•vnnuBBERiES. 891 



garden depends much upon the state of the turf), it is now that the broom and 

 the roll must be kept in constant use. If the grass, from the nature of the 

 soil, is inclined to grow rank and coarse, it will be much improved by a good 

 dressing of sand all over it ; if, on the other hand, it has a tendency to scald 

 and burn up, it will receive great benefit from a sprinkling of good guano or 

 soot just before a shower of rain. Just before regular mowing commences, it 

 will be well to go over all grass, carefully removing rank and unsightly weeds, 

 daisies, dandelions, the little buttercup, &c. &c. Wherever the turf is 

 mossy, it is a very good plan to rake it well with a sharp five-toothed rake ; 

 but it must be borne in mind, that under-draining is the only effectual cure 

 for moss. Daisies should never be allowed to flower : a good daisy-rake, with 

 a little trouble, will remove all flowers as they come out ; but the only plan to 

 clear a lawn effectually of these disagreeable weeds is to tako ^i.hem out with 

 the daisy-forh wherever the}' are found. This clever little tool, which con^ 

 sists of a wooden shaft of any length, shod with a cleft iron prong, having a 

 half-round of iron at the back to act as a fulcrum, may be vised by any lady 

 or child : and in process of time the most hopeless pieces of grass may be 

 cleared by it. We have known turf, quite white with daisies in the spring,, 

 cleared entirely in the course of a season. The neat appearance of the garden 

 ■will well repay the time and trouble spent in the continual use of the daisy-fork. 

 We know a rectoiT' garden in the east of Norfolk, where there is a piece of 

 turf of about a quarter of an acre, which a year or two ago was one mass of 

 weeds and daisies, and which now is as fine and beautiful as any turf can be» 

 This change was entirely brought about by the children of the village-school, 

 who had each a yard or two nieasvired out to them on half-holidays, which 

 they cleared, some with daisy-forks, and others with two-pronged table-forks, 

 receiving some l.ttle present as their reward. A few showers of rain and a 

 heavy roll soon obliterated the holes they made ; and fine grass was not lono" 

 in filling up the spaces hitherto occupied by weeds. 



§ 5.— Shrubberies. 



IT44. In old gardens, it is no unfamiliar thing to find the lawn and borders; 

 skirted by long, vinbroken belts of shrubs, intermingled in pell-mell fashion, 

 the lower part of most of the deciduous shrubs lean and naked, long since 

 denuded of their smaller twigs. Confusion rather than order seems to have 

 been encouraged. Stems bare and naked at the roots show only straggling 

 wiry branches towards the summit. When the shrubbery has acquired all or 

 any of these characteristics, renovation, in whole or part, has become indis- 

 pensable. 



1 145. Shrubberies skirting winding paths, either as a screen to unsightly 

 objects or as shade and shelter from sun and wind, are perhaps the most 

 agreeable portions of a garden ; but in order to be so the shrubs must be culti- 

 vated with as much care as is the most choice individual plant of the parterre 



