38 THE LITTLE GARDEN 



the old artificers in views as the decorative motif for garden- 

 gates; initial letters, too, were cunningly introduced into the 

 designs. Gates in hedges; gates svirmounting steps where a 

 change in grade calls for these — in the gate we have one of the 

 finest of all possibilities for interest in the little garden. The 

 opening for a certain unpretentious gate of wood was boldly cut 

 through a wall entirely clothed with Virginia creeper, as well as 

 through an old shrubbery eight feet in width. A pretty effect of 

 light and shade resulted, as well as the practical convenience 

 afforded by the gate itself. 



Before considering the subject of small adjuncts to the gar- 

 den, let us touch upon the wall and trellis as decorative matters. 

 The color, texture, and type of laying, of a stone or brick wall 

 may make a vast difference in the beauty of the garden. It must 

 be considered exactly as one considers the coloring or hanging of 

 the walls of a good room: its height with relation to the breadth 

 and length of the strip of ground; its tone as a background for 

 foHage and flowers; and where its outline can properly be broken 

 by recesses at the ends of walks, in which to set weU-designed 

 benches; in this last, we have one of the most beautiful of all 

 uses of walls. 



The trellis — or treillage, for the French equivalent has been 

 really adopted into our tongue — may be the loveliest garden 

 accessory possible, or it may cheapen the garden beyond descrip- 

 tion. The little garden calls for a most delicate use of this most 

 delicate garden decoration. It has much to commend it, espe- 

 cially for limited spaces; but in a limited space it must be always 

 sparingly used. A little garden whose boundaries are of green, a 

 garden of, say, fifty by one hundred feet, can support the use of a 

 tiny pavilion, or shelter, of treillage at one end, of an interven- 

 ing rose-support or two in the form of light arches, and of two 

 flanking features in the way of arches or shelters, perhaps, but 



