128 Landscape Gardenipg 



through the work their attention becomes awakened to the 

 subject, and all sorts of alterations, involving a great addi- 

 tional outlay, have to be effected; and after all, the result 

 will rarely be a connected and satisfactory one. To delib- 

 erate and arrange and determine everything well before com- 

 mencing is, therefore, the only way of ensuring economy. 



The avoidance of broad and numerous walks and the 

 adaptation of the design to the existing levels of the ground 

 will tend powerfully to keep down the expense. The mate- 

 rials of which walks are made are often costly and generally 

 have to be carted and wheeled from a distance. Much mov- 

 ing of earth, too, is always an expensive operation, as in 

 additi(5n to the actual labor of shifting it, there will be the 

 trouble of throwing off and restoring the surface soil, both 

 from the place that has to be lowered and that which is 

 raised. 



The cost of keeping up a place must also be thought of 

 when the plan for laying it out is under consideration. To 

 maintain a lawn in good order is deemed more troublesome 

 by some than keeping beds and masses of plants cl'ean. 

 But if the whole of the labor has to be paid for, none of it 

 being done by members of the family, and beds have a variety 

 of flowers in them and are required to be kept very neat and 

 duly raked, they will be much more exacting in point of 

 labor than grass, especially when the constant trouble of 

 keeping their edgings cut with the Shears is computed. 

 Lawn is consequently on the whole less expensive to keep 

 up than flower beds and borders, and should therefore abound 

 where economy of keeping is sought. 



But, for a more general rule, whatever gives complexity 

 and multiplication of parts to a place, decidedly increases 

 the amount of labor demanded for its maintenance. Sim- 

 plicity of plan will be by far the most economical. Little 



