Louise Shelton

“ In the garden, too, we labor faithfully, as best we know how, in following rules that promise good results. Then at a certain time we must stand aside, consciously trusting to the source of life to do the rest. With hopeful eyes we watch and wait, while the mysterious unseen spirit brings life into plant and tree. When something goes wrong, how sublime is our cheerful garden philosophy, as smiling we say: "Just wait until we try next year!" ”

“ The broad beds, profuse in glowing yet orderly bloom, are especially lovely in June. The garden has the benefit of ancient trees as a setting and the richness of its planting combined with the white balustrade lends a noble effect, comparing favorably with many of those abroad. The beautiful water garden, reached by a winding stone stairway, is encircled by willows and forest trees which fill the little lake with green reflections.
A winter garden is a luxury so rare that one dwells with keenest pleasure upon the view from Thornton—a most perfect specimen of its kind. ”

“ Our unwritten motto is: "If others can, then why not we?" Even the man who "contends that God is not" shows all this wondrous reliance in the unseen force within his garden.
With hands plunged into the cool earth we seem to bury in the magic soil all thoughts that jar till we almost feel ourselves a part of the garden plan; as much in harmony with it as the note of the bird, the soft splash of the fountain, the tints of the flowers and their perfumes. ”

“ At Kenarden Lodge the garden in the clear atmosphere of this northern climate is most beautiful in form and coloring, and its background of distant hills combines to intensify the charm of this famous place, which is in bloom all summer. The centre beds are filled with annuals in prevailing colors of pink, blue, and white, noticeably Snapdragon, Ageratum, Sweet Alyssum, pink Geranium, and Begonia. Planted in masses, these and other dependable annuals blossom as long as needed. The broad green sod paths act as a setting to the delicate hues covering the beds. ”

“ By early April the spring garden blooms with Hepatica, Crocus, Chionodoxa, Scilla, Sundrops, Pansy, English Daisy, Spring Beauty, Bloodroot, Trillium, Cypripedium, Violet, Tulip, Hyacinth, and Daffodil, followed soon by many later garden favorites. Sufficient water is supplied to carry the bloom safely through midsummer and September, and year by year the beauty of this garden is increasing with the maturing of its trees and shrubbery, and all that tends to complete the dignity of so noble a design. ”

“ Near Tacoma, among majestic surroundings of forest and lake, with Mount Tacoma as a background, are the famous gardens of Thornewood, rich in flowers and shrubs and splendid garden architecture. Trees and hedges will wither and die, but the "everlasting hills" and the silver waters of American Lake will form a perpetual background to this beautiful place, built in 1880 and standing as the pioneer great garden of the State. ”

“ How few would be content to create a beautiful garden if none could see! And our pleasure is not complete until others have shared its sweetness with us. The gardener is developing nature in the simplest and truest way, following the thought of the first great Architect and gladdening the hearts of men with the vision beautiful of the possibilities within plant life. In the flower garden the efforts are for upbuilding, for giving back some of the beauty intended in the Perfect Plan, too often defaced by man's heedlessness. ”

“ Illinois, with its claim to countless fine estates, includes a plentiful share of gardens, and more especially in the lake region, where luxuriant growths of trees tell of congenial soil and climate. As a background the great lake stretches like a sea beyond many of the beautiful flower-borders, which bloom almost as richly as those near the distant ocean. ”

“ Favored not only by climate but by riches unknown to the early landowners of our States, the best of the old gardens across the sea stand for the combined dreams of the many minds which gradually evolved them, the loving handiwork of innumerable patient toilers who have successively ministered to them.
Just as there are gardens peculiar to other nations, Dutch, French, Italian, etc., might we not give serious consideration to evolving some day a type peculiarly American, inasmuch as it would embody the poetic and artistic sense of our country? ”

“ The hill covered with wild shrubs sloping to the lake, the formal garden, the water garden and Rose garden, with the long inclined pathway seeming to lead out to space immeasurable into the green Garden of Everyman, combine with the scenery to make it a place of remarkable beauty. ”

“ Annuals follow, and the place is kept in long bloom under the careful supervision of the owner.
At The Blind, Havre de Grace, on the Chesapeake, is a charming and typically Southern garden with ancient Box hedges for a background, and filled with the bloom of many old-fashioned hardy plants and shrubs. The property of two hundred acres is partly under cultivation and partly covered with Holly and ancient trees. Around the gray stone mansion in springtime the place is like a fairy-land, with hundreds of blossoming shrubs and fruit trees. ”

“ Then above, in the rainbow, we learn the harmony for our color scheme, and unto no nation on earth need we apply for the latest theories dealing with these subjects for the beautifying of our gardens. The more of the nature scheme we bring into them the greater satisfaction will they give.
We should build the garden with a setting of fine trees grouped upon the outskirts, otherwise it will seem as incomplete as a portrait without a frame. Half of the charm attached to the beautiful old gardens of Europe lies in the richness of their backgrounds of stately hedges and trees. ”

“ In seeking the simpler life which many are now craving, if luxuries are blessings that we could do without, must we count the flower garden a luxury? Not while its beauty is a joy in which others may share, nor when it helps to keep at home our interests which make the real home. ”

