FOUNTAINS. 31 



other woodland flowers may be planted in among 

 the osmunda, the hart's-tongue, and other hardy 

 ferns ; and rare mosses and lichens may be taught v 

 to cling to the darker clefts and hollows of the 

 rock, as in one rockery which I know, where 

 the " shining moss " (Schistostega pennatd] catches 

 and refracts the sunlight with a metallic lustre 

 like that of the humming-bird's breast. 



One of the greatest ornaments to a garden is 

 a fountain, but many fountains are curiously 

 ineffective. A fountain is most beautiful when 

 it leaps high into the air, and you can see it 

 against a background of green foliage. To 

 place a fountain among low flower-beds, and 

 then to substitute small fancy jets, that take 

 the shape of a cup, or trickle over into a basin 

 of gold-fish, or toy with a gilded ball, is to 

 do all that is possible to degrade it. The 

 real charm of a fountain is, when you come 

 upon it in some little grassy glade of the 

 " pleasaunce," where it seems as though it 

 sought, in the strong rush of its waters, to vie 

 with the tall boles of the forest-trees that 



