Situation and Design 21 



which attention should be directed. Put crosses where unsightly 

 objects need to be screened or planted out; but first make very 

 sure that what you have considered an eye-sore may not be 

 transformed into an object of beauty. Consider deepening the 

 dismal swamp into a pond for a water garden; covering the dead 

 tree with a mantle of vines instead of chopping it down ; making an 

 alpine garden among the rocks instead of blasting them out. 



Think well before locating the house, even on paper, and 

 include the drive or path by which it is to be approached in your 

 calculations. Many a house has been completed before it was 

 discovered that the only route left to it approached from the worst 

 possible point of vantage, or spoiled the chances for a good broad 

 lawn, or necessitated too steep a grade, or cut the garden picture 

 in half. 



Oftentimes considerable planting may be done on larger grounds 

 than suburban lots before the house is built, but only on the area 

 outside of the building operations, where the carpenter's, plumber's 

 and painter's horses will not feast upon the tender new growth or 

 strip off the bark from your favourite possessions. As soon as the 

 design of your place has been mapped out, a list of such trees, shrubs 

 and hardy perennials as will be needed to execute it may be made. 

 Do not try to collect a museum of plants; avoid freaks of variegated 

 foliage, exclamation points of colour, strange exotics that look out 

 of place in our American landscape, and the beguiling novelties 

 of the catalogues. Personally visit several reliable nurseries if 

 possible, make your own selections and see them tagged with your 

 name. Choose well-grown, vigorous stock at a fair price rather 

 than the puny disappointments that, alas! are what tempt so many 

 because they are erroneously considered cheap. Many a man, 

 intensely practical in his own business, will give his order to the 



