while we admire a wide border of flowers 

 all round the edge. I should not like such a garden as 

 this at all, and could never feel at home in it. Fancy no 

 kindly turf to throw one's self down upon in the noonday 

 heat, with a book in hand and a tree overhead, or if not 

 a tree, a parasol. If we had no lawn to be cut and trimmed, 

 where would be the sounds that most do " rout the 

 brood of care, the sigh of scythe in morning dew," or 

 the less poetical but still soothing monotone of the 

 mowing-machine ? And what a loss never to smell the 

 fresh scent of the new-cut blades of grass as they are 

 collected in box or barrow, and used to mulch the wilting 

 flowers ; nor to note the deliciously neat appearance of 

 the well-rolled, carefully swept grass-plot, looking so much 

 like a good child that has just been washed and dressed, 

 and repays so fully for the sweet trouble it has given. 



A writer on the subject of very diminutive gardens 

 has described one that belonged to a small suburban villa. 

 It captivated my fancy. Narrow was this tiny plot and 

 very old, but it was grassed all over, and at one end a 

 child's swing had been left standing, which was covered 

 with a thick growth of Ivy. How quaint and cool and 

 pleasant on a summer's day, and what a setting for a 

 touch of white or scarlet ! Any flower would look its best 

 in such a garden. 



Not long ago a contributor to Country Life wrote an 



