INTRODUCTION 



xi 



is with them that future success lies, and by 

 teaching them to tend small gardens of their own, 

 and compete for prizes in tidiness and artistic 

 arrangement of flower plots, we shall continue a 

 love for the country in future generations. To 

 keep them away from the gloom, squalor, and 

 temptations of large towns is what we aU wish to 

 achieve. Well - tilled, wisely - worked farms, 

 orchards, gardens, bring us prosperity ; but we 

 gaia a love of Nature, too, from contact with 

 such things. This must soften people. It brings 

 us nearer God. 



" A garden is a lovesome thing, God wot ! 

 Eose plot. 

 Fringed pool, 

 Ferned grot — 

 The veriest school 

 Of peace ; and yet the fool 

 Contends that God is not — 

 Not God ! in gardens ! when the eve is cool ? 

 Nay, but I have a sign ; 

 'Tis very sure God walks in mine." * 



It is not alone amongst our village people that 

 we hope for steady development in the cultiva- 

 tion of our soil. They unconsciously assimilate 

 much from vfhat they see carried out in the vicarage 

 garden, the manor-house orchard, and the large 



* From " My Garden," one of the collected poems of T. E. Brown, 

 By kind permission of Messrs. Macmillan and Co. 



