In Dongguan Street, Yangzhou, there is a salt merchant garden with the longest existing history and the best preservation, which is called a garden.

Geyuan is the home of Huang Zhiyun, the head of the salt merchants in the two Huai regions in the 22nd year of the Jiaqing reign of the Qing Dynasty (1818), and is a classic representative of private gardens in Yangzhou during the Ming and Qing dynasties. The entire garden covers an area of 2.3 hectares, and the overall layout adopts the traditional form of a classical garden with a front house and a back garden, with bamboo and stone as the main elements in the garden design. Showcasing the luxurious lifestyle of a generation of salt merchants' homes. Due to its unique scenery and clever construction, it has a winding, deep, and captivating realm in a spacious and open environment. In 1998, it was announced by the State Council as a "National Key Cultural Relics Protection Unit". Along with the Humble Administrator's Garden in Suzhou, the Summer Palace in Beijing, and the Summer Resort in Chengde, it is known as one of the "Four Famous Gardens in China".

There is a couplet on the pillar of Qingsong Hall: "For hundreds of years, people have only accumulated good deeds, and the first good thing is just reading.

The owner loves bamboo and covers it with bamboo to fix it. It can be seen that the owner has a great preference for green bamboo and takes the name "Geyuan". Bamboo is planted throughout the garden, and the shape of the bamboo leaves resembles the Chinese character for "Ge", hence the name "Geyuan". In fact, the biggest feature of this garden is not bamboo, but the concept and architecture of "Four Seasons rockery". In this garden, four realistic rockery areas have been opened, named spring, summer, autumn, and winter respectively. In the bamboo grove in front of us, there are several stalagmites planted. The bamboo is lush and the stalagmites are uneven, like mushrooms sprouting from the ground. This is the spring scenery of our garden.

The beauty of a garden lies in the beauty of stones, bamboo, architecture, and couplets. It embodies the poetic and picturesque atmosphere of "spring mountains are suitable for sightseeing, summer mountains are suitable for viewing, autumn mountains are suitable for climbing, and winter mountains are suitable for living".

The gardeners make use of the uneven and thin, transparent, leaky and wrinkled characteristics of the Taihu Lake Lake stones to build rockeries. The stacked stones look like clouds and fog. From a distance, they are smooth, like clouds and strange peaks; Myopia is delicate and transparent, like peaks and caves. This is a summer scenery.

In Chinese culture, bamboo is a symbol of noble character because it remains evergreen throughout the year, does not change color due to seasonal changes, and does not wither due to extreme cold. Su Shi wrote in his poem: "It is better to eat without meat than to live without bamboo. Without meat, one becomes thin, and without bamboo, one becomes vulgar." Therefore, the name "Individual Garden" reflects the owner's spiritual aspiration to maintain high standards despite being in a bustling city.

The outstanding aspect of the owner of the garden, Huang Zhiyun, is that he is a Confucian businessman with profound cultural cultivation. The reason why Yiyuan has such high taste and artistic appreciation value is also related to Huang Zhiyun's extraordinary aesthetic taste and artistic appreciation.

The wall hanging of the "Han School" in the main hall of the Huang family reads "Manyan Zhulu cutting Tang sentences, chewing plum blossoms and reading Jin books". At the Nanmu restaurant of the Huang family, there is a couplet that reads "In the wind and moon at home, there is joy at four o'clock, and in righteousness, there is taste in reading. These couplets all express Huang Zhiyun's traditional ideas of farming, reading, and passing on his family, as well as his earnest expectations for his children. The strict upbringing of the Huang family, coupled with the children's own efforts, has resulted in each of the four sons of the Huang family having profound literary cultivation, proficient in poetry, calligraphy, and painting, and all having works that have been passed down to the world.

Huang Zhiyun attached great importance to the education of his children throughout his life. There are many couplets in the garden hall, such as "There is no other way to pass on a family than to cultivate and read, and there are good plans for a prosperous future only through diligence and frugality. What do the current second generation of officials and the second generation of wealthy people think of this pair of couplets?

The biggest feature of the garden is the concept and architecture of the "Four Seasons rockery". In the garden with an area of less than 50 acres, four realistic rockery areas have been opened, named spring, summer, autumn, and winter respectively. The entire garden is centered around Yiyuxuan, and visitors can enjoy the beautiful scenery of the four seasons by following the direction of the flow.

Autumn Mountain is made up of stacked yellow mountain stones, with a high mountain terrain and a large area. The mountain stones are brownish yellow in color, with distinct edges and corners, like a knife chopping an axe. The entire mountain is steep and towering, appearing magnificent and majestic. If we compare this garden to a painting scroll, then this is the main part of the painting; If we compare this garden to a piece of music, this is the climax of the song.

Dongshan is made of a type of stone called Xuan Shi. This type of stone is crystal clear and snow-white, containing many quartz particles that shine brightly under the light. Each stone has almost no visible edges and corners, giving a sense of unity and undulation, as if white snow covers it. The gardener intentionally or unintentionally stacked the rockery like a group of lions, and from a distance, it looked like a group of snow lions jumping happily, with a charming and silly appearance. Winter has arrived, can spring be far behind?
The rockeries, stacked stones, architecture, bamboo, and couplets in the garden create one poetic and picturesque time and space for us, leaving us with endless memories. At the same time, it is also interpreting a certain information code passed on to us by the owner. This information is the lingering fragrance of books that has been lingering in the deep courtyard for a hundred years.