The Secret Garden

Mary Lennox is a troubled, sickly, and unloved 10-year-old girl born in India to selfish, wealthy British parents. She is primarily cared for by servants, who pacify her as much as possible to keep her out of her parents' way. She grows into a spoiled and selfish girl. Eventually, there is a cholera epidemic in India which kills Mary's parents and all the servants. Mary is discovered alive but alone in the empty house. She briefly lives with an English clergyman and his family and is then sent to Yorkshire, England, to live with Archibald Craven, an uncle she has never met, at his home called Misselthwaite Manor.

At first, Mary is her usual self, sour and rude, disliking her uncle's large house, the people within it, and, most of all, the vast stretch of moor, which seems scrubby and grey after the winter. She is told that she must stay confined to her two rooms and keep herself amused without much attention. Martha Sowerby, a good-natured maid, tells Mary a story of the late Mrs. Craven and how she would spend hours in a private walled garden growing roses. Mrs. Craven fell to her death when a tree branch gave way beneath her, and the devastated Mr. Craven locked the garden and buried the key. Mary is piqued by this story and her ill manner begins to soften. Soon, she comes to enjoy the company of Martha, Ben Weatherstaff the gardener, and a friendly robin redbreast whom she assigns a human personality. Her appetite increases and she grows stronger as she plays by herself on the moor. Martha's mother buys Mary a skipping rope to encourage this, and Mary takes to it immediately. Mary occupies her time wondering about both the secret garden and the cries she hears at night. The servants claim not to hear the cries.

As Mary is exploring the periphery of the gardens, her robin friend draws her attention to an area of turned-over soil. Mary finds the key to the locked garden, and eventually the door to the garden. She asks Martha for garden tools, which Martha sends with Dickon, her twelve-year-old brother. Mary and Dickon take a liking to each other, as Dickon has a kind way with animals and a good nature. Eager to absorb his gardening knowledge, Mary lets him in on the secret of the garden...

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