deep walled ha! ha! invented by Brown, was seldom used by him but to give a view through some glade, or to afford security to a terrace-walk; from whence we might see two bulls fighting, without the possibility of danger: this cannot

be said of that wire-bird-cage expedient, which has, of late years, been introduced to save the expense of a more lasting barrier; and though it may be sufficient to resist sheep, or even cows, for a few years, in the villas near London, yet the mind is not satisfied when a vicious stag approaches it with undaunted eye, and a mien not to be terrified [see figs. 217 and 218]. Add to this, the misery of viewing a landscape through

a prison-bar, or misty gauze veil ranging above the eye. Besides, iron is a material of which we have had but little experience, except that it too soon decays. For this reason, a line is shewn on the map [u, s, in fig. 214], which may hereafter be adopted; and I must consider the present wire-fence only as a temporary expedient.

I might also add another argument against invisible fences in general (except in short glades), viz. that when they divide a park from a garden, they separate two things which the mind knows cannot be united.

In modern gardening it has been deemed a principle to exclude all view of fences; but there are a certain class of flowering plants which require support, and these should be amply provided for in all ornamental gardens. The open trellis-fence, and the hoops on poles, over which creeping and climbing plants are gracefully spread, give a richness to garden scenery that no painting can adequately represent.

The novelty of this attempt to collect a number of gardens, differing from each other, may, perhaps, excite the critic's censure; but I will hope there is no more absurdity in collecting gardens of different styles, dates, characters, and dimensions, in the same inclosure, than in placing the works of a Raphael and a Teniers in the same cabinet, or books sacred and profane in the same library. Perhaps, after all, the pleasure derived from a garden has some relative association with its evanescent nature and produce: we view with more delight a wreath of short-lived roses, than a crown of amaranth, or everlasting flowers. However this may be, it is certain, that the good and wise of all ages have enjoyed their purest and most innocent pleasures in a garden, from the beginning of time, when the father of mankind was created in a garden, till the fulness of time, when HE, who often delighted in a garden, was at last buried in one.

FRAGMENT XXVIII.

CONTAINING EXTRACTS FROM THE REPORT ON WOBURN ABBEY.

THE improvements I have had the honour to suggest, have nowhere been so fully realized as at Woburn Abbey; I am, therefore, peculiarly obliged to his Grace the Duke of Bedford for permission to avail myself of my original manuscript, by extracting more largely than in any other instance, although such extract can only be considered as a fragment, since the

original report consists of ninety pages, elucidated by fortyseven drawings, maps, and diagrams.

TO HIS GRACE THE DUKE OF BEDFORD.

MY LORD DUKE,

I have the honour to lay before your Grace the following remarks, concerning the further improvement of the grounds about Woburn Abbey. If, in composing this volume, I have had some difficulties, they have arisen less from the nature of the subject, than from my delicacy, as a professional man, making me unwilling to mention, with disapprobation, the works of another. I have, however,

endeavoured to do my duty, in conformity to your Grace's instructions, so strongly and so clearly expressed, that I shall repeat the directions by which I have been guided in my consideration of the subject, and which, I hope, will justify my freedom in discussing it.

"Much has been done here, but much remains to be "done, and something, I think, to undo. I am not partial to "destroying works recently executed; but sometimes cases "will occur where an alternative is scarcely left. My wish is, "that you should look over everything about the grounds here "attentively, and then freely give me your opinion, as to "what alterations or improvements suggest themselves to your "judgment, leaving the execution of them to my own discre❝tion or leisure."

Such instruction will best plead my excuse for the freedom with which I deliver my sentiments; and if, in many instances, I must condemn what Mr. Holland has done at Woburn, as a landscape gardener, yet, as an architect, the magnificent library, in which this volume aspires to hold a place, will be a lasting monument of his genius and good

taste.

The original situation of Woburn Abbey was judiciously chosen in those times when water, the most essential necessary of life, was suffered to take its natural course along the valleys; and before the ingenuity of man had invented hydraulic

engines to raise it from the valleys to the hills. The great object of the monks was, to take advantage of two small springs, or rivulets, of which the traces are still left in the pools, and shapes of ground, one near the green-house, the other near the dairy. These two streams united a little above the site of the old abbey, contributing greatly to its comfort, by reservoirs and fish-ponds, so requisite to the supply of a numerous ecclesiastical establishment, whose chief food was the fish of fresh water.

It is now too late to inquire why this site was preserved in the present house; or why the residence of a noble family retains the name of Abbey, when every vestige of the original pile has been destroyed. If any mistake is committed, it becomes the duty of the improver to suggest expedients that may retrieve errors, or remedy defects. And since it is impossible to raise the house in reality, or to alter its real situation, we must endeavour to do so in appearance; at least, we should cautiously avoid everything which tends to lessen the magnitude, to depress the importance, or to diminish the character which so obviously belongs to Woburn Abbey, as now altered from a monastic to a ducal residence.

CHARACTER AND SITUATION.

So intimately connected is the character of a place with the situation of the house, that it is hardly possible to separate them in idea; yet it is obvious that, at Woburn, these two circumstances are at variance with each other.

The character of Woburn Abbey (whether we consider its command of surrounding property, its extent of domain, the hereditary honours of the family, the magnificence of the mansion, or the number of its appendages,) is that of greatness. To greatness we always annex ideas of elevation; and, I believe, in every European language, loftiness of situation, whether literally or figuratively expressed, forms the leading characteristic of greatness; to which we are always supposed to look up, and not to look down. Every epithet applied to it seems to confirm the general opinion, that what is low cannot be truly great; from the exalted sovereign to the kneeling slave, or from the lofty mountain to the humble valley.

But as greatness of character may be distinct from greatness of dimensions, so loftiness of character may exist without loftiness of situation. The works of art, however great or lofty in themselves, can never be truly so when surrounded by the works of nature, with which they are liable to be compared thus, the stupendous mass of ruins at Stonehenge is rendered diminutive in appearance by the vast extent of Salisbury Plain.

THE SHAPE OF GROUND.

The surface near the house has been so altered by the various works of art, at different periods, that it is difficult to ascertain precisely what were the natural levels; but it is not improbable that the abbey was originally placed across the valley, or near the conflux of the two small rivulets; leaving a space on one side, if not on both, for the water to take its course towards the west. As the buildings became enlarged, the valley was lessened, till at length they nearly filled in the whole of the hollow between the two hills [see fig. 219.]*

The natural surface is the shaded line. That natural surface is now altered to the lower dotted line [a]: the earth had been brought, and filled in, to the upper dotted line [b], making a plane, or, rather, an inclined plane, sloping towards the windows of the south front: [c is the floor of the principal rooms, and d the floor of the basement story.] If this was done under an idea of giving a natural shape to the ground, the principle was a mistaken one; for had such been the original shape, we must suppose a hole dug in the ground, in

• Very soon after I had buried the lower story of the house at Welbeck (as described in my volume of "Sketches and Hints, &c.") [see p. 50], Mr. Holland began to do the same thing at Woburn, but never proceeded further than the south front.