CHAPTER VIII 
Shrubbery 
I T is the common habit to think of and 
make use of shrubs — almost never of 
shrubbery. Which is all the difference 
between a nursery and a garden picture, in 
the last analysis. For shrubs individually have 
not the pictorial quality; indeed I think we may 
very safely say that neither has anything else 
that goes to the making of a garden, alone and 
by itself. Solitary growths may become 
splendid and perfect specimens, but their very 
perfection destroys their picturesqueness. So 
I am going to ask you to banish completely the 
thought of the lilac bush or the snowball in the 
midst of the dooryard and to acquire a new 
conception of this kind of garden material. 
Not that we are to make an end of these hne 
old-timers themselves by any means; but we 
must learn more about their kind than we pos- 
sibly can while they as individuals occupy the 
mental foreground, obscuring all else. 
In the first place there are several important 
