elegance to originnlty and force. But his language is generally pure, chaste and reflned, 

 not unfrequeiitly beautiful and liighly ornate. His style is peculiarly liis own, and rigid- 

 ly methodic, sometimes abrubt, but always versatile and flowing. It is remaikable for 

 that of which lie was passionately fond in nalure, and to which, with some latitude of ex- 

 piession, we will appropriate the word " pictaresqaa." 



A single quotation will truly illustrate our meaning, and also these qualities of his style. 

 We select the woids with wiiich he introduced the Horticulturist to his readers with the 

 first breath of summer. " JJii^ht and beautiful June! embroidered with clusters of odo- 

 rous roses, and laden with ruddy cheiiies and strawberries, rich with the fieshness of 

 spring, and the luxuriance of summer — leafy June! If any one's heart does not swell 

 Avith the unwritten thoughts that belong to this season, he is only fit for " treasons, stra- 

 tagems and spoils." He does not practically believe that God made the country. Flora 

 and Pomona, fiom amid the blossoming gaidens and orchards of June, smile graciously 

 as we write these few introductory words to their circles of devotees. * # * 

 Angry v<dunies of politics have we written none, but only peaceful books, humbly aiming 

 to weave something more into the fair garland of the beautiful and useful, that encircles 

 this excellent old Earth." Such passages enliven and adorn his works. 



Of tlicse we can give but a biief account. 



The first is his " Landscape Gardening," which introduced him to the literary andsci- 

 entilic world, and gave him a rank among the distinguished writers of the age. For years 

 previous to its publication, he seemed retired from the world, abstracted and absorbed, 

 but in reality, he was occupied in intense study of his subject. When he mastered it, and 

 adapted its principles to American climate, scenery and people, he published it on both 

 sides of the Atlantic. 



Think of this young man, at twenty-six years of age, without the advantage of a libe- 

 ral education— with no precedents to guide him, with only a few practical hints from 

 such men as Parmentier, seizing upon the first principles o( this science in the works of 

 Repton, Price, Loudon and others, with a comprehensiveness of mind, with a power of 

 analysis, an oiiginality and fixedness of purpose that would have done honor to the first 

 scholars in other departments, popularizing and appropriating them to his own period and 

 countiy, and actually producing a book which becomes at once a standard universally 

 acknowledged by his own countrymen, and piaised by Loudon, editor of" Repton's Land- 

 scape Gardening," who pronounced it " a masterly work," and after quoting ten pages, 

 to give his English readers an idea of its excellencies, remarks, " We have quoted largely 

 from this work, because, in so doing, we think we shall give a just idea of the great mer- 

 it of the author." This woik the celebrated Dr. Llndley critically reviews, in sundry 

 articles in his Gardener's Chronicle; and \Uiile he dissents from it on some minor points, 

 yet in respect to its cardinal excellencies, he thus remarks: " On the whole, we know 

 of no work in which the fundamental principles of this profession are so well or so con- 

 cisely expressed." And in regard to Mr. Downing's explanation of this science, and his 

 general definition of it, he adds, what is equally complimentary to our author, and to 

 American genius, " no English Landscape Gardener has written so clearly, or with so 

 much real intensity." 



Closely allied to this science is the subject of Architecture, to which our author next 

 turns his attention; and in the following year he publishes his "Cottage Residences." 

 Of this work Mr. Loudon also observes, " This book is highly creditable to him as a man of 



and an author, and cannot fail to be of great service." This latter work, in 

 creates occasion for his " Architecture of Country Houses," including designs for 



