rising above a carpet of forget-me-nots. How very much more charming
different-coloured tulips are together than tulips in one colour by
itself! Last year, on the recommendation of sundry writers about
gardens, I tried beds of scarlet tulips and forget-me-nots. They were
pretty enough; but I wish those writers could see my beds of mixed
tulips. I never saw anything so sweetly, delicately gay. The only ones I
exclude are the rose-coloured ones; but scarlet, gold, delicate pink,
and white are all there, and the effect is infinitely enchanting. The
forget-me-nots grow taller as the tulips go off, and will presently
tenderly engulf them altogether, and so hide the shame of their decay in
their kindly little arms. They will be left there, clouds of gentle
blue, until the tulips are well withered, and then they will be taken
away to make room for the scarlet geraniums that are to occupy these two
beds in the summer and flare in the sun as much as they like. I love an
occasional mass of fiery colour, and these two will make the lilies look
even whiter and more breathless that are to stand sentinel round the
semicircle containing the precious tea roses.

The first two years I had this garden, I was determined to do exactly as
I chose in it, and to have no arrangements of plants that I had not
planned, and no plants but those I knew and loved; so, fearing that an
experienced gardener would profit by my ignorance, then about as
absolute as it could be, and thrust all his bedding nightmares upon me,
and fill the place with those dreadful salad arrangements so often seen
in the gardens of the indifferent rich, I would only have a meek man of
small pretensions, who would be easily persuaded that I knew as much as,
or more than, he did himself. I had three of these meek men one after
the other, and learned what I might long ago have discovered, that the
less a person knows, the more certain he is that he is right, and that
no weapons yet invented are of any use in a struggle with stupidity. The