KEPTON'S LANDSCAPE GARDENING AND AKCHITECTUPvE. 



served in tlie picture gallery of Woburn* This attention to strict congriiity may appear 

 tritling to sucli as have never considered, that good taste deliglits in the harmony of the 

 minutest parts of the whole; and this cottage, however small, compared with modern 

 mansions, is a tolerably fair specimen of the style and size of private houses three hundred 

 years ago ; for, although the castles and collegiate buildings were large, some of the dwel- 

 ling-houses of respectable persons did not much exceed this cottage in dimensions or com- 

 fort, when one living-room was often deemed sufficient for all the familj^. 



"The change in customs, during three or four centuries, makes it very difficult to build 

 such dwelling-houses as shall contain all the conveniences which modern life requires and 

 at the same time preserve the ancient fornis we admire as picturesque : yet, the prevailing 

 taste for the Gothic style umst often be complied with ; and, after all, there is not more 

 absurdity in making a house look like a castle, or convent, than like the portico of a 

 Grecian temple, apj)licd to a square mass, which Mr. Pkioe lias not unaptly compared to a 

 clamp of bricks : and so great is the difterence of opinion betwixt the admirers of Grecian 

 and those of Gothic architecture, that an artist must adopt either, according to the wishes 

 of the individual by whom he is consulted ; happy if he can avoid the mixture of both in 

 the same building ; since there are few who possess sufficient taste to distinguish what is 

 perfectly correct, and what is spurious in the two diffierent styles ; while those who have 

 most power to indulge their taste, have generally had least leisure to study such minutia3. 

 To this may, perhaps, be attributed the decline of good taste in a country with tlie increase 

 of its wealth from commercial speculation. 



"By the recent works of professed antiquaries, a spirit of inquiry has been excited 

 respecting the dates of every specimen that remains of ancient beauty or grandeur ; and 

 tlie strictest attention to their dates may be highly proper, in repairs or additions to old 

 houses; but, in erecting new buildings, it may reasonably be doubted whether modern 

 comfort ought to be greatly sacrificed to external correctness in detail ; and whether a style 

 may not be tolerated which gives the most commodious interior^ and only adopts the gen- 

 eral outline and the picturesque effect of old Gothic buildings. 



" Among the Avorks professedly written on architecture, there is none more effective and 

 useful than that by Sir William Chambers ; and it were much to be wished that a similar 

 work on the Gothic style could be referred to ; but it has been deemed necessary for artists 

 to study the remains of Greece and Rome in those countries, whence they generally bring 

 back the greatest contempt for the style they call Gothic. The late much-lamented James 

 Wyatt was the only architect with whom I was acquainted who had studied on the Con- 

 tinent, yet preferred the Gothic forms to the Grecian. As the reason for this preference, 

 he told me, about twenty years ago, that he conceived the climate of England required the 

 weather moldings, or labels, over doors and windows of the Gothic character, rather than 

 the bolder projections of the Grecian cornices, Avhich he often for-d it necessary to make 

 more flat than the models from which they were taken, lest the materials should not bear 



of open porches, and particularly the cloisters of old alms-houses, or short galleries leading to dwelling-houses, as at 

 Clapton, near Lea r>ridge (since destroyed), &c. The design for the door of the cottage is taken from one remaining 

 at t^udbury, in Suffolk. The chimneys are copied from those at Wolterton Manor House, at P.arsham, Norfolk, pub- 

 lishe<l in the fourth volume of the Vetusta Monumenta. The ornaments painted on the posts and rails are taken 

 from the picture of King llcnry VIII and family, now in the possession of the Society of Antiquaries. 



"* Tlie plan of this garden, as given in Foehes' Ifortiis WoJiurnoifiis, plate XV, differs ft-om that here given, 



though not materially. Mr. Fokuks has given an extract from the lied Boah of Woburn Abbey, by which it appears 



that Mr. IIepton recommended the following flowers, as still to be found in very old gardens, viz., 'Rosemary, Col- 



(A. umbine, Double-Crowfoot, I'love-Pink, Marigold, Double-Daisy, Monkshood, Southernwood, Tansies, White PiOsej ^ 



^< Yellow Lilies, TurU's-cap,' it.c.—IIurt. Woh., p. 290. J. C. L. >S 



|p^ — — ^'^mi 



