Historical Sketches 1 1 



still interesting Clermont, then the residence of Chancellor 

 Livingston. Its level or gently undulating lawn, four or 

 five miles in length, the rich native woods, and the long 

 vistas of planted avenues, added to its fine water view, 

 rendered this a noble place. The mansion, the green- 

 houses, and the gardens, show something of the French 

 taste in design, which Mr. Livingston's residence abroad, 

 at the time when that mode was popular, no doubt, led 

 him to adopt. The finest yellow locusts in America are 

 now standing in the pleasure-grounds here, and the gardens 

 contain many specimens of fruit trees, the first of their 

 sorts introduced into the Union. 



Waltham House, about nine miles from Boston, was, 25 

 years ago, one of the oldest and finest places, as regards 

 Landscape Gardening. Its owner, the late Hon. T. Lyman, 

 was a highly-accomplished man, and the grounds at Wal- 

 tham House bear witness to a refined and elegant taste in 

 rural improvement. A fine level park, a mile in length, 

 enriched with groups of English limes, elms, and oaks, and 

 rich masses of native wood, watered by a fine stream and 

 stocked with deer, were the leading features of the place 

 at that time; and this, and Woodlands, were the two best 

 specimens of the modern style, as Judge Peters' seat, Lemon 

 Hill, and Clermont, were of the ancient style, in the 

 earliest period of the history of Landscape Gardening 

 among us. 



There is no part of the Union where the taste in Land- 

 scape Gardening is so far advanced, as on the middle por- 

 tion of the Hudson. The natural scenery is of the finest 

 character, and places but a mile or two apart often possess, 

 from the constantly varying forms of the water, shores, and 

 distant hills, widely different kinds of home landscape and 

 distant view. Standing in the grounds of some of the 

 finest of these seats, the eye beholds only the soft fore- 

 ground of smooth lawn, the rich groups of trees shutting 

 out all neighboring tracts, the lake-like expanse of water, 

 and, closing the distance, a fine range of wooded mountain. 

 A residence here of but a hundred acres, so fortunately are 



