Formal Gardening 
alterations of later years. The transition 
from formality to informality has every- 
where been so skilfully managed that there 
is no want of harmony in the scenes through 
which we pass. The free park-like charm 
of some of them merely seems refreshing in 
contrast with the architectonic dignity of 
those we have just left ; or, if we come first 
upon the naturalistic parts, they merely ac- 
cent the impressiveness of those which en- 
circle or lead up to the palace. 
For an example of an opposite sort we 
may look once more at our Central Park. 
Here is a distinctly naturalistic scheme. 
No large pleasure-ground, encircled by city 
streets, could be less formal in general idea, 
more rural in general effect. Yet its chief 
feature is the Mall — a wide straight walk, 
symmetrically planted with rows of elm- 
trees, and ending upon an architectural ter- 
race with flights of stairs descending to the 
plaza at the edge of the lake. Nothing in 
the park is more beautiful than the harmoni- 
ous contrast we note when, standing on this 
terrace, we look in one direction down the 
formal Mall, and in the other across the 
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