78 VARIETY IN THE LITTLE GARDEN 



first on my list given here. I could easily identify by name the 

 various quince flowers of our borders; this is a superficial method 

 of identification, but it has its conveniences. Under C. japonica 

 Bailey lists twenty-one varieties; under C. Maulei, whose habit 

 of growth is dwarf, three. The Japanese quince is an adorable 

 subject for the small place; and if due regard is had to spraying 

 — for this tribe is terribly susceptible to the scale — and if one 

 remembers that its buds will suffer in occasional cold winters 

 in the latitude of Boston, then the wonderful glow of its spring 

 bloom will repay all the care given. 



As for proper placing of this gay beauty with regard to other 

 shrubs, use if possible near it (back of it, for preference) bushes 

 of Rosa rubrifolia with its "plum-red" foliage, to use Miss 

 Waterfield's nice adjective, or else near the reddish kinds of 

 Japanese maple. Miss Waterfield has a charming picture in 

 color in her book, Garden Colour, of Japanese quince, with the 

 brown-madder foliage of tall tea-roses back of it, a foreground 

 for all the delicate blues and greens of a spreading spring land- 

 scape. "The red japonica is also very effective. We have a 

 cascade of it over the roof of a tool house. On a gray morning 

 it is delightful to look up and catch the rose-red branches against 

 the boughs of the elms still bare and silhouetted against the sky." 



As to the use of flowering shrubs in the little garden, how shall 

 any arbitrary rules be laid down? None may or can be; but 

 there are two paths safe to venture upon in this province: one, 

 the principle of restraint in the variety of shrubs in a small 

 place; the other, the idea of the value and beauty of one single 

 fine specimen if properly used. Mr. Glutton-Brock's words 

 always come to mind here and are well illustrated by the simple 

 planting in the picture opposite this page. "A single flowering 

 shrub, rightly placed in front of a dark barrier of greenery, has 

 your eye to itself and satisfies it, like an altarpiece in a quiet 



