II.] 



ENCLOSING, LAYING OUT. 



31 



by the air, and to be more fit for the uses of the garden. There 

 will be plenty of room for this pump and cistern in the hot-bed 

 ground, at the south-east corner ; and, from this spot, it could 

 be carried or wheeled to all parts of the garden. No great pains 

 need be taken with regard to the making of the cistern, so that 

 it were well cemented ; the brick-work should be nine inches 

 thick, and the form should be circular, otherwise the sides might 

 fall in. 



46. In conclusion of "these instructions as to the laying-out of 

 the garden, I ought to observe that the narrow border at which 

 is four feet wide between the wall and the path, is necessary because 

 the path is to be at four feet distance from the wall, in order that 

 the door-way in the wall on the south side may not be close to the 

 corner, which would lessen the strength of the wall. In the work 

 of laying-out, great care ought to be taken with regard to straight- 

 ness and distances, and particularly as to the squareness of every 

 part. To make lines perpendicular, and perfectly so, is, indeed, no 

 difficult matter, when one knows how to do it ; but one must know 

 how to do it before one can do it at all. If the gardener understand 

 this much of geometry, he will do it without any difficulty ; but, if 

 he only pretend to understand the matter, and begin to walk back- 

 ward and forward, stretching out lines and cocking his eye, make no 

 bones with him ; send for a bricklayer, and see the stumps driven 

 into the ground yourself. The four outside lines being laid down 

 with perfect truth, it must be a bungling fellow, indeed, that cannot 

 do the rest ; but if they be only a little asliew, you have a botch in 

 your eye.for the rest of your life, and a botch of your o wn making 

 too. Gardeners seldom want for confidence in their own abilities ; 

 and, in many cases, it requires time and some experience of their 

 doings to ascertain whether they know their business or do not ; 

 especially when in pretensions they are so bold, and the result is at 

 a considerable distance, and clouded with so many intervening cir* 

 cumstances ; but this affair of raising perpendiculars upon a given 

 line, is a thing settled in a moment : you have nothing to do but to 

 say to the gardener, Come, let us see how you do it.'^ He has 

 but one way in which he can do it ; and, if he do not immediately 

 begin to work in that way, pack him off to get a bricklayer, even a 

 botch in which trade will perform the work to the truth of a hair. 



