THE JOYOUS ART OF GARDENING 



A nine-inch square "mesh" is a good size for strips that are 

 J x 1 inch, and a twelve-inch "mesh" if the strips are of 

 lumber }/% x 1J inches.) The lattice may be diamond or 

 square, according to one's taste. Square is a bit easier to make, 

 the diamond, perhaps, more decorative. 



The easiest form of lattice on which to try one's "'prentice 

 hand" is the "ladder," shown on this page. This is used as 

 a support for a climbing rose, for assisting 

 a vine up a piazza-post, and has many dec- 

 orative uses about the house. 



Although apparently simpler of applica- 

 tion, the usual poultry-wire is actually far 

 more difficult for a woman to manage un- 

 aided than even an elaborate-looking lattice. 

 To look well, the poultry-wire needs to be 

 stretched evenly and tightly between its sup- 

 porting posts. And to do this is by no 

 means as easy as it looks. 



In Colonial times the lattice was very 

 much in use, and the Colonial gardens had 

 a charm which ours have not. 

 In these older gardens the lattice was very evident. There 

 were latticed summer-houses such as that at Mount Vernon 

 often a latticed well-house, latticed arches or arbors or 

 porches. These were simple in line, almost invariably beauti- 

 ful in proportion. Usually, in the Colonial gardens these struc- 

 tures were painted white, with the latticework in green. With 

 their complement of vines (for over them would be wistaria, 

 or perhaps the little old-fashioned red roses), these arbors and 

 summer-houses must have been charming settings for the 

 eighteenth-century damsels. For the purposes of romance, 

 they were far ahead of our electric-lighted porches or open 



58 



Ladder " trellis 



