GARDEN HOUSES, BRIDGES, ETC. 



259 



It is rare to see a garden seat that is not an eyesore. Few make 



them well and simply in wood, and there is always decay to be 



considered. Of our own woods Oak is the best. 



Garden seats. Stout heart of Oak laths screwed into a simple 

 iron frame without ornament make a good seat. 

 They are best without paint and in the natural colour of the Oak 

 wood. No seat is so good as one of good stone simply designed 

 and strongly made, and in our country one objection to stone 

 is met by the use of a mat or a light trellis of Bamboo or split 

 laths of Oak held together by cross pieces and placed on top of the 

 stone. In Italy and France one often sees good stone seats, and 

 there they are not expensive. Stone seats should always be set on 



Marble slab seat with lattice cover. 



stone supports bedded in concrete. A good Oak seat is one with 

 strong stone supports, the top being a slab of Oak laid with two bars 

 across its lower side to keep it in place. The top in this form 

 being so easily removed, may be stowed away for the winter, as 

 wooden seats should always be. Tree stems of some size and 

 little value may also be cut into the form of seats, and make 

 very good ones for a time, but they soon decay. The common 

 iron seats with cast patterns on them are ugly, but iron seats need 

 not be so, and some old iron seats quite simply made of lath or rod 

 iron were fairly good, and it is not difficult to cover the seat with 

 bamboo trellis-work or matting for the summer season. Some of the 

 French wooden seats are simple and good in form, and, painted a 

 nice carnation-leaf green, they look very well. Bamboos, which come 

 in such quantities now in the sugar ships, might be more used for 

 making pretty garden seats. Sometimes old tree stumps help to 

 make useful seats, and the bole of the tree, if cut, makes a very good 

 rustic seat. Where stone is plentiful, as in many hill and other parts, it 

 is often easy to make useful seats out of blocks of stone in rocky places. 



