Close to the House 



course. Unfortunately, however, they are 

 usually flower - beds filled with annuals or 

 tender ornamental plants. They look bet- 

 ter, perhaps, than utter nakedness, although 

 when the choice is a particularly tasteless 

 one even as much as this cannot be granted. 



In the first place, what ha.s been said of an- 

 nual creepers applies equally to tender plants 

 of other sorts — the work is done, the effect 

 is produced, for the season merely. When 

 winter comes, nakedness returns in a worse 

 shape than if no flowers had been planted ; 

 the house stands, not even upon grass, but on 

 a line of empty earth which makes its want 

 of harmony with its surroundings most pain- 

 fully apparent. And then in the spring the 

 labor of clothing its base must be begun 

 again. In the second place flower-beds are 

 too monotonous. We need more variety of 

 form ; we need to diversify the clothing 

 green by massing it, by carrying it up in 

 certain places higher than in others, and by 

 spreading it out here and there to connect or 

 group with other plantations in the vicinity. 

 What we want to mitigate is that rigid for- 

 mality of architectural features which does 



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