Are You Going Abroad? 



A CONCISE GUIDE TO THE CHIEF POINTS OF GARDENING INTEREST — PLACES THAT ARE EASILY REACHED, 

 AND HOW BEST TO GO TO THEM, WITH SOME INDICATIONS OF THE LESSONS THAT MAY BE LEARNED 



(Editors' Note: This brief guide to the gardens of Europe has been prepared to satisfy the needs of many readers who have asked, from time to time, 

 for a guide to the chief centres of interest across the ocean. It is, of course, not a complete itinerary; but it is felt that it gives briefly the chief features, and 

 how they may be seen, of the gardens of England, France and Germany. The gardens of Italy are not treated at this lime, as they are a matter of their own.) 



THOSE among us whose great absorbing pas- 

 sion is for flowers, fruits and gardens cannot 

 rest content until we have been to and seen 

 that land of good gardens — England. 

 For the whole country-wide has been spoken of as 

 a garden. Protests are being raised in England 

 to-day against keeping the roadside too tidy. 

 This tidiness is due to the advanced knowledge 

 of the farmers, but it would be a thousand pities 

 if dear old England should become a mere truck 

 farmer's country and land of scientific agriculture. 

 It has been scientifically farmed in the past, de- 

 spite the fact that the hedge banks in the lanes 

 were left in their exuberant rural wildness, with 

 a prodigality of sweet briar, honeysuckle, trav- 

 ellers' joy, barbery, bryony, bindweed and other 

 vines, beneath which the sweet violets, primroses, 

 herb Robert, eyebright, speedwell, ragged Robin, 

 lords and ladies, and Jack by the Hedge flourished. 

 One need not fear, however, that the beauty of rural 

 England is going to pass yet awhile; we can safely 

 count it as an asset and feature of permanent interest 

 there. 



Yet, lovely as the face of the greater part of Eng- 

 land is, especially the central and southern sections, 

 to discover the acme of scenic perfection and to 

 enjoy the best features of gardening in detail, 

 certain estates, parks, and nurseries should be 

 visited if it is at all possible, and among these I 

 would mention the following: 



