THE LURE OF THE GARDEN 
the finest. That youth is fortunate who can pour his 
perplexities into the ear of an older man or woman, and 
who knows a comradeship and an understanding ex¬ 
ceeding in beauty the facile friendships created by like 
interests and common pursuits; and fortunate too the 
girl who is able to impart the emotions and ideas 
aroused in her by her early meetings with the world 
and life to some one old in experience but comprehend- 
ingly young in heart. Both of them will remember 
those hours long after the garden gate has closed be¬ 
hind their friend forever; as long, indeed, as they re¬ 
member anything that went to the making of the best 
in them. 
Besides all these, with whom the garden is so wel¬ 
come as the fittest spot for converse, there is another 
type of gossip to whom the garden is preeminently 
suited, and that is the old. The old men and women 
love it; its sheltered sweetness renews their youth for 
them, and through its haze of green and gold the past 
shines luminously, warm and fair. There they sit, the 
two ancient cronies, rather toward the sunny end of the 
bench, recalling a life, or at least all those pretty acts 
and happy days that build up, in the memory, a 
glorified retrospect of life, in which the harsher lines 
and darker shadows have faded out. For the alchemy 
of time has the fortunate faculty of preserving what is 
radiant and happy rather than the reverse; so that the 
two old friends, preluding their remarks with, “ Do you 
i i 6 
