HOUSES AND GARDENS 



lines, and to base it on the wild garden and the orchard, it will become a 

 question as to how far mown grass, in the shape of lawns, should be included 

 in the scheme. In many cases a lawn for tennis, bowls, or croquet is 

 demanded, and, apart from these uses, I do not wish to undervalue the 

 beauty of a well-kept lawn ; but it will be well if the smaller householder, 

 before including the lawn as a matter of course in his garden scheme, should 

 realise that it implies a certain cost of maintenance, and that a garden can be 

 formed, and not a bad garden either, without any mown grass at all. 



Paths should be as few as possible, and should follow the lines of natural 

 traffic. They should not wind, unless there is a reason for their winding, but 

 should represent the easiest and shortest routes. If one imagines a garden 

 without paths at all one would soon find certain beaten tracks appear, and these 

 would represent the general lines for the fundamental paths. Wherever possible, 

 paths should be paved instead of gravelled, and this is a luxury which may 

 repay by saving the labour of weeding. 



It is not, however, necessary to have a wild garden as the outcome of the 

 conditions I have assumed. Plantations of flowering shrubs with the orchard 

 and borders of perennial flowers will constitute also a type of garden which 

 will require little cost for its maintenance. 



A garden is expensive to maintain, chiefly in proportion to its artificiality 

 and in the extent to which it includes mown lawns, bedded-out flowers, and 

 clipped hedges. I do not wish to imply that these things are therefore in- 

 appropriate to the garden, but that they should be introduced in households 

 of limited means at least with a full knowledge of the labour in maintenance 

 they entail, and that it may be wiser in many cases to aim at that kind of 

 beauty in a garden which can be achieved by assisting and directing Nature 

 rather than by striving to mould her to an artificial ideal. The kind of 

 garden I have tried to indicate is, in short, one for a man who, while fond of 

 a garden, is unable, either through lack of time, means or ability to give it 

 the attention it requires. 



It has been my purpose throughout to show what is possible for the 

 average householder, both in the planning of the house and its surrounding 

 garden, and this has led me to dwell on the economic question in gardening 

 designing which, as in the house, is often overlooked. But if these restric- 

 tions are removed, many possibilities appear in the development of a garden 

 designed with artistic skill, and planted and maintained with expert 

 knowledge. 



The desirability of a natural or wild scheme for the basis of gardens 

 will, of course, greatly depend on the nature of the site ; and in the 

 country it is often possible to obtain a site for the house which will 

 require little modification in its essential features. Probably the best 

 in this kind is an old orchard, but this is difficult to obtain. Of 

 natural surroundings, however, there seems nothing quite so good as a 

 setting for the house as a dark moorland covered with the purple of 

 the heather, and that lesser kind of gorse which seems to have been 

 clipped into neat round bushes by Nature's invisible shears. Add to this the 



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