184 OLD-FASHIONED GARDENING 



or lavender, there is a well defined line of descent. 



Earthworks are of course the most primitive form of 

 defense. Outside of these, the Spaniards at St. Au- 

 gustine planted "several rows of palmetto trees . . . 

 very close": their pointed leaves making "so many 

 chevaux de frieze" which were an impenetrable bar- 

 rier. This was not a garden inclosure, to be .sure, but 

 protected the entire town on the land side. Hedges 

 of cacti, grown much higher than a man's head, not in- 

 frequently inclose Spanish gardens, however, and afford 

 one of the most perfect defensive treatments that Na- 

 ture offers. The lower California Missions show them ; 

 but they are suitable only for broad spaces. The little 

 city of St. Augustine, with its narrow streets, could 

 spare room for nothing wider than straight garden 

 walls, made like the houses, of coquina that curious 

 soft white shell-and-coral "stone" of Florida. These, 

 as high as the first story of the dwellings, and plastered, 

 provided an exquisite background for the oleanders and 

 the roses and the jessamine which grew against them, 

 inside in the gardens. 



Gardens in Elizabeth's time in England were some- 

 times inclosed with walls of brick, sometimes with 

 palings of dead thorn or willow, and sometimes with 

 living or "quick" thorn plashings. This use of both 

 dead wood and of the quick, or living, gave the ancient 

 folkname to England's white thorn or haw "quick" 



