CHAPTER V 



THE MIXED GARDEN 



I DO not wish to enter into the vexed question 

 whether " bedding-out " and " carpet-gardening " 

 are worthy of the name of true gardening. The 

 question is a very old one, and has often been 

 debated with unnecessary warmth. For I hold 

 that there is no such thing in gardening as fixed 

 canons binding on all, but that a garden is, 

 indeed, " the greatest refreshment to the spirits 

 of man," and if one man is more refreshed by the 

 stiffness of a bedded-out garden, and another by 

 the greater freedom of a mixed garden, let each 

 please himself in his own way : " let every man," 

 as Parkinson said, " if he like of these plans, take 

 what may please his mind, or out of these or his 

 own conceit frame any other to his fancy, or 

 cause other to be done as he liketh best." Yet I 

 must say that bedded out gardens give me very 

 little pleasure ; the monotony of the same patterns 

 and colours for four months of the year, and then 

 (very often, though not always) bare earth for the 

 remainder, is to me wearisome and oppressive. 

 That there are advantages in the system I do not 

 deny. Where a gardener or his employers have 

 no real love of flowers, or little knowledge of 

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