CHAPTER VII 



GARDEN COLOUR 



Why include in a book whose aims are ''practical" 

 a chapter on garden colour ? I can well believe that 

 some will ask the question, and possibly call me to 

 task for straying from the prescribed limits of the 

 subject. Let me hasten therefore to assure my critics 

 that I regard a study of colour and colour effect as 

 being no whit less practical than descriptions of digging, 

 pruning, propagating, or seed sowing. If our aim is the 

 making of a beautiful garden — and beauty is only achieved 

 by practical measures — we can no more afford to neglect 

 the question of colour than the simplest principles of land 

 culture. Surely no one imagines that an artistic garden 

 can be made by slavishly copying the plans and diagrams 

 which are such a feature of many so-called practical 

 books. There exists a class of office designers who on 

 receipt of a few brief particulars as to the dimensions, 

 contour, etc., of a piece of ground will forward — in 

 return for the usual fee — a neat plan, drawn to scale, 

 showing exactly how a garden is to be laid out ; positions 

 are assigned for beds, lawns, paths, summer-house, and 

 terrace ; distances are regulated to an inch. This is 

 what is known as ''practical advice," whereas anyone 

 with two grains of common sense must realise that it is 

 /;72practicable to the last degree ; and that, except as 

 specimens of draughtsmanship, such plans are not worth 

 the paper they are drawn on. Long continued abuse of 

 the word ^' practical " has hindered garden art as much 

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