472 DoWfwig^s Laiidscape-Gardeningf 



REVIEWS. 



Art. I. A Treatise on the Theory and Practice of Layidscape- 

 Gardening, adapted to North America ; txiith a Vietv to the Improve- 

 ment of Country Residences: comprising Historical Notices and 

 General Principles of the Art, Directions for laying out Grounds 

 and arranging Plantations, the Description and Cultivation of 

 Hardy Trees, Decorative Accompaniments to the House and 

 Grounds, the Formation of Pieces of Artificial Water, Flotver- 

 Gardens, 8^c. With Remarks on Rural Architecture. By A. J. 

 Downing. 8vo, pp. 451, plates, and numerous woodcuts. New 

 York and Londonj 1841. 



{Continued from p. 427.) 



" ' Where the gardenesque style of imitating nature is to be employed, the 

 trees and herbaceous plants must be separated ; and instead of being grouped 

 together as in forest scenery, where two trees, or a tree and a shrub, often 

 appear to spring from the same root, every gardenesque group must consist of 

 trees which do not touch each other, and which only become groups by 

 being as near together as is practicable without touching, and by being 

 apart from large masses, or from single trees, or rows of trees. It is not 

 meant by this, that in the gardenesque, the trees composing a group should 

 all be equally distant from one another ; for in that case they would not form 

 a whole, which the word group always implies. On the contrary, though all 

 the trees in a gardenesque group ought to be so far separated from each other 

 as not to touch, yet the degrees of separation may be as different as the 

 designer chooses, provided the idea of a group is never lost sight of. 



" ' In laying out grounds, it is necessary always to bear in mind the difference 

 between the gardenesque and the picturesque, that is, between a plantation 

 made merely for picturesque effect, and another made for gardenesque effect. 

 In planting, thinning, and pruning, in order to produce the latter effect, the 

 beauty of every individual tree and shrub, as a single object, is to be taken 

 into consideration, as well as the beauty of the mass ; while in planting, thin- 

 ning, and pruning for picturesque effect, the beauty of individual trees or 

 shrubs is of little consequence, because no tree or shrub in a picturesque 

 plantation or scene should stand isolated — each should be considered as 

 merely forming part of a group or mass. 



" ' When planted, the trees and shrubs should be scattered over the ground 

 in the most irregular manner, both in their disposition with reference to 

 their immediate effect as plants, and with reference to their future effect as 

 trees and shrubs. In some places trees should prevail, in others shrubs; 

 in some parts the plantation should be thick, in others thin ; two or three 

 trees, or a tree and shrub, ought often to be planted together, and this more 

 especially on lawns over which trees and shrubs are to be scattered in the 

 picturesque manner. 



" ' Where, on the contrary, they are to be scattered in the gardenesque 

 manner, every tree and shrub should stand singly ; as in the geometrical manner 

 they should stand in regular lines, or in some geometrical figure. In the 

 gardenesque there may be single trees and single shrubs ; but there can be no 

 such thing as a single tree in the picturesque. Every tree in the picturesque 

 style of laying out grounds must be grouped with something else, if it should 

 be merely a shrub, a twining plant, a tuft of grass, or other plants at its root. 

 In the gardenesque, the beauty of the isolated tree consists in the manner in 

 which it is grown ; in the picturesque, the beauty of a tree or shrub, as of every 



