SSKv: Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2015 https://archive.org/details/historichousesofOOunse WELBECK ABBEY, FROM THE WEST. Historic Houses or THE UNITED KINGDOM. ^Descriptive, Ibistorieal, pictorial. CASSELL & COMPANY, Limited: LONDON , PARIS & MELBOURNE. 1891 . [all eights reserved. CONTENTS WELBECK ABBEY PAGE 1 By Charles Edwabdes- WARWICK CASTLE . 16 By William Senior. FLOORS CASTLE . 32 By John Geddie. HATFIELD HOUSE . 45 By Francis Watt. ALNWICK CASTLE . . 65 By" Aaeon Watson. AUDLEY END ...... 80 By the Rev. Professor Bonney, F.R.S. MALAHIDE CASTLE . 92 By Ella MacMahon. CHATS WORTH ...... . 102 By Charles Edwardes. PENSHURST PLACE . 120 By William Senior. TRENTHAM HALL .... . 135 By the Rev. Professor Bonney, F.R.S. ST. GILES’ HOUSE . 145 By Mary Frances Billington. BERKELEY CASTLE ..... . 157 By Harold Lewis, B.A. CAWDOR CASTLE . 170 By John Geddie. HOGHTON TOWER . 184 By W. S. Cameron. \’l CONTENTS. PAGE CASTLE HOWARD By Constance Anderson. CARDIFF CASTLE By He nh y Read. BELYOIR CASTLE By Charles Edwardes. KILKENNY CASTLE . By Ella MacMahon. LONGLEAT By Haeold Lewis, B.A. NAWORTH CASTLE . By Aaeon Watson. KNOLE HOUSE . By E. Feazer-Crichton. LISMORE CASTLE By Ella MacMahon. NEWSTEAD ABBEY . By Hugh W. Strong. CHILLINGHAM CASTLE By Aaron Watson. 198 212 . 226 238 . 249 . 260 288 . 298 . 311 LIST OF FULL-PAGE ENGRAVINGS. Welbeck Abbey, from the West Alnwick Castle, from the Park St. Giles’ House . To face page 1 „ ,, <15 „ „ H5 The Picture Gallery, Kilkenny Castle 2-12 Lismore Castle 289 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. WELBECK ABBEY:— Entrance to Tunnel — Arms of the Duke of Portland — Basement Plan — The Picture Gallery — View of the Abbey from the Boathouse — View of the Abbey from the Garden — Parliament Oak — Alcove in the State Bed-room — Bed with Italian Hangings —Queen Mary II. ’s Jewel Case — The Present Riding School .............. WARWICK CASTLE:— Distant View of Warwick Castle — The Bear and Ragg'ed Staff — The Avon, from Warwick Castle — • Plan of the Principal Floor — Warwick Castle, from the Keep — The Servants’ Hall — Warwick Castle, from the West — Plate at Warwick Castle — In the Great Hall — A Dutch Burgomaster — Guy of Warwick’s Armour and Porridge-Pot — The Warwick Vase ..... FLOORS CASTLE — Arms of the Duke of Roxburghe — The North Front — Plan of the Castle — The Southern Facade — The Ball-room and Royal Bed-room — The Book-collecting Duke — Robert Ker — Old View of Floors Castle HATFIELD HOUSE — Hatfield House: The Approach — Arms of the Marquis of Salisbury — Ground Plan — The Gardens — View of Hatfield House from the Park — The Armoury — Mantel in Hatfield House — Lord Burghley — The Clock Tower — The Marble Hall — The Long Gallery — The Library — Cecil Tombs in Hatfield Church — The Bishop’s Palace ... ...... ALNWICK CASTLE:— View from the Battlements — Arms of the Duke of Northumberland — Plan — The Draw-Well and Norman Gateway — A Glimpse from the Park — The Barbican — The Potter Gate — The Dining-room — A Corner of the Drawing-room — The Percy Bedstead — Recess in the Library AUDLEY END:— The West Front — Arms of Lord Braybrooke — The Hall — The Garden Front and Lodge Gate — Chancellor Audley — Lord Suffolk’s House — The Winding Staircase ..... MALAHIDE CASTLE:— Arms of Lord Talbot de Malahide — Malahide Castle— The Hall — The Dining-Hall — The Oak Room — The Old Chapel — Diirer’s Altar-piece ......... CHATS WORTH — View from the South-East — Arms of the Duke of Devonshire — Gateway to Stables — Marble Doorway to State Rooms — Schwanthaler’s “ Swan Song ” — State Bed-room — In the Sculpture Gallery — Chimney- piece in Dining-room by Westmacott — The State Drawing-room — The Chapel, from the Gallery PENSHURST PLACE — Arms of Lord de L’Isle and Dudley — Penshurst Place, from the Avenue — The Baronial Hall — Algernon Sidney — Sir Philip Sidney — The Tapestry Room — Queen Elizabeth's Drawing-room . TRENTI1AM HALL — The Entrance Gateway — Arms of the Duke of Sutherland — On the Terrace : Statue under Canopy — • The South Front — Old Trentham Hall — Distant View of Trentham Hall — A Dancing Group: The Children of the First Marquis of Stafford — The Venetian Room — Portrait of the First Marquis of Stafford ............. ST. GILES’ HOUSE:— Another View of St. Giles’ — Arms of the Earl of Shaftesbury — Plan — The Stone Hall — Small Drawing-room — Thomson’s Table — The Grotto — The Third Earl of Shaftesbury— The First Earl of Shaftesbury ............ BERKELEY CASTLE — General View of Berkeley Castle— Entrance to King Edward’s Room in the Keep — Plan — The Castle, from the Bowling-Green — A Bit of the Great Hall — The Drake Furniture — State Bedstead . CAWDOR CASTLE: — In the Dungeon — Arms of the Earl of Cawdor — Plan — Cawdor Castle, from the Burn — The Castle, from the North-West — The Drawbridge — “King Duncan’s Chamber” — The Dining-room— The “Iron Yett ” — Mantel-piece in Dining-room ........ PAGES 1—15 1G -31 32—44 45— G4 05— 79 80—91 92—104 105—119 120—131 132 - -144 145—150 157—169 170—183 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. HOGHTON TOWER:— General View — Arms of Sir Charles de Hoghton — A Quaint Gable — Fireplace in the Banqueting- Hall — Entrance Arch to Base Court — The South Terrace — The Draw-Well — The Outer Court-yard — The Inner Court-yard — The Banqueting-Hall — King James’s Staircase ..... CASTLE HOWARD — Castle Howard, from the Back — Arms of the Earl of Carlisle — The South Front — The Temple, with the Mausoleum in the Distance — Plan — The Obelisk — The Chapel — The Seventh Earl of Carlisle — The China Room — Top of the Staircase . . . . CARDIFF CASTLE:— Cardiff Castle — Arms of the Marquis of Bute — The East Front and Keep — Plan — Plan of Section — The Banqueting-Hall — The Drawing-room — The Winter Smoking-room — The Clock Tower . BELYOIR CASTLE.— Head-piece, with Arms of the Duke of Rutland — Belvoir Castle, from the Front — Ground Floor Plan — View from the Flagstaff — The Picture Gallery — In the Chapel — In the Library — The Guard-room and Grand Staircase ............ KILKENNY CASTLE — Kilkenny Castle, from the Lawn — Arms of the Marquis of Ormonde — Kilkenny Castle, from the River — Portrait of Strafford in Kilkenny Castle — The Dining-room — The “ Golden Key ” and Crystal Ball . LONGLEAT — Distant View of Longleat — Arms of the Marquis of Bath — Longleat, from the Lake— The Garden Terrace — The Hall — The Saloon Fireplace — The Libraries . . . . NA WORTH CASTLE — The Exterior — Gateway and Keep — Plan — The Court-yard — Portrait of Oliver Cromwell at Naworth- In the Gardens — Belted Will’s Chamber — Belted Will’s Library — The Great Hall KNOLE HOUSE — Entrance Front, from the Park — Arms of Lord Sackville — Entrance to the Porter’s Lodge — Plan of Knole —The Stone Court — General View of Knole — The Brown Gallery and Fireplace therein — The Crimson Drawing-room — The Chapel ......... LISMORE CASTLE — The Front Entrance — Plan— Dining-room — The Banqueting’-Hall — Family Group NEWSTEAD ABBEY:— Distant View of Newstead Abbey — Newstead Abbey, from the South — West Front of the Abbey Church — The “Boatswain” Monument — Byron’s Bed-room — The Dining'-Hall CHILLINGHAM CASTLE — Chillingham Castle — Arms of the Earl of Tankerville — Portico, Staircase, and Balcony— In the Gardens — Chillingham Church — The Dining-room — The Drawing-room — Chillingham Wild Cattle Head of Chillingham Bull Shot by the Prince of Wales ...... We arc indebted for the use of Photographs on pages 1, 4, 5, 13, 105, 107, 109, 113, 177, 261, 271, 29S, 301, 305, 308, 309, and facing pages 1 and 65, to Messrs. G. IK. Wilson and Co., Aberdeen ; on pages 33, 36, and 241 to Messrs. Poidton and Sons, Lee, S. E. ; on pages 73, 205, 20S, and 209 to Mr. John Worsnop, llothbury ; on pages SO, SI and S4 to Mr. F. T. Day, Saffron Walden; on page S9 to Messrs. Bedford, Lemere and Co., Strand, lit C. ; on jiages 124, 129 and 131 to Messrs. Carl Forman and Co., Tunbridge Welts; on pages 132 and 140 to Mr. G. Randall, Nciccastlc, Staffs. ; on page 143 to Messrs. E. Harrison and Son, Newcastle, Staffs. ; facing page 145 to Messrs. Debenham and Gould, Bournemouth ; on page 149 to Mr. E. Targett, Salisbury ; on pages 170, 172, ISO, 181, 260, and 265 to Messrs. J. Valentine and Sons, Dundee ; on page 213 to Mr. Alfred Frelcr, Cardiff; on page 217 to Mr. IK. D. Dighton, Cardiff; on pages 220 and 221 to Mr. Francis Bedford, Camden Road, N. ; on pages 238, 245, 2SS, 292, and 293, and facing pages 242 and 289, to Mr. IK. Lawrence, Dublin ; on pages 268, 269, and 312 to Mr. .1. P. Gibson, Hexham ; on pages 274, 2S0, and 2S1 to Mr. C. Essenhigh Corke , Sevenoaks ; and on pages 311, 313, 315, and 319 to Mr. IK. Green, Bcrwick-on-Twced. PAGES 184—197 198—211 212 225 220-237 238—248 249—259 260—272 273—287 288—297 298—310 311—320 Historic Houses of the United Kingdom. WELBECK ABBEY. TF the ghost of Elizabeth Hardwick, daughter of John Hardwick, Esquire, of Hardwick in Derbyshire, could revisit the earth in this late period of the nineteenth century, it would he of a veritably sublimed composition if it were unable to feel some motion of pride in the thought that the person whose tenement it once occu- pied was, in the sixteenth century after Christ, the pro- genitrix, more or less directly, of several of the most distinguished noblemen in the land. Bess of Hardwick, as the lady is more familiarly called, seems to have had a great deal of the tact, energy, and decision of the famous Queen who 1 ARMS OF THE DUKE OF PORTLAND. 9 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Welbeck Abbey. ruled England as her contemporary. But, unlike Queen Elizabeth, she did not live and die a maiden. In fact, it is probable there never was a country-horn young lady whose life was so thoroughly and successfully devoted to the ambitions that may and often do pertain to matrimony. She was horn in 1520, and in 1532 she w r as left a widow. As the relict of a Derbyshire land- owner named Barley, she married, in 1536, Sir William Cavendish, whom Henry VIII. knighted the same year. From this marriage the house of Devonshire has proceeded : first as Earls of Devonshire, and later as Dukes. Also from this marriage, in a junior line, came her great-great-great-great-granddaughter, Lady Margaret Cavendish-Harley, who, as heiress of Welbeck, became the wife of William Bentinck the second. Duke of Portland. At the death of Sir William Cavendish, his widow married Sir William St. Loe, Captain of the Guard to Queen Elizabeth, by whom she had no offspring. And, being be- reaved by death of him also, the indefatigable lady yet again went to the altar — this time as the Countess of George Talbot, sixth Earl of Shrewsbury. She survived this her fourth husband about seventeen years, content in her old age to build palaces for the great families who were to spring from her children. After the dissolution of monastic houses in 1538 Henry VIII. granted the domain of Welbeck to one Richard Whalley. From his heirs it passed into the hands of a London tradesman and two others, who eventually sold it to Bess of Hardwick, by whom it w^as settled on Sir Charles Cavendish, her third son by her second husband. One can well imagine that a woman so masterful in matrimony, and with such a pronounced passion for building and for consolidating estates, would tender advice to her own son, and advice, too, not lightly to be rejected. But it is sufficient for us to know that it is to her and her son that Welbeck in its present phase as a nobleman’s palace owes its foundation. The old Abbey of Premonstratensians which preceded it among the oaks and beeches of Sher- wood Forest has, at least for size, been dwarfed by the residential build- ings of later times. No doubt in its era (from 1140 until the Dissolution) it was an important institution, since it was the chief of some thirty-five houses of the same Order in England. But after four centuries of peace- ful existence in the fairest woodlands of the country, it had to bow to the inevitable. Such architectural relics of it as remain to us are in- corporated into the present Abbey (so-called) with such shrewdness that they must be sought ere they can he found. The Duke of Portland’s do- mestic servants have them to themselves. They pass to and fro between the kitchens and the other offices under groined ceilings supported by the old columns. And they have the privilege of dining in the best preserved of all Welbeck Abbey.] BESS OF HARDWICK’S PORTRAIT. o the rooms, in an atmosphere that, architecturally speaking, ought to he delightfully monastic. There is no space here to enlarge upon the debt of gratitude due from the various noble houses of the Dukeries of Nottinghamshire to Bess of Hard- wick. It is enough for us that she was the mainspring of Welbeck at the beginning of its secular career. The painting of her at the Abbey is emin- ently suggestive. She has the broad brow of a woman with capacity for uncommon thoughts. Her mouth indicates that she was not given to vacil- lation. There is a certain attraction in her face, even here after her fourth marriage ; and few hands could be more shapely than hers. While, lastly, the excessive wealth she acquired by her various marriages is at least symbolised in the great quadruple necklet of pearls which hangs loosely from her waist. From whichever side it is reached, Welbeck Abbey is sufficiently imposing. The ordinary approach is by the long tunnel, which begins at a lodge nest- ling cosily between the adjacent woods and its yawning mouth. This eventually debouches near the domestic part of the Abbey, of which a handsome clock tower is a conspicuous feature. The winter rose garden — under glass — 4 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Welbeck Abbey. is close by, and, receding a little overground, we then come to the border of the great lake, some three miles long, with its ornamental railings, bridge, automatic ferry-boat, and aquatic birds. Acres of lawn of the most enchanting kind stretch by the water side towards the house, studded with cedars, Himalaya firs, and other umbrageous trees, which seem to be much at home in the soil of old Sherwood Forest. The gables and turrets of the Abbey THE PICTURE GALLERY. form a superb coup (Vceil as the goal towards which lake, gardens, and lawns all seem to tend. Smooth green terraces descend to the water from the house. They are perhaps a little stiff, but that may be excused for the sake of the magnificent prospect of forest and blue sky beyond, which seems enhanced by the velvety verdure at one’s feet. The grand front of the Abbey is attained in a few minutes from the tunnel mouth by a gravelled road between plantations. It is of a digni- fied but not very individual kind. Distinctly Palladian in style, its two pinnacled turrets and balustraded facade seem to demand the cloudless skies of Italy to show to the best advantage. Here, too, however, there is abundant compensation in the far-extending green crests of the Sherwood oaks and elms and beeches. One might fancy they were a battalion of sylvan giants Welbeck Abbey.] A COMPOSITE STRUCTURE. 5 menacing the Abbey with an advance not to be withstood. The dome behind the towers adds to the effect of the building. Like most other historic houses, Welbeck is of a distinctly composite VIEW OF THE ABBEY FROM THE BOATHOUSE. kind. Only the foundation in part, and the columns and chambers immediately contiguous to the servants’ hall, date from the time of the wliite-cassocked Premonstratensians. After the Dissolution— when its revenues amounted to £'249 6s. 3d.- — the Abbey proper was no doubt allowed to decay at will. The first Duke of Newcastle, grandson to Bess of Hardwick, began to build Welbeck as we know it, and the late Duke may be said to have finished it. But it is not in its more conventional aspects that Welbeck makes c HISTORIC HOUSES. [Welbeck Abbey. much impression upon the visitor. Everyone has heard of the famous tunnel which burrows for a mile and a half under the soil, and forms the chief high road to the Abbey. It is this that the holiday makers from the neigh- bouring counties are so anxious to see, and which excites such various emotions in their minds. Nothing can be more striking than the contrast between the tunnel itself and the glorious woods through which one attains to the lodge at its beginning. In the early days of summer these woods are especially lovely. Overhead, amid the gold of the oak twigs and the bronze of the beech buds, there is a right-royal carolling of birds. Thrush is heard calling to thrush. The cuckoo breathes its sweet plaintive note far and near. The low, gentle cooing of doves attunes one to all manner of placid thoughts. At one moment a pheasant whirrs through the trees. Squirrels may be seen climbing the gnarled trunks to their nests in the oak hollows. Little white-tailed rabbits scamper across the road with a ridiculous affectation of alarm. It is an alluring scene. Nor are the trees all of the commoner sorts. The ducal foresters have planted cedars in the- glades of oak and elm and yew, and these flourish as if they were indigenous. The pale blue of the sky above the dark heads of the firs and cedars, and the richer blue of the banks of hyacinths on the curves of the dells, give increased charm where none seemed lacking. The black-mouthed tunnel comes as an abrupt sequel to this. From the glad sunlight one plunges into an unnatural gloom. It is not dark, for at every twenty paces a circular skylight appears in the vaulting above. Gas piping pervades the passage. Here and there a jet may be seen still burning. For half an hour one walks thus under cover, with the echoes of one’s own footfalls for sole companionship. Mysterious rumblings make themselves heard. It is a cart a mile ahead, or a gardener wheeling a barrow into one of the apartments which nearer the house are cut laterally from the tunnel wall. If a dog barks, its voice is bandied to and fro until one is apt to wonder if the sound will ever get free of the place. Much has been said in censure of this apparently purposeless excavation. Such censure, however, seems a waste of words. Within certain notorious bounds, every man bas the right to do what he likes with his own ; and if the late Duke of Portland chose to spend a couple of millions sterling upon works that seem futile the world need not complain. A man of modest means, when the whim takes him, orders a new summer-house. It may not bo wanted, and it may be pronounced detestably ugly when it is made. Similarly, the Duke, having a fancy of truly remarkable intensity for solitude and seclusion, chose to cut these Titanic corridors and passages and chambers in the solid earth to keep himself aloof from daylight. Whatever VIEW OF THE ABBEY FROM THE GARDEN HISTORIC HOUSES. [Welbeck Abbey. may have been the primary cause of his love of solitude, the Duke was consistent in his quest of it. He did not associate with his equals, and he preferred not to be recognised even by the workmen whom he employed so liberally. That he was no mere vulgar eccentric, with a craving for fame of an uncommon kind, his bust in the large picture gallery proves to conviction. One cannot but wonder, however, that the nobility in such a man did not find issue by somewhat worthier channels. Internally the Abbey is as commodious as such a majestic building deserves to be. The entrance hall leads right and left into suites of rooms so full of articles of value and interest that the eye is distraught -with the effort to do its duty. The hall itself is a small museum of spoils from distant lands as wdl as from the vicinity. The enormous stuffed bears, standing on their hind legs to receive the visitor’s over- coat, were shot by the present Duke in Russia. The tiger- skin on the hearth, with the head attached, is a trophy from India. The preserved pike under glass, which weighed thirty-six pounds, came from the Welbeck lake. So with the remainder of the Abbey. It w T ere vain to attempt to cate- gorise the multitude of treasures which here find a resting-place. Elsewhere such a crowd of things rich and rare would have a tendency much to detract from the homeliness of the rooms in which they are amassed. But it is not so at Welbeck. One may see as much splendour in a Homan “palazzo” as in these state rooms, but not so fair a combination of luxury and com- fort. No doubt the Duke’s fondness for his country seat has much to do with this. It is a place of residence, not a show palace. On the tables you may see the latest tliree-volumed novel, last week’s Graphic , and to-day’s Times. Flowers, too, help to give winsome tone to one’s surroundings. Bess of Hardwick herself could hardly fail to approve of the Welbeck of to-day, even PARLIAMENT OAK. Welbeck Abbey.] THE OXFORD WING. 9 though it would be sure to differ vastly from such ideals of comfort and grandeur as she may have conceived in her robust, aspiring mind. Probably, however, she would have something severe to say about the subterranean works upon which the late Duke lavished so much time and money. ALCOVE IN THE STATE BED-BOOM. Among the most attractive parts of the Abbey is the portion built 1^ the Countess of Oxford early in the eighteenth century. This is called after her — the Oxford wing. The Gothic dining-hall, a lovely room of great height, with an oak ceiling carved in elegant fan tracery, is indebted to the same lady for its splendid embellishments. The portraits here embrace the later 2 10 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Welbeck Abbey. members of tlie Portland family, among them a Richmond of Lieutenant- General Bentinck, father of the present Duke, and a Sant of the Baroness Bolsover. A noble silver wine-cooler stands by the windows of the room, whence there is a view across to the leafy shade of Sherwood: A model of the racehorse St. Simon is also worthy of notice. This room is the first of the state chambers, so called, though, as we have implied, there is but little at Welbeck of the frigidity of ordinary state rooms. One might spend a day in the large drawing-room alone without ex- hausting its interest. Among the least of its curios are the ear-ring which Charles the First wore at his execution, and also his wife’s rosary of worked cherry and plum stones. The jewel-case of Mary II. is another of its remarkable treasures. But it is to the paintings on the walls that one looks with the greatest avidity. In fact, the room may almost be said to be consecrated to Vandyck — it contains so many of his canvases. Over the white marble mantelpiece is a group of Sir Kenelm Digby, his wife, and two children ; and to the left of it the Earl of Strafford is seen in armour, with extended right hand. The famous portrait of Queen Henrietta Maria is also here, draped, and standing apart on an easel. No matter if, in a moment of forgetfulness, the guide indicates it as Marie Antoinette. There is no forgetting that face when once it has been seen. The crimson Louis Seize tapestry, by Neilson, on two of the walls of this room, is as cheerful as Offenbach’s music. It must be as good for vexed minds as for the complexion. Other paintings of the first order are in the adjacent music-room, where, however, the piano is so unobtrusive that at first one looks to Carlo Dolci’s “ St. Cecilia” on the wall for all local harmony. There is a “Virgin and Child ” here by Yandyck — the Virgin with the suggestion of a Magdalene in her face. A large “ Mary and the infant Saviour,” by Raphael, is also noteworthy, though it does not seem to be of the divine artist’s best period. Another drawing-room, called the “ Swan Room,” after the design of the carpet upon its floor, has a portrait of Napoleon by Delaroche, which alone would give character to a small house. The expression of pensiveness and decision upon the pale face of the Emperor is captivating. There are, further, two miniatures of him in the same room by Isabey and Soissons, and a lovely one of Hortense in the young prime of her beauty. The “ Garden of Love,” by Rubens, immediately beneath Delaroclie’s picture, is in odd contrast with the countenance of the man to whom love was as nothing compared with ambition. But, in spite of their great merits, these and the multitude of other precious paintings in the dwelling-rooms of Welbeck seem to fall short in attraction when compared with a single picture in the ante-cliamber to the large semi- Welbeck Abbey.] WILLIAM BENTINCK. 11 subterranean picture-gallery. It is the portrait of William Bentinck, the first Earl of Portland, “ the best keeper of secrets in Europe,” the man who nursed William III. through the smallpox as devotedly as if he had been the sick man’s mother, and himself nearly died of the disease in consequence; the man whom Sir William Temple described as “ the best and truest servant that ever prince had the good fortune to possess,” and whose hand the king in his last moments held fondly to his failing heart as if he hoped that even Death himself would not venture to come between him and Bentinck. It was to this man that William III. wrote, in congratu- lation upon the birth of an heir, “ He will live, I hope, to be as good a fellow as you are ; and if I should have a son, our children will love each other, I hope, as we have done.” Surely there never was a friendship between a king and a subject — howsoever noble of degree or intimate in youth — so durable as this, or so full of honour to both of them. One cannot doubt that, notwith- standing Ins humours and blunt- ness, the first Earl of Portland would never have denied William his presence in any moment of real necessity. Ho w r as a conspicuous example of a man whose friendship was more emphatic in troublous times than under the serene skies of prosperity. Among the multitude of portraits in the great picture-gallery (one hundred and fifty-nine feet by sixty- four) is a capital portrait of Prior the poet, the Earl’s Secretary of Legation during the embassy to France. It is by Richardson, and there can be little doubt that the artist has caught in a masterly manner the spirit of the clever courtier who “passed his boyhood in drawing corks at a tavern, and his early manhood in the seclusion of a college.” There is something Voltaireian in his face as he sits here on a scarlet chair, at a scarlet table, quill pen in hand, like one challenging the world to perplex him. BED WITH ITALIAN HANGINGS. 12 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Welbeck Abbey. He was much too keen for liis master, who was content with his orthodoxy simply on the evidence of his ability to define a true Church upon the basis of the nineteenth Article of the Prayer Book. To borrow from Macaulay — I am glad, Mr. Prior,” said the duke, “ to find you so good a Christian. I was afraid that you were an Atheist.” “An Atheist, my good lord!” cried Prior: “What could lead your lordship to entertain such a suspicion?” “Why,” said Portland, “ I knew that you were a poet, and I took it for granted that you did not believe in God.” “My lord,” said the wit, “you do us poets the greatest injustice. Of all people we are the farthest from Atheism. For the Atheists do not even worship the true God, whom the rest of man- kind acknowledge ; and we are al- ways invoking and hymning false gods whom everybody else has renounced.” In the same part of the Abbey is the old riding-school, built in 1623 by the first Duke of Newcastle. In its entirety it is one hundred and eighty feet long, fifty feet high, and forty feet wide. There is so much glass in its composition that it might almost he termed a Crystal Palace in miniature. The four glass chandeliers suspended in it each weigh nearly a ton. When these and the other brackets in the room are lighted, some two thousand gas jets may be counted. To tell the truth, it is a room which demands some such artificial splendour to show it off. The decorations are a trifle garish. Nowadays this hall is divided into two parts. The ante-room is a library, and the rest is used as a chapel. Over the altar of the chapel is Sir Joshua Reynolds’s “Angel in Contempla- tion,” and the walls elsewhere are hung with paintings. It is a rather cold- looking place of worship by day, and one would suppose that at night, when its multitude of gas jets in glass chandeliers are lit, the suggestion of a foreign cafe in a large city might be at least strong, if not overpowering. No doubt a great change for the better will result from the alterations, after designs by Sedding, now being made in this chapel. The library, too, is somewhat formal. It does not contain the more precious of Welbeck’s books, which may be found in the drawing-room called Welbeck abbey.] THE LIBRARY AND STATE BED-ClIAMBEIiS. 