ame of Shenstone does not appear in
the Essay on Gardening by Lord Orford: even the supercilious Gray only
bestowed a ludicrous image on these pastoral scenes, which, however, his
friend Mason has celebrated; and the genius of Johnson, incapacitated by
nature to touch on objects of rural fancy, after describing some of the
offices of the landscape designer, adds, that "he will not inquire
whether they demand any great powers of mind." Johnson, however, conveys
to us his own feelings, when he immediately expresses them under the
character of a "sullen and surly speculator." The anxious life of
Shenstone would, indeed, have been remunerated, could he have read the
enchanting eulogium of Wheatley on the Leasowes; which, said he, "is a
perfect picture of his mind--simple, elegant, and amiable; and will
always suggest a doubt whether the spot inspired his verse, or whether
in the scenes which he formed, he only realized the pastoral images
which abound in his songs." Yes! Shenstone would have been delighted,
could he have heard that Montesquieu, on his return home, adorned his
"Chateau gothique, mais orne de bois charmans, dont j'ai pris l'idee en
Angleterre;" and Shenstone, even with his modest and timid nature, had
been proud to have witnessed a noble foreigner, amidst memorials
dedicated to Theocritus and Virgil, to Thomson and Gesner, raising in
his grounds an inscription, in bad English, but in pure taste, to
Shenstone himself for having displayed in his writings "a mind natural,"
and in his Leasowes "laid Arcadian greens rural." Recently Pindemonte
has traced the taste of English gardening to Shenstone. A man of genius
sometimes receives from foreigners, who are placed out of the prejudices
of his compatriots, the tribute of posterity!

Amidst these rural elegancies which Shenstone was raising about him, his
muse has pathetically sung his melancholy feelings--

But did the Muses haunt his cell,
Or in his dome did Venus dwell?--
When all the structures shone complete,
Ah, me! 'twas Damon's own confession,
Came Poverty, and took possession.

_The Progress of Taste._

The poet observes, that the wants of philosophy are contracted,
satisfied with "cheap contentment," but

Taste alone requires
Entire profusion! days and nights, and hours
Thy voice, hydropic Fancy! calls aloud
For costly draughts.----

_Economy._

An original image illustrates that fatal want of economy which c