gardens, may, though it seems to savour largely of the old topiary art, be a very legitimate and desirable process. Only, instead of fanciful or grotesque figures being chosen, or imitations of animals, the forms selected should be globular, or pyramidal, or conical, or square, or of any other simple and conventional kind. Either standards or dwarfs may be thus operated upon. But the cutting should be chiefly done with a knife, and not with shears, that the individual leaves may not be mutilated, nor the entire plant be made too smooth and artificial. The sorts of shrub best adapted for this treatment are Yews, Hollies, Box, Portugal Laurels, evergreen Oaks, Phillyreas, Irish Yews, Sweet Bays, hairy Laurustinus, Laurel, Cotoneaster, Taxus adpressa, and others. And there are several suitable varieties of some of these, which require less pruning, such as Waterer's dwarf golden Holly, golden Yew, variegated prickly Holly, (for standards,) and, also for standards, Cotoneaster microphylla, black-leaved Laurustinus, Taxus adpressa, and Sweet Bay. 11. New plantations will often call for a greater or less amount of temporary shelter, as they may happen to be in any degree exposed, or as the plants in them may want what is usually styled "nursing." In some districts, as along the whole of our north-western coast, where gales laden with saline matter are so baneful to the progress of young trees, a few coarse and rapid-growing kinds, towering above the mass of the plantation, will catch and break the power of the breeze, and, if in foliage, preserve the lower and better sorts wholly unharmed. Several species of Poplar and Willow are found to be the most valuable of such nurses; and their mean appearance may be well endured for a time, in consideration of their services; but they should be gradually cut out as they become less needed, and entirely destroyed as soon as they have thoroughly done their work. An Poplars, Larch, Wych-elm, and Scotch-fir, will, with a few others, be useful in more inland places, when scattered among the better kinds temporarily, to give them a good start. ornamental tree or plant, so far from being injured by having rather near and common neighbours for three or four years, is thereby aided in making an energetic and more speedy growth; and if the nurses are not placed too close to the permanent plants, and are kept within due bounds, they will assuredly be beneficial in helping forward the plantation, and can be taken up or cut out at any time. Exactly the same principle will apply to shrubs, among the best of which Privet, common Laurel, common Holly, common Broom, &c., may be found of the greatest use in encouraging them onwards for a few years; though greater care will be requisite here to hinder the inferior things from trespassing on their more aristocratic companions, otherwise they may do them irreparable mischief. In those parts of the country where the prevalence of particular winds at certain seasons renders special shelter for newlyplanted shrubs indispensable, this should be afforded on the like basis to that previously recommended for general protection. Light and air must not be excluded. And the materials of shelter should be placed on one or two sides only, shifting them about as the wind may come on to blow injuriously from any quarter. Such materials, also, as are partially open, and not perfectly impervious, will be preferable, as staying, and not merely turning the violence of the wind. Large Fir or Pine branches stuck in the ground at a short distance from the plants to be protected, or hurdles interlaced with the same, or with reeds, strong rushes, furze, or laths, and placed about a yard from the plants, will afford enough of shelter to them without diminishing their hardihood. If necessary, the same kind of screen can be renewed in succeeding years. 12. Edgings for walks may be exceedingly various; but there are very few indeed that will give lasting satisfaction. Grass is almost the only one that can be altogether commended for pleasure-gardens; and it is one which, if carefully laid, and diligently kept, will be sure to please, for it has a good colour, smoothness, regularity, durableness when not under trees, and harmony with both the architectural and the vegetable constituents of a garden. It furnishes, likewise, the best groundtint for setting-off the colours of flowers, as in a flower-garden. As an edging, it should invariably be flat, and at an equal height (not more than half-an-inch) above the surface of the walk at its margin, with about an inch, or even two, in depth along the inner line, next the bed or border, to allow for the washing down of the soil towards it. It must not be too narrow, or it will be difficult to