96 PBAGTIGAL GUIDE TO GARDEN PLANTS 



THE ROCK GARDEN 



This is one of the most important and picturesque features in the 

 modern flower garden. Although many of the plants recommended 

 for the Eock Garden will grow perfectly well in the flat flower 

 border, still they appear in a different light and often to better ad- 

 vantage when cultivated among the plants usually associated with 

 alpine heights. 



The rockery is an attempt to imitate nature on a small scale by 

 arranging masses or boulders of rock and earth more or less artistically 

 and growing upon them, or between the chinks, plants usually found at 

 high elevations on the mountains of Europe and other parts of the globe. 

 It is only within the last twenty-five or thirty years that the formation 

 of beautiful rockeries has been seriously taken in hand. Before that 

 time all kinds of material did duty for a rockery, but usually not the 

 slightest attempt at copying nature or studying the interests of the 

 plants was made. And it was not until Mr. Eobinson, in his valuable 

 little book dealing with ' Alpine Plants,' opened the eyes of the public 

 to a better and more rational method of building rockeries and growing 

 alpine plants upon th^m, that anything like a good rock garden was to 

 be found in the kingdom. Now there are many good and several bad 

 ones, but as the light is spreading we may hope to see the latter 

 dwindling in number every year. 



Formation of a Rock Garden. — The Eev. C. Wolley-Dod, of Edge 

 Hall, Malpas, Cheshire, who has for very many years been an expert 

 cultivator of all kinds of hardy herbaceous and alpine plants, vsriting 

 about the formation of a rockery a few years ago in the Eoyal Horti- 

 cultural Society's ' Journal,' made the following observations, which 

 deserve every attention : — 



'The forms in which the rockery, usually so called, can be con- 

 structed may be divided into three : (1) the " barrow-shaped " rockery, 

 (2) the " facing rockery," and (3) the " sunk rockery." The first may 

 be raised anywhere, the other two depend partly upon the configuration 

 of the ground. No wood or tree roots should be used to supplement 

 any of them ; they must be all stone. The kind of stone is seldom a 

 matter of choice ; everyone will use what is most handy. The rougher 

 and more unshapely the blocks the better. The size should vary from 

 40 to 50 lbs. to 3 or 4 cwt. No mortar or cement for fixing them 

 together must ever be employed; they must be firmly wedged and 



