TYPES OF GARDENS 



obtained by opening up vistas from the shadowed places where the 

 branches are thick to the glades where the sunlight is free to play ; 

 and the illusion of wildness can be increased by planting in suitable 

 nooks and corners the woodland flowers which flourish in the half- 

 veiled light that gleams through the foliage overhead. In a wild 

 garden of this kind the scientific gardener who grows specimen 

 blooms for exhibition purposes will, no doubt, be exceedingly 

 unhappy ; and the man who has an affection for ribbon borders, 

 and for floral devices which wriggle and sprawl over vast expanses 

 of flat lawn, will feel the utmost contempt for nature's untidiness ; 

 but the lover of charming unconventionality will enjoy unreservedly 

 the persuasiveness of surroundings which remind him pleasantly of 

 those remoter spots in the world where human improvements have 

 not as yet exercised their disfiguring influence. 



And, after all, the lover of unconventionality has as much right to 

 be heard on the subject of garden-making as the man to whom the 

 seriousness of stately formality makes a strong appeal. It would be a 

 pity, indeed, if the art of gardening were ever to be hedged round by 

 rigid rules which sought to define exactly what should or should 

 not be the line it should take. Nothing could be more undesirable 

 than any attempt to fix immutably what is legitimate in gardening. 

 Everything is legitimate that can be defended as artistically correct 

 and that has the necessary quality of fitness ; nothing is illegitimate 

 unless it is contrary to good taste or opposed to nature's laws. The 

 range of possibilities is so wide, the chances of success are open in so 

 many directions, that to impose any but the most obviously necessary 

 limitations would be to contradict the whole genius of the art and to 

 destroy its vitality. 



Between the two extremes of fantastic topiary work which takes 

 hardly any account of nature at all and contorts natural growths into 

 entirely arbitrary forms, and the naturalistic gardening which simply 

 accepts a piece of purely wild scenery and accentuates its character- 

 istics, almost every type of design has a claim to be recognised. 

 Each one is right if it satisfies the essential condition of suitability to 

 its surroundings, and each one can be made to reflect fully the 

 personality of the designer. But, of course, it is necessary that the 

 designer should maintain always the capacity to receive .new 

 impressions, the power to observe and understand what he sees, and 

 the ability to select with shrewdness and discretion. Of all artists he 

 must be the most adaptable and the least inclined to substitute a 

 formula for independent thought ; directly he becomes stereotyped, 

 his claim to rank among the leading lights of his profession is gone, 



xv 



