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battle for supremacy. It is easy enough to live with
several charming little Speedwells, even the rather more
tenacious Wood Speedwell (specifically named 'montana'),
and one can afford to be tolerant of at least three species
of Willow Herb. One gentle pull and they give in without
protest, no doubt in their herbaceous minds aware that they
will be amply succeeded when spring comes round again.
Whenever I flatter myself that my grass is a lawn, it is
time for knees down, and armed with some pet implement
never seen in a tool shop, to tackle a few of the more
garrulous types. One early learns to compromise with
root of Dandelion - I take the upper half, they keep the
lower. Broad-leafed Plantain, of no great depth, hangs on
by means of its parachute of fine white separated hair
roots, uncommonly tough and resilient. Creeping Buttercup
is not dissimilar with an inverted bouquet of white string,
its 'repens' quality half forgotten until up to two feet
of adventitious progeny has been gently dragged back, like
a worm under grassblades, to the parental node.
When some ten Februarys ago, we were visited by the strongly
perfumed flowers of Winter Heliotrope, such an out-of-
season bonus was accepted with pleasure, somewhat tarnished
by June when the reckoning arrived as a scattered colony
of mostly solitary sunshades. I still fork deeply there
and strengthen my wrists on those pale thin ropes, some-
times dislodged unbroken from a cubit of soil, but just as
capable of snapping, to fling me on my back.
In high summer it is not unusual to find a few rigid stems
of Phlox pulled sideways towards a drooping arm of Rambler
Rose, the two urged towards an unwilling embrace sponsored
by coils of Convolvulus. One can (a) pull hard with
damaging results, (b) uncoil anti-clockwise if standing
with both feet in the Northern Hemispere, or (c) lie ventre-
a-terre with head thrust into the jungle at the back of the
flowerbed, where the stem of the clamberer may be encountered
as straight as any other around. It is slender and elastic,
promising no trouble at all. In reality the root system
is astonishing, and with a manifold thickening of the stem,
continues steeply down before shooting off at a tangent to