32 
HENDERSON’S 
PICTURESQUE GARDENS 
Rivals in Harmony 
The art of gardening has been evolving since the days of the Garden of 
Eden, developing gradually into gardens in which in addition to fruits, there were 
also grown herbs, spices and vegetables; then followed an era in which ornamental 
vegetation was included, as well as that for practical use. Arrangement soon 
succeeded haphazard planting ; form and design followed, and then came 
"styles,” with their votaries and opponents, since which time there has been 
a continuous conflict of rival schools designated as architectural, classical, 
formal, geometrical, symmetrical, topiary, natural, landscape, etc.; or possibly 
the style bore the name of the country in which it originated— as the Italian, 
Dutch, etc. We will enter into neither the merits nor the faults of these 
various styles. Each, no doubt, 
suited the taste, environment 
and times. Occasionally an ex- 
treme of style, an arboreal mon- 
strosity, or bad judgment and 
taste would be displayed, call- 
ing forth the ridicule of some 
rival school ; though it is well, 
perhaps, that there should be 
this "condemning-of-sins-we- 
are -not -inclined- to ” spirit, for 
the criticisms, one of the 
other, tend to general im- 
provement and check the pro- 
duction of the grotesque. 
At the present day the im- 
portant battle of "styles” in 
the decoration of home grounds 
is being waged between the ex- 
ponents of "design bedding” 
and the "naturalists,” but there 
is no doubt that both styles 
are indispensable in appropriate 
locations, and in many instances 
should go hand-in-hand, the 
one enhancing the beauty of 
the other ; formality and design 
bedding in juxtaposition with 
the formal lines of architecture, 
gradually breaking into the 
landscape of the natural. We 
picture on this page a good 
example of how gardening art 
has wrought harmony between 
the rivals formality, bedding, 
landscape and the natural; it 
replies silent^ to all critics. 
