The Birmingham age-herald., 1917-04-25
MEN, WOMEN
 AND THINGS
Yes. I'm a pot gardener.

Yes. I'm pot gardener.
 Some of my friends have been trying to josh me for admitting it. Why not? The man who has to keep the pot full these days is forced to hustle or his wife won't have anything to boil
 
 I'm glad it's the fad just now to grow something From President Wilson all down the official line comes the cry, Raise something"
 Here is the right spirit put in verse by azine.
 It's enough to make the Browning so- cieties start a riot to have such advice appear in a publication named after their patron literary saint.
 But why object? Did not a great bard sing q quote from memory; Imperial Caesar, dead and turned to
 clay,
 Might stop hole and keep the wind
 away"
 It's shame to make doggerel out of a classic, but I haven't time to look up the original It's the idea and not the words I want you to get This is utili- tartan age.
 But for Miss Pearce and her poem, ''The Practical Gardener"-for this is the variety I'm trying to encourage. The funny kind won't do In this crisis,
 Now here is a resolve that I hope many of our women will make Where once my flowers bloomed so sweet,
 This spring I'll raise good things to eat.
 
 It may be right hard to do if you are flower lover, but heed her advice and say to yourself: 'tIll scatter in my pansy bed The seeds for onions, white and red" Now, I know it's asking a good deal of my lady friends, but won't you please just shut your eyes while you say: And cabbages shall have the care That made my lilies seem so fair" It will take a plot of patriotism to ar rive at the point where you are willing to make the sacrifice, saying: For turnips must my tulips go, And string beans be induced to grow
 
 But now comes call to every heroine It requires genuine sacrifice to be able to smile and say: And where rich roses spread their buds, I'll cultivate square of spuds."
 But after giving you all these hard things to do, you'll find relief in getting rid of all your pent up emotions by say ing:
 "Then tall fence I'll build about To keep my hungry neighbors out" But what are you going to do with your neighbours chickens? Aye, there's the rub. Far be it from me to try to answer or even open this sore spot which has caused so many feuds.
 I'll just sidestep with the old joke; Brown looked over the fence and saw Jones burying one of his hens Say, there" cried Brown, what are you doing?" Planting my garden" sweetly replied Jones. NO, you are not" indig- nantly answered Brown, you are plant ing my hen; where are your seeds?'' "Oh." said Jones, 'the ones I bought are inside your hen" This was how the row started.
 Of course. you who read this column are Christians and keep your chickens penned up, but won't you please call your unsaved neighbours attention to the sin of letting chickens use their neighbours flower and vegetable gardens as their run.
 run?
 I thought I would dodge the question, my reputation in my hands and here with. with malace aforethought, reiterate the statement that I'm pot gardener and that I'm not going to make ceme- tery of my garden by interring poultry in it.
 Some wag has said that chickens are the best vegetables that grow. I believe this and if I find any growing in my garden, why, I, as a pot gardener, am going to pot~them.
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