Page [xiii]

INTRODUCTION.
To improve the scenery of a country, and to display its native beauties with
advantage, is an ART
which originated in England, and has therefore been called English Gardening;
yet as this expression
is not sufficiently appropriate, especially since Gardening, in its more
confined sense of Horticulture,
has been likewise brought to the greatest perfection in this country,* I
have adopted the term
Landscape Gardening as most proper, because the art can only be advanced
and perfected by the
united powers of the landscape painter and the practical gardener. The former
must conceive a plan,
which the latter may be able to execute; for though a painter may represent
a beautiful landscape
on his canvas, and even surpass nature by the combination of her choicest
materials, yet the luxu-
riant imagination of the painter must be subjected to the gardener's practical
knowledge in planting,
digging, and moving earth; that the simplest and readiest means of accomplishing
each design may
be suggested; since it is not by vast labour, or great expence, that Nature
is generally to be improved;
on the contrary,
Ce noble emploi demande un artiste qui pense,
Prodigue de genie, mais non pas de depense."
* This appears from the many valuable works on that subject; particularly
the well known labours of the ingenious Mr. Speechly,
gardener to the Duke of Portland; and from many other useful books produced
by English kitchen gardeners.