THEIR GENERAL ARRANGEMENT. 



661 



beds, however, we would have changes 

 made, as bulbs to flower during winter 

 and spring, and to be succeeded by an- 

 nuals, or planting out things to flower 

 during summer and autumn. No herba- 

 ceous, annual, or other flowering plants, 

 should be set in the margins of the beds 

 of shrubs ; they have no connection here 

 whatever, and have, at best, but a meagre 

 appearance, and in nowise harmonise 

 with the shrubs, either in a botanical or 

 gardenesque point of view. Circular beds 

 are here adopted irrespective of their size ; 

 yet they are so grouped and mingled to- 

 gether as to produce an agreeable effect 

 when looked upon as a whole. Their 

 distance from the walks, and from each 

 other, in no case exceeds 12 feet. The 

 simplicity of this form is a great re- 

 commendation in this style of arrange- 

 ment, in point of beauty, the symmetry 

 of disposal, as well as in regard to setting- 

 off the flowers to advantage — each bed 

 being, as it were, a huge nosegay. It is, 

 besides, the best of all forms for, and 

 most adapted to, culture, as well as for 

 viewing the plants to advantage. The 

 difference in the sizes of the beds, and the 

 disposal of them on the turf, will produce 

 a pleasing variety of outline that cannot 

 be attained by any other means whatever. 

 To produce the greatest amount of variety 

 and beauty from objects of the greatest 

 simplicity is a most agreeable and satis- 

 factory sort of task ; whereas to attempt 

 the production of beauty and variety by 

 an endless number of anomalous forms is 

 never by any means satisfactory. For it 

 may be asked, why is one modification of 

 irregularity adopted rather than another 1 

 In answer to this, it may be said, that 

 irregular forms are never satisfactory 

 when planted entirely with flowering 

 plants. When planted with flowering 

 plants and shrubs, or with the latter 

 only, the entire form of the bed is then 

 never seen at the same time : the in- 

 tricacy and variety of the outline occupy- 

 ing the mind as far, at least, as form is 

 concerned, the result produced rarely 

 fails to be a pleasing one. 



Presuming that the foregoing observa- 

 tions are founded in truth, those engaged 

 in planting irregular beds, particularly if 

 large ones in flower-gardens, should al- 

 ways place both shrubs and flowering 

 plants in them, and in such proportion 



that the shrubs may prevent the entire 

 outline of the figure from being seen at 

 once. When the beds are either of 

 regular forms, or when they combine 

 with other figures, forming either irregular 

 or symmetrical wholes, (the two being 

 quite different,) nWering plants only 

 should be employed, unless the beds be 

 very large ; and, in that case, shrubs only 

 should be planted. When beds of dif- 

 ferent sizes, but of one form, only are 

 employed, they must be connected by a 

 common principle. Circular figures of 

 different sizes disposed and connected to- 

 gether, as shown in our Plate, will form a 

 much more satisfactory garden than can 

 be done by the use of irregular forms 

 only, or by irregular and regular forms 

 blended together. The effect of the lat- 

 ter mode of arrangement is, in gene- 

 ral, unsatisfactory. A very prevalent 

 error, often fallen into, is that of mixing 

 herbaceous flowering plants with shrubs 

 and trees : such a mixture cannot be 

 tolerated in a well laid out garden in the 

 gardenesque style, if regular forms be 

 adhered to. It is, however, upon a small 

 scale, as that of the specimens we have 

 given, figs. 907, 908, 909, and Plate 

 XXXIL, that a repetition of circles can 

 be employed, so as to produce all that we 

 have said of them ; but to continue them 

 over 10 or 20 acres, would be monotony in 

 the extreme. In medium cases, as respects 

 extent, we would propose the partial in- 

 troduction of circular figures subdivided, 

 at least where flowering plants are to be 

 employed : where shrubs are planted, 

 subdivisions are unnecessary. Our reason 

 for this is, that to sow or plant a circular 

 bed of 15 or 20 feet in diameter — which 

 would be the case, upon a large scale, 

 with one species, and, of course, of one 

 colour — would produce a far less satis- 

 factory appearance than if that circle 

 were divided into equal parts ; and in 

 these parts the habits of the plants and 

 the colours were so disposed as to produce 

 a harmonious arrangement, producing in 

 themselves perfection individually, and 

 collectively a perfect whole. The very 

 circumstance of these subdivisions would 

 give variety, and still the principle would 

 not be departed from. The divisions of 

 circles may be into six portions, or into 

 three or six zones, or concentric circles, 

 admitting the three primary colours in 



