Gardener

“ The winds rock it, the rains wash it, the breezes fan it, the dew kisses it, the sun smiles on it, the clouds give rest to it, the soil feeds it, neighbouring shrubs shelter it, its leaves protect it, the insects enrich it—and over all is the Great Gardener. ”

“ All this is not justified, either by experience or physiology. The gardener may plant, if he choose, the lily and the rose, the oak and the vine, within the same enclosure; let the same soil nourish them, the same air visit them, and the same sunshine warm and cheer them; still, he trains each of them with a separate art, warding from each its peculiar dangers, developing within each its peculiar powers, and teaching each to put forth to the utmost its divine and peculiar gifts of strength and beauty. ”

“ Our school of gardeners seem to have [Pg 62] found this out; for the task of the gardener has been rather that of translator than of creator; he has not had to labour at an artificial world he himself had made, but only to adorn, to interpret the world as it is, in all its blithe freedom. "The earth is the garden of Nature, and each fruitful country a Paradise;" and in England, "the world's best garden," man has only had to focus the view and frame it. Flowers, odours, dews, glistening waters, soft airs and sounds, noble trees, woodland solitudes, moonlight bowers, have been always with us. ”

“ A request for some plants came to me last autumn from the baggage-master of a railroad station some twenty miles from us, who, by the boxes of shrubs and plants that came to me, inferred that I might have some to spare. I learned that all this man’s spare time was spent in his little garden plot, so great was his love of flowers. I know, too, a village expressman (another whom nature intended for a gardener) , whose little plot of ground is always a mass of beauty. He has a surprising variety of plants, and every one is a fine specimen of its kind. ”

“ To the truly discerning, the truly nature-loving eye, the smallest scrap of plant-producing ground, the homeliest corner of earth—“long heath, brown furze, anything"—has potentialities of beauty and interest which even the best gardener rarely develops as they might, and ought to be developed. ”

“ The garden is taken in hand and cultivated, not by a mechanical ignorant gardener, but by someone who understands the capacities of the soil, and knows what will do well and repay his care. See the transformation in time to come! ”

“ A gardener must do likewise. Sometimes, when ground is not yet laid out, he must do more. He then has to think some years ahead and imagine what this bare piece of meadow will be when plants have grown in it. The lay of the land, the character [xiii] of the soil, the relation of the house with the garden—all have to be weighed before planting is commenced. Therefore, our gardeners must be artists as well as successful cultivators of plants. ”

“ Whether our neighbour be politician, soldier, architect, or painter, he will surely listen with interest to the mention of a garden. He will tell us of some newly-discovered plant, a flower show that he went to see, or he will expatiate upon the beauties of South African bulbs. We may be sure that if he himself is no gardener, he has someone dear to him who is a lover of flowers. ”

“ And when you pass by a garden wherein vegetable beds and plants, flowers and fragrant herbs are all combined so as to form a harmonious whole, this is an evidence that this plantation and this rose garden have been cultivated and arranged by the care of a perfect gardener, while when you see a garden in disorder, lacking arrangement and confused, this indicates that it has been deprived of the care of a skillful gardener, nay, rather, it is nothing but a mass of weeds. ”

“ A barrow, full of odds and ends, baskets, queer little bags of seeds, a heap of Groundsel gathered for a bird and lying there forgotten. Like a Dutch picture, half in gloom with bright lights on the shears, and along the edge of the scythe, and on the curved wire mesh made to guard young seedlings. Empty seed packets on the floor, bright coloured pictures of the flowers on the outsides, a little soiled by the earth and the gardener’s thumb.
Plant memories, indeed! A man may plant a host of them and never then recapture all his joys. ”

“ In this sort, on whatever scale, whether of the capitalist or of the cottager, the supreme feature is the lawn; the lawn-mower puts this feature within the reach of all, and pretty nearly every American householder has, such as it is, his bit of Eden.
But just in that happy moment the Tempter gets in. The garden's mistress or master is beguiled to believe that one may have a garden without the expense of a gardener and at the same time without any gardening knowledge. ”

