42 
House & Garden 
COTTAGE GARDENS 
The Do or yard Garden Is One of the Few Remaining 
Expressions of Folk Art Which Show No Sign of Wa7ii7ig 
FRANCIS BRETT YOUNG 
A S I walked down the village street this evening, I saw an old 
acquaintance, Giles Hannaford by name, sowing sweet peas. 
Giles is more than seventy years old, and for the last few months 
I have been unable to induce him to hold rational converse on 
any subject other than the virtues of the pension which he has 
lately received. Consequently I should have passed him by if I 
had not noticed a bed of primroses fringing the path which ap¬ 
proaches his cottage door. The pallid buds are still uncrumpling 
in the hedgerows, but this was the first mass of bloom that I 
had seen. 
jNIoreover, it brought to my mind the picture of Hannaford’s 
garden in summer; the brilliant beds of ])hlox, the clematis and 
honeysuckle of the porch; and the fragrant treasures of his 
walks,—lavender, gilly-flower, and sweet William. 
That I should linger at his gate was an invitation to converse. 
Stooping still, he wished me “good evening.” Then he straightened 
his back with a sigh of content, and wiped his earthy hands upon 
the seat of his corduroys. 
‘Alarch have gone out like a lamb, sure ’nough,” said he. 
I assented. Then, out of an idle curiosity, I asked him why 
he planted his sweet peas. 
He scratched his head, “\^’ell, that be hard to say,” said he. 
“I reckon they’m purty, like; an’ sweet smellin’. An’ I like to 
see un grawin’ under my eyes, an’ to think as I’ve planted un. 
An’ I like to show un to folk.” 
A comprehensive answer, this; and one that gave me food for 
thought. 
Hannaford’s garden is only one of twenty which turn this 
village into an island of sweetness in summer, making the air 
murmurous with the music of their bees and enchanting the eye 
with their old-fashioned charm of color. 
T he cottage garden, so it seems to me, is one of the aptest 
expressions of popular art, and far more representative of 
the art of the people than the oleograph and the music hall song. 
Folk song and folk dance have vanished,—almost beyond the 
reach of those enthusiasts who would recall them; and still the 
primal artistic instinct of the people may be seen in every cottage 
garden of this flowery land. It is a far step from the scarlet 
blossom set in the dark hair of the Polynesian to Mr. Hannaford’s 
sweet peas. But the idea is the same. 
And see how easy Nature has made things for the cottage 
gardener. Her pigments are cheaper than those of the colorman. 
Her palette is richer and more intense. You may cull the deep 
bloom upon the foxglove’s bell and the primrose’s delicate pallor 
from every English hedgerow. There is another advantage. Na¬ 
ture is so deft in her gradations of color that the primitive artist— 
(as we will call the cottage gardener)—cannot offend the eye with 
harsh combination, bungle how he will. 
J F you will examine Mr. Hannaford’s answers to my question 
in detail, you will see that they contain the principles which 
underly the expression of art in any medium. “/ reckon they’m 
purty, like,” said he, “an’ I like to see un grawin’ beneath my 
eye” Hazlitt has said the same thing in his essay on the “Plea¬ 
sures of Painting,” and in such wise may every artist watch his 
cherished work shaping beneath his fingers. 
“I like to think as I have planted un, an’ to show un to folk.” 
So do we all. 
Indeed, the art of the cottage gardener is nearer akin to paint¬ 
ing than to any other. In both the artist is taking Nature into 
his confidence,' as it were, and working side by side with her be¬ 
neath the skies. But the gardener reaps the incalculable advan¬ 
tage of her fair caprices; soft dews will “hang a pearl in every 
cowslip’s ear”; wandering breezes will send a cool wave of color 
thrilling through his curtains of lilac; and the cups of his purple 
crocuses will expand, unveiling their golden centres to the splen¬ 
dor of the sun. 
Then it is Nature,—you will say,—who is the artist; and 
rightly. But popular art is more appreciative than creative. 
Surely it is a goodly thing that Giles Hannaford has brought 
these fair flowers out of the highways and hedges into the pre¬ 
cincts of his cottage, where all may see their beauty and inhale 
their sweetness. A simpler and a better thing than the exclusive 
spirit of the millionaire who preserves the canvases of Turner, 
Titian, or Rembrandt within four walls, for the select apprecia¬ 
tion of himself and his friends. 
Mr. Hannaford’s art is, like all popular art of the best kind, 
utilitarian. He admires the bright livery of the scarlet runner; 
and he likes a dish of beans. The clematis w'reaths the lintel of 
his cottage in its summer snow; and it shelters his threshold from 
the snows of winter. Every flower in his garden brings its hue 
and its perfume to the service of his house and those who fore¬ 
gather within it and about. 
There is something illuminative in IMr. Hannaford's history. 
For all his benevolent eyes and his gray hair (which I revere), he 
has been in his time an inveterate poacher. I know that the life 
of his sweet cottage is not free from conjugal dissensions. He is 
not above taking “a glass too much” at the Golden Lion of a 
Saturday night. His conversation, upon such occasions, is as 
foul and profane as that which you may expect to find in men of 
the station to which it hath pleased God to call him. He is, if 
you look at him with eyes unprejudiced, an ignorant and brutal 
old man. And in his heart you may find a love of flowers,— 
surely the most innocent love that a man’s heart may cherish, and 
an everlasting tribute to the inherent beauty of our human nature. 
