84 LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTURE. 



to attract as residents or visitors the class of people whose 

 culture and intelligence can alone confer upon a commu- 

 nity the sterling stamp which gives assured value to 

 wealth. . 



As a means of giving a generally attractive character to 

 the country at large, the importance of securing a tasteful 

 arrangement of the smaller towns and rural villages, is 

 perhaps of even more importance than that of the large 

 cities. 



Sir Uvedale Price, in his Essay on the Picturesque, 

 remarks : 



"An obvious and easy method of arranging a village is 

 to place the houses on two parallel lines, to make them of 

 the same size and shape, and at equal distances from each 

 other. Such a methodical arrangement saves all further 

 thought and invention ; but it is hardly necessary to say 

 that nothing can be more formal or insipid. Other regular 

 plans of a better kind have been proposed ; but it sems 

 to me that symmetry, which in cities, and generally in all 

 the higher styles of architecture produces such grand 

 effects, is less suited to humbler scenes and buildings. 



" The characteristic beauties of a village, as distinct 

 from a city, are intricacy, variety and play of outline; and 

 whatever is done should be with a view to promote those 

 objects. The houses, therefore, should be disposed with 

 that view, and should differ as much in their disposition 

 from those of a regularly built city, as the trees which are 

 meant to have the character of natural groups should from 

 those of an avenue. Wherever symmetry and exact uni- 

 formity are introduced, those objects which produce a 



