Design for laying out and planting a Flo^wer-Garden. 44'9 



they earn, and leave their wives and children to be supported 

 entirely by the parish ; declaring, what, indeed, appears to be 

 their belief, that there is a law obliging the parish to provide 

 for their families, and that they are only bound to take care of 

 themselves. 



These are but a few of the numerous tales which were told us 

 by different persons about Fonthill; and it must be recollected 

 that we do not vouch for the truth of any of them, though we 

 think the whole of them are very likely to be true. We admire 

 in Mr. Beckford his vivid imagination and cultivated mind, and 

 that good taste in landscape-gardening which produced the 

 perfect unity of character which pervades the grounds at Font- 

 hill. We also give him full credit for his good sense in having 

 quitted the place when he could no longer afford to keep it up, 

 and the honourable principle he showed in never getting into 

 debt, but paying liberal prices and ready money to the last. 

 W^e must, however, enter our protest against the recklessness 

 with which he employed his wealth to gratify his wishes, without 

 regard to its demoralising effects on the labouring population of 

 his neighbourhood, effects so serious that it will take a gene- 

 ration to remove them. Far happier will it always be for a 

 country gentleman to cultivate feelings of kindness and sympathy 

 for all those that are about him, and to encourage similar 

 feelings in them towards him, than merely to lavish money upon 

 them. Still, it is as impossible not to admire Mr. Beckford, as 

 it is not to admire Lord Byron, from the native grandeur of his 

 mind, its superior cultivation, and the high aristocratic feeling 

 which he possessed, unmixed with the slightest shade of mean- 

 ness. His faults and eccentricities appear to have been chiefly 

 caused by an ardent temperament, stimulated by the early 

 possession of almost unbounded wealth, and unchecked by the 

 restraints of reason, prudence, and human sympathy. 



Art. II. A Series of Designs Jhr laying out and planting Flotver- 

 Gardens, tvith Remarks on each by the Conductor. Design 4'., by 

 A Young Gardener. 



First, as to the " beauties " of the plan of a garden in Vol. 

 VII. fig. 130., repeated in the present volume, in p. 238. and 

 239., 1 think they consist in the outlines of the plantations, 

 which appear well calculated to add to the apparent breadth of 

 the interior ground. The gravel walks, too, harmonise with 

 these outlines ; and the sweeps are easy and graceful, with the 

 exception of the punchbowl-like form of a diverging branch, 

 near the far corner fronting the house. 



