THE 



GARDENER. 



APRIL 1871. 



.—A-^-S-^P^T-tL^ 



A PLEA FOR EVERGREEig" OR SHRUB GARDEHSTS. 



E EH APS there is no other department of gardening of 

 which so little has been said in the horticultural press 

 as that which embraces our hardy evergreens and flower- 

 ing shrubs, nor a department in which has been ex- 

 hibited less alteration — to say nothing of decided progress — in 

 the matter of planting or arrangement. And yet pleasure-ground 

 and garden scenery is greatly dependent for character and distinc- 

 tive features on the absence or presence of the fine assortment of 

 shrubs which have been collected into British gardens. The ever- 

 green or shrub garden, judging from the almost entire exclusion of 

 such terms from our garden vocabulary, and from the very few in- 

 stances where such a garden exists as would warrant such a designa- 

 tion, does not appear yet to hold that place in our gardens of w^hich, 

 after a little thought, it cannot fail to be considered worthy. To 

 do what may be considered justice to the merits and decorative capa- 

 bilities of shrubs is, to our mind, as yet a department of gardening 

 that affords ample scope for improved arrangement and effect. And 

 it is all the more worthy of the genius and attention of gardeners, 

 when it is considered how wonderfully almost every other matter 

 connected with gardens has been pushed forward to a point which, 

 to all appearance, is the extreme confine of improvement. In reply 

 to this it may justly be said, Go where you will, wherever a villa 

 or a mansion is reared, you will generally find a profusion of hardy 



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