564 



LANDSCAPE GARDENING. 



Of the M- not extend farther than a few feet or yards from the 

 terials c f nlar gj n o f f ne water. The other respects islands, which 

 ! ' are the greatest ornaments to lakes. But that island 

 which is placed in the centre, or in ny situation where 

 it does not connect with other islands, or with the 

 shore, so as to form part of a prominence or recess, is 

 injurious to the effect of the whole inversely as its 

 beauty, when properly placed. 



Rivers and rills, we have said, are rather to be im- 

 proved than created ; for we cannot sympathise with 

 that taste, which directs the mimicry of so noble a 

 character as a river, or is satisfied with a nearly stag- 

 nated rill. We do not consider the river at Blen- 

 heim as an exception, because that piece of water was 

 formed by widening a considerable brook. We allude 

 to those wavy serpentine canals, which are never mis- 

 taken for natural scenes, and -in almost every case 

 might be advantageously exchanged for a lake. 



The two leading ideas which belong to running wa- 

 ters, are progress and impetuosity. The first expres- 

 sion may be heightened by counteracting any tendency 

 to expansion ; by removing some of the circuitous and 

 oblong projections of earth or stone in the banks ; and 

 sometimes by deepening its bed, or by substituting a more 

 direct line for a circuitous course. The idea of impetu- 

 osity is indicated by its effects, in reverberating against 

 high banks, or common banks, on which trees are situa- 

 ted, and may be increased by augmenting the cause or 

 the effect, and thus either digging and undermining the 

 trees, cutting down the high banks on which the water 

 acts, or placing very slight piers as jetties on the op- 

 posite shore. Picturesque additions to the marginal 

 accompaniments both of rivers and rills will readily 

 suggest themselves. Cascades and waterfalls may some- 

 times be created ; and the occasional expansion of na- 

 tural brooks into pools, affords a fine hint for imitation, 

 when this form of water comes within a scene of im- 



provement. 



SECT. IV. Rocks. 



Rocks, It forms no part of the geometric style of gardening 



to imitate rocks, which are a material of the natural 

 style equally unsuitable to be created. But though rocks 

 cannot readily be imitated, their expression may some- 

 times be heightened when desirable, and concealed 

 when disagreeable. 



*!ieir cha- The character of rocks may be savage, terrific, su- 

 ftcter. blime, picturesque, or fantastic. By attending to the 

 forms of the milder characters, and their connection 

 with ground and trees, we shall discover whether, and 

 to what extent, they may be improved. Savage rocks 

 are too inhospitable to be permanently admitted, in any 

 extent, near the eye. All rocks convey something of 

 this idea that are not accompanied by vegetation ; and, 

 therefore, planting among or near them, is in every 

 case an improvement, where trees do not exist. All 

 rocks are expressive of dignity ; those eminently so, 

 are not greatly varied by projections from then- surface : 

 their beauty is to be augmented, either by increasing 

 their surface in height or depth, or by connecting it 

 if too scattered. The removal of a few feet of earth, 

 or part of the bushes or trees from the bottom of a pre- 

 cipice or ridge, and the implacement of a line of wood 

 along its summit, will increase its real and apparent 

 height; a similar process with respect to the sides, will 

 add to the idea of stability and continuation. If the 

 parts are too much scattered, a few trees placed before, 

 or bushes or creepers planted in the intervals between 

 the parts, will connect them, and give the idea of a 



whole, partly concealed. But in this ease, a consider- Of the M. 

 able breadth of surface is ^necessary, at least in one term's of 

 place, otherwise dignity must give way to. picturesque G 

 beauty. But the least indications of rocks that are not R oc iJf 

 very fantastic in their form, even including such whose 

 chief expression is picturesque beauty, are to a certain 

 degree expressive of dignity. The slightest indication 

 of a stratum or ledge appearing above the surface, con- 

 veys something of the idea, and ought not to be ne- 

 glected. When they are discovered by alterations in 

 the ground with a view to the formation of roads, fences, 

 and water, or to the erection of buildings, occasional 

 advantage may be taken of their appearance. A road 

 across a declivity, may be accompanietl by a ledge of 

 rocks, instead of a bank of earth. Ground merely 

 broken and picturesque, will display a more sufficient 

 reason for the appearance. The walls of a terrace, evi- 

 dently in part founded on a rock, will give an idea of 

 dryness, dignity, and security to the house ; and the 

 margin of a stream displaying even large stones, in- 

 creases the idea of impetuosity ; or in lakes, of the ac- 

 tion of water in washing away the earth. Among imi- 

 tations of wild scenery, detached stones heighten the 

 illusion, and carry back the mind to the aboriginal 

 state of the country. Loose or detached fragments of 

 rocks may often aid the effect of real or supposed 

 masses. The appearance of a large rude stone near a 

 wooded steep, unless of one evidently rounded by wa- 

 ter or art, always leads the mind to the larger mass up 

 the acclivity from which it has been broken and rolled 

 down ; if partly sunk in the ground, and concealed by 

 vegetation, the fertility of the imagination considers 

 them as parts of magnitudes which lie buried under 

 the surface. All this, however, can only be success- 

 fully accomplished in a country which, by the charac- 

 ter of its general surface, does not preclude the idea of 

 rocks. On a flat or a champaign country, the want of 

 truth, or seeming truth, would render them disagree- 

 able; and, indeed, did rocks exist in such a landscape, 

 they should be hidden rather than displayed, unless of 

 such extraordinary magnitude and effect, as to form an 

 exception to general principles. 



SECT. V. Buildings. 



Buildings, as materials of scenery, are entirely un- Building! 

 der the power of man ; and, from that circumstance, 

 were carried to an unwarrantable excess in the decline 

 of the ancient, and the infancy of the modern style. Im- 

 provements on ground are forgotten by their effect ; 

 that of planting may be accounted too distant or too 

 slow by ordinary minds; but a building is complete the 

 moment it is finished. It affords immediate satisfaction 

 to the owner ; and, being known as a costly object, full 

 credit is given to him for the expence incurred. Thus 

 wealth, confiding in its powers, multiplied garden build- 

 ings to an excess, which ended in creating 'a disgust, 

 which still exists, in some degree, at their appearance in 

 improved scenery. Buildings, as independent archi- 

 tectural compositions, are treated of under our article 

 CIVIL ARCHITECTURE. We shall here, therefore, confine 

 ourselves to a consideration of their effect as parts in a 

 composition of verdant scenery, and to their natural 

 expression in scenes of improvement in both styles of 

 gardening. 



As parts of a verdant composition. Shenstone ob- as compo 

 serves, that a landscape, to him, is never complete ing parti 

 without a building or rocks ; and certainly, consider- verdant 

 ing it merely in the light of a picturesque view, a build- 8cen( 

 ing, in addition to merely verdant scenery, forms a bet- 



