A COTTAGE LOT.
When a tradesman can indulge in a suburban home or a summer cottage it will often happen that he will desire to keep a family horse. If he doesn’t want a horse he will often want a cow or chickens. In the accompanying sketch A is a site provided for one or other of these animals, and it is designedly given a prominent position that its architecture may receive treatment in consonance with that of the residence, that it may be in unison with the surroundings, and that it may supplant the useless and ugly pavilions frequently seen.
The approach to the house is direct and convenient for all points, unless the architect is perverse enough to put the coal cellar on the opposite side.
The boundary hedge is of Norway spruce with room enough to grow and room enough to get between it and the fence to clip it. I saw a hedge on paper recently—between two groups of shrubbery—which was not allowed room to stand on end.
There is a small vegetable garden, 13, with a border around it for blackberries, currants, raspberries, strawberries and such like, and at the end, 14, either a few fruit trees or flowering shrubs. The porches, both back and front, are but a single step above the roadway. The rooms may or may not be another step above them, depending somewhat upon the character of the subsoil, etc. I have not arranged any special drying ground, for cedar poles may be set up in the center of any of the round beds, 1 to 8, and clothed with Japanese ivy, Euonymus radicans, climbing hydrangeas and so on, and have wires between them.
Now these beds may be further filled with either bedding plants or select herbaceous plants. I will assume that it is a summer cottage, and I would then plant the ground as follows, which would result in a very different how d’ye do from that usually seen in such places: 1, Begonia Evansiana; 2, Funkia grandiflora; 3, Echinacea purpurea; 4, Aconitum Napellus variegata; 5, Lobelia cardinalis; 6, Sedum Sieboldii; 7, Veronica longifolia subsessilis; 8, six distinct varieties of Phlox paniculata. These beds may be varied greatly, but nothing of unreliable character should ever be planted in them. Number 1, for instance, might have a tub of nelumbium in place of the begonia, not that it is greatly better, but for variety and fancy.
Numbers 9, 9, 9, are shrubbery groups composed of the following summer-flowering material, disposed in such manner that all sides may be seen, and mowed around, and giving the longest possible margins for the space occupied. There are but few trees to bloom after July, they are chiefly Rhus semialata Osbeckii and R. glabra; Dimorphanthus Mandschuricus; Koelreuteria paniculata and Clerodendron trichotomum. None of them are large. Of shrubs there are a number, and it is strange that they are so seldom used effectively. Garden shrubbery looks more devoid of color in August here than English shrubbery in midwinter. This should not be with a list such as the following to draw from and utilize. Just fancy what we have—and the great artists we have—and tell me if it should be.
There are the altheas, lots of them; Buddleia Lindleyana; Calluna vulgaris; Clethras in variety; Callicarpa purpurea; x Clematis in variety; Clerodendron viscosum; Desmodiums; Dabœcia polifolia; Daphne cneorum; Erica vagans; Euonymus Sieboldianus; Hydrangea Hortensia varieties; Hydrangea paniculata grandiflora; Hypericum in varieties; Hibiscus roseus, etc.; Indigofera Dosua; Kerria Japonica; Lespedeza bicolor; Leycesteria formosa; Lagerstrœmia Indica; x Lonicera Halleana; x Periploca græca; Polygonum cuspidatum; Potentilla fruticosa; Rubus odoratus; Rhodotypus Kerrioides; Rhus copallina; Rosa rugosa; R. Wichuriana, and several hybrids; Spiræa salicifolia, S. tomentosa, S. Douglassii, and S. Bumalda if it is pruned after flowering in spring; Tamarix Chinensis; x Tecoma radicans; x Tecoma grandiflora; Vitex agnus-castus; Vitex Negundo incisa, and a large number of sub-frutescent plants of large size, which may be substituted for such of the shrubs as are tender north of Philadelphia. Numbers 10 and 11 are prepared borders which may well be planted with Hydrangeas Hortensia, Thomas Hogg, etc., and interspersed with the pink and white varieties of Lilium speciosum. Numbers 12, 12 are plants of Sciadopitys verticillata.
PLAN OF GROUNDS.
Climbers are marked x. South of Philadelphia Bignonia capreolata, Magnolia grandiflora and evergreen roses may be grown on walls.
Trenton, N. J.
James MacPherson.