Iborace tKftatpote 277 v 



pictures ; and even where taste is wanting in the 

 spot improved, the general view is embellished 

 by variety. If no relapse to barbarism, formal- 

 ity, and seclusion is made, what landscapes will 

 dignify every quarter of our island, where the 

 daily plantations that are making have attained 

 venerable maturity ! A specimen of what our 

 gardens will be may be seen at Petworth, where 

 the portion of the park nearest the house has 

 been allotted to the modern style. It is a gar- 

 den of oaks two hundred years old. If there is 

 a fault in so august a fragment of improved 

 nature, it is that the size of the trees is out of 

 all proportion to the shrubs and accompani- 

 ments. In truth, shrubs should not only be 

 reserved for particular spots and home delight, 

 but are past their beauty in less than twenty 

 years. 



Enough has been done to establish such a 

 school of landscape as cannot be found on the 

 rest of the globe. If we have the seeds of a 

 Claude or a Caspar amongst us, he must come 

 forth. If wood, water, groves, valleys, glades, 

 can inspire or poet or painter, this is the coun- 

 try, this is the age to produce them. The 

 flocks, the herds, that are now admitted into, 

 now graze on the borders of, our cultivated 

 plains, are ready before the painter's eyes, and 

 group themselves to animate his picture. One 



