136 Landscape Gardening 



"The drive known as the Long Walk is three miles in 

 length, in a straight line, and is supported on either side by 

 two rows of elms, which have attained their full size, and, with 

 a very few unimportant exceptions, are yet in the greatest 

 vigor and luxuriance. Tliis avenue will be sure to strike 

 the visitor as exceedingly grand. It is somewhat marred, 

 however, by being carried over a considerable swell in the 

 ground about half way up it, which helps to shorten its 

 apparent length, and to make the drive seem as if it were 

 not straight, while a more decidedly objectionable feature is 

 that it ascends a hill away from the castle at the further end. 

 If there are any two circumstances which, more than others, 

 require to be kept in view in the formation of avenues, they 

 are that the ground over which they run should be nearly 

 level, or have one continuous ascent towards the mansion or 

 principal object to which they lead, and that conseciuently 

 this object should be on the highest ground, at least as 

 respects the avenue. Any avenue that commences on a hill 

 and passes down that hill towards its terminating object, 

 even though it afterwards rise again near the end, must 

 appear to some extent inverted, and every undulation or 

 swell of the ground in it will necessarily be a deformity. 

 The idea which is conveyed to the mind by the elevation of 

 the Long Walk at Windsor, as it reaches its termination in 

 the Great Park, is that the Castle ought to be somewhere 

 about the site of the statue of George III, by which this walk 

 is so appropriately finished. 



" Those familiar with the Champs Elysees at Paris will 

 remember that the grand avenue there, like this at Windsor, 

 is partly on a steep ascent, away from the palace of the 

 Tuileries to the Triumphal Arch at the summit. And 

 although this circumstance enhances the effect as viewed 

 from the front of the palace, yet, regarded as an approach 



