ON CONGRUITY IN LANDSCAPE GARDENING. 
255 
unassisted Nature, it is also strictly an art, and for this reason an additional and 
closer adherence to congruity is required. 
Although, however, as we have thus endeavoured to establish, the law of con- 
gruity is so universal and so deeply-rooted in men's minds, there is perhaps no 
principle which, in landscape gardening, is more extensively violated. Objects which 
have the most opposite expression are sometimes brought into near connexion and 
even contact with each other. Fragments of scenes, having a peculiar character, are 
thrust into the midst of a tract, the prevailing characteristics of which are directly 
the reverse. A formal and rigid style is promiscuously intermingled with a flowing 
one; the ornate and the picturesque are jumbled together; architectural enrich- 
ments and rustic decorations stand side by side ; and, in short, there is scarcely a 
garden in Britain in which some species of this deformity may not be traced. 
In order that particular instances of this impropriety may not be lost sight of 
amid mere generalisations, or the sweeping assertion we have made be taken in too 
wide a sense, and therefore fail of its individual application, we must observe, that 
we do not consider any strict kind of congruity necessary, except as regards objects 
which may be taken in by the eye from one point. A domain may be broken up 
into an indefinite number of separate scenes, each having a very different character, 
and no interference with our rule be discernible, provided each of these scenes be 
rendered harmonious in itself, and be gradually blended with another different scene 
upon which it opens at any part. 
To explain still further what we mean, a mansion may be and ought to be so 
situated as to take in a very extensive range of prospect, in and beyond the estate of 
its owner. But the landscape gardener is not called upon, in conformity to the law 
of harmony, to exclude all but one class of scenery from the view. He is only bound 
to arrange the several parts so that each passes gradually into the other, and thus all 
harmonise. For example, the architectural character of the house is connected with 
the garden by terraces, vases, statues, or other similar ornaments. Beyond this again, 
the highly dressed pleasure-ground extends ; then the remoter and less ornate parts 
of the same ; then the park, woods, hills, and picturesque and varied Nature in the 
distance. 
If a place be sufficiently large, or the nature of its surface will allow, or the taste 
of the proprietor — willing to surmount natural difficulties — desire, the landscape 
gardener may, in addition to the general views from the house we have just described, 
break up an estate into several distinct parts, and give to each of these a character of its 
own. What we maintain in such case is, that these separate parts, with their peculiar 
distinguishing features, should be quite isolated, so as not to damage the general 
harmony. Or, if in any way or at any point they mingle with the rest of the garden, 
their peculiarities should be softened away at that point, and merge into the pre- 
vailing style. Thus, a rock and root garden and grotto, a conservatory with its 
accompanying flower-gardens at a distance from the house, a picturesque ravine and 
its dashing stream, a temple with its attendant flower-garden or dressed ground, and 
