NOTE II. Page 202.

It is undeniably true, that there was great formality in the endless dotted Clumps of Brown and his followers, which are long since exploded. Price alleged, with great severity, and some truth, that a recipé could be given, for making a place anywhere, by Brown's system; because you had only to take a Belt, with a walk in it, a few round Clumps, and a formal Piece of Water, and the object was effected. But as to the Circular and Oval Clumps, as fashion always runs into extremes, it has now given us something greatly worse in their stead.

It would have been nothing, after Brown (according to Price's witty remark) had changed Quadrata rotundis, if the professors of the present school had again substituted Rotunda quadratis (See p. 42. anteh.), and restored the rectangular figures of a former day. But, instead of this, our present Landscape Gardeners have made a merit, and are regularly vain of disfiguring their most beautiful subjects, with clumps and plantations, and even approaches, in the most zig-zag and grotesque figures, which are ten times more hideous and un-picturesque, than the worst productions of their predecessors! As a late powerful writer says: "Their plantations, instead of presenting the regular or rectilinear plan, exhibit nothing but a number of broken lines, interrupted circles, and salient angles, which are as much at variance with Euclid, as with nature. * * In cases of enormity, they have been made to assume the form of pincushions, of hatchets, of penny tarts, and of breeches displayed at old-clothesmen's doors." See Quarterly Rev. Vol. XXXVI. No. 72. In all these, they tell you, they are imitating nature! They seem truly to be of opinion, that to change, must be the same thing as to improve; and that, in order to display the taste of Price and Knight, they have only to reprobate that of Brown and Repton.

There is no man whose taste has been formed on any correct model, that does not feel and acknowledge the beauty of those elegant forms, the Oval, the Circle, and the Cone, and

who does not experience the pleasure of contemplating smooth and soft surfaces, everywhere marked by swelling undulations, and gentle transitions. Such are the outlines, constantly prevalent in all the most beautiful objects in nature. We derive them originally from that most perfect of all forms, the Female Figure; and there are few well-educated persons, who will for a moment compare to them a multitude of obtuse and acute angles, great and small, following each other, in fantastical and unmeaning succession.

If masses must be planted in parks, in order to get up Wood, for future single Trees, and detached groups (which, without the interposition of the Transplanting Machine, they must be), it is plain, that they will continue in existence for five-andtwenty or five-and-thirty years, before they can be cut out with proper effect. What shape, I would ask, can be adopted with such distant objects in view, more generally pleasing than that of the Circle, or the Oval, or some modification of it? observing always, in laying out such plantations, to make the masses large enough, which will preclude the stale objection of a want of variety, and a too frequent recurrence of the same figures. "The man of taste (as the eminent author above mentioned observes) will be desirous, that the boundaries of his plantations should follow the lines designed by nature, which are always easy and undulating, or bold, prominent, and elevated, but never stiff and formal."

It is to be hoped, that there is discernment enough in our present race of artists, to see the propriety of adopting or restoring those fine figures, the Oval and the Circle, as certainly the best for temporary, and large detached masses of wood. And now, that all controversy between hostile systems is at an end, I trust, that the ENGLISH GARDEN, distinguished by simplicity and freedom, will henceforth be under no law but that of Nature, improved and embellished by such Art only, as owns her supremacy, and knows to borrow, without being herself seen, every pleasing form, which owes its origin to that unfailing source of Variety and Beauty.

NOTE III. Page 203.

I feel particular satisfaction in paying this just tribute to the memory of a very superior and ingenious artist. His professional character has been slightly, but justly sketched in the passage, to which this Note refers; and all, who remember him, will unite with me in doing justice to his private worth, his pleasing manners, and his extensive information on all subjects connected with rural affairs. Mr White was an excellent agriculturist, an ingenious mechanic, and a planter of great skill. Like his master Brown, he was in the habit of undertaking the execution of his own designs, and also of plantations of considerable extent, in both England and Scotland, until his business as a Landscape Gardener, in the latter country, became too extensive to admit of such undertakings. In this way he had planted, before the year 1780, for Lord Douglas, at Douglas Castle, about fifteen hundred acres of ground, which are now covered with fine wood, and of which the thinnings have long been a source of considerable revenue to the noble owner.

