6 THE FORMAL GARDEN IN ENGLAND i 



sciousness, you alter the surrounding scenery to 

 bring out these characteristics. For instance, 

 the characteristics of rocks are determined to 

 be " dignity, terror, and fancy." By way of 

 enhancing dignity, Wheatly tells us to cut away 

 the ground to make them steeper ; and to 

 refine their appearance we are to cover them 

 tip with " shrubby and creeping plants." Or 

 again, if the scenery is wild, we may make 

 it wilder by making a ruined stone bridge. 

 Straight lines and unbroken masses of foliage 

 are to be avoided at all costs, in order to secure 

 variety of effect, *' and the planter is to plant 

 trees of different foliage at stated intervals, by 

 way of reproducing the colours of the painter's 

 palette." These views are repeated in modern 

 treatises on landscape gardening, with, however, 

 a curious inversion. Wheatly's idea was that 

 we should saturate our minds with the composi- 

 tions of the old masters, and then proceed to 

 alter actual scenery till it resembled their 

 pictures ; but the modern landscapist tells us 

 that we are to copy nature — that is, study a 

 piece of scenery of natural formation, and 

 then reproduce this in our gardens. Wheatly 

 admitted design of some sort, while his suc- 

 cessors direct every effort to imitating the 

 absence of design. The latter insist that we 

 are not to copy nature literally, but only in her 

 spirit, whatever that may mean. Mr. Robinson 

 says, " We should compose from nature as land- 



