every aid to make it natural-looking, and the outflow, or the pretence of it, is also made an attractive feature. The drains proper are, of course, never unduly visible, but are skilfully arranged to carry off the surface and rain water, without allowing it to mix with the ornamental sort, and so contaminate it.
Fountains and artificial ponds of architectural and geometrical designs, such as the European loves so dearly, are never seen in strictly Japanese gardens. Such set designs are for the highly artificial grounds of a landscape architect, not for those whose only true guide is Nature. There are, it is true, certain patterns set, such as circles, crescents, and squares (seen only in the tiniest of models), but their names indicate but roughly their shapes, for the edges are not outlined with stone copings, as ours are, and are broken and ‘lost’ at irregular intervals by plantings of Reeds, Irises, or shrubbery. Two pretty models are those of the ideographs of ‘water’ and ‘heart’; and, although these graceful and free designs of Chinese characters would seem to require no groups of trees and flowering bushes to make them appear the spontaneous work of Nature’s hand, they nevertheless have them.
This ‘breaking the line’ of a design is found in every phase of the landscape artist’s method, and does more than anything else to give the fresh look of unspoiled and untouched Nature
