Pot-pourri from a Surrey garden

I am now staying with a friend who has no stove, only one greenhouse ; and her flower-table, standing in the window, looks charming. At the back are two tall glass vases with Pampas grass in them, feathery and white, as we never can keep it in London ; a small Eucalyptus - tree in a pot, cut back in summer and well shaped ; a fine pot of Arums, just coming into flower ; a small fern in front, and a bunch of paper-white Narcissus. These last, I fear, must have been grown elsewhere, as they could not be so early here without heat and very careful growing-on. January %Qth. — I came from London, to pass two or three days in the country and look after my garden, as usual. I make lists and decide on the seeds for the year, and look to the mulching of certain plants. JANUARY 17 Hardly anything grows here to perfection when left alone. Most plants require either chalk, peat, leaf- mould or cow-manure, and half-tender things are now the better for covering up with matting or Bracken-fern. It is seldom of any use to come so early as this ; but there has been no cold this year, though one feels it must come. Oh ! such days and days of gloom and darkness ; but to-day the wind freshened from the north- east, and I could breathe once more. How delightful it is to be out of London again ! There is always plenty to do and to enjoy. How the birds sing, as if it were spring 1 I love the country in winter ; one expects nothing, and everything is a joy and a surprise. The Freesias are flowering well ; they improve each year as the bulbs get larger. Cyclamens are in the greenhouse, and a large, never-failing, old white Azalea, which forces faithfully and uncomplainingly every year, and from which we cut so many blooms. The first Aconite ! Does any flower in summer give the same pleasure ? The blue-green blades of the Daffodils and Jonquils are firmly and strongly pushing through the cold brown earth ; nothing in all the year gives such a sense of power and joy. One is grateful, too, for our Surrey soil and climate — to live where it never can rain too much, and where it never accords with Shelley's wonderful description of damp ; — And hour by hour, when the air was still, The vapours arose which have strength to kill. At morn they were seen, at noon they were felt, At night they were darkness no star could melt. These mild winters have a wonderful effect on plant life. The Solanum jasminoides looks as fresh as in November, and as if he meant to stand it out ; we shall see. In front of my window, on the ground floor, I have c 1 8 POT-POURRI FROM A SURREY GARDEN