CHAPTER VI 

 WILD GARDENING 



How we can obtain most of the charm of an English park in four 

 years, while the doomed chestnut trees may pay the bills 



THE first day I was in England I stepped into the grounds 

 of an archery club at Plymouth, and saw millions of 

 bluebells carpeting the ground by the acre. They grew so 

 thickly that it was impossible to avoid stepping on them, as the 

 reader may see for himself, by plate 24, facing page 57. The effect 

 was enchanting. One seemed to be walking in the forest of Arden. 

 It made one think of Robin Hood, of Puck, of Arthur and his 

 knights. 



"Oh, yes; but it takes a thousand years to produce such 

 effects," you will say. 



On the contrary, I am positive that any American who owns 

 a great estate can get most of this charm in four years, and practi- 

 cally all of it in one lifetime. These bluebells, for instance, cost 

 only ten dollars a thousand, or one cent a bulb. They need no care 

 after planting. You can order them now, plant them next fall, 

 and they will bloom next spring. In rich woods they will increase 

 so fast that you could duplicate the identical effect here pictured 

 in four years at a cost of one hundred dollars. 



Even the trees in your overcrowded, uninteresting wood- 

 lands will respond wonderfully in four years, if you will let a land- 

 scape forester mark (at a cost of eight dollars an acre) the trees 

 which should come out this year, and the three succeeding years. 



