BANKS AND SLOPES IN GARDENS 



FEW people who have banks or steep slopes in 

 their gardens know what to do with them. They 

 cannot be turned into ordinary flower beds or borders, 

 because with their sharp drainage they do not afford 

 enough moisture to most plants in the summer; and, 

 if they are covered with grass, the grass is difficult 

 to mow. The usual plan is to plant them anyhow, 

 with shrubs such as laurels, snowberry, or Berberis 

 aquifolia, with a carpeting of ivy or the Rose of Sharon, 

 and having planted them thus to leave them alone. 

 Now, whatever may be said in favour of wild gar- 

 dening in places where the garden can hardly be dis- 

 tinguished from surrounding woodland or meadow, 

 there is nothing to be said for it where it is merely 

 the result of ignorance or indifference. Neglected 

 banks of this kind are constantly to be found in hill- 

 side gardens right in front of the house; and they 

 have scarcely more wild beauty than a disorderly 

 rubbish heap. In such places neglect and untidiness 

 are as discomforting as about the house itself. Yet 

 one often sees a house, neat and trim enough, with 

 all its neatness and trimness spoilt by one of these 

 unkempt wildernesses in front of it. Sometimes there 

 will be an ailing pine or fir tree here and there on the 

 bank, underneath which not even ivy will grow, and 



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