“ The gardener, to understand his business well, and to be capable of undertaking the management of a gentleman’s garden and grounds, should not only be perfect in the ordinary business, and the regular routine of digging, cropping, and managing a kitchen garden, but should be also well versed in the nature of soils, manures, and composts, the best methods of propagating plants, shrubs, and trees, the management of the hot-house, green-house, conservatory, hot-beds ”

“ A dressed garden, I said, is Nature idealised—pastoral scenery put fancifully, in man's way. A gardener is a master of what the French writer calls "the charming art of touching up the truth."
Emerson observes that all the Arts have their origin in some enthusiasm; and the art of gardening has for its root, man's enthusiasm for the woodland world. ”

“ For this reason those who find pleasure, edification, and comfort in its subtle qualities should imitate the skilled gardener in his watchful and discriminating culture of flowers. A professional gardener is to horticulture what a critic should be to art. Each is supposed to bring trained faculties to his task, but the gardener, familiar with the principles that govern flower growth, studies the natures of his germs, and then adapts soil, temperature, etc., to the requirements of each. ”

“ Let the gardener dress for himself one field of fresh earth, and make it as uniform as he can; then let him plant therein all the varieties of the vegetable world, in their roots or in their seeds, as he shall think most proper; yet out of this common earth, under the droppings of common water from heaven, every one of these plants shall be nourished, and grow up in their proper forms ”

“ If you have more than you can keep tidy, the grown-ups will be sorry they let you have a [3] garden at all, and some day they will say that the gardener wants your bit of sunny border for his winter lettuces, and that you had better take yourself and your weeds and your mess away to that no-man’s-land in the shrubbery, where nothing much will grow, and where it is always sad and chilly. So we will imagine that your garden is twelve feet long and seven feet wide, and that the sun shines on it whenever it is fine. ”

“ The gardener takes to revisiting the gardens after nightfall. He is met in the shrubbery with an unaccountable spade in his hand and answers huskily. Why should a gardener carry a spade? Why should he answer huskily? ”

“ Each home gardener should study garden literature, in order to assist in solving the garden problems; for the day has passed when one needed only to scratch the soil with a shell, plant the seeds, and receive an abundant crop. ”

“ Our theme is such a garden as a householder may himself make and keep or for which, at most, he needs professional advice only in its first planning, and for its upkeep one gardener, with one occasional helper in pressing seasons or in constructional work. ”

“ After the seeds being workmanly bestowed in the beds, the gardener's next care must be that he diligently pull up and weed away all hurtful and unprofitable herbs annoying the garden plants coming up. ”

“ They certainly stimulate the production of magnificent fruit, of beautiful florist-flowers, and of handsome stove and greenhouse plants. But how do they affect the gardens in which these prize specimens are grown? It is mere matter of fact that, when [72] a gardener begins to think of exhibiting, he is very apt to pay undue attention to the plants which will secure him prizes and reputation. If his master is satisfied with the usual monotony of garden-beds, why should the gardener give special attention to what can be of no service to himself? ”

“ It is more important to have a deep, rich preparation of the soil, so that plants may not be dried out. A serious part of the gardener’s work during the average summer consists in judicious watering of the garden. ”

“ The owners have become aware that their gardens may be sources of the keenest pleasure. The gardener may be an excellent man, perfectly understanding the ordinary routine of garden work; he may have been many years in his place ”

“ THE GREY GARDEN.
THE BLUE GARDEN.
THE GREEN GARDEN.
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The strength of colour and degree of variation is so great that it is well worth going to a nursery to pick out all these gold-variegated plants. It is not enough to tell the gardener to get them. There should be fervour on the part of the garden's owner such as will take him on a gold-plant pilgrimage to all good nurseries within reach, or even to some rather out of reach. No good gardening comes of not taking pains. All good gardening is the reward of well-directed and strongly sustained effort. ”

