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Toys of Peace-Part22_H.H.Munro(Saki)(1870-1916)_English Literature(文学名著)-第2页

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the cats of the neighbourhood hold a parliament in the centre of the

tulip bed; that rather forlorn looking strip that we intended to be



a border of alternating geranium and spiraea has been utilised by

the cat-parliament as a division lobby. Snap divisions seem to have



been rather frequent of late, far more frequent than the geranium

blooms are likely to be. I shouldn't object so much to ordinary



cats, but I do complain of having a congress of vegetarian cats in

my garden; they must be vegetarians, my dear, because, whatever



ravages they may commit among the sweet pea seedlings, they never

seem to touch the sparrows; there are always just as many adult



sparrows in the garden on Saturday as there were on Monday, not to

mention newly-fledged additions. There seems to have been an



irreconcilable difference of opinion between sparrows and Providence

since the beginning of time as to whether a crocus looks best



standing upright with its roots in the earth or in a recumbent

posture with its stem neatly severed; the sparrows always have the



last word in the matter, at least in our garden they do. I fancy

that Providence must have originally intended to bring in an



amending Act, or whatever it's called, providing either for a less

destructive sparrow or a more indestructible crocus. The one



consoling point about our garden is that it's not visible from the

drawing-room or the smoking-room, so unless people are dinning or



lunching with us they can't spy out the nakedness of the land. That

is why I am so furious with Gwenda Pottingdon, who has practically



forced herself on me for lunch on Wednesday next; she heard me offer

the Paulcote girl lunch if she was up shopping on that day, and, of



course, she asked if she might come too. She is only coming to

gloat over my bedraggled and flowerless borders and to sing the



praises of her own detestably over-cultivated garden. I'm sick of

being told that it's the envy of the neighbourhood; it's like



everything else that belongs to her--her car, her dinner-parties,

even her headaches, they are all superlative; no one else ever had



anything like them. When her eldest child was confirmed it was such

a sensational event, according to her account of it, that one almost



expected questions to be asked about it in the House of Commons, and

now she's coming on purpose to stare at my few miserable pansies and



the gaps in my sweet-pea border, and to give me a glowing, full-

length description of the rare and sumptuous blooms in her rose-



garden."

"My dear Elinor," said the Baroness, "you would save yourself all



this heart-burning and a lot of gardener's bills, not to mention

sparrow anxieties, simply by paying an annualsubscription to the



O.O.S.A."

"Never heard of it," said Elinor; "what is it?"



"The Occasional-Oasis Supply Association," said the Baroness; "it

exists to meet cases exactly like yours, cases of backyards that are



of no practical use for gardening purposes, but are required to

blossom into decorative scenic backgrounds at stated intervals, when



a luncheon or dinner-party is contemplated. Supposing, for

instance, you have people coming to lunch at one-thirty; you just



ring up the Association at about ten o'clock the same morning, and

say 'lunch garden'. That is all the trouble you have to take. By



twelve forty-five your yard is carpeted with a strip of velvety

turf, with a hedge of lilac or red may, or whatever happens to be in



season, as a background, one or two cherry trees in blossom, and

clumps of heavily-flowered rhododendrons filling in the odd corners;



in the foreground you have a blaze of carnations or Shirley poppies,

or tiger lilies in full bloom. As soon as the lunch is over and



your guests have departed the garden departs also, and all the cats

in Christendom can sit in council in your yard without causing you a



moment's anxiety. If you have a bishop or an antiquary or something

of that sort coming to lunch you just mention the fact when you are



ordering the garden, and you get an old-world pleasaunce, with

clipped yew hedges and a sun-dial and hollyhocks, and perhaps a



mulberry tree, and borders of sweet-williams and Canterbury bells,

and an old-fashioned beehive or two tucked away in a corner. Those



are the ordinary lines of supply that the Oasis Association

undertakes, but by paying a few guineas a year extra you are



entitled to its emergency E.O.N. service."

"What on earth is an E.O.N. service?"



"It's just a conventional signal to indicate special cases like the




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