FORM IN PLANTING 149 



meant a right movement of line and form and group — 

 can at least recognise its value — indeed, its supreme 

 importance — when it is present, and do not, in its 

 absence, faU to feel that the thing shown is without 

 life, spirit, or reasonable justification. 



Even a proficiency in some branch of fine art does 

 not necessarily imply ability to lay out ground. I have 

 known, in the intimate association of half a lifetime, 

 a landscape painter whose interpretation of natural 

 beauty was of the most refined and poetical quality, 

 and who truly loved flowers and beautiful vegetation, 

 but who was quite incapable of personally arranging 

 a garden ; although it is more usual that an artist 

 should almost unconsciously place plants well. 



It is therefore not to-be expected that it is enough 

 to buy good plants and merely to tell the gardener 

 of average ability to plant them in groups, as is now 

 often done with the very best intention. It is impos- 

 sible for the gardener to know what is meant. In all 

 the cases that have come under my notice, where 

 such indefinite instruction has been given, the things 

 have been planted in stiff blocks. Quite lately I came 

 upon such an example in the garden of a friend who 

 is by no means without a sense of beauty. There was 

 a bank-like space on the outskirts of the pleasure- 

 ground where it was wished to have a wild Heath 

 garden. A better place could hardly be, for the soil 

 is light and sandy and the space lies out in full sunlight. 

 The ground had been thrown about into ridges and 

 valleys, but without any reference to its natural form, 

 whereas with half the labour it might have been guided 

 into slight hollows, ridges and promontories of good 



