G2 A BOOK ABOUT THE GARDEN. 



looking comfortable and happy, as though they 

 thanked him for his trouble; and, indeed, to look 

 upon that smiling pleasaunce is a " refreshment to 

 the spirit of man." It is laid out much as gardens 

 were a quarter of a century ago. Large beds, round 

 or oval principally, with flowering trees in the centre, 

 the lilac, the acacia, the laburnum, the almond, and 

 their kind; next these the glossy evergreen, the 

 arbutus, the aucuba, the box, the berberis, the juniper, 

 holly, and yew ; and outwardly the border for flowers. 

 " And gravel walks there for meditation " meander 

 about these beds in tortuous course, conducting you 

 to sweet little spots of coolness and seclusion, and 

 giving you a continual change of objects for contem- 

 plation. I never wander in those charming grounds 

 but I ask myself this question Are we not making a 

 "tremendous sacrifice" (as the drapers say, when 

 they are anxious to dispose of surplus stock, or seedy 

 old " shopkeepers ") to that Gigantic Idol called 

 " Bedding-Out " ? Are not our modern gardens, and 

 these close to our windows, fireworks and kaleido- 

 scopes for three months in the year, with brown 

 fallows for the remaining nine ? Don't talk to me 

 about your "Winter Gardens," your golden hollies 

 with eight leaves, your priggish little Irish yews, 

 about as big as ninepins. To the nursery, say I, with 

 those tiny infants. And I won't listen to any non- 

 sense about " grand display of bulbs in spring ! " 

 The grand display costs a fortune, and comes up 

 "patchy," after all. I looked out the other morning 

 from the window of a grand house in these parts, 

 where they have streets of g]ass and regiments of 



