THE LANDSCAPE BEAUTIFUL 



Would it not seem comfortable to com- 

 promise so great a controversy? There is 

 a place where such a compromise can 

 honorably be made. It is in the field of 

 landscape gardening. Here art and nature 

 combine so perfectly that none may say, lo 

 this is art, or see here nature. "The art 

 itself is nature." 



Indeed, the art of landscape gardening 

 is so near to nature that some have denied 

 it the right to be called an art at all. A 

 certain modern university text-book of 

 sound qualities and high reputation pre- 

 tends to classify all the fine arts and to 

 estimate the scope and power of each. The 

 successive chapters discuss painting, sculp- 

 ture, poetry, etc., down to dancing, which 

 is ably defended for a place in the list; but 

 the art of landscape gardening is unplaced 

 and forgotten. This is certainly surprising, 

 but it illustrates the vulgar neglect of this 

 subject. Landscape gardening is the most 

 recent of the arts, and the least under- 

 stood. It is hardly known as a definite 

 separate thing, even among its practi- 

 tioners; so that a deep and widespread 

 ignorance of its aims and methods may 

 be excused in the laity. 



86 



