The Secret Garden

Fiction | Novel | Middle Grade | Published in 1910

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Summary

Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Chapters 1-3

Chapters 4-6

Chapters 7-9

Chapters 10-12

Chapters 13-15

Chapters 16-18

Chapters 19-21

Chapters 22-24

Chapters 25-27

Character Analysis

Themes

Symbols & Motifs

Literary Devices

Important Quotes

Essay Topics

Chapters 4-6Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Chapter 4 Summary

Mary awakens the next morning to the sound of a young housemaid clearing the cinders out of the fireplace. The housemaid introduces herself as Martha Sowerby. She is there to tidy Mary’s room and wait on her a bit. Accustomed to being dressed like a doll, Mary is shocked to learn that Martha isn’t going to dress her. When Martha hears this, she forgets herself and replies in broad Yorkshire, “Canna’ tha’ dress thysen!” (16). This is only the second time Mary has heard the Yorkshire dialect, and she doesn’t understand it. Martha quickly translates: Can’t you get dressed by yourself? Indignant, Mary replies that she has never dressed herself because her Ayah always dressed her. Martha replies that it’s time Mary learned. While helping Mary dress herself, Martha chatters about her family. She has 11 younger siblings. Mary is particularly fascinated to hear about 12-year-old Dickon, who tames wild animals.

After breakfast, Martha sends Mary out to amuse herself in the gardens, telling Mary that one of the walled gardens is locked up. When Mary asks why, Martha explains that it was the late Mrs. Craven’s special garden, and when she died, the heartbroken Mr. Craven locked the door and buried the key. Mary wonders why, if Mr. Craven had loved his wife so much, he hates her garden.

Mary begins exploring the grounds but finds nothing growing. She sees a wall covered with ivy, and a robin is perched on a branch in a tree on the other side of the wall. He sees her and starts to sing. For the first time, Mary feels that someone is friendly to her. The author comments that even a disagreeable child can be lonely.

Mary decides the secret garden must be where the robin is. Searching for the door, she meets Ben Weatherstaff, a crusty old gardener. He’s not very friendly until she mentions the singing robin. Ben smiles and whistles, and the robin alights on the ground near his foot. Ben introduces Mary to the friendly little bird, explaining that the robin had been a lonely fledgling who became his friend. Mary says she has no friends and is lonely. Ben tells her that he and Mary are alike—neither of them is good-looking, and they both have the same sour disposition and nasty tempers. It makes Mary uncomfortable to think she is as unpleasant as Ben.

Mary asks Ben if he knows where she can find the door to the hidden garden, but he stiffens and tells her it’s not there anymore. He picks up his tools and walks away without saying goodbye.

Chapter 5 Summary

There is nothing for Mary to do indoors at the Manor, so she goes outside daily, wandering around the gardens. Sometimes she sees Ben, but he avoids her. Other times, she encounters the robin. One evening after supper, she asks Martha why Mr. Craven hates his wife’s garden. Martha doesn’t answer at first. Instead, she comments on the sound of the wind “wutherin’ round the house” (30). Mary figures out the word’s meaning by listening to the sound of the wind wrapping around the house and finds that it makes her feel safe and cozy indoors. When Mary asks again, Martha explains that Mr. Craven and his wife, Lilias, used to go into the garden, close the door, and stay there for hours. Lilias had a favorite tree with a low branch she liked to sit on, but one day, the branch broke, and she was hurt so badly that she died. Mr. Craven misses her so much that he cannot bear to go in there or allow anyone else to enter or talk about it.

Mary listens to the wuthering wind, and for the first time in her life, she feels sorry for someone other than herself. Thinking about Mr. Craven’s sorrow, she hears a child crying somewhere deep in the house.

Chapter 6 Summary

The next day, it rains too hard for Mary to go outside, so Martha entertains her by telling her about the Sowerby family. Hearing about Martha’s mother comforts Mary, while stories of Dickon fascinate her. According to Martha, Dickon doesn’t mind wet weather. He once found a half-drowned fox cub and raised it, and now it follows him everywhere. He has a crow he saved the same way. Mary says she would have something to play with if she had a crow or a fox cub. Martha asks Mary whether she can knit or sew, but Mary never learned. She can read, but she has no books. Martha remarks that it’s too bad Mrs. Medlock won’t let Mary go into the library, where there are many books. Mary decides to amuse herself by searching for the library.

Mary explores the house, finding only empty rooms. She hears crying on the third floor at quite a distance from her room. Following the sound, she runs into Mrs. Medlock, who is quite angry to see her out of her room. Mary explains that she heard crying, but Mrs. Medlock tells her she heard nothing.

Chapters 4-6 Analysis

Mary wonders why, if Mr. Craven loved his wife, he locked up her garden. The question shows Mary’s childlike understanding of other people and their feelings. The reader sees that Mr. Craven locked the garden because it reminds him of his wife, and he doesn’t know how to deal with the pain except to shut it away.

The broad Yorkshire dialect represents the earthy reality of the common Yorkshire folk, signifying life, nature, and magic to Mary. The dialect becomes a part of her new world, and she, Colin, and Dickon will use it like a secret language to set themselves apart from the rest of the world. “Wutherin’” is a Yorkshire word that plays into the motif of the Yorkshire dialect. Mary listens to the sound, which seems magical and comforting. The word also refers to one of the author’s favorite books, Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë, who lived in West Yorkshire.

Mary hears the sound of a crying child only after she understands another person’s pain. She will discover that the crying child is her cousin Colin, but the crying child also symbolizes Mary herself. Mary has never known that she felt grief for having never been loved, so the disembodied crying is the hurt she has held inside. The crying also represents the sorrow that permeates the whole house with the loss of Lilias. The house itself has become dark, sad, and lost without her.

Enclosure is another strong element in this section. When Lilias and Archibald enter the enclosed garden, they make a world that belongs only to them, like Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. The walls contain Lilias inside them, so she is the garden that contains and shelters Archibald. The wind represents another kind of enclosure. The wind wrapping around the enclosing walls of the manor house signifies to Mary that she is safe inside. For the first time, she belongs to a place that defines her by showing her the boundaries between herself and the outside. In this way, she becomes more aware of herself as a unique person.

Martha’s description of Dickon shows him to be a special person—one who is so much a part of nature that rain doesn’t make him uncomfortable, and animals follow him and keep him company. He nurtures and protects wild things, and Mary is something of a wild thing herself; she has no people to belong to. She has to be her own person and try to raise herself, and Dickon is someone who might be able to help her do that.

The second time Mary hears the crying, the sound plays into the theme of secrets. Everyone lies to Mary, telling her that she is not hearing what she knows she hears. They are all hiding something from her.