Pennsylvania School of Horticulture for Women - Wise Acres Yearbook (Ambler, PA)

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planned with some thought of its design. The gardeners on the large estates seem really to love their work. Certainly they must give more than their eight hours daily, when we find that three men and a boy are able to do justice to the garden work at Compton Wynyates with its extensive lawns, and its richly maintained perennial borders with hedges and quaintly clipped figures in box. This love of gardens is no recently acquired taste, but has been growing stronger with the years. Gardens in England are handed down from father to son, and this has a restraining influence. An Englishman does not think only of immediate effects, but plants long-lived trees, looking toward the future development. This restraint protects the garden from fads, and promotes a healthy, well-conceived growth. Age plays a large part in the beauty of these gardens. It has softened the colors of the stone of walls and garden features, has added picturesqueness in the rugged, gnarled branches of the older trees, and has given a splendid luxuriance to the planting. Such widespread appreciation of the art of gardening is the result of the education and intellectual growth of an older country. As Bacon said in his essay “Of Gardens ”—“And man shall ever see, that when Ages grow to Civility and Elegance, Men shall come to Build Stately sooner than to Garden Finely; As if Gardening were the Greater Perfection.” The English countryside itself is a garden with the magnificent trees, the rich tangle of vines and shrubs in the hedgerows, and the lavish supply of wild-flowers. All gardens have this splendid background, but the people do not stop here. “• Our England is a garden, and such gardens are not made By singing, ‘Oh, how beautiful !’ and sitting in the shade.” Their love of gardening is so sincere that they are constantly making improvements. No scheme is entirely successful after the first planting, and some adjustment is always necessary as new growth changes conditions. The English appreciate this, and their gardens show it by their finish. English gardens have many natural advantages, the climate, the age of the gardens, and the true spirit of gardening born and bred in all the people. However, there are certain tangible elements of charm which if studied as principles and not simply copied, may be adapted to our conditions with great success. “In the form of his garden, man has been, is, and will be most revealing.” Englishmen, as a result of their aristocratic training, have a passion for privacy. So the English emphasize privacy which has always been the greatest charm and chief source of popularity of all successful gardens. In this country, with our democratic ideals, we subordinate the development of the individual lot to the appearance of the street as a whole. However, whenever it is consistent with other eon- t

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two years. The lectures are proving very interesting and comprehensive, covering as they have, the history of man's attempts to make his habitation and its surroundings beautiful as well as useful, — although there have been periods when both the beauty and usefulness might be held in question. Our struggles with triangles and T-squares, to say nothing of those horrible French curves or the right-line pens, are pathetic in the extreme, but we cannot say enough for Mr. Stevenson's endless patience with our pitiful accomplishment, and his sincere encouragement that we will learn in time. We hope his fond expectations may be realized. English Gardens “A house full of books and a garden full of flowers is certainly an ideal situation. Just as books add a homelike atmosphere to our houses, so flowers give the livable quality to the garden, with their gay, cheery colors. “The formal garden dominated by flowers is the type which England has perfected. It is the cheeriest and most homelike of all, and it is just these qualities which make us love the English gardens. In traveling through England to study gardens, one is forced to admit, after carrying an umbrella every day for a month, that the climate is made for plants. Constant moisture and long seasons reward the gardener abundantly for his pains, with a luxuriance of flowers, vigorous, healthy trees, and many broad-leaved evergreens, rhododendrons, box and holly, so useful for winter effects. The long twilights give time to work in and enjoy the gardens, thus satisfying the national craving for outdoor life. English gardens are really outdoor living-rooms. There are pavilions in which one may enjoy the flowers at closer range in spite of summer showers, and seats commanding the view of some particularly charming flower color or composition. The love of flowers and gardening is a national trait, from the lord of the manor house, down to the owner of the smallest cottage. Flower venders cry their wares from many street corners. Not all have as fascinating cries as Kipling's flower girl:— “ Buy my English posies! Kent and Surrey may— Violets of the Undercliff wet with Channel spray; Cowslips from a Devon combe—Midland furze afire— Buy my English posies, and I’ll sell your heart's desire! Still it is not difficult to sell flowers to a flower-loving people. It is not an uncommon sight to see workmen in the roughest clothes buying flowers from these venders to carry home at night. Even the smallest cottage has its front yard garden 6

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ditions, we add charm in proportion as we create secluded enclosures, sheltered from the public gaze. Our design training demands some method of enclosing the flower planting to give unity and background to the picture, and England offers the tangible proof this principle. Everywhere we are impressed anew' with the charming enclosures from the low brick parapet walls of the city gardens of Guilford, and the simple weathered fences of Penshurst village, to the deep green of the yew hedges and the soft colorings of the old brick terrace wall at Penshurst Manor House. Simplicity of planting materials is a characteristic of much of the planting. By this I mean that exotic plants foreign to the country are not used in such abundance as here, where the owner is often influenced by the nurseryman’s glowing description of the latest importation, rather than by an inherent taste for gardening. The English people love their native trees and shrubs, and use them in abundance. In this way they obtain a luxuriance not possible with imported stock, and also the planting takes its proper place in the scheme and does not attract particular interest to itself. Horticultural varieties have their place, and, I think, nowhere have I seen this better shown than in the Golden Box Garden at Penshurst. The garden was one of the many long allees between tall dark green yew hedges with a wall sundial and semi-circular pool at the end of the vista. The deep borders on either side of the broad turf panel were filled with masses of violet and blue larkspur, filmy clouds of cream-colored meadow rue, the pure white trumpets of madonna lilies, and white grass pinks. For accent points at regular intervals on either side were balls of golden box in the midst of the flowers. I saw the garden in a pouring rain, and that may account for my pleasure in the brilliancy of the golden box. Much as I dislike yellow-leaved varieties under most circumstances, here the exotic quality of the box was a part of the well-conceived formal unit, and did not give the restless feeling that golden varieties used in an accidental fashion do. Another pleasing result of their ability to see beauty in the homely trees and shrubs is the use of the apple trees in their gardens. Since the time of the mediaeval pleasaunce, the English have appreciated the picturesque outline of this tree, and have often given it places of honor in the planting. At Penshurst they have a “flowery orchard” laid out with a simple design of grass walks, shade-loving flowers, and unadorned features. Many of the important vistas of this garden are laid through the midst of the orchards so that the apple trees play a definite part in the garden ensemble. The branches spread in a caressing fashion over the hedges, relieving the hard clipped line at points, and adding the glory of flower and fruit in its season. There were apple trees in our colonial gardens, perhaps from necessity, but for a time every useful tree or shrub was banished from the flower area. Now with renewed in- 8