Page:Japanese Gardens (Taylor).djvu/29

Rh of Nature alone. We cannot believe that enormous sums have probably been paid for these stones, which may have been brought from hundreds of miles away (perhaps having been broken in pieces, marked, and stuck together again). We cannot understand how water, which, like the wind, goeth where it listeth, has had its bed of white stones built for it, and has been trained, as pet dogs are, to run and tumble and lie down at the will of the master. We cannot even understand, unless we have seen it done, that these age-old trees, and the young but sturdy blossoming ones, have perhaps been transplanted a few months before to this site. It is one of the constant wonders of this wonderful land that a new garden may, in so short a time, seem an old one.

If a rich man in Japan makes his house bigger, it goes without saying that he has to increase the size of his grounds, for, from least to largest, the one inflexible rule is to keep to scale in gardens and all surroundings. And this scale is not only one of size, of feet and inches; it means also character, sentiment, adornment: all must continue the idea, and work towards a harmonious whole. You would never find one part of a Japanese garden decorated with a Greek temple, approached by an Italian pergola, and surrounded by ‘old-fashioned’ flower-beds, as you might in home places. The whole garden would be subtly and delicately Japanese.