Page:Japanese Gardens (Taylor).djvu/124

74 The Japanese, in their fences, garden walls, and hedges, have arrived at a happy medium between the methods employed in America and England. The British idea of a private possession, into which no man may even look without an invitation, is perhaps a little selfish. The American notion that a man’s lawn and front garden should be as much for the adornment of the street on which he lives as for his own use and pleasure is, although so altruistic, to my way of thinking a mistaken one, for it is only in its privacy that one can enjoy a garden or grass and trees. But the Japanese combine the merits of both systems. The fence, or wall, or hedge, as the case may be, is in itself so attractive that one need hardly turn to the blooming trees that overhang it; to the branch of Bamboo, or flowering Pomegranate, or Cherry, half caught through its moon-shaped opening, or peeping over the corner; to the Pine tree that guards its gates, to lend it interest and grace, and decorate the street on which it faces. But when, added to this, is the fact that the flower-loving stranger may enter unasked,—I do not say he would, but he might, and he would be treated with courtesy, and as if by his appreciation he conferred a favour on his willy-nilly host,—it would appear as though the real millennium of garden-owning had arrived.

In towns or crowded districts, very high