428 Visits to Suburban Gardens. 



of the walks, which are not covered with rockwork ; but these for the most 

 part are planted with plants of one kind, intended to spread over the entire 

 surface, in order to display large masses of one kind of colour, such as that of 

 Petunia, Pelargonium, &c. Others are planted with large single specimens of 

 showy plants or low shrubs, allowing ample room for each to form a handsome 

 bush, without touching any of the bushes or plants around it. 



We never in any other garden saw such a profusion of admirably grown 

 single plants on the lawn. The most conspicuous of these at this season was 

 the peony, many varieties of which were magnificently in flower ; and we 

 observed that such as had gone out of flower had the flower-stalks cut off 

 close to a leaf, so that the bush presented a handsome mass of foliage, of 

 itself ornamental. Though the number of single herbaceous plants on the 

 lawn is so great, yet they are grouped together in such a manner as at a dis- 

 tance to appear in masses, and to leave sufficient glades of turf to produce 

 effect by contrast. These single plants are previously cultivated for two or 

 more years, as may be necessary, in a reserve garden, till they become strong ; 

 and before they are placed on the lawn, an ample pit of proper soil is pre- 

 pared for them. After the plant has been planted, all the surface of this 

 mass of prepared soil is turfed over, except just as much as will contain the 

 stems of the plant, surrounded with a ring of naked soil, two or three 

 inches in width, and on a level with the surface of the turf, and to be kept 

 stirred, and, as occasion requires, watered. 



There is an excellent collection of roses here, and we never before saw 

 such a fine display of all the different kinds of yellow rose. A part were 

 standards budded on the wild rose in the open border, some were bushes there 

 raised from suckers, and a number also raised from layers or suckers trained 

 on a wall having a north-west exposure. These roses get no pruning, fur- 

 ther than cutting off the flower-stems when they go out of bloom. We 

 also saw here a very fine variety or hybrid of the China rose, which was 

 trained against a wall along with the yellow roses, and had passed the severe 

 winter before last without any injury. It is called l'Art incomparable, and 

 is strongly recommended by Mr. Jenkinson, both for its fine dark colour and 

 great hardiness. 



There are many valuable gardening lessons to be learned at this place, 

 besides the true use of floricultural rockwork, and the art of managing single 

 specimens of herbaceous plants on lawns, and of grouping them with flower- 

 beds. One of these lessons, and that not the least important, is the advantage 

 of growing all herbaceous plants in beds or borders, and all shrubs or trees 

 in shrubberies or plantations, so far apart as never to touch each other. 

 We have often argued in favour of this practice, and even applied the term 

 gardenesque to it ; but^ here it has been done for many years, and the 

 excellent effect of it is shown in the fine single specimens that present 

 themselves in every part of the grounds. Though every part of the beds 

 and borders is filled, yet in no part whatever is there the slightest appear- 

 ance of crowding, or even of that equidistant placing of the single specimens 

 or beds which becomes monotonous from want of that breadth which can 

 only be produced by glades of turf. 



In planting shrubberies, the practice of keeping the shrubs distinct, and 

 always pruning or thinning out, so as to keep each near, but never 

 touching those adjoining it, is particularly worthy of imitation; as well as 

 another, that of not mixing rapid and large growing trees with slow-growing 

 trees and shrubs. Indeed, as Mr. Jenkinson remarked to us, the reason 

 why shrubs and low trees are not more cultivated in England is, that, in- 

 stead of being planted by themselves, they are mixed with timber trees, and, 

 when these begin to choke the low trees and shrubs, the latter are destroyed 

 to make room for the former. In cases where the shrubbery plantation, 

 after a certain number of years, is not thinned out so as to leave only 

 the timber trees, the shrubs and low trees are so far overpowered by them, 

 as to lose the greater part of their beauty ; so that in either case their beauty 



