The Hardy Garden 
THE OLD-FASHIONED WAY BESIDE THE GARDEN PATH 
yucca, a native of the South Western States, a plant 
that glories in the sunshine and perhaps looks best 
near rocks, or in a position in keeping with its native 
habitat, where luxurious foliage is not so often seen 
as arid wastes. 
Our second illustration shows a better position for 
it. Several specimens may be seen growing among 
the rocks. Rockeries or rock gardens are more often 
a failure than otherwise, owing to the difficulty of 
placing them where they will have appropriate sur¬ 
roundings. If, however, they can be built where 
they do not look too artificial and where sufficient 
moisture is provided, there is nothing better for 
showing off some of the choicer alpines or mountain 
plants. 
The pockets and crevices formed by the rocks 
are ideal places in which to grow such plants as 
edelweiss, mountain pinks, stonecrops, saxifrages, 
hardy cacti for sunny spots and choice hardy ferns, 
hepaticas, anemones and such like for the shaded 
ones. If the grounds around the home are of a 
rocky, uneven character, after the utilities have had 
due consideration, it is a great mistake not to take 
advantage of the great possibilities in this feature of 
gardening. One has only to see the wonderful effects 
produced hy the Japanese to realize how much can 
be done with a few stones, and how much art is re¬ 
quired to place a single stone in its proper position. 
If a criticism of American design is at all justi¬ 
fiable it would certainly be of the tendency to make 
all gardens look alike, instead of originality and in¬ 
dividuality. 
Perhaps one of the most popular and from a utili¬ 
tarian point of view, the best arrangement for grow¬ 
ing a collection of hardy perennials, is the mixed 
border as shown in the illustration. In such a bor¬ 
der flowers may be had for house decoration from 
early spring until late fall. Beginning with the 
snowdrop, daffodil and violet before the snow has 
scarcely left the ground, each kind blooms in its al¬ 
lotted season through the summer months until the 
Japanese anemone and the last lingering hardy 
chrysanthemum mark the close of the season. 
A glance at the illustration will reveal a symmetry 
in arrangement which brings all the low growing 
ones to the front along the path and the taller to the 
hack without apparent effort. The clumps of the 
individual kinds should be large enough to give 
character, and care must he used not to get clashing 
colors in too close proximity to each other. 
Color effects are almost an impossibility where 
massing is required to produce them, success rather 
depends on the continuity of bloom, and to produce 
this a large assortment must be used, or there will 
be seasons when the border will not look very at¬ 
tractive. 
177 
