Early Norman church--it was in the backyard of a man from whom I was
buying bulbs. I told the man that I would like it, and he said he
thought half a crown was about its value. I did not try to beat him
down--one never gets a bargain by beating a tradesman down--and I set
to work rummaging through his premises. In ten minutes I had discovered a
second capital; and the good fellow said I might have this one as I
had found it. I thought it better, however, to make the transaction a
business one, so I paid my second half-crown for it. But two years had
passed before I found two stone shafts with an aged look, and on these
I placed my Norman relics. They look very well in the embrace of a
Hiawatha rose against a background of old wall. These are but a few
of the “made-ups” which furnish my House Garden, not one of which I
acquired in what some people would term the legitimate way.
I have a large carved seat of Sicilian marble, another of “dove” marble,
and three others of carved stone, and no one of them was acquired by me
in a complete state. Why should not a man or woman who has some training
in art and who has seen the best architectural things in the world
be able to design something that will be equal to the best in a
stonemason's yard, I should like to know?
And then, what about the pleasure of working out such details--the
pleasure and the profit of it? Surely they count for something in this
life of ours.
Before I forsake the fascinating topic of stonework, I should like
to make a suggestion which I trust will commend itself to some of my
readers. It is that of hanging appropriate texts on the walls of a
garden. I have not attempted anything like this myself, but I shall
certainly do it some day. Garden texts exist in abundance, and to have
one carved upon a simple block of stone and inserted in a wall would, I
think, add greatly to the interest of the garden. I have seen a couple
of such inscriptions in a garden near Florence, and I fancy that in the
Lake District of England the custom found favour, or Wordsworth would
not have written so many as he did for his friends. The “lettering”--the
technical name for inscriptions--would run into money if a poet paid by
piece-work were employed; unless he were as considerate as the one who
did some beautiful tombstone poems and thought that,--
“Beneath this stone repose the bones, together with the
corp,
Of one who ere Death cut him down was Thomas Andrew
Thorpe,”
was good; and so it was; but as the widow was not disposed to spend so
much as the “lettering” would cost, he reduced his verse to:--
Beneath this stone there lies the corp
Of Mr. Thomas Andrew Thorpe.”
Still the widow shook her head and begged him to give the question of a
further curtailment his consideration. He did so, and produced,--
“Here lies the corp
Of T. A. Thorpe.”
This was a move in the right direction, the heartbroken relict thought;
still if the sentiment, was so compressible, it might be further
reduced. Flowery language was all very well, but was it worth the extra
money? The result of her appeal was,--
“Thorpe's
Corpse.”
I found some perfect garden texts in every volume I glanced through,
from Marlowe to Masefield.
Yes, I shall certainly revive on some of my walls, between the tufts of
snapdragon, a delightful practice, feeling assured that the crop will
flower in many directions. The search for the neatest lines will of
itself be stimulating.
But among the suitable objects for the embellishment of any form of
garden, I should not recommend any form of dog. We have not completed
our repairing of one of our borders since a visit was paid to us quite
unexpectedly by a young foxhound that was being “walked” by a dealer in
horses, who has stables a little distance beyond the Castle. Our third
little girl, Francie by name, has an overwhelming sympathy for animals
in captivity, especially dogs, and the fact that I do not keep any since
I had an unhappy experience with a mastiff several years ago, is not
a barrier to her friendship with “Mongrel, puppy, whelp, or hound, and
curs of low degree” that are freely cursed by motorists in the High
Street; for in Yardley dogs have trained themselves to sleep in the
middle of the road on warm summer days. Almost every afternoon Francie
returns from her walks abroad in the company of two or three of her
borrowed dogs; and if she is at all past her time in setting out from
home, one of them comes up to make inquiries as to the cause of the
delay.
Some months ago the foxhound, Daffodil, who gallantly prefers being
walked by a little girl, even though she carries no whip, rather than
by a horsey man who is never without a serviceable crop with a lash,
personally conducted a party of three to find out if anything serious
had happened to Francie; and in order to show off before the others,
he took advantage of the garden gate having been left open to enter and
relieve his anxiety. He seemed to have done a good deal of looking round
before he was satisfied that there was no immediate cause for alarm, and
in the course of his stroll he transformed the border, adapting it to
an impromptu design of his own--not without merit, if his aim was a
reproduction of a prairie.
