

CHAPTER XVI 

 Wall Gardening 



THERE is perhaps no more charming garden scene 

 in early spring than a wall built dry, i.e. without 

 mortar, and planted with a selection of free-growing, 

 profuse flowering rock plants. When they are established 

 the wall becomes draped in blossom from top to base. 

 I have seen many wall gardens, but I remember none 

 that so impressed me with the exquisiteness of its display 

 as one in a garden on the red loam of Somerset. I was 

 fortunate enough to obtain a photograph of this, and 

 am able to reproduce it in one of the accompanying 

 plates. As I saw it in early June it showed a perfect 

 riot of bloom ; there were garden and Alpine Pinks, 

 Bellflower and Mossy Saxifrage, Toadflax and Catchfly, 

 Cerastium and Veronica. Here and there the old stone 

 showed through, and, together with the grey leaves of 

 the Pinks and Cerastiums, gave just sufficient relief 

 to the glowing mass of colour to render the whole scene 

 a delightful and complete garden. The wall was scarcely 

 more than four feet high. In the border against which 

 the wall was built were flaming Oriental Poppies, Paeonies, 

 Dropmore Anchusa, Larkspurs, and other favourite 



flowers of early summer. Quite happy in the wall chinks 



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