488 ON USEFUL AND BOOK I. 



s 



groups ; for giving effect to an old decaying tree ; for render- 

 ing an ugly tree interesting, and such-like purposes. Where a 

 number of trees of the same kind, and very much alike, are in 

 a foreground, one or more of them may be varied by ivy, per- 

 haps with as good an effect as by pruning, and better than with 

 any species of deciduous climbers. 



2. For varying, but not entirely concealing, cottages, ruins, 

 and irregular buildings, whether new built or antiquated. 

 Many old houses, the external appearance of which it might be 

 too expensive or difficult to new model or decorate in masonry, 

 might be highly and richly decorated by simply planting ivy, 

 and training it to cover in different places. The expense of 

 building would frequently be much less, if the external appear- 

 ance were contrived to admit of ivy ; which would not only 

 vary the general mass, but might sometimes supply the place of 

 window labels, string courses, cornices, and even of projections, 

 towers, turrets, and buttresses. This last remark is exemplified 

 at Wallace's Tower, Ludlow Castle, Down ton Castle, S tor ton 

 Castle, and several old ruins in Wales and Scotland. See also 

 Plate VIII. 



3. To the third purpose I would beg the particular attention 

 of proprietors in the north. It is, to plant ivy against stone 

 walls, dykes, or sunk fences between fields ; which it will not 

 only render highly ornamental, bys chequering their sides with 



