Rivers and rills, we have said, are rather to be improv ed than created ; for we cannot sympathise with that taste, which directs the mimicry of so noble a character as a ri ver, or is satisfied with a nearly stagnated rill. We do not consider the river at Blenheim as an exception, because that piece of water was formed by widening a considerable ro bok. We allude to those wavy serpentine canals, which are never mistaken for natural scenes, and in almost every case might be advantageously exchanged for a lake.
The two leading ideas which belong to running waters, are progress and impetuosity. The first expression may be heightened by counteracting any tendency to expansion ; by removing some of the circuitous and oblong projections of earth or stone in the banks ; and sometimes by deepen ing its bed, or by substituting a more direct line for a cir cuitous course. The idea of impetuosity is indicated by its effects, in reverberating against high banks, or common banks, on which trees are situated, and may be increased by augmenting the cause or the effect, and thus either dig ging and undermining the trees, cutting down the high banks on which the water acts, or placing very slight piers as jetties on the opposite shore. Picturesque additions to the marginal accompaniments both of rivers and rills, will readily suggest themselves. Cascades and waterfalls may sometimes be created ; and the occasional expansion of na tural brooks into pools, affords a fine hint for imitation, when this form of water comes within a scene of improve ment.
It forms no part of the geometric style of gardening to imitate rocks, which are a material of the natural style equally unsuitable to be created. But though rucks can not readily be imitated, their expression may sometimes be heightened when desirable, and concealed when dis agreeable.
The character of rocks may be savage, terrific, sublime, picturesque, or fantastic. By attending to the forms attic milder characters, and their connection with ground and trees, we shall discover whether, and to what extent, they may be improved. Savage rocks are too inhospitable to be perma nently admitted, in any extent, near the eye. All rocks con vey something of this idea that are not accompanied by ve getation ; and, therefore, planting among or near them, is in every case an improvement, where trees do not exist. All rocks are expressive of dignity ; those eminently so, are not greatly varied by projections from their surface : their beauty is to he augmented, either by increasing their sur face in height or depth,'or by connecting it if too scattered. The removal of a few feet of earth, or part of the bushes or trees from the bottom of a precipice or ridge, and the im placement of a line of wood along its summit, will increase its real and apparent height ; a similar process with re spect to the sides, will add to the idea of stability and con tinuation. If the parts are too much scattered, a few trees
placed before, or bushes or creepers planted in the inter vals between the parts, will connect them, and give the idea of a whole, partly concealed. But in this case, a con siderable breadth of surface is necessary, at least in one place, otherwise dignity must give way to picturesque beauty. But the least indications of rocks that are not very fantastic in their form, even including such whose chief ex pression is picturesque beauty, are to a certain degree ex pressive of dignity. The slightest indication of a stratum or ledge appearing above the surface, conveys something of the idea, and ought not to he neglected. When they arc discovered by alterations in the ground with a view to the formation of roads, fences, and water, or to the erection of buildings, occasional advantage may be taken of their appearance. A road across a declivity, may be accompa nied by a ledge of rocks, instead of a bank of earth. Ground merely broken and picturesque, will display a more suffi cient reason for the appearance. The walls of a terrace, evidently in part founded on a rock, will give an idea of dryness, dignity, and security to the house ; and the mar gin of a stream displaying even large stones, increases the idea of impetuosity ; or in lakes, or the action of water in washing away the earth. Among imitations of wild scene ry, detached stones heighten the illusion, and carry back the mind to the aboriginal state of the country. Loose or detached fragments of rocks may often aid the effect of real or supposed masses. The appearance of a large rude stone near a wooded steep, unless of one evidently rounded by water or art, always leads the mind to the larger mass up the acclivity from which it has been broken and rolled down ; if partly sunk in the ground, and concealed by ve getation, the fertility of the imagination considers them as parts of magnitudes which lie buried under the surface. All this, however, can only be successfully accomplished hi a country which, by the character of its general surface, does not preclude the idea of rocks. On a fiat or a Cham paign country, the want oa: truth, or seeming truth, would render them disagreeable ; 'and, indeed, did rocks exist in such a landscape, they should be hidden rather than dis played, unless of such extraordinary -magnitude and effect, as to form an exception to general principles.