THE FLOEAL WOKLD AND GAEDEN GUIDE. 



and the design of the whole is perhaps a little fanciful, and would 

 puzzle both military and civil architects, though there is really 

 nothing at all extravagant in any of the details. The bastion was 

 constructed with the largest burrs that could be obtained. By the 

 term " burrs" is meant the great blocks of half vitrified brick which 

 are thrown out of the kiln as useless to the builder. The demand 

 for these has become so great that they are expensive articles, though 

 but a few years since the cost of carriage was about all that was of 

 necessity incurred in obtaining them. The walls of the bastion are 

 filled in with earth, and for the guidance of any reader who should 

 wish to adopt a similar contrivance, I will remark that such walls 

 should be at least three to four feet thick, so as to enclose a large 

 body of earth, for plants growing on such walls will occasion very 

 much trouble in watering, etc., to keep them alive during hot 

 weather if there is but a scanty body of soil in the walls. Of 

 course, in the process of building, openings were left, and numerous 

 irregularities were produced intentionally, so as to form receptacles, 

 basket-like recesses, and chinks and hollows for plants. In order 

 that the whole body of earth in the walls should be moistened by 

 rain, the summits of the walls were not covered in, but were planted 

 with various shrubs, succulents, and other plants of kinds suit- 

 able for such a position, the relative dispositions of the materials of 

 these walls may be understood by the aid of a printer's diagram : — 



in which the word " rock" stands in this case for a facing of btirrs. 

 A few " butts," as the gardeners here term the stumps of trees, 

 have been worked in with good effect, and one of the prettiest eff"ects 

 is produced by a tuft of that noble grass Mpmis arenarkis, planted 

 in a large butt on the left, near the summer-house. 



The banks on either side of the walls are raised from two to five 

 feet high, and the walks are planted with Sagina iwocumbens in the 

 bays and recesses, because gravel does not long preserve a sightly 

 appearance in such places, and the Sagina forms a green moss-like 

 growth. In a peaty or sandy .soil, mosses would grow freely in such 

 spots ; but in our heavy clay land, mosses have no beauty. All the 

 walks necessarily used are, of course, gravelled and well kept. 



The summer-house is as much benefited by the rockery as the 

 experimental ground. Fov as this retreat is chiefly used by myself all 

 the summer long as a sanctum for literary work, its separation from 

 the working department is a matter of great importance, and I 

 enjoy the immense advantage of writing in the garden, and being at 

 hand to direct the work, and also to see the subjects it may be my 

 business to describe. I might speak also of the service rendered by 

 the rockery in screening the bee-shed from the upper end of the 

 garden; the bees always sail high up over the arches and trees, and 