13 the “Blue.” Nor can it boast of any of those agreeable sequestered corners in which the student might love to nestle with his hook. The light is too strong. As a studio for an artist or photographer, one can imagine that it would serve excellently ; or even as a riding-school in the old days ; hut it is not an ideal library. Here, in a case among other ancient manuscripts and documents, is the original of his Grace of Newcastle’s hook on the art of horsemanship. There are also royal autographs which may or may not he more interesting THE PRESENT RIDING-SCHOOL than the duke’s manuscript. From his portrait in the picture-gallery this master of Welbeck was an uncommonly handsome man. His sober black coat, deep lace collar and cuffs, and the scarlet baldrick underneath his coat, suit well his firm countenance ; nor is the flowing Cavalier wig upon his head in disaccord with it. In connection with this same lord of Welbeck, the “Horsemanship” bed-room in the Abbey deserves to be mentioned. The Flemish tapestry on its walls helps to perpetuate his fame as an equestrian and a lover of horses. Two of the state bed-chambers must not escape notice : the Alcove Room, which the Prince of Wales has used, being furnished with extraordinary magnifi- cence ; and another with an antique four-poster, the Italian bed-hangings of which are remarkable for their fine workmanship. The old riding-school is superseded by the present one, a construction more remote from the Abbey. In wet weather his Grace may reach it by a 14 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Welbeck Abbey. tunnel from the servants’ part of the Abbey, more than a thousand yards long. Close alongside is a tan gallop nearly a quarter of a mile in extent. Both these conveniences for the exercise of the ducal horses in had weather would, in the esteem of the head of the Welbeck stables, be hard to match elsewhere in the realm. As may he supposed, the stables of Her Majesty’s Master of the Horse are models of their kind. A Dutch wife might pass a compliment upon them for their cleanliness. Here are hunters, hacks, carriage horses, and ponies for the Duchess’s driving. The horses turn their heads eagerly as the visitor approaches their stalls, the brass-work of which glows like the silver in the butler’s pantry. They seem to know by instinct and experience that caresses and kind words are to be their portion, and perchance one or two of the palatable carrot-snippings, a little pile of which stands by the window-sill outside each stall. Near the handsome quadrangular stable-block is a building which shows that the retainers of the Portland family are at least as well cared for as the horses. This is the Welbeck club-house, for the workmen on the estate. It contains a billiard-room, a reading-room (with the latest magazines), and a re- freshment bar. In fine weather there is fishing, football, or cricket (the matches played on the lawn close to the Abbey windows) ; in bad weather there are games and literature at the club ; and at no time is there ennui. The late duke is thought to have in a measure spoiled his workmen by his exceptionally liberal and condescending treatment of them. The present Duke’s regard for them is of a different and more enlightened kind. The kitchen-gardens and conservatories of Welbeck are in keeping with the rest of the palatial establishment. One may walk under the glass of forcing- houses for more than three hundred yards. Perhaps few bunches of grapes are nowadays cut here like that which Speechley, in the last century, got from a Syrian vine in these same Welbeck liot-houses. It was in the time of the present Duke’s great-grandfather, and it weighed nineteen pounds and a half. The Marquis of Eockingham at Wentworth was the happy recipient of this phenomenal cutting, and “ the men who took it carried it in the same manner that the spies carried the grapes from the land of Canaan — namely, suspended on a pole.” Nevertheless, it may he said of the glass-houses that they hold the seasons at their service. The Welbeck table need never want the luxuries of floriculture and of the vegetable or fruit world. It were an oversight, before quitting Welbeck, not to mention the cele- brated oaks in the deer-park. There is the Greene! ale Oak, whose heart was cut out in 1724 to allow a coach and four to pass through the mutilated but still living tree. Three men on horseback may even now ride abreast through the cruel gap. The oak ought to he in the last stage of decre- pitude if its age be anything like the millennium and a half which, in 1797, Welbeck Abbey.] FAMOUS TUFFS. 15 was supposed to have elapsed since it was an acorn or a sapling of the tenderest kind. But yet, though hoarded and supported artificially as if it had no more vitality than a mummy, year by year in spring its surviving limb puts forth buds which, in due time, break into leafage quite dense enough for the accommodation of the birds who may fancy it for a build- ing site. The Seven Sisters’ Oak was for long another of Welbeck’s woodland curiosities. Seven stems grew vertically from a main trunk some ten yards in girth. But the autumnal storms have been too much for this ambitious giant. One by one the seven sisters have fallen to the ground, and now they may be seen only on the canvas of the artist Barrett, in the underground picture-gallery. The same artist has done his best to immortalise the Greendale Oak also, and divers pretty sylvan landscapes of Sherwood. It seems not im- probable, however, that the Greendale Oak will itself outlive the picture that was painted to preserve the tradition of it. The Parliament Oak, though five or six miles from Welbeck, may also he claimed as one of the ducal properties. Its age, like that of the “Greendale,” may be conjectured, not computed. But it is now time to leave this princely domain. The evening mist has begun to rise over the lawns. The air has chilled, and there is every sign of a heavy dew in the night. In the tunnel the atmosphere seems less agreeable than it was a few hours ago, and one is more quick to mark the white streaks which indicate the humidity of this unnatural thoroughfare. The same haunting sounds recur in the long, seemingly interminable, passage. At one moment they echo on the left, then on the right, and next, as it seems, they are close at one’s heels. It is really almost disturbing; and yet, of course, it is all mere imagination, or a carter at the far end of the tunnel urging his horse into the gloom that has come with the waning of day. Else, were the ghosts of Welbeck known to live and move in the place, one might be glad to conjure up for a moment or two — no more — that of the stout-hearted lady who has conferred a certain fame upon lordly Welbeck. Charles Edwaedes. DISTANT VIEW OF WARWICK CASTLE. WARWICK CASTLE. IAN Warwick Castle, picturesquely perched upon the rocks which overlook ' the winding Avon, there are few nobler wit- nesses of the feudal age, with its had points and its good. More perhaps than other remains of the same character, it hears this representative distinction, since it was one of the houses of that turbulent Last of the Barons, wdio, largely living by the sword, perished by it at the battle of Barnet, in 1471. One of the old Warwickshire antiquaries (who, it is necessary, however, to hint in parenthesis, was notoriously given to drawing upon his imagination for his facts) would have us believe that there w'ere Earls of Warwick amongst the Knights of Arthur’s Bound Table, and that there was a prototype of Warwick Castle in Boman, if not Saxon, times. The rudely fortified town of Warwick being destroyed by the Danes, the Castle was rebuilt under the energetic influence of Ethelfleda, daughter of Alfred the Great, and wife of one of the Earls of Mercia. A hundred years later, another horde of Danish invaders, led by Canute, came this w r ay, and Warwick and its Castle were again laid in ruins. This was an obvious result, for the place was evidently from the first a situation of military importance, and small wonder was it that William the Norman, who was certainly a capable soldier, had it carefully looked after. The town was enwalled and Warwick Castle.] THE BEAR AND RAGGED STAFF. 17 moated, and the Castle made, for those times, an impregnable stronghold. Thenceforth, Warwick Castle, and a succession of Earls of that name, took an established place in the history of England. The famous device of the THE AVON, FROM WARWICK CASTLE. Bear and Ragged Staff, originally the badge of the Turcliil branch of the family, became the crest of the belted masters of the Castle, and Warwick was the centre of its domination. So much of history it is necessary to remember in order to appreciate rightly the Warwick Castle which is open to the visitor of to-day. Inhabited still by 3 18 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Warwick Castle, the descendants of Siward de Arden, son of the Tnrchil wdiose heirs were deprived of the Earldom by the Conqueror, Warwick Castle is emphatically what is termed a show-place. The visitor pays his shilling at the ticket window of a cottage opposite the walls, and is thereby franked through the porter’s gate, and taken in hand by an intelligent official in uniform, who con- ducts him, and the party of which he will probably form part, through the portions of the building that are open to the public. The proceeding throughout is regulated by well-understood rules that make for the general comfort. The Embattled Gateway and the Porter’s Eodge at once suggest interest- ing historical associations. The well-kept approach to the Castle, which is for the time being hidden behind the vista of foliage overhanging on each side the rock-hewn walls, was formed by the second Earl Brooke and Warwick, whose taste for liberality gave to the town much of its improvements, and to whom the complete renovation of the Castle and its beautiful grounds is directly due. But everything seems still to bear the flavour of a baronial fortress, and one never, on introduction to the sleek moss, patches of lichen, and coaxing ivy covering the rocks of the gravelled way, or to the pendulous trees and bird-haunted shrubberies above them, quite forgets that formidable gateway by the porter’s lodge. Were the approach a little longer, the visitor would doubt- less abandon himself to the sylvan delights lavishly spread around. But a sharp sweep of the drive soon brings into the prospect grim, grey towers, battle- ments, and massive outworks. Some of these have been green with daisy- spangled turf these hundred years and more, but are solid evidences all the same of the defiant and aggressive stronghold of the olden time. These ancient portions of the Castle are regular in their very irregularity, telling as they do of successive periods of history. When, as happens in the smoothly grassed Court of Warwick Castle, a number of objects, each in itself ranking as a surprise, burst upon the gaze, the eye at first, roams without a purpose. It. takes in the coup d'ceil before settling upon any one thing. Here it will probably travel by an impulse of natural selection upwards to lofty twelve-sided macliicolated Guy’s Tower, rising from a base of thirty feet in diameter, to a height of T28 feet; then following the line of embattled wall, it dwells upon the central arched gateway, the flanking towers, and the battlements, pausing at rugged Caesar’s Tower, believed to have been built upon the rocky foundations in its present massively irregular form by the Norman conquerors. This tower is 117 feet high, and is connected by the embattled wall with Guy’s Tower, which is of more recent (probably fourteenth century) architecture. Warwick Castle.] THE “MOST PRINCELY SEAT ” IN THE M INLANDS. 19 From the inner court other views are commanded of these feudal towers, and one realises how apt, even now, are the words written by the eighteenth- century historian, who, describing the improvements made by the first Lord Brooke, remarked that Warwick Castle had been made “ not only a place of great strength, hut extraordinary delight, with most pleasant gardens, walks, MOUND Ty po I'ti liii’/j ( V .SV REFERENCE . t. Lord Brooke’s Room. 2. Sitting Room. 3. Waiting Room. 4- Breakfast Room. 5. Vestry. 6. Armoury Passage. 7. Billiard Room. Scale of Feet. 100 North PLAN OK THE PRINCIPAL FLOOR OF WARWICK CASTLE. and thickets, such as this part of England can hardly parallel : so that now it is the most princely seat that is within the Midland parts of this realm.” The showy peacocks, secure in their strict preservation, strut upon the level lawns, and approach the porches of the Castle itself, impartially dividing their atten- tion between the inhabited wing and the section maintained for the public benefit. Beyond the green velvety sward rises the Mound, surmounted by a line of battlements and tow T ers, broken by a central Gothic gateway filled with dark frowning iron grating. An. open flight of narrow and numerous steps conducts to the pathways on the top of the wall communicating with the towers. The incomplete structure is the Bear Tower, begun by Bichard III., and herein is a descent to a subterranean tunnel, the destined purpose of which no one conjectures. The fine trees, clipped hedges, and sheltering 20 HIS TUllIC HO USES. [Warwick Castle. shrubberies assist in forming a beautiful framework to the inner court, -which effectually introduces you to the spirit of the place. Beyond this, reached by a bridge across the moat, and a shrubbery opening to the prettiest portion of the grounds, is a glass house, built expressly for the great marble vase found at the bottom of the lake at Hadrian’s Villa. Postponing a closer acquaintance with the towers for a season, the visitor wall probably seize the earliest moment for an inspection of the Castle proper. The grounds may be sauntered through at leisure ; the treasures within demand undivided attention, and are to be scrutinised -with somewhat of a sense of duty. And, indeed, much of the romance and not a little of the history of mediaeval times are brought to remembrance by the Great Hall. Warwick Castle, like the town itself, has suffered severely from fires. In 1694, the town, which at the lowest calculation is supposed to be a thousand years old, was almost obliterated by a conflagration, and if the beautiful specimens still remaining of sixteenth century architecture may be taken as an indication of what Warwick was before the calamity, it must have been truly picturesque. Fires have removed much that was priceless in. the interior of the Castle, and the worst disaster was on a December night in 1871. How the fire originated will now, probably, never be known ; but it broke out in the private apartments, swept through the Great Hall, raged in the eastern wing, touched the grand staircase, and finally stopped at the state apartments, where so many artistic treasures are preserved. Restoration has been both complete and splendid, and as far as possible, the original features of the building have been retained. The Great Hall, a magnificent apartment, sixty-two feet long and forty broad, we may well imagine used to resound with the tread of mailed warriors, and the liberal, if rude, hospitality of baronial times. The original hall, built- in the fourteenth century, consisted of two storeys. Even as recently as 1830 it had a plaster ceiling, which, fortunately falling in, w r as reproduced in wood, and raised in height. The fire of 1871 gave a much-needed opportunity for still increasing the elevation. The plaster walls were cased in Warwick stone; an ancient chimney-piece from Rome replaced what the fire had demolished; and the general altitude w r as raised ten feet by the substitution of the present open roof of darkly-stained pitch pine. The floor, which was of lozenge-laid squares of red and white marble from Verona, was made at Venice expressly for Warwick Castle in 1831 ; and as this was only partially ruined, there was no great difficulty in restoring it by material from the parent quarries. If this famous fire destroyed, however, it also brought to light features of the ancient building which had been hidden for ages, such as the clerestory windows, now filled with old stained glass, and protected by wrouglit-iron Venetian WARWICK CASTLE, FROM THE KEEP. II 1ST OHIO HOUSES. [Warwick Castle. 22 grilles, two long-forgotten doorways, and the remnant of a fire-place at the western end. Who can resist the desire to linger a while in this Great Hall, approached by its flight of stone steps from a shaded porch ? The spacious recesses of the three Gothic windows, the w T alls, and the tables, teem with objects of interest. Of pictures there is a large collection. Many of the choice works of art were fortunately saved from the fire, even if some of the paintings narrowly escaped wdiile their frames w r ere charred. In the chapel passage, and most effectively seen from the Hall, is Yandyck’s celebrated portrait of Charles I. The King is dressed in armour, bestrides his grey charger, and is attended by a favourite officer. Warwick Castle has many another reminder of those sad Stuart times. In another room are the half-length portrait which some connoisseurs have regarded as Yandyck’s best, and a wliole length of Queen Henrietta ; Charles is stated to have sat for, and ultimately owned this portrait, which was recovered from the Continent after the Kestoration. It is a fascinating painting, where- in the melancholy quality of the unfortunate monarch, and something of his fatal weakness, seem to be indelibly associated with the refined cast of counten- ance. But it should not be forgotten that there are numerous tokens in the Castle that, during the Civil War, the head of the House of Greville espoused the cause of the Parliament. Among the armour the steel helmet should be noted. It must have been worn by a man with a roomy sconce, and it does not lose interest from the tradition that it w r as the headpiece of no less- a Roundhead than Oliver Cromwell himself. And upon the wall behind are samples of the Scottish claymore, of which tire hero of the crowning mercy of Dunbar must , have had no little experience. The historical relics and the armour are chiefest of the treasures of the Great Hall. The rarest pieces of an always famous collection were destroyed by that not-to-be -forgotten fire, but enough remains to make it still one of the finest in the kingdom. The armour is all spotless and bright, and there are. no gaps in the long shining ranks. The armour upon the mounted knight and his charger are apparently not older than the Henry YIII. period. A suit is pointed out as having belonged to Montrose, and there is no reason why it should not have done so, as a picture of that gallant and unfortunate gentle- man himself, in the Cedar Room, represents him in precisely such a panoply. Of the more ancient armour, a leg-piece and gauntlet are ascribed to the hap- less young Prince Edward, the son of imbecile Henry VI. and the turbulent Margaret. Remembering the circumstances of the youth’s murder at Tewkes- bury (lie having married into the family of Warwick), the preservation of this armour in Warwick Castle is emphasised. One of the most finished specimens is a tiny suit of armour made for, and no doubt worn by, that small son of Warwick Castle.] GUY OF WARWICK. 23 Robert Dudley who w^as called the Royal Imp. The poor boy had a long roll of titles awaiting his arrival at years of maturity, but poison is supposed to have prematurely terminated his career. He was buried in the Beauchamp Chapel of St. Mary’s Church, at Warwick, which was so much damaged by the seventeenth century fire. These conflagrations interfere considerably with chronological accuracy, and the most that probably can be said of the armour in the Hall is that it is generally of sixteenth century manufacture. The well-known device of the house in these happy times takes the shape, near the main entrance, of an upstanding bear, holding, not as in the coat of arms, a ragged staff, but a modern letter-box for postal despatch. Upon an Indian table rests a delicately carved viol in a leather case, a gift from Queen Elizabeth to her favourite Leicester. Every schoolboy must have read of Guy of Warwick, one of the band of mysterious knights who figure stoutly in the stories of w'onderful adventure in Merrie England. A recess in the Great Hall may be considered a kind of chapel for relics of this redoubtable hero. Here are enshrined his shield, a trifle of thirty pounds’ weight; his breastplate, weighing fifty pounds; odd pieces of horse armour, with an illegible inscription, and the ponderous helmet. The porridge pot standing upon the polished floor holds 120 gallons, and near it has been affixed a small pen-and-ink sketch, a humorous souvenir of a visit made l> 3 r Major Fawkes, in 1872, now hung in remembrance of the dame who played the part of cicerone in the last generation. She would inform visitors that Guy’s porridge pot had become the family punch bowl, and that she had seen it filled and emptied, three times in one day, at the coming of age of Lord Brooke ! The two-handed sword, the two-pronged fork, the walking staff, and other personal gear, could only have been used by a very Goliath. Con- noisseurs in old armour will be delighted with the suit of chain-mail of the time of King John. A jester’s metal mask, like Prince Edward’s gauntlet, recalls the time of Henry VI., and the past politics of Warwick Castle are perpetuated in a suit of Cromwellian armour, worn by the Lord Brooke who was shot at the siege of Lichfield. The original buff leather doublet was destroyed in the fire, but it has been accurately reproduced. Beyond the Great Hall we enter upon parts of the Castle which may be roundly put at not less than six hundred years old, though the stout floors of English oak may have been laid about the time of the Commonwealth. The range of apartments includes the Red Drawing-room. Rubens’ portrait of Thomas Howard, Earl of Arundel, which was highly praised by Sir Thomas Lawrence, is here. Rembrandt’s “ Dutch Burgomaster,” in the painter’s most characteristic style, was one of Sir J. Reynolds’s favourites, and by having it engraved he made it familiar to the world. Vandyck we meet again in 24 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Warwick Castle. this room, as in most of the apartments of Warwick Castle, represented now by the wife of Snyders, and a Lady and Child. The first-named, from the Orleans Gallery, is a companion to the Snyders at Castle Howard, and is a striking illustration of a period when good housewives wore close caps, ruffs, embroidered bodice and cuffs, and when their entire appearance was womanly and homely. The largest of the pictures, Raphael’s “Assumption of the Virgin,” painted for the cathedral of Pisa, found its way to Warwickshire THE SERVANTS’ HALL. by purchase from the Solby collection. A portrait by Rubens, of “Ambrose, Marquis de Spinola,” a magnificent gentleman in half armour, with high ruff, and embroidered scarf around the left arm, hangs on another w r all, and in another light. The Bear and Ragged Staff is, in this room, chiselled in marble on the mantelpiece sustaining a Louis Quatorze clock, and a pair of sacrificial vessels of antique bronze. As a supplement in a measure to Rubens’ portrait of llie Admiral is a splendidly inlaid ebony, tortoiseshell, and ivory cabinet, once a household god of the Spinola family as it flourished in the sixteenth century, and adorned with its arms. A melancholy interest attaches to the table of pietra conunessa, with marble slab of fine mosaic, in lapis lazuli and precious stones, for it belonged to Marie Antoinette. But the Red Drawing- Warwick Castle.] A NOBLE APARTMENT 25 room has artistic objects to suit all tastes and captivate all fancies, and while many will turn to the Limousin enamels, whose four plates suggest the history of Psyche, after the design of Raphael, others will he attracted hy the rare tables and cabinets, bronze vases and pottery, Etruscan vases, Venetian crystals, or Bohemian glass. Yet this apartment is but an ante-chamber to its more splendid neighbour, panelled in cedar, much carved, and properly unpolished. The huge chimney- WARWICK CASTLE, FROM THE WEST. piece is unique in the English workmanship of its marble sculpturing. The ten feet thickness of the Castle walls may, in one of the recesses of the Cedar Drawing-room, be measured by anyone anxious to verify the fact, and it may be added that these liberal windows that ensure light and cheerfulness to the apartment were put in after the Civil Wars. Time would fail us to enter into details of the rich and rare articles distributed upon the tables and in the alcoves, or to catalogue the antique furniture. It is sufficient to feel that the guide-books do not err in describing this as a noble apartment. Modern art is embodied in a bust of Proserpine, by the American sculptor Power ; and as a curiosity w T e have a metal study of Charles the First, the reputed model of 4 26 ms whig no urns. [Warwick Castle. Bernini’s marble bust made for Henrietta Maria. The old Venetian mirror sets off, and is set off by, the superb marble of the chimney-piece, and all in character is the Florentine centre table, with its antique Roman statue, flanked by two Etruscan vases. In this company appears Robert Rich, Earl of War- wick, a whole length portrait by old Stone, after Vandyck. This Earl was the Lord High Admiral who fought for the Commonwealth during the Long Parliament ; he looks down upon us in his armour, with helmet laid aside, and the bare right hand grasping the truncheon of office. If antique Western art is illustrated by the Pompeian vases, a gigantic and Japanese vessel takes us to the far East. The picture of victorious but doomed Montrose on the battle-field is now generally attributed to Hobson, and not to Vandyck. Prince Rupert, however, the dashing and versatile cavalier, is an undoubted Vandyck, and an admitted portrait. Two of Charles the Second’s women simper from canvases over the doors. We are confronted with Prince Rupert again in an adjoining apartment, named, on account of its decorations, the Green or Gilt Drawing-room; but this is a half-length likeness, in which Vandyck shows us the Prince when something past middle age, and in less warlike guise. Amongst several por- traits of the Brooke family are those of WTlliam Lord Brooke and his wife, by Dabl ; under them is a pair of Italian wedding chests, gilded and painted in the style of a long past generation. The portrait by Moroni ot a warrior came from the Ro}ial gallery at the Hague ; a half-length, in armour, ot the Earl of Strafford, is Vandyck’s; Algernon Percy, Earl of Northumberland, Lord Warwick’s predecessor in the post of Lord High Admiral, is Dobson’s ; and we have portraits of Lord William Russell, and of Charles the First and his consort. But the masterpiece here is Rubens’ fine picture of Loyola. The great founder of a great order presents no dark and saturnine appearance, but is a man in the prime of life, with a flood of light qualifying the fiery enthusiasm of a noble countenance. Painted for the College of Justice at Antwerp, this picture, in the hurly-burly of the French Revolution, w r as brought to England, and purchased by Lord Warwick. On the same line is Janssen’s portrait of the Earl of Lindsay, who has every right to be here, for, wounded at Edgehill, he was brought prisoner to Warwick Castle, and died in the very hour of bis reception. His son, too, fighting hard to save his father, fell into the hands of the captors and, no summons from death setting him free, was kept in confinement for a considerable time in Guy’s Tower. To the curiosity- hunter, perhaps the most irresistible attraction will be the Florentine table from the Grim an i palace at Venice. This will not be wholly because the estimated value is ten thousand pounds, but because it is a peerless piece of mosaic, profusely patterned in precious stones. The Grimani arms, Pope’s triple crown, Warwick Castle.] THE STATU BED-ROOM. 27 Lion of St. Mark, Doge’s cap, Iveys of Saint Peter, and Cardinal’s liat, are figured in lapis lazuli, jasper, onyx, amethyst, malachite, and cornelian. What the glorious picture of Loyola is on the walls, this remnant of a historic Venetian palace is upon the floor of the Green Drawing-room. Our contemplation of the seventeenth century world is ended for a while in the State Bed-room, where stands the lofty, heavy bed- stead in whose dreary wastes Queen Anne slept. The popu- lar fancy has so little that is tangible to fasten upon in connection with Her Majesty, that this State Bed - room serves an educational purpose. The solid travelling trunks, so carefully preserved at the foot of the bed, held the Royal clothes; and its sensible brown leather exterior cover, studded with brass nails, suited the laborious style of travelling at a period when the flimsy ar- ticles which the modern rail- way porter delights to smash would have been useless. King George III. was good enough PLATE AT WARWICK CASTLE. to present this royal bedstead, with posts fifteen feet high, and faded upholstery of embroidered crimson, together with other furniture necessary in even a State Bed-room ; and over the fire- place is Queen Anne herself, from the brush of Sir Godfrey Ivneller. One special reason why this State Bed-room should be dedicated to the memory of Queen Anne is that in the annals of Warwick Castle she is a link with the present reign, some articles of its furniture having been used by Queen Victoria when her Majesty visited the Castle with Prince Albert. The adjoining boudoir, a small apartment, rich in paintings, contains Hol- bein’s portrait of Henry the Eighth; a Boar Hunt, by Rubens; a Dead Christ, on copper, by a follower of Correggio ; a striking character sketch of a