After an industrious five minutes he received some token of the
gardener's disapproval, and we hope that in a few months the end of our
work of restoration will be well in sight.
But Nemesis was nearer at hand than that horticultural hound dreamt
of. Yesterday Francie appeared in tears after her walk; and this is
the story of _illo lachrymo_: It appears that the days of Daffodil's
“walking” were over, and he was given an honourable place in the hunt
kennels. The master and a huntsman now and again take the full pack from
their home to the Downs for an outing and bring them through the town on
their way hack. Yesterday such a route-march took place and the hounds
went streaming in open order down the street. No contretemps seemed
likely to mar the success of the outing; but unhappily Daffodil had not
learned to the last page the discipline of the kennels, and when at the
wrong moment Francie came out of the confectioner's shop, she was spied
by her old friend, and he made a rush in front of the huntsman's horse
to the little girl, nearly knocking her down in the exuberance of his
greeting of her.
Alas! there was “greeting” in the Scotch meaning of the word, when
Daffodil ignored the command of the huntsman and had only eaten five of
the chocolates and an inch or two of the paper bag, when the hailstorm
fell on him....
“But once he looked back before he reached the pack,” said Francie
between her sobs--“he looked back at me--you see he had not time to say
'goodbye,' that horrid huntsman was so quick with his lash, and I knew
that that was why poor Daffy looked back--to say 'good-bye'--just his
old look. Oh, I'll save up my birthday money next week and buy him. Poor
Daff! Of course he knew me, and I knew him--I saw him through Miss
Richardson's 'window above the doughnut tray--I knew him among all the
others in the pack.”
Dorothy comforted her, and she became sufficiently herself again to be
able to eat the remainder of the half-pound of chocolates, forgetting,
in the excitement of the moment, to retain their share for her sisters.
When they found this out, their expressions of sympathy for the cruel
fate that fell upon Daffodil were turned in another direction.
They did not make any allowance for the momentary thoughtlessness due to
an emotional nature.
The question of the purchase of the young hound has not yet been
referred to me; but without venturing too far in prejudging the matter,
I think I may say that that transaction will not be consummated. The
first of whatever inscriptions I may some day put upon my garden wall
will be one in Greek:--
[Illustration: 0256]
CHAPTER THE NINETEENTH
Dorothy and I were having a chat about some designs in Treillage when
Friswell sauntered into the garden, bringing with him a tine book on the
Influence of Cimabue on the later work of Andrea del Castagno. He
had promised to lend it to me, when in a moment of abstraction I had
professed an interest in the subject.
Dorothy showed him her sketches of the new scheme, explaining that it
was to act as a screen for fig-tree corner, where the material for a
bonfire had been collecting for some time in view of the Peace that we
saw in our visions of a new heaven and a new earth long promised to the
sons of men.
Friswell was good enough to approve of the designs. He said he thought
that Treillage would come into its own again before long. He always
liked it, because somehow it made him think of the Bible.
I did not like that. I shun topics that induce thoughts of the Bible in
Friswell's brain. He is at his worst when thinking and expressing his
thoughts on the Bible, and the worst of his worst is that it is just
then he makes himself interesting.
But how on earth Treillage and the Bible should become connected in any
man's mind would pass the wit of man to explain. But when the appearance
of my Temple compelled Friswell to think of Oxford Street, London, W.,
when his errant memory was carrying him on to the Princess's Theatre, on
whose stage a cardboard thing was built--about as like my Temple as
the late Temple of the Archdiocese of Canterbury was like the late Dr.
Parker of the City Temple.
“I don't recollect any direct or mystical reference to Treillage in
the Book,” said I, with a leaning toward sarcasm in my tone of voice.
“Perhaps you saw something of the kind on or near the premises of the
Bible Society.”
“It couldn't be something in a theatre again,” suggested Dorothy.
“I believe it was on a garden wall in Damascus, but I'm not quite sure,”
said he thoughtfully. “Damascus is a garden city in itself. Thank Heaven
it is safe for some centuries more. That ex-All Highest who had designs
on it would fain have made it Potsdamascus.”
