HISTORICAL AND COMPARATIVE. 49 



fair ; " and yn the orchardes were mounts writhen 

 about with degrees, like the turnings in cokil shelles, 

 to come to the top without payne." There is still 

 to be seen, or according to Murray's Guide, 1876, 

 was then to be seen, at Wotton, in Surrey, an 

 artificial mount cut into terraces, which is a relic of 

 Evelyn's work. 



The general shape of an old-fashioned garden is 

 a perfect square, which we take to be reminiscent of 

 the square patch of ground which, in early days, was 

 partitioned off for the use of the family, and walled 

 to exclude cattle, or to define the property. It also 

 repeats the quadrangular court of big Tudor houses. 

 We may also assume that the shape would commend 

 itself to the taste of the Renascence School of the 

 Elizabethan and Jacobean eras, as being that of classic 

 times ; for the antique garden was fashioned in a 

 square with enclosures of trellis-work, espaliers, and 

 dipt box hedges, regularly ornamented with vases, 

 fountains, and statuary. 



The square shape was common to the French 

 and Italian gardens also. Old views of Du Cerceau, 

 an architect of the time of Charles IX. and Henry III., 

 show a square in one part of the grounds and a 

 circular labyrinth in another : scarcely a plot but 

 has this arrangement. The point to note, however, 

 is, that while the English garden might take the 

 same general outline as the foreign, it had its own 

 peculiarities ; and although each country develops 

 the fantastic ornament common to the stiff garden of 

 the period in its own way, things are not carried to 



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