ALPINE FLOWER, ROCK, AND WALL GARDENS. 91 



natural rock is beautiful, as in the country round Tunbridge Wells, 

 Why anybody should bring the artificial rockmaker into a gar- 

 den or park where there is already fine natural 

 Misplaced beautiful rock it is not easy to see. Also, in certain 

 artificial rock, districts, it is a mistake to place this artificial rock 

 under conditions where rock of any kind does 

 not occur in nature. It would be much better, as far as alpine and 

 rock plants are concerned, to dispense with much of this ugly artificial 

 rockwork, and take advantage of the fact that many of these plants 

 grow perfectly well on raised borders and on fully exposed low banks. 

 Many vigorous alpine flowers will do perfectly well on level ground 

 in our cool climate, if they are not overrun by coarser plants. 

 Where there are natural rocks or good artificial 

 Alpine plants ones it is best to plant them properly ; but 

 grouped. people who are particular would often be better 



without artificial " rockwork " if they wished to 

 grow these plants in simpler ways. There is not the slightest 

 occasion to have what is called "rockwork" for these flowers. I 

 do not speak only of things like the beautiful Gentianella, which 

 for many years has been grown in our gardens, but of the Rock- 

 foils, the Stonecrops, and the true alpine plants in great numbers. 

 Then, for the sake of securing the benefits of the refreshing rains,. 

 it would often be best, in the south of England at least, to avoid 

 the dusty pockets hitherto built for rock flowers. 



The next point is the great superiority of natural grouping over 

 the botanical or labelled style of little single specimens of a great 

 number of plants. In a few yards of border, in the ordinary way r 

 there would be fifty or more kinds, but nothing pretty for those who 

 have ever seen the beautiful mountain gardens. Many rightly con- 

 tend that, in a sense, Nature includes all, and that therefore the 

 term "natural" may be misapplied, but it is a perfectly just one 

 when used in the sense of Nature's way of arranging flowers as 

 opposed to the lines, circles, and other set patterns so commonly 

 followed by man. Through bold and natural grouping we may get 

 fine colour without a trace of formality. But most gardeners find it 

 difficult to group in this natural way, because- so used to setting 

 things out in straight lines. A little attention to natural objects 

 will help us to get away from set patterns, and let things intermingle 

 here and there and run into each other to form groups such as we 

 may see among the rocks by alpine paths. After a little time the 

 plants themselves begin to help us, and an excellent way is, if a 

 number of plants are set out too formally as in most cases they 

 are to pull up a number here and there, replanting them on the 

 outer fringes of the groups or elsewhere. 



