LANDSCAPE GARDENING. 





History. 



Pliny's 



Laurentine 

 garden. 



Pliny's 

 Tuscan 

 villa. 



(Sjiclitncaria) or ])1atcs of the lapis spectilaria ; which 

 Seneca and Pliny inform us could be split like slate in 

 lenjiths not exceeding five feet. 



Sir Joseph Banks conjectures, that, by the same means, 

 it is highly probable they had peach-houses and vine- 

 ries. (On the forcing houses of the Romans, in Hort. 

 Trans, vol. i.J Daines Harrington seems to be of the 

 same opinion, which he considers more probable from 

 the circumstance, that the luxury of cooling liquors with 

 ice was in use about the same time ; these two arts 

 being coeval inventions in England. 



Of the form and extent of Pliny's winter garden at 

 Laurentinum, nothing very accurate can be obtained 

 from his letters. It was evidently small, being sur- 

 rounded by hedges of box, and where that had perish- 

 ed, made good by rosemary. Vines, figs, and mulber- 

 ries, were the fruit trees. He seems to have valued 

 this retreat chiefly from its situation relatively to the 

 surrounding country, which he describes with delight ; 

 " pointing out all the beauties of the woods, the rich 

 meadows covered with cattle, the bay of Ostia, the scat- 

 tered villas upon its shore, and the blue mountains in 

 the distance." (Preface to" Girardin's Essay on Land- 

 scape, translated by D. Malthus, Esq.) Eustace men- 

 tions that the same general appearance of woods and 

 meadows exists to this day. ( Classical Tour, vol. i. p. 1 4s ) 



The situation of Pliny's Tuscan villa was a natural 

 amphitheatre, formed by the richest part of the Appe- 

 nines, whose lofty summits, crowned with groves of 

 oak, are broken into a variety of shapes, their sides wa- 

 tered by numerous springs, and diversified by fields, 

 vineyards, and copses. Of the artificial part of the 

 grounds, ive have a particular and well known des- 

 cription in Pliny's Epistles, book v. letter 6th, which is 

 of importance to our purpose, as shewing what was es- 

 teemed good taste in the pleasure grounds of a highly 

 accomplished Roman nobleman and philosopher. 



" It is almost superfluous to remark," observes Dr. 

 Faulkener, speaking of Pliny's gardens, " the striking 

 resemblance which they bear to one in the French or 

 Dutch taste. The terraces adjoining to the house; the 

 lawn declining from thence ; the little flower garden, 

 with the fountain in the centre ; the walks bordered with 

 box; and the trees sheared into whimsical artificial 

 forms, together with the fountains, alcoves, and sum- 

 mer houses, form a resemblance too striking to bear dis- 

 pute.'' " In an age," observes Lord Walpole, " when 

 architecture displayed all its grandeur, all its purity, 

 and all its taste ; when arose Vespasian's amphitheatre, 

 the temple of peace, Trajan's forum, Domitian's bath, 

 and Adrian's villa, the ruins and vestiges of which still 

 excite our astonishment anil curiosity ; a Roman con- 

 sul, a polished emperor's friend, and a man of elegant 

 literature and taste, delighted in what the mob now 

 scarce admire in a college garden. All the ingredients 

 of Pliny's garden corresponded exactly with those laid 

 out by London and Wise on -Dutch principles; so that 

 nothing is wanting but a parterre to make a garden in 

 the reign of Trajan serve for the description of one in 

 the reign of king William." We consider these re- 

 marks of this eloquent author as dictated by too li- 

 mited a view of the subject. Because the Roman 

 gardens were considered as scenes of art, and treat- 

 ed as such, it does not follow that the possessors 

 were without a just feeling for natural scenery. 

 Where all around is nature, artificial scenes even of the 

 most formal description will please, and may be ap- 

 proved by the justest taste, from their novelty and con- 

 trast, and other associations. If all England were a 

 scattered forest like ancient Italy, and cultivation were 



to take place only in the open glades or plains, where Kistoiy. 

 would be the beauty of her p.^rks and pleasure grounds ? "*" "Y"*" ^ 

 The relative or temporary beauties of art should there- 

 fore not be hastily or entirely rejected in ouradmiration 

 of the more permanent and absolute beauties of nature. 

 That the ancient Romans admired natural scenery 

 with as great enthusiasm as the moderns, is evident 

 from the writings of their eminent poets and philoso- 

 phers ; scarcely one of whom has not, in some part of 

 his works, left us the most beautiful descriptions of ru- 

 ral scenery, and the most enthusiastic strains of admi- 

 ration of all that is grand, pleasing, or romantic, in land- 

 scape ; and some of them, as Cicero and Juvenal, have 

 deprecated the efforts of art in attempting^ to improve 

 nature. " Whoever, 1 ' says Mr. G. Mason, " would 

 properly estimate the attachment to rural picturesque 

 among heathen nations of old, should not confine their 

 researches to the domains of men, but extend them to 

 the temples and altars, the caves and fountains, dedi- 

 cated to their deities. These, with their concomitant 

 groves, were generally favourite objects of visual plea- 

 sure as well as of veneration.' 1 



SECT. III. French Gardening. 



As the French made the most conspicuous figure in Third 

 gardening during this period, we shall commence with poh. 

 such notices as we have been able to collect of its pro- ' J T QO 

 gress in France, and pass successively to the other Garden of 

 countries in Europe. Charle- 



The earliest notice which we have been able to find rnagne. 

 of a garden in France, is in the Capit. de villis et c;t 

 riis imperalorif Caroli Magni, prepared about the end I 



of the eighth century, and referred to by Montesquieu 

 as a " chef-d'oeuvre of prudence, good administration, 

 and economy." It contains 70 articles, recommend- 

 ing or proposing every possible attention and pre- 

 caution ; and the 70th contains a list of the plants and 

 trees to be cultivated. Among these, medicinal plants 

 hold a considerable place ; there are but few shrubs, 

 and only the common fruit trees. This monarch had 

 domains in most parts of France, and jjave every en- 

 couragement, as the Abbe Schmidt (Encyc. Method. 

 tomes 4 and 5.) informs us, to clearing away fo- 

 rests, and planting vineyards and orchards. From his 

 intimacy with the Saracenic Prince Haroun al Ran* 

 child, he introduced many charming varieties of the 

 rose, the best sorts of pulse, melons, and the finer sorts 

 of fruits. He had a noble palace at Ingleheim on the 

 Rhine, supported by a hundred columns of Italian mar- 

 ble, and containing an immense number of apartments. 

 The whole is consecrated by Nigellus in a Latin poem 

 of considerable length. 



The next notice of a garden in France, unaccompa- A. D. Isoo. 

 nied by any details, is that of the Hotel de St. Paul, at 

 Paris, formed by Charles the V. in 136i. The scene of 

 the Romaunt de Rose is in a garden ; but, excepting 

 that there were edgings of violets and primroses, there 

 is not a hint as to its form or productions. 



Little appears to have been done in France before 

 the beginning of the 16th century, when, in conse- 

 quence of the marriage of Francis the I. with the 

 daughter of Leo the X. something of what that illus- 

 trious pontiff revived in Italy would be transplanted to 

 France. Stephens and Liebault published their Mai- 

 son Rustique towards the end of this century ; from 

 which it appears, that gardening, and every other rural 

 art, had made considerable progress in France. What 

 relates to ornament in La Maison Rustique, may be in- 

 cluded in the directions given for forming arbours of 

 jessamine, rows of box, juniper, and cypress, and the 



