FRENCH GARDENING AND ITS MASTER 



By JOHN GALEN HOWARD 



FELLOW OR THE AMERICAN 1 NS'IT lUI E OF ARCHJTECIS 



SUCH a subject as that upon which I have been asked 

 to say a tew words is of far too vast a scope to be 

 adequatel)' treated within the Umits of a short paper. 

 I have therefore thought it wise to single out one great epoch 

 and to con 

 fine 



my re- 

 marks and 

 my illustra- 

 tions mainly 

 tothatperiod. 

 This can the 

 more justly 

 and the more 

 readily be 

 done in 

 speaking of 

 French gar- 

 dens, inas- 

 much as all 

 the early his- 

 tor}' of hor- 

 ticulture i n 

 France leads 

 up to the per- 

 iod I propose 

 especially to 



A LEAD VASE 

 Basin of Neptune, Versailles 



i 1 lustrate ; 

 and ever 

 since that 

 time, all work 

 of French- 

 men in land- 

 scape design 

 has been 

 done with 

 that age of 

 achievement 

 \'ery vividly 

 in the eye of 

 the artist, 

 whether he 

 worked from 

 it as an ac- 

 cepted proto- 

 type, or flung 

 himself into 

 eager oppo- 

 sition to the 



principles which governed it and made its greatness. 



The entire history of French gardening is dominated in a 

 degree very exceptional in any art or people bv a single per- 

 sonality — that, namely, of Le Notre. I do not mean to say, 



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