. He knew very well that the old grass would begin to come
through again on such soil, and that it would make terribly hard
weeding. He was not going to have any such thing for his two "little
girls," as he called them. So he gave that little garden particular
attention. This is what he did.

After he had thrown out all the turf, he shovelled clean earth on to the
garden,--as much as three solid inches of it; not a bit of grass was in
that. Then it was ready for raking and fertilising, and for the lines.
The little footpaths were marked out by Father Brown's feet; Margery and
her mother laughed well at his actions, for it looked like some kind of
dance. Mr Brown had seen gardeners do it when he was a little boy, and
he did it very nicely: he walked along the sides of the square, with one
foot turned a little out, and the other straight, taking such tiny steps
that his feet touched each other all the time. This tramped out a path
just wide enough for a person to walk.

The wider path was marked with lines and raked.

Margery thought, of course, all the flowers would be put in as the
vegetables were; but she found that it was not so. For some, her father
poked little holes with his finger; for some, he made very shallow
trenches; and some very small seeds were scattered lightly over the top
of the ground.

Margery and her mother had taken so much pains in thinking out the
arrangement of the flowers, that perhaps you will like to hear just how
they designed that garden. At the back were the sweet peas, which would
grow tall, like a screen; on the two sides, for a kind of hedge, were
yellow sunflowers; and along the front edge were the gay nasturtiums.
Margery planned that, so that she could look into the garden from the
front, but have it shut away from the vegetable patch by the tall
flowers on the sides. The two front corners had canariensis in them.
Canariensis is a pretty creeper with golden blossoms, very dainty and
bright. And then, in little square patches all round the garden, were
planted London pride, blue bachelor's buttons, yellow marigolds, tall
larkspur, many-coloured asters, hollyhocks and stocks. All these lovely
flowers used to grow in our grandmothers' gardens, and if you don't know
what they look like, I hope you can find out next summer.

Between the flowers and the middle path went the seeds for that
wonderful salad garden; all the things Mrs Brown had named to Margery
were there. Margery had neve