GARDENS OLD AND 



THE GREAT YEW ARCH, HAMPTON COURT, LEOMINSTER. 



essential, with a truer understanding of the manner in which 

 fl wers shall be cultivated, holding their large place in the 

 garden design. 



The older dweller in these islands, like the modern, loved 

 his garden well. It was a place for quiet and retirement, 

 and for the welcoming of friends and their diversion, a place 

 beloved for its shady alleys in the hot days of summer, for 

 the delectable freshness of the evening air on the terrace, 

 and for the pleasure of the green lawns where the English- 

 man sped his well-turned bowls. In the pages of Shakespeare 

 several garden scenes occur. There is that in " Richard II.," 

 in which the ladies would dance, or tell tales, or sing, and 

 where the bowls were sped, reminding the Queen how often 

 F( rtune "runs 'gainst the bias." It was an ordered realm, 

 extolled by "old Adam's likeness," the gardener, in contrast 

 with the larger disordered commonwealth. In such pleasaunces 

 men lived much, anJ it is delightful to find them, sometimes, 

 like Lindsay of Edzell in his viridarinin, even transacting 

 affairs of weight there. The garden is, indeed, a place where, 

 in gay delight or pensive meditation, the days may well pass 

 profitably if unnumbered. 



In the Introduction to the first series of "Gardens Old 

 and New " some account was given of the successive phases 

 of the gardener's art, and, after a more brief view of that 

 interesting subject, it may be suitable here to develop a little 

 more fully certain special characteristics therein dealt with, 

 and to speak of some special garden features described in 

 writings of the past and exemplified in gardens of the present. 

 It was suggested that wh.le some look upon the garden as an 

 extension of the house into its surroundings, others have 

 regarded it as an approach of wild Nature to the'r dwelling- 

 places. What may certainly be said is that neither house nor 

 garden can be .complete in itself, each being the complement 

 of the other. A certain formality of character is doubtless 

 engendered from this relationship, and history shows that 

 some constancy of features in this formality has r.xisU-d in 

 widely different ages. The Tuscan gardens of Pliny the 



Younger were instanced, indeed, as presenting a remarkable 

 similarity to the old Scottish gardens which Sir Walter Scott 

 described at Tully Veolan. 



But there is another ruling condition which affects the 

 character of any garden the situation in which it lies, 

 for manifestly what is suitable to the steep hillside cannot 

 altogether befit the plain. There is, moreover, always a 

 seeking for some distinctive character or feature in any 

 garden, and, if it be found in the strictly formal, it may be 

 discovered also in those adornments which were added to the 

 natural gardens of a hundred years ago. The truth is that no 

 class of gardening can remain under the ban. Each is good in 

 itself, and each may in some degree borrow from the other. 

 While we welcome the beautiful effects that are attained by 

 aiming at natural character, let us not deride the fine tall yew 

 and hornbeam hedges or the mossy terraces upon the steeps, 

 and let us remember that essentially it is no worse to clip a 

 tree than to mow a lawn that, as was said in the last series, 

 the difference is in degree and not in kind that all gardening 

 is in a measure formal, and that only extravagance is to be 

 condemned. At such extravagance Pope raised many a 

 laugh, and Rousseau did many times sneer. There were 

 gardens like the famous one at Moor Park, near Farnham, in 

 which the old formality existed without extravagance. The 

 pleached alleys of such places still survive here and there, 

 and the " cradel walk" Queen Mary's Bower at Hampton 

 Court, and the examples at Drayton House, Northamptonshire, 

 and at Melbourne in Derbyshire, are illustrations of what 

 the older Englishmen loved. How they introduced quaint 

 topiary features may be seen in many famous gardens, 

 while fine hedges exist all through England. The pergola, 

 also, though not essentially related to formal gardens, had 

 often its place in them, and many beautiful examples of 

 such garden features are illustrated in this work. The moral 

 sundia!, again, belongs to the old formal garden, though it 

 has been borrowed and used well in pleasaunces of every 

 kind. There are excellent examples in old Scottish gardens, 



