S98 General Results of a Gardetiing Tour : — 



is, that we have hardly seen one mansion residence kept in the 

 order in which it ought to be. The pleasure-grounds at 

 Stoneleigh Abbey, at Hewel Park, and at Barlaston Hall, are 

 approximations to our beau ideal ; but the kitchen-gardens at 

 the first two places are badly situated. 



Most proprietors of mansions have, within these few years, 

 been obliged to curtail the number of hands allowed to their 

 gardener ; and, under such circumstances, the plan we should 

 recommend would be, to reduce and concentrate the highly 

 kept part of the pleasure grounds, and keep it near the house; 

 never to attempt higher keeping at a distance from the house 

 than is to be found at it, and leave all distant parts to run com- 

 paratively wild, but keeping the walks in good order, though 

 without trimming their edges, or digging or hoeing the sur- 

 face among shrubs. Some parts of the pleasure grounds at 

 Sandwell, Guy's Cliff, and Deepdene are in the style to 

 which we allude; but few gardeners hit the precise point 

 where digging and trimming the edges of walks ought to be 

 gradually left off. In wild pleasure ground scenery of this 

 kind only three fourths of the width of the walk ought to be 

 kept in high order, leaving the remaining fourth in the form 

 of irregular broken edges, such as we see along the margins 

 of gravelled approach roads which are much in use, and in 

 which the gravel is on a level, or as nearly so as the nature 

 of the soil and surface will admit, with the adjoining grassy 

 surface. The difficulty with wild scenery created by art is, 

 to avoid the appearance of waste ground covered with weeds ; 

 but this is to be got over by planting trailing evergreens, such 

 as ivy, large-flowered St. John's wort, periwinkle, &c., and ' 

 by abundance of evergreen shrubs, and such perennial her- 

 baceous plants as will grow among turf. 



It is very common among places of this class to have flower- 

 gardens, or perhaps a green-house and parterre of flowers, at 

 some distance from the house, with a portion of commonplace 

 shrubbery, lawn, and gravel walk intervening. We conceive 

 this to be in very bad taste. To whatever extent avowed art 

 is carried, the highest degree ought almost always to be nearest 

 to the most avowedly artificial object, viz. the house ; and, from 

 the garden front of that, art ought to spread along the lawn 

 and the walks, diminishing in proportion to the distance, till it 

 loses itself in scenery comparatively natural. Were diis prin- 

 ciple properly understood and acted upon, the money now spent 

 upon even those places where the hands are greatly reduced, 

 would produce tenfold the present efi'ect. It would, in fact, 

 give satisfaction ; whereas, miles of walks and acres of land, in 



