What wondrous Life in this I lead

Andrew Marvell's Thoughts in a Garden are undoubtedly misogynistic (think what fun I can have without you, ducky!) but there's no doubt that both sexes can find gardening pretty sexy. And when he wrote:
Ripe Apples drop about my head;
The lustrous clusters of the vine
Upon my mouth do crush their wines;
The nectarines and curious peach
Into my hands themselves do reach -

he really did manage to capture the delight of fruiting time in the garden. Not that it's as effortless as that - the apples have to be picked up from where they lie if they drop - or plucked before they can drop - and it takes a lot of time to pick - not grapes, in my garden, but Japanese wine-berries. Of which more anon.



But it is wonderful to be surrounded by so much lavish deliciousness. We ate our Two Peaches this weekend; they grew on a small tree in a pot that I keep outside the kitchen window and have furnished a lovely view from the kitchen. They were exquisite, almost spicy and lush yellow, with a sweet juiciness the most delicious supermarket peach can't match. One of them was Huge, the other 'normal' size. I hope for more next year.



Though probably they'll never become as prolific as the quince, which started with one fruit, two the next year, four the year after that, then sixteen, then about forty - and so on till now it bears more than a hundred fruit and I am giving them away. They are clad in brown fuzz at present, later they will glow yellow among the autumn leaves.



Courgettes, of course, are arriving daily in this warm weather;



the autumn-fruiting (really late-summer fruiting) raspberries are beginning, and we already have apples; a Tydeman's Early Worcester that has been getting earlier every year. This is the first year they've arrived in July, though. They have the most wonderful perfumed flavour.



But the most glamorous apple in the garden is certainly the Sunset apple; already deceptively deep red, it looks as if it should be ripe, though it's the last we pick, in October.



I got two wineberry plants about eight years ago, having seen them in a potager open to the public, where the gardener broke the rules and let me taste. They have a flavour like no other berry, red stems which look marvellous all winter, and a turn for drama. The white flowers open, then once the bees have done their bit the outer case closes round the fruit, which stays in hiding till it's formed then 'ta-da!' they open their casing again and present the pale orange fruit to the world.


Later I re-read the memoir my father left behind and found that my grandfather actually grew them in his garden in the 1920s. My father said they had a flavour like no other fruit he'd ever tasted - they do - and 'set themselves freely'. They do - I have given a lot of plants away. I wish I could ring him up in the Beyond and tell him. If any spirits do the Internet and find this blog, please will you send its url to Frank Baker?