February, 1914 
HOUSE AND GARDEN 
113 
l\StVCX6e- 
and the outline of the plot will have taken shape upon the paper. 
Perhaps you may be dealing with a five-sided form ; in which event 
it will be plain enough that the determining of the fourth side must 
be made from the third ; and then the fifth added. 
Contour lines are unnecessary on level, or even on quite de¬ 
cidedly sloping land; but land of very irregular surface conforma- |-Vv Q 
tion must have them indicated in order to proceed intelligently 
with its general arrangement. Determining contours is some¬ 
thing of a nuisance, it must be confessed, although it is by no 
means a difficult undertaking. Two people are necessary — one 
to handle the poles, and the other to work the levels; and two 
methods are open to the amateur, either accurate enough to serve 
the purpose perfectly. One is by means of a T-square attached 
firmly to the end of a straight and flat-sided pole; the other is 
with a plane table. The former is more open to error; the latter 
is a little bit more troublesome to prepare for. Both are given, 
however, so that choice may be made. 
A 50-foot tape line is a valuable assistant, but distances may be 
paced, so this is not a necessity. Before doing any pacing, how- 
every, it is well to measure off 3 feet on the ground and get the 
feel” of this stride 
10 
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The main axes of a house are along its longitudinal and transverse centers. If the 
house center is found and related directly with the garden feature along its main 
axis as in this case, unity generally results 
if you are not accus¬ 
tomed to measuring 
distance, otherwise 
you may not succeed 
in judging the right 
length. 
Contours are usu¬ 
ally plotted at 5-foot 
levels, though they 
may, of course, be 
any distance apart 
vertically that one 
chooses. Five feet 
gives a pretty satis¬ 
factory idea of grade, 
however, and is more conveniently worked than a shorter dis¬ 
tance. So the T-square must be affixed to a substantial piece of 
wood about i l / 2 by ij/2 inches square and just 5 feet in length; 
the top of its head being exactly even with the top of this pole. 
The sighting is to be done lengthwise along the head of the T; so 
in order that this may be kept perfectly horizontal and so insure 
a perfectly level contour, a plumb-line should hang from the top 
of the pole on the side opposite the T-square. The whole arrange¬ 
ment will look about like the picture. 
Choose the lowest spot on your land for a beginning or first 
station point; drive a stake here; locate its exact position on your 
map ; mark it in ink and number it “1.” Standing at this point with 
the lower end of your sighting pole on the ground beside this 
marking stake, and the pole kept erect by the plumb-line, sight 
along the T-square to the boundary, at one side or the other of 
your plot — I choose the left usually — and have a stake driven 
here by your helper at the exact point where your line of vision 
along the head of the T-square is stopped by the rise of the 
ground. Assuming that you begin the sighting at the left, have 
a similar stake driven 10 feet to the right of this mark, another 
10 feet from this, and so on until the other side of the property is 
reached. This will give you a line of 
stakes 10 feet apart, exactly 5 feet 
higher than the station point. Measure 
the distance from the station point to 
the first of these stakes; measure a like 
distance with your scale on the map 
from the point 1 to the spot on the 
boundary where the first contour line is 
to be indicated; indicate this with a dot, 
and mark it “5.” Next measure from 
the station point on the ground to the 
second stake; measure a like distance 
on your map, making sure to keep 
exactly 10 feet in and away from the 
(Continued on page 128) 
There may be many separate divisions to your garden. Why not consider fruit trees for one section? They give 
you shade, flowers and fruit and require little tending 
