A GARDEN NOTE-BOOK 



biers. The expanse of color on the gate-posts is out 

 of place. It gives the look of the cover of a seed 

 catalogue of about 1890. No, this is no place for 

 my ramblers, fine though they are in themselves. 

 I walk to the upper garden from this lower, turn 

 to the left, where at each end of a short walk of 

 brick hedged with clipped Spiraea VanhouUeii there 

 are two of the same well-designed arches such as 

 I have mentioned. These two are wreathed in 

 pink ramblers. Lady Gay and Paradise; beyond 

 this walk is not only smooth turf, but a fine growth 

 of dwarf mountain pine, and it is here that the 

 little rose comes into its own. It is seen only near 

 and against green; or, as one looks at it from 

 another angle, perhaps against the blue sky itself, 

 where ramblers, like fruit-blossoms, are always 

 seen at their loveliest. But the teaching here is 

 that the rambler rose calls for a background of 

 green, and of smooth, dark green, if possible 

 clipped arbor-vitse, clipped spruce, or other rich- 

 hued non-deciduous tree or hedge. In England it 

 is, of course, the yew that encircles the loveliest 

 rose-gardens. It is against that wall of green that 

 the ropes and festoons of gay pink roses swing 

 and smile. 



'It is delightful,' says Lady Eden, in "A Gar- 



17 



