[Illustration:  A BED OF JAPAN PINKS.]

The surrounding fences were entirely concealed by lilacs and syringas, interspersed with gigantic bushes of the fragrant, brown-flowered strawberry shrub; the four gates, two toward the road, one to the barn-yard, and one entering the wood lane, were arched high and covered by vines of Wisteria, while similar arches seemed to bring certain beds together that would have looked scattered and meaningless without them.  In fact next to the presence of fragrant things, the artistic use of vines as draperies appealed to me most.

The border following the fence was divided, back of the house, by a vine-covered arbour, on the one side of which the medicinal herbs and simples were massed; on the other what might be classed as decorative or garden flowers, though some of the simples, such as tansy with its clusters of golden buttons, must be counted decorative.

The plants were never set in straight lines, but in irregular groups that blended comfortably together.  Mrs. Marchant was not feeling well, Mrs. Puffin said, and could not come out, greatly to my disappointment; but the latter was only too glad to do the honours, and the plant names slipped from her tongue with the ease of long familiarity.

This patch of low growth with small heads of purple flowers was broad-leaved English thyme; that next, summer savory, used in cooking, she said.  Then followed common sage and its scarlet-flowered cousin that we know as salvia; next came rue and rosemary, Ophelia’s flower of remembrance, with stiff leaves.  Little known or grown, or rather capricious and tender here, I take it, for I find plants of it offered for sale in only one catalogue.  Marigolds were here also, why I do not know, as I should think they belonged with the more showy flowers; then inconspicuous pennyroyal and several kinds of mints—­spearmint, peppermint, and some great plants of velvet-leaved catnip.

Borage I saw for the first time, also coriander of the aromatic seeds, and a companion of dill of vinegar fame; and strangely enough, in rotation of Bible quotation, cumin and rue came next.

Caraway and a feathery mass of fennel took me back to grandmother’s Virginia garden; balm and arnica, especially when I bruised a leaf of the latter between my fingers, recalled the bottle from which I soothe the Infant’s childish bumps, the odour of it being also strongly reminiscent of my own childhood.

Angelica spoke of the sweet candied stalks, but when we reached a spot of basil, Martin Cortright’s tongue was loosed and he began to recite from Keats; and all at once I seemed to see Isabella sitting among the shadows holding between her knees the flower-pot from which the strangely nourished plant of basil grew as she watered it with her tears.

A hedge of tall sunflowers, from whose seeds, Mrs. Puffin said, a soothing and nourishing cough syrup may be made, antedating cod-liver oil, replaced the lilacs on this side, and with them blended boneset and horehound; while in a springy spot back toward the barn-yard the long leaves of sweet flag or calamus introduced a different class of foliage.