Make a Rock Garden

"I advise you sincerely that if you have in your garden a bit of a slope, or a small terrace, make a rock garden there. In the first place, such a rock garden is very beautiful when it is grown over with cushions of saxifrage, aubrieta, alyssum, wall cress, and other very nice little alpine flowers; secondly, because making a rock garden is itself a splendid and fascinating exercise. A man who buids a rock garden feels himself to be a cyclops when he, so to speka, with elemental power, piles stone upon stone, createshills and dales, transports mountain and erects rocky cliffs. Later when, with aching back he has finished his gigantic masterpiece, he finds that it looks rather different from the romantic mountain which he had in mind; and it seems to be only a heap of rubble and stones. But don't worry; in a year these stones will change in to a most beautiful bed, sparkling with tiny flowers, and grown over with nice green cushions; and your pleasure will be great. I tell you, make a rock garden."

-Karel Capek