PREFACE. 



xi 



relates to the banks of artificial water, 

 how much the character of the picturesque 

 has been neglected, or sacrificed to a false 

 idea of beauty. 



But though I take no slight interest in 

 whatever concerns the taste of gardening in 

 this, and every other country, and am parti- 

 cularly anxious to preserve those picturesque 

 circumstances, which are so frequently and 

 irrecoverably destroyed, yet in writing this 

 Essay, I have had a more comprehensive 

 object in view: I have been desirous of 

 opening new sources of innocent, and 

 easily attained pleasures, or at least of 

 pointing out, how a much higher relish 

 may be acquired for those, which, though 

 known, are neglected ; and it has given 

 me no small pleasure to find that both my 

 objects have in some degree been attained. 



That painters do see effects in nature, 

 which men in general do not see, we have, 



