Scenic Gardens as Special Favors of Nature

The name of this type of garden may sound a bit queer as what one sees may not be just a garden in its usual sense but any locus of scenic value in Hangzhou. The building of this type of scenic place began early in history, going back to the time of the Jin Dynasty（265-420）, such as what is known as the Pavilion of Xu You the Recluse on a hill not far from Lingyin Temple and the Mengxie Pavilion of Tianzhu Mountain. During the Tang Dynasty（618-907）, conservation work began on the West Lake which was drained and dredged. In the year 781, a minister named Li Bi started work on what was known as The Six Wells （Liujing）and in the year 882 the famous poet and governor of Hangzhou Bai Juyi presided over the project of building what is today's Bai Causeway on the lake. Then in 1089 in the Song Dynasty, Su Dongpo the famous man of letters and official began large-scale conservation work on West Lake, building the Su Causeway that until this day traverses the lake north to south. In the Qing Dynasty （1616-1911）, the provincial governor of Zhejiang, Ruan Yuan by name, had West Lake once again dredged and the resulting sludge and mud was piled up to make the well-known scenic sight Lord Ruan's Islet（Ruangongdun） or more poetically A Green Belt Around the Ruan Islet.

Solitray Hill

Solitray Hill（Gu Shan）, an islet in the West Lake, is known for its great scenic charm. With an altitude of 38m, it covers an area of 200,000 sq m. Linked with the Bai Causeway to the east, it is connected with land to the west by way of Xiling Bridge. Facing the Outer West Lake in the south and backed by the Inner West Lake in the north, Solitary Hill is a mound densely covered with woods and other kinds of plant life in the midst of which are pavilions and other semi-decorative structures that dot the hill here and there, seemingly at random but collectively having a pleasant effect on the eye. Here and there one comes upon quaint little stone bridges and narrow flower-bordered paths that look as if they would lead one into more secluded unknown sanctuaries somewhere. In history, Solitary Hill had been the site of an imperial garden of some Song emperors and the abode of some emperors of the Qing Dynasty when they happened to be in Hangzhou. On the other hand, Solitary Hill had also been the home of hermits in the past where a well-known poet of Song Dynasty, Lin Hejing by name, had lived a reclusive life in his day at the foot of the northern slope. At the foot of the hill on the south is located Wenlan Tower which, built in 1782, was one of the imperial libraries of Emperor Qianlong of Qing where he had a whole set of what was called Si Ku Quan Shu（A Complete Collection of All the Four Categories of Chinese Books）stored. To the west is the site of the Seal Engraver's Society（Xi Ling Ying She）where scholars and artists gather to study the inscriptions on ancient bronze and stone ware, fine art and calligraphy and the Chinese art of carving seals. Occupying the central part of Solitary Hill is a park named after Dr. Sun Yat-sen. Altogether there are over thirty places of scenic and historical interest in the vicinity.

The Seal Engraver's Society, which was set up for the clearly stated purpose of “carrying on the study of ancient bronze and stone ware inscriptions and the art of seal engraving”, occupies a hilltop house and garden on Solitary Hill. A flagstone path leads up to the top of this mini-hill where immediately one sees the enchanting sight of a Chinese-style pavilion half hidden in a grove of trees. That is the Sizhao （Four Illuminations）Pavilion which occupies a unique vantage point in terms of scenery appreciation in Hangzhou. Not very big in terms of physical dimensions, it is yet in artistically correct proportion to the general physical appearance of the hill and it is where a lakeside decorative piece of architecture can best interact with the lake by borrowing views from each other to enhance their own respective attractiveness. The presence of this hilltop pavilion has added to the scenic charm of Solitary Hill and serves somehow to dominate and bring together all the other pavilions, terraces and suchlike semi-decorative pieces of architecture on the hill for an integrated scenic effect. This Sizhao Pavilion is also an ideal spot to take in beautiful views of the West Lake from a fixed position, for it is open on all four sides, with so to say four big “picture windows”where the eye is being greeted with an endless series of beautiful landscape paintings.

Solitary Hill is but one of the many many scenic gardens as special favors of nature at the West Lake. Other such scenic gardens include the Ten Scenic Sights of West Lake such as the poetically-named Autumn Moon on a Placid Lake, Three Pools Mirroring the Moon, etc. whose history goes back to the Southern Song Dynasty and the New Ten Scenic Sights of West Lake that were named in the 1980s such as Bamboo-Shaded Paths at Yunqi （Cloud Hugging Temple）, Trees Shrouded in Mists at the Nine Brooks, Budding Green at Yellow Dragon Cave, Hillside Aglow at Baoshi Mountain, etc. From these names we can see that the scenic gardens so-called have played an important role in garden development in Hangzhou and contribute significantly to the scenic charm of the city as a whole.