[Illustration: _Thrumpton Hall. A type of numerous English gardens with informal planting_] And the sketches in the book show us what these possible gardens are! They are careful architects' drawings, deficient in light and shade; not engraved, but reproduced by a hard process, some being mere reproductions of old engravings; and diagrams of old "knots" and "patterns," with birds and ships perched on wooden trellises, without the slightest reference to any human or modern use. A curious one of Badminton will show fully the kind of plan the authors wish to see revived. Some of the illustrations show the evils of the system which the authors advocate, notably one of Levens Hall, Westmoreland, a very interesting and real old garden. Interesting as it is from age, the ugliness of the clipped forms takes away from the beauty of the house. Even in sketches of gardens like Montacute and Brympton, the beauty of the gardens is not well shown. The most interesting drawings, it is not surprising to find, are the informal ones! Many of the others show the _evil_, not the good, of the system advocated, by their hard lines and the emphasising of ugly forms. "NO DESIGN IN LANDSCAPE" Horticulture stands to garden design much as building does to architecture. This book has been written entirely from the standpoint of the designer, and therefore contains little or no reference to the actual methods of horticulture. Throughout the book it is modestly assumed that there can be no "design" in anything but in lines of stone, and clipped trees to "harmonise" with the stone, and to bring in "order" and "balance." A Longleat, Highclere or Little Trianon, or any of the many English places which are planted in picturesque ways can show no design; but a French town, with its wretched lines of tortured Limes, is "pure" and "broad" in design. _The naivete_ of the book in this respect is often droll. One amusing passage is on p. 54:-- However rich the details, there is no difficulty in grasping the principle of _a garden laid out in an equal number of rectangular plots_. Everything is straightforward and logical; you are not bored with hopeless attempts to master the bearings of the garden. This is the kitchen gardener's view, and that of the market gardener of all countries, but the fun is in calling the idea of it "_grasping a principle_"! At this rate makers of chessboards have strong claims to artistic merit! No wonder that men who call a "principle" the common way of setting out kitchen and cabbage gardens from Pekin to Mortlake can see no design in the many things that go to make a beautiful landscape!