Varied Gardens Fair 



59 



and fair," and neatly spread with colored sands or 

 gravel. Parkinson says, " The fairer and larger 

 your allies and walks be the more grace your 

 garden should have, the lesse harm the herbes and 

 flowers shall receive, and the better shall your 

 weeders cleanse both the bed and the allies." " Cov- 

 ert-walks," or " shade-alleys," had trees meeting in 

 an arch over them. 



A curious term, found in references to old Amer- 

 ican flower beds and garden designs, as well as 

 English ones, is the " goose-foot." A " goose- 

 foot " consisted of three flower beds or three 

 avenues radiating rather closely together from a 

 small semicircle ; and in some places and under 

 some conditions it is still a charming and striking 

 design, as you stand at the heel of the design and 

 glance down the three avenues. 



fV In all these flower beds Box was the favorite 

 edging, but many other trim edgings have been 

 used in parterres and borders by those who love not 

 Box. Bricks were used, and boards; an edging of 

 boards was not as pretty as one of flowers, but it 

 kept the beds trimly in place; a garden thus edged 

 is shown on page 63 which realizes this descrip- 

 tion of the pleasure-garden in the Scots Gardener : 

 "The Bordures box'd and planted with variety of fine 

 Flowers orderly Intermixt, Weeded, Mow'd, Rolled 

 and Kept all Clean and Handsome." Germander 

 and Rosemary were old favorites for edging. I 

 have seen snowy edgings of Candy-tuft and Sweet 

 Alyssum, setting off well the vari-colored blooms 

 of the border. One of Sweet Alyssum is shown 



