282 Landscape Gardening 



pictures, and all the elegancies and refinements of luxury; in the midst 

 of titles, and dignitaries, and ranks allied to regal grandeur, there was 

 one object which transcended and eclipsed them all, and showed how 

 much the nobility of character surpassed the nobility of rank, the beauty 

 of refined and simple manners all the adornments of art, the scintilla- 

 tions of the soul, beaming from the eyes, the purest gems that ever 

 glittered in a princely diadem. In person, education and improvement, 

 in quickness of perception, in facility and elegance of expression, in 

 accomplishments and taste, in a frankness and gentleness of manner, 

 tempered by a modesty which courted confidence and inspired respect, 

 and in a high moral tone and sentiment, which, like a bright halo, seemed 

 to encircle the whole person,--! confess the fictions of poetry become 

 substantial, and the beau ideal of my youthful imagination was realized. 

 " In the morning I first met her at prayers; for, to the honor of England, 

 there is scarcely a family, among the hundreds whose hospitality I have 

 shared, where the duties of the day are not preceded by family worship; 

 and the master and the servant, the parent and the child, the teacher and 

 the taught, the friend and the stranger, come together to recognize and 

 strengthen the sense of their common equality, in the presence of their 

 common Father, and to acknowledge their equal dependence upon his care 

 and mercy. She was then kind enough to tell me, after her morning's 

 arrangements, she claimed me for the day. She first showed me her chil- 

 dren, whom, like the Roman mother, she deemed her brightest jewels, and 

 arranged their studies and occupations for the day. She then took me 

 two or three miles on foot, to visit a sick neighbor; and, while performing 

 this act of kindness, left me to visit some of the cottages upon the estate, 

 whose inmates I found loud in the praises of her kindness and benefac- 

 tions. Our next excursion was to see some of the finest, and largest, and 

 most aged trees in the park, the size of which was truly magnificent; and 

 I sympathized in the veneration which she expressed for them, which was 

 like that with which one recalls the illustrious memory of a remote pro- 

 genitor. Our next visit was to the green-houses and gardens; and she 

 explained to me the mode adopted there, of managing the most delicate 

 plants, and of cultivating, in the most economical and successful manner, 

 the fruits of a warmer region. From the garden we proceeded to the 

 cultivated fields; and she informed me of the system of husbandry pur- 

 sued on the estate, the rotation of crops, the management and applica- 

 tion of manures, the amount of seed sown, the ordinary yield, and the 

 appropriation of the produce, with a perspicuous detail of the expenses 

 and results. She then undertook to show me the yards and offices, the 

 byres, the feeding stalls, the plans for saving, increasing, and managing 

 the manure; the cattle for feeding, for breeding, the milking stock, the 

 piggery, the poultry yard, the stables, the harness-rooms, the implement- 

 rooms, the dairy. She explained to me the process of making the differ- 

 ent kinds of cheese, and the general management of the milk, and the 

 mode of feeding the stock; and then, conducting me into the bailiff's 



