VISITS TO COUNTRY PLACES. 



year or so later, with Downing ; their friendship was such as poets ^ng, and 



dramatists attempt to portray. ^Ir. l)uvviiiii.L!;'s Icistiro moments were never more 

 thoroufrhly enjoyed than when pacinu: witli liis liost around the new grounds, 

 suggesting an ell'ect here, an opening vista through yonder lofty grove, or advis- 

 ing about the hothouses and graperies, tlieir contents and government. These 

 scenes we well rcmem])er ; their recollection is a bright spot in the wastes of life. 

 When Wodenethe was purchased in 1841, the ground, as its name indicates, was 

 finely wooded.* White oaks threw their giant arms about, and the wild black- 

 berry was the only edible fruit. Mr. Sargent has made it "a wilderness of 

 beauty ;" it blossoms with the rose ; the foreign evergreens dispute their sway 

 with the old forest, which has been very gradually yielding its inferior specimens 

 to more ornate native or foreign foliage. Mr. Sargent is, by general consent, 

 our " tree-taster," as Mr. Reeves, of spiraea memory, was tea-taster to the East 

 India Company, with the difference that Mr. Sargent administers only to our 

 mental enjoyment. Ilis evergreens are specimen trees, collected at great cost 

 and labor from every region ; this was attended, of course, with a thousand fail- 

 ures, but these are not now apparent ; all that you see is in perfection. Those 

 portions not hardy have disappeared, and are replaced by more constant friends. 

 The place is a model of landscape gardening ; shrubs and trees appear just 

 where they are wanted ; the lawn is a carjiet of exquisitely kept verdure, mowed 

 every week or ten days with Shank's lawn-mower, an improvement on the English 

 machine, made by Mr. Sargent's neighbor, H. N. Swift, an ingenious mechanic, 

 whose inventive talents have introduced him to a large business in this manufac- 

 ture. We have seen many of his machines in use in various places, and are free 

 to say that we saw but one lawn, that under the care of Mr. Chorlton, on Staten 

 Island, that was perfect without Mr. Swift's invention. The machines are of 

 three sizes ; that for one horse cuts a width of thirty inches ; the pony size twenty- 

 four inches ; that drawn by two men sixteen inches ; and one which a single man 

 draws, and which is used to cut narrow borders, verges, and among and around 

 shrubbery and clumps, has a width of thirteen inches. It cuts, picks up the 

 grass in a box, and rolls the surface at the same operation, and saves an incredible 

 amount of labor. At Wodenethe, the entire lawn, between two and three acres, 

 is cut, gathered up, and rolled in one day, between seven in the morning and 

 sundown ; cut, too, in a way that no mower could cut and gather, and which could 

 not be done unless swept, as in England ; since, the lawn being cut once a week, 

 the grass rarely is over half an inch to one inch long, and, of course, could not 

 be lifted up by the ordinary lawn-rake. The largest size (horse) machine is used 

 here, with one boy to ride the horse, another to guide the machine. This same 

 lawn formerly occupied two men nine days, not mowing between ten and four. 



At Wodenethe, you encounter beautiful specimen trees at every turn. Among 

 the deciduous kind that struck us most for their novelty and beauty were the cut- 

 leaved and fern-leaved beeches, the former six feet and the latter ten feet in height. 

 These truly ornamental trees should be placed in every plantation, as also the cut- 

 leaved horse-chestnut, cut-leaved ash, and cut-leaved linden, all of which at Woden- 

 ethe, being planted near each other, form a curious and interesting group. 



Mr. Sargent has also produced another i)leasing effect by grouping the weeping 

 beech, weeping ash, weeping birch, weeping mountain-ash, weeping cherry, the 

 weeping sophora, the weeping linden, and the weeping larch, the latter a very 

 fine specimen, twelve or fourteen feet high, and a new beautiful weeping thorn. 



As an evidence of the taste which governs the minutest improvement here, we 



Wodeuetlie being composed of two Saxon words — u-oden, ethe, woody promontory 



