44 A BOOK ABOUT THE GARDEN. 



charmed the eye with a perfect unity. " Scarlet and 

 goold, scarlet and goold, Tom Thumb and Eugosa 

 Calcy," had been old Mr. Woodhead's motto ; and of 

 those he " bedded out " many thousands, making his 

 garden so gorgeous that strange carriage-horses, 

 emerging from the sombre shrubberies through which 

 you approach the house, would actually shy at their 

 sudden splendour ; and the vivid brilliancy was so 

 painfully unrelieved and monotonous that it seemed 

 almost to burn one's eyes. 



Mr. Chiswick made a hundred other improvements, 

 which I have no time to tell. That damp shaded 

 corner, under the trees of the " Long Walk," where 

 nothing seemed to flourish but obnoxious fungi (they 

 may have been delicious esculents according to the 

 discoveries of modern mycology, but they had not an 

 appetizing aspect), is now, as you know, a fernery ; the 

 banks of the lake, which had always looked so drear 

 and reedy, are planted with rhododendrons, which 

 reflect their glories in the admiring waters when the 

 time of flowering comes, and are always beautiful in 

 their glossy sheen ; a few trees were felled, and from 

 all the front rooms you can see through the opening 

 our village church in the distance, most striking upon 

 a summer's eve, when its fine old western window 

 blazes and bickers in the setting sun: here is a 

 statue of " Contemplation " admirably posed, with 

 some dark yews, high and dense, for a background, 

 and giving you at once the idea of a place " where 

 ever-musing Melancholy dwells ; " there, passing 

 through an arched stone doorway, you find yourself 

 suddenly in Switzerland, where you may spend a day 