keep cut, and the sides will be likely to crumble away. Box edgings are troublesome, liable to great irregularities, apt to harbour insects, and suitable merely for quaint figures, and old-fashioned geometrical designs. They are the proper accompaniments of parterres and small flower-gardens that are laid out with numerous narrow gravel-walks; though near the house, in a truly architectural garden, neatly dressed stone edgings will be still better. Rougher stone, bricks, thick slates, and tiles may make strong and durable edgings for kitchengardens. Thrift edgings, in connection with cottages, are very pretty when perfect. They want replanting, however, every three years, and parts of them frequently perish, leaving the ugliest gaps, where they have been long grown in the same spot, though the plants should be ever so punctually divided and re-set. The dwarf Gentian, (Gentiana acaulis,) if planted in double rows, sometimes, in soil that suits it, makes a neat edging. Heaths, also, particularly the common Lyng, (Calluna vulgaris,) and its double-flowered variety, may, when promptly trimmed, produce an excellent edging for a Heath garden, or bed of American plants. The smaller Periwinkle, kept in due limits, is useful as an edging under trees; as is the common or the Irish Ivy. Arctostaphylos uva-ursi will be appropriate in the same position as Heaths, and many varieties of Rock and Sun Rose, though a little too straggling, will supply a novel and consistent edging to a border in which masses of stone and rock plants are freely mingled. The Cotoneaster microphylla is likewise suitable, whether on level ground or among rocks, and will bear a great deal of trimming. Where an evergreen edging of anything like an architectural character is required, nothing is better than the common Yew, as it may be cut and maintained in any shape or size, and has a very decided colour. The most valuable requisites in an edging are evenness, diminutiveness or capability of being regularly trimmed, quietness of appearance or harmony with whatever is behind it, and permanence. In each of these respects, grass will, in nearly all circumstances, except in the kitchen-garden, have the advantage. Where it is least in character is immediately alongside of any rocky surface. There, the common Heath, undressed, would be most expressive and characteristic. Of late years, it has become the fashion, in many cases, to put edgings to beds, whether these be filled with dwarf shrubs or with flowers. In respect of beds arranged formally, and occupied with dwarf shrubs, as in regular winter gardens, or in peculiar positions on lawns, (see, for example, the beds marked 14 in fig. 150,) edgings of some dwarfer shrub than the one employed in the centre of each, may help to define the beds more clearly, to impart an additional air of neatness, and to secure greater contrast and variety. For flower-beds, again, the same practice, where a plant of a dwarfer and compacter habit is used as the edging, may be equally suitable; and if a decided change of colour be thus introduced, the effect may become even brilliant. But the system requires to be pursued with judgment and caution, and in reference more to individual beds or small groups than to a regular flower-garden. A degree of quaintness, and an appearance of antiquity, are sometimes attained by surrounding large flower beds on lawns with an edging of some shrub or tree, and keeping this duly clipped. I have even seen the common Oak and the Turkey Oak thus applied, and kept at the height of about nine inches, presenting a dense mass of leaves in the summer season. With the ordinary materials for a hedge,-Box, Yew, &c., or with Ivy, the larger variety of variegated Periwinkle, Cotoneaster, Lyng, &c., the formation of an edging of this sort would be by no means difficult; though its value appears to me to be at least doubtful. Ornamental wire edgings, of various forms, but generally with the rim curved outwards, are occasionally serviceable in the case of large flower beds, as they may be made the vehicle for displaying several pretty summer climbers that could not in any other way be conveniently placed upon a lawn. The varieties of Maurandya, Lophospermum, Tropæolum, and twining Convolvulus, may be instanced as examples of this class. And it may not be out of place to mention here that an edging to flower beds composed of rough blocks of larch or oak, not denuded of the bark, will, if sparingly adopted, answer a most important purpose, by lifting up certain of the beds, and thus giving greater elevation and distinctness to the plants in them, besides divesting a parterre or, a group of everything in the shape of flatness and sameness. Such beds may be raised one, |