Vlll. 



GARDENS OLD AND NEW. 



Copyright. 



Such a close 

 relation almost 

 inevitably brings 

 some degree of 

 formality into a 

 garden, as may be 

 seen in examples of 

 every period, 

 except of one 

 co m pa r a tively 

 recent. This is a 

 broad truth, not- 

 withstanding 

 certain famous 

 poetical descrip- 

 tions dating from 

 old times, which 

 seem to tend to 



the contrary, and may, indeed, have foreshadowed a breaking 

 away from the older style, such, for example, as Milton's 

 account of the Garden of Eden, and that which Tasso has 

 given of Armida's enchanted pleasaunce, where in the 

 scented ways no trace remained of the gardener's hand, for 

 " nowhere appeared the art which all this had wrought." 

 "So with the rude the polished mingled was, 



That natural seemed all and every part; 

 Nature would Craft in counterfeiting pass, 



And imitate her imitator Art." 



Notwithstand- 

 ing such poetical 

 descriptions of 

 gardens of land- 

 scape or woodland 

 character, it would 

 be no difficult 

 matter to show that 

 formality has 

 almost universally 

 prevailed in some 

 degree if only in 

 the shape of a well- 

 kept hedge or a 

 sequestered alley 

 as will, indeed, 

 be revealed in the 

 plates which 

 accompany the ac- 

 counts of English 

 gardens in this 

 book. It is, more- 

 over, curious to 

 observe how, amid 

 change, a certain 

 constancy has 

 existed in gardening 

 methods, revealing 

 the essential basis 

 of the art, which 

 gives us the gar- 

 dener as the creator 

 of an appendage to 

 the house. 



It has been 

 observed that Sir 

 Walter Scott im- 

 pressed a certain 

 wide-reading public 

 with a love for the 

 fresh beauties of 

 wild Nature, and 

 helped to inspire 

 a taste which, 

 under the influence 

 of other writers also 

 of the romantic 

 school, acquired 



Copyright. 



force among us. and 



A BORDER AT PENSHURST. 



"Country Life." 



THE HEDGE OF YEW, BOX, AND HOLLY AT HALL BARN. 



was not without 

 its influence upon 

 the gardening art. 

 And, yet, let us 

 with Scott and 

 Waverley lift the 

 latch of the wicket 

 door that reveals 

 the old garden at 

 Tully Veolan, 

 where the hero is 

 welcomed by Rose 

 Bradwardine and 

 her hospitable sire. 

 It is a perfect 

 picture of an old 

 garden. Here is 

 Alexander Saun- 



derson, half butler, half gardener, working at Miss Rose's 

 garden in the parterre, sheltered from the blasts by a 

 close yew hedge, while the venerable house looks over it, 

 clothed with fruit trees and evergreens ; over the terrace also, 

 with its grotesque animals and huge sundials, and below it over 

 a garden " kept with great accuracy," exhibiting a profusion 

 of flowers and "evergreens cut into grotesque forms," whence 

 we descend level by level to the octangular garden-house 

 overlooking the stream, there surprised by the dam into 



temporary tran- 

 quillity. 



Let us then go 

 back to the Tuscan 

 gardens of Pliny 

 the Younger nearly 

 i, 800 years before. 

 " In the front of 

 the portico is a sort 

 of terrace, consist- 

 ing of several 

 members, embel- 

 lished with various 

 figures and bounded 

 with a box hedge, 

 from whence you 

 descend by an 

 easy slope, adorned 

 with the repre- 

 sentation of divers 

 animals in box, 

 answering alter- 

 nately to each 

 other, into a lawn 

 overspread 

 the soft 1 

 almost said 

 liquid acanthus ; 

 this is surrounded 

 by a walk en- 

 closed with 

 tonsile evergreens, 

 shaped into a 

 variety of forms. 

 Beyon.1 it is the 

 Gestatio, laid out 

 in the form of a 

 circus, ornamented 

 in the middle with 

 box cut in number- 

 less different 

 figures, together 

 with a plantation 

 of shrubs, pre- 

 vented by the 

 shears from shoot- 

 ing up too high : 

 the whole is fenced 

 in by a wall 



with 

 had 

 the 



" Country Lije ' 



