Two other traits peculiar to these old Persian gardens may be remarked: the one of so constructing the canals and tanks as to keep the water brimming to the level of the paths on either hand; the other, a charming custom of paving the shallow watercourses with brilliant blue tiles, the clear rivulets running in and out between the gloom of the old cypress avenues reflecting even a deeper blue than the cloudless sky above them.
The Mughal gardens, copied from the earlier gardens of Turkestan and Persia, are invariably square or rectangular in shape, their area being divided into a series of smaller square parterres. A high wall, adorned with serrated battlements and pierced by a lofty entrance gateway, encircles the garden. These imposing entrances are a great feature of the Mughal style, and in the larger gardens there are always four main gateways, one in the centre of each wall, while the angles of the outer walls are marked by small octagonal buildings.
The water runs in a trim stone- or brick-edged canal down the whole length of the enclosure, falling from level to level in smooth cascades, or rushing in a tumult of white foam over carved water-chutes (chaddars). Below many of these waterfalls the canal flows into a larger or smaller tank, called a hauz, usually studded with numerous small fountains. The principal pavilion was often placed in the centre of the largest of these sheets of water, forming a cool, airy retreat from the rays of the midday sun, where the inmates of the garden might be lulled to sleep by the roar of the cascades, while the misty spray of the fountains, drifting in through the arches of the building, tempered the heat of a burning noontide: water pavilions, such as the exquisite black marble baradari in the harem garden of the Kashmir Shalimar, or the octagonal building which once adorned the great tank of the ruined garden at Bijbehara. In nearly all the larger gardens side-canals were added, leading out from the principal tanks and terminating in architectural features such as baradaris built into the wall, raised platforms, or gateways. From these stone-bordered canals and tanks the water required for irrigating the soil is conducted by pipes concealed beneath the ground to points where it is needed.
