1. The Medieval garden: the Tudor garden: its remains at Hampton Court: the Mount garden: the parks.—2. Elizabeth and her garden: the symmetrical taste: the decorations: Bacon's idea of gardens.—3. The Rebellion a break in English horticulture: Cromwell: Charles II.: the imitation of Versailles: Le Notre: Evelyn's description of the gardens: Queen Mary's bower.—4. William III.'s changes: his personal interest: the Royal gardeners: the wilderness: the Maze: Latin poem thereon: Queen Mary's collection of plants: the oranges: the gates :suspension of the works on the Queen's death: the new plans: the great Parterre: the Lion gates.—5. The gardens under George I.: the Frog Walk: the passion for Nature: Thomson's description of a garden: the changes under the Landscape gardeners.—6. The fish and fowl: the great vine: the characteristics of the gardens.
I
"God Almighty first planted a garden," says Bacon, "and, indeed, it is the purest of humane pleasures." If it needs some training of the eye to appreciate the architecture and the art of Hampton Court, there are few visitors indeed who do not enjoy the gardens and the parks. The exquisite neatness appeals to some, the brightness, the peace, the variety to others. No gardens within reach of the Londoner have half their manifold attractions. But besides their general they have a very special interest. In few places can we trace so well the history of English gardening.
When Wolsey first obtained the manor, he set himself to make gardens such as he should be able to find repose in after the long labours of his busy days. There in "therber" he would say his office; and he would daily watch the planting and the weeding, of which the records give such quaint particulars. Strong walls surrounded this irregular garden. It was a place of herbs and hedges, with alleys and long shaded walks—the medieval garden of which we know so little. When Henry VIII. took the Court for his own, great alterations were carried out. The pleasaunce became "Italianate," and statues of "kynges and queenys beestes" were set up. The accounts show continual placing of trees in the King's great orchard and the "triangle," of roses, gillyflowers, sweet-williams, violets, and primroses, and setting the divisions with low walls, on which stood capering or rampant beasts in stone. At every convenient spot stood a sundial.
Of the Tudor garden at Hampton Court, only the very smallest specimens remain. There is the quaint fountain still standing in the midst of a trim-set design of walks and borders, in the hedge-surrounded plot of low ground that lies between the "banqueting-house" of William III., and the greenhouse, which is sometimes mistakenly termed the orangery. Oriel Window in South Front
Oriel Window in South Front
In the front of this greenhouse is another sunk parterre. To the left, as you look towards the Thames, is the large oriel which Queen Elizabeth set in the tower that stands between a fine piece of Wolsey's building and the rigid stateliness of the end of Wren's south front. The low walls stand, it is likely, as they stood in Henry's days, and on them may now be trained dwarf creepers, where the bright gillies with "the mynts and other sweet flowers" stood out against the red brick in the old days. Architecture is brought in to aid the attraction of horticulture. Steps lead down, in the little garden hard by, to the fountain in the midst; and, again, low walls and trim hedges shut off one walk and one design from another. Rising a few feet and walking southwards, you would come upon the terrace that overlooked the river.
I am tempted to quote Ellis Heywood's fascinating description of that other garden, some miles farther down the stream, where Henry's faithful Chancellor, Wolsey's successor, walked with his children.
"There each child, each servant, had his own domain and his own work. There the friends gathered to talk with More," he says in his pretty Italian memory of the martyr More,[1] " on a little lawn set in the midst of the garden, on which was a little grass 'mount.' It was a happy spot, crowned with perpetual verdure, having flowering shrubs and the branches of trees woven together in sort so beautiful that it might have been Nature's own handiwork."
The "monticello" of which Heywood speaks is a great feature of Tudor gardens, and many besides More delighted to make the "animala tappezeria" of flowers. At Hampton Court this tapestry effect was heightened by the coloured palings and balustrades, green and white, with which the flower-beds were surrounded.
The "topiary art" came in vogue, too, to add quaintness to the Tudor gardens, and was seen, no doubt, by the southern walls of the Hampton Palace. Besides these gardens at the south, Henry had, at the north of his Palace, kitchen-gardens and two orchards, the "great" and the "new," in which grew hollies, and oaks, and elms, cherries, pears, and apples, yew, cypress, juniper, and bays. These are now entirely destroyed, and are partly covered by the "wilderness" which leads to Bushey Park, partly by the kitchen-gardens, which include also the old tilt-yard.
