40 Landscape-Gardening, 



The reason is this : plants have other peculiarities besides 

 those of contour or colour ; some are poisonous, others savage, 

 hostile, noxious. If a painter were also a botanist or gardener, 

 he would probably hesitate to place monstrous docks, hem- 

 lock, or odious nettles on his fore-ground ; and, if a naturalist, 

 would hardly admit hobgoblin plants which neither naturalist 

 nor gardener ever saw. 



Here the artists differ : the gardener is compelled to attend 

 to the character of his plants, the painter regards only their 

 form in composition. Were the latter to execute on the 

 ground what he feels necessary, and delights to depict on the 

 canvass, the pleasing marks of cultivation and propriety would 

 be sacrificed to pictorial effect. 



This, however, would be hideous in real landscape ; and, 

 notwithstanding all that has been said and written in justifi- 

 cation of such attempts, we must not suppose that the late 

 Mr. Knight (author of The Landscape), or Sir Uvedale Price 

 himself, would advise such absurdity. All those accomplished 

 arbiters of fine taste wished to inculcate is, that, in forming 

 real landscape, the principles of pictorial composition should 

 be studied, and imitated, as far as possible, by the gardener. 



In uniting the features of the pleasure-ground with those of 

 the park, therefore, attention must be given to plant the con- 

 necting masses of the former, so as to fall in properly with the 

 latter. The marginal plants on this enclosed fore-ground 

 should be of some strojigly marked, character, in order that they 

 may be a good contrast to the softened forms and foliage in 

 the distance. Sometimes the groups within the fence must be 

 continued on the outside by trees or shrubs of self-protecting 

 character; and the nearest groups of trees in the park should 

 have a shrubbery-like appearance given them, by being thickly 

 planted with suitable under-growths. 



As the practicability of this process, viz. the disposing trees 

 and shrubs so as to produce the effect so much admired by 

 painters, has been much questioned by writers on the subject, 

 it is necessary that the question should be stated here, with 

 the circumstances bearing upon it, and the means which may 

 be available in the gardener's hands for its accomplishment. 



It has already been said that the favourite sylvan scenery of 

 the painter is only met with on uncultivated land, or in forests 

 where neglect or accident have produced those combinations 

 so suitable for his pencil. The peculiar charms of such 

 scenes, however, fly before the wand of the cultivator. Paint- 

 ers and others, notwithstanding, imagined that such scenery 

 might be composed by art. On this supposition, the destruc- 

 tion of the Italian style, and the introduction of English gar- 



