AVENUES, VISTAS, AND LAWNS 
89 
These vistas, now carpeted with short grass, have opened up to the 
public portions of Kew which, although in many respects the most 
beautiful and most picturesque, were practically a closed book to 
all but one in a thousand of the people a few years ago. 
In the more thinly-planted parts of the grounds, where the lawns 
are kept smooth, the same system of opening up long stretches to 
the uninterrupted view has been pursued. It is sur- 
Thcir prising how often the removal of a few trees and of 
the lower branches of a few others has been found to 
disclose a vista a quarter or half a mile in length. In visiting 
the demesnes of England one is very frequently struck by the neglect 
to open up the charming views which often exist. On such occasions 
there is nothing more irritating than to feel that beautiful glimpses 
of mountain, valley, or river, or even the quieter beauties of the 
English champaign, are being shut out, when a day or two’s work 
with saw and axe would reveal them all. At Kew these vistas have 
done much to rectify the somewhat amorphous character of certain 
parts where the trees had been dotted about without regard to any- 
thing more than giving a sufficiency of space for the development of 
each. The separation of the trees into groups, which the formation 
of vistas has often involved, has given a form and definiteness 
to certain portions, and has much improved Kew as a picturesque 
garden. 
If there be one feature which, more than any other, is the pride 
of English gardens, it is their broad sweeps of thick, closely-mown 
turf. Nowhere else in the world are the lawns so fresh, 
so green, so good to walk upon. There is nothing in the 
gardens the tourist envies so much. The credit belongs chiefly, no 
doubt, to the much-abused climate. Still, lawns require and respond 
to careful treatment and attention as much as do any of the subjects 
of the gardener’s care. This is especially the case at Kew, where 
from two to three millions of people enter the gates annually, yet 
scarcely any restrictions to the free use of its lawns exist. Never, 
indeed, does one feel the delight of Kew more than when, on a hot 
summer day, one can escape the heat and dust and turmoil of Kew 
Bridge, or the busy Kew Road, to saunter along the ample stretches 
of soft green turf dappled with the cool shadows of many trees. 
The oldest lawn in Kew whose continued existence can be traced 
is the large open space in front of Kew Palace. It originally filled the 
Lawns. 
