290 



AMERICAN HOMES AND GARDENS 



November, 1906 



This basin not only provides a place for 

 the water plants but drains the land of the 

 spring water. 



The pond and its surroundings are one 

 mass of beautiful foliage and flowers and 

 constitute a feature of the garden. All 

 summer yellow, pink, blue and many va- 

 rieties of white lilies float on the water. 

 These lilies are planted in boxes and 

 sunk in the pond, so that the tender ones 

 can be easily taken in before the frost. Be- 

 sides the lilies there are the dainty water 

 poppies and the water hyacinth — one of the 

 most satisfactory water plants, growing as 

 it does very rapidly. Not only is the cluster 

 of pale lavender blossoms very beautiful, 

 but the foliage is quaint in form and very 

 rich in color. 



In the early spring the masses of iris on 

 the border of the pond with the long, pale- 

 green pods of the common wood fern en- 

 circling make the wonderful colors of the 

 old Japanese embroidery seem crude. 



The garden was planted with the idea of 

 growing each plant in the location best 

 adapted to its special need. The pond was 

 made for the water plants, the edges 

 planted with the many beautiful flowers that insist upon 

 always having wet feet. The bamboo summer house be- 

 yond was built as a place for the vines to clamber toward 

 the sun. One of the prettiest features of the summer house 

 was the result of an experiment made with nasturtiums. In 

 the fall several of the strongest of the plants were taken 

 into the barn and planted in boxes near a sunny window. 

 The barn was heated just enough to prevent the plants 

 from freezing. In the spring the vines were planted by the 

 summer house and trained up its side. In a few sunny 

 weeks the very straggling and almost leafless vines sent out 

 new shoots which reached almost the top of the roof and 



m 





A Summer House Overgrown with Nasturtiums 





The Pond and Its Surroundings are a Mass of Beautiful Flowers and Foliage 



were covered with gorgeous blossoms of splendid variety. 

 As far as has been possible the garden has been planted 

 with perennials or self-sowing annuals; for they not only 

 make the labor and expense of keeping up the garden less, 

 but most of the hardy plants increase in beauty every year. 

 Of the self-seeding plants none appeared with more vigor 

 and beauty than the verbena planted on the dry sloping 

 outer bank of the pond. Discouraging as the spot is the 

 verbenas covered it with a carpet of red, white and purple 

 from June until long after most of the flowers were quite 

 frozen. 



The garden has no conventional beds and borders, but is 



a true flower garden, ablaze 

 with color and crowded 

 with beautiful flowers. 



Unconventional as this 

 garden is, its very unconven- 

 tionally is not without form 

 and method. Simple as it 

 may seem to grow beautiful 

 flowers, it is really one of 

 the most difficult arts in the 

 world. It requires patience 

 and care, and above all a 

 knowledge of flowers, their 

 habits, form, colors and 

 growth. All this Mr. 

 Wagar possessed in abun- 

 dance. There is nothing 

 helps a garden so much as 

 knowing what to do and 

 then how to do it. Here 

 also Mr. Wagar has 

 achieved success. The 

 beauty of his garden is, 

 then, the direct resultant of 

 the fundamentals he em- 

 ployed at the outset, and 

 without which the most 

 lavish expenditure of time 

 and money will fail to 

 achieve satisfactory re- 

 sults. 



