LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTURE. 13 



as suburban additions, finding ready sales for lots at 

 prices which pay a fair profit on the cost of improvement. 

 Everywhere the demand has proved how readily the 

 popular heart responds to the opportunity, and the revo- 

 lution which has _been effected in the condition of the 

 country surrounding every large city affords sufficient 

 evidence of the innate love of nature, and the longing to 

 secure the enjoyment of her attractions, which pervades 

 the popular heart. 



As a natural consequence, books and treatises upon 

 landscape gardening and rural art, have multiplied till they 

 have became an important branch of literature. Vol- 

 umes and pamphlets of all sorts and sizes ; original works, 

 compilations, republications, and essays in the pages of 

 horticultural journals have flowed from the press, till it 

 would seem that no farther elucidation of the subject was 

 required, or could be conveyed through the medium of 

 publication; yet after twenty years experience as a pro- 

 fessional landscape gardener, I am continually impressed 

 with the inadequate conception of the scope of the art, 

 which generally prevails, and I am convinced that the 

 popular writers on the subject are largely responsible for 

 the general ignorance. Not that they have failed to 

 explain lucidly, and often in charming style, the esthetic 

 principles of the art, and the management of the almost 

 endless variety of combinations of natural and artificial 

 decorations, whose tasteful introduction may often add 

 very essentially to the bdauty and interest of a country 

 home ; but that they have confined themselves so exclu- 

 sively to such details that the idea has became almost 



