JAPANESE gardens are bounded by walls, fences, or hedges. Walls serve more as a general enclosure to property, and belong rather to the province of the architect, than to that of the landscape gardener; but in cases where gardens are carried to the outer boundary, and not preceded by gravelled courts and paved approaches, the style of the outer wall and its gateways are more or less influenced by the character of the garden. The walls surrounding the grounds of the old palaces consist of a thick battering construction of clay and tiles, neatly plastered, and enclosed in a stout timber framework, having elaborate wooden bracketting as a cornice, and being crowned with a roof of ornamental tiles. Intercepted at intervals by handsome roofed gateways, they present a strikingly grand appearance, as may be seen around the Imperial Palace and the Temple called Higashi Honganji, at Kioto.
