CHAPTER XIX 



GARDENS OF FEW FLOWERS 



IT is true that there is generally felt in America 

 a love for lavish, exhilarant bloom in a garden, 

 unfolding at will, absolutely without restraint. 

 In no other country, perhaps, are flowers massed in the 

 same dense abundance that is here far from unusual, 

 nor do many other gardens show such numbers of 

 blooms of varied character. This is partly because 

 almost any new variety of plant that is well advertised 

 finds in this country a ready sale. It is introduced first 

 into the principal gardens and shortly afterward becomes 

 more or less general. Indeed, so great is the number of 

 new plants that have been given places in our gardens 

 during the last few years that very often they are re- 

 sponsible for a superabundant, almost confused effect. 



A great deal has been said and written about the 

 massing of floral colors, and about color harmonies, 

 and undoubtedly our gardens have thereby been 

 much benefited. Still, a Japanese, regarding our luxuri- 

 ant planting grounds, looks upon the massing of their 

 colors as absolutely at the expense of the individuality 

 of the plant, wherein the beauty of both stem and 

 leaf is lost. These artistic people think, moreover, 

 that the gardens of this country display an excessive 

 and barbarous extreme of planting. 



[ 245 ] 



