XVI. 



A VISIT TO MONTGOMERY PLACE. 



October, 1847. 



rpHERE are few persons, among what may be called the travelling 

 JL class, who know the beauty of the finest American country- 

 seats. Many are ignorant of the very existence of those rural gems 

 that embroider the landscapes here and there, in the older and 

 wealthier parts of the country. Held in the retirement of private 

 life, they are rarely visited, except by those who enjoy the friend- 

 ship of their possessors. The annual tourist by the railroad and 

 steamboat, who moves through wood and meadow and river and 

 hill, with the celerity of a rocket, and then fancies he knows the 

 country, is in a state of total ignorance of their many attractions ; 

 and those whose taste has not led them to seek this species of plea- 

 sure, are equally unconscious of the landscape-gardening beauties 

 that are developing themselves every day, with the advancing pros* 

 perity of the country. 



It has been our good fortune to know a great number of the 

 finest of these delightful residences, to revel in their beauties, and 

 occasionally to chronicle their charms. If we have not sooner 

 spoken at large of Montgomery Place, second as ft is to no seat in 

 America, for its combination of attractions, it has been rather that 

 we were silent like a devout gazer at the marvellous beauty of 

 the Apollo from excess of enjoyment, than from not deeply 

 feeling all its varied mysteries of pleasure-grounds and lawns, wood 

 and water. 



Montgomery Place is one of the superb old seats belonging to 



