Front Dooryards 
43 
eases, no running out, no funguses ; it doesn’t have 
to be covered in winter, and it will bloom in the 
shade. No old-time or modern garden is to me 
fully furnished without Peonies ; see how fair they 
are in this Salem garden. I would grow them in 
some corner of the garden for their splendid healthy 
foliage if they hadn’t a blossom. The P^eonia 
tenuifolia in particular has exquisite feathery foliage. 
The great Tree Peony, which came from China, 
grows eight feet or more in height, and is a triumph 
of the flower world ; but it was not known to the 
oldest front yards. Some of the Tree Peonies have 
finely displayed leafage of a curious and very grati- 
fying tint of green. Miss Jekyll, with her usual 
felicity, compares its blue cast with pinkish shad- 
ing to the vari-colored metal alloys of the Japanese 
bronze workers — a striking comparison. The 
single Peonies of recent years are of great beauty, 
and will soon be esteemed here as in China. 
Not the least of the Peony’s charms is its 
exceeding trimness and cleanliness. The plants 
always look like a well-dressed, well-shod, well- 
gloved girl of birth, breeding, and of equal good 
taste and good health ; a girl who can swim, and 
skate, and ride, and play golf Every inch has a 
well-set, neat, cared-for look which the shape and 
growth of the plant keeps from seeming artificial or 
finicky. See the white Peony on page 44 ; is it not 
a seemly, comely thing, as well as a beautiful one ? 
No flower can be set in our garden of more dis- 
tinct antiquity than the Peony ; the Greeks be- 
lieved it to be of divine origin. A green arbor 
