LANDSCAPE GARDENING. 



THE PHILOSOPHY OF RURAL TASTE. 



August, 1849. 



ALL travellers agree, that while the English people are far from 

 being remarkable for their taste in the arts generally, they are 

 unrivalled in their taste for landscape gardening. *So completely is 

 this true, that wherever on the continent one finds a garden, con- 

 spicuous for the taste of its design, one is certain to learn that it 

 is laid out in the " English style," and usually kept by an English 

 gardener. 



Not, indeed, that the south of Europe is wanting in magnificent 

 gardens, which are as essentially national in their character as the 

 parks and pleasure-grounds of England. The surroundings of the 

 superb villas of Florence and Rome, are fine examples of a species 

 of scenery as distinct and striking as any to be found in the world ; 

 but which, however splendid, fall as far below the English gardens 

 in interesting the imagination, as a level plain does below the 

 finest mountain valley in Switzerland. In the English landscape 

 garden, one sees and feels every where the spirit of nature, only 

 softened and refined by art. In the French or Italian garden, 

 one sees and feels only the effects of art, slightly assisted by nature. 

 In one, the free and luxuriant growth of every tree and shrub, the 

 widening and curving of every walk, suggests perhaps even a higher 

 5 



