Even in the one-house garden I should like to see
the climaxes plural to the extent of two; one immediately at the back of
the house, the other at the extreme rear of the ground. At the far end
of the lot I would have the final storm of passion and riot of
disclosure, and then close about the rear of the house there should be
the things of supreme richness, exquisiteness and rarity.
This soft-voiced echo answering back out of the inmost heart of the
whole demesne gives genuineness of sentiment to the entire scheme. To
plant a conflagration of color against the back fence and stop there
would be worse than melodramatic. It would be to close the play with a
bang, and even a worthy one-act play does not close with a bang. The
back of the lot is not the absolute end of the garden-play. Like the
stage-play, the garden-play brings its beholder back at the very last,
by a sweet reversion, to the point from which it started. The true
garden-lover gardens not mainly for the passer-by, but rather for
himself and the friends who come to see him. Even when he treads his
garden paths alone he is a pleased and welcome visitor to himself, and
shows his garden to himself as to a visitor. Hence there is always at
last a turning back to the house or to the front entrance, and _this_ is
the play's final lines, the last grouping of the players, the relief of
all tension and the descent of the curtain.
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