WHAT CAN BE DONE IN TEN YEARS 
AT MAKING A COUNTRY HOME-IV. 
By MARY C. ROBBINS 
(Continued from Volume IV., No. 6 of House and Garden') 
AN OLD-FASHIONED GARDEN 
F ROM the early days of New England 
settlements the garden was dear to the 
hearts of the women, and still in our neigh¬ 
borhood one can detect the site of a long- 
fallen house, by the flaunting tiger-lilies and 
other old-fashioned perennials which serve 
as its tombstone. 
When we went to “ Overlea ” there were 
still traces of what had once been a cherished 
garden plot. English violets and periwinkles 
were straying in confusion, ancient shrubs 
and hedges grew tall and neglected near the 
old well, tulips sprang up in the grass, daf¬ 
fodils and narcissus rioted under the dilap¬ 
idated old rose-bushes and lady’s-tresses, 
which from a once-neat border had grown 
into a tangled thicket. 
Deprived of the support of the old house, 
above whose third-storey window it once 
waved, a stout trumpet-creeper had devel¬ 
oped into a spreading bush, which still shel¬ 
ters myriads of lilies-of-the-valley in the 
spring. Buckthorns and lilacs had become 
trees ; rose-bushes bearing white, yellow or 
rosy strays of bloom were scattered in pro¬ 
fusion about what were once borders, or a 
garden-plot; and Sweet Williams, shrunken 
with age and neglect, sprang up from self- 
sown seeds on the sunny side of the box arbor. 
After our trees and shrubs were under way, 
it seemed well to utilize this storehouse of 
perennials, and to rescue the old roots from 
the choking grass which stifled them ; so 
a very simple garden was dug where old 
pear-trees needed fresh food and careful 
pruning, and the long box-edged beds, which 
border the walk to the well, are now filled 
with old-fashioned blossoms of some sort, 
from earliest spring until late autumn. 
The soil is rich and moist, so water-loving 
plants grow luxuriantly, and the many-colored 
irises, French, German and Japanese, find 
a congenial home. Comparatively little care 
is paid to this garden where things come up 
very much as they like. In spring and 
autumn the ground is enriched, and the 
superfluous growth given or thrown away, 
and every year enough goes into the dump- 
heap to plant an acre, since things spread 
inordinately in the moist soil. 
Though a perennial demands less than an 
annual garden, it does require a good deal 
of attention, for roots do better if divided, 
and moved to fresh places, and the tendency 
of vigorous plants is always to get into a 
desperate tangle in midsummer, and there 
is a provoking determination in colors 
to conflict, in spite of one’s most faithful 
efforts at harmony. 
A bed of cherry-colored phlox, for in¬ 
stance, far removed from any other color, 
planted in a corner near the terrace, sends up 
seedlings of all sorts of fine roseate hues 
which swear vigorously at the cherry tones 
we are determined to preserve in the mass; 
so that all through the summer uprooting has 
to go on, to the detriment of the symmetry 
of the beds, which show gaps like freshly 
pulled teeth for several weeks after the ex¬ 
traction of the offending members. 
The joy of an old garden of this kind is 
perennial, for it constantly affords the unex¬ 
pected, in addition to what is counted on. 
Seeds, brought by birds to its congenial 
shelter, germinate, and delight the eye with 
fresh specimens, and thus, though old favor¬ 
ites perish, new ones come to take their 
places. 1 cannot hold up my straggling gar¬ 
den as an example to any one. It has its mo¬ 
ments of beauty, and days when nothing 
but its picturesque tangle redeems it from 
disgrace, but it is a good experiment ground, 
and from what I have there learned I can 
deduce certain general principles which may 
be of use to others. 
In these days of a return to formal gar¬ 
dening as an architectural feature attached 
to a house, I would gladly put in a plea 
