In a College Garden (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1917 edition. Excerpt: ...from, a square, hard foundation of rock, protected on the north side, which should in the future be an ideal site for forcing things under glass. The only difficulty was moving this mass of chalk, and we overcame it in this way. I was fortunate in obtaining the help of several lime-pit workers who, having been shown the size of ground they had to fill in, built up, with their usual skill, a wall of turfs to form the outskirts of it. By placing these layers of turfs, grass side downwards, a good solid retaining wall is made, for grass soon grows and moulds them into an immovable mass. When a portion of this wall had been built up, the next thing was to find a suitable light cart in which to convey the chalk, for although the distance between the two places was not great, there were several stiff littte mounds to drag it over, and a heavy farm cart was too unwieldy. By a happy inspiration, I remembered that the village sexton had a small tip-cart. He readily consented to bring it and his stout, red-haired pony to our help. They spent many days with us, and I wonder how often Sally crossed and recrossed the impeding mounds of earth, for she could not drag very much at a time, and so it was a case of little and often. At the end of each week, it was pleasant to think that work ceases at four on a Saturday and there would follow many hours of silent meditation, alternating with deliberate munching, which is a pony's way of enjoying Sabbath rest. When the ground had been given sufficient time to settle, some good soil, to the depth of several inches, was placed all over it, and in the early spring, grass seed was sown. As the hill-side garden here reminds us of Italy, we outlined the terrace with dark Irish yews, because the colour of their foliage is...