In 1539 the Honour of Hampton Court was by statute created a forest—the last, it appears, that was thus made. It was disafforested under Edward VI., but certain peculiarities of the forest jurisdiction still remain.
II
Elizabeth loved to walk in her gardens, and foreigners who visited Hampton Court noted their number and size, and the quaintness with which the flowers and shrubs were trained and clipped. The parks, which her father had increased, she delighted in; there she hunted and gave hunting to the foreign princes who were her guests. Gardens stretched to Kingston,[2] and the parks extended north and east for miles. A German traveller observed with astonishment the arrangement of the ponds:—"The surrounding land is well arranged in gardens and ponds. The latter may at pleasure[3] be left dry or filled with water, and fish then let in. I never before saw the
like of them."[4]
Throughout all the gardening of this period, the characteristic excellence is to be found in symmetry, and everything is precisely planned and designed. Straight walks surround geometrical flower-beds; mounds or ponds form a centre to which the walks converge. Bacon's essay on gardens is a picture of elaboration, where the chief garden is surrounded by a hedge which is clipped after a most complete and artificial fashion. Gradually the garden was divided, by the best authorities, into two parts, the "flower-garden" and the "herb-garden." Both were walled, both elaborately designed, but the Italian ornamentation, the statues, fountains, dials—all works of art in themselves—were reserved for the former. As system began to rule supreme in the flower-garden, a concession to man's undisciplined desires was made in the "heath" or the "wilderness," where a wildness which had no part in the trim order of the gardener's scheme was allowed, though not without some check, to exist.
The wooden figures of Henry VIII.'s day, the gaily coloured beasts then set up, soon yielded to the more durable decoration in stone and lead. Solidity and permanence came more and more to be marks of the design. Thus there sprang into existence the "garden-houses," the "pleasure-house," "gazebo," "banquet-house." Sir Thomas More built him a house in his Chelsea garden, whither he could retire for study and prayer, and spend, if he willed, the whole day in seclusion. Henry VIII. had built more
than one of these at Hampton Court—one in the "Mount" garden and one below; but later alterations swept them away.
Bacon's picture, in its size at least, might have been drawn for Hampton Court, with its luxury of space, where green and heath, or "desart" and main garden, with its alleys, might find ample room. "Knots of figures with divers coloured earths" he will not endure, but the "stately arched hedge," set "upon pillars of carpenters' work ten foot high and six foot broad," delights him. And he, too, like More, has "in the very middle a fair Mount, with three Ascents, and Alleys enough for four to walk abreast, which I would have to be perfect circles, without any Bulwarks or Imbossments, and the whole Mount to be thirty foot high, and some fine Banquetting House, with some chimnies neatly cast, and without too much glass." And in fountains, too, he was of the same mind as those who planted the gardens of Henry and Elizabeth. "For fountains, they are a great Beauty and Refreshment, but Pools mar all, and
make the garden unwholesome, and full of Flies and Froggs." Bacon's garden, though he allows for a "natural wilderness," is formal enough.
III
The Tudor methods, growing more elaborate as time went on, seem to have governed the gardeners of the first two Stewarts. The great Rebellion came as a break in the history of English horticulture. Gardens, like images and organs, were sometimes destroyed by Puritan fanaticism. Cromwell, though he resided frequently at Hampton Court, took no special care of the gardens, beyond ordering that the water-supply created by Charles I. in the "New" or "Longford" river should be restored to use. A tract of the time satirises his unpopular proceedings:—"Who will have the fine houses, the brave parks, the pleasant fields and delightful gardens, that we have possessed without any right and built at other men's cost? Who shall enjoy the delight of the new rivers and ponds at Hampton Court, whose making cost vast sums of money, and who shall chase the game in the hare-warren, that my dear master hath inclosed for his own use, and for ours
also that are time-servers?"[5]
One of the first cares of Charles II. was the garden at Hampton Court. In 166 1 one May was made their superior, and
"for fifty vears we find a succession of famous gardeners."[6]
A new era set in with the Restoration. French influence became dominant. Le Notre, who inspired the magnificent designs of Louis XIV. in gardening, was widely followed in England. Rose, the royal gardener, was his pupil, and brought with him some of the lordly ideas of his master. The small, delicate, systematic gardening of the past was replaced by designs no less systematic indeed, but of a much larger scope. Long avenues, broad terraces, wide canals came in fashion, and with them the delight in extensive views and the employment of large areas. At this time, too, were added many charming decorations in stone and in lead, such as the beautiful fountain which Evelyn mentions, and which William III. The Great Canal
The Great Canal
moved to Bushey Park. It is now called "the Diana Fountain."
