THE DECORATIVE TREATMENT OF WATER. 



birch may be planted with great effect, but for the lower portions, dogwood, broom, 

 mahonia, tree ivies, laburnum or holly, are most suitable, and in any case due regard 

 must be paid to colour in mass. For islands, masses of scarlet dogwood, willows and 

 cut-leaved alders are suggested. Additional interest may be given to the margins by 

 the tasteful disposition of groups of iris, lythrum, meadow-sweet, sedges, bulrushes or 

 other sub-aquatic plants, though if the water is shallow for any distance, the natural 

 tendency of such free-growing plants to cover the whole of the shallow area will need 

 severely curbing, or much of the water surface may be lost under the rampant 

 vegetation, especially in small ponds. 



Additional interest and boldness may be given to the headlands by the formation 

 of artificial rockwork escarpments such as would naturally occur in such places, but, of 

 course, nothing in the slightest artificial in appearance should be intruded on the naturally 

 treated area. 



Naturally-treated streams also form delightful adjuncts to the wild garden or the Streams. 

 outlying portions of the domain, in fact the former can hardly be said to be complete 

 without at least a tiny streamlet half concealed and half revealed among masses of 

 luxuriant native ferns. 



How much can be done where a small stream is available is shown in the illustration 

 of that at Ballimore, Argyleshire (111. No. 261). Standing by the water or even looking 

 at the photograph, it is difficult to believe that, little more than a year before the 



photograph was taken, it flowed through a hideous conduit between rough stone walls, 



that the rockwork which looks so perfectly indigenous has all been placed there by the 



hand of man, and the finely-laminated strata even moulded out of strong cement coloured 



in exact imitation of the stone which forms 



the larger masses of rock, or that the ferns 



and other native plants which cover and 



adorn the whole have been collected from the 



surrounding woods and placed in position. 



The other illustration of this class of 



work (111. No. 262), showing the rocky stream 



at Mount Stuart, Isle of Bute, which was 



formed for the late Marquis of Bute under 



the Author's supervision, originally flowed 



through a hollow, trodden into disagreeable 



mud by the feet of cattle, though there were 



some small pieces of natural rock in places which 



formed the basis of the work as illustrated. 



The volume of the water had been increased by 



the more efficient drainage of the higher ground 



further up the stream, thus rendering some form 



of protection for the banks necessary. In many 



cases this would have been effected at the 



expense of all natural beauty by clearing away 



the trees and stubbing the undergrowth of 



brambles, honeysuckle, gorse and broom, and 



destroying every natural charm left after the 



depredations of the cattle. 



Instead of this, the opportunity was seized 



to bare the natural strata of rock, form rocky pools, and heighten the little cascades 



carrying the new strata by which this was achieved along the sides of the stream to 



protect the banks, and planting the clayey bottom of the stiller pools with iris and 



FIG. 262. 



