36 HISTORY OF GARDENING Part I.
says, this artist gave the model of natural gardens on a piece of ground which belonged
to him in the Faubourg Saint Antoine, already alluded to, and thus fixed the principles of natural(that is, English) gardening in France about the commencement of the last
oO century. Laugicr is the first French author who espoused the English style of garden- ne in his Essai sur P-Architecture, published in 1753; and next in order Prevdt, in his
Homme du Gott, published in 1770. About the same time, the first notable example was preparing at Ermenonville, the seat of Viscount Girardin, about ten leagues from Paris. An account of this place was written by Girardin himself in 1775, anc|
published in 1777. It was soon after translated into English by D. Malthus, Esq. and is well known for its eloquent descriptions of romantic and picturesque scenes. j
Morel observes, in his Whéorie des Jardins, published in 1766, that very little had been 169 oe done previously to 1766: he mentions Ermenonville, as to which he had been con- i ouch J rks‘TA; ariel sulted, and the Due d Aumont’s park at Guiscard, and a seat near Chateau haf te Thiery, chiefly laid out by him.‘Soon after Morel’s work, Delille’s celebrated poem, fe se .? 2::: os ot (Les Jardins,) mace its appearance, and is perhaps a more unexceptionable pertormance oe ym mH 7 ¢= 7 As Trenc indgee ave written much better 1 ano than The English Garden oi Mason. The French, indeed, have written much better atte que” on.gardening and agriculture than they have practised,— a circumstance which may be gut te lie ;>:. t 10 P ¢ ale i rADpItAl ahar te Dh accounted for, from the general concentration of wealth and talent in the capital, where wales rete books are more frequent than examples; and of professional reputation in that country, oyrivey ne .. 7} i: palaus) depending more on what a man has written, than on what he has done. It daes not ap- Bolosn, for pear that English gardening was ever at all noticed by the court of France. pay, 1 167. Ermenonvilic(fig.11.), stillin the Girardin family, but now rather neglected, appears to have been ib rbot
laid out in a chaste and picturesque style, and in this respect to haye been somewhat different and superior
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to contemporary English places. The chateau(a) was placed on an island in the lake, near the village(). taller ar sip Among other objects in the grounds were Rousseau’s cottage(c); his tomb in the Island of Poplars(d); 7 that of the landscape-painter Mahier, who had assisted Girardin in designing the improvements in an adjoining island(e); a garden in ruins(f), and the grand cascade(g). Useless buildings were in a great
' degree avoided, and the picturesque effect of every object carefully considered, not in exclusion of, but in connection with their utility. Thereis hardly an exceptionable principle, or even direction referring to landseape-gardening laid down in the course of Girardin’s Essay; and in all that relates to the pictu- resque, it is remarkable how exactly it corresponds with the ideas of Price. Girardin, high in military rank, had previously visited every part of Europe, and paid particular attention to England, and before publishing his work, he had the advantage of consulting those of Wheatley, Shenstone, G. Mason, and Chambers, from the first of which he has occasion¢ borrowed. He professes, however, that his objece is neither to create English gardens, nor Chinese gardens, and less to divide his grounds into pleasure- grounds, parks, or ridings, than_to produce interesting landscapes,“ naysages intéressans,”&c. He re- ceived the professional aid of J. M. Morel, the Kent of France, who afterwards published Théorie des Jardins, and probably that of his guest Rousseau, who seems to have composed the advertisement to his book. Magellan, in the Gazette Littéraire de? Europe for 1778, in giving some account of the last days of Rousseau, who died at Ermenonville, and was buried in the Island of Poplars(d) there, informs us, that Girardin kept a band of musicians, who constantly perambulated the grounds making concerts some- times in the woods, and at other times on the waters, and in scenes calculated for particular seasons, so as to draw the attention of visitors to them atthe proper time. At night they returned to the house, and performed in a room adjoining the hall of company. Madame Girardin and her daughters were clothed in common brown stuff, en amazones, with black hats, while the young men wore“ hadillements le plus simple et le plus propres@ les faire confondre avec les enfans du campagnards,”&c.
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