TREATMENT OF WATER. 279 



perhaps occasionally a few strags^ling trees can be said to 

 fulfil that purpose ; for richly tufted margins, and thickets 

 of overhanging shrubs, are accompaniments rare indeed.* 



Lakes or ponds are the most beautiful forms in which 

 water can be displayed in the grounds of a country resi- 

 dence. f They invariably produce their most pleasing effects 



♦Simple and easy,, as would appear the artificial imitation of these variations 

 of nature, yet io an unpractised hand and a tasteless mind, nothing is really 

 more difficult. To produce meagre right lines and geometrical forms is ex- 

 tremely easy in any of the fine arts, but to give the grace, spirit, and variety of 

 nature, requires both tasteful perception and some practice; hence, in the in- 

 fancy of any art, the productions are characterized by extreme meagreness and 

 simplicity ; — of which the first efforts to draw the human figure or to form arti- 

 ficial pieces of water, are good examples. 



Brown, who was one of the first practitioners of the modern style abroad, and 

 who just saw far enough to lay aside the ancient formal method, without ap- 

 preciating nature sufficiently to be will'ng to take her for his model, once dis- 

 graced half of :he finest places in England with his tame bald pieces of artificial 

 water, and round, formal, clumps of trees. Mr. Knight, in his elegant poem, 

 " The Landscape," spiritedly rebuked this practice in the following lines : — 



" Shaved to the brink our brooks arc taught to flow 

 WJiere no obtruding leaves or branches grow : 

 While clumps of shrubs bespot each winding vale 

 Open alike to every gleam and gale : 

 Each secret haunt and deep recess display'd, 

 And intricacy banished with its shade. 



Hence, hence! thou haggard fiend, however call'd, 

 The meagre genius of the bare and bald ; 

 Thy spade and mattock here at length lay down, 

 And follow to the tomb, thy favourite, Brown ; 

 Thy favourite Brown, whose innovating hand, 

 First dealt thy curses o'er this fertile land ; 

 First taught the walk in spiral forms to move, 

 And from their haunts the secret Dryads drove ; 

 With clumps bespotted o'er the mountain's side, 

 And bade the stream 'twixt banks close-shaven glide; 

 Banish'd the thickets of high tow'ring wood 

 Which hung reflected o'er the glassy flood." 



I Owing to the immense scale upon which nature displays this fine element 

 in North America, every sheet of water of moderate or small size, is almost uni- 



