adajJted to North America. 423 



Esq., near Philadelphia, are familiar examples to many of our readers, of the 

 geometric style. These gardens, when in their perfection, some ten years ago, 

 were filled with a collection of the rarest and most costly exotics, as well as a 

 great variety of fine native trees and shrubs, which, interspersed with statues 

 and busts, ^onds, jefs d'eau, and waterworks of various descriptions, produced 

 certainly a very brilliant, though decidedly artificial effect. An extensive 

 range of hot-houses, curious grottoes and spring-houses, as well as every 

 other gardenesque structure, gave variety and interest to this celebrated spot, 

 ■which we regret the rapidly extending growth, and the mania for improvement 

 there, as in some of our other cities, has now nearly destroyed and obliterated. 



" The garden of the Van Rensselaer Manor, near Albany, may be given as 

 another specimen, on a large scale, of the geometric mode of gardening. 



" In the suburbs of Boston, a far greater number of elegant country seats of 

 moderate extent are to be found, than in any other equally small neighbour- 

 hood in the union. Many of these are, no doubt, familiar to our readers. 

 Among the most celebrated are those of J. P. Cashing, Esq., at Watertown, 

 the Hon. John Lowell at Roxbury, and Col. Perkins at Brookline. These, 

 with many other beautiful villa residences of less extent, are remarkable for 

 elegant arrangement, and for the high keeping of the grounds, as well as the 

 perfection to which the art of gardening is carried within the precincts.* In 

 short, we consider these places as fine models of a species of country resi- 

 dence which will, undoubtedly, become the most popular in this country. 

 While the extent of ground embraced in these country seats is rarely greater 

 than is easily obtained every where, in situations most desirable in the coun- 

 try, it includes every thing which can render a country seat delightful: beau- 

 tiful pleasure-grounds, large enough to admit of a park-like character, varied 

 with trees in irregular groups, smooth lawns, and firm gravel roads, and M-alks ; 

 flower and kitchen gardens, well stocked with floral beauties, and the most 

 excellent culinary productions ; and hot-houses and forcing-houses, filled 

 with all that can minister to the eye or the palate. In short, this class of 

 residences, while it comes within the reach of such moderate fortunes as are 

 not very rare in a republic, yields to the possessor all that is really gratifying 

 or delightful in the overgrown estates of a titled aristocracy. 



" There are several other country residences, which have been quite cele- 



* " We Americans are proverbially impatient of delay, and a few years in 

 prospect appears an endless futurity. So much is this the feeling with man}', 

 that we verily believe there are hundreds of our country places, which owe 

 their bareness and destitution of foliage to the idea, so common, that it re- 

 quires ' an age ' for forest trees to ' grow up.' 



" The middle-aged man hesitates about the good of planting what he imagines 

 he shall never see arriving at maturity ; and even many who are ) ounger 

 conceive that it requires more than an ordinary lifetime to rear a fine wood of 

 planted trees. About two years since, we had the pleasure of visiting the seat 

 of the late Mr. Lowell, whom we found in a green old age, still enjoying, with 

 the enthusiasm of youth, the pleasures of horticulture and a country life. For 

 the information of those who are ever complaining of the tardy pace with which 

 the Towth of trees advances, we will here record that we accompanied Mr. L. 

 through a belt of fine woods (skirting part of his residence), near half a mile in 

 length, consisting of almost all our finer hardy trees, many of them apparently 

 full o-rown, the whole of which had been planted by him when he was thirty- 

 two years old. At that time a solitary elm or two were almost the only trees 

 upon his estate. We can hardly conceive a more rational source of pride or 

 enjoyment, than to be able thus to walk in the decline of years beneath the 

 shadow of umbrageous woods and groves planted by our own hands, and 

 whose growth has become almost identified with our own progress and exist • 

 ence. 



