26 THE MANSE GARDEN. 



The legal fence is one of stone and mortar, two ells 

 in height, measured from the surface, and therefore 

 exclusive of the depth necessary to obtain a founda- 

 tion, and of such length as to enclose half an acre of 

 ground. Mortar perhaps once signified clay, but 

 now it means lime, according to use and wont. And 

 lucky it is for your apricots, as they require so much 

 nailing, and the clay does not hold. But you are 

 not likely to suffer by the substitution of clay for 

 lime, as no gentleman, in these times, is willing to 

 have an ugly hole in his property, or to exhibit, by 

 a clay pit, the proof of an execrable soil. A lime 

 wall, besides, will in most places cost less, requiring 

 only one foot in thickness ; whereas a mud construc- 

 tion must be twenty inches, or two feet, to have any 

 chance of standing; and even with such expensive 

 thickness, as the wall has not the benefit of a roof 

 over its head, it will be sure, on the slightest failure 

 of the turf cope, getting soaked, to suffer expansion 

 by frost, and to burst, a mass of hateful ruin, in the 

 February rains. But, not failing, the turf cope is a 

 pest, polluting, by the seeds of every thing vile, both 

 flower borders and gravel walks ; and if to prevent 

 the bursting of the wall through the failure of cop- 

 ing, and kindly to save the minister from a pest, as 

 well as to remove from the eye the meanness of a 

 turfy heap which uncouthly mingles with peach 

 blossom, the heritors should determine for a cope 

 of stone ; then the needful thickness of a clay wall 

 becomes a very considerable aggravation of the ex- 

 pense. For if freestone be adopted, it is charged by 

 the square foot, and if common stone, for cheapness, 

 be preferred, it is yet not cheap when required of a 



