310 
AMERICAN HOMES AND GARDENS 
August, 191tt 
Rustic Furniture for the Garden 
By Helen Lukens Gaut 
HE fact that the majority of people fill their 
houses with seats and leave their gardens 
unfurnished, is a puzzling one, for it is 
generally conceded, even by those who 
neither practice nor encourage the idea, 
that a garden is the pleasantest place in the 
world in which to sit and rest, or to enter- 
tain one’s friends, provided of course the weather is amiable. 
In the plans and specifications of conventional society, a 
guest, when he arrives, unless the scene happens to be laid 
in Southern California, which is famous for its garden en- 
tertainments, 1s ushered straightway into the parlor, where 
A stone arched bridge with a rail of rustic wood 
which forms a picturesque safeguard 
he is supposed to be interested and edified by a view of wall- 
paper, fresco, nottingham and mahogany, and nourished by 
a cup of weak tea, briefly enlivened by a clove and a slice 
of lemon. Under such conditions, unless, of course, he is in 
love with one of the young ladies of the house, his stay will 
be short; whereas, if he is led into the garden, where all 
about him are glinting sunbeams, delicious perfumes of flow- 
ers, the buzzing and fluttering of happy wings, and the 
sweetest music of earth—the song of birds—he will, seated 
there on the rustic bench that has been offered him, linger 
on, loth to leave, forgetting time in the joy of it all. 
There is no hospitality in the world as enjoyable as gar- 
Rustic garden seat of eucalyptus. Roof thatched with stems of 
palm leaves 
