INTRODUCTION. IX 



such a discussion must be highly desirable to 

 him, whatever be the result. 



Taste, as connected with general feeling, 

 is more or less subject to the influence of 

 fashion. We perceive this influence in dress, 

 ornament, plate, &c. as well as in architecture 

 and gardening ; and as alteration usually 

 ends in extremes, so within the last century 

 taste has experienced the sweeping hand of 

 reform. Simplicity became the standard of 

 the day ; and as the richly embossed plate of 

 former times was superseded by the bald 

 and meagre productions of more modern 

 simplicity ; so the ample terrace, with its 

 massive balustrade, its steps, fountains, and 

 alcoves, with all its rich, though formal, ac- 

 companiments of parterres backed by the 

 sheltering skreen of venerable evergreens, 

 fell beneath the indiscriminating hand of re- 

 form, and left the mansion stripped of those 

 embellishments which time had, as it were, 

 identified with its very existence, to lament 

 over the insipid simplicity and baldness spread 

 around it. 



Time and reflection seem at length to have 

 enabled us to judge with impartiality be- 

 tween the old and new systems ; and the 



a 