PRIVATE ESTATES 



Aldenham House, Hertfordshire 



Ascntt, Buckinghamshire 



Batsford, Gloucestershire 



Cliveden, Berkshire 



Carberry Towers, Midlothian, 

 Scotland 



Castlewellan, Co. Down, Ire- 

 land 



Claremont, Hampshire 



Cirencester House, Gloucester- 

 shire 



Chatsworth, Derbyshire 



Dalkeith Palace, Midlothian, 

 Scotland 



Downside, Surrey 



Dropmore, Berkshire, 



Eastnore Castle 



Eaton Hall, Cheshire 



Eastwell Park, Kent 



Frogmore, Berkshire 



St Anne's, Dublin, Ireland 



Tilgate, Sussex 



Tring Park, Hertfordshire 



Royal Horticultural Society's 

 Garden, Wisley, Ripley, 

 Surrey 



PUBLIC GARDENS 



Battersea Park, London Kew Gardens, London 



Edinburgh Parks and Botanical Peckham Rye Park, London 



Friar Park, Berkshire 

 Floors Castle. Roxburgh- 

 shire, Scotland 

 Gatton Park, Surrey 

 Gunnersbury House, Mid- 

 dlesex 

 Gunnersbury Park, Middlesex 

 Gravetye Manor, Sussex 

 Holland House, London 

 Hillingdon Court, Middle- 

 sex 

 Hever Castle, Kent 

 Kings Walden Bury, Hert- 

 fordshire 

 Leonardslee, Sussex 

 Levens Hall, Westmoreland 

 Murthly Castle, Perthshire, 



Scotland 

 Myddleton House, Middlesex 

 Overstrand, Norfolk 

 Sutton Place, Surrey 

 Wilton House, Wiltshire 

 Wrest Park, Bedfordshire 

 Warwick Castle, Warwick- 

 shire 



Gardens 

 Glasgow Parks and Botanical 



Gardens 

 Greenwich Park, London 

 Hampton Court, near London 

 Hyde Park, London 



Pittencrieff Park, Dunferm- 

 line, Scotland 

 Regent's Park, London 

 Torquay Parks, Devon 



florists' and nurserymen's establishments 



Barr & Sons, Taplow 



G. Bunyard & Co., Maidstone 



Carter & Co., Raynes Park, 



London 

 F. Cant & Co., Colchester 

 B . R . Cant & Sons, Colchester 

 Charlesworth & Co., Hayward's 



Heath 

 Dobbie & Co., Edinburgh 

 Dicksons, Ltd., Chester 

 Stuart Low & Co., Enfield 

 J. R. Pearson & Sons, Lowd- 



ham 



G. Paul & Son, Cheshunt 

 W. Paul & Sons, Waltham 



Cross 

 Amos Perry, Enfield 

 W. H. Page, Hampton, Mdx. 

 Jos. Rochford & Sons. Brox- 



boume 

 Sutton & Sons, Reading 

 Wallace & Co., Colchester 

 J. Waterer, Sons & Crisp, 



Bagshot 

 Merryweather & Sons, South- 

 well 



To obtain full information as to the owners of the 

 private estates, and their gardens, also as to the 

 nearest post towns and distances therefrom, the 

 traveller is referred to "The Horticultural Direct- 

 ory" for 1014, published at one shilling net, or one 

 shilling and four pence postpaid in the United 

 Kingdom, by the Journal of Horticulture, 10 Essex 

 St., Strand, London. This will be found an invalu- 

 able guide book for the gardens and nurseries. 



Of course, it would be out of the question to name 

 even a tithe of the good gardens of England, Scot- 



land and Ireland, not forgetting Wales, but those 

 above named are thoroughly representative. There 

 may occasionally be a difficulty in obtaining per- 

 mission to visit some of these gardens, but as a rule, 

 if a suitable request is made to the owner or his 

 gardener by letter, enclosing a stamp for reply — ■ 

 in the case of those gardens that are not usually 

 opened for public inspection — a favorable answer 

 generally follows. 



Undoubtedly the finest gardens, with a few excep- 

 tions, lie around London, or within easy reach of it, 

 and when one has devoted a day to Kew Gardens, 

 so full of treasures and has visited the resplendent 

 display of summer bedding and herbaceous flower 

 gardening at Hampton Court, the Old English 

 Gardens at Battersea Park and Peckham Rye 

 Park, each of which are recent additions; and more- 

 over, when one has seen the beautiful water garden- 

 ing at Kensington Palace (contiguous to Hyde 

 Park) , and the delights of Hyde Park itself, together 

 with the roses, nymphaeas and Japanese gardens 

 at Holland House and the Gunnersburys, one has 

 seen some of the finest features of English gardens 

 to-day. 



The London parks, including Kew, of course, 

 have much improved in recent years, and grand 

 herbaceous borders and other floral arrangements 

 have become a feature. At Hillingdon Court, near 

 London, one finds an Elysian garden of golden leaved 

 shrubs — ivies, such as we cannot have in America, 

 privet, elm, elder, nuttalia, etc., etc., and a gorgeous 

 array of hardy perennials. 



Frogmore is the King's garden, but is really of less 

 general or scenic interest than Cliveden or Friar 

 Park. Each of these contains remarkably fine 

 ornamental features, and Friar Park is one of the 

 most curious, most interesting, and most charming 

 of the renowned gardens of England at this time. 

 It is a garden of quaint fancies and conceits, a gar- 

 den in which men appear to wade to their neck 

 in water but do not; a garden of underground caves 

 containing all sorts of freakish things; and one which 

 also has many separate little gardens, such as a 

 Tudor garden, an ancient medicinal or monastic 

 garden, the gray garden, the alpine garden, with 

 its miniature of the Matterhorn, and so on. As it 

 lies close to Henley, on a beauty spot of the Thames, 

 it ought certainly to be visited. 



Another lovely garden is that of Lady North- 

 cliffe, wife of the well known newspaper proprietor, 

 which has wonderful "color borders." And if I 

 might take a big step and go up to Norfolk, what a 

 truly remarkable garden and most charming would 

 I find at Lady Battersea's estate, Overstrand, near 

 Cromer, itself a fashionable seaside resort. This 

 is one of the neatest, best kept, most highly orna- 

 mental, and altogether most captivating gardens 

 the writer has ever seen. Not very far off are the 

 King's Norfolk gardens, Sandringham, with their 

 pergolas and roses. 



