NORTH SHORE BREEZE 
The Fascinations ot the Fountain 
From time immemorial, mankind 
has loved a garden; and in that gar- 
den, there has been a fountain. From 
the tombs of Ancient Egypt comes 
a picture of the garden once owned 
by a King of Thebes. In it was a 
pergola, covered with grapevines, 
and bordered with palm-trees. This 
garden contained four pools of 
water, each bordered by a grass plot, 
where geese were kept, and the sa- 
ered flower of the lotus spread its 
pure and fragrant petals upon the 
surface of the lagoon. 
The author of the Odyssey, writ- 
ing nearly a thousand years before 
the Christian Era, speaks of ‘‘all 
manner of garden beds, carefully 
planted, perpetually fresh, and in the 
midst, two fountains of water, 
whereof one scatters his streams all 
about the garden; the other issues 
by the lofty house, and thence did 
the townsfolk draw water. Such 
were the splendid gifts of the gods 
in the palace of Alcinous.’’ 
King Cyrus of Persia took such de- 
light in his gardens that he planted 
and measured off with his own hand. 
The gardens of- Epicurus, with 
fountains and streams, were famous 
in Athens. Indeed, the charm of 
spouting water, which appeals alike 
to eye and ear, has always been ap- 
preciated by those who loved a gar- 
den. It is quite safe to suppose that 
fountains have been in existence 
since the history of the world began. 
Some have been elaborate achieve- 
ments in architecture, such as those 
beautiful examples of the Italian 
Renaissance, which may still be seen 
in ancient Italian villas, or the more 
modern, but no less ornate, struc- 
tures built by La Notre in the gar- 
dens of Louis Quatorze, at Versailles. 
Credit for introducing gardening 
into England has sometimes been 
given to King William, and to that 
Sir William Temple, who ordered 
that his dead heart be buried under 
the sun-dial in his garden. That 
this credit is undeserved is proved 
by the fact that it would place the 
event at the close of the seventeenth 
century; whereas Paul Hentzner, a 
Nuremberg scholar and traveler, as 
early as 1612, fully describes his vis- 
its to the gardens of Lord Burleigh, 
at Theobalds; or to those at White- 
hall and Nonesuch, the latter a royal 
retreat selected by that much-mar- 
ried monarch, King Henry VIII. 
In each of these places, Hentzner 
speaks of a singular type of fountain 
By MARY H. NORTHEND 
common at this time, and partaking 
of the nature of a boistrous practical 
joke. As it was called the jet d’eau, 
it seems probable that the idea came 
across the channel, from France. Be 
that as it may, the contrivance was 
often connected with a sun-dial, and 
consisted of concealed water-pipes, 
worked by a gardener at a distance, 
who, by turning a little wheel, flung 
coplous streams of water upon the 
luckless wight who drew near to 
consult the sun-dial. So far as I 
know, this style of fountain was 
never copied in America, which cer- 
tainly speaks well for Colonial good 
taste. It seems little less than 
eriminal to turn into a joke that 
which should be the garden’s crown- 
ing loveliness, its very highest em- 
bodiment of beauty—for such the 
fountain has always been regarded. 
Certain English gardens and those 
of the Colonial type, modeled upon 
the sweet seventeenth century. gar- 
dens of Temple and Walpole, may, if 
not too large, use the sun-dial as 
their central feature; but in almost 
every case, our sense of the eternal 
fitness calls for a fountain, and will 
accept no substitute. 
The earliest form of fountain used 
in this country was doubtless that 
still seen in certain fine old gardens 
in the South. It consists of a single 
water jet, falling into a handsome 
basin of marble or some other stone. 
Nothing could be finer in its sim- 
plicity. Near it stands the ‘‘green 
gallery,’’ with its burden of vines, u 
structure which would be desecrated 
by the name of pergola. Close at 
hand, a climbing Baltimore Belle or a 
sweet, white, Mary Washington rose 
wreathes itself about a ‘‘garden 
lyre.”’? A ‘‘rose bower’’ leads to the 
house. It terminates in handsome 
gates, of wrought iron, such as King 
William introduced into England. 
beehives stand under a cherry-tree. 
The air is sweet with the scent of jas- 
mine and wild white honeysuckle. 
Who would eall ‘or anything addi- 
tional ?—save the musical fall of the 
single jet into the beautiful stone 
basin; the wavering of the column, 
to and fro, as the hght breeze blows 
the spray aside; the sparkle of a 
thousand tiny rainbows, now in sun- 
shine, now in shadow, as the foun- 
tain plays in that old-fashioned Vir- 
gvinia garden. 
There is no part of garden archi- 
tecture that offers freer scope for the 
play of imagination than does this 
matter of designing fountains. It is 
a pity that the designer should ever 
lose sight of the fact that the really 
interesting motive is. the water itself, 
fresh, changeful, instinct with life as 
a bird or a flower. No wonder tha 
the phantasy of Undine could grow 
up in a gifted brain! If we held our 
peace, there in the rosebower, the 
fountain in that old garden would al- 
most sing us a similar story. 
Now this is just why statuary 
must be used with the greatest care, 
or we shall find our lovely and pellu- 
cid shower, our fairy cloud of spray, 
our rainbow vision, playing a sub- 
ordinate part to a serpent-wreathed — 
Laosoon, or a Dying Gladiator! 
Comparatively few gardens are on a 
scale of grandeur sufficient to excuse 
the presence of statuary in the foun-— 
tains. When we see groups in pub- 
he parks, their iron ugliness smites 
us like a blow; and the beauty of the © 
water is forgotten, in the actual — 
pain of its hideous surroundings. 
The single jet is beautiful and ef- 
fective in a small garden. 
By in-} 
creasing the size of the jet and the — 
size and elaborate decoration of the — 
basin, the single jet may be adapted 
to any situation, never jarring upon 
our sensibilities, never out of har- 
mony with its surroundings, always — 
effective, and always pleasing—es- — 
pecially so, if care has been taken 
that it shall enjoy a vantage-ground 
of mingled shade and sunshine. 
How well they 
Hahan villas! 
vines, that clamber up the stone, or 
trail into the water. 
vista, an alluring woodland path, 
that charms and beckons. 
In the Villa Borghese, we find four . 
besides the central 
Here the effect is so per- 
separate jets, 
fountain. 
fect that we would not voluntarily — 
alter the slightest detail. We admire 
the curb, set level with the ground, — 
with the water but an inch or two 
lower. 
Just where they stand, the trees 
should be, and of just such a height; 
while the hard, white road disap- 
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In the distance, — 
beyond the fountain, lies a shadowy — 
We would not change one 
line in the carvings upon the foun- 
tain, or make the stream higher or — 
broader by the smallest fraction. — 
understood the — 
beauty of the fountain in those old 
Note the use of the, 
single jet in the Villa Medicea, and — 
the divided jet in the Villa Torlonia, | 
with its mossy marble railing about — 
the basin, and its border of delicate 
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