24 



GARDENS OLD AND NEW. 



THE ALHAMBRA GARDEN. 



1 Country Life." 



in 1712, were remarkable for fine cut greens, and clipped yews 

 in the shape of birds, dogs, men, ships, eic. Pope \v.is 

 scathing in his sarcasm. His famous gibes set a vogue in 

 garden criticism, and a loud outcry was raised for the natural 

 in tile gardener's art, such as some may echo when they 

 see these pictures of Elvaston. It was the sarcasm of the 

 wits that did much to dethrone the sculptor of trees, and his 

 more quaint brother, the pleacher. 



Yet it was easy to run into another extreme. Shenstone's 

 dictum, that " Art should never be allowed to set foot in 

 the province of Nature," becomes an absurdity when we 

 remember that without art there can be no gardening, and that 

 essentially there is no difference in principle between the 

 cutting of grass and the clipping of a hedge or tree. The 



Copyright. 



IHH BIRD COTTAGE. 



" Temple of Venus," the " Egyptian Pyramid," the " Ruined 

 Arch," the " Hermit's Cave," the " Saxon Temple," and the^ 

 oft-recurring grotto, frequent features, when the boundaries 

 of the inclosed garden had been broken down, were every bit 

 as absurd as the verdant monstrosities of the grove. The 

 efforts of the topiarhis were, perhaps, even less to be 

 deprecated than those of the landscape gardener, for the 

 former was content quaintly, and in a conventional spirit, to 

 imitate, while the latter often deliberately set to work to make 

 places and things appear to be what they were not. 



It is not, indeed, difficult to understand the prayer 

 expressed by Knight ("The Landscape," second edition, 

 1795), when he, with many heart-pangs, turned from some 

 destruction brought about by Kent or Brown 



" Again the moss-grown terraces 



to raise. 



And spread the labyrinth's per- 

 plexing maze; 



Replace in even lines the duc- 

 tile yew. 

 And plant a^'ain the ancient 



avenue. 

 Komi- feature's then, at lenst, we 



should obtain 



To mark this Hat, insipid, wav- 

 ing plain; 

 Some vary'd tints nncl forms 



would intervene 

 To break this uniform, eternal 



green." 



Happily the best of our 

 gardens are flower gardens, 

 and avoid one extreme and the 

 other, and the truest guide in 

 forming any garden must be 

 the hand of taste educated by 

 the comparison of many 

 examples. The Elvaston gar- 

 dens, which have rarely been 

 illustrated, are a remarkably 

 fine example of the particular 

 form of art they embody. 

 So much all will concede, even 



' Country Lije. ' 



