LAYING OUT GARDENS. 65 



spared, and others have been since added, the terraced gardens at Wmdsor 

 Castle presenting no insigrificant example. 



156. The old gardens thus immolated to the rage of fashion were generally 

 laid out so as to correspond with the main lines of the building, and no doubt 

 architectural unity requires that this should always be the case, but it is not 

 always necessary to terrace effects that architectural decorations should be 

 introduced ; simple embankments of a noble character, blending most 

 happily with the sm-rounding landscape, may be produced by very simple 

 means. The engra\ing at page 48 represents a portion of the Papal 

 Gardens of the Belvedere behind the Vatican, which is elegant in its simplicity. 

 The geometric figures are produced by deep box edgings, and the symmetrical 

 effects given to the variety of elevation by the embankment, " are evidences, 

 says Mr. Humphreys, "of true feeling for the gardenesque in the designer." 

 The effects to be produced by deep box edgings have been revived with excel- 

 lent effect in laying out the Horticultural Society's Gardens at Kensington, 

 and the general effect of sloping banks and terraces without too much elabora- 

 tion may also be observed in the elegant structures in these gardens, which 

 are now rapidly approaching completion. 



157. Among the garden arrangements we have had occasion to consult, 

 we have met with few descriptions so perfect as the following, which we 

 abbreviate from the " Carthusian," a work which probably few of om- readers 

 have seen. *' My garden," says the writer, " is south of the house, the ground 

 gradually sloping for a short distance till it falls abruptly into the tangled 

 shrubberies. A broad terrace runs along the southern length of the 

 building, extending round the west side also, for I would catch the last 

 red light of the setting sun. Musk and Noisette roses and jasmine must 

 run up the mullions of the oriel window, and honeysuckle and clematis, 

 the white, pm-ple, and blue, climb roxmd the top. The upper terrace is 

 strictly architectural ; no plants are to be found there. I can endure no 

 plants in pots— they are like birds in a cage. The gourd alone throws out 

 its tendrils, and displays its green and golden fruit from the vases that sur- 

 mount the broad flight of stone steps that lead to the lower terrace ; while a 

 vase of larger dimensions and bolder sculpture at the western comer is backed 

 by the heads of a mass of crimson, rose, and straw-coloured hollyhocks, that 

 spring up from the bank below. The lower terrace is of the most velvety turf, 

 laid out in an elaborate pattern in the Italian style. Here are collected the 

 choicest flowers of the garden in masses,— the purple gentianella, the dazzling 

 scarlet of the verbena, the fulgent lobelia, the bright yellow and rich brown 

 of the calceolaria, here luxuriate in their trimly-cut parterres, and 



* Broider the ground 



"With rich inlay.' " 



158. It will probably occur to the reader, from this description, that costly 



works are necessary to garden decorations. Let us hear the practical 



Mr. Noel Humphreys on this subject:— ''I think," he says, "that even a 



simple turfed embankment, surmounted by a low cut hedge, formed of some 



p 



