:6 THE FORMAL GARDEN IN ENGLAND 



VI 



plot beyond was laid out as an enormous sun- 

 dial, the hours probably shown in box or rose- 

 mary on an oval of sand, with an upright 

 dial formed of wood in the centre. Olivier de 

 Serres mentions a similar sun-dial, in which 

 a single cypress formed the dial.^ Such a 



Fig. 26. 



garden, if it had been preserved, would have 

 been beyond all price to us now. The ridicule 

 with which such work is dismissed, the abuse 

 lavished on it as artificial, is beside the mark. 

 It is just this very artifice, this individuality, 

 this human interest, that gives to the old formal 

 garden its undying charm — the feeling that once 

 there was a man or a woman who cared about 



Theatre d' Agriculture^ p. 531. 



