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PARK SCENERY.

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poplar in the same direction, where it will be backed by dark masses of Scotch pines or other similar trees. Before you make an opening, you must also ascertain whether any disagreeable objects will be exposed by your so doing; and, before cutting down even a single tree, you must consider what effect its removal will produce upon the trees around it. You have often told me of the exquisite taste your husband possesses, and his fondness for fine paintings: he must, therefore, be admirably qualified for improving the scenery round his house himself. Landscapegardening is, in fact, but landscape-painting on the largest scale, and with the noblest materials; the same taste is required in both.

As the plantations near the house have been suffered to become so completely overgrown, I have no doubt those in the park are in a similar state, and that the park itself will require considerable improvement. The same general observations with regard to thinning out plantations will apply in every case; but in the park I think you will find it advisable, whenever an opportunity occurs, to take advantage of any natural feature to introduce what landscape-gardeners call a scene; as, for instance, should your park contain a rocky glen, advantage may be taken of it by planting it with different kinds of pines and firs, to form an imitation of alpine scenery, as was done, in a

very striking manner, by the late Mr. Beckford at Fonthill. Another part of the grounds might be planted in imitation of American scenery, with magnolias, American oaks, and maples, and tulip trees, as was done by the late Duke of Marlborough at White Knights. A pond, in a secluded part of the grounds might have a degree of interest given to it by planting its banks with alders and willows. A variety of similar scenes will no doubt suggest themselves to you, which do not occur to me, from my ignorance of the peculiar features of the place.

I suppose neither deer nor cattle are allowed to graze in your park, as you speak of several of the trees sweeping the grass with their foliage. Cows are particularly destructive to the beauty of park scenery, as they are very fond of tearing off the lower branches of the trees, and thus producing the hard line which looks as though the branches had been shaved off about five feet from the ground, and which is called by landscape-gardeners and painters the browsing line.

It is disagreeable to have even deer come close to the windows, and they are not only fond of the young shoots of trees, but they would be decidedly injurious to your flower-garden and the clumps of ornamental shrubs in the pleasureground. Should your husband have any deer, it will be necessary to have some fence or line of

FENCES AGAINST ANIMALS.

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demarcation between the park and the pleasureground; and it is always considered a proof of skill in the landscape-gardener to conceal such a fence as skilfully as possible. When an iron fence is used it is generally extremely slight, and painted green, so as to be almost invisible; and when this fence is used, it is sometimes concealed by a plantation of trees thrown together indiscriminately, as in fig. 13., or planted artistically

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in groups. In other cases a sunk wall, forming a kind of ditch, is used, which is concealed by plantations; or iron hurdles are stuck in, and the line is varied occasionally. Any of these plans may be adopted in the front of your house, to protect your garden if necessary.

As I have already alluded to the improvement that will be effected by introducing a shrubbery to harmonise the intended flower-garden with the trees in the park, you will probably wish

to know if any thing of the kind will be required on the back-front of the house; but in that case there will be less difficulty, as the terrace affords an admirable medium for uniting the architectural stiffness of a mansion with the beautiful wildness and grace of nature. There is always a degree of incongruity in passing abruptly from the stiff symmetrical forms of a building, to the unsymmetric, though graceful, forms of a tree left in a state of nature; and it was no doubt a feeling of this kind which induced our ancestors to surround their houses with formal architectural gardens and trees clipped into stiff and regular forms. In more modern times something of the same kind was done, by always adding to the house verandas, porticos, and terraces, which formed a connecting link between the building and its grounds. After a time these also were laid aside; and about the beginning of the last century, when Brown and his followers would admit nothing but what they called nature in garden scenery, the park was allowed to come close up to the windows of the house, and, as a writer in the Gardener's Magazine observes, the inhabitants of the mansion might "leap from their windows into jungles, and steppes, and wildernesses, where the lion and the panther would be more at home than the lady in her silken sheen."

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You will see from these observations that there are styles marking different periods in gardening, as well as in architecture; and, in some cases, it is advisable to preserve a certain degree of similitude between the style of the garden and that of the house. Of course, however, this can only be done as far as is consistent with modern comforts; and the fact of your house being partly Elizabethan does not entail upon you the necessity of having a formal garden with high clipped hedges, and trees cut into a thousand fantastic forms, any more than it obliges you to sit in rooms darkened by stone mullions and smallpaned casements, because the courtiers of Queen Elizabeth were obliged to submit to such inconveniences. With regard then to the back-front of your mansion, I would leave the terrace in its present form, with its stone alcoves at each end, as it corresponds so well with the style of that part of the house which appears to have been added in the reign of Anne or George I.; and I would preserve and repair the stone balustrade with urns at regular intervals, and the stone steps leading from the terrace, which are all in the same style as the house; I would also have them lead into an architectural garden below. The form of this garden should be quite regular, or, if you prefer the term, quite formal; and it should be ornamented with fountains, urns, and statues.

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