It oftens happens that the builder of a home has a piece of low land, too wet for gardening or ordinary cultivation, which is really an eyesore. Now it is quite possible to work every foot of such land into the general scheme of landscaping and to make it as beautiful as any part of the grounds. This is true of brackish as well as fresh water swamp. Wherever the land is so low that it is generally under water it may easily be made into a pool, pond or lake with a moderate amount of labor, and the mud which is removed can either be filled into adjoining low land or used as muck for high land. I have elsewhere in this work written about the construction of pools, so that it will not be necessary here to treat at length on the subject. In some cases there will be a considerable growth of scrub or even timber on low land which is to be treated and there may be open spaces here and there upon it. Such open spaces would seem to be natural locations for artificial bodies of water.

In laying out walks in low land it will, perhaps, be found best to carry them in a general way on the higher, firmer ground. If the land is partly timbered they may be so laid out that very little cutting will need to be done. If one has rock it may be broken finely and two or three inches laid over the mud where the walk is to be, an inch of sand being put on over all for a cover. I have made such walks throughout several acres of swamp, some of it being so soft that one would mire down in it, but with the amount of material I have mentioned, a walk has been made that bears up with any amount of foot travel, though the whole trembles when it is walked over. If rock cannot be had marl and sand or even sand mixed with a little muck will answer, though a considerable depth must be put on in order to make it bear up.

Rustic seats can be built in low land if a sufficient amount of rock or sand is placed around them to make it dry under foot. Such seats may often be so placed that a fine view can be had from them over artificial bodies of water. I have constructed them of rough rock and cement, simply building them on the mud with only a slight enlargement of the base, and they have never cracked or settled in the least. The outside should be made as rough and irregular as possible, while the seat itself is made smooth and easy in which to sit. Below the seat the space is to be filled in with broken rock, pounded in so that it will not settle and two or three one-inch pins should be set up vertically in this. The cement in the seat bottom is to be smoothed around these and when it has set the pins are to be pulled out. This will allow the rainwater to drain but so that the seat will always be dry. If one has no rock, wooden seats can be made; the posts being driven deep into the mud. All seats should have a good rake back, rocking chair fashion.

Open spaces may be left in low grounds which if mowed occasionally would have something the effect of a lawn. I do not as yet know of any grass that would answer for lawn in such locations but there is a succulent, half creeping plant (Monniera monniera) that grows in brackish and fresh water swamps from Maryland to Texas which, without any attention whatever, makes a lovely carpet in low, open places. This charming little plant bears its pale blue flowers in abundance throughout the greater part of the year and flourishes in much trodden places.

I have made some experiments in planting my low grounds, some of which are very wet. The entire area is subject to occasional overflow from Biscayne Bay during hurricane tides, and I am surprised at the large number of things which do well or promise to do so. Undoubtedly this list might be greatly extended but very good effects can be produced with the plants here mentioned.

Among the palms all the species of Phoenix which I cultivate do excellently in brackish mud; a number of them being planted where they are surrounded with water during every unusually high tide. Here they grow with the greatest vigor, their leaves being of a rich, intense green and that without any fertilizer. The list includes P. reclinata, P. tenuis, P. farinifera, P. rupicola, P. cycadifolia, P. tomentosa, P. paradenia, P. paludosa, P. canari-ensis, P. pumila, P. humilis, P. senegalensis and P. melanocarpa. I have not tried P. sylvestris and P. dactylifera on low ground but believe they would succeed. All the Inodes (better known under the name of Sabal) do equally as well as the species of Phoenix. I have tried with perfect success . utnbraculifera, I. havanensis, I. tnegacarpa, I. mexicana and everyone knows that our native cabbage palmetto, I. palmetto, is perfectly at home in all kinds of marsh. So are the varieties of the saw palmetto, Serenoa serrulata, some forms of which assume almost tree-like proportions in such conditions.