ARTIFICIAL ADAPTATIONS, ETC. 
113 
gardening is included in, and subject to the rules of landscape- 
gardening : an unfortunate error. The word landscape conveys an 
idea of breadth and extent of view, so that landscape-gardening 
means gardening on a great scale, in imitation of natural scenery. 
All the effects that can be produced artificially with small trees, by 
topiary arts, may seem puerile as parts of a landscape ; but in the 
dimensions of a small lot, where each feature of the place needs 
to be made as full of interest as possible, no such idea is con- 
veyed. On the contrary, whatever little arts will render single 
sylvan objects more curious and attractive, or more useful for 
special purposes, may with propriety be availed of. It is as absurd 
to apply all the rules of grand landscape-gardening to small 
places, as to imitate in ordinary suburban dwellings the models of 
palaces. The only limit to the use of topiary work of the char- 
acter we are about to treat of is, that whatever is done shall be 
subsidiary to a general and harmonious plan of embellishment, 
and that the forms employed shall have some useful significance. To 
shape trees into the forms of animals, or to resemble urns or vases, 
or into ungraceful forms suggestive of no use or beauty, are farci- 
cal freaks of gardening art to be played very rarely and unobtrusive- 
ly. As one of Walter Scott’s famed Scotch Judges, when caught 
in the act of playing king in a court of buffoons, is made to say 
that it takes a wise man to know when and where to play the fool, 
so in such freaks of art as those just named, great prudence is 
necessary. The safest course is not to worry or coax nature 
into such caricatures. But hedges, arches, arbors, and bowers 
of verdure are all useful, and the tribute that nature renders to art 
in such forms is as proper and sensible as the modes by which her 
grains and vegetables are improved on farms and in gardens. 
Hedges and Screens. — These are usually made of shrubs or 
trees which naturally take a dense low growth, and, if for barriers 
against animals, of those which are thorny. The wild thorns, and 
other trees clipped by browsing cattle and sheep until they seem 
condensed into solid masses of leaves and thorns, doubtless sug- 
gested the use of hedges, which has become more general in Eng- 
land than in any other country ; and there the climate and the 
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