HOUSE AND GARDEN 
November, 1909 
161 
mapping a walk, I therefore 
contend, is in humoring this 
whimsical human nature — 
in other words, in placing a 
gate at the psychological 
point, a walk along the psy¬ 
chological line. 
The walk or drive —1 
must be understood as refer¬ 
ring to both in all generali- 
zations — that carries a 
capricious human creature 
to a given point without its 
having occurred to him that 
a difference in direction here 
or there would get him there 
with completer satisfaction 
to his captious soul, is a suc¬ 
cess. This is unquestionably 
the supreme test. 
Of course it is nothing 
but the line of least resist¬ 
ance again, you see, in the 
last analysis — only this time 
it’s the human element to be 
dealt with instead of Nature. 
But how are we to determine 
this line? And will it not 
interfere sometimes with a 
great many important things, 
if literally followed ? 
To the latter, yes it 
will—sometimes — if literally 
followed; to the former, we 
are going to determine it by 
predetermining just where 
it shall fall. That is, we are 
going to create the condi¬ 
tions which will establish 
the direction we wish it to take, instead of accepting the direc¬ 
tion already established by conditions as we find them — providing 
of course that condi¬ 
tions as we find them do 
not already direct it 
along the easiest, best 
and most generally 
beautiful, course. 
On a large place this 
is as apt to be the case 
if the ground is rolling. 
Long, sweeping curves 
will come naturally from 
following the easiest grade 
and avoiding mounds 
and hummocks; but with 
less land natural contours 
are less varied and some¬ 
thing must be done to 
supply the lack, nine 
times out of ten. What 
to do is the question. 
Decide in the first 
place at what point of 
the grounds travel to¬ 
wards the house natur- 
A typical suburban lot redeemed by a all X focU f es i if y ou wUI 
new arrangement of walks notice where your own 
For the entrance driveway to a big estate here is a suggestion. The Lorn 
bardy poplars were planted to protect young Norway spruces only tem 
porarily, but the effect is such that they have been allowed to remain 
steps tend to leave the side¬ 
walk and stray truantly 
across the lawn or the place 
where the lawn is going to 
be, you will easily fix this. 
From this point learn the 
course that is the very best 
for your walk to follow—the 
course which will suit you 
best as you walk over it, 
and that will look best from 
house, grounds and street; 
then, if there is no excuse for 
deviating from a common¬ 
place straight line, furnish 
such an excuse. 
Plant a tree squarely in 
the way, with another near 
enough to give both the ap¬ 
pearance of happening to be 
there. Reinforce these with 
groups of shrubs if necessary, 
which the walk will have to 
avoid. Lead and coax it 
along in this way until, 
adjusting itself to the ob¬ 
structions you have pro¬ 
vided, it follows your own 
sweet will with nothing to 
hint that it could have taken 
any other course. 
In most small suburban 
places the “direct” line is in¬ 
terpreted to be a line straight 
in from the street to the front 
door for the walk, and straight 
back to the stable or garage 
if there be one, for the drive 
—an arrangement as uncom¬ 
promisingly ugly as anything could possibly be, unless the style 
of the house is strictly formal and the walk is lined up accordingly, 
with the drive planted out. But very rarely is a suburban 
house strictly formal—that is, the main entrance is rarely 
exactly in the middle of a perfectly balanced house — and 
very, very rarely does a tired individual, sauntering home¬ 
ward, find it the natural thing to walk to a point directly 
opposite the door, turn a right-about-face corner and walk in, 
in a bee line, and up his front steps; though it’s not fatigue, as 
a matter of fact, that makes the idea irritating, in spite of his 
possible belief that it is. 
The small suburban place offers, possibly, the most difficult 
problem of all in this as in other respects, its limitations being 
very severe and conventional ugliness being accepted as the 
proper thing—indeed the only thing. In fact the small suburban 
place, commoner than every other kind of place in the land, is the 
one thing of all others that we, as a nation, go on uglifying year 
in and year out in Simian imitation of each other, with almost 
never an attempt to break away from our commonplace traditions. 
But that, as I have said before, is another story. 
To show that we are not all aping our neighbors, however, I 
am going to append the little plan of an unusual departure from 
the customary treatment of a very small place, which will make 
some of the things I have been saying plainer than simply telling 
about them possibly can The entrances are of course the 
feature which makes this place so emphatically different from 
all others; which is my reason for presenting it in an article deal¬ 
ing with this subject. But it is worth while to note that, by 