Reformer, who, visitors are informed, was Miles Coverdale himself ; Saints, by Andrew D’Alsato; Charles the Second’s beauties, by Lely; a San Sebastian, by Van- dyck ; a remarkable picture from the Orleans collection, by Gerhard Douw ; 28 HISTORIC HO USES. [Warwick Castle. Card-players, by Teniers, and a landscape by Salvator Eosa. The portrait of Mary Boleyn, by Holbein, is believed to be the only one in existence. The Armoury passage, to which a concealed door in the wainscot opens, is furnished with a heterogeneous assortment of curiosities, collected from time to time by members of the Brooke family. A delicately-wrought suit of chain armour, of the time of the Crusades, will be flanked by Canadian paddles, or Maori and Fijian weapons. There are Turkish sci- mitars and rude Afghan match- locks, old spears and modern yataghans, Oriental daggers and swords, assegais hurled by the bronzed Zulu, and the ponderous battle-axe of the mediaeval knight. A New Guinea club sets off an old English cross-bow ; and the Bed Indian’s tomahawk is side by side with short Roman swords. Neighbouring Edgeliill contri- buted bugles and other wreckage from that disastrous field, and there are trumpets which sounded the call in the Peninsular War. A ghastly cast of Cromwell’s face, taken after death, appears in the mixture of odds and ends, comprising vessels, bows and ar- rows, bronzes, busts, equestrian figures, sphinxes, stirrups, spurs, and more or less formidable pikes captured from the Irish rebels during the risings of 1798, 1848, and the more recent Fenian times of 1868. Our tour is now nearly at an end, but w T e must not ignore the window of painted glass from Flanders, since we are bidden to believe that Eubens had a hand in the work. This is in the Compass-room, where a Laughing Boy, by Murillo, is placed so that the merry grin of the dark youngster is our first welcome. David’s much engraved portrait of the First Napoleon, a landscape by Salvator Eosa, and three small works by Eubens, are in this room. The Great Dining-room, which is only used on State occasions, is one of the apart- ments that were burnt out in 1871 ; but it has been restored as much as possible in keeping with the rest of the building. On either side of the fireplace are Warwick Castle.] THE SHAKSPEARE ROOM. 29 gilt figures from Venice; over it is Rubens’ sketch of lions for the Louvre picture ; and elsewhere is an amusing portrait of George the Third in his mother’s arms. The chapel, recently restored, is wainscoted in old oak, and in A DUTCH BURGOMASTER. ( From the Painting by Rembrandt, at WanoicTc Castle.) the passage of approach, an elaborate and masterly wood-carving copies, in full size, Rubens’ “Battle of the Amazons,” from the Munich gallery. A modern addition to the Castle has, in recent times, been made of a Shakspeare Room, and in this, the Kenilworth Buffet, presented to the Earl of Warwick by the town and county, is placed. The private apartments are not less rich in pictures by great masters than HISTORIC HOUSES. [Warwick Castle. those which have been described, and the history of the families who have sustained the title may be read in some of the portraits. Guy of Warwick may or may not have been a mythical personage. We have the equipment of the giant in the Great Hall ; the ribs of a terrible dun cow slain by him in single combat have been preserved ; a headless statuette discovered recently in excavating near the Castle is accepted as Sir Guy in the palmer’s garb worn previous to his combat with the gigantic Saracen ; there is Guy’s Tower in very substantial evidence ; and about a mile from Warwick, as everybody guage and rude woodcuts of early romance. The warrior became a hermit, and if he lived he died in 929. Safer than these legends however, are the known annals of the House of Warwick. We may begin with Henry de Newburgh, the first Earl of War- wick, a Norman, who came over with William the Conqueror, and died in 1123. In the reign of Henry III., the Earldom, by the marriage of an heiress, went to John do Plessit, and at his death the title reverted to his wife’s family, the lineal successor being William Mauduit, wdio died without issue, leaving the title and estates to his sister, wife of William de Beauchamp. This noble family retained the Earldom of Warwick till, again by right of a wife, it was assumed in 1449 by Richard Nevil. The Duke of Clarence, having married a daughter of Nevil, was the next Earl of Warwick, and a second Plantagenet held it for a while. Then the title lay in abeyance for nearly half a century, and was given by Edward VI. to Dudley, Viscount Lisle. In GUT OF WARWICK’S ARJIOUR AND PORRIDGE-POT. knows, is Guy’s Cliff, on a rocky eminence, a centre of lovely scenery, and offering the testimony of a cave which w r as Guy’s cell, and a memo- rial showing the faith in the legend held by Richard de Beauchamp, who had Richard II. for godfather, and w 7 as a great man in the State in the beginning of the fifteenth century. A “ full and true account” of the Saxon Earl’s “many famous and valiant actions, remarkable and brave exploits, and noble and re- nowned victories,” is em- balmed in the quaint lan- Warwick Castle.] GENEALOGICAL. 81 course of time it again became dormant, until it was revived by James I., by whom it was bestowed upon Robert Rich, Lord High Admiral. There were seven Earls of this line, but in 1759 another gap intervened. Then came the ennobling of Fulke Greville, the first Lord Brooke. It was his cousin’s son Robert, his successor, who fought for the Parliamentarians, and was killed at Lichfield. A later Lord Brooke, however, was a chief instrument in the restoration of Charles II. The Lord Brooke who was Recorder of Warwick in the middle of the last century, was made Earl Brooke of Warwick Castle, in 1746, and Earl of Warwick in 1752, assuming by special grant the crest of the ancient Earls. The Grevilles, although their motto is, “I can scarcely call these our own,” are paramount lords of Warwick Castle, and its very careful custodians. The situation of the Castle upon the river-side cliff, as shown in the illustration on page 17, renders it a notable landmark for many a mile, and the view from the limiting lodge affords the measure of distance required for a view of this historic house relatively to its surroundings. In passing round from the gateway into the streets of Warwick we soon lose sight of the Castle, but from the open country which it overlooks, and the knolls of the charming parks of the country-side, the massive towers are always visible. William Senioh. 32 FLOORS CASTLE. u KINGDOM for Oberon and Titania ! ” exclaims Sir Walter Scott of Floors and its environs. It is sooth that the family seat of the Dukes of Roxburgh e and its neighbour region still own fealty to the Queen of Faery. But the spell that rests on the ferny bank of Huntly Wood, in the quaint mazes AR nL 0 f!xm-RrHF KE of Elvandean, and under the shadow of the “ Eildon tree,” works differently at Floors. There is a noble grace, an ordered dignity, about its spacious lawns and the lines of the surrounding landscape that excludes the idea of this being the scene of the more frivolous pranks of fairyland. Here Titania’s train would meet only on state occasions. It is the choicest of spots for the marshalling of a host for an elfin raid, or for the holding of the Court revels of the green -jerkined people. The chief glory and ornament of Floors are its rivers. Two streams of Border history and tradition meet and mingle with the waters of Tweed and Teviot. The Tweed sweeps past park and wood and meadow in silver curves, and from the terrace of the Castle can be traced for miles the windings of Teviotdale. Below Floors the parent stream is “bridled with a curb of stone” — the great weir formed at Michael Scott’s magic word. Beyond the white waters of the “ Canid,” and its copse-clad islands, and the meeting with the Teviot, the river takes a noble breadth before it disappears under the arches of Rennie’s handsome bridge, between the spires and poplar trees and ruined Abbey tower of Ivelso, and the steep wooded bank of Maxwellheugh. Right opposite, crowning the ridge that separates the two streams — the “ March Mound ” of ancient Northumbria — runs a line of crumbling grey walls. of Old Roxburgh. Not a trace is to be found of the once famous “King’s burgh ” that stood near by. Its site was the strip of meadow-ground along the south bank of the Tweed, now occupied by the Kelso golf course,' and once a year by the merry-makers of “ St. James’s Fair.” Even of Old Rox- burgh Castle there remains only a huge wall, looking steeply down on one side on the Teviot, and on the other across the ancient moat, the Tweed, and the meadows to Floors. As decay fell on the feudal fortress and on the One moss-grown ruin rises ’tween the trees — The still-green trees, whose mournful branches wave In solemn cadence o’er the hapless grave 5 FLOORS CASTLE : THE NORTH FRONT. 34 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Floors Castle. Abbey — itself built for warlike defence as much as for prayer — Floors bourgeoned and grew. They speak of the past ; Floors stands for the present. A hint as to the meaning of the name will be found in the title of Floors given to the terraces of the great liill-fort on the Eildons. The “ Terraces,” or the “Floors,” admirably describes the magnificent situation of the palace built for John, first Duke of Roxburghe, by Sir John Vanbrugh in 1718. and improved by Playfair in 1839, when James, the sixth Duke, came hither to take up house after his marriage. The ground rises from the river side in gentle acclivities, followed by more level spaces, and the grand southern facade of the Castle crowns the summit. The front of the building, and the finest architectural grouping of its great central mass, its extended wings, and its many turrets and pinnacles, faces the north, or rather the north-west. But the favourite views are from the margin of the Tweed, and best of all, perhaps, are those from the Kelso Bridge and from the walls of Old Roxburgh Castle. The clean white stone of which the Castle is built, its background of lofty trees, and its broad lawns, undulating down to the river level, greatly heighten the impression which it makes from this side. Floors is a building which pleases more in the coup cVoe.il than when examined in detail. It owes comparatively few of its ornamental features to its original designer. Sir John Vanbrugh’s plan, if we may judge by the painting in the Entrance Hall, aimed at producing effect by mass rather than by elegance. The heavy, plain-featured, stolid looking pile with which that “better playwright than architect ” burdened the site smacked strongly of the early Hanoverian period to which it belonged. But there were hints of Tudor treatment which the later architect took care to emphasise and elaborate. With somewhat unpromising and unplastic materials to work upon, Playfair achieved conspicuously successful results. The square mass of the central building, rising above the basement to a height of three storeys, was surmounted by four corner towers. These were crowned by pavilion- topped turrets and corbelled pinnacles, and between them, and along the entire length of the facade, ran lines of battlements, further broken by clustered groups of chimneys. Fine effects of perspective, subordination, and light and shadow, were obtained by the extension and treatment of the wings, which enclose on either hand the kitchen and stable courts, and are ad- vanced or recessed beyond the lines of the main building. Over the whole structure, especially as viewed from the north side or front of the Castle, was distributed a great wealth of decorative detail, conforming to the general style. The flat surface of the walls was relieved by parapets and corbellings, and the line of the roof fretted by crocheted finials and rose, star, and Floors Castle.] THE GROUNDS AND GARDENS. other ornamental devices, including the unicorn’s head of Ker and the hoar’s head of Innes. Floors gained immeasurably, in stateliness as well as in grace, by these changes, which came not far short of reconstruction. The ornate porch, forming the principal entrance, is Playfair’s work, while the fine doorway to the eastern extension, forming the magnificent Ball-room, hears above it the date 1842. This adjunct, a notable feature of the southern facade of Floors, by reason of its lofty mullioned windows, was the last of the more 1. Game larder. 2. Game larder. 3. Fisli larder. 4. Maids’ room. 5. Cook’s room. 0. Pantry. 7. Pantry. 8. Store, 9. Vegetables. 10. Tool house. 11. Smoke house. 12. Scullery. 13, Drying-room. 14. Pantry. 15. Butler’s pantry. 16. Glass pantry. 17. Stair- case. IS. Drawing-room. 19. State dressing-room. 20. State bed-room. 21. Museum. 22. Needle-room. 23. Saddle-room. 24. Saddle-room. 25. Harness-room. 26. Cleaning-room. 27. Wasli-house. 28. Pigeon-house. 29. Fire engine. PLAN OF FLOOP.S CASTLE. important additions and improvements made under the competent direction of Playfair. The proportions of the Castle are seen to great advantage when approach- ing it through the avenues of superb beeches and oaks. Large as are many of these trees, very little of the wood in the park is of great age. The credit of its picturesque disposition, and of the general laying out of the grounds of Floors, is largely due to General Sir Charles Dalbiac, grand- lather of the present Duke, who also took a notable part in the plan- ning of the gardens. These lie to the westward of the Castle, screened from view' by a belt of tall trees. The conservatories of Floors are peculiarly rich in exotic plants, and wide is the renown of its “Tropical Avenue,” winding for 000 or 400 feet among the graceful foliage of palms and the brilliant blossoms of orchids. The present is at least the third site occupied by the gardens of Floors, l he first was close to the East Entrance Gate, on ground where had formerly 36 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Floors Castle. stood tlie market cross and some of the houses of Old Kelso ; and the green meadow below the Castle was also once laid out in formal parterres and flower beds. A favourite promenade is the “Long Walk,” which, shaded by fine timber, stretches westward from the house until it touches the river at the extremity of the grounds, near what is perhaps the finest salmon-cast in Tweed — the “Fishing Shiel.” THE SOUTHERN FACADE, LOOKING ACROSS THE TWEED. One need not make a pilgrimage to Floors in search of art treasures, antiquities, or old heirlooms. What mementoes of the past it possesses are in the surrounding soil and air, rather than exposed to the eye. A superb stair- case of oak ; a grand hall-room or banqueting hall, lofty and light, with fine mullioned windows ; a dining-room of noble proportions, commanding in three directions marvellously beautiful prospects of the Tweed-side and Teviotdale ; and an interesting collection of family and other portraits — these well-nigh exhaust its internal claims to he a “ show-place.” For the rest, the spirit that reigns within is one of home comfort and dignified privacy, seeking, not without success, to accommodate itself to a somewhat intricate ground plan of chambers and passages. Entering by the richly ornamented porch, the principal access from the north front of the Castle, you find yourself in a handsome lofty Entrance Hall, panelled with varnished oak, on the walls of wdiicli are hung, beside Floors Castle.] THE ENTRANCE IIALL some family portraits, several paintings to which time has given a high antiquarian value. Notable among these is a picture supposed to reproduce the plain features of Old Floors. The later Floors, planned and built by Vanbrugh; St. James’s Park and Whitehall, as they looked when they were peram- bulated by the beaux and fine ladies of the days of “ Great Anna ” and the early Georges ; Old Broxmouth, the dower house of the Ptoxburghe THE ROYAL BED-ROOM. THE BALL-ROOM. family, with other ingenuous landscapes, figures, and architec- tural pieces — help to give an air of antique dignity to the apart- ment. Leading from it, in suite, are the great public rooms of Floors — ante- drawing- room, great and smaller drawing-rooms, library, and dining-room — chambers of fine proportions, and furnished in a style that pleasingly combines the feeling of space and grandeur with that of homelike ease. The dining-hall, especially, is a noble chamber, all the more impressive because its aspect of rich stateliness is obtained without any straining after effect. The views from the windows 38 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Floors Castle. looking west and south are of almost unapproachable beauty. They range over the marvellous expanse of valley and hill, woodland and lawn, of which the faint Cheviots form the boundary line on the distant horizon, and they trace upward and downward many a league of Tweed and Teviot. The floors and panellings are of solid oak, and of carved oak of simple design are the mantelpieces and side tables. Looking down from the walls are the faces of the men who built the fortunes and the walls of Floors. Best worth study, perhaps, is the portrait, by George Jameson the Scottish Van- dyck, of Bobert Ker, first Earl of Roxburghe and founder of the family. His strong features bear out the testimony of his rival warden on the English side, Sir Robert Carey, who found him a foe of “harsh carriage,” but after two or three hunting bouts, a noble friend ; and of the Archbishop of York, who also had him in pledge, and described him as a man “ w T ise and valiant, but haughty and resolute.” He looks what he was — something of the courtier and something of the rough-riding Border Baron. He lived in times when land could be won both by hard blows and by the king’s favour. It was lie who slew the Laird of Ancrum, at His mother’s instigation, as men said, and made blood-feud between the tw r o great branches of the Kers-Cessford and Ferniehirst. It was he, also, who first of his race set foot down firmly at Floors. After the breaking up of the monastic houses, Kelso Abbey and its possessions bad been conferred upon that inveterate plotter and ne’er-do-well, Francis Stewart, Earl of Botliwell. The hue old Norman pile, whose founda- tion dates back to 1128, and whose mitred abbots disputed precedence with the prelates of St. Andrews, had been repeatedly sacked and burned and its inmates scattered. But it was rich in lands, and these, including the site of Floors, fell to the share of that favourite at Court, Robert Ker. He lived to see the middle of the seventeenth century, and to marry, at the age of 77, his third wife. But before he died he settled and unsettled the whole family succession, and made a great coil for future lawyers and genealogists to unravel. He was probably the first of the line to live at Floors — until his time farm and “waste,” in the occupation of the monks and their “kindly tenants.” While Old Floors was being built, Halydean, where Watling Street touches the base of the southern Fildon, was probably the family residence ; and the Roxburghe Kers, down to the last Duke, are buried in a vault at Bowden Church, near by. Of the old fortified Manor House, built close to the edge of “ St. Ringan’s Dean,” nothing remains hut a fragment of wall and a lintel with the unicorn’s head and three stars of Ker, the date 1530, and the inscription — “ Feir God: Fie from sin: Mak for the lyfe everlasting to the end.” It w r as pulled down to build farm steadings by a frugal steward of the Roxburghes. Even worse was the fate of another predecessor ol Floors — Floors Castle.] i ROMANCE OF THE PEERAGE. 39 the religious liouse of the Grey Friars, in the haugh across the river. Not a stone was left above another by the “English Hottentot-’’ (as Robert Burns indignantly called him), and the fine old monastic gardens and the great Trysting Tree of Friars disappeared to make place for potatoes. No vestige seems to survive of Old Floors, unless it be the hypothetical print in the Entrance Hall. It appears to have occupied the site of the present stately building, and probably made no pretensions to architectural effect. Timothy Pont’s map of 1647 figures it as surrounded by a park ; and the Gala Law and the “Hangman’s Ladle,” which took toll of every sack of corn entering Kelso, exist to testify of its day of seigniorial rights. It was a rendezvous ol Royalists in the time of the Civil War, and General Leslie sent an ex- pedition which captured the old first Earl when he was supposed to be plotting mischief in his house of Floors. Here in the dining-room, also, is the portrait, by Reynolds, of John, the first Duke, who fought at Slieriffmuir, and got his strawberry leaves for services rendered at the Union of the Parliaments, and beside him is his Duchess, also by Sir Joshua. Of Robert, the second Duke, whose portrait by Allan Ramsay hangs near by, perhaps the most remarkable thing recorded is the chance men- tion he once made at a dinner table, in the hearing of his son, the Marquis of Bowmont, about a wonderful old edition that had come into his hands, for it aroused in the bosom of the youth a passion for book-hunting that en- dured in him for nearly half a century, and brought together one of the richest collections of old ballad poetry, metrical romances, dramas, and scarce tracts, ever in private hands. The bookworm Duke never married, although Sir Walter Scott is a witness to his courtly charm of face and manner, somewhat imperfectly reproduced in Battoni’s portrait. The oft-told tale is that he loved and was be- loved by a daughter of the reigning Duke of Mecklenburg- Strelitz, and elder sister of Queen Charlotte. Court etiquette stepped in to prevent a match, other- wise suitable, which would have made the elder sister the subject of the younger. The lovers vowed themselves to celibacy, and faithfully kept the vow, thereby nearly bringing to an end the House of Roxburghe. The Library is a luxuriously appointed chamber, with windows opening to the south and west. But one looks in vain along its well-filled shelves, replete with solidly-bound classical works, for any remnant of the rare old editions brought together by the third Duke. Few of these precious volumes were ever permanently housed at Floors ; and in the modern library, almost the only relic of the world-famous collection is the catalogue, in which will be found duly marked the item of £2,260 paid for the first edition of Boc- caccio’s “ Decameron,” printed by Valdarfar, of Venice, once again sent on its travels by the dispersion of the Marlborough library ; and the entry of a 40 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Floors Castle. thousand guineas for Caxton’s grand folio “Recuyell of tlie Historyes of Troy.” One or two of the old portraits hung in the library make some little amends for the dearth of interest, to an antiquary’s eye, in the shelves. A world of Jacobite associations — melancholy rather than gay — lingers about the thoughtful face of Robert, the third Earl of Roxburghe, who went down with the Gloucester frigate, as she was con- veying the Duke of York from Leith to the Thames ; we see also the hand- some form of the Duke of Perth, of the ’45 Rebellion, who risked and lost lands and titles in the same thankless cause. A grand staircase of carved oak con- ducts you to the upper storeys of the Castle. Lining its walls, lighted from the domed roof, are a host of family pictures, most of them busts and kit- cats, and some of no great artistic merit. Among them a place of honour is re- served for Sir Godfrey Ivneller’s portrait of George III., the kind patron and friend of the third Duke. Lrom the first land- ing there is access to the Duchess’s apartments, beyond which is the magni- ficent suite of rooms set apart for the Queen on the occasion of her visit to Lloors in August, 18G7. This visit is the latest historic event in the history of Floors. The spirit of enthusiastic loyalty aroused at the old centre of Border Jacobitism and mustering-place of rebels is still proudly remembered in the neighbourhood. At night the bale-fires blazed again on every liill-top. The Wellingtonia planted by Her Majesty’s hands to the westward of the house is guarded and watched with as reverent care as the holly-tree in the park below, marking the spot where James II., King of Scots, was killed by the bursting of his great brass cannon, while besieging Old Roxburgh. The Royal Bed-Room, with its beautiful maple furniture and portraits of princely personages, is preserved unchanged. By a winding stair and sliding panel it has private access to the sumptuously-furnished Great Drawing-Room below, where are fine portraits, by Raeburn, of James, fifth Duke, and of his second wife. Floors Castle.] THE VICISSITUDES OF SUCCESSION. 41 With this portly and sagacious-looking gentleman of the old school came in the present Roxburghe line of the Innes-Kers. To connect it with the parent stem of Cessford, it was necessary, for the second time within a couple of years, to hark hack to the early part of the seventeenth centuiy, and to the founder of Floors, Robert, the first Earl. When Duke John of the Books died, the succession passed through a line of impecunious Lords Bellendean, one of whom is figured in “ Kay’s Por- traits ” as fiddling for his jorum of punch to a childless octogenarian, who died in little more than a year after coming into possession of the titles and estates. Again the lawyers had to re- turn to the fountain head, and, after long and costly litigation, discovered the rightful heir in Sir James limes, of Innes, of a long-pedigreed Morayshire family, about whom the saying goes that the succession never went to or through a woman, and that the head of the house never had an ill wife, and never had a friend who suffered for his debt. Their lands — rolling links of bent and shingle, between Spey and Lossie, backed by bristling fir woods, which shelter from the north wind the white towers of Innes, now the heritage of the Duke of Fife — were sold to carry on the “ guid-ganging plea,” with the reward that Innes-Kers now reign at Floors. Yet once more a new struggle in the law courts, in default of direct heirs to Floors and the dukedom, seemed looming ahead when the lady figured on Raeburn’s canvas bore a son — father of the present owner of the house and title — to her husband, who had already turned four-score. Now the Rox- burghe line has vigorous young slips growing up, and appears to be planted in perpetuity at Floors. In the great drawing-room, in the elegant Needle drawing-room, which opens off it, and in the boudoirs and bed-rooms above, may be seen many evidences of the tastes and pursuits of the present occupants of the Castle : among the rest, magnificent screens painted by the hands of the Duchess (a daughter of the late Duke of Marlborough), and water-colour drawings G 42 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Floors Castle. of the Highland and Scandinavian scenes where it is the delight of the pre- sent master of Floors, as it was that of his father, to resort yearly for shooting and fishing. The later generations of owners of this historic house have been patrons of the manly outdoor sports — hunters and fishers — rather than art collectors. Even of the creator of the Roxburglie Library, and namefather of the Roxburglie Club, it is recorded that he would show as much patience in watching at grey dawn for a shot at a wild goose in the Cheviots as in hunting down some tall folio or rare old tract in the bookshops. Their doughty deeds are manifest in the Museum and the Corridor leading to the Billiard Room, in the shape of trophies of fur, feather, and fin. No one will explore this part of the Castle without pausing to admire and wonder at the form of the huge 60 lb. salmon drawn from a favourite cast in the Tweed by an ordinary fly and tackle ; to glance over the fine collection of birds, including a specimen of that rarci avis , the Great Auk ; and to look with interest at the cabinet made of the wood of the ancient “ Trysting Elm ” of Friars, in which are treasured, with other curiosities, the ponderous keys of Old Rox- burgh and Cessford Castles. A great part of the historic ground, stretching away to the range of Cheviot, which can be surveyed from the Castle terrace, or, better still, from its battle- ments, still belongs to the head of that branch of the fierce and turbulent border clan of Iver which has now for two hundred years been settled at Floors. The first of the name known to have been a man of mark in the district was John Iver, “from the Forest of Selkirk,” who, about the middle of the fourteenth century, held from his overlord, the Earl of Douglas, the lands of Mow and Altonburn, lying high up the Bowmont Water, and at one time possessions of Walter, the first High Steward, and of the Avenels. A strong hand — and, according to Hogg, the Kers were all “bred left-handed men, and fence against them there was nane ’’—was needed to protect the owner’s head and the passes of the kingdom on this wild frontier. England and ' Scotland, and the East and Middle Marches, meet on the hills overlooking the green valley. From the Cribhead, what in the old “Boundaries” is called “the