Design for a Flotsoer-Garden. 237 



of trees of which our nurseries can boast, nor yet described a 

 single mass, far less a series of masses, that might be produced 

 by carrying out these principles, when a numerous variety of trees 

 are employed. 



Bicton Gardens, near Exeter, February/, 1834. 



Art. VI. A Series of Designs for laying out and planting Flotver- 

 Gardens, tvitk Remarks on each hy the Conductor. Design 1., by 

 Floretus. 



If our readers will turn to VII. 725., they will there find a 

 notice of a plan of a flower-garden actually existing, which was 

 sent to us for our opinion. That opinion we gave to the pro- 

 prietor, together with a plan for remodelling it ; but we, at the 

 same time, with the proprietor's permission, published the plan, 

 and invited young gardeners to send their remarks on it, with 

 plans expressing their ideas as to how it ought to be reformed. 

 We intended this as an exercise for young gardeners, offering a 

 small premium for the best plan, &c. We have received half a 

 dozen plans in competition, and we now propose to publish 

 them, offering our own remarks on each. We consider that by 

 doing this we shall be conveying more instruction than by merely 

 publishing the best plan. Indeed, as a general principle, we 

 are convinced that more instruction may-be conveyed by present- 

 ing an imperfect design, and pointing out its faults, than by pre- 

 senting a perfect one, and pointing out its beauties. We feel no 

 hesitation in stating this as our opinion, because we have proved 

 it, both in the case of designs for laying out grounds and for 

 building dwellings. We proceeded on this principle with regard 

 to some of the designs in our Encyclopcedia of Cottage Architec- 

 ture, and we are every month exemplifying it in the Architectural 

 Magazine. The result has been, that, by pointing out to our 

 readers gross faults, we have created a taste for the subject in 

 many who never thought of it before, by rendering them suffi- 

 ciently acquainted with its principles to become critics. 



Repeating the undoubted fact, that more instruction may be 

 conveyed by giving an imperfect design, and pointing out its 

 faults, than by giving a perfect one, and pointing out its beau- 

 ties, it seems desirable, in order to strengthen the impression, to 

 ascertain the reason of this from the nature of the human mind. 

 As far as we have reflected on the subject, we can only derive it 

 from an innate principle ; viz., that the perceptive faculties of the 

 human mind, in a rude state, are more readily excited by exag- 

 geration than perfection, and that we can more easily discover 

 what is wanting, superfluous, or faulty, in an object, than we 

 can what is complete. The impression made by faulty objects 



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