298 LANDSCAPE GARDENING. 



The sunken fence, fosse, or ha-ha, is an English in- 

 vention, used in separating that portion of the lawn near 

 the house, from the part grazed by deer or cattle, and is 

 only a ditch sufficiently wide and deep to render com- 

 munication difficult on opposite sides. When the ground 

 slopes from the house, such a sunk fence is invisible to a 

 person near the latter, and answers the purpose of a 

 barrier without being in the least obtrusive. 



In a succeeding section we shall refer to terraces with 

 their parapets, which are by far the most elegant barriers 

 for a highly decorated flower garden, or for the purpose of 

 maintaining a proper connexion between the house and the 

 grounds, a subject which is scarcely at all attended to, or 

 its importance even recognised as yet among us. 