passage and bye-way of the Thief” came down upon Mow from the wastes of Ividland. Higher up Bowmont was the Cocklaw, where Kers succeeded Gladstones ; and where were wont to take place the meetings of the Wardens of the Marches, to settle quarrels and to surrender pledges — meetings often ending in fresh strife and bloodletting. The Wardenship of the Scottish side was shared between or disputed by the Kers of Cessford and Fernieliirst —ancestors of the noble families of Roxburglie and Lothian — and the Scotts of Buccleucli, and thereby hangs a long and bloody tale of Border feud. Thus the early family history of the Kers is stormy and stirring. They Floors Castle.] TIIF/ RISE OF THE KERS. 43 had a genius not only for fighting, but for fighting on the winning side. When the power of the Douglases began to crumble, they became Crown vassals, and the family fortunes mounted rapidly. They won new lands, and held, as they do still, the old. They kept a hawk’s eye upon the wild tracts of moor and pasture and peat hog, where even in the old days of foray there was, as Dandie Dinmont says, “mail’ stabling for horses than change-houses for men,” and where all is now utterly abandoned to the curlew and the sheep. But they moved their household gods, and extended their bounds, from the Bowmont to the Kale, from the Kale to the Teviot, and finally from the Teviot to the margin of the Tweed. At what date they became masters of Cessford may not be accurately known. The ruined Castle of Cessford stands in a lonely place, on a slope overlooking a little side glen of the Kale Water, some eight miles from Floors. The roof is gone, and all about it is bare and deserted. A few sapling ashes grow in the crannies of the stone, but Time has riven the thick walls which Surrey, in 1523, found so hard to breach, and has thrown down the grand old “Crow Tree” that stood so long beside Habbie Ker’s stronghold. Since 1650 it has ceased to be a dwelling place of Kers. It was last in use as a prison for the Conventicle-holders of Kaleside. Long before even this time the Kers had flitted to a warmer nest, and had feathered it with the spoils of Old Roxburgh and of Kelso Abbey. These are the nearest neighbours of Floors, and have been the beginning of its fortunes. But the whole surrounding country is crowded wdtli scenes of Border romance and history. Within a twelve-mile radius of Floors are the famous monastic houses of the Tweed Valley — Melrose, Dryburgh, Jedburgh, and Coldstream, as well as Kelso. The circuit would embrace a large slice of the English Border. It would include the site of Flodden, Ancrum Moor, and other famous fights and skirmishes of the days of “rugging and riving”; the ruins of scores of ancient peels and keeps, camps and cairns, and the scenes of a hundred ballads. On the sky-line behind Floors rises the square massive form of Hume Castle, with a little hamlet crouching in the cleft of the rock behind it. Hume looks, on one side, across the plain of the Merse to the Lammermoors, and on the other, be- yond the Tweed valley to the Cheviots. In aspect and in position it is the type of the Z winger - — the Bobber Baron’s Castle of feudal days — and its his- tory accords not ill with its grim features. Another sentinel on these heights, commanding from the north the Vale of Tweed, is Smailholm Tower. Every schoolboy knows that beside this shat- tered keep, gazing down on the fair scene below, and away to the “ distant Cheviots blue,” Scott, while a child, drank in the spirit of Border romance. From whatever side Floors is approached, the forms of Hume and Smailholm seem to shift places mysteriously, like the triple heads of the weird Eildons, as if 44 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Floors Castle. they were pacing guard upon the hilltops. The hanging woods of Stichell and Newton-Don ; the “linn” and the sylvan glades of the Eden water; Ednam, at whose country manse the poet of the “Seasons” was born; Rosebank, and the Great Elm under which Sir Walter Scott, while a weakly OLD VIEW OP FLOORS CASTLE, FROM PAINTING IN ENTRANCE HALL. lad attending Kelso Grammar School, pored over the pages of “Percy’s Reh iques ” ; Nenthorn, whilom the summer retreat of Alexander Russel, the genial journalist and angler ; Hendersyde, Mellerstain, Broomlands, Makerstoun ; and, beyond Teviot, the rich woodlands of Springwood, Woodendean, and Sunlaws, the darker pine trees of the Duke of Roxburghe’s hunting-seat of Bowmont Forest, the green hills of Ilownam and Morebattle, and behind all the soft blue line of Cheviot, with peeps here and there of Haddon Rig, and Ruberslaw, and Bunion, and Minto Crags, and Penielheugh with its tall monument, and other famous border heights — these are part of the rich “setting” of which Floors is the centre jewel. John Geddie. HATFIELD HOUSE: THE APPIIOACH. HATFIELD HOUSE. rrvriE first sight of a famous place, like the first sight of a A- famous person, is interesting and important. One lias heard or read a great deal about it: it already exists in the mind, and as the thing in fact is greater or less than the thing in idea, so one is pleased or vexed. It were hut just, then, to take the place at its best. And this you cannot do in the case of Hatfield House. The chief entrance is on the south side. There is here a tall gate tower with a clock tower behind. The front is built of fine Caen stone, right and left are projecting wings. A gently sloping avenue of great breadth, flanked with noble trees, stretches along towards London. One ought to ride up that avenue with solemn magnificence in a coach with six white horses, as the Cecils once did, and he received with stately ceremony by a crowd of dependents. If the best time were chosen, it would be a calm summer evening, and one might well step out and walk a part of the way, were it only to admire the old masses of brick warmed to a deeper red by the sunset, the light flashed back from long rows of windows, the quaint garden banks that still have choice of sun or shade. But the railway came and planted a station just at the back of the house, so that you approach on the north side, with a feeling that ARMS OF THE MARQUIS OF SALISBURY. 40 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Hatfield House. you are not treating so august a place with proper respect, and, it may be, a recollection of a scriptural passage about those who enter not the right way. Just opposite the station there is a fine gate of open iron-work. When this is entered, a moderately steep hill has to be climbed ; on the right, at a lower level, is the village. It is small, and many of the houses are picturesque and old, with projecting fronts. It consists of two streets, one at the foot of the hill, the other at right angles, going straight up. Still going up, you turn to the right, and see Hatfield House set on the highest summit, and crowned by a clock tower. The house is a huge mass of weather-beaten and yet perfectly solid brickwork, with projecting square turrets, and an abundance of windows of great variety of size. It rises from a sort of terrace which is approached by steps, and from this there are other steps to the outer door, the chief entrance on this north side. Authorities differ, in a comically outrageous way, as to the length ; we may take it roughly at 250 feet, and the width through the middle at 70 feet. TT le side, however, is about 150 feet wide, for two wings run out from the south, so that the whole has the form of the three sides of a square. There is a good deal of stone work, and the brick is covered here and there with ivy. To the west is a fine brick building of more ancient aspect than the house itself. This is the remains of Bishop Morton’s old palace, now partly stable and partly dependents’ houses, the whole so well preserved and so well kept that you cannot call the uses base. Thus in regular ascent one has the village, with the church, then the old palace, and finally Hatfield House, which dominates all with a certain air of protection, and yet may be said to be linked by the church, and still more by the yard where peer and peasant meet at last on terms of very real equality, to the humbler erections on the hill slope. On the west and east side of the house are two gardens : the front, the Privy Garden, very old, with a sort of arbour, formed by the ingenious bend- ing of trees and boughs, running all round it. That on the east is possibly less used, but it is quite as interesting. It is the old English garden of two centuries ago, inspired by a quaint and pleasing formality. But to be enjoyed perfectly, it must be seen from the outside. A modern long hat and black coat kill the charm. Ah ! if it could be filled with figures in doublet and hose, and ruffs, or even with wigs and swords, and some brave touch of colour in the garment, then ’twere a sight indeed ! Descending from the terrace, the visitor has right before him the bowling green. It is in excellent condition, but there are no bowls to be seen. Can it be that here — as elsewhere in the Sorrtli — that fine old game, still fondly cherished in North Britain, is a lost art? Then, after some flower beds, there is the maze— a very large one; and below this is a huge artificial lake, where a sufficient number of swans and ducks disport themselves. Hatfield House.] THE COUNTRY ROUND ABOUT. 47 Before dealing more in detail with the house, something may be said of the park, and of the country around Hatfield. They are perfection, but not the highest kind of perfection. There is not the unique and un- approachable effect which sea and mountain give to a landscape. Here are but gently swelling heights, clumps of ancient trees, stretches ot Dress 0 Room Ash Dress’ Room Lord S s Bed Room Ash Room Study Lime Room Chestnut Room Dressing Room Lime Dressing Room ChapLn's Room Chapel Morning Room Myrtle Roor.' Yew Room Kitchen Half Storey Summer Drawing Room Steward'sHaoam&eve Room Bstair^ase North Hall Marble Hall pantry GROUND PLAN OF HATFIELD HOUSE. cultivated fields, pleasant meadows by the side of the river Lea, frequent hamlets clustering round their old churches. There is nothing majestic or terrible, little even that is imposing, but there is everything that is soothing and restful and quiet, the very “ abodes of ancient peace.” The atmosphere itself partakes of all this. If it has not the rare, the delicate charm, that in- spires the air of a northern summer, if it is never transfused with the strong rich colours of the south, it is quiet and restful to mind and eye. A haze often hangs here, the toned-down effect, presumably, of London’s smoke. It is a long time before one gets into the country at all, for the park is of huge extent. It consists of a number of gentle summits — that on which the house stands is considerably higher than the others — and is full of immemorial elms and of oaks as old as oaks may well be. Many are but trees in ruin, but, tended with curious care, they promise survival to distant years. When one seems about 48 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Hatfield House. to fall, it is carefully propped up, so that it looks for all the world like an old man supported by a crutch! The late Bishop Wilberforce used to tell a story — not without a touch of the comical — about these trees. He and Mr. Gladstone were on a visit to the Marquis of Salisbury, and all three were walking in the park — Gladstone as much interested in the size of the oaks, their probable age, and the various interesting trees, as if he had nothing else to think about.” So far the Bishop, but one cannot help believing that Lord Salisbury listened to his political opponent with some apprehension, as he reflected on his other than political reputation ; nay, possibly cast a rapid glance around in fear that some heedless woodman had left his axe conspicuous on the sward ! The park, then, with its suggestion of human care and interest, meeting the visitor at every step, is in every way a fitting environment for the house. It is quite clear. There is nothing between the grass and the trees. No thickets or brushwood here, just as there is no or almost no shrubbery in the immediate precincts of the house. This, again, is not a castle , but in truth a house — a real English home, built at a time when English life had become practically as even and regular as it is to-day, so that dwelling and comfort, and not refuge, were the things studied, for the towers and turrets that mark it, as they do other Elizabethan and Jacobean houses, are but ornamental survivals and reminiscences of an earlier and wilder time. And again, as is the character of park and house, so is their history. Hatfield House has not the pathetic interest of Holyrood, nor are her annals tragic and terrible as those ol the Tower. They give us an essentially domestic story, and yet it has its own attraction, and well deserves its own place in our record. The name of Hatfield (let us begin at the beginning) so the learned — or some of them at any rate — aver, means Heathfield, the cleared heath. True, it is not a heath, and it never seems to have been cleared, but possibly etymo- logical like other dreams go by contraries; and then others suggest that “hat” is a corruption of “ bout,” so that it is really the high field, though as about the time of the Conquest (is it not written in Doomsday Book ?) it was called Hetfelle, neither theory seems quite satisfactory. It was then held by the Abbot of Ely, to whose predecessor in the time of St. Dunstan it had been gil ted by King Edgar. The present church, or rather some small part ol it (it "was restored in 1871 by the Marquis of Salisbury), dates from that far-off epoch. Even then the oaks grew thick and lav, for there was “ pannage (viz., mast of the forest) for two thousand hogs.” In such glades the lot of these old English porkers must have been a happy one ; still more happy that of those who feasted on them! In 1108 the “golden rhetoric” of the Abbot persuaded Henry I. to erect Ely into a bishop’s see. The new prelate took up his abode at Hat- field, and parted the lands between himself and the monks. The proportion was 7 THE GARDENS. 50 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Hatfield House. three to one, or thereabouts, and there was much grumbling — but to no purpose — from the monks. During the next few centuries the records of Hatfield as detailed by Matthew Paris and the other dry-as-dust chroniclers are dull enough reading, but here and there one does get a glimpse of the strange old mediaeval life. As for instance : — in 1269, Hugh Balsham was elected bishop without the consent of King Henry III. Thereupon, William de Yalence, Earl of Pembroke, half brother to His Majesty, broke into Hatfield Park, hunted the deer, and refreshed himself and his companions rather well than wisely on the contents of the episcopal cellar. There we see the true mediaeval baron, who was so very much the overgrown schoolboy ! The true mediaeval priest is seen in another Bishop of Ely, who, besides, was Cardinal Archbishop of Rouen. This was Louis de Luxembourgh, a great man in his day, yet not perhaps so great as he fancied himself. He seems to have thought it likely the Church would make him a saint, and folk would “ longen to go on pilgrimage ” to his various remains. So by his will lie left bits of himself far and near. Hatfield Church got his bowels, but there is no record of the use made of the strange gift. A much later bishop, Nicholas West, shows a better side of the medigeval character. “Daily he gave at his gate warm meate and drinke to two hundred poor folke.” This was obviously in complete disregard of every principle of political economy, but that science was not then invented. The most important Bishop of Ely for us, however, was the famous John Morton, who, in Edward IY.’s time was Archbishop of Canterbury and Chancellor of England. He rebuilt the episcopal palace at Hatfield, between 1479 and 1486. This is the old building we have met with as “ Morton’s Palace.” There still remains a tower of red brick, flanked by two wings. Here is the old banqueting hall, of which the open and ornamental timber roof is still sound and perfect. At one end of the hall was a chapel, at the other a very fine archway, all which may yet be seen to-day. Though the place is fallen from its high estate and used as offices, it has a certain old-world interest that Hatfield House — -which, after all, belongs quite to the modern time — does not possess. How excellently well those long-vanished builders did their work ! Go a little way towards London, and one may find miles of houses built a few years ago, and already more dilapidated than this ancient pile. They are of brick and so is it, but then there is evidently brick and brick. This has the solidity of stone, that the instability of dirt. The most modern thing to he noticed here is a tablet on the wall on the west side. An inscription records that the last charger of the Duke of Wel- lington was presented by his successor to Mary, Marchioness of Salisbury, in 1852, and that on its death in February, 1861, it was buried near this spot. Hatfield House.] HENRY VIII.’S CHILDREN AT HATFIELD. 51 In 1538 the domain of Hatfield again came, for about a century, into the possession of the Crown — King Henry VIII. having exchanged certain other lands for it with the then bishop. The reader need scarcely be reminded that when this “prince of a most royal courage,” as Wolsey described him, took a fancy to anything, he very speedily seized upon it. In some cases these ex- VI EW OF IIATFIELD HOUSE FROM THE PARK. changes of his were quite illusory, but possibly not so here, as Bishop Good- rich was a devoted adherent — perhaps one ought to say creature— of his, and so may have got better terms than many of his episcopal brethren. It had already for some time been the residence of the King’s sister Mary, dowager Queen of France and wife to Charles Brandon, Duke of Suffolk, and here, on the 17th June, 1517, was born the Lady Frances Brandon, mother of Lady Jane Grey, who calls to mind somewhat ruefully, in a letter to Roger Ascliam, the “pinches, nips, and bobs,” received at her hands. This birth, by the way, was a strange event to happen in an episcopal palace of the old time, and shows that the ancient order of things was more than beginning to change. Hatfield is intimately connected with the history of Henry VIII. ’s children. Here Edward VI., a precocious boy of nine, studied French under a future Bishop of Ely, and it was here, in 1547, that the news reached him of his father’s death. His elder sister Mary was again and again at the place HISTORIC HOUSES. [Hatfield House. 52 whilst Elizabeth was here, a child, and here, during Mary’s reign, Elizabeth resided in a sort of dignified imprisonment. Her governor was Sir Thomas Pope, and one can w’ell imagine the difficulties of his position. Were he too lenient he displeased the Queen that w r as ; were he too strict he displeased the Queen that was to be. And those Tudors were such awkward people to aggravate ! Conduct they didn’t like they called high THE ARMOURY. treason, and for that there was only one punishment. However, Sir Thomas managed very w T ell. He entertained Elizabeth over and over again with those strange, grotesque allegorical pageants which w r ere the delight of the age. Thus at Shrovetide, 1556, there was a “ greate and rich maskinge in the Great Halle, at Hatfield, where the pageants w T ere marvellously furnished.” No doubt they w r ere, for here is one, “the devise of a castell of clothe of gold, sett with pomegranates about the battlements, with shields of knights hanging therefrom, and six knights in rich harness turneyed ; ” and something else besides the eye was gratified, for there was a “banket of seventie dishes,” succeeded by “thirty spyse plates ” (oh, the capacity of those Tudor stomachs !), and for sequel “ the next day the play of Holo- phernes.” There were inquisitive eyes to note, and officious tongues to report, all this at London, where it caused some displeasure, and a hint was given to Hatfield House.] ELIZABETH AT HATFIELD. Sir Thomas to conduct affairs more quietly. He gave but little heed, for we have another account of a hunting expedition, when Elizabeth rode forth attended by “ a retinue of twelve ladies, clothed in white sattin, on ambling MANTEL IN HATFIELD HOUSE. palfries, and twenty yeomen in green all on horseback,” and was met by “fifty archers in scarlet boots and yellow caps, armed with golden bows.” One of them presented her with a silver-headed arrow, winged with peacocks’ feathers. 54 HIST OHIO HOUSES. [Hatfield House. To give a touch of realism to the affair a buck was produced, and Elizabeth cut its throat. The women of that day were not very qualmish. When Mary visited her sister at Hatfield she was entertained with songs, and music, and bear-baiting. And Elizabeth was equal to a good round oath or two when she lost her temper — and that was not seldom. Mary died on the 17th November, 1558. Her sickness was known at Hatfield, and during the last few days many a visitor posted down to fawn him- self into favour. Elizabeth was some- what disgusted, and long afterwards referred to the matter. She thought of a distant yet certain day, when men would be sending messages from her sick couch to her successor. The official intimation only came on Satur- day, the 19th. The story goes that she was seated under an oak in the park when the messenger rushed to her with the news that the Lords were waiting at the palace to salute her as Queen. She hastened home- wards, and on her way dropped her hat. Is it not preserved in Hatfield House to this day ? “ Princesses don’t sit under oak trees in Novem- ber,” croaks the sceptic, “ and then — ” but we refuse to hear him. It was surely Queen’s weather on that of all occasions, and then it was only a late autumn day, mild and dry, with a touch of sunlight on the fallen leaves and the bare branches. Das mtigen die letzten Kusse Des scheidenden Sommers sein ! And then there is the very oak ! You leave the house by the north door, descend the terrace, and go for some little distance between two rows of tall trees. A gate on the right admits to another avenue. At the end of this is Queen Elizabeth’s oak — an old stump about twelve feet in height, the top having some grotesque resemblance to a face. It is propped up on three sticks, bound with iron, plastered over with lime, and surrounded with a substantial paling of some height, so that the Philistine cannot hack his name thereon, nor the tourist (that odd pilgrim of our own time) remove it Hatfield House.] THE BUI IDEE, OF HATFIELD HOUSE. 55 piecemeal for relics. A new tree, the result of some chance acorn, is growing out of the top, but the oak itself seems as dead as well may be. About half a century ago it still bore acorns. Queen Victoria, on her visit to Hatfield in 1846, took one away to plant at Windsor. It never shed another, so the graceful though modern legend runs. One is induced to hold fast by the story of Queen Elizabeth’s oak, for one special reason. Hatfield House is not rich in legends. Place such a mansion in Scotland, or Ireland, or Germany, and every room in it and every place round it would have its story ; but the peaceful and orderly development of English life has well-nigh killed romance. Nihil est ah omni parte heaturn. The historian of Hatfield does feel tempted to gird at successions of prosaically law-abiding generations. It is during Elizabeth’s reign that the builder of Hatfield House, as we now have it, first comes on the scene. Robert Cecil (created Earl of Salisbury in 1605) was the second son of Lord Burghley, the famous Lord High Treasurer. He succeeded to most of his father’s infiuence, and in the next reign filled the same high office. His career and character are not for us here. He had few friends and many enemies, but in that respect he was but as other statesmen of the day. He ruled vigorously and well, and was much superior to any of James’s later advisers. Some personal details are of interest for our present purpose. He was a courtier, and knew how to climb, and in climbing he had to put up with a good deal. He was a small man — a trifle over five feet, and his “head, squarely set on rounded and disproportioned shoulders, gave him the appearance of being deformed.” His enemies indeed averred that he had “ a wry neck, a crooked back, and a splay-foot,” but 'this is an obvious exaggeration. Now the Elizabethan dress was a very handsome dress, but it required a very handsome man inside it. ’Twas the very attire for Raleigh or Sidney, but poor Robert Cecil in those tight scarlet stockings and large ruff! The aspect of him seems to have given good Queen Bess infinite amusement, and she was never tired of inventing nicknames. He was “the little man,” “the pigmy,” “the elf,” or 'eXfa as she comically wrote it. He felt the not particularly delicate witticisms. “ I received a gracious letter from Her Majesty under her sporting name of pygmy,” he writes to his father, and again he sent a letter (he knew she would see it) in which he says, “I mislike not the name she gives me only because she gives it.” Thus he made his very deformity help him on, as his relative, Sir Francis Bacon, writes of him in one of those brief and bitter essays of his. Even James, Scot as he was, saw the joke and called him “my little beagle.” With this sovereign, whose interest he had carefully studied, Cecil was in high favour. He entertained the King, on his way south, for some days at Theobalds, the seat his father had left him. Both James and his Queen 56 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Hatfield House. took a fancy to the place, and in 1607 it was exchanged for Hatfield. Cecil was pleased with his acquisition, and at once set about great changes. He enclosed two large parks (afterwards united), one for red, the other for fallow deer, and, discontented with the site and accommodation of the place, he set about building the present house on the high ground to the east. The thing was like a toy to him — the only toy he had. He seems to have been his own architect, at least as far as the ground idea of the house went. The building was not completed till 1611, and, in- deed, it was not ready for occupa- tion when he died in 1612. Such sarcasms of fate are too common to deserve the cheap moralising of which they are made the subject. He had no doubt more pleasure in building than he ever would have had in occupying his man- sion. The cost was £7,631 11s. 3d., which, if we consider the then cheapness of labour, and the still greater dearness of money, was a truly enormous sum. He got the materials far and near. The leaden roof was the wonder of the time. £500 worth of Caen stone came from France, the clay for bricks was at hand, and a good part of the old palace was built into the new. As for oak, there was the park. The grounds were laid out by the best gar- deners of the day. Friends sent gifts of trees and shrubs ; my Lord Coke presented Cecil with “ a, Norfolk tumbler for bis warren.” At which gilt one is inclined to suspect a covert sarcasm. But the vinery was the great out-of-door work, and to stock it 20,000 vines were brought from France, at a cost of £50. It lies a little way north of Queen Elizabeth’s oak, on the banks of the Lea. It is entered through a charming little summer-house (the very place for afternoon tea), and you find it not unworthy of the reputation it has had all along. In 1643 John Evelyn notes its magnificence. Garrulous Samuel Pepys tells us that on the 22nd THE CLOCK TOWEK. Hatfield House.] FAMILY FORTUNES. 