GARDEN-CRAFT. 



to emotions the natural objects have awakened in 

 man. The raison d'etre of a garden is man's feel- 

 ing the ensemble. 



One fine day you take your architect for a jaunt 

 along a country-lane, until stopping shyly in front of 

 a five-barred gate, over which is nailed an ominous 

 notice - board, you introduce him to your small 

 property, the site of your new house. It is a field 

 very much like the neighbouring fields — at least, so 

 think the moles, and the rooks, and the rabbits ; not 

 you, for here is to be your " seat " for life ; and 

 before you have done with it, the whole country far 

 and near will be taught to look as though it radiated 

 round the site and the house you will build upon 

 it — an honour of which, truth compels me to say, the 

 land betrays not the remotest presentiment just 

 now ! 



The field in question may be flat or undulating, 

 it may be the lap of a hillside, the edge of a moor, 

 a treeless stretch of furrowed land with traces of 

 " rude mechanical's " usage, or suggestions of mut- 

 ton or mangels. The particular character of the 

 place, or its precise agricultural past, matters not, 

 however ; suffice it to say that it is a bit of raw, and 

 more or less ungroomed, Nature. 



Upon this plain, unadorned field, you set your 

 man of imagination to work. He must absorb both 

 it and its whole surroundings into his brain, and 

 seize upon all its capabilities. He must produce 

 symmetry and balance where now are ragged out- 

 lines of hillocks and ridges. He must trim and 



