CHAPTER XXI. 



WATER GARDENS BY VARIOUS WATER GARDENERS. 



It is not only from the mountain's breast, dyed with Violet and 

 Gentian, the Sunflower-strewn prairie of the north, or the sunny fields 

 where Proserpine gathered flowers, that our garden flora comes. 

 River and stream are often fringed with handsome plants, and little 

 fleets of Water Lily — silvery fleets they look as one sees them from 

 the bank — sail on the lakelets far away in North America and Asia, 

 even where the water is solid ice in winter. One need not go so far 

 to see beautiful plants, as our own country rivers and back-waters of 

 rivers possess many. Our gardens are often made about towns 

 where there are few chances of seeing our native water plants, but by 

 the back-waters of rivers and by streams in many situations, and by 

 lakes like the Norfolk Broads one may often see as handsome 

 plants in these places, and also in the open marsh land, as in any 

 garden, and some that we do not often see happy in gardens, such 

 as the Frogbit, the Bladderwort, and Water Soldier. 



Where, as often is the case in artificially made ponds, the margin 

 of the water is not the rich deep soil that we have by the Broads and 

 by the sides of rivers, which themselves carry down deep beds of 

 rich soil, a good way is to put the mud which we take out of the 

 pond around its sides a little above and below the water line. This 

 will encourage a rich growth of such Reeds as are found beside 

 natural waters. Water with a hard, naked, beaten edge and little or 

 no vegetation is not good to look at, and a margin of rich living 

 plants is better for fish and game as well as for effect. The waterside 

 plants one may establish in that way are worth having and give good 

 cover for duck. 



Perhaps the most beautiful of all water gardens are the river and 

 stream gardens, as their form is so much better than anything we 

 can make and the vegetation is often good even without care. With 

 a little thought we can make it much more so, and in our river- 

 seamed land there are so many charming opportunities for water- 

 garden pictures. 



