THE LURE OF THE GARDEN 



flowers caked in gold, with bees buzzing round them; 

 a wilderness of pinks and hot-glowing peonies ; poppies 

 run to seed, the sugared lily, and faint mignonette. 



And before Hazlitt comes Horace Walpole, upholding 

 a "Natural Taste in Gardens," and ridiculing the geo- 

 metrical designs that had so inspired the admiration 

 of Temple. "The compass and square," he says, 

 "were of more use in plantation than the nursery- 

 man. The measured walk, the quincunx, and the 

 etoile imposed their .unsatisfying sceneries on our 

 royal and noble gardens. Trees were headed, and 

 their sides pared away; many French groves seem 

 green chests set upon poles. Seats of marble, arbours, 

 and summer-houses terminated every vista, and sym- 

 metry, even where the space was too large to permit 

 its being remarked at one view, was an essential . . . 

 knots of flowers were more defensible, subjected to the 

 same regularity. ' Leisure,' as Milton expressed it, 



... In trim Gardens took his pleasure ! 



In the gardens of Marshal de Biron at Paris, consisting 

 of fourteen acres, every walk is buttoned on each side 

 with flower pots, which succeed in their -seasons. 

 When I saw it, there were nine thousand pots of 

 Asters. ..." 



Looked at through print, those measured walks but- 

 toned by flower-pots, the trim hedges and green chests 



