VARIOUS FLOWER GARDENS. 69 



Borders are thick set with the foliage of the Iris in many forms, 

 and particularly the winter-flowering Iris, which has its home in 

 Algeria. The Pelargoniums are in lovely bushes in light or shade, 

 while Datura, Palm, Jasmine, Acacia, Fig, Lemon, and Magnolia are 

 happy in the sun, with masses of Cineraria here and there in half- 

 shade, with many Violets, and even wild flowers of the country. 

 Bougainvilleas and handsome Bignonias grace the walls in free and 

 pretty ways, while here and there the Algerian Ivy is seen, a noble 

 climber, the fine qualities of which are not in the least affected by the 

 hot sun in the summer here it ascends to high parts of the moun- 

 tains there, which look arid enough and are terribly hot in summer. 

 No one need despair of gracing a dry bank with a fine thing who takes 

 the Algerian Ivy for that purpose, and it may be its long sojourn in so 

 dry a country has prepared it better for growth in the sun than the 

 forms of the Ivy from the cooler northern woods of our Islands. 

 Some of the most beautiful garden effects I have seen were here, 

 all the finer from the background of high cliffs above clad with ever- 

 green Oak, Pine, and wild Olive, but the best lesson is not from the 

 varied life in the garden so much as from the happy and natural way 

 the whole is disposed. 



In this way also we have variety as well as pictures as much 

 variety as may be wished, of which there is an example in Mr. 

 Hanbury's well-stored garden at La Mortola, in the Italian Riviera. 



The variety is not in itself so much worth seeking as beauty, which 

 is just what we lose when we commit ourselves to any one way of 

 flower gardening. To be free to add or plant at almost any time of 

 the year is a great advantage ; whereas in the pattern flower garden 

 the whole is set out and taken up at fixed times. The result is a 

 dreadfully fixed one too, and if any beautiful bush, or bulb, or flower 

 happens to come in our way that does not fit into the wretched 

 system, so much the worse for it. 



The fear of anything like a bush or low tree that governs the idea 

 of many flower gardens at home at present does not exist here, so 

 that we have light and shade, many bushes and even low trees that 

 give chances for surprises and changes. This is partly owing to the 

 warmth which allows of the growth of many pretty bushes that may 

 well grace a flower garden, but, once free from the idea that a flower 

 garden must be a flat surface seen at a glance, there would be no real 

 difficulty in carrying out like ways of planting in our climate in which 

 so many lovely bushes grow if we give them a chance. One minor 

 charm of these English gardens abroad arises from the fact that any 

 necessary stone-work is done in a simple way by the garden men. 

 As the ground is often steep, steps and little walls or protecting 

 corners are often wanted ; but whenever the native gardener wants 



