26 OUR ROCK-GARDEN 



almost anything, if it be necessary to economise 

 material, the better earth being saved for the front 

 and upper portions. Where such thrift is not called 

 for, it is needless to say that if the earth be of the 

 best all through we are so much the nearer to a 

 success, since some plants have roots of wonderfully 

 penetrating power. 1 Dwellers in the country, who 

 have extensive garden-ground, an orchard, and 

 perhaps a meadow or paddock, can scarcely under- 

 stand, with such a wealth of soil at their disposal, 

 how pinched the man is in this respect who has but 

 a small plot of ground at the back of his little place 

 in Suburbia, where the abstraction of enough 

 earth to fill a flower-pot leaves a permanent void in 

 his flower-border. We know of one enthusiast, 

 residing within a shilling return ticket from the 

 centre of the metropolis, who based his rock-work 

 on a fairly solid substratum of empty pickle bottles 

 laid on their sides, one or two pails turned upside- 

 down, and a goodly garnishing of canisters, with, 

 of course, a veneering of stones to suggest some- 

 thing at least of "the everlasting hills." This 

 we need scarcely say was not an ideal basis, though 

 probably the foundations of the house itself were 

 not much better, judging by the queer mass of 



1 On digging up carefully some plants of the common 

 mallow that were encroaching overmuch on their neighbours 

 we find the roots descending into the ground considerably 

 over a yard ! 



