Theory and Practice 75 



a large animal appear small, so the distance will be 

 apparently extended by the smallness of the animal. 



The same reasoning induced me to prefer, at Stoke 

 Pogies, a bridge of more arches than one over a river 

 which is the work of art, whilst in natural rivers a single 

 arch is often preferable, because in the latter we wish to 

 increase the magnitude of the bridge, whilst in the former 

 we endeavour to give importance to the artificial river. 



Another instance of the necessity of attending to 

 comparative scale occurred near the metropolis, where 

 a gentleman wished to purchase a distant field for the 

 purpose of planting out a tile-kiln, but I convinced him 

 that during the life of man the nuisance could never be 

 hid from his windows by planting near the kiln, whilst 

 a few trees, judiciously placed within his own ground, 

 would effect the purpose the year after they were planted. 



The art of landscape gardening is in no instance 

 more intimately connected with that of painting than in 

 whatever relates to perspective, or the difference between 

 the real rand apparent magnitude of the objects, arising 

 from their relative situations; for without some atten- 

 tion to perspective, both the dimensions and the dis- 

 tances of objects will be changed and confounded. Few 

 instances having occurred to me where this can be more 

 forcibly elucidated than in the ground at the fort near 

 Bristol, I shall avail myself of the following observa- 

 tions to shew what can and what cannot be done by 

 a judicious application of the laws of perspective. 



When I first visited the fort, I found it surrounded 

 by vast chasms in the ground, and immense heaps of 

 earth and broken rock: these had been made to form 

 the cellars and foundations to certain additions to the 

 city of Bristol, which were afterwards relinquished. The 

 first idea that presented itself was to restore the ground 



