BIRDS OF A GARDEN IN 

 COLUMBIA, S. C. 



By Belle Williams 



In this beautiful old southern city, there is a garden 

 which covers a square of four acres. The sides and 

 back are inclosed by an old brick wall ten feet high. 

 The front is shut in by an iron fence which rests on a 

 brick foundation. 



On the inside the wall is draped with a profuse tan- 

 gle of honey-suckle, woodbine, trumpet vine, wistaria 

 and English ivy. The iron fence is bordered with an 

 old hedge of box (Boxus semper virens). 



On the outside in' front of the iron fence is a row of 

 mock orange trees, ( Prunus caroliniana ) , evergreens 

 — covered in early spring with dainty little white blos- 

 soms, beloved of bees ; in winter, bearing dark purple 

 berries which furnish a feast for many kinds of birds. 

 Guarding the high old brick wall on the outside, like 

 sentinels, stands a stately row of willow oaks and 

 water oaks, a century old. 



The garden was planted in the long ago by an Eng- 

 lish landscape gardener and tradition has it that the ivy 

 came from Kenilworth. The flora is most interesting, 

 comprising as it does, in addition to its rich native 

 species, many rare foreign species. 



We find a rare East India pine; several handsome 

 deodars ; tall trees of sweet olive ( Olea f ragrens ) ; a 

 handsome bush of the Camellia japonica ; a few plants 

 of the Thea Camellia, or tea plant; oak leaf hydran- 

 geas; syringas; two magnificent live oaks and two 



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