54 THE GARDENS OF EPICURUS 



Chinese scorn this way of planting, and say a boy that 

 can tell an hundred, may plant walks of trees in straight 

 lines, and over against one another, and to what length 

 and extent he pleases. But their greatest reach of 

 imagination, is employed in contriving figures, where 

 the beauty shall be great, and strike the eye, but with- 

 out any order or disposition of parts, that shall be 

 commonly or easily observed. And though we have 

 hardly any notion of this sort of beauty, yet they have 

 a particular word to express it ; and where they find 

 it hit their eye at first sight, they say Th^ SJiarawadgijis 

 fine or is admirable, or any such expression of esteem. 

 And whoever observes the work upon the best Indian 

 gowns, or the painting upon their best screens or 



r purcellans, will find their beauty is all of this kind, 

 (that is) without order. But I should hardly advise 



X any of these attempts in the figure of gardens among 

 us ; they are adventures of too hard achievement for 

 any common hands ; and though there may be more 

 honour if they succeed well, yet there is more dis- 

 honour if they fail, and 'tis twenty to one they will ; 

 whereas in regular figures, 'tis hard to make any great 



'T'and remarkable faults. 



The picture I have met with in some relations 

 of a garden made by a Dutch governor of their 



