The Garden Magazine, June, 1920 
255 
ingless, formal monstrosities. At the same time he made his 
criticisms constructive by showing us what a wealth of material 
was at our service, and teaching us how to compose it in natural 
picturesque ways that embellish, instead of mar, the general 
landscape. And his life work vindicates his dictum that good 
gardening is a “ matter of taste and not of style,” to be restricted 
by man-made conventions and regulations. 
Hence to acclaim William Robinson as the great gardening 
genius of his age is according him only a just and well earned 
meed of praise; for he, above all men, has had the vision to see, 
and the faculty to convince the world that, to quote his own 
words, “of all things made by man for his pleasure a flower 
garden has the least cause to be ugly, barren, or stereotyped, 
because in it we may have the fairest of the earth’s children in a 
living and ever changeful state, and not, as in other arts, mere 
representations of them.” Thus to-day we are all his disciples, 
and gardeners the world over pay homage to this most illustrious 
of gardeners. 
THE HEATH GARDEN AT GRAVETYE IN APRIL, AND ITS PROTECTING PINES 
Sheltered by native and ornamental evergreens, masses of white Erica arborea and rose colored Erica mediterranea 
occupy the background, with pale violet Erica gracilis in the centre and the pink Calluna vulgaris close up 
II.— HIS GARDENS AT GRAVETYE MANOR, By J. WILKINSON ELLIOTT 
fortune came to William Robinson, which it has in 
I abundance, he bought a neglected old place known 
as Gravetye Manor in the hills of north Sussex, with 
more than a thousand acres of land about it. And to 
making here one of the loveliest gardens in the world he has 
devoted a large portion of his time for twenty-five years. 
The old gray stone manor house stands about half way up the 
slope of a hill. This has necessitated a series of terrace walls to 
secure level spaces where, because paved stone walks and square 
beds afforded the best treatment of certain areas, he has not 
hesitated to use them — in which connection let me say, in passing, 
that some stupid people therefore describe the garden as a 
“formal” one, though nothing is farther from the truth, or dis- 
gusts the owner more. Mr. Robinson’s objection never was 
to terraces where they are needed, as those who wilfully mis- 
understand him like to assert, but only to their use when there 
is no necessity for them. These terrace walls of Gravetye 
are covered with vines and the interstices between the stones 
are planted with dainty little hardy plants, which rob the walls 
of all stiffness and formality. Every plant in the garden more- 
over has been allowed to develop its natural form and beauty. 
Beginning at the house the gardens spread in every direction 
