SOME GARDEN PICTURES
When the eye is trained to perceive pictorial effect, it is frequently
struck by something--some combination of grouping, lighting and
colour--that is seen to have that complete aspect of unity and beauty
that to the artist's eye forms a picture. Such are the impressions
that the artist-gardener endeavours to produce in every portion of the
garden. Many of these good intentions fail, some come fairly well, a
few reward him by a success that was beyond anticipation. When this is
the case it is probably due to some cause that had been overlooked but
that had chanced to complete his intention, such as the position of
the sun in relation to some wished-for colour-picture. Then there are
some days during the summer when the quality of light seems to tend to
an extraordinary beauty of effect. I have never been able to find out
how the light on these occasions differs from that of ordinary fine
summer days, but, when these days come, I know them and am filled with
gladness.
In the case of my own garden, as far as deliberate intention goes,
what is aimed at is something quite simple and devoid of complication;
generally one thing or a very limited number of flowering things at
a time, but that one, or those few things, carefully placed so as to
avoid fuss, and to please the eye and give ease to the mind. In many
cases the aim has been to show some delightful colour-combination
without regard to the other considerations that go to the making of
a more ambitious picture. It may be a group in a shrub border, or a
combination of border and climbing plants, or some carefully designed
company of plants in the rock garden. I have a little rose that I
call the Fairy Rose. It came to me from a cottage garden, and I have
never seen it elsewhere. It grows about a foot high and has blush-pink
flowers with the colour deepening to the centre. In character the
flower is somewhere between the lovely Blush Boursault at its best and
the little De Meaux. It is an inch and a half across and of beautiful
form, especially in the half-opened bud. Wishing to enjoy its beauty
to the utmost, and to bring it comfortably within sight, I gave it a
shelf in raised rock-work and brought near and under it a clear pale
lilac Viola and a good drift of _Achillea umbellata_. It was worth
doing. Another combination that gives me much pleasure is that of the
pink Pompon Rose Mignonette with Catmint and whitish foliage, such as
Stachys or _Artemisia stelleriana_. I may have mentioned this before,
but it is so pretty that it deserves repetition.
In a shrubbery border the fine _Spiræa Aruncus_ is beautiful with
an interplanting of _Thalictrum purpureum_. At the end of a long
flower-clump there is a yew hedge coming forward at right angles to
the length of the border. Behind the hedge is a stone wall with an
arch, through which the path in front of the border passes. Over
the stone arch and rambling partly over the yews are the vigorous
many-flowered growths of _Clematis Flammula_. In the end of the border
are pale sulphur-coloured Hollyhocks. Both in form and colour this was
a delightful picture; the foam-like masses of the Clematis resting on
the dusky richness of the yew; the straight shafts of the Hollyhock
giving clear colour and agreeing with the upright lines of the sides
of the archway, which showed dimly in the shade. These are only a few
incidents out of numbers that occur or are intentionally arranged.
There is a place near my house where a path leads down through a
nut-walk to the further garden. It is crossed by a shorter path that
ends at a Birch tree with a tall silvered trunk. It seemed desirable
to accentuate the point where the paths cross; I therefore put down
four square platforms of stone "pitching" as a place for the standing
of four Hydrangeas in tubs. Just before the tree is a solid wooden
seat and a shallow wide step done with the same stone pitching. Tree
and seat are surrounded on three sides by a rectangular planting of
yews. The tender greys of the rugged lower bark of the Birch and the
silvering of its upper stem tell finely against the dark velvet-like
richness of the Yew and the leaf-mass of other trees beyond; the pink
flowers and fresh green foliage of the Hydrangeas are also brilliant
against the dusky green. It is just one simple picture that makes one
glad for three months of the later summer and early autumn. The longer
cross-path, which on the right leads in a few yards to steps up to
the paved court on the north side of the house, on the left passes
down the nut-walk as the second illustration shows. The Birch tree and
seat are immediately to the right, just out of the picture. Standing a
little way down the shaded nut-walk and looking back, the Hydrangeas
are seen in another aspect, with the steps and house behind them in
shade, and the sun shining through their pale green leaves. Sitting on
the seat, the eye, passing between the pink Hydrangea flowers, sees a
short straight path bounded by a wall of Tree Box to right and left,
and at the far end one tub of pale blue Hydrangea in shade, backed by a
repetition of the screen of Yews such as enclose the Birch tree.
On the south side of the house there is a narrow border full of
Rosemary, with China Roses and a Vine, as shown in the illustration
opposite p. 106. Here the narrow lawn, backed by woodland, is higher
than the house-level. Shallow steps lead up to it in the middle, and
to right and left is low dry-walling. On the upper edge of this is a
hedge of Scotch Briars, shown in full bloom at p. 48, and in the narrow
border below, a planting of the low-growing _Andromeda (Leucothoë)
axillaris_, a little shrub that is neat throughout the year and in
winter prettily red-tinted.
[Illustration: _HYDRANGEA TUBS AND BIRCH-TREE SEAT._]
[Illustration: _HYDRANGEA TUBS AND NUT WALK._]
[Illustration: _WHITE LILIES._]
[Illustration: _THE STEPS AND THEIR INCIDENTS._]
The beautiful White Lily cannot be grown in the hot sandy soil of my
garden. Even if its place be ever so well prepared with the loam and
lime that it loves, the surrounding soil-influences seem to rob it of
its needful nourishment; it makes a miserable show for one year and
never appears again. The only way to grow it is in pots or tubs sunk
in the soil. For some years I had wished to have an orderly planting
of this lovely Lily in the lower border at the back of the Andromeda
just in front of the Briars. I had no flower-pots deep enough, or wide
enough at the bottom, but was able to make a contrivance with some
short, broad, unglazed drain-pipes, measuring a foot long and of about
the same diameter, by cementing in an artificial bottom made of pieces
of roofing-tile and broken flower-pot, leaving spaces for drainage.
Then three bulbs were put in each pot in a compost that I knew they
would enjoy. When they were half grown the pots were sunk in holes at
nearly even distances among the Andromedas, and in a few weeks my row
of Lilies gave me my reward. Other Lilies (_L. longiflorum_) follow
them a month later, just beyond in the wood edge among tufts of Male
Fern, and a pot of Francoa is to right and left of the shallow steps.
During the last year or two some pretty incidents have occurred about
these same steps; not important enough to call garden pictures, but
charming and interesting and easily enjoyable because they are close to
the open garden door of the sitting-room and because they teach me to
look out for the desirable things that come of themselves. A seedling
of the wild Clematis (_C. Vitalba_) appeared among the Briars to the
left. As it was too strong a plant to let grow over them unchecked,
I pulled it forward towards the steps, training one or two shoots to
run along the hollow of the step and laying on them pieces of stone
invisible among the foliage, to keep them from being dislodged by the
skirts of visitors or the gambols of my cats. At the same time, in a
crack of the stone just below the upper step there came a seedling of
the tall Chimney Campanula (_C. pyramidalis_). The second year this
threw up its tall flower-stem and was well in bloom when it was wrecked
by an early autumn gale, the wind wrenching out the crown and upper
root-stock. But a little shred of rooted life remained and now there is
again the sturdy tuft promising more flower-stems for the coming season.
Close behind the Bell-flower a spreading sheet of Wild Thyme has crept
out of the turf and spread rather widely over the stone. Luckily I just
saved it from the tidying process that threatened it, and as it is now
well established over the stone I still have the pleasure of its bright
rosy bloom when the duties of the mowing-machine rob me of the other
tiny flowers--Hawkweed, Milkwort and Bedstraw--that bloom so bravely in
the intervals between its ruthless but indispensable ministrations.