THE 

 BOOK OF ROCK AND WATER GARDENS 



CHAPTER I 



ROCK AND ALPINE GARDENS 



Between the rock garden and the " rockery" there is a 

 vast difference. The latter is a thing which no good 

 gardener will tolerate, contravening as it does all ideas 

 of common sense, good taste, and artistic perception. 

 It is hard to preserve a spirit of tolerance towards 

 the uncouth excrescences which distort and mar the 

 appearance of many gardens, inflicting as they do upon 

 the gracious earth and cool sward the semblance of some 

 horrible disease. Ugly and ridiculous in itself, and 

 ill-adapted to the growth of plants, the average " rockery" 

 is an eyesore. It is rarely productive of any pleasure or 

 satisfaction, even to a mind least exacting. More often 

 than not, it is made in some tree shaded corner, where 

 sun and air, the very essentials to the happiness of rock 

 plants, never penetrate. A few stunted ferns share with 

 a tangle of dusty ivy the melancholy duty of partly 

 screening an ill-considered heap of stones and vitrified 

 brick rubbish. 



And yet the possession of a few cart-loads of builder's 

 refuse, clinkers, broken pottery, shells and fragments of 

 statuary, immediately seem to suggest an opportunity 

 for "rockery" making. Small wonder that such spots 

 display nothing of the true charm of a garden, or that 

 they soon come to be regarded as so much waste ground. 



