132 



Gardens for Small Country Houses. 



walk, with flower-borders backed by yew hedges, leading to a circular fountain 

 court paved and brick-walled. The perspective and plan of a garden by Mr. 

 Inigo Triggs (Figs. 174 and 175) show the same need and good use of yew hedges for 

 enclosing and protecting rectangular gardens. At Bulwick (Fig. 176) some old yews 

 are clipped only where their lateral advance threatens the closing of a green path. 

 Yew hedges have much use besides for securing privacy. Fig. 177 shows a young 

 hedge that will be allowed to grow some feet higher to screen the offices and their 

 possibly unsightly adjuncts from the pleasure garden. Such hedges are usually 

 carried up to a height of from six to seven feet. For finishing the top the best-looking 

 and most practical form is that of a very low-pitched roof ; this also presents 

 the most easily accessible shape for clipping. 



FIG. 171. — A QUIET BOWLING GREEN. 



Though yew is undoubtedly tlie best tree for garden hedges, it is b}^ no means 

 the only one. Where the soil contains lime, or, in fact, in any good loam, the green 

 tree box makes a fine hedge and clips well. But it is slow to grow — slower than 

 yew — and both are costly. Ilex can be trained and clipped into tall hedges ; there 

 are fine examples at the remarkably beautiful and successful Italian gardens at 

 Brockenhurst. Green holly is also a fine hedge plant, but wants more width if it is 

 to be carried up any height. For a quicker hedge at less cost there is the Lawson 

 cypress, growing fast and clipping well. The humbler prix'et we all know ; it is 

 quite cheap and soon grows into a neat hedge. We are so well used to seeing it bearing 

 green leaves all the year that we forget that it is really deciduous. When it grows 

 wild as a small twiggy tree it is leafless in winter. It is the trimming that induces 



