46 XanDscape Brcbitecture 



viduality and unity be never lost. But let me not 

 be misunderstood; a general plan should govern the 

 whole, there must be no room for random work; 

 in every detail the guiding creating brain must be 

 recognized, and it is essential that the scheme should 

 originate from the special circumstances of the artist, 

 from the experience and conditions of his life or the 

 former history of his family, limited by the locality 

 with which he has to deal; but I do not counsel that 

 the whole exact plan should be worked out in detail 

 at first and doggedly maintained to the end. I would, 

 to a large extent, recommend just the opposite, for 

 even if the main scheme comprehends many features 

 which may be considered from the start, in working 

 it out the artist must continually follow the inspira- 

 tion of his imagination. From time to time, the 

 painter will alter his picture (which, after all, is 

 much less complicated than the picture the landscape 

 gardener has to create), here and there making a 

 part more true to the general effect or to nature, here 

 improving a tone, there giving more accent, more 

 power to a line. Why should the landscape gar- 

 dener who works in such refractory, changeable, 

 and often impossible-to-estimate material, and who, 

 moreover, has to unite many different pictures in 

 one, succeed in hitting the mark at the first attempt 

 infallibly? Much will be discovered as he goes on 

 studying, observing, both within and without the 

 confines of the place, the light effects on his raw 

 material (for light is one of his chief assets), estab- 



