CHAPTER XVII 



THE MANAGEMENT OF LARGE COUNTRY 



PLACES* 



COUNTRY places that may properly be called orna- 

 mental f are increasing so fast, especially in the 

 neighborhood of the large cities, that a word or two 

 more touching their treatment will not be looked upon as 

 out of place here. 



All our country residences may readily be divided into 

 two classes. The first and largest class is the suburban 

 place of from five to twenty or thirty acres; the second is 

 the country-seat, properly so called, which consists of from 

 thirty to five hundred or more acres. 



In all suburban residences, from the limited extent of 

 ground, and the desire to get the utmost beauty from it, the 

 whole, or at least a large part of the ornamental portion, 

 must be considered only as pleasure grounds - - a term used 

 to denote a garden scene, consisting of trees, shrubs, and 

 flowers, generally upon a basis of lawn, laid out in walks of 

 different styles, and kept in the highest order. The aim in 

 this kind of residence is to produce the greatest possible 

 variety within a given space and to attain the utmost 

 beauty of gardening as an art by the highest keeping and 

 culture which the means of the proprietor will permit. 



Of this kind of pleasure ground residence, we have number- 

 less excellent examples, and perhaps nowhere more admir- 

 able specimens than in the neighborhood of Boston. Both 



* Original date of March, 1851. 



f Attention has been called elsewhere in this volume to Mr. Downing's 



habitual use of this word "ornamental" -a word which has become 



unfashionable and distasteful to the present generation. It is well to 



remember that this word carried no unpleasant connotations in his day. 



-F. A. W. 



225 



