Colonial Garden-making 
21 
I do not doubt that this Van Cortlandt garden 
was laid out when the house was built; much of it 
must be two centuries old. It has been extended, not 
altered; and the grass-covered bank supporting the 
upper garden was replaced by a brick terrace wall 
about sixty years ago. Its present form dates to the 
days when New York was a province. The upper 
garden is laid out in formal flower beds ; the lower 
border is rich in old vines and shrubs, and all the 
beloved old-time hardy plants. There is in the 
manor-house an ancient portrait of the child Pierre 
Van Cortlandt, painted about the year 1732. He 
stands by a table bearing a vase filled with old gar- 
den flowers* — Tulip, Convolvulus, Harebell, Rose, 
Peony, Narcissus, and Flowering Almond; and it 
is the pleasure of the present mistress of the manor, 
to see that the garden still holds all the great-grand- 
father’s flowers. 
There is a vine-embowered old door in the wall 
under the piazza (see opposite page 20) which opens 
into the kitchen and fruit garden ; a wall-door so 
quaint and old-timey that I always remind me of 
Shakespeare’s lines in Measure for Measure : — 
“ He hath a garden circummured with brick. 
Whose western side is with a Vineyard back’d ; 
And to that Vineyard is a planched gate 
That makes his opening with this bigger key : 
The other doth command a little door 
Which from the Vineyard to the garden leads.” 
The long path is a beautiful feature of this gar- 
den (it is shown in the picture of the garden oppo- 
