The daily phoenix. [volume] (Columbia, S.C.) 1865-1878, 1871-03-26
The Season OF Gardens.

The Season OF Gardens.
The time is ut hand for indulging in
one OF the best OF amusements, and the
most ipvigorating of exercises. People
of taste and feeling who have once
thoroughly enjoyed gardening, and who
possess facilities for still enjoying it, do
not need to be reminded of the season.
There are many, however, each year in
New York-and the number constantly
increases-who change their homes from
city to surrounding country, and to
whom few suggestions regarding the
most invigorating occupation they Sc
cure by the change, may not be super
huous. The pains and cost bestowed
upon the garden during the coming few
weeks will be richly compensated here
after. Lord Bacon holds, it is true,
that in the .'royal ordering of gardens
months of the year," but for unambi-
tious people the period just at hand is
the fttest, if not the sole one, for pre-
pairing them. For, despite the leaden
skies and sullen drip, of which we have
lately had so much, we are, as yester-
days weather denoted, on the verge of
"The sweet spring days,
And blue bells trembling by the forest ways,
ana scent OF nay new moWn.
The taste for ornamental gardening
has developed among US of late years
with great rapidity. What with the ac-
cumulation of wealth, the pressure of
population into the suburbs, and the ex-
ample of Central Park, (as it used to be-
growing up under the popular eye, o
love for this graceful and elevating nrt is
happily spreading among all classes of
f1o ind of -
practices gardening on large scale in the
neighborhood of great city. Bacon's
thirty acres of garden, for most of us, is
q mere Utopia. It is to be observed,
however, that with the growth of taste
in these matters, the grounds of other
people become, rs regards visible beauty
and harmony, practical additions to our
own. When the general eye for such
things is uncivilized or barbaric, each
individual is, in some degree, at the
mercy of his neighbors; and only the
very rich man can keep all neighbors so
far away as absolutely to control the
prospect Increasing refinement dis
penses with this necessity; and, accord
ingly, in our finest suburbs on the banks
of the Hudson, the slopes of Staten
Island, and the heights of Orange, there
is little to offend the eye among hun
dreds of closely mingled dwellings and
grounds.
Whoever can possess garden, though
it be upon the humblest scale, should
get it. Even 'bough pots out of win
dow" are better than nothing. The pas
sion for gardening, like others less inno-
cent, grows with indulgence. It is not
uncommon to hear people object that
gardening does not ''pay"--not often.
let US admit. from feminine lips. Of
course, the obvious reply is that the gar
den may almost invariably be proper
toned to the means of it's cultivator.
There is no finer ornament for the table
than flowers, and, as certainly, no dniu-
tier gift. The humblest meal is invested
with elegance by flowers, and the plain
est rooms may derive from their use an
air of refinement. But the highest uso
of garden is not to give the possessor
vegetables; or fruit, or flowers. These
can, in fact, be better and more cheaply
grown by the market gardeners. The
superior function is that of inculcating
patience and philosophy, together with
other virtues which the habit of CON-
muning with and depending upon nature
nourishes in the mind. When to this is
added the consideration of how much
health is bettered and nerves soothed by
the open air exercise of q garden,
enough has been said to outweigh com
mercial objections, even were they more
cogent than in most instances they are.
Ne,o York Times.
What a strange, desperate notion it is
of men, when they have erred, that