February 27, 1889.] 



Garden and Forest. 



107 



rival arts, but together, as those of sister arts, each of which is 

 dependent upon the other and neither of which can be 

 properly practiced or appreciated if the other is left out of 

 mind. Moreover, while most extended treatises on the his- 

 tory of gardening have been issued in large and costly tomes, 

 this one forms but a single volume of about 550 pages of 

 large octavo size, and costs less tl\an $5. Of course its illus- 

 trations are not so beautiful as those in more sumptuous and 

 costly books ; but they are very well selected ; their number 

 (250) makes up for their lack of size; the recent development 

 of photographic art has permitted the inclusion of pictures of 

 many gardens not hitherto familiar to the student's eye, and 

 the numerous plans are clearly printed and sufficiently large 

 to be easily understood. In short, the book is the most useful 

 one of its kind of which we know ; none in French or English 

 exactly tills its place as being at once scholarly in point of view 

 and popular in tone, and the gardener, architect or amateur 

 who can read it in German is to be envied by his less fortu- 

 nate fellows. 



The introduction is one of the most interesting chapters in 

 the book. It explains, among other things, that in all the ear- 

 lier ages of the world, when a great part of the earth's surface 

 remained in its primitive condition, formal gardens were ex- 

 clusively created, natural gardens taking rank as works of art 

 only when the savage beauties of nature had been so far sub- 

 dued that a modified return to them meant novelty and refresh- 

 ment for the soul of man. The first chapter deals with the 

 gardening art of Egypt, Asia Minor, Persia, and Greece and its 

 colonies. A long chapter on Roman Gardens follows, and a 

 necessarily shorter one — for here the subject itself is less rich 

 and sources of information are slenderer — on mediaeval devel- 

 opments. The Italian Renaissance is then taken up, and its 

 period of full bloom — when such men as Michael Angelo and 

 Giulio Romano concerned themselves with the laying out of 

 gardens — is fully treated. The spread of Italian ideas and 

 their degeneracy into barocq^ue, puerile and grotesque phases is 

 then followed ; next Dutch gardens are discussed, and then, 

 at great length, the famous French period. The eighth chap- 

 ter deals with the rise of true landscape-gardening in England. 

 The ninth is devoted to the art of China and Japan, and the 

 influence it had upon English development. Then this devel- 

 opment is followed as it spread over the continent of Europe. 

 Modern German gardens follow, then modern gardens in the 

 rest of Europe, and in non-European countries, especially in 

 America. German gardens in their estate to-day have a chap- 

 ter to themselves, as do the useful gardens of the world — 

 botanical gardens, cemeteries, winter-gardens, etc. And in a 

 final chapter the present condition and the prospects of garden- 

 ing art are theoretically considered. From this brief summary 

 it will be guessed how rich Herr Jaeger's book must be in his- 

 torical material. It is impossible within the limits of a mere 

 review to summarize any of its historical chapters. Next week, 

 however, we shall print some extracts having reference to 

 American gardens, which we think will be of peculiar interest 

 to our readers. And meanwhile we inay quote a few counsels 

 of a general sort which Herr Jaeger puts into particularly 

 effective shape. 



One of the great mistakes of modern theorists and practi- 

 tioners, he says, is that they feel themselves obliged to take 

 sides with one or the other of the great camps into which the 

 gardeners of all time may be divided. They feel it incumbent 

 upon them to declare distinctly in favor of the formal or of the 

 natural style of gardening, and to exalt their chosen style to a 

 degree which means the total denial of all worth or beauty in 

 the other. In former times the same spirit has often mani- 

 fested itself, as when, during the bloom of English landscape- 

 gardening, countless beautiful old formal gardens were 

 destroyed— in England itself and on the continent as well — to 

 make room for novel arrangements often less harmonious and 

 appropriate, and therefore less desirable in the given situation, 

 tlian the arrangements they replaced. To-day almost every 

 artist and amateur likewise professes himself a champion of 

 the natural style, and refuses to consider the claims of archi- 

 tecture to a semi-architectural environment in the landscape. 

 But the true aim of gardening art to-day, writes Herr Jaeger, 

 should be " to unite both gardening styles — the pictorial (natu- 

 ral) and the symmetrical (architectural or formal) — or to use 

 them alternately, as the exigencies of the site and of the domi- 

 nant building demand the one or the other." His preference 

 seems to be for a combination of both; not for a mixture of 

 the two, in a disorderly, inartistic scheme, but for such a juxta- 

 position of contrasted elements, properly connected together 

 and gradually leading the one into the other, as will properly 

 support a building by symmetrical features and yet give true 

 landscape beauty in remoter portions of the domain. 



