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SOME NOTES ON THE GARDEN AT EAST BERGHOLT PLACE. 
Contributed by Charles Eley, 
This garden consists of a small ancient garden and the additions which have 
been made to it since 1875, the greater part of which has been done from 1900 
onwards. 
The site, about 130 feet above sea level, is an exposed one for the most part, 
consequently a large part of the work has consisted in planting, undertaken to 
secure that shelter which is necessary to the comfort of most plants, and almost 
vital to the successful growing of rhododendrons. 
With the exception of a few old hardy hybrids, there are no rhododendrons 
here more than about twelve years old, and the only point worthy of note is that 
a fair number of the Himalayan varieties are progressing steadily, ha\'ing been 
planted here about nine years, and are believed to constitute the only plants of 
their kind in this dry and cold neighbourhood. There are also a good number 
of small rhododendrons from the collections of Henry, Wilson, and Forrest, for 
most of which the owner is indebted to members of the Rhododendron Society. 
It follows from this that there is little to recount regarding the rhododendrons 
here, and what little of interest in this respect there may be, may well wait untH, 
in some future year. Notes are again required. 
But in order to qualify for a copy of the Society’s Notes, even if it has to be 
taken with a blush, the writer will attempt some remarks upon the composition 
of shelter belts in gardens, in the hope that it may provoke other members to 
enlarge upon the possibilities. 
Visitors for the first time to that Meccah of gardeners, Cornwall, must often 
have been driven by despair to the conclusion that they would do well on their 
return to burn all their books and to begin anew. 
On recovery from the first shock, consideration will force upon them that the 
amazing results produced there are fundamentally based upon an almost prodigal 
use of that shelter which is so conspicuously absent from the design of most 
English gardens, particularly old ones, and is absent, no doubt, for the reason 
that the makers did not contemplate the cultivation or rare trees or shrubs, but 
strove to obtain a fine and comfortable frame for their homes, supplying the 
necessary colour by the use of bulbs, roses and, in later times, of herbaceous 
plants. 
Naturally, it is necessary that the plants for shelter purposes should be 
ornamental, quite hardy and absolutely dense to the ground ; neither greedy 
of soil, nor of attention; of requisite height, easy to obtain cheaply, and if 
possible “ rabbit proof.” 
So much for the counsel of perfection, now for the other thing. 
Leaving the favoured west altogether out of consideration, one plant alone, 
the common laurestinus, seems to fill the bill, and that requires to be trans- 
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