PREFACE. 
IX 
readily loses the trace of the ideas of his forefathers, or 
takes no care about them.” 
The love of country is inseparably connected with the 
love of home. Whatever, therefore, leads man to assemble 
the comforts and elegancies of life around his habitation, 
tends to increase local attachments, and render domestic 
life more delightful ; thus not only augmenting his own 
enjoyment, but strengthening his patriotism, and making 
him a better citizen. And there is no employment or 
recreation which affords the mind greater or more 
permanent satisfaction, than that of cultivating the earth 
and adorning our own property. “ God Almighty first 
planted a garden ; and, indeed, it is the purest of human 
pleasures,” says Lord Bacon. And as the first man was 
shut out from the garden, in the cultivation of which no 
alloy was mixed with his happiness, the desire to return to 
it seems to be implanted by nature, more or less strongly, 
in every heart. 
In Landscape Gardening the country gentleman of 
leisure finds a resource of the most agreeable nature. 
While there is no more rational pleasure than that derived 
from its practice by him, who 
“ Plucks life’s roses in his quiet fields,” 
the enjoyment drawn from it (unlike many other amuse- 
ments) is unembittered by the after recollection of pain 
or injury inflicted on others, or the loss of moral rectitude. 
In rendering his home more beautiful, he not only con- 
tributes to the happiness of his own family, but improves 
the taste, and adds loveliness to the country at large. 
There is, perhaps, something exclusive in the taste for 
some of the fine arts. A collection of pictures, for 
example, is comparatively shut up from the world, in the 
private gallery. But the sylvan and floral collections, — 
the groves and gardens, which surround the country 
residence of the man of taste, — are confined by no 
barriers narrower than the blue heaven abo^e and 
around them. The taste and the treasures, gradually, but 
certainly, creep beyond the nominal boundaries of the 
