FORMATION OF GARDENS. 123 



but in this country the great radiation of heat from the earth, 

 during the heat of summer, would render low walls of little use. 

 On the other hand, high walls have always a gloomy efTect, and, 

 where it is necessary to have high walls round a garden, it is 

 better to relieve the monotony of the wall by making it of differ- 

 ent heights. 



Hot, or flued, walls are very common in European gardens, 

 and have been used upwards of a century; and, in our opinion, 

 where walls can be of any importance in this country, in the 

 practice of horticulture, it must be chiefly as fined walls. In 

 summer, the protection of a wall is not required to ripen the 

 common fruits, and in hot summers they are frequently injuri- 

 ous, by the attraction and radiation of heat during the midday 

 sun, by which the leaves are sometimes scorched. It must be 

 as protectors of peach and apricot blossoms in spring, and accel- 

 erating the ripening of grapes in autumn, in which they can be 

 most serviceable to the horticulturist ; and for these purposes hot 

 walls are of great benefit. [See Wall Heating, Part II., Sec. V.] 



Flued walls can be built as cheap, if not cheaper, than solid 

 ones, and are invariably built of brick; indeed, a considerable 

 saving of material is effected, as little more than half of the 

 bricks required to build a solid wall will build a hollow or flued 

 wall ; and, unless a flued wall be desired, it is better to dispense 

 with a wall altogether, for although a wooden paling will not ab- 

 sorb so much heat as a brick wall, as a structure for mechanical 

 shelter it is in every way equal to it, providing it be boarded 

 perfectly close, and sufficiently high. The comparative cheap- 

 ness of wooden fences, for gardens, must give them the prefer- 

 ence, and the comparative beauty of brick walls and wood 

 palings is a matter of taste which must be decided by the pro- 

 prietor. 



Walls, or close palings, must, in all cases, be faced with a 

 light trellis, made of laths or wire, to which the trees can be 

 trained. The injury resulting to trees nailed on walls, in oar 

 gardens, is owing to their touching the material of the wall. 

 The branches should be trained at least six or eight inches from 

 the surface, so as to admit a stratum of air between the wall 

 11^ 



