Poetical associations connected with monuments and ruins of antiquity caused them to be considered desirable adjuncts to picturesque landscape gardening. No structure seems to have been thought too foreign or incongruous to administer to this new fancy. Greek temples, ruined Roman aqueducts, Italian bagnios, Turkish kiosks, Chinese bridges and pagodas, were capriciously scattered in the same design. Extravagant, not to say mendacious, descriptions of Oriental splendour assisted to excite this passion for fantastic luxury. Sir William Chambers, a famous architect and scientific writer of the middle of the last century, has left a most marvellous picture of Chinese gardening derived, as he says, from his own observations in China, from conversations with Chinese artists, and from remarks transmitted to him at different times by travellers. After a long dissertation on Oriental gardening in general, he continues;� "The Chinese, in their large gardens contrive different scenes for different times of the day, disposing at the points of view buildings which from their use point out the proper hour for enjoying the view in its perfections. * * * They have besides scenes for every season of the year: some for winter, generally exposed to the southern sun, and composed of pines, firs, cedars, evergreen oaks, phillyreas, hollies, yews, and many other evergreens, being enriched with laurels of various sorts, laurestinus, arbutus, and other plants; and to give variety and gaiety to these gloomy productions, they plant among them in regular forms, divided by walks, all the rare shrubs, flowers, and trees of the torrid zone, which they cover during the winter with frames of glass disposed in the form of temples and other elegant buildings. * * * Their scenes of spring likewise abound with evergreens, intermixed with lilacs of all sorts, laburnums, limes, larixes, double-blossomed thorn, almond, and peach trees; with sweet brier, early rose, and honeysuckle. The ground and verges of the thickets and shrubberies are adorned with wild hyacinths, wall-flowers, daffodils, violets, primroses, polianthus, crocuses, daisies, snowdrops, and various species of the iris; * * * and as these scenes are also scanty in their natural productions, they intersperse amongst their plantations menageries for all sorts of tame and ferocious animals and birds of prey; aviaries and groves, decorated dairies, and buildings for the exercise of wrestling, boxing, quail fighting, and other games known in China. * * * Their summer scenes compose the richest and most studied parts of their gardens. They abound with lakes, rivers, and water-works of every contrivance, and with vessels of every construction, calculated for the uses of sailing, rowing, fishing, fowling, and fighting. The woods consist of oak, beech, Indian chestnut, elm, ash, plane, sycamore, maple, arbutus, and several other species of the poplar, with many other trees peculiar to China. The thickets are composed of every deciduous plant that grows in that climate, and every flower or shrub that flourishes during the summer months; all uniting to form the finest verdure, and most brilliant harmonious colouring imaginable. The buildings are spacious, splendid, and numerous, every fence being marked by one or more; some of them contrived for banquets, balls, concerts, learned disputations, plays, rope dancing, and feats of activity; others again for bathing, swimming, reading, sleeping, or meditation. In the centre of these summer plantations there is generally a large tract of ground set aside which is laid out in a great number of close walks, colonnades, and passages, turned with many intricate windings, so as to confuse and lead the passenger astray, being sometimes divided by thickets of underwood, intermixed with straggling large trees, and at other times by higher plantations or by clumps of rose trees and other lofty towering shrubs. The whole is a wilderness of sweets, adorned with all sorts of fragrant and gaudy productions; gold and silver pheasants, peafowls, partridges, bantam hens, quails, and game of every kind swarm in the woods,�doves, nightingales, and a thousand melodious birds perch upon the branches; deer, antelope, spotted buffaloes, sheep, and Tartar horses frisk upon the plains; every walk leads to some delightful object, to groves of orange and myrtle, to rivulets whose banks are clad with roses, woodbine, and jessamine; to murmuring fountains, with statues of sleeping nymphs and water gods, to cabinets of verdure, with beds of aromatic herbs and flowers, to grottoes cut in rocks, adorned with incrustations of coral shells, ores, gems, and crystalisations; refreshed with rills of sweet scented water and cooled by fragrant artificial breezes."
