132 OBSERVATIONS ON THE 5%OWJgR 



Neatness should be the prevailing characteristic of a 

 flower garden, which should be so situated as to form an 

 ornamental appendage to the house ; and, where circum- 

 stances will admit, placed before windows exposed to a 

 southern or south-eastern aspect. The principle on which 

 it is laid out, ought to be that of exhibiting a variety of 

 colour and form, so blended as to produce one beautiful 

 whole. In a small flower garden, viewed from the windows 

 of a house, this effect is best produced by beds, or borderi, 

 formed on the side of each other, and parallel to the win- 

 dows from whence they are seen, as by that position the 

 colours show themselves to the best advantage. In a retired 

 part of the garden, a rustic seat may be formed, over and 

 around which grape vines, or honeysuckles, and other 

 sweet and ornamental creepers and climbers, may be trained 

 on trellises, so as to afford a pleasant rural retreat. 



In extensive pleasure grounds a rockery, formed of rough 

 stone, and rich light soil, may be erected in imitation of a 

 mountain, on which maybe cultivated various plants natives 

 of mountainous districts, and such indigenous plants as are 

 calculated for the situation, also herbaceous plants, pro- 

 cumbent and trailing, such as Messembry anthem urns, 

 Climbing Cordydalis, the various species of Silene, or Catch 

 Fly, Gypsophilu, Lotus, Ricota or Syrian Honesty, Go- 

 detia, &c. These being interspersed with dwarf plants of 

 different species, as Mountain Lychnis, Violets, Daisies, 

 &c., and so arranged as to cover a great proportion of the 

 rocky surface, must necessarily produce a very pleasing 

 effect. 



Although the greatest display is produced by a general 

 flower garden, that is, by cultivating such a variety of sorts 

 in one bed or border, as may nearly insure a constant 

 blooming ; yet bulbous plants, while ossential to the per- 

 fection of the flower garden, lose something of their pculiar 

 beauty when not cultivated by themselves. The extensive 

 variety of bulbous roots furnishes means for the formation 

 of a garden, the beauty of which, arising from an intermix- 

 ture of every variety of form and colour, would well repay 

 the trouble of cultivation, particularly as by a judicious 



