PAGE 14
In A London Garden
by
The reservoir being in its place and the basin constructed, the next step is to connect them. This is done by a compo pipe with a surreptitious tap in it.
And after that you fill the bath with the garden hose and turn the tap. As a rule nothing happens the first time, because there is air in the pipe; but you can put the garden syringe to the fine nozzle in which the compo pipe terminates, and draw out the air. My own fountain will play for six hours continuously; and then when no one is looking one must fill up the bath reservoir again.
It is really extraordinary how gardening turns decent, God-fearing men into braggarts. I have said that I did this myself. I did design it. I did direct the work, and to some extent assist in it; but can I fix compo pipes on to holes in baths, or fine nozzles on to compo pipes? Can I fit taps? Can I manipulate stone and concrete? Certainly not.
It is very useful to know a man who can do everything, especially when one gets ambitious in a London garden. The same man who did the plumbing work of the fountain also did the stone work. He built the palace–it were an affectation of modesty to call it a kennel–in which the Pekinese puppy lives when it is not eating the Iceland poppies. He painted the garden seats. He is an expert in the removal of the American blight. He has diagnosed that my wild cherry is bark-bound, and wishes me to let him cut a slit in it, but I dare not. He is wonderful and he is inexpensive.
The public fountain is always placed in an open space. There is a tendency even among quite decent private people to use the fountain as a lawn decoration. I like it better among trees myself; it is more classical. It recalls more lines of Horace. The fountain must never be allowed to play on a dull or cold day. And if you yourself are doing something strenuous in the garden, it is irksome to have the fountain playing while you are working. The fountain belongs to sunlight and repose, and the garden that is not a place of rest is no garden. The purr of the lawn-mower and the tinkle of falling water are the two most soporific sounds in existence. They should be used by the medical profession in the cure of insomnia. I do not know why, but people generally seem to be a little proud of insomnia. They like to tell you how many times in the night they heard the clock strike. One will do almost anything to be interesting, undeterred by failure in it. This, I suppose, it is which drives some to story-writing.
You may have chanced to hear the story of
THE LITTLE DEATH
There was once (but it must have happened a long time ago and in some very distant island) a race of people who never slept. Occasionally they became tired and lay down, but they never closed their eyes and never lost consciousness. They had never heard of sleep. They had never learned it. And in consequence they did a great deal of work, but they died very young. They were quite happy about it of course, because one never misses what one has never had. There may be something quite as sweet as sleep which we ourselves do not miss, only because we do not know about it.
One day a shipwrecked man was cast up on the shore. These were hospitable people, and they took him up to the King’s palace and entertained him. And when night came, after he had feasted and drunk, the King said: “And now what pleasure can we offer you? Would you like to hear music, or to see the dancing-girls, or to ride out in the moonlight?”