A comparison of the drawing by Wynegaarde[7] of the Palace in Queen Mary's time with that of the picture by Danckers[8] shows something of the revolution which was effected by the new principles which were derived from Le Notre. That the great gardener himself visited England is improbable, though some have ascribed to him the persona] origination of the new garden of Hampton Court. But his influence is clearly apparent in the scheme by which the gardens are now treated as part of one design with the house, and are studied and developed in relation to its architectural features.
Two great changes were inaugurated under this influence. A great canal was dug from within a few yards of the east front of the palace for nearly a mile.[9]
It was bordered, after the Dutch fashion, with lime trees. By it, no doubt, as by the water in St. James's Park, the King would often saunter, followed by his dogs, and throwing food to the ducks. Besides this, three avenues of limes were planted, extending from the east front, and Charles, says Switzer (himself a pupil of London, who studied under Rose), in his " Ichnographia Rustica," "did plant the large semicircle before the palace . . . in pursuance of some great design he had formed in gardening."
This must have been one of his first works, for as early as June 9, 1662, John Evelyn, who was a great authority on gardens, noted that the Park, "formerly a flat, naked piece of ground," was "now planted with sweet rows of lime trees," and that the "canal for water" was "now near perfected." The whole of the alterations were in the direction of enlargement, which was fully in accordance with Evelyn's advice. The aim of the changes was to imitate Versailles. The House Park stretches for more than a mile to the south. In that fine space there could be well set the vistas of tree and water which should lead so appropriately to the sovereign's home. Every plan was drawn on strictly geometrical lines, in the gardens, as later in Wren's buildings.[10]
Evelyn tells us also of two other features of the gardens, which fitly represent the two contending tastes of earlier days. "In the garden there is a rich and noble fountain, with sirens, statues, &c., cast in copper by Fanelli." This fountain seems to have disappeared, but many beautiful specimens of architectural decoration remain, chiefly vases, elaborately designed in lead and stone, and little animal or figure groups dispersed among the beds. The second feature whichEvelyn mentions—but this
is later—is one which strikes every visitor to-day. It South Front and Cradle Walk
South Front and Cradle Walk
is what is now called "Queen Mary's Bower," from a tradition that she spent long hours there with her maids of honour, walking or resting in the shade. It is a walk of one hundred yards long, the trees meeting overhead.[11] There can be little doubt that it is this of which Evelyn speaks as the "cradle-work of horn-beam in the garden," and as, "for the perplexed twining of the trees, very observable;" and again, "the close walk, with that perplext canopy, which lately covered the seat in his Majesty's garden at Hampton Court." The horticultural books of the period give rules for the construction of these quaint artificialities, and many, particularly of yews, still remain in old English gardens. But the Hampton Court walk is in the stronger wych-elm,[12] which was
especially commended by the gardeners of the day.
IV
So the gardens remained for some years, all changes being undertaken on the same plan, and under the ruling influence of Le Notre. The accession of William and Mary effected an alteration. William had all a Dutchman's delight in gardening, and Mary had the liking of a homely Englishwoman for sweet flowers. A new scheme was at once undertaken, which Defoe states was "devised by the King himself."[13] "Especially," he says, "the amendments and alterations were made by the King or the Queen's special command, or both; for their Majesties agreed so well in their fancies, and had both so good a judgment in the just proportion of things which are the principal beauties of a garden, that it may be said they both ordered everything that was done." They effected a revolution in the appearance of the garden and park. Everywhere appeared borders and hedges of box, the great feature of Dutch gardening, which endured, indeed, only so long as the Dutch king ruled, for Queen Anne, who was little of a gardener herself, took pleasure in immediately rooting up most of the memorials of her brother-in-law's taste.
Throughout the reigns of the two sovereigns the work was carried on con amore, but two special periods of activity seem to be noticeable: the beginning of the reign, when George London was appointed royal gardener, with a post also in the Queen's household, and the year 1699-1700, when William took in hand the reconstruction of the entire palace and all that belonged to it. Gardening was now become a serious business. Great firms of gardeners directed the designs of the great houses throughout the country. "Gardening," said a literary gardener, "advanced to its highest meridian." The formal garden, in fact, went beyond its formality into eccentricity, and so sank under the reaction begun by the protests of Addison and the satires of Pope.
