naith 7'egard to Practical Gardeners. 35 



sions of sublimity may be felt in the contemplation of such a 

 union of the works of nature, heightened by those of art. 



Coimtry Seats. — r-The manner in which a great majority of 

 those delightful residences are laid out and improved by the 

 landscape-gardener, has created a style which has acquired 

 the distinction of English gardening. The finely wooded 

 state of the kingdom at the time the present fashion was intro- 

 duced, enabled the designers to execute this peculiar style 

 with very fine effect. Even entirely new places, taken in from 

 commons within the last fourscore years, have risen into 

 admirable beauty and value. Many of them are perfect types 

 of the chastely beautiful, the interestingly picturesque, and 

 numbers, from their extent and magnitude of design, truly 

 magnificent. 



Such places deserve imitation, as they are examples of our 

 national taste ; but it is impossible to lay down any thing like 

 rules for the execution. The character of the country, of the 

 place, its buildings, woods, peculiar features, and situation, 

 form the basis, on which whatever the improver may see fit 

 to add or take away must be founded. 



The Ferine ornee. — To surround a country residence with 

 beautiful scenery, invariably requires a sacrifice of useful land, 

 not always agreeable to proprietors of limited fortune or pos- 

 sessions. To get rid of this difficulty, it has been urged that 

 no marks of useful and necessary cultivation can possibly 

 offend the eye of taste, provided they are not forced into 

 notice ; that a walk or ride through fruitful trees, waving corn, 

 and thriving sheep is as interesting, and may be made as 

 inviting, as the devious drive through open groves, exotic 

 shrubs, and dappled deer. An ornamented farm has there- 

 fore been admitted as a legitimate expedient of uniting the 

 beauties of landscape with all the advantages of a fertile soil . 

 A farming gentleman may have " a painter's eye," and, in 

 disposing his farm, will wish to keep a moderate space before 

 his windows in highly dressed order; next, his meadows and 

 pastures in a park-like state, and his arable fields in the off- 

 scape. These last he will intersect with rides or green drives 

 along his hedge-row elms, or through irregular groups of 

 unlopped trees, that he may visit at pleasure his ploughman's 

 furrows, his mower's swathes, or " reaper train." 



Such things have been executed with great success, and 

 chiefly by the highly talented proprietors themselves. Some 

 of the most interesting^ estates in Britain are laid out in this 

 manner. It has the peculiar charm of uniting the sweet with 

 the useful ; and, though such a disposition cannot be allowed 

 with propriety to break in upon the high keeping of a noble- 



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