the Lawn, Shrubbery, and Floioer-Garden. 55^ 



trived that the water should enter in one basin, then proceed to a second, 

 then to a third and a fourth, passing off by the fifth ; thus, by a constant 

 circulation, however gentle, the water will be kept clear and fresh. 



The walk a connects the garden with the house, or whatever other archi- 

 tectural feature may be judged proper, c is a broad border of turf, with a 

 narrow border of a few low shrubs. The rest requires no farther explanation 

 at present. 



Before proceeding farther with this article, we shall make some observations 

 applicable to the whole of the designs which we have hitherto given, to which 

 we beg the particular attention of the practical gardener and the amateur, if 

 the latter is not already master of the general principles of composition in 

 landscape-gardening. 



It will be observed that, in every design we have given, there are beds of 

 comparatively large size, some quite small, and others of intermediate dimen- 

 sions ; the smaller beds being for the most part of the same character of form 

 as the larger ones. Now the object of the smallest of these beds is, by 

 contrast, to support the magnitude of the larger ones ; and the object of the 

 intermediate beds is to preserve a harmonious gradation of form and magni- 

 tude throughout the whole design. The principle of contrast becomes thus 

 one of the fundamental principles of composition ; and this holds, not only in 

 architecture and landscape-gardening, but in all the fine arts, and even in 

 literary composition. An architect, in a magnificent elevation, contrives to 

 bring in one or two small openings to give effect to the largest ones ; he studies 

 this even in the members of his cornices, architraves, and pediments, and if he 

 has but little shade over the general face of his elevation, in consequence of 

 its being without projections or recesses, he crowns the whole with such a 

 far-projecting cornice, as throws down one grand belt of shade, sufficient, 

 by its width and its intensity, to form a contrast to the whole face of the 

 elevation. The Reform Club-house in Pall Mall by Mr. Barry, and some 

 designs in our Encyclopcedia of Cottage Architecture, by Mr. Lamb, are fine 

 examples of the sort of contrast to which we allude. In every painting there 

 is a prevailing mass of some particular colour in one part of the picture, but 

 in other parts there are subordinate masses and very small indications of the 

 same colour, put in by the artist in order to support and harmonise the prin- 

 cipal mass. The same may be said of the shades of a picture, and even of 

 the forms. See Burnett On Painting, and Howard On Colour as a Means of 

 Art. For example, you do not find in the picture of any good artist, who has 

 been allowed to follow his own taste, a landscape having Highland mountain 

 scenery in the distance and a smooth unbroken lawn in the foreground ; but 

 the lawn is broken up or varied by forms, perhaps those of the shade of the 

 castellated mansion, or of the foreground, broken up on purpose, so as to 

 produce such a piece of ground as nature requires, but still differing from 

 the vegetation of the locality, in being planted with exotic shrubs. The 

 same application of the principle of contrast is attended to in historical 

 pictures, as may be seen even in Hogarth's, where the main subject is the 

 wrangling of human beings, and the contrasting one some dogs or cats fight- 

 ing. Every piece of music has its accompaniment. In all dramatic pieces 

 there is not only a plot, but a by-plot ; and there is the same in novels and 

 romances. 



Footmen, even in giving the fashionable raps of the London street-door, 

 contrive to combine loud sonorous raps with smaller, and very small ones ; 

 the whole forming a sort of harmony that is not very easy to imitate. The 

 post gives two knocks ; but an ordinary professional teacher of music or 

 languages is only entitled to give one, yet this, in contrast with a very small 

 knock, he contrives to render effective in distinguishing his knock from that 

 of a common servant. 



" First one, and then a little one behind. 

 As if the knocker fell out of his fingers." 



