tops of the plants were cut back so that the entire width instead of 
being eight feet was four feet. 
At the end of the second year, it was ahnost impossible to see 
through what was once a very straggly hedge. If dynamite had not 
been used, it would probably have taken three times as long to get the 
fertihzer down around the roots. 
Book Reviews 
A Garden of Peace. F. Frankfort Moore. Doran — Price $3.00. 
Whoever F. Frankfort Moore, who writes this book, may be, he 
is a gay and accomphshed writer, a traveller and litterateur, as well as 
a gardener with enthusiasm. His garden, unique in position and type, 
is agreeably described in these three hundred pages, but — the pictures 
of the garden! — I confess that before some of them I exclaimed in- 
voluntarily "Pere la Chaise!" 
The book is what its author calls it, a medley, yet not so agreeable 
a medley as Mrs. Earle's Potpourri for instance. A little effort is 
apparent in the book before us, a slight self-consciousness, a certain 
sophistication which interferes to some degree with one's interest. 
If garden writing be not spontaneous, if it cannot be the sort of writ- 
ing which had to be set down, it had much better not exist at all. Mrs. 
Earle's pages flow from her pen as though she breathed the words; 
and her paragraphs on flowers find eager readers, huddled though those 
paragraphs are among others on puddings and currant wine. 
In A Garden of Peace there are dehghtful passages; witness 
that on the beauty of the Anchusas and their gardener from Drop- 
more; and on page ninety- three an illuminating reference to the 
Geometry of Gardening. There are other such in the book; but, 
however justifiable is a Dutch Garden for close quarters beneath 
castle walls, and with whatever charm a facile and amusing writer 
can and does invest the same, pictures and descriptions, too, taken as 
a whole, fail to excite and warm. L. Y. K. 
The Old Gardens of Italy: How to Visit Them. Mrs. Aubrey Le 
Blond. John Lane Company. 
If some day you expect to go to Italy or if you need some fur- 
ther inspiration for such a journey, buy and look through Mrs. Le 
Blond's little book. It is the most complete and charming of guide 
books and makes easy an otherwise difi&cult quest. For in it are 
briefly described endless Italian gardens. You are told where they 
are in terms of the nearest railway station or motor route, imder what 
conditions they may be seen, who made them and when, who owns 
them, and what they offer of interest and beauty. Two added charms 
are that it is a small, light book and that it tells you what is not worth 
struggling to see. If you buy the book you will go to Italy: if you 
are going to Italy you must buy the book. K. L. B. 
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