BEAUTIFUL GARDENS 
IN AMERICA 
i 
THE GARDEN AND ITS MEANING 
A world without flowers ! What would it be ? Among 
those who know, such a question needs no answer — and 
we are not seeking a reply from the uninitiated who, for 
lack of understanding and sympathy, can but gaze at us 
with wondering pity, when our gardens cause us to over- 
look so much that to them means life. But is there any 
life more real than the life in the garden for those who 
actually take part in its creation and nurture it carefully 
week by week and year by year? If, owing to this ab- 
sorbing occupation, we fail to give a full share of our- 
selves to some of the social avocations of the busy world 
are we to be pitied for getting “back to the soil” to which 
we belong? Man was put by the Creator “in the Garden 
of Eden to dress it and to keep it,” and even after his 
forced departure therefrom he was bidden to “till the 
ground,” and the reward seems great to us who know the 
meaning of the signs and wonders continually being re- 
vealed in the garden world. 
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