4-90 Notices of some Gardens and Country Seats 



trained on trellises placed against them ; but there is the dis- 

 advantage attending them, that, when the trees are washed with 

 a syringe or engine, the leaves or fruit are apt to get dirtied by 

 the soil loosened and brought down from the wall by the water. 

 These walls, as well as the houses of cob, are frequently white- 

 washed, and sometimes rough-cast ; which resists for a time the 

 action of the weather, but not sufficiently in garden walls to 

 justify their use where fine fruit is an object. The various 

 ways in which the round hills are crossed by the hedges which 

 divide the fields afford useful hints to the landscape-gardener, 

 in cases where such hills are in cultivation, and are, at the same 

 time, to be treated with a view to their effect in landscape. It is 

 least desirable to have the lines of the fences cutting the hills hori- 

 zontally ; and most so to have the lines in the same direction as 

 the slope, and tending more or less to the summit or highest part 

 of the hill. Much depends on the distribution of the trees in the 

 hedge-rows ; two or three hedges, with hedge-row trees, meeting 

 on or near the summit of a hill, add wonderfully to its effect; 

 while a single hedge, with trees, crossing the hill horizon- 

 tal^, half-way between its base and summit, or at a certain dis- 

 tance below the summit, will destroy the character of the hill 

 altogether. Where the soil on the summit of such hills can be 

 moved, a conical or pointed termination may frequently be 

 given at a moderate expense, by hollowing out a little soil from 

 the sides, and heaping it up on the summit. Of course, hills 

 so improved must be kept under grass, for the plough would 

 soon reduce them to a tame, monotonous, convex outline. 



From Tiverton to Exeter the road follows the course of the Exe, 

 which passes through a finely wooded valley ; and, were it not for 

 the high road-side fences, it would be exquisitely beautiful. It is 

 impossible, however, to enjoy this or any other scenery properly 

 from the public roads, on account of the height of the fences. 



The church at Tiverton contains some curious carving, par- 

 ticularly in a chapel erected long after the church ; on the 

 exterior of which was represented an extensive sea-scene with 

 ships, proving, as all such scenes do, that the artist did not 

 know the proper province of sculpture, which is to represent 

 single objects, or foreground groups, and never subjects re- 

 quiring the effect of distance. In the churchyard, we observed 

 an American, a Cornish, and a Dutch elm, with both the new 

 and old Lucombe oaks, and the Turkey oak. 



Sept. 6. — Cowley Bank ; Mrs. Wells. The grounds consist 

 of a portion of table land, and a steep and varied bank bordered 

 by the rivers Exe and Culm, which here form a junction. The 

 bank has been covered with wood, which in some places is 

 partially removed to make room for lawn, and in others thinned 

 to admit of evergreen under-growths; and there is a con- 