57 July, 1661, lie “walked all down to the vineyard, which is now a very beautiful place again,” and then through “all the gardens, such as I never saw in all my life, nor so grand flowers, nor so great gooseburrys as large as nutmegs.” And here (7tlr August) there is another bit of Pepys, which must he quoted : “Bayted and walked into the great house, through all the courts, and I would fain have stolen a pretty dog that followed me, hut I could not, which troubled me.” One suspects that Pepys remembered that stealing dogs is not larceny at common law, hut at any rate the frank impudence of the confession is quite delicious. To resume, the first Earl of Salisbury lost in childhood his eldest son, whom King James had, as godfather, held in his arms at the font, and pro- mised all sorts of honours. Thus on his death in 161‘2 he was succeeded by his younger son William, of whom we know little. This is unfortunate for his memory, for, adhering, after some hesitation, to the popular side in the Civil War, he is the subject of one of those marvellous word portraits which adorn Clarendon’s History. In this case the colours are of the blackest, and we have little independent testimony to judge by. His grandson and successor, James (died 1683), was of the same way of thinking, and Miss Strickland tells us, with pious horror, that when the Duke of York (afterwards James II.) and his wife were on their way to Scotland in 1679 they stopped, after notice, at Hat- field House, and were received in the most shameful manner. The Earl had betaken himself elsewhere, first locking up everything. The visitors, after some search, discovered “2 does on the hall table, one barrel of small beer, and a pile of faggots.” The Duke took them, but, in high dudgeon, insisted on paying for the beer and wood, and the payment was accepted. The venison was possibly provided by the eldest son James (died 1693), afterwards fourth Earl, who was a devoted Jacobite. “ Salisbury was foolish to a proverb. His figure was so bloated by sensual indulgence as to be almost incapable of moving, and this sluggish body was the abode of an equally sluggish mind.” So far Macaulay. But then Macaulay is as keen a partisan as Clarendon, and it is conceivable that it the dates of the two Earls had been exchanged, both might have had milk and honey, instead of gall and vinegar, for their portions. Another Royal visit was that of King George III., who, on the 13th January, 1800, reviewed the militia of the county and the local yeomanry and volunteers. A sumptuous dinner was provided in King James’s room. The Royal family and their entertainers sat at one table, the “nobility and gentry” at another, “the militia, yeomanry, and volunteers sat down to 25 tables placed on the lawn, and forming a circle of about two hundred and forty yards,” whilst round it all, “ in the form of a horse-shoe, were some three miles 8 58 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Hatfield House. of carriages and wagons decorated with oak houghs.” So remarkable an occasion deserved memorial, and so a large picture of the Marquis was painted and engraved (probably in the older local taverns copies may still he found), and “ H. Dundas ” (he was not Lord Melville yet) sent, by His Majesty’s command, a letter of felicitation to Lord Salisbury. That letter is written in very stilted and wooden English, and indeed the whole pro- ceedings have a certain comical touch of fatuity about them, which nevertheless has its charm. Well for the nation that such prosaic rejoicing could take place in the very midst of that terrible struggle with Napoleon. And were not Tra- falgar and Waterloo to come and he its justification ? One word more and this brief historical sketch is finished. On 27th November, 1835, the west wing of the house was burned, and the aged dowager Marchioness perished before help carne. James the second Marquis died in 1868, and was succeeded by the present peer. Of the former it is not necessary, of the latter it would not he becoming, here to speak. And now, going inside the house, we encounter real difficulty of descrip- tion. You go through room after room, King James’s Room, the Chestnut Room, the Yew Room, the Rose Bed-room, the Cherry Bed-room, etc., and you pass up stairs and down stairs, you see a vast number of rare, splendid, and beautiful objects, tapestry, old oak panelling, marble, rich furniture, admir- able pictures. But such things, though vastly entertaining to see, may be vastly dull to describe. Iiet us pick out what is most characteristic. Entering by the south side, you first note an arcade, or corridor supported on Boric pilasters. Originally, the large windows that light this were merely ojien stone- work, but they have been filled with small panes of glass. Here are some fine old tapestry, oak panelling, carved chests, and suits of armour. Behind this arcade is the Marble Hall, of which an illustration appears on the next page. A portion of the west wing is occupied by the chapel. Here one is struck with the fine oak work, much of it richly carved. Over the altar is a large window of twelve compartments, filled with stained glass representing Old Testament subjects. There is a gallery round three sides of the chapel. One little detail about this gallery is worth noting : there is easy access to it from the dwelling rooms, so that devotion is made as pleasant and facile as possible ! Neither the State chair and footstool of Queen Anne nor Butler’s picture of “The Adoration of the Magi” need detain us long. And now the visitor is conducted to the Great Hall — fifty feet by thirty — which is at the other end of the mansion. The massive carved screen at the lower end, bearing various coats of arms and the crest of the founder, must be noticed, also the continuous settle or fixed seat running round the hall. A picture of a particularly well-fed Hatfield House.] 11ELICK OF ELIZABETH. 59 grey horse is interesting for its subject. The animal in question carried Queen Elizabeth when she reviewed the troops at Tilbury. She afterwards gave it to the founder of Hatfield. The men- tion of Elizabeth puts us in mind of the various relics of her presence. THE MARBLE HALL. GO HISTORIC HOUSES. [Hatfield House, Probably the most curious is her cradle. The wood is dented and gnawed very perceptibly. Did she fix her teeth in it now and again when in one of her very early Tudor tempers ? At the upper end of the hall is the Grand Staircase. There are five land- ings ; the massive balusters and the genii with musical instruments above the : /,wson’.j THE LONG GALLERY hand-rail deserve attention. The wicket of carved open work guarding the ascent served (so ’tis said) to prevent the dogs getting into the State rooms. The ceil- ing has a fine pendant. Next is King James’s Room. This is fifty-nine feet by twenty-seven, and receives the light from three oval windows. You are probably most attracted by the huge chimney-piece. “ It is twelve feet wide, is supported by black marble columns of the Doric order, and is surmounted by a statue of King James I., in his robes, crowned, and with a sceptre in his right hand; above the King are medallions containing heads in relievo of Julius and Augustus Ca;sar : ” so says the learned Vitruvius Britannicus. But let us move on into the Long Gallery. This runs the whole length of the southern front. Here Hatfield House.] THE PICTURES. 61 is the “ Frett Seelinge ” of which the builder’s accounts make mention, also six large hay windows, some deeply recessed, old oak panelling richly ornamented, and an organ of the time of James I. Here, too, he choice old Japan cabinets, quaint Elizabethan pieces of furniture, and bits of china of such variety and rich- ness as to drive any sensitive collector crazy with envy. At the west end of the THE LIBRARY. gallery is the Library. This is of the same size as King James’s Room. Here is the picture mentioned by Evelyn, of “ Secretary Cecil, in mosaic work, very well done by some Italian hand.” He w r as forty-eight when the portrait was done, and here we see the little man <£ in his robes as Knight of the Garter, with a letter in his hand, indicating his office of Secretary of State,” and looking very important and magnificent. The people of the time said it was a good likeness. Here a few general words on the pictures may find place. The most curious is probably that of Queen Elizabeth, by Zucchero. The face is young, the hair in long tresses. “The lining of her robe is worked with 62 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Hatfield House. eyes and ears, and on lier arm is a serpent embroi- dered with pearls and rubies, hold- ing a great ruby in its mouth, de- noting vigilance and wisdom. In the hand is a rainbow with the motto Non sine sole Iris ” — truly an elaborate pic- torial compli- ment ! There are two portraits of Elizabeth’s rival, Mary Queen of Scots. One is ere her evil days — no lines on her brow, no grey hair. The other belongs to her Locli- leven time, when she was just entering that long valley of humiliation. Other “ dear dead women” are here too, some of them by Lely. Of English kings, there is a Charles I., by Yandyck ; a George TIT., by Sir Joshua Rey- nolds. Among the foreign mon- arclis are Philip the Third of Spain and his Queen, by Velasquez. Here too is Lord Burghley, by Zucchero, in the robe of the Garter, carrying his treasurer’s staff. There is also his motto, Unum cor , ana via. A singular fact about one of the pictures deserves mention here. It carries two faces, as one sees at once. Surely, material was not so expensive as to make the artist crowd his canvas in this odd way, and, besides, it is only a small piece. Why, then, is it “contrived a double debt to pay?” One feels there must be some history connected with the picture, and wonders if there is a legend to ac- count for the Janus-faced style of portraiture. There is such a legend. First CECIL TOMBS IX HATFIELD CHURCH. Hatfield House.] HATFIELD CHURCH. 63 of all, it runs, a portrait of the Duke of Monmouth was put on the canvas, and there it remained as long as the Duke was prosperous. But his Grace, who aspired to a yet higher title, came to grief at Sedgemoor, as we all know, and soon afterwards, on Tower Green, made his exit from this world. It was not thought loyal or perhaps quite safe to have the portrait of a traitor in the house, so the figure was painted out. The empty surface seems in time to have been taken for a blank piece of canvas, and was used as a background for the figure of the fourth Earl of Salisbury. Then the faint outlines of the original were discovered, and the lineaments of the unhappy duke were partly restored. And that is why we now see one man looking over another’s shoulder ! ' In the Library is preserved a famous collection of manuscripts. Something less than ten years ago a calendar of them was published under the direction of the Historical Manuscripts Commission. The number is very large, and the importance enormous. They extend from the time of Edward I. to that of the House of Hanover. The period covered by the lives of Lord Burghley and his son, viz., from Henry VIII. ’s to the middle of James I.’s reign, is best represented, for both these statesmen, and especially the elder, wrote and received an enormous number of letters. And they are not all on dry affairs of State. There are two from Wolsey “ written with the Cardinalles own hand after his fall.” The words are those of a man cut to the heart. There are two of the Casket Letters — one cannot venture to say Queen Mary’s with- out taking sides in a controversy never likely to be determined ; but there are here many epistles of hers whose authority is undoubted. Kings and Queens and Princesses, English and foreign, have done their part. The great Eliza- bethans- — Bacon, Baleigli, Sidney, Greville — and many more, have contributed. Here we have the childish prattle of some royal infant; there, words of men conscious that their appointed time is well-nigh arrived. There is all the comedy and tragedy of human life in a collection like this. The tears are long dry, the hands that wrote are dust, and the words affect us in a dim, stern, strange way — “ old unhappy far-off things ” indeed. It is pleasant after all to step out on to the terrace again. The sun comes forth for a moment and lights up the house and the trees. The whistle and smoke and clatter of a passing express have something cheerful about them : they bring us back to modern times. And yet there is still one relic to visit. Going round the terrace by the privy garden, and passing through the archway and the courtyard of the old palace, one is at the height of the village, where stands the church. Inside is the Salisbury chapel, built in 1618, containing the “fair monument” which the first Earl left directions to raise at a cost not exceeding £200. There he lies in marble effigy, supported by four kneeling figures, his head on a white 64 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Hatfield House. cushion, a ruff round his neck, his staff of office in his hand— dignified, but small. You cannot help smiling as you see how cruelly appropriate that “ sporting name of pygmy ” was, and then you guess on which side the artist would err. The smile passes away when one looks below and sees a perfect skeleton of white marble, set off against the black marble pillars. So they pointed the moral of life and death in those days ; but the moral you are inclined to draw is one reversing the earlier reflection that the grave levels all distinctions. The churchyard is fairly large, and seems a little crowded. Hatfield is not very big, but, it is very old, and, from beginning to end, many thousands must have been laid here. And as far as the world's interest goes, the sedate little man at whose marble effigy we have just looked is more important than all the rest put together. Well does he deserve that fair monument and the pious care with which it is preserved. h H anoi s Watt. THE BISHOPS PALACE. i ALNWICK CASTLE, FROM THE PAR; ALNWICK CASTLE. T HE little town of Alnwick, ancient of aspect and in origin, yet for the most part of quite modern con- struction withal, stands like a pedestrian who is about to step off from a friendly threshold into the desolate moor- lands. Its streets wind upward, straggling into the lulls. Beyond lies the wide borderland, much of it now brought into cultivation, but still hearing evidence of its past condition in mile on mile of purple heather and windy spaces of yellow gorse. The “Blue Bonnets” must have had a melancholy march of it, as somebody has said, when they came across the Border to fight the Southron foe. And melancholy also was the welcome they received when they fell, as they so often did, into the Percies’ hands. Inside the gateway of Alnwick Castle there is a square chamber that is still known as the prison. ARMS OF THE DUKE OF NORTHUMBERLAND. 9 66 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Alnwick Castle. It is altogether hare. There are iron fastenings on the walls, not for the purpose of securing the prisoners, as is sometimes said, nor for clamping the huge stones together, as might appear, but placed there, as one may guess, in order that the prisoners might the more easily hill themselves in their despair. Underneath the prison there is another, smaller, chamber. It is entered through a hole in the stone iloor. There is no means of ascent or descent, and the miserable marauding Scots must simply have been dropped into this Inferno, to he left here, it is probable, till they died. From picturing the horrors of such an imprisonment even the stoutest imagination will recoil. Alnwick Castle was founded by one Ivo de Yescy, to whom the barony was given when our fair England was divided among its Norman conquerors. The original building, which covered the whole of the present extensive site, was completed by Eustace Fitz-Jolm, who married the heiress of De Yescy, and assumed her name. It was not until two centuries thereafter that the family which had taken the Percy name became the lords of this castle and its vast domains. “In 3 Edward II., 19 Nov., 1309,” says an old historian of the family, “ Anthony Beke, Bishop of Durham, granted and sold to him ” — to Lord Henry de Percy, to wit — “ the barony of Alnewyk, which he had by grant from William De Yescy ; and all those lands and tenements which Isabel, wife of John de Yescy, held in dower of the said barony, to hold to him and his heirs for ever.” Whilst the De Vescies still remained its lords, Alnwick Castle was playing a not less important part in Border history than that for which it was destined under the more illustrious house. Near the road leading northward, a mile from Alnwick town, there is a cross marking the spot where Malcolm Canmore fell, on his fifth invasion of Northumberland. William the Lion, says the latest historian of Scotland, with a curious disinclination to admit a defeat by Southron men, “wasted the north of England,” and “when amusing himself he was taken prisoner by a party of English barons.” William’s “amusement took the form of a siege of the town and castle of Alnwick, and a second monu- ment marks the spot where he fell into the hands oi Ranulph de Glanvil, Constable of England. An English family, Mr. Fronde has remarked, takes rank according to the number of its members who have been executed ; or, it may he added, the number of those who have died in battle. From any other point of view but that of historical renown it was an unlucky thing to he lord ol Northumber- land. The three earls who preceded the Conquest were slain; the fourth, the unfortunate Cospatrick, died in exile ; the fifth was beheaded, the sixth murdered, the seventh deprived of his dignities, the eighth left to die in prison. Of the line founded by Henry de Percy, who, say the records ot Alnwick Alnwick Castle.] THE PERCY LINE. 07 Abbey, was “ a magnanimous man,” the first to bo made Earl of North- umberland was slain at Bramham Moor, the second at St. Albans, the third at Towton, and the fourth at Barnet. Of succeeding earls, one was murdered, another was beheaded, and a third suffered fifteen years’ imprisonment in the Tower. Three times thereafter the direct line of descent was broken. The Percy blood, it has been truly enough observed, lias always shown a singular reluctance to flow in other than female veins. It was not till the Earls of School. 22. West Garret. 23. Abbott’s Tower. 24. Falconer’s Tower. 25. Postern Tower. 20. Constable’s Tower. 27. Bavine Tower. 2S. East Garret. 29. Warder’s Tower. 30. Auditor’s Tower. 31. Clock Tower. 32. Avener’s Tower. PLAN OF ALNWICK CASTLE. Beverley succeeded to the lordship of Alnwick, only one generation back, that there was good promise of a continued prosperity. To that Henry de Percy who purchased the Alnwick lands from the war- like Bishop Beke the Castle owes its nobility of plan, though not its present stateliness. Of the original Castle of the De Yescies little now remains. Here and there in the lines of the outward walls one may trace courses, and occasional wide spaces, of the old masonry ; but twice at least the Castle has been in ruins, and it is only within years comparatively recent that it has been made one of the most splendid of English baronial homes. “ The whole view of Alnwick Castle,” says William Howitt, “ is noble, feudal, and worthy of its fame.” Its feudal aspect, its massiveness of design, its beautiful group- ing, must be attributed to Henry de Percy, who built the gatehouse and barbican, one of the strongest and most formidable pieces of defensive work now remaining in these islands. He it was, too, who strengthened the walls 68 HIS TORIC HO USES. [Alnwick Castle. and their towers, and gave much of the character which it still retains to the central keep. But the Castle as it stands to-day, especially as regards its habitable portions, is the work of Hugh first Duke of Northumberland, and, to a still greater extent, of Algernon, the fourth Duke, who is still spoken of as “ Algernon the Good.” Alnwick Castle looks out over a quiet river, to rich woodlands and wide meadows of a gentle upward slope. The town of Alnwick nestles closely at its back, so that one is reminded of some great fighting general of the olden days surveying the field of battle with his army close pressing behind him. A stranger might enter the town through the square grim tower which was built by Hotspur’s son, and press on through the long winding- street towards the moors, without guessing that any castle was to be seen thereabouts ; but should he take a turn to the right he would shortly come to the walls which enclose the stables and the Guest Hall, and then to the great Barbican, dark, and tall, and threatening, with mimic warriors on its battlements, and the ramping lion of Brabant sculptured on its face. Hence, the outer wall trends swiftly downwards to the river Ain ; and there, from a bridge that is comparatively modern, but which is not without renown, the strong, beautiful towers of the keep burst into view, and one understands at once why Alnwick is called “ The Windsor of the North.” A picture of Alnwick by Cana- letto hangs in the corridor of the Castle. It is one of the finest of his works, but it gives but a pro- saic idea of this great stronghold. ^ What this painter perceived was the size of the building rather than its magnificence. For poetry, for the larger vision of material things, one must go to Turner’s treatment of the same subject. Yet, truly, the mere largeness of Alnwick Castle is in itself impres- sive. The w 7 alls, lofty and mas- sive, with towers and turrets at intervals, enclose a space ol five acres, sufficient for the camping- ground of a small army. They crown the steep bank of the Ain, Alnwick Castle.] 4 LONG PEDIGREE. 69 which liere rises up sudden and bare, as if for the special recep- tion of such a proud fortress. The towers — of which one of the finest and most interesting, the Con- stable’s Tower, is figured in the illustrations to this article — give an appearance at once of strength and of gracefulness to the exterior of the Castle, and make a truly noble setting to that central clus- ter of round towers which is, in fact, a palace, but is named The Keep. Before entering the gateway of the Barbican one thinks again of the great history of the family by which this Castle has been raised and maintained. The pedi- gree goes back to a time when, notwithstanding what may be pre- tended to the contrary, no pedi- gree can be accurately traced. “ This right noble and ancient family of Percy,” says a laborious Dryasdust of the last century, “ is descended from Mainfred de Percy, who came out of Denmark into Normandy before the adventure of the famous Polio there, and had issue Geffery, that took part with the said Polio in his expedi- tion into that province, whereof lie attained the sovereignty.” An old tradition has it that one of these Norman Percies w r as the pilot of William, the successor and de- scendant of Polio, when he set 01 crown. But of the original Percie? ever held land in Northumberland. A GLIMPSE FROM THE PARK. to deprive Harold of England of his none was ever Lord of Alnwick, nor From early in the twelfth century, and 70 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Alnwick Castle. for five hundred } 7 ears onward, those who hore the Percy name were in fact Louvains. The history of the assumption of that designation which, despite successive changes of blood, has lasted unto our own day, is related with sufficient brevity in some lines which accompanied the portrait of Agnes Percy in the pedigree of Sion House : — “ Lord Percy’s heir I was, whose noble name By me survives unto his lasting fame ; Brabant’s Duke’s son I wed, who, for my sake, Retained his arms and Percy’s name did take.” The great warriors who played so large a part in our national history, who kept the Borders for so many generations, whose deeds and whose characters shine in the pages of Froissart and of Shakespeare, were Louvain-Percies, therefore, and the name still remains attached to the family, for the eldest son of the pre- sent Duke of Northumberland sits in the House of Lords as Baron Louvain. In March, 1780, Edmund Burke strove to induce the House of Commons to limit the allowance for the King’s privy purse to the sum of <£48,000. That sum, he main- tained, was more than suffi- cient to enable His Majesty to live with splendour and with dignity. He instanced the case of the Duke of Northumberland, who, he said, possessed three palaces, each of which w T as more splendidly furnished than any of His Majesty’s houses, and yet the Duke’s income was not more than £48,000 a year. One of those palaces, it need scarcely be remarked, was Aln- wick Castle. When Sir Hugh Smithson, on whom a Duke- dom was conferred in 17G6, THE BARBICAN Alnwick Castle.] THE FIRST DUKE OF NORTHUMBERLAND . 71 married the heiress of the Seymours and succeeded to the Earldom of North- umberland, in 1749, he found the Castle once more in ruins. His more imme- diate predecessors had pre- ferred Petworth as a place of residence, and that por- tion of Alnwick Castle which was in the best re- pair had actually been used as a school for the children of the town. The new lord, whose mind was for some time divided as to whether Alnwick or Wark- wortli had the greater at- tractions, determined not only to put the Castle in repair, hut to make it one of the most splendid of the mansions of the English nobility. Much of his work was done over again, at a more vast expense, a cen- tury later, as being in but indifferent taste ; but it was of Alnwick Castle, under Duke Hugh, that Burke spoke as one of those palaces that were superior to any of the houses of the King. For its period, indeed, it w r as without rival. However, as taste developed throughout another century it was perceived that what was called Georgian Gothic was mean and poor, that the ornament was too florid, and that there was too pronounced a monotony in the height of the great group of central towers. It is to Algernon, the fourth Duke, that many of the more striking of the beauties of Alnwick Castle are to be ascribed ; and especially that central tower which gives so much majesty to the proportions of the Keep. Duke Algernon was a sailor of distinction. He commanded the Caledonia in the action with the French fleet off Toulon in THE POTTER GATE. 72 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Alnwick Castle. 1815, and lie continued in the service until he rose to Admiral’s rank ; but he was also a scholar, a traveller, and an archaeologist. His alterations of Alnwick Castle, his great acts of liberality, the kindness of nature which he united with a full appreciation of his rank, earned for him the title of “Algernon the Mag- nificent.” It was computed that in the seventeen years during which he held the Dukedom he expended £39,000 on bridges and roads, £176,000 in drainage, £100,000 on churches, £308,000 in building cottages for his tenantry, and a quarter of a million sterling in making Alnwick Castle the monument of a splendid taste. The scheme of Duke Algernon, as Bishop Creighton has remarked, was to carry out boldly and decidedly the plan which Duke Hugh had imper- fectly conceived. He wished to preserve and emphasise the mediaeval character of the exterior of the Castle, and at the same time to convert the interior into a palace which should vie with the richest and most ornate of the palaces of Italy. To that end he called a whole army of artists and of artisans to his aid. He employed, first of all, the Signor Luigi Canina, of Borne, and then that great architect’s most distinguished pupil, Signor Giovanni Montiroli. The late Signor Bulletti was brought from Florence to superintend the wood carving, but a carver of equal skill and more refined taste was found in Alnwick itself, in Mr. John Brown, to whom it is the merest justice to attribute the larger share of the beautiful work which has hitherto been associated with Signor Bulletti’s name. Fully ten years were occupied in these reconstructions, during which time the Castle found employment for an average of 600 men, and thus brought to the town of Alnwick a prosperity that had been unknown at any previous period of its history. What is known as the Prudhoe Tower, that feature of the Keep which relieves the building of its former monotony, is of Duke Algernon’s construc- tion. In all other respects the ancient structural characteristics were restored, with the addition of a corridor round one side of the inner court, designed to give separate entrance to the various rooms. But the perfect restoration of a stronghold of the middle ages was the least part of the great scheme of the fourth Duke of Northumberland. The interior was so dealt with as to bring it into really amazing contrast with the dark severity of the towers and walls. Chatsworth is a museum, and even Hatfield, in a less degree, is, as to some large portions, a place for show. Alnwick Castle, on the contrary, is through- out, and in every essential feature, a dwelling. The interior splendour, great as that is, is even less striking to the visitor than the air of comfort and homeliness which prevails. Palaces, especially of that Italian model which has been followed in this case, are apt to seem too spacious, and formal, and Alnwick Castle.] yl'N IDEAL RESIDENCE. 73 cold. It might have been so in this instance had the rooms been of a different construction ; but the shape of the towers, each one presenting a front like a bow, everywhere dictated the terms of the general design, and THE DINING-ROOM. Alnwick Castle became a residence in the stricter sense of the term, retaining a look of privacy amid its splendour, and in a high degree combining conveni- ence with refinement. There are no rich gardens or trim flower-beds within the Castle walls. 