18 OUR ROCK-GARDEN 



floral treasures of some palatial domain, to the 

 lowly dirt-heap, duly embellished with an odd 

 whelk-shell or two, a statuette, headless, of the little 

 kneeling Samuel, a piece of broken blue and white 

 plate, and a few brick-ends in some stifling back- 

 yard in the midst of the town ; which, poor and 

 vulgar as it is, is nevertheless the touching delight 

 of some hard toiler in office or factory, who sees in 

 it and its soot-laden London-pride or musk sweet 

 far-off suggestion of the meadows he played in as 

 a boy, before he had found out that the city that 

 his imagination paved with shining gold has 

 no earthly realisation. 1 Somewhere within these 

 extremes is the rock-garden that most of our 

 readers, if they so will, may fairly hope to compass. 

 The first consideration, naturally, in the forma- 

 tion of a rockery is the getting together of the 

 necessary raw material. This, in many country 

 districts, is no great difficulty, as almost any 

 geological formation will yield us excellent stuff 

 for our purpose ; though some of these formations, 

 as the sandstones, limestones, or granites are 



1 Cowper brings before us, with admirable touch, the 

 grotesque pathos of the position : 



"There the pitcher stands, 

 A fragment, and the spoutless teapot there : 

 Sad witnesses how close-pent man regrets 

 The country : with what ardour he contrives 

 A peep at nature, when he can no more." 



