134 GARDEN-CRAFT. 



preferences for any given style of garden, or with 

 a view to copying a design from another place, 

 will ignore the characteristics of the site at his 

 disposal. 



Equally unwise will he be to follow that school 

 of gardening that makes chaos before it sets about 

 to make order. Features that are based upon, or 

 that grow out of the natural formation of the ground, 

 will not only look better than the created features, 

 but be more to the credit of the gardener, if success- 

 ful, and will save expense. 



The ground throughout should be so handled 

 that every natural good point, every tree, mound, 

 declivity, stream, or quarry, or other chance feature, 

 shall be turned to good account, and its conse- 

 quence heightened, avoiding the error of giving 

 the thing mock importance, by planting, digging, 

 lowering declivities, raising prominences, planting 

 dark-foliaged trees to intensify the receding parts, 

 forming terraces on the slope, or adding other 

 architectural features as may be advisable to con- 

 nect the garden with the house which is its raison 

 d'etre, and the building with the landscape. 



What folly to throw down undulations in order 

 to produce a commonplace level, or to throw up 

 hills, or make rocks, lakes, and waterfalls should the 

 site happen to be level ! What folly to make a 

 standing piece of water imitate the curves of a 

 winding river that has no existence, to throw a 

 bridge over it near its termination, so as to close the 

 vista and suggest the continuation of the water 



