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J3otp&fttltcI.—Bishop Percy observes, that a nobleman in thedark ages, retired within his castle, had neither books, nor newspapers,nor literary correspondence, nor visits, nor cards, to fill up his leisure:his only amusements were field-sports, nor did the love for these declinein the Tudor period. Some illustration of the structures required by agentleman for his amusements is therefore necessary ; and the Dog-kennelis selected as being an almost invariable appendage to a manor-house,and also, as it affords an opportunity for exhibiting, in a subsequentPlate, the manner of constructing buildings of an inferior cast in thosetimes. Picturesque as the style may be to the eye of an artist, there isreason to apprehend (whatever its application) that many of the presentrace would declare “ ’tis only fit for a dog-kennel.”
Plate VIII.—©bf plan*
“ Upon some little eminence erect
And pointing to the ruddy dawn ; its courts
Wide opening on either hand.
* • * *
In a large square the adjacent field enclose,
There plant in equal ranks the spreading elm,
Or fragrant lime: most happy thy design,
If at the bottom of thy spacious courtA large canal, fed by the crystal brook,
From its transparent bosom shall reflect
Downward thy structure and inverted grove.”— Somerville’s Chase.
Somerville having directed the situation of the kennel, Beckford,the next great authority in such matters, may be quoted touching itsarrangement.