March  29,  1900. 
JOURNAL  OF  HORTICULTURE  AND  COTTAGE  GARDENER. 
26:^ 
advantage  of  me.”  “  You  recollect  so-and-so  ?  ”  It  all  came  back 
like  a  flash.  “  And  where  are  you  gardener  now  ?  ”  “  Oh  !  I’ve  left 
gardening  for  good,  I’m  - ,  a  splendid  position.  The  gentleman 
who  put  me  on  my  feet  wants  some  plants,  and  hearing  you  were 
here  I  thought  you  would  give  me  some.”  He  was  wrong,  the  superb 
air  of  supercilious  arrogance  accompanying  the  beggar’s  petition 
would  have  frozen  any  channel  of  mercy,  and  the  man  of  mystery 
passed  out  of  our  garden  and  our  life  into  another  world,  between 
which  and  the  gardeners’  freemasonry  there  is  a  great  gulf  fixed. 
The  gardeners’  stock  exchange  is  a  prominent  feature  in  the  free¬ 
masonry  of  the  order.  The  biggest  beggars  on  earth,  they  have  been 
called.  It  seems  to  be  a  rule  of  the  fraternity  never  to  visit  any 
the  gardener’s  pocket  in  the  shape  of  carriage  by  post  or  train. 
Little  amendments  are  wanted  here — in  both  these  phases.  “  Your 
gardener  has  wonderfully  improved  the  place ;  quite  a  nice  little 
collection  of  hardy  plants.”  ”  Yes ;  those  are  G - ’s  forte.”  A  growl 
from  G -  after  the  above  few  words  from  his  master  revealed  the 
fact  that  not  a  thing  had  been  bought.  Love,  not  money,  was  forming 
the  collection;  and  if  ever  “  The  Master”  gave  the  matter  a  thought, 
it  probably  went  no  farther  than  Topsy’s  hypothesis  of  spontaneous 
generation,  “Specs”  they  “growed.” 
In  the  glamour  of  the  long  ago  lies  some  of  the  happiest  recollec¬ 
tions  of  visits  paid  and  received  in  the  little  kingdom  of  bothydom.  It 
was  the  writer’s  initiation  into  the  freemasonry  of  gardening — that 
Fig.  71.— ANGRiECUM  MODESTGM.  (Sec  page  261.). 
place  without  bringing  some  bit  of  the  vegetable  kingdom  back. 
Bits,  scraps,  cuttings,  eyes,  roots ;  the  business  done  is  enormous, 
the  profit  to  the  garden  incalculable,  although  the  giving  side  and 
the  taking  side  of  our  ledgers  remain  evenly  balanced.  Many  lovers 
of  their  gardens  know  this,  and  enter  fully  into  the  spirit  of  the 
thing  ;  but  others  there  are,  in  not  understanding  may  misunder¬ 
stand,  and,  consequently,  question  the  sterling  honesty  of  purpose 
which  rules  the  gardeners’  stock  exchange.  Simply  exchange ;  that 
“it  is  more  blessed  to  give  than  to  receive  ”  enters  not  into  the 
bargain,  for,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  pure  selfishness  prompts  the 
transaction ;  but  it  is  selfishness  in  which  self  is  lost  sight  of  in  the 
love  which  each  bears  for  his  own  little  domain.  Services  thus 
mutually  rendered  are  for  some  inexplicable  reason  often  secret 
services,  whilst  most  have  little  sacrifices  attached  drawn  direct  from 
good  camaraderie,  which  one  is  never  too  young  to  join  or  too  old  to 
enjoy.  Well  do  we  recollect  that  particularly  Good  Friday,  when  the 
lads  of -  Gardens  trooped  over  to  our  at  home.  After  a  look 
round,  during  which  our  visitors’  criticism  seemed  to  amount  to  every¬ 
thing  being  just  a  little  better  or  a  little  earlier  with  them,  although  we 
beat  them  by  points  in  exhibits  that  year,  we  all  adjourned  at  a  given 
signal  for  tea — high  tea,  of  course,  in  spite  of  the  fast  day.  “  Two  cups 
short  (a  common  trick  with  bothy  china)  here,  a  saucer  11  do  for 
you,  and  I’ll  put  a  cork  in  this  flower  pot  for  myself ;  and,  crowning 
triumph,  though  unheard  of  extravagance,  a  special  pot  of  marmalade, 
which,  to  our  disgust  as  hosts,  absolutely  refused  to  go  round  ere  the 
spoon  scraped  on  its  thick  deceptive  bottom.  More  discussion  upon 
the  merits  of  our  respective  places  and  masters,  the  minstrel  following 
after  with  such  tunes  as  the  punctured  bellows  of  W - ’s  concertina 
