420 Landscape Gardening 



English society, which was his ideal of society. There was 

 nothing wanting to gratify his fine and fastidious taste; 

 but the passage already quoted from his letter at Warwick 

 Castle shows how firmly his faith w r as set upon his native 

 land, while his private letters are full of affectionate longing 

 to return. It is easy to figure him moving with courtly 

 grace through the rooms of palaces, gentle, respectful, low 

 in tone, never exaggerating, welcome to lord and lady for 

 his good sense, his practical knowledge, his exact detail; 

 pleasing the English man and woman by his English sym- 

 pathies, and interesting them by his manly and genuine, 

 not boasting, assertions of American genius and success. 

 Looking at the picture, one remembers again that earlier 

 one of the boy coming home from Montgomery Academy, 

 in Orange County, and introduced at the wealthy neigh- 

 bor's to the English gentleman. The instinct that remem- 

 bered so slight an event secured his appreciation of all that 

 England offered. No American ever visited England with 

 a mind more in tune with all that is nobly characteristic 

 of her. He remarked, upon his return, that he had been 

 much impressed by the quiet, religious life and habits which 

 he found in many great English houses. It is not a point 

 of English life often noticed, nor presupposed, but it was 

 doubly grateful to him, because he was always a Christian 

 believer, and because all parade was repugnant to him. 

 His letters before his marriage, and during the last years 

 of his life, evince the most genuine Christian faith and 

 feeling. 



His residence in England was very brief - - a summer 

 trip. He crossed to Paris and saw French life. Fortunately, 

 as his time was short, he saw more in a day than most men 

 in a month, because he was prepared to see, and knew where 

 to look. He found the assistant he wished in Mr. Calvert 

 Vaux, a young English architect, to whom he was introduced 

 by the Secretary of the Architectural Association, and with 

 whom, so mutual was the satisfaction, he directly concluded 

 an agreement. Mr. Vaux sailed with him from Liverpool 

 in September, presently became his partner in business, and 



