A Handbook of Old Japan, Volume II

The garden is the only place in which we Dutchmen, being treated in all respects little better than prisoners, have liberty to walk. It is commonly square, with a back door, and walled in very neatly. There are few good houses or inns without one. If there be not room enough for a garden, they have at least an old ingrafted plum, cherry, or apricot tree; and the older, the more crooked and monstrous, the greater value they put upon it. Sometimes they let the branches grow into the rooms. In order to make it bear larger flowers and in greater quantity, they trim it to a few, perhaps two or three, branches.