12 Landscape Gardening 



expression in landscape, we shall be called upon to explain 

 why the Picturesque is so much more attractive to many 

 minds. This, we conceive, is owing partly to the imper- 

 fection of our natures by which most of us sympathize 

 more with that in which the struggle between spirit and 

 matter is most apparent, than with that in which the 

 union is harmonious and complete; and partly because 

 from the comparative rarity of highly picturesque landscape, 

 it affects us more forcibly when brought into contrast with 

 our daily life. Artists, we imagine, find somewhat of the 

 same pleasure in studying wild landscape, where the very 

 rocks and trees seem to struggle with the elements for foot- 

 hold, that they do in contemplating the phases of the pas- 

 sions and instincts of human and animal life. The mani- 

 festation of power is to many minds far more captivating 

 than that of beauty. 



All who enjoy the charms of Landscape Gardening, may 

 perhaps be divided into three classes: those who have 

 arrived only at certain primitive ideas of beauty which are 

 found in regular forms and straight lines; those who in the 

 Beautiful seek for the highest and most perfect develop- 

 ment of the idea in the material form; and those who in 

 the Picturesque enjoy most a certain wild and incomplete 

 harmony between the idea and the forms in which it is 

 expressed. 



As the two latter classes embrace the whole range of 

 modern Landscape Gardening, we shall keep distinctly in 

 view their two governing principles - - the Beautiful and 

 the Picturesque, in treating of the practice of the art. 



There are always circumstances which must exert a con- 

 trolling influence over amateurs, in this country, in choosing 

 between the two. These are, fixed locality, expense, indi- 

 vidual preference in the style of building, and many others 

 which readily occur to all. The great variety of attractive 

 sites in the older parts of the country, afford an abundance 

 of opportunity for either taste. Within the last five years, 

 \vc think the Picturesque is beginning to be preferred. It 

 has, when a suitable locality offers, great advantages for us. 



