278 
The Garden Magazine, June, 1924 
crudity and accentuate their loveliness by giving glimpses of the 
gray beneath. 
Aside from the welcome seclusion it brings and from the fact 
that it furnishes an attractive frame for a garden, the wall often¬ 
times becomes an arresting feature in itself—the play of surface 
light and shadow, a flowing and varied line will lift it to dis¬ 
tinction. A happy flow of line is essential—from wall to tea¬ 
house roof, down again to coping, up over the arch of a gateway 
—break and diversify as you will, but create a feeling of one¬ 
ness. 
In walls as in walks there is again a choice of materials and 
again the limiting consideration that this must be part of the 
whole plan—dwelling and terrace and walk and wall all of a 
piece, as it were. Modern cement offers a flexible and artistic 
medium as it may be tinted to almost any color and made to 
display very interesting texture by skilful trowel work applied 
while the surface is still plastic. A buff-colored stucco with 
coping or trimming of red brick is one of the many successful 
combinations of two materials. 
Brick has decided vivacity, particularly among the less hack¬ 
neyed sorts, and such friendly enduringness of aspect that 
nothing has yet superseded it for certain purposes. No vo¬ 
cabulary truthfully conveys its fascinating divergencies of 
color—we talk about “red” brick thus clumsily designating 
the infinitely various hues of Holland brick, pinkish like dying 
embers and flecked with chrome yellow; or referring perhaps to 
the subdued terra-cotta of the “clinker” with its almost iri¬ 
descent smoky overlay, or to the once despised and now popu¬ 
lar “culls” so similar and yet so individual in character. 
There are many ways of building an all-brick wall—many 
very interesting ways. A simple and commonly used trick 
to create variation of surface and vibration of color is by raking 
out the joints, thus creating hundreds of little shadow lines 
that make the wall almost live. The “headers” too (brick laid 
endwise to tie the wall together) lend variety of color and tex¬ 
ture, as do the pilasters put every six or eight feet apart for rein¬ 
forcement. The pilaster is frequently topped by the familiar 
Italian pot which seems somehow especially fitted to such 
uses by reason of its shape, and perhaps by reason of its long 
tradition too. Filled with trailing or gay-bloomed plants these 
pots sometimes furnish a final needed touch. 
The wall niche is quite in keeping in an elaborate garden 
but seems to me somewhat too pretentious for the more modest 
types or for the small city garden—it gives a kind of gallery 
effect overly striking except for the large-scaled plan; it is really 
an architectural feature belonging legitimately in the bigger 
garden. Accents or focal points can be secured in small gar¬ 
dens by tall, stately trees. Junipers and Arborvitaes—indeed the 
tall columnar Juniper (Red Cedar) is almost indispensable 
for such purposes. Small bronzes too may be safely intro¬ 
duced. 
The wooden fence, though less durable than stone or brick 
or cement perhaps, still holds its place and for some houses is 
the only suitable frame. There are, of course, attractive 
standard patterns—Colonial and the like—and among newer 
sorts the woven wood fence seems desirable for many situa¬ 
tions. 
Seats Which Invite 
T HOUGH much has been written and said on behalf of fur¬ 
niture for the garden, as an actual fact there is still a dearth 
of seats in the average small garden; and even in many a large 
one it has been my lot to wander vainly seeking a comfortable 
spot to linger and enjoy. 
It is self-evident that for comfort a seat must be placed in 
shade and seclusion and always at the end of a walk or vista or 
some place where it has a meaning—perhaps, for instance, the 
place where you would hesitate and want to look in both direc¬ 
tions in strolling through the garden; or near a pool. Water 
has a strong fascination, particularly moving water which 
murmurs or falling water with its tinkling little song, so curi¬ 
ously alluring. The play of light and shade is part of its 
fascination too. 
I remember, in particular, a Southern garden with four 
curved seats at the four corners of a pool and a lantern at the 
end of an adjoining pergola which shone on the pool at night and 
threw its shadow by day. The owner of this garden told me 
that though there were a number of other conveniently situ¬ 
ated seats, this pool drew people to itself, that both his visitors 
and his family inevitably gravitated there—and stayed. Small 
points like this may seem neglible in the making of a garden 
but it is after all the subtleties, the sympathetic individual 
touches in gardens, as in friends, which capture and delight. 
For the permanent seat probably nothing surpasses the classic 
Grecian stone for service and a sense of durability. Lighter 
pieces of furniture that can be shifted about from terrace to 
trees or from one part of the lawn to another are, of course, as 
necessary a part of the garden equipment as they are of the 
living room. Solid rattan with the bark left on is by all odds 
the most satisfactory. It is woven without nails and with a 
wide apron or flounce at the bottom instead of feet and does not 
dig up or injure a fine turf. The bark is smooth, hard, firm, 
and absolutely impervious to weather—it is quite unlike the 
stripped rattan commonly seen and, besides being much more 
durable, is more “out-doorsy” in character and hence more 
suitable for garden use. 
Inside the Teahouse 
A GREAT many objects not ordinarily associated with gar¬ 
dens can be brought in by putting them under adjoining 
shelters as afforded by teahouse or covered terrace. 
Mirrors are occasionally found on sunporches or in sunrooms 
but scarcely ever do they wander further, yet I know of at 
least one teahouse where they have been used with remarkable 
effect. It is in a North Carolina garden, a teahouse of three 
sides and opening full upon the garden picture. It is really 
lived in and has a complete little outfit of china and so forth for 
afternoon tea and light evening suppers. These things are 
tucked snugly out of sight in panelled cupboards faced with 
mirrors set flat and held in place by unostentatious strips of 
wood so that they appear as an integral part of the panel. 
You’ve no idea of the sense of spaciousness they give and how 
the garden sparkles back! It is absorbing to watch the chang¬ 
ing color, the sway of greenery, and the drift of cloud repeated 
here almost as if these quiet receptive silver surfaces brought 
to life another garden. We have enough of the child in us 
still to love gazing-globes too and so they continue to find 
a place in many gardens. 
All such things must, of course, be skilfully set with just the 
right background, emphasis, and relation to the plan as a whole, 
otherwise they are liable to appear comic and distinctly out of 
keeping. 
The fireplace, too, often adds a welcome friendliness and 
contributes definite comfort to outdoor living as hunters and 
fishermen and campers in general well know. Happily it is be¬ 
coming more and more a feature not only of the closed sunroom 
but of the open terrace and garden house as well. 
Materials for the garden house are many and will obviously 
be chosen with due regard to the other features—terrace, walks, 
walls and so on, and all of these, of course, in harmony with the 
dwelling itself. Besides the brick, cement, and slate already 
described there is available nowadays a pitted asbestos shingle 
which appears peculiarly fitted for small structures like the 
teahouse. It comes in five colors—all good—and has an inter¬ 
esting rough edge reminding one of a de-luxe deckle-edged 
paper. 
With so much at its command there seems every reason in the 
world why the garden should cease to be the scene merely of 
frantic grubbing or leisurely strolling and become the firmly 
established center of daily living. 