But if I were to attempt to say ever so little about 

 all of the places whose names are given there would 

 be small space left in The Garden Magazine for 

 any other matter. Go to Aldenham House for 

 shrubs and prizewinning vegetable gardens; to 

 Dropmore, Castlewellan, Leonardslee, Wilton House 

 and Wrest Park for magnificent evergreens and 

 rare or interesting trees and shrubs; visit Colchester, 

 Cheshunt, Waltham Cross, Maidstone, Lowdham 

 and Southwell for their fruit trees and roses (this 

 allusion is mainly to the nurseries) ; or go to Carter's 

 or Sutton's or Dobbie's to see complete collections 

 of annuals. Barr, Perry, and Wallace are leading 

 hardy plant nurserymen. Hay wards Heath is a 

 great orchid growing centre, and Rochford's at 

 Broxbourne is one of the largest and most complete 

 florists' establishments for growing plants, blooms 

 and grapes for market. 



Lastly, though the Royal Horticultural Society's 

 garden is only for Fellows of the Society, a request, 

 presented in the proper manner to the Secretary at 

 the Society's offices, Vincent Square, Westminster, 

 will, I feel sure, procure for the writer, if he or she 



342 



is an American keenly interested in gardening, the 

 international courtesy of permission to enter. 



Whoever finds even a tenth part of these nur- 

 series, parks or gardens has a treat in store, and 

 will not have made the visitation without a recom- 

 pense in knowledge, inspiration and happy mem- 

 ories. 



J. Harrison Dick 



The Garden Art In France 



Americans who wish to instruct themselves in gar- 

 den art cannot give too much attention to the 

 masterpieces of garden composition to be found 

 in Italy, France, England, and Germany. In 

 Italy we may study the Italian style, with its 

 charm of distant views, its fine terraces, its archi- 

 tectural features, and artistic effects to be created 

 with foliage and water. In France we may study 

 another style — the French, created by Le Notre, 

 who teaches us gardening on a grand scale, with 

 great canals, pools, fountains, parterres, and 

 trimmed avenues of deciduous trees, which cover 

 many acres of land. In England we see the value 

 of foliage masses, turf, and flowers; and here we 

 find great beauty and perfection in all styles — 

 Italian, French, Dutch (the only place where the 

 Dutch garden still exists), the Old English, the 

 Geometrical, the Architectural, and the Landscape, 

 or English style. In Germany we find interesting 

 and beautiful examples of the Italian, the French, 

 and the English styles. 



In Italy, and in France, especially, many fine old 

 gardens were allowed to fall into decay, or were 

 ruthlessly destroyed as the result of wars, political 

 upheavals, financial difficulties, etc., so that we 

 find but few good examples of old gardens where we 

 may see the original design. 



In France gardening as an art was of little 

 consequence until Le Notre's great ability created 

 a style (the French) distinctly different from all 

 previous ideas in garden design. Andre Le Notre 

 was one of the most celebrated gardeners that ever 

 lived. His best examples are: Versailles, Chan- 

 tilly, Tuileries, Vaux-le-Vicomte, Fontainebleau, 

 St. Cloud, andMeudon. 



Versailles (12 miles from Paris, by railway; 

 open to the public daily except Mondays and holi- 

 days) . — This great garden at Versailles, designed 

 for Louis XIV about 1661-65, is the finest example 

 of the French style that exists to-day. Le Notre 

 worked 40 years laying out and embellishing this 

 garden of 600 acres, and the enormous sum of 

 $40,000,000 was expended on it. When the garden 

 was first laid out its long clipped alleys, and richly 

 decorated parterres; its groves full of architecture, 

 and gilt trellises; its great fountains, cascades, and 

 canals; its profusion of statues, vases, and urns, 

 were the wonder of not only France, but all Europe. 

 A spectacle well worth seeing is the fountains in 

 play, between 4 and 5 P. m. on Sundays and Thurs- 

 days, a display that costs about $2,000 for each 

 occasion. 



The garden of the Grand Trianon was laid out 

 at this time in the same formal style. 



In 1783 Louis XVI had the grounds round the 

 Petit Trianon laid out in the Landscape, or English 

 style, with one feature, the Hamlet, of unusual 

 interest. The Hamlet is a group of several rustic 

 cottages intended to represent an English village. 

 The idea was suggested by J. J. Rousseau's book 

 "The Village Soothsayer," which portrays the 

 simple life of the English village. To the Hamlet 

 Queen Marie Antoinette and the ladies of her court 

 came to play the characters described in the "Sooth- 

 sayer." 



Chantilly (25 miles from Paris by railway; 

 open to the public on Thursdays, Saturdays, and 

 Sundays, except race-days). — The principal garden 

 features at Chateau Chantilly cover about 500 

 acres, and are the canals, water parterres, terrace, 

 the Pare de Silvie, laid out in the formal style by 

 Le Notre, about 1663-78, and the Jardin Anglais, 

 {Continued on page 344) 