About the year 1770, Mr White made the purchase of an estate in the higher parts of the county of Durham, on which he planted so extensively and successfully, that it may be worth while, for the encouragement of the young planter, to give some idea of the returns which it made to him. But these are so wonderful and portentous, that, to the ordinary reader, they may rather seem referable to the feats of some Arboricultural Münckhausen, than to the sober results of judgment and industry.

The territory of Woodlands (for so it was named by the new owner) extended to between seven and eight hundred acres, and cost Mr White about L.750. It was situated in a high, and, at that time, a barren tract of country, about eighteen miles from the city of Durham, and wholly destitute of wood. But, as it was surrounded with Coal-mines, he had the sagacity to forethat there was scarcely any return, that might not be expected from Fir and Larch, and other quick growers judiciously planted, and on a suitable soil. The first thing he did, there

see,

fore, was to enclose, with a strong ring-fence, the whole estate, in which, of course, he had the benefit of aid from his neighbours; and, having previously drained such parts of it as were swampy, he immediately proceeded to plant the whole, excepting only an arable farm of a hundred and forty acres. This took place about 1777. The soil was a brown mould, the subsoil light and gravelly; and, although he covered it with Trees. of every common species, yet he resolved that the Larch, and the Scotch Fir, for which he had a peculiar predilection, should form the staple of his woods.

The singular spectacle of nearly an entire property dedicated to Trees, did not fail to attract the attention of his neighbours, who entertained no belief of the extraordinary success of Wood, in these high latitudes; but the repeated premiums and medals, conferred by the Society of Arts, soon attested the importance of his operations. After the plantations had grown for five-andtwenty years or more, Mr White began to think of establishing his residence on the spot. For that purpose, he built a commodious House and offices; he laid out an excellent KitchenGarden; and added Shrubberies, a Piece of Water, and a handsome little Park, all cut out of this extensive woodland. Enclosures, adapted to tillage, soon followed, which were added to the arable farm, already in his own occupation.

But the wonderful part of the story still remains to be told. It is well known to those, who chance to have subjected to the plough old woodland, how inconceivably even the poorest soils are meliorated, by the droppings of Trees, and particularly of the Larch, for any considerable length of time, and the rich coat of vegetable mould, which is thereby accumulated on the original surface. The first years' crops of Corn were accordingly immense; and those that followed were such, as to give an extraordinary impulse to the good culture, which gradually took place. After the park was laid down, and the farm improved, the Land-rent, fairly estimating its value to a tenant, amounted to no less than about L.250 a year.

In respect to the Plantations, after the first ten or twelve years, they began to pay admirably, in Pit-wood, Hedge-stakes,

and other country uses; and the Fir and Larch the best of all, from the Tanning principle so powerfully possessed by the latter, over and above the value of the Wood.-On inquiry, many years ago, I found, that the Larch-wood alone returned Mr White L.650 a year, a sum not greatly less than the price he had paid for the entire estate: And, five or six years since, it appeared, that his son, the present Mr White, had long drawn more than L.400 a year for his Larch-bark only, and L.1000 a year, as the revenue of his entire Woods!-This, it is to be observed, was derived merely from the thinnings of these thriving plantations; including, of course, the cutting out of the Place and Park, as already stated.

To those acquainted with the rapid progress made by the Larch, on a gravelly soil, on which any tolerable quantity of vegetable mould has been aggregated, it is a well-known fact, that it doubles its value every three years, after fifteen years old, and every five years, after five-and-twenty; so that it was obvious, that, in that ratio, it must soon reach the greatest size and value, that the soil and climate would admit. This period has now nearly arrived; and a valuation having been made of the whole of the Fir and Larch Wood on the estate, it amounted last year (1826) to the surprising sum of L.40,000, putting no value on any other species of wood!!! Whatever is at its best, it is pretty clear, can admit of no further improvement; so that the judicious owner, as I am informed, has it now in contemplation, to cut down the whole; and, after taking two crops of Corn (which must be of the most abundant sort), to plant the estate anew, in order to create a second fortune for his family!

I regret that I am not so much acquainted with the details, as to give a comparative view of the Expenditure, and the Returns from the beginning; as it might prove interesting to those who are embarking, or who may hereafter embark, in similar designs. But there is good ground to believe, that Arboricultural skill and perseverance were never more amply or speedily rewarded, even during the life-time of the planter, than by this judicious and most successful speculation.