“He would have done his devil best, pulling down the Treillage you saw
there, because it was too French. Don't you think, Friswell, that you
should try to achieve some sort of Treillage for your memory? You are
constantly sending out shoots that come to nothing for want of something
firm to cling to.”
“Not a bad notion, by any means,” said he. “But it has been tried by
scores of experts on the science of--I forget the name of the science: I
only know that its first two letters are mn.”
“Mnemonics,” said Dorothy kindly.
“What a memory you have!” cried Friswell. “A memory for the word that
means memory. I think most of the artificial memories or helps to memory
are ridiculous. They tell you that if you wish to remember one thing you
must be prepared to recollect half a dozen other things--you are to be
led to your destination by a range of sign-posts.”
“I shouldn't object to the sign-posts providing that the destination was
worth arriving at,” said I. “But if it's only the front row of the dress
circle at the Princess's Theatre, Oxford Street, London, West--”
“Or Damascus, Middle East,” he put in, when I paused to breathe. “Yes,
I agree with you; but after all, it wasn't Damascus, but only the
General's house at Gibraltar.”
“Have mercy on our frail systems, Friswell,” I cried. “'We are but
men, are we!' as Swinburne lilts. Think of our poor heads. Another such
abrupt memory-post and we are undone. How is it with you, my Dorothy?”
“I seek a guiding hand,” said she. “Come, Mr. Friswell; tell us how a
General at Gib, suggested the Bible to you.”
“It doesn't seem obvious, does it?” said he. “But it so happened that
the noblest traditions of the Corps of Sappers was maintained by the
General at Gib, in my day. He was mad, married, and a Methodist. He
had been an intimate friend and comrade of Gordon, and he invited
subscriptions from all the garrison for the Palestine Exploration Fund.
He gave monthly lectures on the Tabernacle in the Wilderness, and at
every recurring Feast of Tabernacles he had the elaborate trellis that
compassed about his house, hung with branches of Mosaic trees. That's
the connection--as easily obvious as the origin of sin.”
[Illustration: 0260]
“Just about the same,” said I. “Your chain of sign-posts is complete:
Treillage--General--Gibraltar--Gordon--Gospel. That is how you are
irresistibly drawn to think of the Bible when you see a clematis
climbing up a trellis.”
“My dear,” said Dorothy, “you know that I don't approve of any attempt
at jesting on the subject of the Bible.”
“I wasn't jesting--only alliterative,” said I. “Surely alliteration is
not jocular.”
“It's on the border,” she replied with a nod.
“The Bible is all right if you are only content not to take it too
seriously, my dear lady,” said Friswell. “It does not discourage simple
humour--on the contrary, it contains many examples of the Oriental idea
of fun.”
“Oh, Mr. Friswell! You will be saying next that it is full of puns,”
said Dorothy.
“I know of one, and it served as the foundation of the Christian
Church,” said he.
“My dear Friswell, are you not going too far?”
“Not a step. The choosing of Peter is the foundation of your Church, and
the authority assumed by its priests. Simon Barjonah, nicknamed Peter,
is one of the most convincingly real characters to be found in any
book, sacred or profane. How any one can read his record and doubt the
inspiration of the Gospels is beyond me. I have been studying
Simon Barjonah for many years--a conceited braggart and a coward--a
blasphemer--maudlin! After he had been cursing and swearing in his
denial of his Master, he went out and wept bitterly. Yes, but he wasn't
man enough to stand by the Son of God--he was not even man enough to
go to the nearest tree and hang himself. Judas Iscariot was a nobler
character than Simon Barjonah, nicknamed Peter.”
“And what does all this mean, Mr. Friswell?”
“It means that it's fortunate that Truth is not dependent upon the truth
of its exponents or affected by their falseness,” said he, and so took
his departure.
We went on with our consideration of our Treillage--after a considerable
silence. But when a silence comes between Dorothy and me it does not
take the form of an impenetrable wall, nor yet that of a yew hedge
with gaps in it; but rather that of a grateful screen of sweet-scented
honeysuckle. It is the silence within a bower of white clematis--the
silence of “heaven's ebon vault studded with stars unutterably
bright”--the silence of the stars which is an unheard melody to such as
have ears to hear.
