Chap. IV.] THE PARC DES BUTTES CHAUMONT. 



73 



Take, again, the Royal Horticultural Society's garden at South 

 Kensington, and, leaving out of view entirely the question of 

 style, assume that the geometrical is the only one. This garden 

 was specially designed for flower-shows and for the reception of 

 crowds. Now, if there has been any one thing taught by all 

 previous experience of large flower-shows and the gardens in 

 which they have been held, it has been that the happiest efi'ect 

 is only obtained where there is a quiet open lawn for walking, 



Vurw/rovt Central Cliff tcnuards Stalactite Caves. — Fare dcs Buttes Cluiumonl. 



and giving easy access to the various points of interest in the 

 garden. And what has been done to meet this want ? The 

 design is the most complicated ever seen, even for a geometrical 

 garden. Every spot where the turf might have spread out to 

 form a foreground, or a setting for the difl'erent objects which a 

 garden should contain, is frittered away — here a maze (what an 

 idiotic adjunct to any public garden ranking above that of a tea- 

 house!); there a short avenue of Lombardy Poplars cutting oflF 

 the view, for no evident reason ; beyond, placed on a bank, lest its 



