A good growth of Golden Glow. Steamer chairs and rockers are much in evidence here on summer nights 
A City House Roof in Summer 
By KATHERINE POPE 
O NE whose dwelling-place happens to be on the 
seventh floor of an apartment building, 
must acknowledge the sheer impossibility- 
no matter how earnest the desire to rank with the 
“best persons”—of eating and sleeping with the 
earth; but growing in the open air is by no man¬ 
ner of means impossible. 
The good gray poet tells us, 
“ Now I see the secret of tlie making of the best persons, 
It is to grow in the open air and to eat and sleep with the 
earth.” 
I do not speak from inexperience. I do not olfer 
idle theory. When the fortunes of life brought me 
from beautiful isles of the sea to dwell in a monstrous 
town, immediately I cast about for ways of making 
town tolerable, for substitute for that outdoor life in 
which I had revelled in the past. The easily dis¬ 
couraged might have thought the situation hopeless, 
transplanting from plantation house to city flat¬ 
building a shock from which one could not recover; 
but though hard at first, tremendously hard—so hun¬ 
gry was I for sea and mountain and waving cane 
fields—in a comparatively short time I found a new 
out-of-doors and a most satisfying one. From the 
roof of a city apartment building I found height 
and depth, broad outlook, colorful sky and water, 
fresh breeze and clean sunlight. 
The flat roof of a building offers a fine vantage 
point from which to look out upon summer, a pleas¬ 
ant place in which to spend summer hours; a sub¬ 
stitute for country not to be scorned or neglected. 
First of all there is the wide outlook; then it is an 
exhilaration to be so high up in the air; and from the 
roof-top—a building such as I speak of is of course in 
a residence district—one can see no little of Nature. 
To be sure one’s feet do not sink into velvety turf, 
there is no “fairy bridge of leaves” through which to 
glimpse the blue sky, looking about one is met by 
considerable reminder of town; but when I mount 
to my house-top seldom am I confronted with lack, 
finding so much to enjoy, to he grateful for. 
If there be not green grass underfoot there are 
plants and vines which I have raised and which 
respond delightfully to my care. Any of the nu¬ 
merous varieties of flowers and plants suitable for 
window box cultivation are useful for tbe roof gar¬ 
den. The larger the boxes the greater degree of 
success, as the earth dries out less quickly. Golden 
glow, asters, geraniums, sweet peas, etc., are some 
with which I had greatest success. There are white 
pebbles that give me reminder of beach and water¬ 
side; I get the whole view of the sky, from high- 
piled snowy clouds to dim horizon line where sky 
and hills meet; I look out on one side upon the 
broad flowing river with its many busy craft and 
anchored on its broad bosom at this time are grim 
battle ships of several nations. From a distance 
roofs and walls give less suggestion of “city desert” 
than of the greatness, yes, the greatness, that “ multi¬ 
tudinous scenes of life” may have; and the air 
is smokeless, clear, fine. Remember, we are far 
from factory and mart; the smoke of the passing 
trains does not climb up to us, the smoke billows 
below us, both black and snowy ones, only adding to 
the picturesqueness. 
57 
