LAYING OUT OF GROUNDS 



mountains are well, if the life and the mists of 

 the mountains are in them; but they do not 

 blind us to the merit of a cabinet gem. I 

 question very much if that subtle apprehension 

 of the finer beauties which may be made to 

 appear about a given locality does not ex- 

 press itself more pointedly and winningly in 

 the management of a three or five acre lawn, 

 than upon such reach of meadow and upland 

 as bounds the view. The watchful care for 

 a single hoary boulder that lifts its seared and 

 lichened hulk out of a sweet level of green- 

 sward ; the audacious protection of some wild 

 vine clinging its tendrils carelessly over a bit 

 of wall, girt with a savage hedge-growth — 

 these are indications of an artist feeling that 

 will be riotous of its wealth upon a bare acre 

 of ground. Nay, I do not know but I have 

 seen about a laborer's cottage of Devonshire 

 such adroit adjustment of a few flowering 

 plants upon a window-shelf, and such tender 

 and judicious care for the little matlet of 

 turf around which the gravel path swept to 

 his door, as showed as keen an artistic sense 

 of the beauties of nature, and of the way in 

 which they may be enchained for human 

 gratification, as could be set forth in a park of 

 a thousand acres. Of course, I do not mean 



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