THE climate of North Lincolnshire is by no means one of the most favourable of our islands, but the good gardener accepts the conditions of the place, faces the obstacles, fights the difficulties, and conquers.
Here is a large walled garden, originally all kitchen garden; the length equal to twice the breadth, divided in the middle to form two squares. It is further subdivided in the usual manner with walks parallel to the walls, some ten feet away from them, and other walks across and across each square. The paths are box-edged and bordered on each side with fine groups of hardy flowers, such as the Hollyhocks and other flowers in the picture.
The time is August, and these grand flowers are at their fullest bloom. They are the best type of Hollyhock too, with the wide outer petal, and the middle of the flower not too tightly packed.
Hollyhocks have so long been favourite flowers—and, indeed, what would our late summer and autumn gardens be without them?—that they are among those that have received the special attention of raisers, and have become what are known as florists’ flowers. But the florists’ notions do not always make for the highest kind of beauty. They are apt to favour forms that one cannot but think have for their aim, in many cases, an ideal that is a false and unworthy one. In the case of the Hollyhock, according to the florist’s standard of beauty and correct form, the wide outer petal is not to be allowed; the flower must be very tight and very round. Happily we need not all be florists of this narrow school, and we are at liberty to try for the very highest and truest beauty in our flowers, rather than for set rules and arbitrary points of such extremely doubtful value.
The loosely-folded inner petals of the loveliest Hollyhocks invite a wonderful play and brilliancy of colour. Some of the colour is transmitted through the half-transparency of the petal’s structure, some is reflected from the neighbouring folds; the light striking back and forth with infinitely beautiful trick and playful variation, so that some inner regions of the heart of a rosy flower, obeying the mysterious agencies of sunlight, texture and local colour, may tell upon the eye as pure scarlet; while the wide outer petal, in itself generally rather lighter in colour, with its slightly waved surface and gently frilled edge, plays the game of give and take with light and tint in quite other, but always delightful, ways.
Then see how well the groups have been placed; the rosy group leading to the fuller red, with a distant sulphur-coloured gathering at the far end; its tall spires of bloom shooting up and telling well against the distant tree masses above the wall. And how pleasantly the colour of the rosy group is repeated in the Phlox in the opposite border. And what a capital group that is, near the Hollyhocks of that fine summer flower, the double Crown Daisy (Chrysanthemum coronarium), with the bright glimpses of some more of it beyond. Then the Pansies and Erigerons give a mellowing of grey-lilac that helps the brighter colours, and is not overdone.
The large fruit-tree has too spreading a shade to allow of much actual bloom immediately beneath it, so that here is a patch of Butcher’s Broom, a shade-loving plant. Beyond, out in the sunlight again, is the fine herbaceous Clematis (C. recta), whose excellent qualities entitle it to a much more frequent use in gardens.
The flower-borders are so full and luxuriant that they completely hide the vegetable quarters within, for the garden is still a kitchen garden as to its main inner spaces. These masses of good flowers are the work of the Misses Freeling; they are ardent gardeners, sparing themselves no labour or trouble; to their care and fine perception of the best use of flowers the beauty and interest of these fine borders are entirely due. Indeed, this garden is a striking instance of the extreme value of personal effort combined with knowledge and good taste.
BLYBOROUGH: HOLLYHOCKS
FROM THE PICTURE IN THE POSSESSION OF MR. C. E. FREELING
These qualities may operate in different gardens in a hundred varying ways, but where they exist there will be, in some form or other, a delightful garden. Endless are the possibilities of beautiful combinations of flowers; just as endless is their power of giving happiness and the very purest of human delight. So also the special interest of different gardens that are personally directed by owners of knowledge and fine taste would seem to be endless too, for each will impress upon it some visible issue of his own perception or discernment of beauty.
About the house and lawns are other beds and borders of herbaceous flowers of good grouping and fine growth; conspicuous among them is that excellent flower Campanula pyramidalis, splendidly grown.
Though Blyborough is in a cold district, it has the advantage of lying well sheltered below a sharply-rising ridge of higher land.
