GARDENS IN LITERATURE 
frequently asked, and never, so far as I know, satisfac¬ 
torily answered. He commonly spends his seventy 
years, if so many are given him, in getting ready to 
enjoy himself. How many hours, how many minutes, 
does one get of that pure content which is happiness? 
I do not mean laziness, which is always discontent; but 
that serene enjoyment, in which all the natural senses 
have easy play, and the unnatural ones have a holiday. 
There is probably nothing which has so tranquilizing an 
effect, and leads into such content, as gardening. By 
gardening I do not mean that insane desire to raise veg¬ 
etables which some have, but the philosophical occupa¬ 
tion of contact with the earth, and companionship with 
gently growing things and patient processes; that exer¬ 
cise which soothes the spirit and developes the deltoid 
muscles. . . . In half an hour I can hoe myself right away 
from this world, as we commonly see it, into a large 
place . . . the mind broods like a hen on eggs... I 
begin to know what the joy of the grapevine is in run¬ 
ning up the trellis, which is like the joy of a squirrel in 
running up a tree . . . we all have something in our 
nature that requires contact with the earth.” 
A good deal of healthy philosophy was developed in 
that German garden planted by Elizabeth in a couple of 
volumes that bear a lot of visiting, rather a salty and vig¬ 
orous philosophy, but well soaked in fun. And there are 
countless other records of the wisdom found in the culti¬ 
vation or observation of growing things in ordered ways, 
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