William and Mary were nothing if not systematic. The very Wilderness was made symmetrical. It was set in "regular strait walks, bounded on each side by tall clipped hedges, which divide the whole ground into angular quarters." Defoe gives details of the work, which show that though Queen Mary did not design the "Bower" called by her name, she actively encouraged the custom of training trees on espaliers, and trimming them till they form a compact and complete protection from sun and wind. "Pleaching"
reached its culmination under William and Mary. "On the north side of the house," says Defoe (to the east, that is, of the old tilt-yard and beyond the tennis-court), "where the gardens"—he means those which were now developed at the east—"seemed to want screening from the weather, or the view of the chapel, and some part of the old building, required to be covered from the eye, the vacant ground, which was large, is very happily cast into a wilderness, with a labyrinth and espaliers so high, that they effectually take off all that part of the old building which would have been offensive to the sight. This labyrinth and wilderness is not only well designed and completely finished, but is perfectly well kept; and the espaliers fitted exactly at bottom to the very ground, and are led up to proportioned height on the top: so that nothing of the kind can be more beautiful."
About the truth of this judgment there may be two opinions; and indeed, though something of the formality of the "wilderness" still remains, it has not been unaffected by the influence of the "landscape gardeners," who came before long to destroy all the symmetry they could. But whatever audacity may have done in the "Wilderness" by cutting down hedges and allowing the trees to grow with comparative freedom, no one has been hardy enough to disturb the Maze.
Now mazes were not uncommon in the sixteenth
century,[14] and it is possible that the Maze at Hampton Court may have been made earlier than the reign of William and Mary; but the reconstruction of the whole of the gardens near it make it probable that it was altered, if not entirely designed, at this time. No one who has visited the Palace will doubt that it still retains its attractions, and few perhaps have not suffered annoyance, and had to call The Garden Front
The Garden Front
in the aid of a friendly gardener. Among all changes the Maze has survived. A curious instance of its fame is to be found in the British Magazine, July 1749, where a Latin poem is devoted to its honour. This is probably a schoolboy's exercise, but it is worth quoting:[15]—
"Hamptoniæ quisquis regales viseret hortos
Hic labyrinthæos novet inesse dolos.
Quos simul ingreditur cœtus juvenilis in ipso
Introitu, in primo limine fallit iter.
Decepti pergunt errare, retexere, si qua
Ancipitem possint progrediendo viam.
Si regredi statuunt eadem est fortuna regressis
Implicitos idem devius error habet.
Compellunt alios alii, ridentque vicissim;
Sed prope quid prodest, et simul esse procul?
Nec captos tamen illudi cursu atque recursu
Tædet, nec toties est remeare labor.
Scilicet est omnis comites habuisse voluptas,
Falli cum sociis tam patienter amant.
Dulce genus lusus! idem gratissimus error
Decipit, et fessos decipiendo juvat."
A memorial of Queen Mary is still present in the exotic plants which survive from her collection. She took considerable interest in botany, employed a scientist of distinction, and grew many curious specimens. The Agave americana variegata may still be seen, which probably was placed in the greenhouse by the Queen; and the orange trees which are ranged along the south wall in summer came, there can be little doubt, from Holland. So the Queen diverted herself when her cold and ungrateful husband was taking enjoyment with Elizabeth Villiers and his Dutchmen. She lived chiefly in the "Water Gallery," a small house looking upon the river, busying herself with her needle and among her china; and "giving," says Burnet, "her minutes of leisure with the greatest willingness to architecture and gardenage."
The last work for the decoration of the gardens which we can ascribe to William and Mary together is the set of thirteen iron gates or screens (more strictly, twelve screens and a gate), which form the finest specimens of wrought ironwork that can be seen in England. They were at first intended to screen the private gardens from the river path; now one stands in the Long Walk, two are placed in the Queen's Guard Chamber, and the rest may be seen in the South Kensington and Bethnal Green Museums. Mr. Law[16] has shown that they were designed by Jean Tijon, though they were partly executed by a Nottinghamshire man, Huntingdon Shaw. The extraordinary delicacy of the work, the rich elaboration of the design, and the variety of the foliage represented, make the work unique. The main features of the work are of course classical, and they link the art of the Renaissance to that of the famous decorative period which marked the latter part of the eighteenth century in England; but their originality and variety are among their most striking merits. There could hardly be a better example of the culmination of Renaissance influence in England. The monograms of William and Mary form part of the centre of several of the screens, and they appear to have been erected in the years following 1691.