“ A world without flowers! What would it be? Among those who know, such a question needs no answer—and we are not seeking a reply from the uninitiated who, for lack of understanding and sympathy, can but gaze at us with wondering pity, when our gardens cause us to overlook so much that to them means life. But is there any life more real than the life in the garden for those who actually take part in its creation and nurture it carefully week by week and year by year? ”

“ The rear beds contain tall-growing perennials mixed with some annuals. There are weeks when the garden is all pink, and again all blue and white. It is surrounded on three sides with most artistic pergolas, from one side of which the view down the Piscataqua River is a picturesque feature. Stone steps on another side lead to an upper garden filled with bloom surrounding a quaint and ancient little building kept as a studio. In isolation, simplicity, and ripeness the atmosphere of the whole place breathes of olden days, and might well be taken as a model for a perfect American garden. ”

“ In considering the gardens belonging to the State of New York, its most favored garden centre is undoubtedly Long Island. Here soil and climate combine to encourage both vegetables and flowers. And on the shores, particularly of the south side and eastern end, the most satisfactory bloom is obtainable as a rule with less trouble than is expended upon the flowers of the interior. Not that Long Island is secure from periods of drought and visitations of rose-bugs, but on the whole the plants weather the obstacles better here than in other places of this latitude. ”

“ The great show is not Magnolias, or even the Camellias, although they are lovely—but the Azaleas, which grow in such profusion and variety of shades that one loses all sense of individual plant and flowers and perceives only glowing, gleaming masses of color veiled by festoons of gray moss, giving one a delicious feeling of unreality, almost enchantment. ”

“ You will see flowers, that at home you had to coax and nurse into growth, here in radiant, luxuriant masses. The Pansies are unusually large, whole borders of them, and paths bordered with beds a foot wide, filled to the edges with changeable velvet. Sweet Peas grow up to the tops of the fences, and then, if no further support is given them, over they go, back to the ground again. All summer the Nasturtiums climb nearer and nearer the roofs of the cabins, and bloom and bloom in sheer delight. ”

“ Seabrook's garden belongs to still another distinctly different class, illustrating a planting which appeals strongly to the many Americans who ardently admire simplicity in outdoor art. Here we find a sweet place in which to live in idle hours, with favorite flowers well-kept, a pool, and shaded retreats from summer sun. ”

“ In the heart of this fair garden, in the country of the Englishman, at the end of this book on American gardens, the author, though a proud American, unhesitatingly admits that usually it is the Englishman who has inspired us to make gardens as nearly as possible like those of the mother country. Is it the old blood that is stirring within us, the common bond of past associations and brotherhood so often expressed in our physical resemblances as well as in many of our ideals? The garden in the accompanying illustrations shows a beautiful combination of flowers with picturesque old trees. ”

“ Longfellow's place at Cambridge, Doctor Weld's at Brookline, and The Witch's Place at Salem are typical of New England—the paths all edged with Box, which shrub, on account of frost blights, has never attained great height. These gardens are just simple, lovable little places filled with shadows and sunshine, some flowers, and the good scent of Box, which latter always seems so especially essential to old gardens. ”

“ The lower garden only is discernible in the illustration, showing the dignity and charm of an evergreen garden, relieved by a massing of color in narrow beds which form a setting to the clipped Box and other shrubs. The upper garden is full of bloom and kept chiefly as a place for cutting-flowers. ”

“ At least some of the best examples in photography can be given, although each view but hints at the fuller beauty to be found in the garden itself.
Of the many wonderful gardens in Massachusetts possibly the most remarkable of all is Weld, in Brookline, which is known to gardeners far and wide. There is nothing in America more extensive and more richly planted. The numerous beds are filled with bloom for many weeks, and each bed contains a massing of one variety, whether perennials or annuals, which, when it has finished flowering, is replaced by something of another period. ”

“ Not only is it possible to grow all the favorite flowers along the shore, but even on the islands lying off the coast of Maine there are innumerable little gardens, such as those at Isleborough, which revel in the moist sea climate of midsummer and blossom most satisfactorily until frost. At this point it is interesting to contrast the climate of the North Atlantic section with the region directly across the continent along the Pacific coast, where at Vancouver's Island, for instance, plant life enjoys a climate similar to that of England, with a growing season quite as prolonged. ”

“ The object of this book is to present, more particularly, another type of garden, demonstrating the cultured American's love of beauty expressed through plant life rather than in stone; showing the development of his ideal in more original directions, when planning for himself the garden spot in which he is to live rather than when building wholly in imitation of some accepted type of classic art. ”

“ In the low country of the interior the midsummer climate is humid and hot enough to discourage the flowers of this season, but when certain annuals are kept sufficiently moist and mulched they may pass unscathed through the trying season and join the few fall perennials for several weeks of bloom.
Winter protection is not a matter of importance and Pansies need but an ordinary covering of leaves. An extreme of cold, which is rare, might bring disaster to the leaf-covered Canterbury Bell in the open, but this is one of the gambles in garden life. ”

“ The difference is slight between the climate of Ohio and other States of its latitude in the East and middle West. While there is no mountainous region, northern Ohio has the advantage of a great lake as its border. On a line with central Connecticut, the temperature of Cleveland is similarly favorable to flower growing, and garden enthusiasts are increasing. Like most of the Middle States, the country is rather flat and the soil fertile as a rule. But, except on the lake shore, the gardens suffer more or less from the hot weather and scarcity of moisture. ”