NOTES ON THE ILLUSTRATIONS 



v Knowsley Park, near Prcscot (Plates LXV. to LXVIIL), is a place 

 of greater pretensions. It covers a good deal of space and has much 

 variety of treatment. The principal flower garden is designed for 

 bedding-out plants, and the whole group of beds in it is filled with 

 scarlet geraniums, an old-fashioned flower, but one which, used as it is 

 here, gives wonderful effects of gorgeous colour. It is certainly seen 

 to perfection at Knowsley. The lake and lily pond are examples of 

 the best kind of wild gardening, and there are in the grounds many 

 pretty walks and some well-placed rustic bridges. 



\/ The gardens at Lambton Castle (Plates LXIX., LXX., and LXXI.) 

 are finely designed and have been planted with excellent judgment. 

 In front of the Castle is a broad gravelled terrace, with a parapet wall, 

 from which there are fine views of the River Wear (on the banks of 

 which the building stands) and of the lovely country beyond. On 

 the eastern side is a succession of grass terraces leading down to a 

 formal flower garden about eighty yards long, which is laid out in 

 scroll patterns of different coloured flowers. On the western side 

 there is a pair of magnificent wrought-iron gates through which the 

 gardens are approached. In the surrounding woods are a number 

 of shady walks which lead up and down the slopes of the river 

 bank ; and in one part of the grounds is a pretty ravine crossed by a 

 suspension bridge. Lambton Castle is a modern building but it is in- 

 teresting architecturally and its surroundings give it ample dignity. 

 v Levens Hall, in Westmoreland (Plates LXXII. to LXXX.), is quite 

 the most famous of all the English houses for the remarkable character 

 of its gardens and for the large amount of fine topiary work that is to 

 be seen in them. They were laid out originally with much ingenuity 

 of design, and as they are kept in scrupulous order all the beauties of 

 this design and all its remarkable variety of detail can be fully enjoyed. 

 As an exercise in formal planning and clever space-filling the whole 

 place deserves the closest study ; and the way in which trimmed trees 

 have been used in the scheme of garden-making to increase the 

 picturesqueness of the general effect, and to give it the right note or 

 studied quaintness, is singularly fortunate. In the summer-time when 

 the beds are filled with a gay profusion of bright-coloured flowers, 

 which tell brilliantly against the dark foliage of the clipped yews, 

 the Levens Hall gardens are a wonderful sight and abound with 

 subjects for the painter. The Hall itself has many notable archi- 

 tectural features and its oak-panelled rooms are entirely delightful, 

 i/ Lord Londesborough's shooting-box, Londesborough Park (Plates 

 LXXXI. to LXXX VI.), provides a good illustration of the way in 

 which the configuration of the ground can be utilised to guide the 

 xxviii 



