342 THE ENGLISH FLOWER GARDEN. 



make level ground beautiful by planting in natural ways, level ground 

 has a great deal in it that is favourable to artistic ways of planting. 

 That is to say, with such ground we may more easily secure breadth, 

 simplicity, and dignity, get dividing lines in the easiest way, richer 

 soil and finer and more stately growth and nobler shelter. Many of 

 the most beautiful gardens of Europe are on perfectly level ground, 

 as Laxenberg in Vienna, the English garden in Munich, not to speak 

 of many in our own river valleys and in counties like Lincolnshire. 

 What would be said of planting in all the flat countries of Northern 

 Europe if this assertion were true, to say nothing of the absurdity of 

 assuming that the only way out of the difficulty is in the stupid 

 disfigurement of trees ? I shall not imitate the example of these 

 writers in leaving the matter in doubt, but give some reasons against 

 the wasting of precious labour in order to rob trees of their natural 

 charm. The old poets and satirists, who laughed at it, did not go 

 into the reasons against clipping big trees, which are serious never- 

 theless. 



LOSS OF FORM. First of all is the loss of tree form a wonderful 

 and beautiful gift, so wonderful and beautiful, indeed, that the marvel 

 is that we should have to allude to it at all, as in nearly every parish 

 in England one has only to walk one hundred yards or so to come 

 /ace to face with fine examples of good tree form. There is more 

 strength and beauty of line in many an ash tree by a farmhouse yard 

 than in all the clipped forest trees in Britain. Some protest against 

 the cropping and docking of animals' ears and tails, but, when the 

 worst is done in that way, the dog or the horse remains in full beauty 

 of form in all essential parts, but if we clip a noble tree, which in 

 natural conditions is a lesson in lovely form in all its parts, we reduce 

 it at once to a shapeless absurdity. 



LIGHT AND SHADE. The second great loss is that of light and 

 shade, which are very important elements of beauty. These are 

 entirely neutralised by shaving trees to a level surface, whether the 

 trees take the form of a line, or we clip them singly, as in the British 

 phase of tree clipping. If we see old examples of the natural yew, 

 a forest tree, and the commonest victim of -the shears among evergreen 

 forest trees, and if we look at them in almost any light, we may soon 

 see how much we lose by destroying light and shade, as the play of 

 these enhances the force and beauty of all the rest. 



COLOUR. The third objection is the loss of refined colour. In 

 gardens we are so much concerned with garish colour that we often 

 fail to consider the more delicate colours of nature, and such fine tone 

 as we see in a grove of old Yews, bronzed by the winter, or in Ilex 

 with the beautiful silver of the leaf, or a grove of coral-bearing Hollies. 

 Even the smallest things clipped, such as juniper, have in a natural 