After the Queen's death the works seem for a time to have been suspended. The King did not live at Hampton Court for several years, and his mind was employed on other matters.
The great plans for the reconstruction of the Palace were in being while she lived, but the greatest changes in the gardens were made after her death. About 1699 William resumed his interest in the Palace, and gave minute directions for the addition of a number of fountains to what was now becoming the "Great Fountain Garden," which stretched in front eastwards to the canal and the Long Water. At this time also Bushey Park was laid out in avenues, and "The Lynes" with limes and horse-chestnuts. The park was to have been an approach to the new entrance court, as Wren designed it. But happily the old buildings beyond the Chapel Court were never destroyed, and the wilderness remains as it was before Wren drew his magnificent new plans.
In 1700 the completion of the great garden as we know it was begun. The Broad Walk, which extends the whole length of the eastern front, from the gate which touches the road to Hampton Wick and Kingston beyond the private garden to the river, was already made. The gate at the north end of this is the beautiful "Flower-pot Gate," of which the piers are decorated with William's initials and crown, and are surmounted by putti bearing baskets of flowers.
In the centre of the great garden was placed the large fountain which breaks the Broad Walk that leads from the east front to the Long Water. Four hundred of the limes which had been planted by Charles II. were moved so as to form a semicircle skirting the canal, which was now completed. The garden thus enclosed became known as "The Great Parterre." The elaborate parterre work, in which a complicated design was carried out in an arrangement of box-edged beds, filled with different coloured earths, with grass plots, and sanded walks of different widths, and decorated by jars full of flowers, by small fountains, and little pieces of statuary, was completed before the King's death, and marked the culmination of the formal garden at Hampton Court. The great gardeners, London and Wise, themselves literary authorities as well as practical workmen, may fitly have regarded this
as their chef-d'œuvre.
The changes thus completed were not permanent, but nothing nearly so revolutionary has been attempted since the Dutch sovereign died.
In 1700 one of the chief memorials of the Tudor garden was destroyed—the "Mount," which had been set as the centre of Henry VIII.'s Italian garden. Many trees were at the same time transferred from the The Dolphin Fountain
The Dolphin Fountain
Privy Garden. Under Queen Anne the "great Diana fountain," which had stood there, was moved to Bushey Park, and the fine Lion gates were set up at the end of the Wilderness. With this, and her crusade against Dutch box, Queen Anne seems to have been satisfied.
V
The gardens as Queen Anne left them, and as they were when the fat lady ("mere cataract of animal oils," Carlyle calls her) and the lean lady of George I. walked up and down what is now called Frog Walk (some say it was Frow Walk), must have been, Ithink, much like those which Thomson describes in "Spring," published in 1726. Every one is supposed to have read "The Seasons," but I doubt if the quotation is familiar. It certainly expresses the feeling of the period when formality was beginning to yield to a somewhat artificial Nature-worship.
"At length the finished garden to the view
Its vistas open and its alleys green.
Snatched through the verdant maze, the hurried eye
Distracted wanders; now the bowery walk
Of covert close, where scarce a speck of day
Falls on the lengthened gloom,protracted sweeps;
Now meets the bending sky: the river now,
Dimpling along, the breezy-ruffled lake,
The forest darkening round, the glittering spire,
The ethereal mountain, and the distant main. But why so far exclusive? when at hand,
Along these blushing borders bright with dew
And in yon mingled wilderness of flowers,
The Frog Walk
The Frog Walk
Fair-handed Spring unbosoms every grace;
Throws out the snowdrop and the crocus first,
The daisy, primrose, violet darkly blue, And polyanthus of unnumbered dyes,
The yellow wallflower, stained with iron brown,
And lavish stock that scents the garden round;
From the soft wing of vernal breezes shed,
Anemones; auriculas, enriched
With shining meal o'er all their velvet leaves;
And full ranunculus of glowing red.
Then comes the tulip race, where beauty plays
Her idle freaks: from family diffused,
To family, as flies the father-dust,
The varied colours run; and, while they break
On the charmed eye, the exulting florist marks
With secret pride the wonders of his hand.
