262 THE ELOEAL WOELD AND GAEDEN GUIDE. 



rockeries. A fountain in a main path, within view of the drawing- 

 room windows, or readily accessible from the house by a short walk, should 

 certainly present itself to the eye in a very distinct form, and should con- 

 stitute a feature in the scene. If so small as to be invisible until the 

 visitor almost tumbled into it, and so mean in character as to have no 

 more dignity than belongs to an accidental detail, every person of cul- 

 tivated taste would condemn it as an absurdity. If too grand for the 

 place it would be equally absurd ; in fact, if it cannot be well done, as 

 circumstances require, it should not be done at all, for paltry waterworks 

 are more obnoxious than paltry earthworks, and betray more quickly 

 whether lack of means or lack of taste is to be accredited with the 

 failure. 



Rustic waterworks may be introduced in rustic scenes very appro- 

 priately, but to dispose rustic forms and proportions with propriety and 

 effect demands quite as much taste and judgment as the plan of a grand 

 architectural fountain. If a supply of water can be obtained for a por- 

 tion of the ground appropriated to ferns, rockeries, and green recesses, it 

 can be made much of, both for the greater display of the sparkling stream 

 and for assisting such of the plants as require it, by leading it about in the 

 form of a rivulet down a succession of cascades, terminating in a rocky pool 

 at the outlet, and this rocky pool may be made bewitchingly beautiful by 

 planting it with bur-reeds, flowering rushes, lady ferns, osmundas, arundos, 

 and other aquatics of graceful forms and luxurious habits. Happily for 

 the possessors of villa gardens there is no need to call in an architect or 

 engineer for advice on any waterworks of moderate pretensions, for the 

 fitting of a fountain, according to the laws of hydrostatics, is a matter 

 within the capacity of any respectable plumber, and Mr. Frederick Ran- 

 some, of Ipswich, will supply, in imperishable stone, fountains, basins, 

 and statuary in any and every style, from the most severely classical to 

 the most grotesquely rustic, and sheets of patterns may be obtained 

 through the post by asking for them, and supplying a stamp to frank 

 them through. In " Rustic Adornments," which Jemima of course pos- 

 sesses, we have given some rules for the introduction and use of water in 

 scenery, and to that work we must refer those who wish for more infor- 

 mation than can be given in a magazine article. But it may be well here 

 to say, that for a fountain there must be a reserve of water at a higher 

 level than the fountain itself. In London this is easily accomplished by 

 constructing a cistern in some elevated part of the residence, and securing 

 a supply to it from the ordinary water-pipes. Then from the cistern 

 there must be another service to the fountain. If the house is far re- 

 moved from the fountain, it will be better to place the cistern on the sum- 

 mit of a tower, shed, summer-house, or other structure, as the longer the 

 supply-pipe the more will the play of the fountain be lessened by friction ; 

 for though water will always rise in a pipe to the level of the point of de- 

 parture, it requires time to do so, and friction reduces the rapidity of the 

 flow, and hence the force with which a fountain will play cannot be de- 

 termined solety by the difference of altitude between the jet and the cis- 

 tern. If the supply-pipe is one hundred yards in length, the height of 

 the fountain will be reduced one foot below what it would attain if the 

 supply were close beside it. Suppose that, according to the respective 

 levels of the jet and the cistern, a fountain ought to ri.se ten feet, we 

 have only to remove the cistern to a distance of one thousand yards to 



