Of all the alterations which we should wish to make on the grounds at Drumlanrig, there is none that strikes us as of half the importance as that of forming new approaches. There is one now going on; but a more preposterous under-taking of the kind we have seldom or never witnessed in any country. An attempt is made, or was making in August, 1831, to ascend a steep acclivity directly in front of the house; a still more hopeless task than that of cutting the rock into terraces, above related by Gilpin, by the old Duke of Queensberry. The duke did succeed, and the terraces were formed, and now exist; but this approach never can form an easy ascent; and we maintain that, even if it did, it would be in the very worst taste imaginable in the given situation; for this specific reason, that it would show all the striking beauties of the spot before entering the house. Now, we hold it to be a fundamental principle, in laying out grounds, that the grand beauties of every situation should be first shown to the stranger from the drawing-room windows. If this be not a fundamental principle, we should be glad to know on what reasons either the situation for a house is fixed on, or the direction of a road to it islaid out. There are many points in which a stranger taking a cursory glance at a place may be mistaken; but, if he has his eyes open, he never can err in forming an opinion as to the approach. As to the terraces we certainly have no wish to alter them. At the time Gilpin wrote, terraces were common, and the great rage was for nature and the picturesque. That rage has now subsided; and in landscape-gardening, as in architecture, and in other arts which combine beauty with utility, reason is the governing principle.
