XIV. 



A CHAPTER ON LAWNS. , 



' November, 1846. 



LANDSCAPE GARDENING embraces, in the circle of its per- 

 fections, many elements of beauty ; certainly not a less number 

 than the modem phemists count as the simplest conditions of mat- 

 ter. But with something of the feeling of the old phposophers, who 

 believed that earth, air, fire and water, included every thing in na- 

 ture, we lite to go, baci to plain and simple facts, of breadth and 

 importance enough to embrace a multitude of little details. The 

 great elements then, of landsca,pe gardening, as we understand it, 

 are trees and grass. . - 



Trees — delicate, beautifel, grand, or majestic trees-'— pliantly 

 answering to the wooing of the softest west wind, like the willow ; 

 or bravely and sturdily defying centuries of storm and tempest, like 

 the oak— they are indeed the great "princes, potentates, and peo- 

 ple," of our realm of beauty. But it is not to-day that we are per- 

 mitted to sing triumphal'songs in their praise. 



In behalf of the grass^the turf, tlie lawn, — then, we ask our 

 readers to listen to us for a short time. And. by this we do not 

 mean to speak of it in a moral sense, as did the inspired ' preacher 

 of old,- when he gravely told us that " all flesh is grass ;" or in a 

 style savoring of the vanities of costume, as did Prior, when he 

 wrote the couplet, 



" Those limbs in lawn and softest silk arrayed, 

 From sunbeams guarded, and of winds afraid." 



