House £s? Garden 
charming they may be in reality—are difficult 
to reproduce on paper, so loth they are to 
yield up their secrets to the contrivances of 
picture making. 
Avonwood Court at Haverford—one of 
the beautiful group of suburbs west of Phil¬ 
adelphia,—is an example of this panoramic 
type of garden. It was built four years ago 
as an adjunct to a much older house, in re¬ 
lation to which it lies broadside, so that all 
windows facing the south enjoy the garden’s 
unhidden expanse. From the terrace where 
stands the house, the ground fell away into 
what must have been once a meadow. Rich 
soil, brought from a distance, was placed on 
the site for the garden so as to make it level. 
As a matter of fact, it is level in the direction 
of east and west; but it falls toward the 
south (i. e. in leaving the house) at the rate 
of about one foot in six. So well groomed 
is the countryside now that all traces of 
careless lowland, fields and stream have 
gone, and a small copse of maples and pines 
occupies the hollow. Insufficient are these 
for a background, however, and it is a natural 
framing of dark woodland foliage that the 
garden lacks. To fill this void, walls were 
built around the garden, and very beautiful 
they have made the enclosure. Indeed 
Avonwood Court is as fine an example of a 
walled garden, the delight of which our 
English ancestors enjoyed, as can be found 
anywhere in America. Once within it, the 
dark, rich red of the bricks, changing from 
course to course and from place to place along 
the walls, appears as the very best possible 
background for the ever varying and grada¬ 
ting greens. At the side having no wall is a 
privet hedge, four feet high, which separates 
the well-kept space of the garden from the 
open lawns outside. The hedge will grow, 
and the height of the walls being fixed, in due 
time will the completeness be realized of “a 
garden within walls, squared, crossed bv 
walks and full set with hedges.” 
The level lawn surrounding the house 
suddenly ends on the side overlooking the 
garden, and the tops of honeysuckles and 
