184 



a modern ruin : nor at a distance would 

 the real size have undeceived me ; for the 

 old foss having been filled up, and the 

 surface levelled and smoothed to the very 

 foot of the building, the whole had ac^ 

 quired a character of littleness, as well as 

 of bareness, from the flat naked ground 

 about it. 



By filling up the fosses of a castle, its 

 character as a castle is greatly destroyed; 

 by removing the trees and brushwood, 

 and levellino; and smoothins; the rouoh ir^ 

 regular ground, its effect to the painter, 

 and its character as a ruin, are no less in- 

 jured. AYhat a system of improvement 

 must that be, which universally destroys 

 character, and creates monotony!* 



* I lately observed the same effect produced by the 

 same cause on natural masses of stone, in a walk near 

 Matlock. The walk led towards the principal feature, a 

 rock which I had been greatly struck with from below, and 

 was eager to get a nearer -view of. On approaching it, I 

 hard!} could believe it was the same, but did not immedi- 

 ately conceive the cause of my disappointment: 1 had 

 sllowed for the bad effect, in such a scene, of a gravel 

 V/alk with regular sweeps and borders ; but besides that^ 