“Yes,” said I at last, “I am sure that you are right: an oval centre
from which the laths radiate--that shall be our new trellis.”
And so it was.
Our life in the Garden of Peace is, you will perceive, something of what
the catalogues term “of rampant growth.” It is as digressive as a wild
convolvulus. I perceive this now that I have taken to writing about
it. It is not literary, but discursive. It throws out, it may he, the
slenderest of tendrils in one direction; but this “between the bud and
blossom,” sometimes Hies off in another, and the effect of the whole is
pleasantly unforeseen.
It is about time that we had a firm trellis for the truant tendrils.
And so I will discourse upon Treillage as a feature of the garden.
Its effect seems to have been lost sight of for a long time, but happily
within recent years its value as an auxiliary to decoration is being
recognised. I have seen lovely hits in France as well as in Italy. It
is one of the oldest imitations of Nature to be found in connection with
garden-making, and to me it represents exactly what place art should
take in that modification of Nature which we call a garden. We want
everything that grows to be seen to the greatest advantage. Nature grows
rampant climbers, and if we allowed them to continue rampageous, we
should have a jungle instead of a garden; so we agree to give her a
helping band by offering her aspiring children something pleasant to
cling to from the first hour of their sending forth grasping fingers in
search of the right ladder for their ascent. A trellis is like a family
living: it provides a decorative career for at least one member of the
family.
The usual trellis-work, as it is familiarly called: has the merit of
being cheap--just now it is more than twice the price that it was five
years ago; but still it does not run into a great deal of money unless
it is used riotously, and this, let me say, is the very worst way in
which it could be adapted to its purpose. To fix it all along the face
of a wall of perhaps forty feet in length is to force it to do more than
it should be asked to do. The wall is capable of supporting a climbing
plant without artificial aid. But if the wall is unsightly, it were best
hidden, and the eye can bear a considerable length of simple trellis
without becoming weary. In this connection, however, my experience
forces me to believe that one should shun the “extending” form of
lattice-shaped work, but choose the square-mesh pattern.
This, however, is only Treillage in its elementary form. If one wishes
to have a truly effective screen offering a number of exquisite outlines
for the entwining of some of the loveliest things that grow, one must go
further in one's choice than the simple diagonals and rectagonals--the
simple verticals and horizontals. The moment that curves are introduced
one gets into a new field of charm, and I know of no means of gaining
better effects than by elaborating this form of joinery as the French
did two centuries ago, before the discovery was made that every form
of art in a garden is inartistic. But possibly if the French
_treillageurs_--for the art had many professors--had been a little
more modest in their claims the landscapests would not have succeeded in
their rebellion. But the _treillageurs_ protested against such beautiful
designs as they turned out being obscured by plants clambering over
them, and they offered in exchange repoussé metal foliage, affirming
that this was incomparably superior to a natural growth. Ordinary
people refused to admit so ridiculous a claim, and a cloud came over
the prospects of these artists. Recently, however, with a truer
rapprochement between the “schools” of garden design, I find several
catalogues of eminent firms illustrating their reproductions of some
beautiful French and Dutch work.
Personally, I have a furtive sympathy with the conceited Frenchmen. It
seems to me that it would be a great shame to allow the growths upon a
fine piece of Treillage to become so gross as to conceal all the design
of the joinery. Therefore I hold that such ambitious climbers as Dorothy
Perkins or Crimson Rambler should be provided with an unsightly wall
and bade to make it sightly, and that to the more graceful and less
distracting clematis should any first-class woodwork be assigned. This
scheme will give both sides a chance in the summer, and in the winter
there will be before our eyes a beautiful thing to look upon, even
though it is no longer supporting a plant, and so fulfilling the
ostensible object of its existence.
There should be no limit to the decorative possibilities of the
Treillage lath. A whole building can be constructed on this basis. I
have seen two or three very successful attempts in such a direction
in Holland; and quite enchanting did they seem, overclambered by Dutch
honeysuckle. I learned that all were copied from eighteenth century
designs. I saw another Dutch design in an English garden in the North.
