House & Garden 
THE GARDEN OF THE READ 
HOUSE. 
AT NEW CASTLE, DELAWARE. 
T HE September number of House and 
Garden contained illustrations of the 
Read House, at New Castle, Delaware, a 
mansion erected in the year i8ot. It stands 
in the corner of a garden occupying the whole 
of the property which belongs to the house and 
extending back into the town where ancient 
church towers and brick gables overlook the 
secluded walks. This beautiful surrounding 
for the mansion was laid out in 1846 by Mr. 
Robert Buist of Philadelphia. The trees 
and shrubs already existing were not only 
left undisturbed, but their value in the garden 
whole was so appreciated that the new work 
was skilfully adjusted to their surroundings. 
We see to-day trees of more than a hundred 
years playing their part with the younger 
growth and with plants that spring up only 
for a season. 
Gardens of fifty years ago are not so com¬ 
mon in America that one can afford to pass 
them without some study of their planning. 
The Garden of the Read House has three 
distinct divisions. Along the street at the 
front, and overlooked by the principal rooms 
of the house, is The Flower Garden, a per¬ 
fectly formal arrangement of two circular 
paths linked, by means of square, latticed 
arbors, to an elliptical parterre in the centre. 
The arbors are veritable vine-clad bowers 
with wooden benches within on two sides. 
All the surrounding plats and flowers are 
enclosed by A Box Hedge, large enough to 
make a strong contrast with the edgings of 
the beds, but scarcely high enough to yield 
the heart’s desire of so many, a garden en¬ 
closed by living green. The full, close 
hedges of the flower garden keep it distinct 
