COTTAGE GARDENS 



plot we must often do without those lovely backgrounds 

 of tree and shrub and those lovely foregrounds of grass 

 or other dwarf herbage which are such helps in creating 

 great garden pictures. It is at a sonnet that we small 

 gardeners must aim and not at an epic or great narrative 

 poem. Yet I often feel that brevity is of the very 

 essence of fine poetry, and it is possible that limitation 

 of space may be contributory to the finest expression of 

 gardening. At all events, it affords a greater test of 

 one's skill and taste as a gardening craftsman, for, whereas, 

 in a big place, trees, shrubs and lawn almost create a 

 beautiful garden of themselves, in a little garden we 

 have to practise more selection and more rejection, and 

 to exercise greater judgment and care in arrangement, 

 since here every detail counts and every fault jars. 



The cottage gardener has usually to employ the 

 simplest flowers wherewith to express himself, but it 

 is probable that this limitation is helpful rather than a 

 source of increased difficulty. He may say, in the spirit 

 of Lewis Carroll : — 



I never loved a dear gazelle, 



Nor anything that cost me much : 



High prices profit those that sell, 

 But why should I be fond of such? 



And these old common plants thrive as well and flower 

 as beautifully in the garden of the shepherd as in the 

 grounds of Windsor Castle. The wind blows from the 

 same quarter, the rain falls equally, and the frost is as 

 severe in the one as in the other. 



I like each garden to contain some one feature of 

 special and unique interest — some well-grown plant 

 which is not much cultivated in the neighbourhood, 

 or some brilliant floral pageant peculiar to the particular 

 garden. Thus, one garden which I know is always 

 associated in my mind with a little thicket, about ten 

 feet in height, of the White-stemmed Bramble (Rubus 



