International studio (32.1907)

Reviews and Notices

the volume, comprise in all, three or four hundred
of the more or less familiar flowering herbaceous
plants of Britain, presented with an unusual degree of
accuracy, both as regards form and colour; and in
addition to the entire plant, the details of the floral
structure are given in many cases, and with suffi-
cient precision to enable the student to study them
when actual specimens are inaccessible. Miss
Adams’s drawings have been admirably reproduced
by the three-colour chromotype process, and besides
being of service to the botanist, they should also
prove a valuable and reliable source of suggestion
for the decorative artist. The letterpress, on which
great care seems to have been bestowed, consists
of technical descriptions of the principal species
arranged according to families, a glossary of
terms, and a good index. It may be hoped that
Miss Adams, who has, by the drawings now pub-
lished, given convincing proof of her ability as a
delineator of plant forms, will proceed with the
orders not represented in the present volume.

The Brasses of England. By Herbert W.
Macklin, M.A. (London : Methuen.) 7s. 6d.
net.—Though it contains little that is new, and
some of the illustrations have been copied or re-
duced from those in other books, the author has
managed to give a certain freshness to a somewhat
hackneyed theme by connecting it more closely
than has hitherto been done with the history of the
country in which the quaint memorials of the dead
he so eloquently describes were produced. Thus
he deals with Edwardian, Plantagenet, Lancastrian,
Yorkist, Tudor, and Elizabethan brasses, and treats
those known as Palimpsest under the attractive
headings of the “ Spoliation of the Monasteries,”
the “ Suppression of Chantries,” etc., thus enabling
the reader to study with ease the characteristics of
each period, and bringing into vivid relief the price-
less value of the surviving relics of a noble art as
historic documents written in all but imperishable
material, as well as examples of the work of the
master craftsmen who designed and executed them.
His interesting account of the brasses of mediaeval
clergy is a complete essay on ecclesiastical vest-
ments; whilst the various appendices dealing with
minor groups of brasses, which might perhaps have
been with advantage incorporated in the text, dis-
play a really remarkable grasp of a subject that
would appear to be practically inexhaustible.

The Art and Craft of Garden Making. By
Thomas H. Mawson, Hon. A.R.I.B.A. Third
Edition. Revised and enlarged. (London : B. T.
Batsford.) 355. net. Landhaus und Garten.
Examples of Modem Country Houses, with Plans,
168

Interiors, and Gardens. Edited, with Introduction,
by Hermann Muthesius. .(Munich: F. Bruck-
mann and Co.). In cloth binding, 12 mks. net.
—We are glad to see this new issue of Mr. Mawson’s
well-known work, which has been out of print for
some time. The outcome of an unusually wide
experience in the laying out of gardens under all
sorts of conditions, the work well deserves the high
esteem in which it has been held since its first ap-
pearance some seven years ago. In now revising
and enlarg:ng the work, the author has made a
more thorough and incisive inquiry into the prin-
ciples upon which successful gardens are founded,
and their various ideals, at ihe same time scruti-
nising certain examples left by able designers, and
examining the problems presented by characteristic
sites in typical districts in Britain. In the present
edition much larger use is made of photographs
for purposes of illustration than in the two preced-
ing editions, there being more than a hundred
views in which the author’s matured work is thus
exhibited. These photographic views are con-
veniently grouped with the plans relating to them-
The volume is handsomely got up, and replete as
it is wich information and suggestions for the prac-
titioner, the work is certain to maintain its position
as a leading one on the subject. We have
bracketed with it the volume by Prof. Muthesius,
because to a certain extent it covers the same field,
though the bulk of it concerns rural domestic
architecture, of which a great variety of examples
are illustrated from the designs of architects of
different nationalities. Both authors have some-
thing to say about the relations of garden design to
architecture. Mr. Mawson’s view is briefly put when
he says that in the course of his extensive practice
he has realized the fact that house and garden
must be complementary parts of a whole, and that
while sympathising with those architects who claim
the right to design the setting to their houses, he
also sympathises with those landscape gardeners
who have felt that to ensure a successful garden,
it is necessary to have some say in the arrange-
ment and disposal of the house on the site and in
the selection of the site itself. Prof. Muthesius
takes much the same view on the main question,
but his sympathies are apparently more on the side
of the architect: if the house is architecture so
must the garden also be architecture, he says;
meaning, of course, that the order and rhythm
which characterise the one should also enter into
the other. The view he champions is one which of
late years has gained many adherents among archi-
tects in Europe and America, many of whom