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ON THE PROGRESS AND PRINCIPLES OF ORNAMENTAL 

 GARDENING. 



(Continued from page 108.) 



The approach should be so managed as not to allow the spectator to view a 

 very large portion of the grounds at once ; and this should be done by conducting 

 the drive through plantations, so arranged as to make it appear necessary for the 

 road to pass through them ; for nothing has a more formal and artificial effect 

 than planting an obvious screen on either side of the road just where required, or, 

 what is still worse, planting a regular belt along the road for the greater part of 

 the distance. The water should be advantageously seen once or twice from the 

 approach, and the road should eventually lead to the lateral extremity of one of 

 the wings of the mansion where the principal entrance should be constructed in 

 such a way as to allow a carriage to drive beneath and set down under cover. 

 The main advantage, however, of having the entrance here, would be the leaving 

 the ground in front and at the back perfectly private. I would have the house 

 so placed that the ground should slope down gradually from the front to a 

 considerable distance. This would enable me to construct a wide terrace or 

 esplanade in front of the house, which never fails to produce a magnificence of 

 effect unattainable by other means. A space to an extent of at least forty feet 

 from the house should be gravel, accurately levelled, which might be ornamented 

 with pedestals supporting groups of statuary ; but in our climate I would confine 

 myself to two or three marble basins symmetrically placed, from the centre of 

 which should rise handsome marble tazze of at least six feet diameter, each of 

 which should throw up a jet of water, which falling back into the tazza and 

 spreading itself over the moulded border in thin sheets as it fell to the basin 

 below, would -produce one of the best effects that can be obtained from fountains. 

 Beyond the gravel I would have a stripe of turf from twenty-five to thirty feet 

 deep, and then a flagged terrace-walk about twelve feet broad, guarded by a 

 balustrade of a design in accordance with the architecture of the main building. 



From this terrace the most beautiful views of the grounds should be obtained 

 at different points, but not seen all at once ; it should terminate at each end with 

 a bold flight of marble or stone stairs leading to a lower portion of the grounds, 

 where the turf to a distance of five or six hundred feet from the base of the 

 terrace should be kept continually mown, and this space should terminate with a 

 wide gravel- walk running parallel with the flagged terrace -walk, and be like it 

 guarded by an open balustrade, but of a bolder and more rustic character. 

 Massive groups of ornamental shrubs should be arranged at the foot of the steps 

 from the upper terrace, whose tufted heads rising above the balustrade, occa- 

 sionally diversified by a forked cypress or towering poplar, would produce a good 



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