478 Calls at the London Nursoies^ 



too far distant from a house, may derange the scale of the whole of the 

 scenery. Even rapid-growing trees of moderate size, placed among slow- 

 growing trees, will produce the same discordance. 



Boyle Farm, near Thamex Ditton. — We had occasion to visit this beau- 

 tiful spot professionally in the course of the spring. It borders the 

 Thames, at a fine bend of that noble river ; and its two principal features 

 are, on one side of the house, the river scenery, with distant prospects 

 beyond ; and, on the other, recluse home scenery, highly enriched with 

 flower-gardens, American shrubs, rockwork, artificial hills and dales, 

 and other kinds of garden decoration. The transition fi-om the one 

 kind of scenery to the other is made in a moment, and the contrast 

 is proportionately striking. The place must have been laid out and planted 

 with great pains, and carefully managed for a number of years afterwards. 

 The grouping of some of the trees by the river side is excellent ; but, in 

 the interior, many of the trees have lately been cut down, or lopped in 

 such a way as to destroy the screens which they formed for separating 

 the diiFerent recluse scenes from one another, and thus materially to 

 injure the beauty of the place. 



Hampton Court. — We had occasion to go through this palace and its 

 gardens in the course of the spring. We saw nothing new in the house ; 

 but, in passing through so many unoccupied and half-furnished rooms, 

 we could not help noticing the want of real magnificence on the one 

 hand, or of plain usefulness on the other. The best part of Hampton 

 Court Palace is its exterior ; which, though in faulty architecture, yet 

 forms one grand mass suitable to the situation. The gardens are also 

 excellent of their kind, and it is to be regretted that they are not kept up, 

 either with sufficient care in point of order and neatness, or due attention 

 to their original form. The walks are harrowed, or raked, instead of 

 being rolled, and look more like newly sown ridges of corn land in a 

 gravelly soil, than walks. The flowers and shrubs are straggling and 

 tawdry, neglected or badly pruned, and either overgrown or deformed. 

 The fountains, too, are in bad order ; but in no country, we believe, are the 

 palaces and gardens of kings kept in such good order as those of private 

 individuals. After the first expense of building and laying out has been 

 incurred, some change takes place ; the successor, probably, dislikes the 

 situation or the arrangements ; and the whole is put into keeping, at the 

 lowest possible rate of expense. Even the villa of a gentlemen of mo- 

 derate fortune, who has probably no other residence, is generally in better 

 order than any one of those of a very wealthy man, who has several, and 

 a town house besides. For example, the Marquess of Westminster has 

 several princely villas in different parts of the country, but there is not 

 one of them kept up in such first-rate style as some of the small villas 

 of retired tradesmen near manufacturing towns. 



Esher. — The churchyard here is badly laid out, and is without trees, 

 with the exception of a circle of hollies, which is planted I'ound one tomb, 

 and which shows what might be done. A man was rooting out mallows 

 and other large plants which gave an appearance of rankness, and the 

 churchyard being surrounded on three sides by a high wood added to 

 this bad effect. Open, airy, and elevated situations are preferable for 

 burying-grounds, and the surface should either be regularly mown, or, 

 what is better, be grazed by a few sheep. 



Claremont. — The lane leading from the village to the lodge is bor- 

 dered on the left by a sweetbriar hedge behind a line of paling. The 

 fragrance of such a hedge, in the mornings and evenings, and after rain, is 

 most grateful : we mention this hedge, for the sake of stating that we 

 think sweetbriar hedges are far less common in the neighbourhood of Lon- 

 don than they ought to be. A marginal belt to a pleasure-ground, thinly 



