62 
LANDSCAPE GARDENING. 
leading directly up to the house. Such a view can never 
appear a satisfactory whole, because we experience a con- 
fusion of sensations in contemplating it. There is an 
evident incongruity in bringing two modes of arranging 
plantations, so totally different, under the eye at one moment, 
which distracts, rather than pleases the mind. In this exam- 
ple, the avenue, taken by itself, may be a beautiful object, and 
the groups and connected masses may, in themselves, be ele- 
gant, yet if the two portions are seen together, they will not 
form a whole, because they cannot make a composite idea. 
For the same reason, there is something unpleasing in the 
introduction of fruit trees among elegant ornamental trees 
on a lawn, or even in assembling together, in the same beds, 
flowering plants, and culinary vegetables — one class of 
vegetation suggesting the useful, and homely, alone to the 
mind, and the other, avowedly, only the ornamental. 
In the arrangement of a large extent of surface, where a 
great many objects are necessarily presented to the eye at 
once, the principle of unity will suggest that there should be 
some grand or leading features to which the others should be 
merely subordinate. Thus, in grouping trees, there should 
be some large and striking masses to which the others appear 
to belong, however distant, instead of scattered groups, all 
of the same size. Even in arranging walks, a whole will 
more readily be recognized, if there are one or two, of large 
size, with which the others appear connected as branches, 
than if all are equal in breadth, and present the same 
appearance to the eye in passing. 
In all works of art which command universal admiration, 
we discover an unity of conception and composition, an unity 
of taste and execution. To assemble in a single composition, 
forms which are discordant, and portions dissimilar in plan, 