10 74 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Alnwick Castle. The Outer Bailey, the space between the Barbican and the Keep, is a plain grassy lawn, with a depressed semicircle indicating the former position of a second and interior moat. Here the fine proportions and the grand disposition of the main Castle come fully into view, with the tall, narrow, slightly pro- jecting chapel seeming to have been added as an afterthought to the grey cluster of rounded towers. A bending road dips downward to the right, pro- ceeds through an archway, and sweeps round to the gateway of the Keep, which is guarded by two semi-octagonal towers, four storeys in height, “ lofty and imposing,” as has been truly enough observed, built by the second Percy of Alnwick almost five centuries and a half ago. These towers are noticeable in their upper courses for a striking peculiarity of ornament. A series of sculptured heraldic shields is displayed in each division of the towers, proudly indicative of the family and marriage alliances of the earlier Percies, and bear- ing impressive testimony to the large connections and pronounced antiquity of the family at a period even so remote as the middle of the fourteenth century, when the history of many of our noble families had not yet begun. In the archway between the two octagonal towers is the entrance to the prison afore-mentioned, and immediately thereafter the visitor comes in face of the quaint draw-well of the castle, with its curious windlass and sculptured ornament — a genuine piece of antiquity in what is, as to that portion of the castle courtyard, a modern setting. From this somewhat confined inner courtyard the entrance is through a square hall, very simple in design, with walls of massive masonry, and nothing but the plainest decorations. An inner hall, entered through swing- ing doors of oak, is of somewhat greater pretension, the walls being plastered in Parian, and subdivided by moulded panels. It is not, however, until the grand staircase is reached that the impression of the severity of the exterior is altogether lost in the first unexpected glimpse of magnificence. An ascending curve of Carrara marbles, of polished freestone, of Aberdeen granite, broad Rothbury stone stairs, Parian arches, an enriched ceiling ingeni- ously groined with foliated ornaments by Taccalozzi — such is the introduction to the gorgeous home in which the modern representatives of the Percies live. By means of this brilliant stairway the Guard Chamber is entered — a chamber thirty feet square and twenty feet in height, with a pavement of Venetian mosaic, a deeply panelled and ornately designed ceiling, and a broad panelled frieze into which are introduced four pictures by Gotzenburg, illustrative of the main incidents in the ballad of Chevy Chase. The Guard Chamber is the vestibule to all the State rooms of the Castle. An archway leads to the upper floor of the chapel, and to a passage which branches off to the principal bed-rooms and private apartments, where the Alnwick Castle.] THE INTERIOR. 75 great Percy bedstead may be seen. One doorway leads to the Grand Corridor, and another to the Antechamber, which has the Library to the left, and the Music-Room, Drawing-Room, and Dining-Room to the right. It is here that the wood-carving comes into evidence. It has been stated elsewhere that three hundred carvers were employed at the Castle during the restoration, but as a matter of fact the number was never more than thirty. Ever since that time, however, a carving studio has been maintained at the Castle, and Mr. John Brown and his pupils have constantly been making additions to the carved ornaments. One of the smallest, but one of the most tasteful and elaborate, of their achievements, stands in a prominent position in this Ante- room. It is a small black exquisitely carved cabinet, made from the oak foundations of the bridge which the Emperor Hadrian threw across the Tyne at Newcastle. This room contains a fine Garafolo, “ Christ Curing the Possessed ; ” and among the pictures hung in its neighbourhood are “ Crying, Laughing, and Anger,” by Dosso Dossi, an “Allegory of a Child Decorating a Skull with Olive Boughs,” by Schidone, and a portrait of Giulio di Medici, by Giulio Romano, after Raphael. There is another copy elsewhere, it may be here noted, the “Bacchus and Ariadne” of the National Gallery, by Nicholas Poussin, after Titian. It is very inferior in beauty and harmony of colour to the National Gallery picture, and one rather wonders at its place of honour. The Library occupies the whole of one of the floors of the new, or Prudhoe Tower. It is an ideal library, quiet, compact, and comfortable, as a student’s room ought to be, and though its decorations and fittings are such as give an air of lightness and space to the apartment, it is peculiarly suggestive of ease, and rest, and quiet meditation. A recess shown in one of the accompanying illustrations contains several family portraits, some of them by Vandyck, and over the chimney-piece there is an attractive marble bust of Shakespeare, by Altini, suggestive of the Chandos portrait, but by no means to be classed as a copy. The most notable treasures of the Library are certain illu- minated manuscripts, of which the Service Book of Sherborne Abbey, declared to be the most exquisite specimen of English illumination extant, is the chief. The Music-Room, or Saloon, is a remarkable example of the ingenuity which has been displayed in adapting the peculiar architecture of a mediaeval castle to the elegances and conveniences of modern life. Here the wood carving is at its best, the doors, ceiling, and window shutters being all most elaborately graven, in woods which are dark without being sombre, and which, indeed, convey much the same feeling as a rich glowing background. The Renaissance frieze is by Mantovani, the restorer of the Raphael frescoes in the Loggia of the Yatican. The walls are covered with rich yellow satin, and there 76 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Alnwick Castle. is a chimney-piece of white Carrara marble, with sculptured figures and ornaments by Nucci and Tacca- lozzi. Here, in two sections, one of considerable dimensions, the other containing a single figure only, are the principal portions of a picture unusually renowned. It is a mural painting by Sebas- tian del Piombo, “The Saluta- tion of the Virgin,” outlined by Michael Angelo, in jealousy, it is said, of Raphael. The work was originally placed above the high altar of the Church of St. Maria Della Pace, at Rome, and was left unfinished by the artist. It was carried off to Paris by the Drench, and became the property of Cardinal Fescli, after whom it had only one other owner before it came into the hands of the Duke of Northumberland. The colours are now somewhat sunken and dead, hut the drawing and grouping are so noble and mas- sive as to give strong support to the tradition that the work owes less to Sebastian than to his mighty contemporary. All the principal pictures at Alnwick Castle, with the excep- tion of some small hut famous works which adorn the boudoir of the late Duchess, are to he found in the Music-room and the adjoining Drawing-room. Here, for instance, is that Giorgione which so stirred Byron’s enthusiasm, and was “the loveliest,” to his mind, “in all the show” at the Manfrini gallery. “ ’Tis but a portrait ” the poet says, — A CORNER OP THE DRAWING-ROOM. “Of liis son, and wife, And self, but such a woman, love in life.” Here also, on a small panel, is a wonderful portrait of Pope Paul III., by Alnwick Castle.] THE DINING-ROOM. 77 Titian, and in the next room is hung Andrea Del Sarto’s portrait of himself, painted for the patron of all contemporary greatness, Lorenzo di Medici. Other notable portraits are by Moroni and Vandyck. There is an exquisite landscape by Claude in the Drawing-Room ; and among the other famous pic- tures at Alnwick are an “ Ecce Homo” by Carlo Dolce; a Crucifixion by Guido ; a very beautiful, small, somewhat earty example of Raphael, “ St. Catherine and Mary Magdalene;” Giorgione’s “Lady with the Lute;” and a very precious but perishing Mazzolini da Ferrara, “ Casting the Money- changers out of the Temple,” from the Aldobrandini Gallery. But the greatest and the most interesting of all the Alnwick pictures is “ The Gods Enjoying the Fruits of the Earth,” the figures by Giovanni Bellini, and the landscape, large, marvellously luminous, but somewhat too strongly painted for the figures, by his great pupil, Titian. The Dining-Room, with a chimney-piece of Sicilian marble, designed by Montiroli, with supporting figures by Nucci and Strazzi, is Cinque Cento in style and decoration. Here the family portraits are mainly hung, some of them copied by John Phillip from the portraits at Petworth. Those of the first Duke of Northumberland and his wife bring to mind the story of how Lady Elizabeth Seymour, daughter and sole heiress of Al- gernon Seymour Duke of Somer- set and Earl of Northumberland, came to marry “the handsome Yorkshire baronet,” Sir Hugh Smithson. Lady Elizabeth, so the story runs, had expressed her sur- prise that a lady of her acquaint- ance should have rejected an offer of marriage from a man so attrac- tive. The remark plainly ex- pressed an incapacity for such a rejection on her own part, and Sir Hugh Smithson promptly availed himself of the hint, and thus succeeded in marrying the the p EEC y bedstead. 78 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Alnwick Castle. noblest and the greatest heiress of the day, together with the Percy lands and name. The Corridor of the Castle is lmng with modern paintings, only a few of which are of any considerable note, among these being a small Wilkie, “ The RECESS IN THE LIBRARY. Gentle Shepherd,” painted after the artist had come under Spanish influences ; Landseer’s “The Return from Deer- Stalking ; ” “The Duke of Wellington’s Charger, Copenhagen,” by Ward; and “Napoleon’s Charger, Marengo,” by the same painter. Alnwick Castle.] MINI A TUBE M USEUAL S'. 79 In some of the towers of the Castle walls there are museums of great value and interest. The Eecord Tower contains the collection of antiquities made by Algernon, the fourth Duke, during some extensive travels in Egypt. Compared with the colossal relics which represent Egypt in the more fre- quented part of the British Museum, all the objects are small, hut they are for the most part such as the British Museum itself might he proud to possess. The Constable’s Tower, structurally the least changed and the most interesting of the series, contains the arms, powder-horns, and what not, of the Percy Volunteers, a regiment which was formed to assist in repelling the threatened invasion of the first Napoleon. In the neighbouring Postern Tower is a choice and well- catalogued collection of British, Poman, and Saxon antiquities, to- gether with relics that should he of peculiar value to those who bear the Percy name, coming, as they do, from such battlefields as Hedgeley Moor, Shrewsbury, Elodden, and Towton. Of the kitchens and servants’ quarters no room is left to speak. They are in the true baronial style. There is a fireplace before which a whole ox has frequently been roasted ; and a record hung on the kitchen wall gives the details of a dinner which was served to six hundred men. From the vast beer cellars the townsfolk were wont to he gratuitously supplied with old ale at the time of the July fair, when, up to quite recent times, men who owed suit and service to the Duke were wont to don armour and arms and watch through the night the various entrances to the town, in memory of those days when the Scots were most apt to time their attacks for the occurrence of the most frequented fair of the year. All the entrances to the town were defended by gates, a characteristic which is commemorated in the elaborate but comparatively modern “ Potter Gate,” shown in one of our illustrations. From the windows of the Castle one looks far away over Hulne Park. It is a lordly demesne, enclosed in thirty miles of stone wall, and with the ruins of two abbeys in its grounds. Over meadows through which the Ain winds like a broad thread of light, between mighty beech trees whose houghs sweep an almost incredible circumference of ground, past timid herds of deer, through ancient woods and young plantations, the road winds upward to Brislee Tower, whence may he seen Holy Island, and Bamborougli, and Dunstanburgh, and W ark worth, and the wide sea, with the Cheviots lying westward, and Flodden Field, and all the famous land of Border song and story. Aaron Watson. AUDLEY END: WEST FRONT. AUDLEY END. £ V UDLEY END, the family seat of Lord Braybrooke, though small in comparison with the original mansion, may still, both for its size and architecture, be justly numbered among the stately historic houses in England. In the past its fortunes, like those of its owners, have been chequered, but now, for many years, they have been, for both, comparatively uneventful. Time may be saved by tracing out briefly their history in so far as they are connected, Audley End is pleasantly situated among rolling uplands on the western side of Essex, about a mile from the old market town of Saffron Walden. The district is undulating rather than hilly. The park, with its shady groves of old trees, shelves at last gently down to a stream which is one of the tributaries of the Cam. Though the characteristic feature of the low r er course of that river — a wide and sometimes marshy valley- — has not yet been assumed, still, in the 11 TilE HALL, AUDLEY END. 82 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Audley End. neighbourhood of the water, the ground is so nearly level as to he well adapted for a mansion of exceptional size. On a site very near to the present one, Geoffrey de Mandeville, Earl of Essex, founded a priory in the year 1136, and this, about fifty years afterwards, became an abbey ; the monks being of the Benedictine order. It wars placed, we are told, at the meeting of four roads, so that the inmates might have ample opportunity of exercising hospitality, and a further reason in favour of the site was comparative proximity to the Castle of Walden, then inhabited by the founder. The abbey prospered; it obtained broad lands and precious relics, hut it made no mark in history. Nevertheless not a few personages of high rank were entombed in its church : Earls of Essex, Earls of Hereford, Be Bohuns, and others of noble birth. Then came the downfall of monasteries in England, and Walden shared in the common fate. It was bestowed by Henry VIII. upon his Chancellor, Thomas Audley, who had already received the plate, lands, and buildings of the priory of Christchurch, Aldgate — as Fuller quaintly says, “the first cut in the feast of abbey lands and a dainty morsel,” these gifts being “ an excellent receipt to clear the Speaker’s voice, and made him speak clear and well for his master.” Thomas Audley, the first owner of this estate, was a native of Essex, a member of a respectable and old family, who had adopted the law as his profession. From Colchester he removed to London, where he made his mark first as a lecturer at the Inner Temple. Then he entered Parliament, and was Speaker of the House at the time when the smaller monasteries were suppressed. He made himself useful to the King, who, if he did not spare the axe when offended, was prompt in payment when pleased. Promotion came to Thomas Audley with rapid steps ; in May, 1532, he was knighted and appointed Keeper of the Great Seal, and early in the following year he became Lord Chancellor. In this position he took a leading part in the dissolution of the larger monasteries. In 1538 he was rewarded with the Abbey of Walden, and late in the same year was created Baron Audley of Walden, and installed a Knight of the Garter. A short time before attaining this dignity he married a daughter of the first Earl of Dorset. Before he had time to experience the fickleness of royal favour, he became seriously ill, resigned his office in the spring of 1544, and died shortly afterwards, being buried in the church at Saffron Walden. Thomas Audley would have kept his master’s favour, if any man could have done it, for he was not only a man of ability, but also a thorough time-server. Two daughters survived him, only one of whom lived to grow up. She married, while still very young, Henry Dudley, fourth son of the Earl of Northumberland, who was implicated in the attempt to place Lady Jane Grey Audley End.] THE BUILDER, OF THE HOUSE. 83 on the throne. The father lost his head, the son also was condemned to death. His life, however, was spared, hut his lands became forfeit. After a time Audley End was restored to him, but there was a doom upon him, for he was killed in battle in Picardy. Indeed, the lands at Walden, like other Church property, as urged by Spelman, for no short time seemed to bring ill-fortune to their owners. The widow married Thomas Duke of Norfolk, and became the mother of the famous “Belted Will,” ancestor of the Earls of Carlisle. Then she died, still young, and after some years her husband indulged wild dreams of wedding Mary Stuart, which were at last cut short by the stern surgery of the headsman’s axe. The Queen, however, spared his estates, so Audley End passed to his eldest son, by the second marriage, Lord Thomas Howard — a stout sailor, who had fought against the Armada under the flag of his cousin, Lord Howard of Effingham, had afterwards distinguished himself at Cadiz, and had defeated a Spanish convoy in an action near the Azores. Though the Queen had been forced to lay a heavy hand on the father, she had always shown kindness to the son, and when James came to the throne of England he remembered for whose sake the late Duke had died. Lord Thomas, who had already been raised to the peerage as Baron Howard of Walden, became Earl of Suffolk and Lord Chamberlain, and in that capacity was con- cerned in the discovery of the explosives stored for the destruction of the Houses of Parliament. Then he was made Lord High Treasurer, but after four years’ tenure of office, fortune turned her wheel. He was committed to the Tower on a charge of embezzlement, and, after an investigation before the Star Chamber, was sentenced to pay a heavy fine, of which, however, a large part was afterwards remitted. Whether he was really guilty is doubtful, but that his wife was a harpy, and that he had practically connived at her ill-doings, seems clear. Perhaps, poor man, he found that he had no other chance of a quiet life. He built the vast mansion at Audley End, of which the present is a rem- nant, and nearly ruined himself, for, as James sarcastically observed, it was too large for a king, though it might do for a Lord Treasurer. Report states that after £100,000 had been expended all documents were destroyed, and that the Earl affirmed he had spent over it twice that sum. Among the bribes which he was accused of accepting were some from Spain, so that it became a saying in the county that Audley End was built with Spanish gold. The Earl, after his fall, lived eight years, and on his death his countess was left in com- parative poverty. In Lord Braybrooke’s “ History of Audley End,” is a quotation from a letter written in 1633, stating as an item of the gossip of the day, “The Countess of Suffolk is run away, or hid herself that she cannot be found, because she refuses to pay £1,400 arrears, and £200 pension to Mrs. Clare, 84 [Audley End. HISTORIC HOUSES. now Harding, decreed a second time upon review by the Lord Keeper, the King rejecting once, twice, thrice, petitions that have been offered from her, and telling others that interceded for her that it was just for her to pay it and she should pay it. She pretends poverty ; and I believe she is so, for she has dissolved her husband’s hospital at Audley End, not being able to main- THE LODGE GATE. it, • pc , n ■ „ , eldest son is so tar from taking care ot her though it be his own case, that he thinks not of freeing her, no, nor of paying bis own debts which wall eat out his inheritance.” This son — the eldest of a large family — died comparatively young, shortly before the outbreak of the Civil War. His son and successor took the King’s side, but was not a very active partisan, so that though he was imprisoned for a short time, he saved his estates and resided quietly at Audley End until the Kestoration. Then the great mansion became a royal palace, for it w r as sold by the Earl to Charles II. The price was £50,000, of which only <£30,000 was paid, the remainder being left as a mortgage. The Court paid not unfrequent visits to Audley End. On the first occasion the Corporation presented His Majesty with a silver cup filled with saffron. On another there was a fair in the little town, and the Queen and the ladies of the Court disguised themselves as country dames, and rode pillion thither in the Audley End.] A FOR T UNA TE DISCO VER Y. 85 hope of sharing in the fun. But their speech betrayed them ; then some- one recognised the Queen’s face, and “this soon brought all the Faire into a crowd to see the Queen.” The Royal party, as soon as possible, “ got to their horses; but as many of the Faire as had horses got up, with their wives, children, sweethearts, or neighbours behind them, to get as much gape as they could till they brought them to the Court gate.” The interest on the mortgage appears never to have been paid, it being the fashion of the Merry Monarch, like Mr. Wititterly, to owe small accounts, and to leave them owing. His successor took no more heed of the matter, and in 1701 the estate was re-conveyed to the fifth Earl of Suffolk on condition of his relinquishing all claims in regard to the mortgage. The family, however, asserted that King William removed some valuable tapestry and other effects from the house, and forgot to go through the formality of compensating the rightful owner for them. The eighth Earl pulled down, in 1726, a large part of the palatial mansion, as will presently be explained. Twenty-six years afterwards Audley End was sold to the Countess of Portsmouth. She, two years later, further reduced its size by taking down the eastern facade. This made the domestic arrangements so inconvenient that her nephew and successor connected the wings by building a tier of corridors at the back of the great hall. Lady Portsmouth and Lord Effingham were both concerned in a lawsuit, in which oc- curred a curious episode indirectly connected with Audley End. The tenth Earl of Suffolk died childless in 1745, and Lord Effingham took possession of his estates under an entail created by a deed of settlement dated in 1721. But this was rendered invalid by a much earlier settlement, executed by the third Earl more than forty years before ; for, by the terms of it, the last Earl was only a tenant for life, and thus could not create an entail. According to the family tradition, the correctness of which is not doubted in Lord Braybrooke’s History, Lady Portsmouth’s solicitor “ accidentally discovered the rough draft of the earlier settlement in selecting some old law writings, conceived to be of no importance, for his son to copy by way of practice.” The original document was really in Lord Effingham’s possession, among the family papers CHANCELLOR AUDLEY. (From Lord Braybroolcc's “ History of Audley End.") 86 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Audley End. at Audley End, but an order of the Court of Chancery compelled him to produce it, and his claims were at once annulled. But he retained Audley End ; for, in 1687, the date of the earlier deed, it was alienated to the Crown, and so not covered by its provisions. Lady Portsmouth died childless, and left Audley End to her sister’s child, John Griffin Wliitwell, a distinguished soldier, who ultimately rose to the rank of Field-Marshal. The barony of Howard de Walden was revived in his favour after he had enjoyed the property about twenty years, and a little later he was created Baron Braybrooke of Braybrooke in Northampton. But he also died childless, and thus the barony of Braybrooke passed to Bicliard Neville, of Billingbear, Berkshire, his nearest relation. The fourth Lord Braybrooke, an enthusiastic and learned antiquarian, was the author of the “History of Audley End,” to which we have more than once referred. His son, the present Lord and fifth Baron, succeeded to the title in 1861. To return now to the history of the mansion. Nothing, we have already said, is left of the Abbey buildings, which must have been inhabited by the owners of the estate till the Earl of Suffolk’s time, but the historian of Audley End had no doubt that their situation was to the east of the pre- sent house, on ground which is now occupied by a flower-garden. Excava- tions on this site indicated that the ground was “ one mass ol building materials.” In one part, nearer to the sunk fence, many skeletons were discovered, indicating the position of a graveyard. No coffins or ornaments were unearthed ; so it was probably the burial-place of the dependents of the Abbey. Nothing of any particular interest was discovered, though a few coins, with much broken carved work in stone, were found. The house is well seen from the Cambridge road, from which a lodge leads into the park. The Cam has been banked and expands into a little lake, a grand old cedar contrasts its dark branches with the lighter foliage of deciduous trees, and across the water rises a group of brick buildings, less stately, but even more picturesque than the house. These are the stables, which are believed to have been the “liospitium” of the abbey. Tbe palace, for it was worthy of the name, erected by Lord Suffolk, after designs by John Thorpe, consisted of two courts, of which the larger and outer was the nearer to the road. The western facade, in which was the principal entrance, was low, being only one storey high, though slightly relieved by four turrets, one on each side of the central gateway; the approach to it was from a bridge over the Cam, through an avenue of limes. The court within was flanked on either side by a row of buildings, two storeys high, from which, near the middle and tbe west end, tower like blocks rose one storey higher. It was closed by the western facade of the inner court. This was three storeys high Audley End.] CHANGES IN THE HOUSE. 87 on all sides but the west, which, was occupied by the great hall ; this had a porch at either end, and its roof-line reached rather above the base of the first-floor windows. At the back of the larger court were kitchen and offices, projecting from the north-east angle. This huge pile, more like a royal palace than a dwelling-house, was standing when Mr. Pepys came this way and halted more than once. With the house itself, notwithstanding its size, he was not well pleased, for he writes in his Diary, “ Only the gallery is good, and above all things the cellars, where we went down and drank of much good liquors. And indeed the cellars are fine : and here my wife and I did sing to my great content. And then to the garden, and there did eat many grapes and took some with us.” This gallery ran along the whole length of the east side of the inner court, and overlooked the bowling-green. Our ancestors, about the beginning of the seventeenth century, appear to have had a special liking for these stately corridors. Not to mention others, there is one at Hatfield, and there was one in the second court of St. John’s College, Cambridge, which of late years has been in part restored to its original condition. The gallery at Audley End was destroyed, with all the eastern side of the inner court, by Lady Portsmouth ; the outer court, as already stated, was cleared away by her predecessor, Lord Suffolk ; so that as the original mansion was completed about 1616, it lasted rather more than a century. The inconvenience occasioned by Lady Ports- mouth’s alteration is apparent enough, for the house now consisted of two large wings with no other connecting link than a great hall. Her successor, as we have seen, united these by building a corridor at the back of the latter, and carrying it up to the second floor. This must have added greatly not only to the convenience, but also to the beauty of the house : for from the first the low western facade must have been a defect in the design ; and the de- struction both of the outer court and of the eastern facade of the inner one must have given to the remnant a mean, disjointed appearance. As it is, the mansion at Audley End, though only a fragment, is a very noble one, and the west facade, with the great bay windows of the hall and the two porches, is remarkably fine. Each of these porches is two storeys high, and the design and ornamentation are particularly good. The house is built of grey stone, and the architecture may be called “ Italian,” for it is much more influenced by “Classic” than by “Gothic” models. The northern porch forms the- principal entrance. This leads into a vestibule, from which we pass into the great hall through the usual ornamental screen, over which is a gallery. This hall alone would repay a visit to Audley End. Thirty yards long, twenty-eight feet wide, and a foot or two higher, its walls are panelled with oak, its ceiling is richly ornamented. At the opposite end of the hall is 83 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Audley End. an open stone screen, behind which is the grand staircase. Formerly this was not visible from the hall, but the change was made by Sir John Vanbrugh, under the idea that it would improve the proportions of the hall. It is a pity he did not remember the saying about “ letting well alone.” The hall contains portraits of Thomas Audley and his wife, said to be :SF* M l I tlt LORD SUFFOLK’S HOUSE. ( From Plate in Lord Braybrooke's “History.”) painted by Holbein, and of their daughter, afterwards Duchess of Norfolk. A shrewddooking man was my Lord Chancellor, with wary, watchful eyes and firm-set lips, a man who could bide his time, and when that came would show little ruth. His face, though softened, is to some extent reproduced in his daughter, who is gorgeously arrayed. From the walls look down the ill- fated Lady Jane Grey, and her sister, not much more fortunate, for she offended Elizabeth by marrying the Earl of Hertford, and was imprisoned for the rest of her life. Among the other pictures is one of Sir Thomas Lunsford, the doughty cavalier, whose name was a terror to the children of the Round- heads ; there are also several of the Cornwallis family, from which the present owners of Audley End are directly descended. On the walls also are hung armour and arms, of various dates and nations, curiosities and trophies and memorials from many lands and from them banners , project emblazoned with the arms of various branches of the family. Audley End.] THE STA TE APARTMENTS. 