GARDEN CRAFT IN EUROPE 



ultimately caused his downfall. He is said to have spent eighteen million 

 francs at Vaux, an enormous sum even for the present day, proving, as a 

 contemporary writer said, that the Chancellor served himself with no more 

 economy than he served his King. Fouquet had the good fortune to be 

 the patron of Charles Le Brun, who introduced his fellow student Le Notre, 

 and the two artists worked amicably together, both being artists great enough 

 to inspire one another. The work was begun in 1656 and was sufficiently 

 advanced by 1661 for the famous fete which was given to Louis XIV on 

 August 17 of that year. This was the most brilliant event of a period of 

 brilliant festivities, when the fete champetre reached the zenith of magnifi- 

 cence. The lavish 

 entertainment of 

 his King caused the 

 ruin of the great 

 financier, who was 

 arrested three weeks 

 afterwards ; but for 

 Le Notre it meant 

 the rise to fame, 

 for the renown of 

 these gardens, to- 

 gether with those of 

 Chantilly, brought 

 him into such 

 prominence that he 

 was soon afterwards 

 invited to assist in the laying out of the new Versailles. 



The Chateau at Vaux was planned upon a scale that had never before 

 been attempted in France. It is approached through a vast courtyard with 

 extensive dependencies planned on either side ; the enormous parterre 

 (illus., p. 86) stretches to the south and is terminated by a broad sheet of 

 water and theatre d'eau. Perhaps the most interesting feature of the plan 

 is the very able way in which Le Notre dealt with the variations in level of 

 the parterre, which besides sloping to the south had a considerable fall from 

 west to east ; this has been cleverly concealed by a bosquet on one side and a 

 balancing terrace upon the opposite side. In the centre of the parterre is 



HtAiRE O EAU, VAUX-LE-VICOMTE. 



