5Q 



AMERICAN HOMES AND GARDENS 



February, 1908 



The Center Walk Leads to the Kitchen Garden ; It is Bordered with 

 Standard Catalpa Trees and Evergreens 



to have been adapted by nature for the 

 planting put upon it, and it needed only a 

 wise and artistic utilization of the natural ad- 

 vantages to yield results at once entirely 

 satisfying and entirely beautiful. 



And while there is spaciousness here there 

 is no solitude. The stretches of lawn and 

 the screens of trees are ample enough to 

 give every possible retirement and privacy 

 to the house; one may walk through quiet 

 paths without being overlooked by the in- 

 quisitive eye of a neighbor or chance passer- 

 by; yet there is life all around one; other 

 houses appear above the branches of dis- 

 tant trees or across long vistas of lawn. And 

 all the neighboring properties, with their 

 own fields and their own trees and woods, 

 seem a part of a completed picture, of which 

 any one estate may be taken as a center and 

 to the full effect of which each contributes 

 its own quota of natural loveliness. 



The outlook from almost any part of 

 Mr. Schmidt's grounds is highly character- 

 istic of the whole vicinity. The lands of 

 two counties — or is it three? — is completely 

 pre-empted with fine estates of a beautiful 

 character. The splendid roads carry one 

 past splendid places, the houses, for the 

 most part, completely sequestered within 

 spacious grounds. The full beauty of these 

 is not always realized from without; but 

 many a stray glimpse gives evidence of the 

 care lavished upon the grounds within, and 



There is the vastest interest in these lands, 

 so highly are they cultivated, so beautifully 

 are they planted, so masterfully have they 

 been arranged. At no point is there any 

 forcing for effect — that is, the beauty of it. 

 Delightful as the grotto is it would not be 

 half so happy had there not been a natural 

 hillside in which to arrange it. Beautiful as 

 the lily pond is it would not be half so 

 lovely had there not been the stream from 

 which it could naturally be made nor the 

 fine old trees that so densely overshadow it. 

 That Mr. Schmidt has a fine and ably kept 

 greenhouse is apparent, not from its glass- 

 inclosed treasures, but because its resources 

 have been spread upon his lawn in a natural 

 way, decorative plants being used in a na- 

 turally decorative way, stood just where they 

 ought to stand, used just so they will do the 

 most service and give the most beauty. 

 There is no sense of over adornment, no 

 lack of proportion, no crowding of effect. 

 But it is seldom that so much pure plant 

 beauty has been so ably displayed even in 

 such extended spaces. 



There is no secret in the way that suc- 

 cess has been achieved in this charming 

 place. The natural lay of the land, the 

 gently rolling hills, the broad open areas, 

 the somewhat sudden descent to a lower 

 level at the brook and pond, all these lent 

 themselves in the readiest way possible to the 

 obtaining of fine landscape effects. And 

 they did so naturally. The very land seems 



A Marble Hermes Stands in the Rhododendron Bed Beside the Porte-Cochere 



