GARDEN DESIGN, 



83 



in what we call pleasure-ground and 

 park, is set down by these writers on 

 garden design as the wicked invention 

 of certain men. No account has been 

 taken of the eternally beautiful lessons 

 of Nature or even the simple facts which 

 should be known to all who write 

 about such things. Thus in "The Art 

 and Craft of Garden Making" we read: 



So far as the roads were concerned Brown built 

 up a theory that, as Nature abhorred a straight line, 

 it was necessary to make roads curl about. Serpen- 

 tine lines are said to be the lines of Nature, and 

 therefore beyond question the only proper lines. 



But nothing of the fact that in 

 making paths or roads in diversified 

 Facts of natural country it is absolute- 

 beauty the source ly necessary to follow 



of good design. ^ ^ of 



dation, and this cannot be a straight 

 line, but is, indeed, often a beautiful 

 bent line. In many cases we are not 

 twenty paces from the level space 

 around a house before we have to 

 think of the lie of the ground in 

 making walks, roads, or paths. We 

 are soon face to face with the fact that 

 the worst thing we can attempt is a 

 straight line. If any one for any reason 

 persists in the attempt the result is 

 ugliness, and, in the case of drives, 

 danger. Ages before Brown was born 

 the roads of England often followed 

 beautiful lines, and it would be just as 

 true to attribute to " Brownites" the 

 invention of the forms of trees, hills, 

 or clouds themselves as to say that 

 they invented the waved line for path 

 or drive. The statement is of a piece 

 with the other, that the natural and 

 picturesque view of garden design and 

 planting is the mischievous invention 



of certain men, and not the outcome 

 of the most precious of all gifts, of 

 Nature herself, and of the actual facts 

 of tree and landscape beauty. All who 

 have seen the pictures by the road- 

 sides of many parts of Britain and the 

 paths over the hills, and, still more so, 

 those who have to form roads or walks 

 in diversified country, will best know 

 how absurd such statements are. 



The very statement that there is 

 but one way of making a garden is its 

 variety the true own refutation ; aswith 

 source of beauty this formula before us 



in gardens. becomes Q f fa 



wondrous variety of the earth and its 

 forms, and of the advantages and 

 needs of change that soil, site, climate, 

 air, and view give us — plains, river 

 valleys, old beach levels, mountains 

 and gentle hills, chalk downs and rich 

 loamy fields, forest and open country? 



What is the use of Essex going in- 

 to Dorset merely to see the same thing 

 done in the home landscape or the 

 garden ? But if Essex were to study 

 his own ground and do the best he 

 could from his own knowledge of the 

 spot, his neighbour might be glad to 

 see his garden. We have too much of 

 the stereotyped style already; in nine 

 cases out of ten we can tell beforehand 

 what we are going to see in a country 

 place in the way of conventional gar- 

 den design and planting ; and clearly 

 that is not art in any right sense of the 

 word and never can be. 



As we go about our country the 

 most depressing sign for all garden 

 lovers (and this often in districts of 

 great natural beauty) is the stereo- 



