Chapter XII 
J * 
POSSIBILITIES OF THE FUTURE 
A LTHOUGH we have, as yet, no gardens com- 
/ % parable to the best in England, Italy, or 
-Z 5L France, and though in the matter of small 
gardens we are also woefully behind the possibilities, 
yet we are steadily doing better. Bacon said that 
“ men come to build stately sooner than to garden 
finely, as if gardening were the greater perfection.” 
At the time he wrote, America was a wilderness* 
During the centuries following, she has built stately 
in more ways than one; now the time approaches 
when she should garden finely. Fortunately, signs 
are plentiful that she has begun so to do. 
The growing tendency to live in the country, and at 
least to spend longer and longer vacations there when 
city life for a part of the year seems imperative, has 
been frequently remarked upon during the past few 
years. The automobile is supposed to be partly ac¬ 
countable, making it easy for persons to spend a large 
portion of each day in town, and the rest on their 
country places; and rapid transit of one sort and an- 
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