ito 



GARDENS OLD AND 



Copy i iglit. 



THE WATER GARDEN. 



"Country Life." 



the realm of Art. Heie is a u;,ion of the two such as 

 will be teen in very few places. Tlu " flower in the 

 crannied wall " is familiar. There is a charm in the 

 weathered brick giving hospitality to a crowd of beautiful 

 things, and crowned with white and red valerian, or snap- 

 dragon, or wallflowers, or with some other radiant thing 

 that finds good rootage where soil and moisture and sun 

 are to its liking. Such thhgs we may find at Kind's Weston, 

 as in many West Country gardens ; but what we note 

 as individual here is that flowers are invited to root 

 themselves in the crevices in the steps that lead down from 

 the mansion. Alpine flowers are flourish ng in the stair- 

 way with many gay companions, and giving floral beauty 

 where it is quite uncommon. Ther-i is something fresli an.l 



THE FLORAL STAIRWAY. 



original in the pleasure of finding flowers garnishing thus 

 the way by which we descend ; something, we may say, 

 especially appropriate to the gentler sex, where Flora attends 

 their coming. On the other hand, there may be those to 

 whom this plan of cultivating flowers in the hollows of 

 substantial masonry may not seem right. We are accustomed, 

 perhaps, to regard the vesting of stonework with thick moss 

 and (lowers as the proper accompaniment of decay or rough- 

 ness of construction. What is suitable, some may say, to the 

 old garden wall, to the broken rockery, or to the clefts of the 

 rugged stone support that holds up the higher bank flanking 

 the garden path, and over which we look to the fair denizens 

 of the vvioJIand shade, may not be suitable to the regular 

 masonry of the house and its immediate approaches. But 



King's Weston is a standing 

 witness that this manner of 

 gardening is, or may be, 

 good. There is harmony in the 

 result where some might expect 

 incongruity, and the investing 

 approach of Nature to the house 

 gives many a clinging plant to 

 clothe the cool stonework. Yet 

 shall we invite her not only to 

 clothe our house, but. as it were, 

 to e:iter intimately into the 

 structure ? Qnot homines, tot 

 scntcntia-. It is a legitimate matter 

 of opinion, but we may, at least, 

 gather one lesson that there 

 are many forms <:f beauty in 

 gardening, each appealing to a 

 particular taste, and that it 

 ill befits a gardener to be a 

 doctrinaire, pinning his faith 

 wholly to this school or that, 

 adopting one manner to set his 

 ban upon another, and rejecting, 

 in his rigid view of his art, a good 

 many beauties that otherwise he 



Country Li/c." 



