"Mary, Mary, quite contrairy, How does your garden grow?"...

"Now is the winter of my discontent." I have not had charge of my garden very long; and I am not sure that I should have undertaken such a charge had there been anyone else to do it. But there was no one else, and it so obviously needed doing. Of course there was the gardener—I shall have to allude to him occasionally—but just now I will only mention the fact that his greatest admirer could not have accused him of taking care of the garden. Then there was his Reverence; he was by way of being in

"And then my heart with pleasure fills, And dances with the daffodils." Daffodils always make me glad. From the moment their strong, blue-green blades pierce the grass, they give one a feeling of strength, vigour, activity and determination to be up and doing, unmindful of wind or weather; in fact, using all for their own purpose, bending circumstances to their own development. And when the big golden bell bursts its sheath of pale green it does it with fine independence, and then swings on its

"Knee-deep in June." And knee-deep in work, too, for June will not give you anything for nothing if you are running a garden. I had my hands full, not only with the legitimate work of June, which is great, but May is sure to have left you in the lurch; this "getting forward" process so much preached by the Master is not seconded by May with at all a whole heart. "March ain't never nothin' new! Apriles altogether too Brash fer me, and May—I jes' 'Bominate its promises. Little hints o' sunshine an

"Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness." "Delicious autumn! My very soul is wedded to it, and if I were a bird I would fly about the earth seeking the successive autumns." So said George Eliot, and with all due reverence for her opinion, my soul would fly in the opposite direction, seeking the spring. If the autumn led straight on to spring I could love it more, but through its stillness I hear the winter blast; its gorgeous colouring scarce hides the baring boughs; day by day death lays a wit