wooing days of spring, or under the suns of the summer solstice, you
had been, either with hoe, rake, or miniature spade, of the least use
in the garden; but your suggestions have been invaluable, and,
whenever used, have been paid for. Your horticultural inquiries have
been of a nature to astonish the vegetable world, if it listened, and
were a constant inspiration to research. There was almost nothing
that you did not wish to know; and this, added to what I wished to
know, made a boundless field for discovery. What might have become
of the garden, if your advice had been followed, a good Providence
only knows; but I never worked there without a consciousness that you
might at any moment come down the walk, under the grape-arbor,
bestowing glances of approval, that were none the worse for not being
critical; exercising a sort of superintendence that elevated
gardening into a fine art; expressing a wonder that was as
complimentary to me as it was to Nature; bringing an atmosphere which
made the garden a region of romance, the soil of which was set apart
for fruits native to climes unseen. It was this bright presence that
filled the garden, as it did the summer, with light, and now leaves
upon it that tender play of color and bloom which is called among the
Alps the after-glow.

NOOK FARM, HARTFORD, October, 1870

C. D. W.





PRELIMINARY