lastly perhaps for resting and refreshing the eye, and giving it 



renewed appetite between its feasts of brilliant colouring and complex 



design. These green yew-bordered alleys occur without end in the 



old gardens. They were not always bowling-greens, though now often 



so called, but rather secluded ambulatories ; places either for solitary 



meditation and refreshment of mind, or where friends would meet in 



pleasant converse, or statesmen hold their discourse on weightier matters. 



Such a place of cool green retreat is this straight alley of ancient yews. 



Almost better it might have been if the path were green and grassy too 



— Nature herself seems to have thought so, for she greens the gravel with 



mossy growths. Perhaps this mossiness afflicts the gardener's heart — let 



him take comfort in knowing how much it consoles the artist. Though 



a garden is for the most part the better for being kept trim, there are 



exceptional cases such as this, where to a certain degree it is well to let 



natural influences have their way. It is a matter respecting which it is 



difiicult to lay down a law ; it is just one for nice judgment. Had the 



path been freshly scratched up and rolled, and the verges trimmed to a 



perfectly true line, it would not have commended itself to the artist as a 



subject for a picture, but, as it is, it is just right. The mossy path is in 



true relation for colour to the trees and grassy edges, and the degree of 



infraction of the canons of orderliness stops short of an appearance of 



actual neglect. 



Among the interesting features of the grounds at Rockingham is a 

 rose-garden, circular in form, bounded and protected by a yew hedge. 

 Four archways at equal points, cut in the hedge, with straight paths, 

 lead to a concentric path within which is a large round bed, with poles 

 and swinging garlands of free-growing Roses. The outer quarters have 

 smaller beds, some concentric, some parallel with the straight paths. 

 The space is large enough to give ample light and air to the Roses, while 

 the yew hedge affbrds that comforting shelter from boisterous winds 

 that all good Roses love. 



Close to the house a flight of steps leads to a flower garden on the 

 higher level. A sundial on steps stands in the midmost space, with beds 

 and clumps of bright flowers around. There is other good gardening 

 at Rockingham, and a curious " mount " ; not of the usual circular 



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