THE GARDENERS' CHRONICLE OF AMERICA 
309 
THE NAME "FORMAL GARDEN" 
'TPHE garden of this house has been called by that 
simple right name for 300 years, and to describe 
it as "formal" is needless and redundant. 
I anticipated and hoped that the opinion as to the 
use of the word "formal" would be challenged, but in 
this I have been disappointed, and leaves me no option 
but to take up the cudgels for the retention of a term 
which I believe not to be "useless," as Mr. Robinson 
describes it, but one that fills a vacuum in gardening 
vocabulary. 
First, let us examine its etymological significance. 
Taken at random from half a dozen dictionaries, new 
and old, I find that its definition is given variously as 
follows: On the authority of Holy Writ, "form" 
means splendor, pomp and dignity. Shakespeare uses 
"formality" to imply regularity, method, order. Wal- 
ler uses "formal" to signify regular, methodical. 
Again turning to Holy Writ, we find "form" used to 
express a sense of beauty, or elegance of appearance ; 
and, finally, Dryden uses the term "to form" to imply 
to modify, to scheme, to plan. 
I might say in passing that this opinion of Mr. Rob- 
inson's is not by any means a recently formed one ; but 
I, in common with many other admirers of him, have 
never been able to understand his reasoning, which 
seems to be lacking in logic. In his "English Flower 
Garden" — undeniably one of the best gardening books 
in the English language — he freely makes use of such 
phrases as these: "Formality is often essential to the 
plan of a garden," and "Design not formal only," 
which imply at least that he found the necessity of 
using the word to express something, whatever he had 
in his mind at the time. In the light of the context to 
the above quotations, there is very little doubt that he 
understood by it what most of us do, viz., those por- 
tions of the garden that have for one reason or an- 
other to conform to regular lines, methodical arrange- 
ment, and perhaps ordered severity of design. 
Now let us examine another term that we all use 
freely and with which Mr. Robinson has been particularly 
liberal — the "wild" garden. Again let us take the ety- 
mological significance of the word: d) "Not refined 
by culture." (2) "Growing without culture." (3) "A 
term prefixed to many plants to distinguish them from 
such as are grown in gardens." Yet a third definition, 
and this time of the word "garden" : "A piece of 
ground appropriated to the cultivation of herbs or 
plants, fruit or flowers," and "A rich, well cultivated 
spot." 
Obviously, if we adhere strictly to the dictionary 
definitions, a garden cannot be a garden and at the 
same time wild. But "wild garden" is nevertheless a 
correct term to employ, because by established usage 
it has come to convey to our minds gardening or cul- 
tivating with the freedom of line and arrangement dis- 
played by Nature. It means cultivating a garden in 
imitation of Nature's own haphazard and indis- 
criminate but, nevertheless, beautiful distribution of 
its component parts. In the true etymological sense 
we have no right to use the term and, curiously 
enough, the French possess none to correspond with 
it. The nearest they get to it is the jardin sauvage. 
But Mr. Robinson, if he did not create the term, has 
certainly been the most efl^ective instrument in popu- 
larizing it, and we are all grateful to him. Would any 
of us dare to say it is "needless," "redundant" or "use- 
less," or that to call the wild garden a garden is suffi- 
cient? No; and why? Because it separates in the 
mind the portions of the gardens that are not regular 
or methodical. It eradicates instantaneously all 
thought of terraced gardens, straight lines, herbaceous 
borders, architecture of all descriptions, but rather 
conjures up the picture of Goldsmith : 
"Near yonder copse where once a garden smiled. 
And still where many a garden flower grows wild." 
If, then, the term "wild garden" is justifiable be- 
cause it separates in the mind the necessary extension 
of the architectural lines of a house into the surround- 
ing land : if these lines must (and often it is inevitable) 
consist of direct paths to particular points ; if it is wise 
— and it often is — to create on the lines of such paths 
a garden arrangement, simple, more or less severe, al- 
ways to a very great extent regular and methodical, 
then the term "formal" is not only desirable but indis- 
pensable. Moreover, it is better used than the word 
"wild" ever can be, applied to any part of the garden. 
Splendor, dignity, beauty, elegance of appearance and 
method always have their place in the good garden. 
Often regularity and pomp may be — indeed, are — 
overdone, but that is no reason for discontinuing 
the use of a word that has come to mean so much. It 
is said that there are gardens called formal that 
are bad in every respect, then I must retort that 
there are so-called wild gardens that are mere ne- 
glected wildernesses, and others that are wild only in 
the sense that they are artificial dumps, such spots as 
Nature never produced in her wildest mood. 
The whole point is this: If a word conveys what it 
is meant to convey and is generally understood, it is 
right to use it. The fact that one may conceivably 
have an objection to what it does convey is no reason 
for suppressing its use. "Formal garden" means some- 
thing that we all understand, and whether that some- 
thing is good or bad matters not at all. It is a term 
we cannot dispense with. — George Dillistone, in The 
Garden (English.) 
THINGS AND THOUGHTS OF THE GARDEN 
{Continued from fage 298. ) 
room enough elsewhere for Corn and Tomatoes. We 
need to preach the gospel of fruit. In any case one 
can plant standards, so that the branches are up in 
the air, away from the ground, and only when the 
trees begin to get large do they cast a damaging shade. 
* * * * 
We are entering Autumn and are reaping the har- 
vest of beauty and utilitarian value for our labors of 
the earlier period. It seems so short a time since we 
were able to get out on the ground after the frosts — 
April is not far distant ; but our sowings have grown, 
our plantings matured, and both in the vegetable plots 
and the flower borders we have gleaned for food and 
for ornament. How lonely the garden is now in these 
beautiful Summer mornings. Under the awning of 
one of those excellent and most desirable swinging 
seats that are so inexpensive, one can take stock of 
the long borders, the Rose beds, the bedding, the 
lawns, the healthy growth of trees and shrubs this 
year, all the while the cicadas strum their pleasant 
vibrant crescendo, the butterflies, bees and gauze- 
winged flies flutter or glide, and the hum of life and 
of opulence of growth fill the heart with joy and satis- 
faction. To those who love flowers and gardens the 
reward will come. It is here now. Too many, how- 
ever, think they can enjoy these things by sitting on 
a piazza or by snatching an odd moment or two be- 
tween runs with the auto. 
