LANDSCAPE GARDENING. 



539 



Baa**. 





ployed in the former capacity. Mr. Holland, we believe, 

 retired from business some yean ago. 



The next artist that deserves to be mentioned, is 

 Mr. Eames, of whom, however, we know little more 

 than that he is mentioned in terms of respect by Mr. 

 G. Mason. 



Mr. Repton, a highly respectable artist, from being an 

 amateur, began his career as professor of landscape gar- 

 dening about thirty yean ago ; and, till a sort of de- 

 cline, or inactivity of taste took place ten or twelve 

 years since, he was extensively consulted. Though at 

 first an avowed defender and follower of Brown, he 

 IMS gradually veered round with the change effect- 

 ed in public opinion by the Essays on the Picturesque, 

 to that now, comparing his earlier works of 1795 and 

 180.5, with his Fragments OH Landscape Gardening, pub- 

 lished in 1817, he appears much more a disciple of 

 Price, than a defender of his " great predecessor." M r. 

 Repton is a beautiful draughtsman, and gives, besides 

 plan* and views, his written opinion in a regular form, 

 generally combining the whole in a manuscript volume, 

 which he calls the red Ijook of the place. He never, 

 we believe, undertakes the execution of his plans. Mr. 

 Repton has not, as far as we are aware, been employ- 

 ed out of England ; but Vallty field, in Perthshire, was 

 visited by hi* two ions, and arranged from Mr. Rep- 

 ton'* designs. The character of this artist's talent, 

 seem* to be cultivation rather than genius, and he 

 eesns more anxious to gratify the preconceived wishes 

 of hi* employers, and improve on the fashion of the 

 day, than to strike out grand and original beauties. 

 This, indeed, is perhaps the most useful description of 

 talent, both for the professor and his employers. Mr. 

 Repton'* taste in gothic architecture, and in terraces, 

 and architectural appendages to mansions, is particu- 

 larly elegant. Hi* published " Oiistrcaliom" on tin* 

 eahjfct are valuable; though we think otherwise of 

 his remark* on landscape gardening, which we luok 

 upon as wanting depth, and often at variance with 

 each other. On the whole, however, we have no hesi- 

 tation ia asserting, that both by his splendid volumes, 

 and extensive practice among the first classes, he has 

 supported the credit of this country for taste in laying 

 out grounds. 



Though it may be true, that " in all liberal art*, the 

 merit of transccndant genius, not the herd of pretend- 

 ers, characterise* an era ;" yet in an art like that of 

 laying out grounds, whose productions necessarily 

 have such an influence on the general face of a coun- 

 try, it is sapossable to judge otherwise of the actual state 

 of the art, than from the effect which is produced. This 

 effect, about forty yean ago, when clumps and l-rln 

 blotted every horizon, could never be mistaken for 

 that intended by such professors as Kent, or such au- 

 thor* a* Wheatley and Mason. The truth is, a* we 

 have already hinted, such was the rage for improve- 

 ment, that the demand for nrtists of genuine taste ex- 

 ceeded the regular supply ; and, as it is usual in such 

 cases, a false article was brought to market, and im- 

 posed on the public. This false taste, which may be 

 said to hare for the time reduced a liberal to a mecha- 

 nic art, gave a new character to modem improvements, 

 which, from consisting in a display of ease, elegance, 

 end nature, according to the situation, became a sys- 

 ~ of set forms, indiscriminately applied in every 

 This syilera was in fact more formal, and less 



varied, than the ancient style to which it succeeded, History 



because it had fewer parts. An ancient garden had """"Y ' 



avenues, alleys, stars, pates d'oye, pelotons, or pla- 



toons, (square clumps,) circular masses, rows double 



and single, and strips, all from one material, wood; 



but the modern style, as now degraded, had only three 



forms, a clump, a belt, and a single tree. Place the 



belt in the circumference, and distribute the clumps and 



single trees within, and all that respects wood in one 



of these places is finished. The professor required n 



further examination of the ground, than what was ne- 



cessary to take the levels for forming a piece of water, 



which water uniformly assumed one shape and charac- 



ter, and differed no more in different situations, than 



did the belt or the clump. So entirely mechanical had 



the art become, that any one might have guessed what 



would be the plan given by the professor before he 



was called in ; and Mr. Price actually gives an in- 



stance in which this was done. The activity of this 



false taste was abated in England before our time ; 



but we have seen in Scotland, between the years 1795 



and 1 805, we believe, above a hundred of such plans, 



in part formed by local artists, and in part by an Eng- 



li>h professor, \\ho was in the habit of making annual 



journies in the north, taking orders for plans, which he 



got drawn on his return home, not one of which dif- 



fered from the rest in any thing but magnitude.* 



The good sense of the country soon revolted at such 

 monotonous productions ; and proprietors were ridi- 

 culed for expending immense sums in destroying old 

 avenues and woods, and planting in their room young 

 clumps, for no other reason than that it was the fashion 

 to do so. Partly on this account, and partly because 

 almost every place in England had been metamor- 

 phosed, and that lassitude had ensued which always 

 succeed* over exertion, the career of improvement 

 slackened its pace in England about the year 178O. 

 Various cause* contributed to diminish its course, till 

 the almost decisive blow given by Mr. Knight and Mr. 

 Price in 1 79 1. 



The first symptoms of disapprobation that were ven- Change T 

 turvil to be uttered against the degradation of the new taste. 

 taste, appear to be contained in an epistolary novel, en- 

 titled ViUage Memoirs, published in 1775, in which the 

 professors of gardening are satirized under the name of 

 Mr. Layout. A better taste, however, than that of 

 Mr. Layout is acknowledged to exist, which the author 

 state* " Shenstone ami nature to have brought us ac- 

 quainted with.'' Most of the large gardens are said to 

 be laid out by some general undertaker, " who intro- 

 duces the same objects at the same distances in all.'* 

 P. 143. The translation of Girardin De la composition 

 des paytaget, ou det moyent d'cmbellir la nature aulour 

 Jet Habitations, enjoignanl fagreabk 11 futile, Sfc. ac- 

 companied with an excellent historical preface by Da- 

 niel Malthus, Esq. in 1783, must have had considerab.e 

 influence in purifying the taste of its readers. A poem 

 in Dodsley's collection, entitled, Some Thoughts OH 

 Building and Planting, addressed to Sir James Lowther, 

 Bart, published in the same year, and in which the poet 

 recommends, that 



" Fashion will not the works direct, 

 But reason be the architect," 



must have had some effect. But the Essay on Prints, 



* Tfc* pte wrr, In general, mounted on linen, which he regularly purchased in piccw of ome hundred* of yard! at time, 

 ttam cclOriud MtwhfaM adjoining Perth. 



