Gardeners. 649 



defect boll of gardeners and their employers. It is deplorable to notice 

 the numerous evidences of this which occur in the gardens, parks, or 

 pleasure-grounds, of almost every country residence which we have 

 enumerated in this and our two preceding articles. Of course there 

 are exceptions, and we have noticed some of them ; but we repeat 

 that want of taste is generally the besetting sin. Quantity will naturally 

 be the great object aimed at by those whose minds have not been refined 

 by that degree of intellectual culture which can alone enable them to find 

 enjoyment in excellence, and to discriminate between what is appro- 

 priate and elegant, and what is merely commonplace. This is the case with 

 many |)roprietors ; and if they are thus deficient in the qualities necessary to 

 appreciate excellence, how is it to be supposed that their gardeners can suc- 

 ceed in its production ? Where there is little or no demand there will be but 

 little supply. The gardeners, in Scotland at least, are overwhelmed by the 

 extent of the grounds committed to their charge, and the paucity of hands 

 allowed to keep them in order. Hence the general coarseness and want of 

 keeping of what is under their care. We can hardly say that we have seen 

 one highly kept place in Scotland, though we have seen some residences con- 

 taining miles of walks, and acres of coarse lawn and commonplace shrub- 

 bery. We must not, however, altogether exculpate the gardeners ; for some- 

 thing of the unsatisfactory state in which most places are found is owin"- to 

 the gardeners entertaining false notions of the manner of keeping them in 

 order. We have, in our two preceding articles, shown that the common 

 mode in which gravel walks and their edgings are kept, in even what are 

 considered the best places in England, as well as in the most neglected in 

 Scotland, is much more expensive than the mode which good taste would 

 dictate. The means, as we have observed in the articles alluded to, are 

 too generally mistaken for the end. If it is the duty and interest of mas- 

 ters, therefore, to improve their taste, in order to enable them to discriminate 

 between what is good and what is bad in the taste of their gardeners, it is 

 no less the interest and duty of gardeners to cultivate their taste, not only 

 to enable them to fulfil their duties in a superior manner, but in order that 

 they may be competent to excite in their employers that taste for the 

 higher beauties of gardening, in which they are at present generally de- 

 ficient. We have already stated when speaking on the same subject, in 

 the Introduction to this Magazine (Vol. I. p. 9.), our conviction that if a 

 class of gardeners of superior taste were to come forward, they would 

 create a demand for themselves, on the principle that demand is in- 

 fluenced both by the supply and the quality of the article. Gardeners 

 may ask, however, why they should take the pains to qualify themselves 

 so highly, unless the result would either add to their remuneration, or 

 diminish their labours ? To this we answer, that it will ultimately do 

 both. We have shown (p. 546.) that if walks, their verges, and the dug 

 borders of clumps and shrubberies were kept in what we consider good 

 taste, the labour of the gardener on them would be immediately lessened; 

 and the same results would follow other improvements. With regard to 

 remuneration, as the possession of superior knowledge, taste, and skill 

 on the part of the gardener, must require him to bestow increased pains 

 and longer time on the study of his profession, it is evident that he will 

 become entitled to more for his labour, than those who have not taken so 

 much pains, or employed so much time, and consequently have not 

 acquired so much skill. This conclusion is founded on the acknowledged 

 principle, that both the value and the price of an article are principally 

 regulated by the labour required to produce it. 



Our present limits prevent us from concluding the general results of 

 this division of our tour ; but we shall resume the subject in our next 

 Number. 



{To be continued.) 



