Supplement to the Gardeners' Magazine, December 17, 1898. 



KEES fancifully shaped by the manipulative skill 

 of the pruner have been so useful to those who whatever may have been 



take advantage of every possible opportunity for 

 posing as the embodiment of taste in its relation 

 to the garden, that the indications we have of a 

 revival in this country of the topiary art can 

 hardly fail to afford gratification to some members 

 of the community. To wax indignant about them, 

 to rail against the mutilation of trees, and to give 

 a show of wisdom to people who are exceptionally 

 shallow, are so easy that it is not difficult to understand why signs of some 

 change in this direction should be welcome to the self-constituted arbiters 

 of taste. The justification for a discussion of the relative merits of old- 

 fashioned and modern gardens no longer exists ; and with the abolition 

 of the worst features of the bedding system, and the popularity of 

 hardy plants, two perennial sources of criticism have been dried up. 

 There are, of course, some who still believe that gardens of the present 

 day cannot be compared with those of past generations, and of this I 

 have evidence in an essay on the gardens of the Tudor period, which 

 appeared in one of the popular monthlies a short time since. In this 

 essay comparisons are instituted between the Tudor and Victorian 

 gardens, and inferences drawn by no means favourable to the latter. The 

 writer indeed asserts that " when in perfection " the Tudor gardens 

 "were equally stately and beautiful, and in their natural variety far 

 superior to the commonplace blaze of colour in geometrical shapes 

 which make up the modern garden, wherein all individuality seems 

 sacrificed to conventionalism." Following a quotation from the opening 

 paragraphs of Bacon's famous essay on gardens, we are assured that 

 " This is a progressive idea to which all our modern fashionable ones, as 

 enunciated by head gardeners, is opposed." Then we read of "trees 

 of odorous blossom," of" waving boughs and multitudinous fragrance," and 

 of "ample areas of well-mowed evergreen grass, which should delight the 

 eye," as compared with "the modern garden, and the limited ideas which 

 define it, and the scrimpy 1 lawn,' with its limited space cut up into octagonal 

 and other beds of verbenas and calceolarias." In writing in this way, 

 it is not difficult to convev to those who do not trouble to think 

 for themselves 



every 



convey to 



an idea of superiority in matters of taste and an 

 acquaintance with the styles of gardening that obtained during the two 

 periods. But what are the facts ? Instead of the flower garden possess- 

 ing ample lawns with few flower beds and spacious borders, and so 

 placed as to afford, in country districts, extensive views over park and 

 meadow, it was enclosed between "green," or other walls, and cut up 

 into innumerable beds known as knots, some of which were occupied by 

 flowering plants, while others had spread over the surface some coloured 

 material. " As for the making of knots or figures that they may lie under 

 the windows of the house on that side which the garden stands, they 

 be," says Bacon, in his essay, " but toys ; you may see as good sights 

 many times in tarts." Having thus stated his views with regard to 

 the knots, this distinguished writer observes : " The garden is best to be 



square, encompassed on all the four sides with a stately 

 arched hedge ; the arches to be of carpenter's work, of some 

 ten feet high and six feet broad/' He also suggests that 



there should be arches in the hedge with a turret over 



a cage for birds, and "over every 

 between the arches some other little figure with 

 broad plates of round coloured glass, gilt, for 

 the sun to play upon." He further advises 

 that the fountain be "embellished with 

 coloured glass and such things of lustre. 0 

 Mason, who was an admirer of Bacon, 

 after bestowing a liberal measure of praise 

 upon him for the efforts he had made with 



a view to the improvement 

 of the garden of his days, 

 writes in the first book of 

 his " English Garden » : 



The age of tourneys, 

 triumphs, and quaint 

 masques, 

 Glar'd with fantastic pa- 

 > geantry, which dimm'd 

 The sober eye «of tru h, 

 and dazzled ev'n 

 The sage himself ; witness the 



high arch'd hedge, 

 In pillar d state by carpentry 



upborne * 

 With coloured mirrors decVd 



and prisonM biids. 



the merits of the Tudor gardens 

 they had their defects, and were 

 certainly not superior to those of the Victorian 

 era, as some writers would fain have us believe. 



Unquestionably in the gardens of the Elizabethan era 



i ' There likewise mote be seen on every side 

 The shapely yew, of all its branching pride 

 Ungently shorn, and, with preposterous skill, 

 To various beasts and birds of sundry quill 

 Transformed, and human shapes of monstrous size. 

