Evening star., 1928-04-02

Just when one had despaired Of find
ing a really good garden book, alonf
comes Spring in the Little Garden,
by Frances Edge McIlvaine.
This is the latest addition to the
Little Garden" series, under the genera
editorship of Mrs. Francis King, pub
lished by Little, Brown g. Co. in asso-
citation with the Atlantic Monthly Co.
Mrs. King says of this new volume
fortunate are we who now have book
on Spring gardening unlike any Other
here or abroad; quite unlike most Amer.
ican garden books thus far in its mellow
quality. born of long holding and use
and In It's gayety. born Of the philo'
sophie humor of Miss McIlvaine her
self"
The sympathetic reader who like
garden books. not so much for what h
are about his hobby, will heartily agree
with this dictum. Here Is a bool
breathed through with what might bt
called the quality of the impromptu.
This Is a good book, 1t would seem
not only because 1t Is well and pleas.
antly written, but also because 1t sug
geStS a great many things-from plant.
ing to drying clothes. The quality o1
the impromptu allows a writer to bring
In many topics which have only slight
point Of contact with the main subject
yet to do 1t with such charm and abil-
ity that these portions are welded into
the very fabric Of the book.
It was In somewhat this manner that
the late Joseph Conrad wrote his novels
Point after point, seemingly irrelevant
was brought in. finally to be gathered
together into one symmetrical larger
point so that the apparently impromptu
thoughts came to focus at last.
y y
The trouble about writing a book or
Spring gardening" is that the flower:
come as a sort OF anti-climax, since the
real work must be done the Autumn
before, or the Summer before, or ever
the Spring beforei
Miss McIlvaine solves this problem by
frankly heading her first chapter BE.
ginnings-the Spring. Summer and Au.
tumn Before" One does not have to &c
farther than the second paragraph tc
discover that she has the spirit of the
true gardener:
Gardeners can never mourn for long
Too much is in the future; one lives ir
expectation, and II the reality disap-
points or II Nature fails you, do 1t all
over again for next year, when the
weather may be kinder"
Too often writer's sit in Judgment on
readers: often enough readers sit in
judgment on writer's. In taking I'D a
new garden book, for instance, 8 out
OF 10 readers will unconsciouSly say to
themselves:
We'll, here Is another one! Does he
or she-really know anything about
gardening? do not know so much N.Y.
self. but think know a bit here and
there, and this writer will have to show
mel"
This showing does not come so much
from practical hints as through the
inner breath Of knowledge. The garden
writer who really loves and understands
the craft viii let 1t show forth In many
ways.
He will have q few earnest words tc
say about the desirability of keeping
bad boys and dogs out Of the garden
and the vast necessity for q fence or
wall Of some description. as the author
OF this book does when she writes:
Here we are reminded again Of that
country Of gardens-England- her
hedges that have made and guarded her
gardens. The remembrance Is all
summed up In the rhythmic paragraphs
OF Amy Lowell's ringing polyphonic
prose In her Hedges of England which
must be quoted. in the hope that 1t may
reverberate In the minds of our makers
Of little gardens and reveal why those
over there hold such charm:
Hedges of England. peppered with
sloes: hedges OF England. rows and rows
OF thorn and brier raging out from the
fire where London burns with its steam
ing lights, throwing q glare on the sky
o. nightsl Hedges Of England, road