PROBLEMS 181 



sumecl that all landscape work about inexpensive 

 houses will consist entirely of planting. 



Suppose a small house of six or seven rooms, 

 with a lot fifty or sixty feet wide and from one 

 hundred to two hundred feet deep, is to be land- 

 scaped. Often in the smaller cities the owners of 

 small houses keep hens, and there is frequently a 

 tiny stable or a garage at the back of the lot. So 

 far as the short-sighted owner can see, the idea is 

 entirely utilitarian, for he has allowed the immedi- 

 ate saving to Ms pocket-book from the poultry in- 

 come to usurp the place of the far more important 

 problem of keeping his possessions in such a sala- 

 ble condition that he can get the greatest cash 

 value for them at any time. 



Almost everybody recognizes that a fresh coat 

 of paint makes a house sell for much more than it 

 would have brought without the new paint, p^its 

 the cost of the painting. Too few realize that 

 planting may do more than the paint to increase 

 the value of a building, and at a much less cost. 



If there is any planting about such a house, it 

 is generally a straggly flower-garden because the 

 woman of the house loves flowers. She thinks of 

 them, however, not in connection with the i^lace it- 

 self, but only for their own intrinsic beauty. 