 Also other wonders of the sportive shears, 

 Fair nature misadorning, there were found : 

 Globes, spiral columns, pyramids and piers, 



With spouting urns and budding statues crowned ; 



And horiz mtail dials on the ground 



In living box, by cunning artists traced ; 



And galleys trim, or on long voyage bound, 



But by their roots there ever anchored fast." 



The shaping of trees with shears and knife is frequently spoken of as 

 mutilation, but with greater propriety it is called topiary work, from the 

 Latin topiarius, shaped by cutting, the word being used in this sense by 

 Pliny, Vitruvaris, Cicero, and other of the classical authors. In giving 

 what must necessarily be a brief sketch of the history of the art, it 

 is not my intention to strongly advocate the practice of shaping trees 

 according to the taste of the pruner, with a view to accelerating the 

 revival of which we havejndications. On the other hand, I do not purpose 

 condemning it as extravagant and absurd. It is undoubtedly true that 

 the natural form of a tree is the most beautiful form possible for that 

 particular tree ; but it sometimes happens that we do not want the most 

 beautiful form, but one of our own designing:, for the sake of the variety it 

 affords. So far as authority bears on the subject, it is distinctly in favour of 

 topiary, for the Romans recognised the shaping of trees into architectural 

 forms as an essential part of the gardening art. Shakespeare is quoted as 

 an authority on a great diversity of matters, and more particularly in 

 defence of " the natural style of gardening/' But there can be no question 

 that the garden of Shakespeare's time was a garden of knots and topiary. 

 It was — as indicated by the quotation from Bacon— enclosed with hedges 

 of clipped hornbeam and yew, and embellished with arbours, obelisks, 

 pyramids, and spires of verdant greenery. The " curious knotted garden " 

 mentioned in the letter of Arnado, in the first scene of M Love's Labours 

 Lost," was, beyond all doubt, furnished with examples of the topiary art. 



Shakespeare was familiar with such gardens as the one above described, 

 and approved of the prevailing taste of his time. Bacon had no 

 liking for clipped trees, and with reference to them he says in his essay, 

 u I for my part do not like images cut in juniper or other garden stuff ; 

 they be for children." Many of those at the present day regard things 

 of lustre as toys for children, and in so doing they render it impossible for 

 them with any degree of consistency to set up Bacon as an arbiter of 

 taste. We can go back to a time long anterior to Shakespeare for 

 authority for the shaping of trees into fanciful forms, for the topiary art 

 was practised with much success in Roman gardens in the first century 

 of the Christian era. It attained a high state of development in the 

 gardens of Pliny's Tuscan villa. According to Malthus these famous 

 gardens were of large extent, and from the terrace, with its stately 

 colonnade, the visitor descended to the lawn, on which were numerous 

 figures cut in box trees. Surrounding the lawn was a broad walk 

 enclosed by evergreens cut into a variety of forms, and a long stretch of 

 grass used for chariot exercise, intersected by two rows of box trees 

 representing various domesticated and wild animals. In other parts of 

 the ground were innumerable examples of the art, including animals, 

 obelisks, and letters— some being the initials of the owner, and others of 

 the persons employed in the management of the garden. There can be 

 no doubt that the garden of Pliny's villa, as it existed at the end of the 

 first century, when, under the reign'of Trajan, Rome was at the zenith of 

 her glory, set the fashion of European gardening for many centuries. 

 The resemblance of the Dutch and French gardens in the sixteenth anc 

 seventeenth centuries to that of Pliny's villa is remarkable. In them 

 were the raised terrace along the principal front of the house, with the 

 gradual slope to the lawn, the small geometrical flower garden cut up 

 into numerous small beds, with a fountain in the centre ; and walks 

 flanked by trees, mostly shaped into a diversity of fanciful forms. 

 With reference to the style of gardening adopted by Pliny, Walpole 

 writes : u In an age when architecture in all its grandeur, all its purity, 

 and all its taste ; when arose Vespasian's Amphitheatre, the Temple of 

 Peace, Trajan's Forum, Dormtian s Bath, and Adrian's Villa, the ruins 

 and vestiges of which still excite our astonishment and curiosity ; a 

 Roman Consul, a polished emperor's friend, and a man of elegant 



