PAPERS ON HORTICULTURAL AND KINDRED SUBJECTS. 



LANDSCAPE GARDENING. 



Landscape gardening is a comprehensive art, combining the genius 

 of the landscape painter with the art of the practical gardener ; the 

 exact knowledge of the engineer with the poetical imagination of the 

 artist. The professor of this art should also possess a competent knowl- 

 edge of the general principles of botany, architecture, geology, hydrau- 

 lics, hydrostatics, mechanics, laws of heat and ventilation, horticulture, 

 and vegetable physiology. This may seem rather a formidable array 

 of acquirements, but in the multifarious details of selecting and arrang- 

 ing the style and location of rural residences and their accompanying 

 domestic auxiliary structures ; the drainage of lands ; the location and 

 construction of roads ; the preparation of garden sites and the erection 

 of horticultural buildings ; the decoration of grounds for the purposes 

 of beautifying the surroundings of rural homesteads, the more ambitious 

 suburban villas, and public buildings of every description ; and th'e 

 artistic disposition of arborescent growths, so as to produce the most 

 varied yet distinct beauties of which the scenery is susceptible, neces- 

 sitate a knowledge more or less intimate and extensive with these as 

 well as with other branches of science. 



During the last twenty years much attention has been given to land- 

 scape gardening, both in the laying put of private grounds and in the 

 design and construction of public parks. Some of the latter are de- 

 serving of the highest commendation, both in design and execution, 

 and have been the means of instructing and familiarizing the public 

 with the capabilities and beauties of the art, and in educating the pop- 

 ular taste to an appreciation of the development of rural improvements 

 and their beneficial effects upon the moral and physical condition of 

 society. 



It can not be too forcibly urged upon the attention of those who are 

 intrusted with educational institutions that one of the most certain 

 means of encouraging a desire for studies in natural history, and form- 

 ing correct principles of taste in young minds, is that of landscape em- 

 bellishments of school houses and college grounds. This has become 

 one of the greatest wants in existing systems of education and can not 

 long remain neglected. 



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