“ I like the ring of stout challenge in the opening words, which command respect for the subject, and, if rightly construed, should make the heretic "landscape gardener,"—who dotes on meagre country-grass and gipsy scenery—pause in his denunciation of Art in a garden. "God almighty first planted a Garden; and indeed it is the purest of humane pleasures. It is the greatest refreshment to the Spirits of man, without which Buildings and Palaces are but gross Handyworks. ”

“ It is from the hammock that the amateur gardener will most enjoy the results of her labour. It is there she will find leisure to watch the growth of plants, to compare the effect of different varieties, to note where she may improve the vista by a different arrangement next year, to observe the effects of locality, 5of the afternoon and morning sun and all the peculiarities of plant growth that escape her when busy with trowel and watering-pot, so that the view from it should be first consideration. ”

“ The gardener studies his ground, and the possible products and available seed. He seeks to get rid of the weeds and briers and poisonous plants, in order that the desired products may grow to perfection. ”

“ Even plants of the same family will not do equally well in the same garden. Every practical gardener knows this in the case of strawberries and potatoes; he has to find out which kinds will do in his garden ”

“ As a rule the gardener only interprets and gives prominence to nature's intentions, fixing the beauties that vegetation would develop were the process of selection governed by artistic factors only, instead of being disturbed by unfavourable conditions of soil or surroundings. ”

“ The Lord of the land roots out the weeds, sows seeds, and plants herbs and fruit-trees. The gardener must then care for them and water them, that they may thrive and blossom, and that the Lord may find pleasure in his garden and come to visit it. ”

“ Rose gardens, sunk gardens, water gardens lead on to copses where all wild things of beauty are met together to entrance the eye. Broad walks between herbaceous borders, containing every flower loved from the time of Eve; sheltered patches where seedlings thrive, a nursery of carefully-reared young. And in this heaven of gardening land gardeners galore flit to and fro, ever doing their master's behest, and manure and water, and time and money may be considerations but are not anxieties. ”

“ We will tell you how to grow fourteen of the best, and when you have succeeded with those you can find hundreds more described in ‘The English Flower Garden’ and other well-known books. Your parents and grandparents can remember when all the beautiful herbaceous or perennial plants were hardly to be found in gardens, and everyone was content with the straight rows of red, blue, and yellow, the ignorant gardener will still inflict on you if you let him. In those days bulbs were planted in autumn and dug up in spring, to make way for Geraniums, Calceolarias, and Lobelias. ”

“ It has always been the aim of the professional and the amateur gardener to furnish the lawn and flower-beds with appropriate settings, some of which have{351} become very quaint in the eyes of twentieth-century horticulturists. ”

“ Oh, Adam was a gardener, and God who made him sees
That half a proper gardeners work is done upon his knees,
So when your work is finished, you can wash your hands and pray
For the Glory of the Garden that it may not pass away! ”

“ “I am his gardener. I take all His flowers and trees, and transplant them into the gardens of Paradise in an unknown land. How they flourish there, and what that garden resembles, I may not tell you.” ”

“ You should imitate those intelligent gardeners who pay a daily visit to their garden, pruning knife in hand, and cut off branches that might exhaust or overcharge the tree—not sparing them for the beauty of their foliage or the brightness of their flowers. ”

“ The flower-borders are so full and luxuriant that they completely hide the vegetable quarters within, for the garden is still a kitchen garden as to its main inner spaces. These masses of good flowers are the work of the Misses Freeling; they are ardent gardeners, sparing themselves no labour or trouble ”

“ Also there are many enthusiastic gardeners, both among those who grow their own flowers and those who cause them to be grown, who spare neither pains nor money until the flowers are gathered; then their grip relaxes, and the house arrangement of the fruit of their labour is left to chance. ”