Page:Japanese Gardens (Taylor).djvu/80

42, purply red earth, or finely raked sand, or beautifully patterned gravel, takes its place. From a plan of the distribution and situation of its principal stones an expert could determine, as scientific men make up the picture of a prehistoric beast from a few bones, the character—I had almost said the age and sex—of the garden, but that would be hardly accurate, as some of the bones are masculine and some feminine, and both come into the same plan, the one to strengthen, the other to soften and beautify the whole.

But if I do not go into the geology of the country it does not mean that the landscape gardener has not done so. He has studied it in a very thorough way, and has applied with a most careful and subtle art the deductions he has drawn from his observations. As usual, in this subject as in that of any other art or craft in Japan, there are classical rules made by the masters of their profession which are founded upon perfectly scientific principles, as well as upon æsthetic ones, handed on and rigidly adhered to by those who come after. But although the rules are rigid, much latitude is not only allowed, but almost demanded, in the carrying out of details. For it must never be forgotten in anything bearing on this subject of landscape gardening in Japan, that the first and greatest master is Nature. As the idea is, primarily, to present an interpretation of