Evening star., 1932-01-02
THIS AND THAT
BY CHARLES E. TRACEWELL.

to the theater would shy visibly at
the idea, even the mere thought, ol
paving Sc for a good evergreen. But
the theater party will be only memory
the next day, whereas the bush WALL nVe
OIL for years. At least one may nope
that it will. ),
The idea of the set, fixed expendi-
ture is good one. 1t means, III tne
first place, that one Is going 10 DC N
terested in something enough, ana 1or
long enough time, to be willing 10 pay
for it.
Sometimes it seems as If human be-
ings are only truly interested In Wnat
they have to pay for, one way or an
other. There are different sorts OF
payments of course. Money taken
as the consideration in many tnngS.
If you 90 up to the railroad tlcket
office, and declare your attenClon Oh
! travelling from one city to anotner, Cne
agent is all attention. If he discovers
| that you lack dollar Of being aole 10
pay for the ticket, however, he snortIy
| loses interest in you.
1t Is much the same everywhere: NO
matter how much one may lament tnls
state of affairs, from theoretlcaI,
some say visionary, standpoint, IL re-
mains the solid basis OF reckoning
Often many a dreamer would ne sur
prised at himself If he could realize
just how much his own interests are
bound up with price, and, even more
than price, full payment.
The home garden is getting put OF
rather meagerly, from year to year. be-
| fore one stops to realize it. Then, alas,
| the habit Is formed. It is a bad haolC.
1t makes parsimony particularly par
simonious. The cure may be sudden
New Year resolve, or Fourth Of July
resolve, or a Labor day resolve. The
time of the year makes no particular
difference. Nobody keeps New Year re-
solves, anyway; perhaps it would be
better for the homeowner to make one,
m this matter, whenever he pleases.
Where many homeoWner, VINO
means to treat his garden fairly, falls
down is in falling to purchase the big
gest and best shrubs. plants. evergreenS,
etc, he can find, within the limits OF
his budget Effect is what the average
perSon wants in a garden, and he had
better plant to get it, filling in later,
than try to achieve major effect all
at once with small plants and bushes.
More gapden plans go wrong from
this one thing than all other matters
whatsoever, once the gardener has
made his resolve to put the grounds on
fair, prcportionate budget. Nothing
will knock the horticultural ambition
out of a person SO completely as a dose
of little rose bushes, little evergreens,
little lilacs.
If any of our dear readers have pur-
chased little plants, and think that we
have seen them. and are hitting" at
them. they are very much mistaken.
We arc hitting at ourself!. We have
spent plenty on poor garden material,
and nobody can see any result, not even
ourself And as we look around, going
about Washington and suburbs, we see
we have plenty of company. Oh, a
great deal of it. All of us would be
better off to resolve highly to spend a
certain sum every year, if we can afford
it, and to get few Of the biggest and
best plants we can get. rather than
scatter our coins on host of little
plants which might do we'll several
years from now if We were expert
horticulturiStS We suspect that most
of us amateurs are not expert horticul-
turists In any sense We love flowers
and like to have them around us, that
is all. And it is enough 1t Is q great
deal. We need not apologize. All we
do Is admit that real horticulturists,
who make a business of 1t, can and do
grow better plants than we can. The
happy thing is that they will sell to us,
and are remarkably enthusiastic, we
suspect, about this budget business.