It took the form of a sheltered and canopied seat. It had a round tower
at each side and a gracefully curved back. The “mesh” used in this
little masterpiece was one of four inches. It was painted in a tint that
looks best of all in garden word--the gray of the _echeveria glauca_,
and the blooms of a beautiful Aglaia rose were playing hide-and-seek
among the laths of the roof. I see no reason why hollow pillars for
roses should not be made on the Treillage principle. I have seen such
pillars supporting the canopied roof of more than one balcony in front
of houses in Brighton and Hove. I fancy that at one time these were
fashionable in such places. In his fine work entitled _The English
Home from Charles I. to George IV._, Mr. J. Alfred Gotch gives two
illustrations of Treillage adapted to balconies.
But to my mind, its most effective adaptation is in association with a
pergola, especially if near the house. To be sure, if the space to
be filled is considerable, the work for both sides would be somewhat
expensive; but then the cost of such things is very elastic; it is
wholly dependent upon the degrees of elaboration in the design. But in
certain situations a pergola built up in this way may be made to do duty
as an anteroom or a loggia, and as such it gives a good return for an
expenditure of money; and if constructed with substantial uprights--I
should recommend the employment of an iron core an inch in diameter for
these, covered, I need hardly say, with the laths--and painted every
second year, the structure should last for half a century. Sir Laurence
Alma-Tadema carried out a marvellous scheme of this type at his house
in St. John's Wood. It was on a Dutch plan, but was not a copy of any
existing arrangement of gardens. I happen to know that the design was
elaborated by himself and his wife on their leaving his first St. John's
Wood home: it was a model of what may be called “_l'haut Treillage_.”
Once again I would venture to point out the advantage of having a.
handsome thing to look at during the winter months when an ordinary
pergola looks its worst.
Regarding pergolas in general a good deal might be written. Their
popularity in England just now is well deserved. There is scarcely a
garden of any dimensions that is reckoned complete unless it encloses
one within its walls. A more admirable means of dividing a ground space
so as to make two gardens of different types, could scarcely be devised,
in the absence of a yew or box growth of hedge; nor could one imagine
a more interesting way of passing from the house to the garden than
beneath such a roof of roses. In this case it should play the part
of one of those “vistas” which were regarded as indispensable in the
eighteenth century. It should have a legitimate entrance and it should
not stop abruptly. If the exigencies of space make for such abruptness,
not a moment's delay there should be in the planting of a large climbing
shrub on each side of the exit so as to embower it, so to speak. A
vase or a short pillar should compel the dividing of the path a little
further on, and the grass verge--I am assuming the most awkward of
exits--should he rounded off in every direction, so as to cause the
ornament to become the feature up to which the pergola path is leading.
I may mention incidentally at this moment that such an isolated ornament
as I have suggested gives a legitimate excuse for dividing any
garden walk that has a tendency to weary the eye by its persistent
straightness. Some years ago no one ever thought it necessary to make
an excuse for a curve in a garden walk. The gardener simply got out his
iron and cut out whatever curve he pleased on each side, and the
thing was done. But nowadays one must have a natural reason for every
deflection in a path; and an obstacle is introduced only to be avoided.
I need hardly say that there are pergolas and pergolas. I saw one that
cost between two and three thousand pounds in a garden beyond Beaulieu,
between Mont Boron and Monte Carlo--an ideal site. It was made up of
porphyry columns with Corinthian carved capitals and wrought-iron work
of a beautiful design, largely, but not lavishly, gilt, as a sort of
frieze running from pillar to pillar; a bronze vase stood between each
of the panels, and the handles of these were also gilt. I have known of
quite respectable persons creating quite presentable pergolas for less
money. In that favoured part of the world, however, everything bizarre
and extravagant seems to find a place and to look in keeping with its
surroundings.
The antithesis to this gorgeous and thoroughly beautiful piece of work
I have seen in many gardens in England. It is the “rustic” pergola, a
thing that may be acquired for a couple of pounds and that may, with
attention, last a couple of years. Anything is better than this--no
pergola at all is better than this. In Italy one sees along the
roadsides numbers of these structures overgrown with vines; but never
yet did I see one that was not either in a broken-down condition or
rapidly approaching such a condition; although the poles are usually
made of chestnut which should last a long time--unlike our larch, the
life of which when cut into poles and inserted in the cold earth does not
as a rule go beyond the third year.