HOUSE AND GARDEN 
Apri 
L, 
I914 
guorous heart of each leaf and person, even the daily walk with 
the cow to hidden pastures grew too much for Francois. Then he 
would pretend to busy himself with some utterly useless occupa¬ 
tion. It made no difference whether I gave him some specific 
work to do, it was sure to be neglected in a short time. 
One hot day I was wearily 
drawing my feet through the 
powdered dust of the road, 
the sun shriveling every pic¬ 
ture in my imagination save 
the one of our piazza, where 
the combination of breeze, 
shade and rest awaited me. I 
climbed slowly up the steps, 
sank into a wicker chair and 
closed my eyes. “I wonder 
what Francois is up to,” was 
my last thought, as I dozed 
into a little “cat nap.” I was 
brought to consciousness 
again bv a faint, rasping 
sound, mingling with the 
droning of the bees. I opened 
mv eyes, looked over the ter¬ 
race, then leaped to my feet. 
Francois, with a little saw, 
was neatly lopping off all the 
lower branches of my last 
poplar tree, leaving the most 
absurd feather dusters in mid 
air. "Hah! mon Dieu que 
faites vor? attendee insta- 
tnent.” The astonished man 
saw me rush wildly into the 
house. I had good reason for 
this. My French being rather 
circuitous in its expression, I 
flew to my dictionary for 
forcible idioms with which to 
abase the blunderer. With trembling fingers, I turned the pages, 
and in a moment hurried out and hurled my tirade eloquent in its 
vehemence at the cowed Francois. Well, the harm was done, so 
I bravely tried to think of my trees as adding one of thise uncouth 
landscape effects which some people like Francois admire. When 
1 found him the next week sawing down a dead tree over which I 
was training a vine \ was threatened with permanent ill-temper. 
Francois was discharged. 
In answer to an advertisement, an army of incompetents be¬ 
sieged David's office, to his decided embarrassment and the amuse¬ 
ment of the other members of the office. After several changes, 
our Swiss returned, and the place flourished happily ever after. 
For “all-the-year” homes, evergreens are most essential, and 
should be planted when the place is new, as they are of slow 
growth. We intended many times to stay well into the winter, so 
I bought quite a number of hemlock. White Scotch and Austrian 
pines for winter to adorn with his white mantles. They ranged 
in height from four to five feet. A neighboring friend, whose 
chief occupation was reading novels and bemoaning her fate for 
having built in a place where there was “nothing to do,” spent 
half her days sitting on my porch good-naturedly jeering at my 
strenuous life. “How can you do it?” was her chief refrain. 
When I showed her my pine trees and told her I had bought them 
to blot out her house in winter, she laughed in her lazily, humorous 
way, saying: “You really don’t expect to be alive when they are 
big enough to do that, do you?” “I hope to be,” I answered, 
laughing; “my ancestors have all been long-lived. I expect these 
They will never come up,’ I said, when 
hocks but in two weeks they were 
shamelessly.” 
trees to be really big in eight years.” “Well, / simply couldn't 
bear to plant things unless they were full grown.” “Nonsense,” I 
tartly replied. “When you are still saving money enough to buy 
such trees and are sweltering in the sun, I shall be luxuriously 
lying in the shade of my evergreens.” I thought I did not disdain 
a humble beginning, but my mother was really 
the one to start at the root of things. On her 
return from a trip through Nova Scotia she 
brought home an Indian basket filled with 
seedling larches. She wrote, telling me of her 
new addition to her garden, and I wrote in re¬ 
ply a letter filled with that lofty tolerance 
which is so easy to assume when one considers 
another's foibles. A few seasons later, when 
I saw those larches, I was positively amazed to 
note their growth, to say nothing of their 
beauty. I admired them immensely, and lis¬ 
tened with interest to their history. “Do give 
me one, mother,” I begged. “Why,” she re¬ 
plied, “you can get any amount from a 
nursery, and at reasonable prices." I fingered 
the tender, green foliage. “But I don’t want 
just any larch : I want a larch all my own, from 
Nova Scotia.” My mother smiled, and more 
kindly than my previous scoffing warranted, 
merely replied: “That is just the point.” By 
this was it driven home to me that the bit of 
Nature dearest to our hearts is that over which 
we have labored and have association. This 
may be the reason why those who are, unfor¬ 
tunately, rich enough to buy nature so seldom 
feel that intangible delight that a humble 
flower can give. 
As the trees happened to arrive on a holi¬ 
day, 1 thought it would be a good chance to 
arouse David's enthusiasm by planting them 
I planted my holly- himself. The question was how to get him to 
elbowing each other , ,, • r , . , T r 1, •, 
do this of his own accord. 1 felt it was neces¬ 
sary to resort to a ruse. I sorrowfully gazed 
at my evergreens, and commented on the lack of labor on a holiday 
and the risk of loss by leaving the trees unplanted. 
I was very anxious to have my evergreens put in at once. David 
offered his services. We took very careful and expert measure¬ 
ments for the planting from the landscape plan, almost all of 
which we changed before we were through. When we had 
finished our measurements we realized with amazement how late 
it was. David began to dig, and I watched with amusement how 
each succeeding hole was decreased in size, quite like one’s appe¬ 
tite at a Thanksgiving dinner, as the courses progress. We knew 
less than nothing about planting, but we were in delightful 
ignorance that there was anything to know. We gailv crammed 
the roots into their 
little holes, threw 
earth in and patted 
around them with 
the spade. “No rea¬ 
son why they should 
not live,” comment¬ 
ed David. “I don't 
know,” I doubted- 
fully replied; “Do 
you suppose any¬ 
thing could be suc- 
cessf ul which is 
done SO easily. Our tiny brook winds slowly through masses of rosy 
“E a s i 1 v !” David, laurel 
