28 GARDENS : THEIR FORM AND DESIGN 



garden. There is no small cottage garden, no child's 

 plot of flowers that fails to teach, if only he will learn. 

 Such lessons are the greatest gifts, and bring true and 

 lasting joy. 



Thus, too, as we wander round large gardens, what 

 pleasure comes from small surprises hidden behind some 

 dense yew-hedge or within a treillage gallery! Some- 

 thing unexpected, mysterious — this is what shows the 

 skill of a garden designer. It may be only twelve tall 

 wooden uprights, cut square, supporting a latticed roof 

 of wood. We call it a shadow arbour, but the children 

 say it is a " bird-cage," because little tits like to nest 

 within the shelter of it. Whatever its real name be, 

 the mere fact of its having a doorway, forming a frame 

 to something beyond, makes us wish to explore farther. 

 In such simple ways incident is made, and the more such 

 surprises we can think out, the more interesting our 

 gardens will be. 



Surprise gardens should be skilfully arranged to lead 

 one into another, just as our rooms are so ordered to 

 take us from hall through anteroom and staircase to a 

 before-dinner drawing-room. Other larger rooms follow, 

 until we reach the chief feature of the house, the long 

 narrow gallery, and from it we wander to the great 

 library. There should be nothing abrupt or sudden in 

 transition from one to the other. So should it be in a 

 large garden. 



Sometimes we grow suddenly weary in a house, 

 because we are hurried from a Marie Antoinette room 

 to one furnished and decorated in the early German or 

 Dutch style. In themselves, the objects are all beautiful, 

 but the fact of having to leap over two or three centuries 

 in imagination, as we cross the threshold of each room, 

 leaves us in a state of exhaustion similar to that which 

 we feel after a visit to the White City. 



