10 GARDENS OF ENGLAND 



have found a safe asylum when the fashion of the 

 day cast them adrift from the parterres of the 

 mansion and the villa. Moreover, when that same 

 foreign influence tended towards the introduction 

 of a formaUty in garden design which has always 

 been more or less out of accord with the liberty 

 and freedom of the national ideal, it has been the 

 artless grouping of wallflowers and early tulips, of 

 " pianies " and white lilies, of gillyflowers and love- 

 in-the-mist, with rue and rosemary, southernwood 

 and lavender, in the unstudied beauty of the cottage 

 garden which has helped to keep the balance 

 weighted in favour of the fuUer grace of Nature. 

 It has been well said of late by a writer in the 

 Times that "this is the great difierence between 

 gardening in England and in other countries — that 

 in England the cottage garden sets the standard, 

 whereas in other countries the standard is set by 

 the garden of the palace or the villa." 



It is, in fact, the love of flowers, pure and simple, 

 not landscape gardening nor schemes of colour, 

 nor display of art, still less commercial value, that 

 permeates the typical English garden, and forms 

 one strong connective link between aU ranks of 

 English people. 



The national importance of the cottage garden 



