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are more like the walks of a gentleman's pleasure ground, than
roads for ordinary occupation. This circumstance, though in part
owing to the peculiar goodness of the materials, is,
nevertheless, much indebted to the neatness and public spirit of
the inhabitants.
A laudable taste for adorning nature has led us from ornamented
gardens to ornamented farms, and being in the possession of good
roads (an essential article for the display of rural beauty)
there seems to be but one thing wanting to make this a truly
ornamental country. What I mean here is, artificial objects
raised on proper parts of the mountains and eminences, which at
every turn are presented to us through some agreeable opening or
other.
Eminences are as naturally fit places for objects intended to
attract the distant eye, as they are for enabling the eye to
survey distant objects. Hence, to decorate them with columns,
obelisks, temples, &c, has the sanction of natural fitness. And
if to this consideration we add that of the inherent beauty of
the objects themselves, and remember, that there is nothing sets
off the beauties of nature so much as elegant works of art;
justifying motives for these erections can never be wanting to
any one who has a taste for rural beauty, and is willing to
accomplish as much of it as is in his power. But this is not all:
the practice is certainly patriotic: for such elegant ornaments
will at least naturally contribute to diffuse a serenity and
cheerfulness of mind into every beholder; and thence (if we may
be allowed the figure) like clectrical (sic) conductors, they may
be supposed to bring down a little of the happy placidity of
better regions, to add to the natural quantity shooting about on
the earth. As another motive, it may be observed, that it is
pleasing, in any country, to see the inhabitants so much at ease
in mind and circumstances, as to pay attention to these fanciful
undertakings; and moreover, that as a man of sense appears the
more so for seeming conscious of the importance of what he says,
so every traveller will conceive the better of a people, who,
sensible
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