FROM MONTH TO MONTH.

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume L, Issue 12387, 7 December 1909, Page 3

FROM MONTH TO MONTH.

NOVEMBER

(By A CORRESPONDENT.)

" Not wholly in the busy world, I Nor yet beyond it, j Blooms the garden that I love."

So sings the Poet Laureate in "The Gardener's Daughter" and he must have written it in May when the garden is at its best. Our so-called "Spring shows" are almost invariably held in these parts near the end of this month, experience showing it to be the time or the year when the greatest variety and wealth of bloom and foliage are found. It is, indeed, in the garden, "beautiful Spring laden with glory and light."

As 1 pointed out last month the Winter and early Spring months of this year have prepared all vegetation for more than usual growth and display. The Native trees shew this, especially the picturesque and conspicuous "cabbage tree" —which has been and is luxuriantly filled with blossom. This plant, really a lily, grows übiquitous, hardy, almost indestructible, through ' all the latitudes of these islands. Just as in London City it is asserted that one ■cannot get a vista anywhere in its numerous narrow and tortuous streets and openings without a tree of some kind being seen flourishing and in leaf in due season, so in NeAV Zealand it is hard to find the smallest j landscape or the tiniest garden without a cabbage tree. Ferns and Nikaus are \ equally beautiful, but they lack the character of the "Mountain Lily," which, like the Silvery Birch and the Mountain Ash in colder climes, stands out on the topmost crag, defying wind and careless of soil. In our gardens the most conspicuous of flowering things have been the Rhododendrums, unless I except ths Elderberry, which, where grown, have been equally fruitful. But the llhododendruins have been especially full and charming of bloom. I remember in the month of May being in Central Park (New York), and that a visitor to the park, evidently a New York man, with the kind affability of American citizens in their public attitude towards strangers, so in contrast to what you find in England, took me to sco the, for the time being, beauty spot of the place. Seated in a pretty summer house v.o were on the side of a large amphitheatre filled with Rhododeudrums, banked tier upon tier, like spectators round an arena. Very numerous were the white ones, many being large and magnificent. "We cannot insist," said a friend to me, "too much on having plenty of white in our gardens." Colour is apt to kill colour, and the neutral and I soft effect of abundance of white blosI som is fully appreciated when the cunning of ths gardener has provided plenty of them to set off the others. Ido not mention roses, they have been too much in evidence to need more than a passing record. To speak of them is like telling of the falls of Niagara or the Pyramids of Egypt. We should, however, incline more to pillar and climbing roses than we do. Our climate favours all herbaceous flowering plants, so much so that beautiful gardens can be made and kept tidy and lovely with little trouble where the expense of a gardener is of moment. Annuals, though very beautiful, and lending themselves to various and ever changing devices, are. subject to vicissitudes known to every amateur gardener. j The very quality of our soil and p.ven-

ness of our climate go against this kind of gardening, fascinating as it is. But as oven delicate herbaceous plants such as heliotrope and oleander will grow, at all events in this island, regardless for the most part of frost and storm, flowering shrubberies are a great success in any scheme of gardening. This month has been a characteristic one. I remember arriving in London on the 7th of May, some years ago, just when .trees and shrubs are coming into their beauty, and London in park s street and garden is at its brightest and greenest everywhere. For three weeks following my arrival there was no rain; the ground in the parks was visibly cracking in an incipient drought. So it lias been with us. For about three weeks consecutively, there has been dry weather, rather boisterous, but on the whole favourable to rapid and early development. The flowering of the May in the early part of the month was very fine. This indigenous English tree is loved by the rural people at Home. Herrick, the Devonshire poet, who wrote "Cherry Ripe," "Gather ye Rosebuds while you May" was passionately fond of flowers as his favourite lyrics show, could not ask a maid to do anything more dainty than to go a-maying: " So while time flies and we are but decaying, _ Come my Comma come! let s go a-maying!" Another sings: Now is the month of maying When merry lads are playing Fal a la la la I Each with his bonny lass A-tripping on the grass Fal a la la la!

To be Queen of the May was the darling wish of Tennyson's little maiden, happy in the thought of the merry spring time. Our climate is rather lax for the May, as it is, in greater degrees for the lardi, the rowan, and the silvery birch. But the hawthorn . sometimes, comes out, as it has done this year, in a way not to be excelled in any climate. Yet all too soon it expands its beauties to the sun', and in a few weeks the berries are formed, and hedgerow or standard, as the case may be', though ever beautiful in foliage, is robbed of its chief glory. Our seasons rather correspond to those of France, though wonderfully like the Old Country. This is the " Floreal" of the French calendar, to bo exact, to about the 21st of the month, and in general characteristics the garden follows here the French seasonal month. Note how, even before November is over there is a tendency to go off in much that makes the abundant flora of the month. In England while May is characteristic all through the month, going off early with us, the rose seems to take prominence in June. Oh my love is like the red, red rcss So sweetly blooms in June. In some sort of way we have roses all summer, the last rose of summer being quite an Autumn flower. But no poet here would invoke December for a rosebud, though many may be found in beauty right up to Xraas and later on in most seasons.

The wisteria gives the name to this month in Japan, where the people have a characteristic plant or flower for every month, the last month having the cherry, and next month being represented by the iris. I have not in my experience, seen any wisteria blossom this month here, though the climate of Japan ought to be almost identical with

ours. The islands of Japan, of Great I Britain, and of New Zealand, are singularly alike in area, seaboard, and, practically, latitude, so that there should be a very close approximation in the seasons of Japan and ours. Doubtless there is; though their classification of the months do not commend itself to nic like , that of France, nor the natural divisions ias known to the old Scandinavians, | which I remember seeing somewhere, and sseming to me very true to Nature. I will look them up, however, and use them to illustrate some future months.

This has been a backward and unfortunate season for agriculturists, many farmers having to give up cereal crops owing to the difficulty of getting a good seed bed: the proverbial peck of March dust not being on hand in September, which was wet. But a wealth of grass makes up for all deficiency there may be in cereals. I have already mentioned how all tree life has been abundant, owing to the very climatic conditions that the agriculturist Has had to fight with in quite an unusual^ way. The end of November sees Spring fairly off the scene and Summer ushered in in earnest. Sooner or later we shall enjoy fine summer days which should come in after bright starlight dewy nights, rather cold and searching; but followed by the sun ; a pleasant sea breeze tempering the sun's rays and calming itself down to a coft zephyr in the evening. There is nothing more delightful in the world than a typical New Zealand summer day. May we have many of them in the excellent months to come.