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JOURNAL OF RUKAL ART AID RURAL TASTE. 



Vol. II. 



DECEMBER, 1847. 



No. 6. 



How TO CHOOSE THE SITE FOR A COUNTRY 



HOUSE, is a subject now occupying the 

 thoughts of many of our countrymen, and 

 therefore is not undeserving a few words 

 from us at the present moment. 



The greater part of those who build 

 country seats in the United States, are citi- 

 zens Avho retire from the active pursuits of 

 town to enjoy, in the most rational way pos- 

 sible, the fortunes accumulated there — that 

 is [to say, in the creation of beautiful and 

 agreeable rural homes. 



Whatever may be the natural taste of 

 this class, their avocations have not permit- 

 ted them to become familiar with the diffi- 

 culties to be encountered in making a nno 

 place, or the most successful way of accom- 

 plishing all that they propose to themselves. 

 Hence, we not unfrequently see a very com- 

 plete house surrounded, for years, by very 

 unfinished and meagre grounds. Weary 

 with the labor and expense of levelling 

 earth, opening roads and walks, and cloth- 

 ing a naked place with new plantations, all 

 of which he finds far less easily accom- 

 plished than building brick walls in the 

 city, the once sanguine improver often 

 abates his energy, and loses his interest in 

 the embellishment of his grounds, before his 

 plans are half perfected. 



Vol. II. 32 



All this arises from a general disposition 

 to underrate the difficulty and cost of mak- 

 ing plantations, and laying the groundwork 

 of a complete country residence. Land- 

 scape gardening, where all its elements're- 

 quire to be newly arranged, where the sce- 

 nery of a place requires to be almost whol- 

 ly created, is by no means either a cheap or 

 a rapid process. Labor and patience must 

 be added to taste, time and money, before a 

 bare site can be turned into smooth lawns 

 and complete pleasure grounds. 



The best advice which the most expe- 

 rienced landscape gardener can give an 

 American about to select ground for a coun- 

 ry residence, is, therefore, to choose a site 

 where there is natural loood, and wliere na- 

 ture offers the greatest number of good fea- 

 tures ready for a basis upon which to com- 

 mence improvements. 



We have, already, so often descanted on 

 the superiority of trees and lawns to all 

 other features of ornamental places united, 

 that our readers are not, we trust, slow to 

 side with us in a thorough appreciation of 

 their charms. 



Hence, when a site for a country place is 

 to be selected, (after health and good neio-h- 

 borhood,) the first points are, if possible, to 

 secure a position where there is some exist- 



