136 THE OPENING DAY FOR ROSES 
ting him know that I am out of sympathy with his 
flaunting beauties. Besides, these ideas of mine 
about oriental poppies are, I am sure, not popular. 
Nearly all the places about here show them scat- 
tered among other hardy flowers. In “An Am- 
bitious Boy’s Garden,” they are spoken of as 
“Great Wonders.” 
With May, the dogwood blossoms of the wood- 
border passed away, the wild columbines ceased to 
bloom, and the cultivated ones of the garden no 
longer put out new flowers. The German irises 
faded from our sight, and their places have been 
supplied by the Japanese, which indeed are ex- 
quisite. One clump of these irises is now showing 
yellow blooms. 
Mignonette and nasturtiums are beginning to 
open in our garden. For both of them we have 
an especial fondness, since Joseph sowed the seeds 
out-of-doors in just the place where he wished them 
to come up, without having had first to plant them 
in the seed-bed. Of course, as these seedlings grew 
Joseph thinned them out, that they might not over- 
crowd each other. He spaced the mignonette 
about twelve inches by twelve, the dwarf nastur- 
tiums twelve inches by ten, and the climbing nas- 
turtiums that are lifting themselves up on the wall, 
about twelve inches by thirty. These plants are 
large and require more room in which to spread out 
than the other two. 
June has also opened for us the blossoms of the 
