-gather up, and weave into a coherent system, the scattered elements of thought and taste; and place ornamental gardening in the rank to which it is justly entitled. By an admirable arrangement of Providence, what the world needs, and is prepared for, nature soon provides. In the year 1685, a few years after Addison, and a little before Pope, was born William Kent. He was originally a coach-painter, but early in life he exhibited a capacity for higher things. His genius and talent secured him the notice and patronage of some distinguished amateurs of the fine arts, and among others those of the earl of Burlington. By their liberality. he went to Rome, to improve himself in the arts of coloring and design. He found, however, that he was not destined to excel as a painter-his vocation was of another kind. Availing himself of the principles of taste which he had acquired, he turned the resources of his mind to the creation of beauty in a new and almost untried sphere. With a keen eye for the picturesque, a just appreciation of the beautiful both in art and nature, a bold and ready genius, quick to perceive and daring to execute, he directed his attention to the subject of rural embellishment, and thus laid the foundation of a new science. He was employed by many of the nobility and gentry to improve their domains. Among other places, the gardens of Stowe; the palace of the dukes of Buckingham; Holkham Hall, the splendid seat of the late Mr. Coke, raised to nobility by reviving the title of earl of Leicester; and Burlington House, the seat of his principal patron,-contain memorials of his taste and genius.

Kent, having led the way, has been succeeded by many adventurers in the same path, several of whom have ventured into new styles, so that gardening has almost as many schools as painting, and those schools not less distinctly marked. To say nothing of the Dutch, the Italian, and the French schools, which are all modifications of the geometric style, we have several varieties of the new or natural style.

Kent was followed by Brown, known by the sobriquet of Capability Brown, from his frequent use of that term in reference to the adaptation of ground for the purposes of gardening. He was the author of the clump system, with the belts of shrubbery. It is of him that the poet of Olney speaks when he says,

"Lo, he comes!

The omnipotent magician, Brown, appears!
Down falls the venerable pile, the abode
Of our forefathers-a grave, whiskered race,
But tasteless. Springs a palace in its stead,

But in a distant spot; where, more exposed,
It may enjoy the advantage of the north,
And aguish east, till time shall have transformed
Those naked acres to a sheltering grove.

He speaks. The lake in front becomes a lawn,
Woods vanish, hills subside, and valleys rise;
And streams, as if created for his use,
Pursue the track of his directing wand,
Sinuous or straight, now rapid and now slow,
Now murmuring soft, now roaring in cascades,
E'en as he bids."

Some additional principles were brought out by Whately, who in 1770 wrote a work called Observations on Modern Gardening. In 1794 were published Price's Essays on the Picturesque; and the next year, 1795, was published Repton's Observations on the Theory and Practice of Gardening. Several other works have appeared since that time on this subject, such as Horace Walpole's History of Gardening, Mason's Poem, the voluminous and excellent works of the Loudons, cum multis aliis; so that this alone forms within itself no contemptible department of literature. The influence of these writers has effected in England a complete revolution in gardening. True, in some of the older places, the geometric style is, for antiquity's sake, or from prejudice, or perhaps a little out of perverseness, still retained; yet the new style has become triumphant. Clipped hedges and topiary work find but little quarter. Instead of trimming up their trees into artificial forms, they allow them to assume the rich variety of shape that nature gives, each retaining its own peculiar and cha racteristic expression; while they take care to adapt the various classes of trees-round headed, spiry topped, or drooping-to the situation; and study, by a judicious mixture, to produce the most agreeable effect. Instead of planting them, as formerly, in straight rows, or exact figures-which Pope satirizes in the often-quoted couplet,

"Grove nods to grove, each alley has its brother,
And half the platform just reflects the other"—

they copy the more agreeable variety of nature, leaving now a single tree alone in its unique beauty; and now forming graceful, but not unnatural looking, groups and clusters, taking care to make them harmonize with the surrounding scenery, and so disposing them as to shut out every disagreeable or unsightly object, and leave in view whatever serves to add beauty, richness, and interest to the prospect. Straight, stiff walks, and formal beds, have been

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abandoned to make way for the graceful, waving, flowing lines of the modern school. Fountains are no longer constructed in imitation of animals-dolphins, dragons, or hippogriffs-pouring from their mouths everlasting streams of water; nor like "a sturdy washerwoman, washing and winding of linen clothes, in which act she wrings out the water which made the fountain," so hugely commended, according to William Howett, by Sir Henry Wotton, as a graceful and natural conceit in Michael Angelo." Water is now managed more in accordance with nature. It is made to tumble over what appear to be natural cascades, or bubble out of a pile of rock work, or gush forth from some well-contrived and partly-concealed fissure. Streams of water are made to wind their way through the grounds, now gurgling unseen through wellarranged foliage, and now appearing full in view, flashing brightly in the sunbeams. We have no more stereotyped models, drawn by the rule and compass, made to look well on paper; but the artist of genius adjusts his plan to the nature and capabilities of the ground before him, taking care to preserve the whole in harmony and keeping with the circumjacent scenery.

