f a plant is moved
quickly, it is advantageous, of course, to take it up with as much
earth as possible, if the roots remain undisturbed in their little
plat. Otherwise, earth is no better than any other protection; and in
sending plants by post, &c. (when soil weighs very heavily), it is
better to wash every bit of soil out of the roots, and then thoroughly
wrap them in moss, and outside that in hay or tow, or cotton wool.
Then, if the roots are comfortably spread in nice mould at the other
end of the journey, all should go well.

I reserve a sneaking credulity about "lucky-fingers." Or rather, I
should say, a belief that some people have a strange power (or tact)
in dealing with the vegetable world, as others have in controlling and
coaxing animals.

It is a vivid memory of my childhood that (amongst the box-edged
gardens of a family of eight), that of my eldest brother was almost
inconvenienced by the luck of his fingers. "Survival of the fittest"
(if hardiest does mean fittest!) kept the others within bounds; but
what he begged, borrowed, and stole, survived, all of it, conglomerate
around the "double velvet" rose, which formed the centrepiece. We
used to say that when the top layer was pared off, a buried crop came
up.

An old friend with lucky fingers visited my Little Garden this autumn.
He wanders all over the world, and has no garden of his own except
window-boxes in London, where he seems to grow what he pleases. He is
constantly doing kindnesses, and likes to do them his own way. He
christened a border (out of which I had not then turned the builders'
rubbish) Desolation Border, with more candor than compliment. He said
it wanted flowers, and he meant to sow some. I suggested that, sown at
that period of the summer, they would not flower this season. He said
they would. (They did.) None of my suggestions met with favor, so I
became gratefully passive, and watched the lucky fingers from a
distance, fluttering small papers, and making mystic deposits here and
there, through the length and breadth of the garden. I only begged him
to avoid my labels. The seeds he sowed ranged from three (rather old)
seeds of bottle gourd to a packet of mixed Virginian stock. They all
came up. He said, "I shall put them in where I think it is desirable,
and when they come up you'll see where they are." I did.

For some days after his departure, on other country visits, I received
plants by post. Not in tins, or boxes, but in