DOI chapter:
Chapter VIII Of Garden Sculpture and Ornament
DOI Page / Citation link:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.65493#0231
AMERICAN SCULPTURE
169
III
Given our garden fountain, with or
without its ornament, what more nat-
ural than a coign of vantage from
which to enjoy it? The exedra, as in-
troduced to us long ago by McKim,
White and other architects, has been
eagerly adopted by garden lovers. A
beloved spot at Aspet, the Saint-Gau-
dens estate, holds in the far distance
a blue sky, a blue mountain and a
lordly crest of purple pines; in the
middle distance is a magic stretch of
simple grass, while near at hand, and
flanked by a rosy tracery of oleander
blossoms, a golden god Pan pipes to
the seven golden fishes spouting water
into a green-veined white marble basin,
rectangular in form. Facing this, and
shaded by pines, hemlocks and silver
birches, is a great white exedra, plan-
ned not on the usual curve but on the
three sides of an oblong, and show-
AND ORNAMENT
169
III
Given our garden fountain, with or
without its ornament, what more nat-
ural than a coign of vantage from
which to enjoy it? The exedra, as in-
troduced to us long ago by McKim,
White and other architects, has been
eagerly adopted by garden lovers. A
beloved spot at Aspet, the Saint-Gau-
dens estate, holds in the far distance
a blue sky, a blue mountain and a
lordly crest of purple pines; in the
middle distance is a magic stretch of
simple grass, while near at hand, and
flanked by a rosy tracery of oleander
blossoms, a golden god Pan pipes to
the seven golden fishes spouting water
into a green-veined white marble basin,
rectangular in form. Facing this, and
shaded by pines, hemlocks and silver
birches, is a great white exedra, plan-
ned not on the usual curve but on the
three sides of an oblong, and show-
AND ORNAMENT