FullReads

At this point the Weeding Woman became short of breath, and I managed to protest against taking so many plants of the hose-in-hose.

“Take un and welcome, my dear, take un and welcome,” replied Bessy’s Aunt. “I did say to Aunt to keep two or dree, but ‘One be aal I want,’ her says, ‘I’ll have so many agin in a few years, dividin’ of un in autumn,’ her says. ‘Thee’ve one foot in grave Aunt,’ says I, ‘it don’t altogether become ‘ee to forecast autumns,’ I says, ‘when next may be your latter end, ‘s like as not.’ ‘Niece,’ her says, ‘I be no ways presuming. His will be done,’ her says, ‘but if I’m spared I’ll rear un, an if I’m took, ’twill be where I sha’n’t want un. Zo let young lady have un,’ her says. And there a be!”

When I first saw the nice little plants, I did think of my own garden, but not for long. My next and final thought was–“Mary’s Meadow!”

Since I became Traveller’s Joy, I had chiefly been busy in the hedge-rows by the high-roads, and in waste places, like the old quarry, and very bare and trampled bits, where there seemed to be no flowers at all.

You cannot say that of Mary’s Meadow. Not to be a garden, it is one of the most flowery places I know. I did once begin a list of all that grows in it, but it was in one of Arthur’s old exercise books, which he had “thrown in,” in a bargain we had, and there were very few blank pages left. I had thought a couple of pages would be more than enough, so I began with rather full accounts of the flowers, but I used up the book long before I had written out one half of what blossoms in Mary’s Meadow.

Wild roses, and white bramble, and hawthorn, and dogwood, with its curious red flowers; and nuts, and maple, and privet, and all sorts of bushes in the hedge, far more than one would think; and ferns, and the stinking iris, which has such splendid berries, in the ditch–the ditch on the lower side where it is damp, and where I meant to sow forget-me-nots, like Alphonse Karr, for there are none there as it happens. On the other side, at the top of the field, it is dry, and blue succory grows, and grows out on the road beyond. The most beautiful blue possible, but so hard to pick. And there are Lent lilies, and lords and ladies, and ground ivy, which smells herby when you find it, trailing about and turning the color of Mother’s “aurora” wool in green winters; and sweet white violets, and blue dog violets, and primroses, of course, and two or three kinds of orchis, and all over the field cowslips, cowslips, cowslips–to please the nightingale.

And I wondered if the nightingale would find out the hose-in-hose, when I had planted six of them in the sunniest, cosiest corner of Mary’s Meadow.

For this was what I resolved to do, though I kept my resolve to myself, for which I was afterwards very glad. I did not tell the others because I thought that Arthur might want some of the plants for our Earthly Paradise, and I wanted to put them all in Mary’s Meadow. I said to myself, like Bessy’s great-aunt, that “if I was spared” I would go next year and divide the roots of the six, and bring some offsets to our gardens, but I would keep none back now. The nightingale should have them all.

We had been busy in our gardens, and in the roads and bye-lanes, and I had not been in Mary’s Meadow for a long time before the afternoon when I put my little trowel, and a bottle of water, and the six hose-in-hose into a basket, and was glad to get off quietly and alone to plant them. The highways and hedges were very dusty, but there it was very green. The nightingale had long been silent, I do not know where he was, but the rooks were not at all silent; they had been holding a parliament at the upper end of the field this morning, and were now all talking at once, and flapping about the tops of the big elms which were turning bright yellow, whilst down below a flight of starlings had taken their place, and sat in the prettiest circles; and groups of hedge-sparrows flew and mimicked them. And in the fields round about the sheep baaed, and the air, which was very sweet, was so quiet that these country noises were the only sounds to be heard, and they could be heard from very far away.