4 THE FLORAL WORLD AND GARDEN GUIDE. 



mass of hollies and junipers. The hank should have either a con- 

 cave or a convex outline, hut there should be no ''ins and outs" 

 about it in so small a space, one good curve being quite sufficient. 

 Towards the adjoining borders it should slope into the general level 

 of the garden, but the level of the bank should not be uniform 

 throughout — one side should rise higher than the other. 



Now plant the wall behind it with ivy, Virginian creeper, white 

 jasmine, or any thick, shrubby, and dark climber. Eig tree, pyrus, 

 or clematis would be suitable, but a dark background will be most 

 effective. The surface of the bank may then be planted with showy 

 flowering plants of almost any kind, and the front rock-work with 

 a few good alpines, or some bright verbenas, heliotropes, hawkweeds, 

 yellow and white alyssum, and in one corner ivy, which should be 

 trailed over the stone into a rich knoll, so as to contrast with the 

 flowers beside it. The slopes adjoining the side borders should be 

 studded with crocus, snowdrop, narcissus, jonquil, crown imperial, 

 gladiolus, and other good bulbs, so that at all seasons they will glow 

 with colour, and be crowded with a gay pendant foliage. On a few 

 ledges in front of the bank a few ornamental grasses would look 

 well, while, as a matter of course, the several choice varieties of stone- 

 crop, houseleek, and such favourite alpines, will not be forgotten. 



From the house such a bank would be at all seasons beautiful. 

 Its elevation and the mingling of various-coloured foliage and 

 flowers in the dark rock-work, which every year would improve with 

 weather stains, would render it a pleasing background, and prevent 

 the eye from wandering beyond. Yet this would not be a rockery 

 strictly, but a raised bank, faced with stones and clinkers, and 

 devoted to miscellaneous showy plants, rather than to alpines. 

 Smile not, ye redoubtable critics who take large views of things : a 

 rockery of this humble sort, if well made and well kept, will make 

 a blessed break in the murky monotony and customary flatness of a 

 town garden. 



Now every ornamental pile or mound may be treated in a 

 manner similar to what I have just described for the bank at the 

 rear of a suburban garden. "Wherever you want a bit of rock-work 

 build it up with one kind of material only — no mixtures of colours, 

 no shells, no gingerbread of auy kind. Let the mass be sufficiently 

 bold, but subordinate to the general scheme of the garden, for it is 

 not in any case to form a special object of attraction, but is intended 

 only to diversify the colouring and character of the scene. Within 

 a considerable distance of your house it ought to be impossible for 

 you to say to a friend, " Come and see my rock-work," because it 

 should have no special importance at all. But in making it sub- 

 sidiary it may still be beautiful. In a dark bowery spot, where light 

 is wanted, it should be formed of white stones ; in an open space 

 where a dark mass would give relief, there use the refuse of the 

 brick-kiln or furnace slag, using large blocks only outside ; the 

 small stuff will do for the foundation. 



Where a few large blocks are used to adorn a terrace or a lawn, 

 they ought to be handsome specimens of some interesting stone, 

 such as two or three immense blocks of granite, or porphyry ; they 