A certain measure of symmetry and architectural dignity in 

 a garden is, indeed, naturally desired by the civilized eye ; and 

 when it is not supplied in right artistic ways is almost sure to 

 be grasped in ignorant and inartistic ways. Theoretically, we 

 ask only for natural effects in our gardens, and might be sur- 

 prised to hear that we are always trying, in spite of theory, for 

 symmetry and formality in line and color. But what other 

 explanation can we give of the universal intrusion into our 

 public and private gardens of geometrical ribbon-beds and 

 borders, and of masses of exotic plants whose foliage is strictly 

 architectural in character? 



In this connection a final paragraph may be quoted from 

 Herr Jaeger's pages. As bright-foliaged plants, he says, 

 "form a contrast with the green of the main plantations, they 

 ought to be very sparingly employed in their neighborhood. 

 But to-day many gardeners and proprietors confuse rarity with 

 beauty, and plant more of these bright-hued plants than is 

 desirable — and sometimes such as are wholly insignificant 

 intrinsically, or actually ugly. In general, the effort to intro- 

 duce unfamiliar plants into a garden is a fashionable folly 

 which can easily prove very dangerous to beauty in the re- 

 sult." 



In conclusion, it is proper to say that Herr Jaeger's treatise 

 has been somewhat severely criticised dinMng the year since it 

 appeared with regard to certain matters of historical detail. 

 Dutch writers have accused him of patriotic bias in exag- 

 gerating the role which German artists played in Holland; and 

 Austrian writers have accused him of unpatriotic bias in 

 exaggerating the role which French artists played in Germany. 

 Both accusations are based upon his account of certain indi- 

 vidual gardens. But it must be remembered that the history 

 of old gardens is often difficult to decipher, as they have 

 largely lost their original estate under the successive retouch- 

 ing of generations of gardeners. And the main point, for the 

 American reader at least, is not to know just who laid out this 

 or that old garden, but to grasp the general course of the art, 

 and the differences between its typical manifestations in this 

 country and in that. As supplying a basis for such knowledge, 

 we find H^rr Jaeger's book all that a student could ask, while 

 it is very pleasant reading even for those who have no 

 serious desire to retain and put in practice the information it 

 supplies. 



Periodical Literature. 



Bordeaux, which is one of the principal centres of the 

 Vanilla trade, imports, according to the Gardejiers' Chrotiicle, 

 over 5,000 pounds annually. Most of the Vanilla imported 

 comes from the French colony of Reunion, where the culture 

 is of comparatively recent date. By the local dealers Vanilla 

 is classified into four qualities. The pods of the first measure 

 from seven to nine inches long ; they possess the character- 

 istic perfume in a greater degree than the other sorts. The 

 Vanilla-vine, it is stated, is at times covered with efflorescence 

 of a silvery brilliance, producing a crystallization similar to 

 that found in the pod, and which in good specimens covers 

 the outside of the pod. This is called Vanilla-vine, and is in 

 great demand in the Bordeaux market. Two different meth- 

 ods prevail for preparing the pods for market. The first con- 

 sists of harvesdng the capsules after they have lost their green 

 tint. Woolen sheets are spread upon the ground, and when 

 thoroughly heated by the sun the pods are spread upon the 

 sheets and exposed to the sun for a certain period ; they are 

 then put into the boxes, covered by a cloth and exposed to the 

 sun. The fruit should assume a coffee color in twelve or fif- 

 teen hours after this last exposure: If this color is not 

 obtained, the Vanilla is again submitted to the heat of the sun. 

 This process occupies about two months, at the expiration of 

 which the Vanilla is packed in tin boxes containing about fifty 

 pods each and securely packed. 



The second process consists of tying together about a thou- 

 sand pods and plunging them into boiling water to bleach 

 them, after which they are exposed to the sun for several 

 hours, and then coated with oil or wrapped in oiled cotton to 

 prevent the pod from bursting. During the drying the pod 

 exudes a sticky liquid, the flow of which is promoted by oen- 

 tle pressure of the pods two or three times a dav. In the 

 course of preparation for market the capsule loses about one- 

 quarter of its original size. 



The latest mail reports from Mauritius estimate that the out- 

 turn of the coming crop in that island will be a small one, and 

 will probably not exceed 34,000 pounds. The present market 

 price in London for Vanilla is very good, ranging from eight 

 shillings per pound for common to twenty-three shillings for 

 fine sorts. 



