eds. What lovelier in early spring than a bed of daffodils close to the
house? Hyacinths and tulips, too, form a blaze of glory. These are
little or no bother, and start the spring aright. One may make of some
bulbs an exception to the rule of unbroken front lawn. Snowdrops and
crocuses planted through the lawn are beautiful. They do not disturb the
general effect, but just blend with the whole. One expert bulb gardener
says to take a basketful of bulbs in the fall, walk about your grounds,
and just drop bulbs out here and there. Wherever the bulbs drop, plant
them. Such small bulbs as those we plant in lawns should be in groups of
four to six. Daffodils may be thus planted, too. You all remember the
grape hyacinths that grow all through Katharine's side yard.

"The place for a flower garden is generally at the side or rear of the
house. The backyard garden is a lovely idea, is it not? Who wishes to
leave a beautiful looking front yard, turn the corner of a house, and
find a dump heap? Not I. The flower garden may be laid out formally in
neat little beds, or it may be more of a careless, hit-or-miss sort.
Both have their good points. Great masses of bloom are attractive.

"You should have in mind some notion of the blending of colour. Nature
appears not to consider this at all, and still gets wondrous effects.
This is because of the tremendous amount of her perfect background of
green, and the limitlessness of her space, while we are confined at the
best to relatively small areas. So we should endeavour not to blind
people's eyes with clashes of colours which do not at close range blend
well. In order to break up extremes of colours you can always use masses
of white flowers, or something like mignonette, which is in effect
green.

"The old-fashioned flowers are lovely--sweet William, phlox,
old-fashioned pinks, petunia, verbena, zinnia, marigold, mignonette, and
poppy are always dear and sweet. Hollyhocks are charming. They represent
a kind of guard for the garden. Stand this hollyhock phalanx up against
a wall like naughty boys, close to the house, or by an old fence. They
are so tall that they must be in the background. They grace it.
Otherwise they would overtop and shadow the other garden plants. If
there is an old ash pile, an old dump or anything else unsightly, plant
something tall before it. Hollyhocks would not do for this, since their
foliage is too scanty. Castor beans are just the thing, however; and
sunf