INTRODUCTION 



T TNDOUBTEDLY the first use of 

 \^} fences and walls was for protection, 

 primarily against the mighty beasts that 

 threatened our earliest ancestors and later 

 to secure the crops and domesticated ani- 

 mals. They helped to stop the encroach- 

 ing forests and jungles, acted as wind 

 breaks to delicate plants or to habitations 

 and finally served as boundaries to prop- 

 erty controlled by the family or com- 

 munity. As the home became an institu- 

 tion and men gathered in favorable loca- 

 tions for mutual protection and social in- 

 tercourse, the fence acted as a screen 01 

 barrier to the private life about the house. 

 All walls and fences, no matter what their 

 use, can be made ornamental and their 

 proper use, however simple, but employed 

 with feeling and discernment for the archi- 

 tecture of the house and for the nature of 

 the land, stamps the property at once with 

 a personal touch. 