89 The state apartments are on the first floor. After mounting the great staircase, the visitor first reaches the saloon or large drawing-room, which is nearly as long as was the original hall. The stucco ceiling has sunken panels, ornamented with fish and tritons, and with pendentives at the angles. r The cornice and the chimney-piece are decorated to match, and in the upper part of the wall portraits are let into an arcade. They are for the most part copies. They represent the owners of Audley End, from the Chancellor down to the first Lord Braybrooke. Biddy furnished and decorated with good taste, the room is as attractive as- it is magnificent. Beyond it is another handsome apartment, formerly a second drawing-room, but now fitted up as Lord Bray- brooke ’s sitting-room. This also contains numer- ous pictures — among them some views of Ven- ice by Canaletto ; beyond it is a study, with “The Misers” by Quentin Matsys, which, how- ever, is not in such good condition as the one of the same subject in Windsor Castle. On the opposite side of the wing is the dining-room, which is hung with portraits. One of George II., by Pine, occupies the place of honour, and is supposed to he the only one taken from life; for the “little red-faced princeling” not only hated “ boetry and bainters,” but also objected to sit for his portrait. So Pine hid himself in a closet overlooking the principal staircase at Kensington Palace, and stole a sketch unperceived. Here also may be seen Bobert Carr, Earl of Somerset, the worthless favourite of James I. ; Sir Charles Lucas, a brave and unfortunate cavalier, who was condemned and shot immediately after the capitulation of Colchester ; the first Marquis Cornwallis, twice Governor- General of India ; and several others. This room and the adjacent one are approached by a curiously constructed and richly ornamented winding staircase of oak. The great library occupies the east end of this wing. It is decorated in white and gold, and the book-cases are sunk in the wall : the collection, though not unusually large, is a good one. The rooms were not originally arranged quite in accord- ance with the description given above, hut then, as now, they led one into the other without a common passage. This arrangement, inconvenient in many 12 THE WINDING STAIRCASE. 90 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Audley End. respects, appears to have been preferred in olden time. The gallery, which connects the two wings — itself, as has been said, a comparatively late addition to the house — contains not a few portraits, chiefly of members of the Cornwallis family, together with a fine collection of stuffed birds. The interest of this is the greater because many of the specimens were procured in the neigh- bourhood. A room in the north-western part of the mansion now serves as a chapel, the original one having been pulled down when the outer court was swept away. It is, to quote from Lord Braybrooke’s History, a specimen of Strawberry Hill Gothic, and so is not likely to he admired by the present generation. In it has been placed a copy, on a reduced scale, of the monu- ment erected in St. Paul’s Cathedral to the Marquis Cornwallis, who died in India during his second period of office as Governor-General. The private apartments of the family, which are in the northern wing, provide a haven of refuge for the quieter hours of life, and contain two or three pleasant rooms, the most attractive, as is befitting, being Lady Bray : brooke’s morning-room. On the ground floor of this wing a room is used as a museum, and contains a valuable collection of Roman and other antiquities formed by the late Lord Braybrooke. Under his direction, not a few tumuli in the neighbouring country were explored, and excavations made on the site of a Roman station (Iceanum) at Chesterford. “Many important relics were disinterred — Samian ware and other pottery, glass, metal, and mosaic work, pins, trinkets, and the like. A number of miscellaneous iron implements found at one spot is supposed to mark the site of a blacksmith’s shop. Other relics come from Hildersham and Hadstock ; and a small piece of human skin is from the famous door of that church. By its side is another fragment from Worcester. Some strings of glass beads from Little Wilbraham will attract notice, as well as a number of Anglo-Saxon fibulae, some of very elaborate workmanship; one found at Aslienden, Buckinghamshire, is inlaid with garnets. Altogether, the collection is one from which the antiquary will not find it easy to tear himself away.” * The State bed-rooms are on the ground floor of the southern wing, so that the magnates went down- instead of up-stairs to bed. Here also are some in- teresting pictures, the most noteworthy being, in the grandest of the chambers. This is a full length portrait of Queen Charlotte, a copy of the Gainsborough in the Royal collection. The bed, as usual, is an imposing structure, with hangings of worked silk. The park is pretty, but not remarkable. The spire of Saffron Walden church often forms a feature in the views, and contrasts pleasantly with the fine old timber of the demesne. In the village of Audley End is a curious * Our Own Country, vol. iii., p. 281. Audley End.] THE SURROUNDINGS. 91 brick building, which the visitor should not forget to see. It consists of a court, surrounded by separate chambers, each with its own door, with a building, part of which now serves for a kitchen, but which is said to have been the chapel. This structure, according to the late Lord Braybrooke, is supposed to have been erected about the beginning of the fifteenth century, “doubtless for purposes of charity, and perhaps placed under control of the monastery, having no sj)ecial endowment. At a later period, Thomas, first Earl of Suffolk, made some allowance to the inmates, and the building is described in the parish register as my Lord’s almshouse, but his widow discontinued the payments ; nor is there any tradition of them having been claimed as a matter of right.” They are still used as almshouses. Nor must the visitor forget the interesting old town of Saffron Walden, once noted for the cultivation of the crocus sativus , from the flower of which came the valuable drug which, according to our ancestors, had the power of forcing true tears from a crocodile. But over this, with its more real uses, over the truffles which are found in the neigh- bourhood, especially about Audley End, over the old houses in the town, or the fine church with its lofty spire, the monument of Lord Chancellor Audley, and the tomb of the Earls of Suffolk, or the ruined castle with its neigh- bouring museum, we must not now linger. T. G. Bonney. 92 MALAHIDE CASTLE. ARMS OF LORD TALBOT DE MALAHIDE. T IKE most ancient houses, Malahide Castle lias ^ been added to, and rebuilt, and restored, till it is very difficult to say, or to see, where what is really old in the structure ends, and what is comparatively new begins. In feudal times, for example, the entrance to the castle — which entrance, it may be observed in passing, now forms the stable gateway — was by means of a drawbridge, and thence beneath the port- cullis into a courtyard, guarded by a barbican. Besides these precautions against attack from without, the castle moat ran round the building, thus cutting off the outer world even more completely. Now the moat, the draw- bridge, and the portcullis, have disappeared, and the old tower of the barbican alone remains of all the castle’s ancient guards. To-day the principal entrance is from the south-east, and though the south-eastern facade terminates in embattled towers, these were built much more to preserve intact the ancient style of the house than for any more practical purpose. Despite the changes and chances of time and fashion, however, the castle presents to the visitor of to-day a very venerable appearance. It is finely proportioned, the line of building forming almost a square, flanked by large circular towers. It stands overlooking the demesne, and its grey weather-beaten walls and towers are shadowed by noble trees and wreathed about with twining ivy. In structure it is indeed almost severely simple, having an aspect of unpretentious dignity, as of one, if we may so express it, who has lived long and worthily. There are no adventitious aids to the attainment of the picturesque, yet the effect certainly is picturesque. Simplicity and repose are the characteristics most vividly suggested by a view of Malahide Castle, and imagination is carried back to the days when life itself was simpler and more restful than it is now. Through a low pointed doorway we pass within the castle walls, and enter a flagged hall, with oaken window-frames and vaulted ceiling. Against the w r alls of this hall are ranged some old Irish pikes, while we are shown a heavy carved oak chair, said to have belonged to King Robert Bruce. Above it hangs a pair of jack-boots, believed to have been worn by one of Cromwell’s drummer-boys in those days when the soldiers of the Common- wealth camped in Malahide park. A circular stone staircase leads up to what is beyond all doubt the most beautiful and interesting apartment the castle MALAHIDE CASTLE. 94 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Malahide Castle. contains. The “Oak Room” at Malahide Castle is famous, and justly so The walls of this most quaint and ancient room are panelled from floor to ceiling with Irish oak, exquisitely carved in relief, and now, from great age, black as polished ebony. The ceiling is cross-beamed with oak, the beams being fully twelve inches in breadth and depth. It is said, with what truth we know not, that these same oaken beams and panels came from the “ faire greene commune at Ostomanstoune,” a few miles off, from which same forest King William Rufus obtained the oak that roofed Westminster Hall ; and it is further asserted that this room is antecedent to that time. Whether or not it can truly claim so long an existence, it can certainly boast of being some centuries old. It may also fairly claim to be unique in design and decoration. It is lighted by a wide mullioned window, the upper panes of which are filled with stained glass. Opposite the window is a double panel, carved in very fine relief in a series 'of scriptural subjects — Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, the Temptation, the Expulsion, the Sale of Joseph; while over the fireplace is a really magnificent example of wood-carving, representing the coronation of the Virgin. It is said that this antique room was at one time a private chapel or oratory of the Talhot family, and that behind the double panel just described stands an altar, at which, in long past days, the Lord of Malahide heard Mass said by his chaplain. Among the other objects of interest which the chamber contains is a cabinet, carved, it is supposed, by Albert Differ, and a suit of armour worn by Sir Walter Hussey, who, in one of the petty civil wars of those feudal times, was slain on his wedding- day. Of his wife, the Lady Maude, who married secondly Sir Richard Talbot, we shall have something to say presently. The great dining-hall, whose pointed church-like roof of rich brown wood, and gallery at one end, date, we are told, from a period prior to Queen Elizabeth, is lined with fine pictures and furnished with charming Chippendale chairs. Here the faces of kings and queens, lords and ladies, knights and soldiers, gaze down upon us from canvases touched by the brush of Lely, of Titian, of Kneller, of Velasquez, and of the great Sir Joshua. At one end, beneath a magnificent pair of old Irish elk-horns, hangs the portrait of John Talbot, Lord of Shrewsbury; while close at hand is “handsome Dick Talbot,” Duke of Tyrconnel and Lord- Lieutenant of Ireland, the favourite of Charles II. and his brother James, painted by the hand of Sir Peter Lely. There also hangs in the dining-hall a portrait of Tyrconnel’s first wife, Catharine Boynton, known as the “witty Lady Talbot,” of whom, by the way, a good story is told. After the Battle of the Boyne, James II. fled up to Dublin and arrived at the Castle there, where, so goes the story, he met Lady Talbot. James, it would seem, was not in the best of spirits or of tempers, and lie accosted the wife of his Malahide castle.] TYRCONNEL AND “LA BELLE JENNLNGSJ 95 favourite ironically in these words: “Well, madam, your countrymen run well.” “Indeed, sire!” replied the lady, nothing daunted; “I am pleased to see that your Majesty has won the race.” Of Tyrconnel’s second wife, “La belle Jennings,” one of the two famous Jacobite beauties — “ La belle Hamilton,” whose portrait hangs . in the large drawing-room at Malahide Castle, being the other — elder sister to Sarah, first Duchess of Marlborough, a veritable romance might he written. In the gay court of the Restoration Tyrconnel met Frances Jennings and fell in love with her, and she twice refused his suit, only to marry him long after, when he had become a widower and she herself a widow. The first Duchess of Tyrconnel survived her husband many a year, and she who had been the brightest butterfly in that butterfly court spent the closing years of her life in a little nunnery for poor Clares, which she had founded in a house in King’s Street, Dublin. The dining-hall also contains a portrait of Philip II. of Spain, said by some to be a Titian, but by others accounted a very fine example of Velasquez ; and certainly, as far as can he judged, it is more in the style of the latter than of the former artist. There are also a painting of Charles II. acting the part of Hamlet, and another of Ireton, Cromwell’s famous general. In the small drawing-room there are two fine Vandycks — Charles I. and his queen, Henrietta Maria ; two pictures of Mary Queen of Scots, and one of her dread foe and cousin, Elizabeth of England ; and a portrait of the notorious Duchess of Portsmouth and her son, the first Duke of Richmond, the latter by Sir Peter Lely. Among the other celebrities whose pictures are in this room are Patrick Sarsfield, first Earl of Lucan, “ Ireland’s Wonder,” as the old song calls him, he who forced William of Orange to sign the famous Treaty of Limerick; a small portrait of Rembrandt, said to be by himself; and one of Myles Corbet, Lord Chief Baron of Ireland during the Cromwellian occupation, and one of the Parliamentary Commissioners who signed Charles I.’s death- warrant. Passing into the great drawing-room, or, as it is sometimes called, the Saloon, we find here also some fine pictures ; among them James II. and his wile, by Sir Peter Lely; good Queen Anne, by Sir Godfrey Kneller ; a curious presentment of Charles I. dancing, it is said, with the Infanta of Spain at the Escurial ; a couple of very characteristic pastoral scenes by Cuyp, and a very fine Titian, “Venus and Cupid.” Here also is the gem of the collection, a small altar-piece, the work of Albert Dfirer. This picture is painted in three compartments, the centre one representing the Adoration of the Magi, while the left depicts the Nativity, and the right the Presenta- tion in the Temple. The story attached to this work is interesting. It 96 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Malaiiide Castle. belonged originally to the ill-fated Mary Queen of Scots, and is said to have adorned her oratory in the old palace of Holyrood, at the time she was living there, a prisoner, though called a Queen. Long afterwards it was presented THE HALL. by Charles IT. to the Duchess of Portsmouth, and was by her given to the Talbots. It may be worth while to add that King Charles II. paid no less than <£2,000 — in his time a truly enormous sum of money — for this little picture. In the same room is preserved another relic of the Royal Stuarts, in the form of a pretty old-fashioned tea-service of painted china, comprising tea- Malahide Castle.] LOYALTY OF THE TALBOTS. 97 pot, cream-ewer, sugar-bowl, and a little cup and saucer, on a china tray — the whole very similar to what we nowadays call a five o’clock tea-tray — which is also said to have once been in the possession of “La Reine Blanche.” THE DINING-HALL. To the Stuarts the Talbots of Malahide were ever devoted subjects. Their loyalty, indeed, cost them dear. On the 14th of August, 1649, just six months after Charles I. lost his crown, his kingdom, and his life, on that bleak January day at Whitehall, Oliver Cromwell landed in Ireland, and marched through Dublin in a northerly direction to the town of Drogheda. The Talbots of Malahide were too pre-eminently loyal to the royal cause, and their castle 13 98 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Malahide Castle. and broad lands too rich a prize, for either to escape the gentle hand of the Lord Protector. John Talbot of Malahide was outlawed, his castle and his lands were forthwith wrested from him, and bestowed on that same Myles Corbet whose portrait now hangs in the small drawing-room ; and the Talbots were thrust out until, for them, the bright days of the Restoration dawned and, Corbet executed as a regicide, the year 1GG1 once more saw the Castle of Malahide the home of its original owners. Strangely enough, only ten years before the Revolution of 1649 another attempt had been made to deprive the Talbots of some of their ancient rights and privileges. In the year 1G39 Strafford, then Charles I.’s Viceroy of Ireland, tried to wrest from Richard Talbot the admiralty of the port of Malahide and other valuable franchises. This attempt, however, was not successful, for Richard Talbot pleaded the ancient charters under which his family had so long inherited, and the Court gave judgment in his favour, and against the Earl of Strafford. The mention of these ancient charters recalls the circumstances under which the Talbots became lords of Malahide. The coming of the first Talbot to Malahide was coincident with the Anglo-Norman conquest of Ireland. But before speaking of the Talbot history, it is worth while to journey still further down the corridors of Time, and glance at the history of the little seaside village which has given the castle its name and the owners of the castle their title. As we in fancy pass through these dim corridors, we come to those days of a dead past when Ireland, a heathen land, first heard the echoes of a nobler faith, as they sounded from the lips of the great St. Patrick, the first Christian missionary whom Ireland ever knew. We read in the old chronicles that about the year 432 a.d. St. Patrick came to Ireland. He and his little band of followers landed, it is supposed, somewhere on the coast of Wicklow. Driven thence by the fury of the pagan inhabitants, they re- embarked, and sailed northwards. Ere long they reached the mouth of a river called lubber, or Inver, Domnainn ; here they stopped to fish, but catching nothing, they voyaged a little farther, and reached an island, henceforth to be inseparably connected with the saint’s name — the island of Innis- patrick, off Skerries, on the north-east coast of the county Dublin. Here they landed, and here St. Patrick preached. One of the most learned and best known of the biographers of Ireland’s patron saint has identified the river lubber Domnainn with Malahide, and gives it as his opinion that the name of Muldowney, now given to the mouth of the Malahide River, is only a cor- ruption of Malihidi ; Malahide is, however, itself a corruption of the Celtic Inbher-Domnaiim, being, in fact, Baile-atlia-icl — that is, Malahide, the town of Id’s ford. This brings us to the next step in our story. The closing years of the Malahide Castle.] THE CHEVALIER RICHARD TALBOT. 90 eighth century of the Christian era witnessed the Danish invasion of Ireland. Hither in 795 came the dread Scandinavian pirates, to plunder, to pillage, and to exterminate, if need he, the Celtic inhabitants of the land. The “Annals of the Four Masters ” tell us that Malahide was their chief and favourite centre of settlement. To any person familiar with the country and its surroundings, the sagacity which prompted their choice of this place is apparent. Here in the little bay was a safe and easy harbour for their ships ; here also was a splendid centre for attack on the rich Christian settlements of Swords and Lusk; while from here expeditions of raid and plunder into the adjoining counties of Meath and Louth could be successfully carried on, with the sea- board to guard against attack on the other side, and to afford a way of escape in case the Celtic owners of the soil should pursue and force them to retreat. Thus the little town of “ Id’s Fort ” rose to a sad pre-eminence. We cannot linger over the story of the Danish occupation and kingdom of Ireland here : we must pass on to' the days when these indomitable Norsemen had, to some extent, beaten their swords into ploughshares and had become colonists and settlers, rather than murderers and thieves. Henceforth, however, their chief town was to be the rapidly-rising town of Dublin, rather than their first strong- hold at Malahide. And yet, as Malahide had been their first point of vantage, so it was to be their last also. We read that the last Norse king of Dublin, Hamud MacTurquil, defeated (as his ancestors had in their turn defeated the luckless Celts) and broken by the strong arm of the Anglo-Norman power, and driven out from his kingdom of Dublin, retired to Malahide, one of the last of his possessions, and thence, with the help of a Norwegian army, made one more desperate bid for life and freedom and his lost kingdom, but was vanquished, taken prisoner, and finally put to death. Thus ended the Danish rule in Ireland. A new conqueror comes upon the scene — Henry IT. of England and his Norman soldiers — and the Anglo-Norman kingdom of Ireland, vice the Danish, deposed. In the winter of 1172 Henry II. paid his famous visit to Dublin. Here for six months he held his court, the first, as he has been the last, English monarch of whom the same can he said. With Henry came a great train of Norman knights, and gentlemen, and courtiers, to assist in conquest and share the fruits of victory. With these spoils ere long came to he numbered the lands of Malahide. The Danish lord of Malahide dispossessed and defeated by Henry, on whom were the fruits of victory to lie bestowed? Among the Norman gentlemen who shared the honours of the expedition was the Chevalier Diehard Talbot, a member of the great Anglo-Norman family which in after years was to be so celebrated in camp and court. On him the king bestowed the lands and lordship of Malahide. The Domesday Book contains the name of Richard 100 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Malahide Castle. de Talbot, and from tliat Richard de Talbot are lineally descended the Talbots of Malaliide and the Talbots of Shrewsbury. Of the former and the conditions of their lordship of Malaliide, Sir Bernard Burke thus speaks : — “ The castle and lordship of Malaliide have been possessed by the Talbots from a period con- temporary with the first introduction of the English government into Ireland, THE OAK ROOM. and at this moment (1891) they furnish an instance unusually rare of a baronial estate having continued for upwards of 650 3 ^ears in the male heirs and name of him on whom it had been originally conferred by Henry II. It is remarkable, too, that of the ancient seigniorial estates in Ireland whose lords were invested with the dignity of parliamentary barons, not one can be traced to have been held directly and immediately under the Crown but the lordship of Malaliide. In this respect Malaliide seems to have been unique in Ireland ; and its lords, pursuant to the nature of their original tenure and the terms of their royal charters, never rendered homage, suit, or service to any but the Crown, nor acknowledged any superior but the King of England alone.” Thus the Talbots came to Malaliide. The tenure by which they held their lands was that known as “knight’s service,” which, it has been Malahide Castle.] THE BUILDING OF MALAHIDE. 101 said, is one of tlie most ancient and honourable of all tenures. The conditions of knight’s service were that he who held lands by it “should render to the King the service of one archer, with a horse and coat of mail, for ever.” In the confirmatory grant, given to Sir Richard Talbot on these conditions by Henry II. ’s son, Prince (afterwards King) John, were included all the append- ages of civil and criminal jurisdiction as possessed by the baronage of that With the advent of Anglo- Norman settlers came the necessity for fortified dwelling-places, wherein they with their families and dependents might live in comfort and security. Thus, among other feudal castles which at this time began to rear their heads proudly throughout the land, came the Castle of Malahide. The first Talbot laid the foundations of that castle as his own dwelling-house in the reign of Henry II., and now, when Queen Victoria has been more than fifty years on the throne of England, a Talbot still lives in the house which his ancestor built when English rule in Ireland was in its infancy. It is a long stretch of family history, from the days of Henry II. to those of Victoria. But year by year, with the exception of a very brief period, have the Talbots, father and son, lived in this old castle, on the broad lands which the power of England wrested from the Danish king. They held Malahide as a lordship and manor, having courts, leet and baron; and the lands included Feltrim and Balvenstown, and extended a considerable distance along the seashore. We 102 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Malahide Castle. read that in 1372 Thomas Talbot was summoned to Parliament, in virtue of his lordship of Malahide ; while Edward IV. made the then head of the house Lord Admiral of Malahide and the seas adjoining, with power to hold a court of admiralty on the high seas, or elsewhere, within the limits of the lordship. This title of Lord Admiral is an hereditary one, and is still held by the Lord Talbot de Malahide of to-day. Of the many historic relics belonging to the Castle of Malahide, few are perhaps of more interest than the ruined arches and ivy-clad walls of the old chapel or church of Malahide, which stands in the demesne close by the castle. This ancient church was, it has been affirmed, founded at the time the Talbot family first settled in the land, and the advowson was granted to the lords of the soil, who seem to have been frequent bene- factors to it. From the ecclesiastical records, Malahide would seem to have been a chapelry attached to the rich and neighbouring parish of Swords. The ruins of the church, or, at least, as much of them as the ever-increasing tangle of ivy and weeds with which it is en wreathed leave exposed to view, show that it must have been a parochial church of no mean pretensions as to size and architectural adornment. The plan of the building consists of a chancel and nave, the former lying due east and being some thirty feet long. The east wall of the chancel contains the remains of a really fine tliree-liglit window; there are also two small lancet windows in the north wall, and one in the south. Across the building is a beautiful chancel arch, lofty, pointed, and exceedingly graceful in outline. The nave is said to be of somewhat later date than the chancel, and it certainly seems, as far as can be seen, to be more ornate in design and architecture. The west gable is surmounted by a curious three-arched bell-turret, unfortunately, however, now almost completely hidden by ivy. Beneath this hell-tower, in the western gable, is a Gothic three- light window with pointed arches and crocheted ogee canopies, hut here, too, the spreading ivy rather interferes with the view of the walls themselves. The entrance doorways are set one precisely opposite the other in the north and south walls. They are arched, pointed, and about five feet in height at their highest point. Both have well-cut stone jambs and dripstones, while the dripstone of the south door is enriched with a curious mitred head, carved somewhat rudely, and at one side of the doorway by a stoup. These two doorways are the only entrances to the church, though in the south-east corner of the chancel is a small pointed door which leads into a curious two-storeyed building, about twelve feet square, and plainly of much later date than the church which it adjoins. As to the probable use of this little edifice, there is considerable conjecture. Possibly it was a chantry, or, as other persons have thought, a vestry, or it may have been a place of residence for the clergyman. Mala hide Castle.] THE OLD CHURCH. 