Beauty is Useful, too


In a book I'm currently  reading - by Victor Hugo  -  I was inspired by a
portion  where he was speaking about the small garden the Bishop had just
outside the kitchen door  -  he  writes: 

 ----  Madame Magloire (his housekeeper) once said to  the Monseigneur  with a
kind of gentle reproach " "Monseignuer, you are always anxious to make
everything useful,  but yet here is a plat (correct spelling) that is of no use.
It would be much better to have salads there than bouquets".     "Madame
Magloire," replied the bishop, "you are mistaken. The beautiful is as useful as
the useful."  He added after a moment's silence, "perhaps more so."    ----
(did he grow irises )?

Then the story continues ---  This plat, consisting of three or four beds,
occupied the bishop nearly as much as his books.  He usually passed an hour or
two there, trimming, weeding, and making holes here and there in the ground, and
planting seeds.   He was much averse to insects as a gardener would have wished.
He made no pretentions to botony, and knew nothing of groups or classifications;
he did not care in the least to decide between Tournefort and the natural
method; he took no part, either for the articles against cotyledons, or for
Jussieu against Linnaeus.  He did not study plants, he loved flowers.  He had
much respect for the learned, but still more for the ignorant; and, while he
fulfilled his duty in both these respects, he watered his beds every summer
evening with a tin watering-pot painted green.....

I thought I'd share this with you....


Larry D. (MA)
Internet:75227.1641@compuserve.com
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