No gradual bloom is wanting from the bud
First-born of Spring to Summer's musky tribes;
Nor hyacinths, of purest virgin white,
Low-bent, and blushing inward; nor jonquils
Of potent fragrance; nor narcissus fair,
As o'er the fabled fountain hanging still;
Nor broad carnations; nor gay-spottedpinks;
Nor, showered from every bush, the damask rose
Infinite numbers, delicacies, smells,
With hues on hues expression cannot paint,
The breath of Nature, and her endless bloom!"
The next change was effected by Queen Caroline, wife of George II. Before the year 1736 much of the elaboration of the great parterre had been taken away, grass had been substituted for the minute flower-beds, the smaller fountains had been banished; and "landscape gardening," in the hands of Kent, attempted to destroy the work of Le Nôtre and his pupils.
But no violent change was made. The details of the original plans were altered, but the great semicircular design was not destroyed. George III. yielded to the rage for landscape, and invited "Capability Brown" to reconstruct the gardens; but he had the wisdom to decline the task. It would have been impossible to combine at Hampton Court the merits of the two schools. The architecture of Wren was made to combine with the gardening of Le Nôtre; and the "noble art of picturesque gardening, which has given, as it were, a new tint to the complexion of nature, and a new outline to the physiognomy of the universe"—to quote Peacock's happy creation "Mr. Milestone"—would have been singularly out of place between the classical east front and the Long Water. But the more modern fashion has unhappily not been without effect, and the mania for "bedding out" has infected even the conservatives of this ancient place. But what little has been done, can be, and is being undone. The
House Park, as well as Bushey, may please to-day, as they pleased a century or two centuries ago. In the great fountain garden we may still very fairly see the design as William III. left it; while the private garden, with its pretty borders of old English flowers, its fine grass walks, and its terraces, shows at once the influence of earlier and later hands.
VI
A charming writer has lately dwelt upon an aspect of the parks and gardens which is not always noticed. They are the home of many birds and fish. The beautiful canal which separates garden and park is full of water-fowl, water-hens, ducks, and the stately swans. For the benefit of the tame birds "exists the only distinctly Dutch contrivance now surviving at Hampton Court. Small 'duck-houses,' either built of boards, or made each spring out of laurel-boughs, are set along the margin for the ducks and geese to lay in. This is a very old Dutch custom to protect the eggs of the waterfowl on the canals and lakes round
the Dutch country-houses from the magpies which abound in the woods. There are no magpies to steal them at Hampton Court, but it has always been the custom to make 'duck-houses' each spring, and the tradition probably dates from the days of William
III."[17] One is tempted to inquire if the phlegmatic monarch was as fond of duck as he was of green peas. Fish, particularly the carp, a royal fish that seems always to speak of ancient days, throng the canals, and birds haunt the trees—rooks, blackbirds, flycatchers, redstarts, and many more. A "paradise of birds" it is indeed.
To forget "the great vine" would be an unpardonable offence in any account of Hampton Court. It has now been planted a hundred and twenty-eight years, and though not uniquely large, is certainly respectable for its age and dignity. It may be seen in its own great house near the south-west corner of the Palace, beyond the "Pond Garden."
Much more might be said about the parks, so skilfully designed, and yet so free from offensive artificiality—the long terrace that looks upon the Thames, the bowling-green, and the shady walks under the limes that skirt the canal. But it would take a book to describe the gardens for those who do not know them, and still more, it may be, for those who do. Their attraction lies in the combination of the styles of different periods—of which they present the beauties of each—in the continuity of their history, and in the happy examples which they afford of the history of horticulture in England. We may still walk in fancy with Henry VIII. in the Pond Garden, with Charles II. by the Long Water, and with William III. along the Broad Walk.
↑Now in Hampton Court Palace. It is by no means improbable that this picture of Hampton Court was the one which Pepys ordered for his dining-room,January 22, 1668-69, and for which he afterwards substituted (March 31, 1668-69) a view of Rome. This is not, I think, noticed by Mr. Ernest Law.
↑It is now 3500 yards long, but Danckers' picture shows that it was originally much longer.
↑Cf. a delightful article in the Spectator for August 1, 1896.
↑Mr. Ernest Law, in his "New Guide" (p. 124), says it is 14 feet high. In his "History of Hampton Court," vol. ii. p. 37, he gives the height at 20 feet.
↑Mr. Ernest Law says it is wych-elm, correcting Evelyn.
↑Considerable caution is necessary in using any work of Defoe, and even his "Tour through the whole Island of Great Britain" is not historically correct; but in this case, though incorrect in some points, some part at least of his statement may be received.
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