Garden Boundaries 
411 
land is at Ascott, the seat of Mr. Leopold de 
Rothschild, but - the examples there have not 
attained a growth at all approaching those at 
Wellesley. Mr. Hunnewell writes thus of his 
garden : — 
u It was after a visit to Elvaston nearly fifty years ago 
that I conceived the idea of making a collection of trees 
for topiary work in imitation of what I had witnessed at 
that celebrated estate. As suitable trees for that purpose 
could not be obtained at the nurseries in this country, and 
as the English Yew is not reliable in our New England 
climate, I was obliged to make the best selection possible 
from such trees as had proved hardy here — the Pines, 
Spruces, Hemlocks, Junipers, Arbor-vitae, Cedars, and 
Japanese Retinosporas. The trees were all very small, 
and for the first twenty years their growth was shortened 
twice annually, causing them to take a close and compact 
habit, comparing favorably in that respect with the Yew. 
Many of them are now more than forty feet in height and 
sixty feet in circumference, the Hemlocks especially proving 
highly successful.” 
This beautiful example of art in nature is ever 
open to visitors, and the number of such visitors is 
very large. It is, however, but one of the many 
beauties of the great estate, with its fine garden of 
Roses, its pavilion of splendid Rhododendrons and 
Azaleas, its uncommon and very successful rock 
garden, and its magnificent plantation of rare trees. 
There are also many rows of fine hedges and arches 
in various portions of the grounds, hedges of clipped 
Cedar and Hemlock, many of them twenty feet 
high, which compare well in condition, symmetry, 
