LARGE AND SMALL GARDENS 175 



beMnd the borders, but of that I have no recollection, 

 only a vivid remembrance of that brilliantly beautiful 

 mass of flowers. The picture was good enough as 

 one went along, especially as at the end one came first 

 within sound and then within sight of a rushing 

 river, one of those swift, clear, shallow streams with 

 stony bottom that the trout love ; but it was ten times 

 more beautiful on turning to go back, for there was 

 the mass of flowers, and towering high above it the 

 noble mass of the giant structure — one of the greatest 

 and yet most graceful buildings that has ever been 

 raised by man to the glory of God. 



It is true that it is not every one that has the 

 advantage of a garden bounded by a river and a noble 

 church, but even these advantages might have been 

 lost by vulgar or unsuitable treatment of the garden. 

 But the mind of the master was so entirely in sym- 

 pathy with the place, that no one that had the privi- 

 lege of seeing it could feel that it was otherwise than 

 right and beautiful. 



Both^these were the gardens of clergymen ; indeed, 

 some of our greatest gardeners are, and have been, 

 within the ranks of the Church. For have we not a 

 brilliantly-gifted dignitary whose loving praise of the 

 Queen of flowers has become a classic ? and have we 

 not among churchmen the greatest grower of seedling 

 Daffodils the world has yet seen, and other names 

 of clergymen honourably associated with Roses and 

 Auriculas and Tulips and other good flowers, and all 



