32 Xan&scape arcbitecture 



and meadow and water shotdd be considered of first 

 importance, and good examples of such work continu- 

 ally sought. Turner and Claude found it of the great- 

 est value for their painting to make thousands of 

 sketches of trees and other natural objects; how much 

 more should the student of landscape gardening find 

 advantage in studying the appearance and habits of 

 trees and shrubs and their best arrangement when 

 composed in a park picture, and this picture or design 

 should be when worked out idealized and transfused 

 with genuine feeling for nature after the same fashion 

 as the work of Claude. It is above aU necessary to 

 learn how nature treats her trees and shrubs, her hill- 

 sides and meadows, and her features of island and 

 water. If one gives oneself to the study of examples 

 of these effects in nature it will become fascinating, 

 and the freshness of conceptions of endless combinations 

 which continually meet the eye wiU lead one to be ever 

 seeking to solve new problems and learning to study 

 new lessons of a similar kind in landscape gardening. 



Excellent, however, and all-important as this con- 

 tinual reference to nature is in landscape-gardening 

 studies, it is quite as important to learn aU about the 

 habits of plants, the quaUty and treatment of soil, and, 

 above all, how to fit the new into the old. On nearly 

 every place there are some agreeable natural features 

 that deserve preservation and the best effect shotdd 

 not be injured by any new elements that may be 

 introduced. It is easy to see that this is the case, but it 

 is a difficult proposition to manage to introduce the new 



