As the fitful warmth of April yields to the steadier sunshine of May the apple blossoms come out to dot the valley slopes with spots of pink- 
tinged white 
Spring in the Garden 
THE PROCESSION OF PLEASANT TASKS WHICH FOLLOWS THE WARM DAYS OF 
EARLY SPRING—APRIL ACTIVITIES AND THE REAL JOY WHICH COMES WITH THEM 
by Walter Prichard Eaton 
Photographs by Ella M. Boult 
"j^T O daffodils “take the winds of March with beauty” 
-k ^ in our Berkshire gardens. What daffodils we 
have in that month of alternate slush and blizzard bloom 
in pots, indoors. But one sign of spring the gardens 
hold no less plain to read, even if some people may not 
regard it as so poetic—over across the late snow, close 
to the hotbed frames, a great pile of fresh stable manure 
is steaming like a miniature volcano. To the true 
gardener, that sight is thrilling, nay, lyric! I have al¬ 
ways found that the measure of a man’s (and more 
especially a woman’s) garden love was to be found in 
his (or her) attitude toward the manure pile. For that 
reason I put the manure pile in the first paragraph of 
my praise of gardens in the spring. 
I hat yellowish-brown, steaming volcano above the 
slushy snow of March promises so much! 
I will not offend sensitive garden owners 
who hire others to do their dirty work, 
by singing the joy of turning it over with 
a fork, once, twice, perhaps three times, 
till it is “working” evenly all through. 
\et there is such joy, accentuated on the 
second day by the fact that the thermometer has taken a 
sudden jump upwards, the snow is melting fast, 
and in the shrubs and evergreen hedge the song 
sparrows are singing, and the robins. Last year, 
I remember, I paused with the steaming pile half 
turned, first to roll up my sleeves and feel the 
warm sun on my arms — most delicious of early spring sensa¬ 
tions—and then to listen to the love call of a chickadee, over 
and over the three notes, one long and two short a whole tone 
lower. I answered him, he replied, and we played our little 
game for two or three minutes, till he came close and detected 
the fraud. Then a bluebird flashed through the orchard, a 
jay screamed, as I bent to my toil again. Beside me were the 
hotbed frames, the glasses newly 
washed, the winter bedding of 
leaves removed, and be¬ 
hind them last year’s 
contents rotted into 
rich loam. Another 
day or two, and they 
would be prepared 
for seeding — if I 
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