IRISH GARDENING 



125 



private gardens as almost secondary to that of 

 the great garden which every wayfarer may 

 enjoy. Our motor-car took 11s a journey of some 

 1,400 miles. Its way was over a vast green lawn, 

 planted with rich woods, and musical with the 

 murmur of a thousand streams ; by the shores of 

 enchanted lakes and summer seas ; over 

 mountains, where every glen and every summit 

 was a romance. Why should we set out for some 

 garden fifty miles away, I sometimes thought, 

 to see a flaming Embothrium, a well-grown Pinus 

 Montezumae; a rare " moraine," when, close at 

 hand, we could drive through such avenues of 

 glowing gorse, measure the magnificence of such 

 beeches and sycamores and silver iirs, or fall down 

 in worship before the violet veil with which 

 Pinguicula grandiflora decorates the grey crags 

 and the brown slopes of the south-western 

 mountains! But I have not been asked to sing 

 the praises of Ireland — I am only to put down 

 some of the impressions made by a few of the 

 famous gardens on one who is no expert, but has 

 this claim to write about gardens — that he loves 

 them. 



I had the good fortune to spend three weeks 

 of this spring, in the company of an eminent 

 botanist at Monserrat, near ("intra, where the 

 late Sir Francis Cook formed so remarkable a 

 collection of rare trees and shrubs : and on my 

 return I paid visits to such notable English 

 gardens as Abbotsbury.Warley Place, Leonardslee, 

 South Lodge, and Xymans. The interest of the 

 visit to Ireland lay. therefore, not so much in the 

 expectation of seeing new plants as in seeing to 

 what state of growth Ireland could bring those al- 

 ready known. Was it not Portugal over again when 

 I was walking among the giant Rhododendrons 

 of Muckross, under the Eucalyptus and through 

 the Bamboos and the Pieris of lovely Derreen. 

 among the Leptospermums, Eugenias, Melaleucas 

 (both lateritia and hypericifolia), Callistemons, 

 Aristotelias, Olearias. and Agonis of Ross- 

 dohan ? Monserrat had been scarier with 

 Tacsonia ignea. blue with Wigandia, white with 

 Exochorda, yellow with Edwardsia grandiflora : 

 but what of the scarlet of the Embothrium 

 coccineum at Fota and Kilmaccurragh and else- 

 where, of Crinodendron and Clianthus at Bantiy. 

 the blue of Ceanothus trees in many places, the 

 white of Drimys and Abutilon vitifolium ? and 

 did we not see flourishing trees of the Edwardsia 

 in full bloom in at least three gardens ? Could 

 we be still in Great Britain, we asked, when led 

 up to the avenue of Dracaena and Chama?rops at 

 Fota, or allowed to measure a leaf of Gunnera 

 manicata at Garnish, which proved to be nine 

 feet across ? 



It was satisfactory indeed to find that, after all, 

 there was no need to make comparisons between 

 the Portuguese, the English, and the Irish 

 gardens : for the latter not only show a truly 

 astonishing collection of rare and tender varieties, 

 but show them, for the most ])art, so finely grown, 

 that the visitor's perpetual delight and surprise 

 left no room for the institution of comparisons. 

 And further, it seemed idle to compare one Irish 

 garden with another, for each had its own special 

 beauty, its own supremacy in some direction. 

 Kilmai urragh and Fota stood out. it is true, by 

 reason of the splendid growth and the rarity of 

 their trees, but what could be more absorbing 

 than the variety of plants seen at Dr. Heard's, 

 at Lord Dunraven's, and Mr. Beamish's ? Beauty 

 of garden scenery, too, must be taken into 

 -account ; and has earth fairer spots than 



Muckross, Killarney House, or Derreen. As 

 an example of the arrangement of colour that 

 shall enhance the natural charm of a lovely 

 piece of ground, could anything be more successful 

 than Mr. Bence-.I ones' planning at Lisselan ? 

 Long shall we remember those banks of varied 

 Cytisus and Deutzia and Tritonia, &c. : those 

 thickets of Myrtles and Abutilon ; those tender 

 groupings of Phlox Laphami, and all sloping to the 

 sparkling river, edged with an unending glory of 

 Primula, Narcissus, Trollius and Iris. And at 

 Ashbourne, when our minds were almost weary 

 with the excitement of rarity, a triumph over 

 difficulty — Pinus canariensis in sturdy health, 

 and Pinus palustris. Beschorneria yuccoides in 

 full flower, Rubus flagelliformis, Actinidia 

 Kolomicta, Puya mexicana, Idesia polycarpa, 

 Corylus tibetica, and a hundred other treasures — 

 what could be more refreshing than the effect of 

 Mr. Beamish's cliff garden? Not that rarity 

 and difficulty were absent there, but the charm 

 of the beautiful pictures presented overcame any 

 technical consideration of the art which had 

 produced them. 



Having so greatly enjoyed such a wealth of 

 uncommon and tender specimens in these 

 wonderful gardens — splendid specimens of plants 

 which the gardens of Sussex, for instance, can 

 only show us as delicate babes — it may seem un- 

 grateful to say that I did notice with surprise 

 the absence of fine examples of certain things 

 which I had taken for granted I should see. 

 Clethra arborea, the beautiful Styrax obassia, 

 Exochorda Alberti. Euonymus fimbriatus, Fran- 

 ciscea, Corynocarpus laevigata, Griselinia lucida, 

 Erythrina crista-galli and corallina. . Just icia carnea. 

 Hibiscus, should not these be found flourishing 

 if due care be taken of them, in those favoured, 

 sheltered gardens Then the Magnolias : there 

 were fine specimens of magnificent M. GampbeUii 

 at Fota and Kilmacurragh, but not such trees of 

 M. conspicua, Soulangeana, Watsoni.hypoleuca, 

 as I had hoped to see. and M. fuscata did not 

 seem to be tried. Nor were there large plants of 

 sonic of 1 he Viburnums plicatum. macrocephalum 

 and Awafuki. The variety of Rhododendrons at 

 Kilmacurragh would be exceptional anywhere, 

 unless, perhaps, at Derreen: the gardens of the 

 south-west did not show very many of the finer 

 species, nor yet of the remarkable hybrids that 

 have been raised in recent years. 



My tour came profitably and pleasantly to an 

 end at an inland garden — beautiful Headfort — 

 whose daring owner, not content with the pos- 

 session of some of the finest old trees in Ireland, 

 has embarked on the planting of a collection of 

 Conifers and flowering shrubs which if they 

 succeed, as they should, will bring many pilgrims 

 to County Meath in the near future, so complete 

 and growing is it to be. Finally, there was a 

 brief, crowded, but glorious two hours at Glas- 

 nevin, where I should like to have spent several 

 weeks. But. indeed, the fragmentary nature of 

 these notes will have shown their readers that the 

 hours spent in these rare gardens were all too 

 short. Much must have been left unnoticed in 

 the hurried walk from wonder to wonder. 

 Writing these lines as I do in a beautiful garden 

 at Aix les Bains, before starting to see the Alpine 

 darlings of Dauphine and the Mont Cenis. I am 

 sorely conscious that I have done no sort of 

 justice to my theme, nor to my own intense 

 enjoyment of my Irish visit. I beg my kind 

 hosts and my readers to be indulgent — to for- 

 give. C. W. J 



