Inkognito, by all means, say what you wish to say. Do not hold it in. I would like to know about my inaccuracies. Intelligent, confident people are perfectly willing to carry on a debate. I wanted to be provocative which is why I introduced my post the way I did. I sometimes try to shake things up a little bit here in the ye olde gardenweb forums because it can be pretty boring sometimes. At times I exaggerated to make my point. Also I was really breezing along and maybe not formulating my ideas as well as I might have wanted to. The only inaccuracy I thought might exist, after writing it BUT before seeing your post, is that I've read that some parts of New England have colonial stone walls. I see from your profile you are from Canada. I presume there are some in Eastern Canada too. Sure, but they cannot be as prevalent on this continent as they are on the British Isles and parts of France. Are there chateaux in France whose front facade is lined with white birches planted 10 ft away from the foundation, that I don't know about? Do some Americans return from winter vacations in the subtropics or southern California and say "all those plants that don't lose their leaves - hideous!" Are there vast stretches of UK suburbia landscaped with nothing but syringas, peonies and Scots Pine? Nary a Cordyline or Fuchsia magellanica in sight? (I KNOW they aren't dumb enough to plant giant american sugar maples on a 1/5 acre lots there, so I was trying to think of an equivalently run-of-the-mill tree for them) Please...share your thoughts! I really wish when I visited the UK in the mid 90s there had been digicams so I could have photographed 100s of residential gardens to prove my point, but I didn't. I spent more time in Edinburgh and I remember walking down streets and spending an hour on one block just surveying new-to-me rare and beautiful plants in people's gardens. I remember seeing Morinas. I remember seeing those exotic lilies like Nomocharis or the other genus whose name escapes me. Obviously I saw meconopsis. I remember artful combinations of Euphorbias and some kind of campion or lychnis. Often not a weed in sight for a whole block - and in the ditches the beautiful Himalayan Impatiens grew as weeds! If it's any "consolation" I fully realize that culture is dying, even there, I would not be surprised if in a couple generations time the British are no more a nation of gardeners than we are. FWIW, I'll also say that a non-gardening friend of mine who visited Dublin said she was absolutely blown away by the quality of people's residential gardens there compared to anywhere in the US she'd been. Not that she knew the specific plants, just that they were lovely and well-kept.

" I do feel though (plz let me say this just once..) that they look like prison facilities." (edit: I caught ltonk before he or she made an edit. But that's a fine opinion to express if you're not used to the look, which, clearly most people in the US wouldn't be) Well, obviously, the British aristocracy would disagree with you. I don't see any razor wire fences, guard towers, concrete block batiments, etc. Are you sure you've actually seen a prison in your life? FWIW the first picture is the back of Castle Howard, here's a better overview: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/north_yorkshire/3624511.stm Of course the ones that actually _were_ castles were in a sense a reverse prison at one time. But I don't think that's the reasoning behind the way they may or may not be planted. I think it's more a mindset about what landscaping, gardening, and architecture all actually are, and mean. There's an utterly fascinating essay I have somewhere...unfortunately I've downloaded 1000s of pdf files of interesting articles and papers over the years, and it's hard to find one I need at a moment's notice - about the history of the concept of "culture" vis-a-vis horticulture. How "culture[d]" and "horticulture" are inexorably intertwined. Basic point is gardens always started out with a utilitarian goal in mind, but their cultural effect was recognized early on. (hanging gardens of babylon, etc) I think to really pull out occam's razor and slash this one open if I may mix metaphors, to put greens in front of one's castle would have implied one had nowhere else to grow one's food. Or something like that. Funny that you said thatthough, as, even though I'm a bit of an anglophile and certainly a fan of English gardening culture, I was reflecting recently that such stately homes, lovely as they are, reflect the "prison" that pre-20th century society was for those who were not in the gentry and aristocracy. You could only build such places without modern machinery and run them efficiently when labor was incredibly cheap and expendable. With the # of recent examples of these piles turning back into what they once were...i.e., fully private homes that don't even need the revenue of visitors, you have to worry whether the world hasn't turned back that way a wee bit. But let's not get into economic policy. That would make a real OT mess. The two I know about are Leonardslee, the Loder Estate - home of one of the most famous collections of rhododendrons in the world - and Torosay Castle, but I'm sure I've read of at least one other in the past few years. This post was edited by davidrt28 on Tue, Apr 30, 13 at 23:22

arcy - I think Cora was willing to cast her spousal net far and wide - remember she was (half?) Jewish, the daughter of a tradesman and from Cincinnati (no offense Ohioans) - so she wasn't exactly at the top of the Social Register. The following is from Wikia.com. The site gives a fairly detailed synopsis of the series. ............................... "Born Cora Levinson in Cincinnati on July 18[citation needed], 1868[1], she was the only daughter of the dry goods multi-millionaire, Isidore Levinson and his wife Martha Levinson, and had an Aunt.[2] Cora has a strained relationship with her mother[3]. As a young woman, she was brought to London in 1888[4] for her first season by her socially ambitious mother, in order to marry a member of the British nobility. During the season she met Robert Crawley, Viscount Downton, the future Earl of Grantham. Much to Robert's mother's chagrin, Cora became engaged to him and the two of them married on 16 February, 1890.[5] As part of their marriage contract, Cora's fortune was tied to the family estate to prevent it from going bankrupt."

yoyo, some years ago friends were in London and were glad to be able to park their car near one of the large football stadiums, despite a game being in progress. A couple of hours later, on their return they realised why there had been so much empty space at the road-side. Their car was covered in dents, scratches and even footprints on the roof . .. presumably inflicted by 'fans' on their way home. There is less football vandalism these days but a drunken British football crowd is not a pretty sight. BTW the US woman deserved their win last night, although I felt the English girls put up quite a fight!