28 
A FEW FLOWERS 
creeper that would look stiff and wretched 
against a wall; here is a shady recess be¬ 
neath a flowering tree. Instead of follow¬ 
ing it up in the ordinary gardening way 
and making a shrub wall or bank of plants, 
keep it for the sake of its shade. If any 
important plants will not grow in it, cover 
the ground with Ground Ivy, which will 
form a pretty carpet, and through the 
Ground Ivy dot a few wild Ferns. In 
front of this only use low plants, and thus 
we shall get a pretty little vista, with shade 
and a pleasant relief. Next we come to a 
bare spot of 6 or 7 feet or so on the 
margin, covering it with a strong evergreen 
Candytuft, and let this form the edge. 
Then allow a group of Japan Quince to 
come right into the grass edge and break 
group OF NARCISSUS IN PROPERLY-sPaUEL) SHRUBBERY. the margin ; next a carpet of broad-leaved 
Saxifrage, receding under the near bushes 
and trees : and so proceed, artistically, making groups and colonies, considering every point, never using a plant which you 
do not know and enjoy the effect, and arranging the place so that with cleaning it may last for years with such slight 
changes as new additions to your stock may require. 
This border plan is capable of considerable variety, depending on whether we are dealing with an established and tall 
shrubbery, a medium one of flowering trees and ordinary shrubs, or a very choice plantation of flowering Evergreens and 
Rhododendrons. In the last case, owing to the soil and the neat habit of the bushes, we have excellent conditions in which 
good culture as well as an effective arrangement is possible. One can have the finest things among them — that is to say, 
if the bushes are not jammed together. The ordinary way of planting shrubs is such that they grow together, and then it 
is not possible to grow flowers between them, nor can one see the very shape of the bushes, because their forms are lost in 
one solid, leafy mass. In growing fine things—Lilies or Cardinal Flowers or tall Evening Primroses—among fairly- 
spaced bushes, we effect a double purpose—we form a delightful kind of garden, we secure sufficient space for the bushes 
to show their form and habit, and we get some light and shade among 
them. In such plantations one might in the back parts have “ secret ” 
colonies, so to say, of lovely things which it might not be desirable 
to show on the front border, or which were the better for the shade 
and more perfect shelter that the front did not afford. 
The Flower Border in the Fruit or Kitchen Garden. — 
In this we have the original and perhaps the commonest form of 
mixed garden — the borders in the kitchen garden or the fruit garden, 
as the case may be. I his kind of border is very badly made, but it 
may be made the most delightful thing conceivable. The plan is to 
secure from 0 to 12 feet of rich soil on each side of the walk and 
cut the borders off from the main garden by a trellis of some kind. 
The trellis may be strong iron or galvanized wire, or perhaps, better 
still, of simple, rough wooden branches — uprights topped by other 
branches of the same kind. Any kind of rough permanent trellis 
will do, from 6 to 9 feet high. On this rough trellis, appropriately 
used, we have the opportunity of growing the climbing Roses and 
Clematis, and .all the choicer but not too rampant climbers. More¬ 
over, we can grow them with all their natural grace along the wires or 
rough branches, or, still better, up and across our rustic wooden trellis, 
and the Rose and Clematis may show their grace uncontrolled. We 
fix the main branches to the supports and leave the rest to the winds. 
Here, then, we have the best opportunity for the finest type of mixed 
border, because we have ail the graceful climbing plant life we desire 
in contrast with the plants in the border. There are opportunities for 
making borders in front of evergreen hedges. In fact, there is 
scarcely a place in which sites and situations may not be made avail¬ 
able. The true art of gardening is to adorn and make the most 
of the situations we have ; the opposite, and the much commoner, 
way is to suppose that we cannot make much of what we have, and 
therefore must go to extraordinary expense to create conditions and 
