But I feel no doubt
whatever that the good lady who shall coddle this little garden at
some distant date after me will be quite as fond of her borders as I
am of mine; and I suspect that these will be about as like each other
as our respective best bonnets.
The annals of Fashion must always be full of funny stories. I know two
of the best amateur gardeners of the day; they are father and son. The
father, living _and gardening_ still (he sent me a specimen lily
lately by parcel post, and is beholden to no one for help, either with
packing or addressing, in his constant use of this new convenience),
is making good way between ninety and a hundred years of age. What we
call old-fashioned flowers were the pets of his youth. About the time
when ribbon-bordering "came in," he changed his residence, and, in the
garden where he had cultivated countless kinds of perennials, his son
reigned in his stead. The horticultural taste proved hereditary, but
in the younger man it took the impress of the fashion of his day.
Away went the "herbaceous stuff" on to rubbish heaps, and the borders
were soon gay with geraniums, and kaleidoscopic with calceolarias. But
"the whirligig of Time brings in his revenges," and, perhaps, a real
love for flowers could never, in the nature of things, have been
finally satisfied by the dozen or by the score; so it came to pass
that the garden is once more herbaceous, and far-famed as such.
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