The garden at the Silver Pavilion was modeled after the one at Saiho-ji and made the same use of bold, angular stones-- a mixture of flat- topped, straight-sided "platform" rocks and tall slim stones reminiscent of Sung landscape paintings of distant mountains. Like Saiho-ji, the garden is on two levels, with the rear reminiscent of a mountain waterfall. At one side of the garden the pond is spanned by a stone footbridge connecting either side of the shore with the central island. Shaped dwarf pines abound, and the surface of the water, interrupted here and there with massive stones, is peaceful and serene. Little wonder Yoshimasa preferred his tasteful pavilion and its distilled microcosm of landscape to the ravaged ruins of Kyoto. Here he could rest in meditation, letting his eye travel over the placid waters, past the flowering trees which framed the symbolic waterfall, upward to the silhouette of the towering pines on the far hillside to watch the moon rise in the evening, bathing his world in silver. In this peaceful setting he could relish the last, closing years of the great Ashikaga age of Zen art. The art of the landscape garden did not end with Yoshimasa, of course; rather, it shifted in its direction and purpose. Already beginning was the next phase of Zen garden art, the abstract sand-and-stone gardens. CHAPTER EIGHT The Stone Gardens of Zen _ And this our life, exempt from public haunt, Finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks, Sermons in stones . . . _As You Like It _Daisen-in Temple, Kyoto, ca. 1513 _ _ Ryoan-ji, Kyoyo, 1490 _