But we cannot multiply our illustrations. We designed nothing more than to give a rapid sketch of the progress of the art, and indicate its present condition. To go into details, and describe all the resources and capabilities of the art, with the various styles and their respective adaptations, would require a volume. Happily the reader will find this admirably done by Mr. Downing, to whom we must refer him for further information.

We cannot close this article without commending this interesting branch of the fine arts to the attention of such of our readers as are in a situation to cultivate it. We think it has peculiar claims upon them, especially in comparison with other modes of gratifying the æsthetic impulse. Where this impulse is strong, and the person has the means at his disposal, it will be gratified in some form. Now the lowest mode of this gratification is in fine dress, gaudy furniture, and showy equipage; a mode of taste so inferior as scarcely to deserve the name, since the monarchs and umpires in this department are persons generally having the smallest pretensions to education and intelligence. Hence the love of finery usually abates in proportion as the higher elements of taste are developed. Next in order, and vastly above it in dignity, is a love of the beautiful in architecture. To reside in a large and expensive house is the grand object of many rich men. But it may be easily shown that there can be no correct taste in domestic architecture without an acquaintance with the principles of landscape VOL. VI.-25

gardening. It is the deficiency here that is filling our country with such multitudes of ill-designed, incongruous, and unsightly masses of masonry and wood-work, under the semblance of the fine mansion, the cottage orné, or the miniature palace; selected according to the prevailing fashion, and stuck down at hazard, without the least regard to the situation, the nature of the ground, or the surrounding objects. To look well, a house must be in keeping with the scenery about it. But this is a principle seldom thought of by those who copy designs out of books, or draft models for buildings without inspecting the ground.

In another class of society, marked not only by wealth, but by education and refinement, considerable attention begins to be paid to painting and statuary. To this, under proper restrictions, we have no objection; and yet we beg leave to suggest that these are not the objects of taste the best adapted to the character and condition of our country. They are very expensive. A single collection of the best paintings is itself a fortune. Very few people among us can afford to indulge their taste in this form, and still fewer can in justice to their families invest so large a portion of their property in a manner so unproductive. It answers better in a country having an hereditary aristocracy, and entailed estates. Besides, painting and statuary, like architecture, are the branches of the fine arts adapted to a state of only municipal civilization. Hence they flourished amid the wars, distractions, and despotisms of the ancients, and amid the darkness and barbarities of the feudal ages; and they still flourish in several of the present continental nations of Europe, amid the oppressions, the ill-divided wealth, the squalid poverty, and utter degradation of one class, and the heartless, selfish arrogance, and indolent indulgence of another. Gardening has great advantage in all these respects. The rich man, it is true, may lay out his extensive grounds at what cost he will; but in no other way can an inconsiderable sum be expended to secure an equal amount of tasteful and elegant gratification. You may satisfy moderate desires simply by saving a portion of what other persons in like circumstances would expend on the dwelling and its superfluous decorations. And even the poor man, though he may not create around him an artificial landscape, yet may he plant his flowers before his window, and train the honeysuckle and eglantine over his door, and see the rose-bush and wax-berry flourish in his court-yard. And why should he not? Why should he consider his home only as a place to eat, drink, and sleep in? May he not render his humble dwelling redolent with nature's perfume, and make it attractive to the eye, by simple, economic beauty? Can

he not pay a little to nurture a sentiment, to awaken humanizing sensibilities, and add the charms of external beauty to the comfort, affection, and tranquillity that reign within? Surely no country possesses facilities for this purpose equally with our own. In

no other country is land so abundant and cheap, property so equally divided, or labor so well remunerated. If ever there was a country capable of making an approximation to the visions of Arcadian beauty and innocence, it is our own highly favored, peaceful, prosperous, and happy land.

We must then be allowed to express the wish that this beautiful art will find special favor among us. It is a pursuit at once innocent and healthful, improving to mind and manners, a producer of neatness, order, and simple elegance. It is so well adapted to the character of our nation and our political institutions, it tends so much to make the country attractive, and abate the unhealthy, injurious love for pent-up city life, the rage of monetary speculation, and the stimulating, pernicious pleasures that always spring from crowded population,-that we cannot but consider landscape gardening as destined to become THE AMERICAN BRANCH OF THE FINE ARTS. And when this comes to pass, we shall see our country everywhere bearing the marks of general comfort, well-diffused intelligence, and an all-pervading refinement and civilization; for of these gardening is the legitimate and inevitable offspring.

"O friendly to the best pursuits of man,

Friendly to thought, to virtue, and to peace,
Domestic life in rural pleasures pass'd!

Few know thy value, and few taste thy sweets;
Though many boast thy favors, and affect
To understand, and choose thee for their own.
But foolish man forgets his proper bliss,
E'en as his first progenitor, and quits,

Though placed in Paradise, (for earth has still
Some traces of her youthful beauty left,)
Substantial happiness for transient joy:
Scenes form'd for contemplation, and to nurse
The growing seeds of wisdom; that suggest,
By every pleasing image they present,
Reflections such as meliorate the heart,

Compose the passions, and exalt the mind."-The Task.