122 



Notes and Gleanings. 



Carpet-Bedding is that system of planting summer flower-beds which has 

 come into vogue during the last two or three years, in which the whole surface 

 of the beds is clothed with a carpet-like covering of low, close-growing plants. 

 As applied to decorative gardening, it also implies the arrangement of plants 

 having leaves of different colors in such a way as to work out ornamental 

 designs. Since the first advent of this system, it has always been most effec- 

 tively carried out by Mr. Gibson, at Battersea Park, this year with fully as much 

 success as on previous occasions, and we are glad to be able to give some illus- 

 trations which will serve to make the manner of planting intelligible. 



The principal carpet-bedding at Battersea during the past summer consisted 

 of two parallelogram and two circular beds, and the picture they presented on 

 the fresh green turf was most exquisite. Of the two larger beds, not having 



Fig. I. 



illustrations to make a description intelligible, we shall only observe that they 

 were perhaps the most effective, on account of the greater scope of the design. 

 The planting was done with very much the same materials as the circles, and 

 the whole was kept dwarf and close on the same plan. The circles were j^lanted 

 with the following subjects — so closely, be it understood, that the surface was 

 entirely covered by the plants, leaving no raw earth visible between them : — 



Fig. I. — The central star (i) was composed of the yellow-leaved Pyrethrum 

 Golden Feather ; this was surrounded by a larger star (2) of the pale rosy-tinted 

 Aliernajiihera amcena; next came a narrow line (3) of the gray-leaved Santo- 

 lijia incatia; then a broader band and enclosing circle (4) of the buff orange- 