103 Such was the old church of Malahide, till that day when Cromwell’s godly captains sacked and desecrated it, stripped its walls of their roof, in order, so runs tradition, to make bullets of its lead, and could find no use more fitted to its sacred aisles than that they should furnish a stable for the horses of their troopers. dueeb’s altae-piece. Within this church is the ancient burial-place of the Talbot family. And here, near the centre of the nave, is the altar tomb beneath which sleeps she who was “maid, wife, and widow” in one day. This lady, whose story is perhaps without parallel in the world’s history, was the Honourable Maud (sometimes called the Lady Maud) Plunkett, wife of Sir Bichard Talbot of Malahide. She had, however, before her marriage with Sir Bichard, married Sir Walter Hussey, Baron of Galtrim, who, as has been already stated, was killed on the day of his marriage. The tomb is surmounted by a recumbent effigy of Lady Maud, very well carved in bold relief, representing her as wearing the curious horned cap which was so favourite an article of feminine attire in the fifteenth century. 104 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Malahide Castle. Our review of Malahide Castle and of its history is now at an end. We pass out from the crumbling walls of the old church, and leaving it once more to solitude and silence, stroll onwards through the demesne itself, which stretches round and about the Castle in green undulating pasture. As we glance upwards to the spreading branches of the trees, clothed in the rich beauty of their summer foliage, we can easily fancy how many a gap and many a detail in our story might these ancient trees till up were they, but for one little hour, endowed with the gift of speech. But they stand silent as the past which saw their birth, and no sound greets the ear save the soft swish and rustle of their leaves, as they bend and flutter in the light breeze. We must fain rest content with our story as it is, and with those records which the chances of time, aided by the carelessness of man, have not wholly destroyed. Ella MacMahon. If VIEW FROM THE SOUTH-EAST, CHATS WORTH. rpiiE family of Cavendish is not of the kind that need be anxious to trace descent from Trojan warriors. Indeed, its fame is not even a mere half millennium old. The Sir William Cavendish who was gentleman usher to Cardinal Wolsey, and also his eminence’s biographer, did well for his name’s sake in marrying Bess of Hardwick in her first widowhood. This lady may really be said to have been the architect of the fortunes of the House of Cavendish ; for there can be little doubt that the children from the marriage inherited, in a measure, her own sturdy qualities, by virtue of which, in a generation or two, the family became among the most distinguished in the land. Sir William, as husband of the Lady Bess, and as keeper for a while of Mary of Scotland, probably had few dull moments during the later years of his life. Chatsworth, in those days, was not of course the palace of our time — a world-renowned show-house, the gilded gates of which open to the sight- craving public as regularly as do those of the British Museum or the Louvre. It was a high, rectangular, baronial castle, set on a cleared space among the 14 ARMS OF THE DUKE OF DEVONSHIRE. 10.6 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Chatsworth. grit-stone rocks and woods near tlie Derwent valley, at the base of one of the ridges which are so characteristic of the Peak District of Derbyshire. It had turrets and a parapeted roof, and a number of windows as small as ever vexed the soul of a fair lady who sought to escape therefrom to her lover below. Before the taste for scenery became as common among us as the eating of mustard, old Chatsworth was not likely to be praised for its charms. There would then have been nothing hut melancholy in the sound of the river a stone’s throw from the castle gates ; the wind up the valley was then a mysterious foreboding dirge, not the agree- able melody we moderns find it ; and the great rounded cops (or “ caps ”) of the hills in the distance probably affected the imaginations of our fore- fathers much like the natural features in the bewitched lands through which the old heroes of romance had to fight their toilsome way. Out of question the earlier Chatsworth must have been a dolorous prison for Queen Mary. And perhaps the more dolorous for the disposition of her keeper’s wife, whose power of tacking successfully through life was of a kind generally incompatible with tenderness and amiability. Bess of Hardwick would have done well as Bess of England ; hut as queen she would have been too confident of her own strength to have been guilty of the crime of Fo the ring ay. Only a morsel of the sixteenth century Chatsworth stands to remind us vigorously that Queen Mary’s connection with the district is by no means legendary. This is a quaint little balustraded mound, with a moat round it, “ scarce half a furlong from the house.” It is called Queen Mary’s Bower. The river murmurs briskly by it, and the vi ew thence up and down the dale is what we in these days call charming. Hither, it is said, the queen used to be led, and here with her maids she would sit at needlework, reading, or being read to, singing, or tending the flovmrs she had planted to keep her company. “ Nothing,” it lias been said, “ can be more lugubrious than the spot.” Its bridge of steps over the water might more aptly be called a bridge of sighs than that by the prisons of old Venice. No doubt this is so. And yet if Queen Mary from this her prison bower saw the river and the cedars on its yellow banks, and heard the song of the blackbirds and finches, and the cheery rustle of the wind in the GATEWAY TO STABLES. Chatsworth.] QUEEN MAR YE BOWER, 107 trees, as one may see and hear them on a bright April day, when the world' is just bursting into leaf, she must have had her hours of quiet pleasure as well as her years of weariness, heartache, and pain. In the evening, however, it is different. When the sun has withdrawn from the hills, and the night-clouds are massing up the valley, or sailing down it before the chilly whistle of the gale, then Queen Mary’s Bower provokes a shudder. The black boughs of the cedars seem to be pointing with an air of menace, and the river clamours with threats of what it will do with the living soul that comes into its clutches. The little white-tailed rabbits, which under the glad sunlight seem to scamper so gleefully into their holes at the roots of the cedars, are at such a time vague, evil-working shapes, imps, gnomes, or what you please ; and the wind in the gloaming is a requiem. If the raindrops begin to thump heavily into the dark, speeding river, so much the better. The con- trast is then brought well home ; and nothing but a clap or two of thunder and a prompt lightning-flash among the shaking tree-tops is needed to make one sigh, “ Poor Mary ! ” in a most hearty way. But, to speak precisely, the Bower may well have been to the queen what it is said to have been. Her flower garden, if it ever existed, has been obliterated. The surface of the mound (seen through the wooden gate, the bars of which are thickly engraved with the initials of an ardent multitude) was the other day of pallid grass merely, half-choked with dead leaves. The moat also has a solid stratum of leaves in it. Nowadays a man might jump from the Bower into the moat, fall lightly, and not get so very wet ere he stumbled ashore. The first Duke of Devonshire, to whom modern Chatsworth owes its being, was a remarkable man in an age of great men. “ The general voice,” Macaulay reminds us, “ designated him as the finest gentleman of his time.” He was a man most desirable as the patron of a new poet or a political pamphlet. He was also a pillar of the State, able to do as much as any of his contemporaries in the unseating of one king and the support of the new order of things that came in with William of Orange. At one time in his career it looked as if he might be disgraced and ruined for ever. This was when the Court of 108 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Chatsworth. King’s Bench sentenced him to pay a fine of £30,000, for striking the man Colepepper in the Boyal Drawing-room at Whitehall. Colepepper played the part of a braggart supporter of the Government at a time when James II. was fast losing the regard of his people. The Earl of Devonshire, on the other hand, was notably in opposition. He could not, or would not, put up with the airs and innuendoes of Colepepper, whom he challenged, and, upon the rejection of his challenge, struck across the face with his cane. For this he was sentenced to be imprisoned until the payment of the huge sum. But it was not so easy to lay hands on the Lord of Chatsworth ; and it was not until several attempts to penetrate into the Peak district for the purpose had failed that the Earl bowed to his fate. Anon, however, the King yielded to entreaty, and released him, although the fine still remained to be paid. This was in 1687 ; in the following year Devonshire was one of the seven lords who signed the invitation to William III. — the annus libertatis as it is called on the marble tablet over the fireplace in the stately hall of Chatsworth. Fourteen years afterwards this same lord was present at the death-scene of the Dutch hero whose fortunes he had so well helped to advance. Meanwhile the Duke had done wonders among the rocks and firs and oaks of Chatsworth. He seems to have commissioned a number of men — all con- spicuous in their own professions — to build and prepare for him a house of regal magnificence. Wren had to do with the plans for the building. One might rather have supposed that Palladio himself had re-visited the earth to give his mind to the work, for outside Verona and Venice there is no building more truly Palladium And as of the building, so of the woodwork, sculpture, and frescoes. The robust mind of the great Whig for whom this mansion was shaping is well suggested by the frescoes in the first chamber into which the visitor to Chatsworth sets foot. The ceiling shows us Verrio’s idea of the apotheosis of Julius Csesar, while on the upper wall at the entrance Brutus stands nobly self-conscious with the dead Cfesar at his feet. No doubt it went against the grain in so proud an aristocrat as the Earl of Devonshire to cabal against his legitimate sovereign. But he was situated like Brutus. He loved his country more than he regarded his sovereign, and so James II. had to be dethroned that liberty might come in with William of Orange. It is a pity that Verrio has not taken for the subject of his frescoes some scenes in the life of William Cavendish instead of Julius Csesar. Then an Englishman of the twentieth century would feel that he had not irked his neck in vain in en- deavouring to find instruction and interest in this and others of the ceiling pictures of Chatsworth. Far more to the taste of a Briton is the wonderful woodwork about the rooms of the Hall. This, at any rate, is British art — whether we ascribe the GIIATSWORTH, FROM THE WEST. no HISTORIC HOUSES. [Chatsworth. best of it to the famous Grinling Gibbons himself, or to Samuel Watson, the Derbyshire man who for twenty years was employed here as an embellisher in stone and wood alike. And what rare art it is ! It is simply beyond com- parison with anything except the objects, animate and inanimate, it assumes to represent. But a very little of the breath of life would be necessary, one fancies, to set the birds here pendant on the panellings throbbing with anxiety to plume their feathers and dash themselves against the glass of the windows in their ardour to get into the sunlight which gleams so gaily upon the ponds and turf and fountains of the terrace outside to the south. The stone decorative work of the Hall does not interest one like the wood- work. It is not so easy to see, in the first place. The urns and statues of the facades are high above the eye-line. Besides, they and the other pieces of sculpture on the terrace balustrade and by the Derwent bridge are seriously weathered. Here an arm and tfiere a leg have gone the way of all stone. No villa in the Roman Carnpagna could look more sad and afflicted than some of the Chatsworth outdoor sculpture. Cains Gabriel Cibber was the first of the sculptors who took this department of the Hall in hand. A note of this laborious gentleman’s is extant, upon which appear the words: “For two statues, as big as life, I have T35 apiece, and all charges borne; and at this rate I shall endeavour to serve a nobleman in freestone.” It is not a very large price for a life-size statue, but the material was doubtless provided by the Duke himself, and money then had four or five times the value it has with us. By 1707 Chatsworth was completed in accordance with the designs of the first architect’s plans. And so for a century it remained. It was at any rate compact and homogeneous, if not quite suited to its position and surroundings. But there can be little doubt that the extension of the western or river front by the sixib Duke early in this century has much added to the grandeur of the palace. If one must carp, one might fain wish that the added part had heen wholly in keeping with the older part — perhaps even a reproduction in size and manner, with an interjacent lower block to assuage the feeling ot pon- derosity that a building so massive and large might have occasioned. But, on the other hand, the Hall would have been spacious enough for a town’s popula- tion ; and such a pile of mortar and stone would have been almost a blot in the midst of the lovely Derwent valley. In a world that is confessedly not perfect one may be content to say “Well done!” from whatever aspect Chatsworth be viewed. It is to this same sixth duke that the gardens owe their origin. Sir Joseph Paxton has done for these what Gibbons and Watson did for the interior ot the Hall. It was here that glass, for the first time since its discovery by Chatsworth.] PAXTON’S CONSER VA TOR Y. the Phoenicians, showed of what it is capable. All the world knows that Paxton’s conservatory of Chatsworth preceded the Crystal Palace and the Exhibition buildings of 1851 as naturally as the fowl precedes the egg she lays. We do not cry “Oh!” and “Ah!” at this glass-house a hundred yards long as our grandsires did. In our day we have railway stations and permanent glasshouses such as Paxton would have approved enthusi- astically; and we are a little spoiled for this Chatsworth wonder which gleams with such a dazzle when the sun is on it, and in which, even after Kew, we may find pleasure for the rich epitome of tropical vegetation it offers to our eyes. The sixth duke — whom Lord Hartington seems, in feature, to resemble greatly — was a worthy patron of a man like Paxton. Each in their respective positions, they appear to have been made for each other. Without the money and enterprise of the duke, Paxton’s energies and abilities would, ten to one, have gone astray, or been concentrated on the attempt to earn a livelihood and nothing more. On the other hand, Chatsworth ought to recall Paxton as much as any of its lords. He was one of the best examples of the century of the distance to which self-help and perseverance will carry a man. If ever again a fresco painter be called to work upon the walls and ceilings of the Hall, Paxton should not be forgotten. That chance meeting of his with Robert Stephenson at the railway station, when the latter was on his way to London to sit with the Exhibition Committee, has a certain value as history. The engineer and the gardener fell into conversation, and the latter told the former of the plan that had occurred to him the other day, and which he had sketched forth without loss of time. “ Wonderful,” exclaimed the engineer, “ worthy of the magnificence of Chatsworth ! a thousand times better than anything that has been brought before us ! What a pity they were not prepared earlier ! ” “Will you lay them before the Royal Commission ? ” asked Paxton. “ I will,” was the reply. And thus the Crystal Palace was sprung upon an admiring world. Paxton’s theories, however, of the use to which glass might be put were by no means confined to exhibition buildings and conservatories. Turn to the Illustrated London News , of July 5th, 1851, and look at his plan for the City of London Hospital for Diseases of the Chest. Contrast this fascinating struc- ture of glass with the depressing dingy brick buildings we have for hospitals. It has as lively an effect upon the mind as a Utopian social or political scheme. And who shall say that, on this point also, Paxton is not worth hearing ? He thus justifies his novel sanatorium — “ By covering the building with glass, placed in an angular form, the sun’s rays (so important to health) will be freely 112 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Chatswokth. admitted. Tlie dimensions, after tlie interior is laid out, will afford a good space for exercise and recreation. The outer air, before its dispersion through the interior, undergoes a process of filtration. Being admitted through tunnels to the centre of the building, it is there modified by heat, ascends a shaft STATE BED-BOOM. 12 feet in height, and is thence distributed, some to reappear and undergo another filtration, and the remainder to escape from the roof. The plants which will decorate the interior will be such as are known not to emit un- healthy exhalations, and that give out a large quantity of oxygen. Thus the air will be rendered and kept pure and exhilarating, and tlie tender lungs of invalids will be stimulated and fed.” Fifty years ago Chatsworth was the show-house it still is, though Paxton had not then devoted his genius to the gardens. It is odd to read in old books how the visitor was led, precisely as he is still led, from the ducal gates to the porch of the entrance-hall, and how he was then requested to tarry a while until the house- keeper had been persuaded either to offer her services to the stranger or find a capable deputy for the task of cicerone. The visitor may now, as then, in the Ghatswoeth.] T1IE STATE BOOMS. interval, pay attention to Verrio’s frescoes, tlie miglity slab of encrinitic marble which forms a table in the middle of the room, the caique sent to the sixth Duke of Devonshire by a Sultan of Turkey, or the alabaster buttressing to the right of the staircase which leads to the galleries and state chambers. The state chambers are on the third storey of the southern wing of the house. They comprise bed-room, drawing-room, music-room, and dining-room, IN THE SCULPTURE GALLERY. and are so arranged that, the connecting doors being thrown open, the eye looks down a majestic avenue of marble thresholds. The view from the windows is uniformly impressive. Trim lawns, fountains, and terraces, are in the foreground. Beyond is the Derwent, its valley, and the adjacent hills. The public are admitted to the state rooms, and also to the corridors (which contain many of the pictures of Chatswortli), the chapel, and the famous sculpture gallery. But the Duke’s private apartments, which include a drawing- and dining-room and the very attractive library, are not shown to ordinary visitors. As we have already said, Chatswortli is most noteworthy for its woodwork. Once in the state rooms, there is no end to one’s admiration of this delicate counterfeit of nature. Perhaps the decoration of the panelling in the state dining- room excites the keenest marvel. The birds here have a russet colouring, 15 114 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Chatswoeth. moreover, which, though doubtless due rather to the grain of the wood, makes them seem pre-eminently creditable to the artists. The chapel, too, in addition to a line altar-piece by Cibber, in Derbyshire spar and marble, has some noble work set on the panels of cedar-wood which perfume the chamber so sweetly. CHIMNEY-PIECE IN DINING BOOM (BY WESTMACOTT). But of all this rich testimony to the skill and industry of British artisans two hundred years ago none is to be compared with the little cluster in which a lace cravat is represented pendent. It is so exquisitely fine that, though you might laugh at the idea, you would not be outrageously surprised if a puff of wind were to carry the cravat in an eddy, as if it were a leaf. As a rule it is a tax on the inclinations when one is requested to admire what all the world has agreed to regard as admirable. But here this masterpiece of Grinling Gibbons disarms all one’s innate humour of petulance and cavil. The state bed-mom is an apartment of solemn magnificence, with gorgeous leather wall-hangings. Its chief treasures are the chairs and footstools used at the coronation of George III. and Queen Charlotte. The music-room contains the same relics of the coronation of William IV. and Queen Adelaide. Chatswortii.] THE PICTURES AND STATUARY. 115 In paintings, of course, the seat of the Cavendishes is likely to excel. Of family portraits, Sir Joshua’s picture of the celebrated Duchess of Devonshire holding her little daughter (afterwards Lady Carlisle) at arms’ length is one of the pleasantest. She is clearly a fine lady, with no slight resemblance to Mrs. Siddons. But somehow this portrait in profile does not convince one of her surpassing beauty. The nose at the tip is rather sharply than alluringly retrousse. Her heavily powxlered hair gives her a touch of magnificence. On the wdiole, how- ever, one sighs for the more famous picture of this lovely woman : the picture with the broad-brimmed hat and the sweet expression. But who shall say what has become of this purloined canvas ? We must wait a generation or two, until public opinion’s -Statute of Limitations allows the man who then finds it in his possession to support his claim to it. Among the old masters, Holbein claims most attention. There are three of his paintings of Henry VIII., the largest and most finished being in the state dining-room — a suitable location for the monarch wdiose corpulence suggests the liveliness of his appetite. The great painter has also given us in one of the corridors a convincing portrait of himself. He is sadly haggard and lean and sallow, and the red carnation held in the right hand as if it were a sceptre lias an air of incongruity. Vet all this is but the stronger testimony in favour of the truth of the likeness. In the large drawing-room Mary of Scots, in her rich, crimson flowered velvet- robe and yellow satin petticoat, holds the eye. It is a work by Zuccaro, and reckoned an excellent likeness. But it is not the Mary of one’s imagination ; nor is there much obvious beauty in her here. The elevations like asses’ ears (a mode lately again prevalent among us) from her gown at the shoulders do not add to Mary’s comeliness. In the same room Charles I., by Janssen, is con- spicuous, and so is a delightful Titian of himself and family. The colouring- of the latter is worthy of the best work in Venetian galleries. Rembrandt, also, must not be forgotten. Sundry of his lowering faces peer at us from the shadow of their background in the corridors. His “ Jewish Rabbi,” however, in the middle drawing-room, is a brighter work. The dignity in the old man is great, though the hands have, to the novice, a ludicrously pasty look. Alongside it is a Murillo — the “ Blind Beggar Receiving Alms.” Of the moderns, Landseer here deserves most recognition. The Red Velvet Room enshrines the two treasures which have been familiarised by the engravers — the “ Laying Down of the Law,” and “ Bolton Abbey in the Olden Time.” It need hardly be said that these two pictures will bear much looking at. From the pictures to the Sculpture Gallery is a natural transition ; and here, too, Chatswortii is very strong. Already, in the dining-room, one has noticed the lovely chimney-piece by the younger Westmacott, and the 116 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Chatsworth. impressive busts of C. -J. Fox, by Nolle kens, and of Canning, by Chantrey, and in the large drawing-room a divine Hebe, by Canova, not much the worse for the lack of the little finger of one of its hands. But in the sculpture gallery there is such a superb association of treasures that one is almost distraught in the endeavour to give each its due measure of regard. No student of Canova must reckon his education finished until he has been to Chatsworth many times. Even St. Peter’s of Rome does not illustrate THE STATE DRAWING-ROOM. his genius so emphatically as this small but precious chamber, in which the light is so w T ell arranged. What a work, for instance, is the bust of Bonaparte here ! and the recumbent statue of Madame Letitia, a woman as remarkable as Napoleon himself! Never were immeasurable ambition and energy better shown in the faces of a mother and her son. A man might train himself towards great aims upon Can ova’s Bonaparte in Chatsworth. In the same room is the “ Sleeping Endymion,” captivating alike hi design and workmanship. And on a bracket against i lie wall smiles Canova’s idea of the Laura who gave Petrarch so many days of bitter sweet. It is not a perfect smile by air^ means ; but the eye catches it, and asks of the mind what it implies. It is at least possible that Petrarch’s Laura smiled occasionally upon her poet lover as this bust smiles, and perplexed him, as the marble smile puzzles us. Schwanthaler’s group, “The Swan Song,” also deserves particular notice, and there are other attractive statues in this fair room, though it is impossible to do more than mention the names of Thorwaldsen, Westmacott, Fenelli, Gibson, and Rinaldi. Chats wort h.] THE LIBRARY. 117 The Library is that of a family by whom intellectual culture has been carried far. There are first editions of the Classics under glass cases, and specimens of the work of Grollier and his brethren that would gladden the heart of a bibliomaniac. The Mazarin Bible is here, and some line examples from the Caxton Press, as well as Shakespeare in the original quartos. The library also contains illuminated manuscripts of price. One does not know THE CHAPEL, FROM THE GALLERY. that a Cavendish has done for the library of his house what the Hon. B. Curzon did for his ancestral fame among the old monastic treasures of Athos and the East, some fifty years ago. But there are other ways of acquiring treasures than by seeking them at the fountain head. Some of the fantastic nomenclature of sham books which one remembers at (lad’s Hill reappears here to provoke a smile. The doorway is panelled with painted book-backs, inscribed with such titles as these : “ Lamb on the Death of Wolfe,” “Cursory Remarks on Swearing,” “Boyle on Steam,” “ On the Lung Arno in Consumption, by D. Cline,” “ John Knox on Death’s Door,” &c. For the rest, nowhere in the world could there be a library more likely to enchant the student who is privileged to have the run of it. Here are order, opulence, cleanliness, and luxury ; and the light from the windows is neither too strong nor too feeble. The little village of Edensor, which nestles about the gates of Chats- 118 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Chatsworth. worth park, contains a church, up the steps of which most visitors to the Hall climb. It is a modern building on an old foundation, and may he noticed for its own sake as the outcome of Sir Gilbert Scott’s genius. But the church- yard annexed to it interests one more than the church. At the upper end of it, is a simple grass plot railed from the rest of the area. A thicket of rhodo- dendrons grows where the railed space ends. Beyond are the swelling outlines of the park hills, dappled with deer, with a fringe of trees on the summit of the ridge. This railed space contains the unpretentious tombs of several members of the Cavendish family. Here lies the sixth Duke, under a plain monument of freestone. It is such a tomb as would, for its poverty, shock the soul of the widow of an opulent bacon merchant. But it is good enough for the sixth Duke of Devonshire. There is one tomb in this Cavendish enclosure to which people make a sort of pilgrimage of pity. Under it lie the remains of Lord Frederick Charles Cavendish. A small cross is cut in the stone beneath the name, and the date May 6th, 1882, is eloquent enough to most }:)eople. It is computed that eighty thousand men and women assembled here in Edensor to see Lord Frederick buried. The raised mound over him does not often lack some kind of offering from the hands of the children of Edensor. No doubt the tale of the murdered Lord Cavendish will for many a year be handed down from one generation of Edensor villagers to another. In this churchyard too lies Sir Joseph Paxton. He died in 1865, in the prime of his energies. One could wish he also had but a simple monument to remind us of him. But it is not so. It is a burly rectangular mausoleum, as heavy to the imagination as his own glass structures were light. Happily, the words over the north porch of St. Paul’s Cathedral to the honour of Sir Christopher Wren have kindred application here to Sir Joseph Paxton. From any elevation in Chatsworth it is possible to see the gleam of the glass of his conservatories and the winsome gardens which have made the Hall a household word. These are Paxton’s monuments at Chatsworth. A visit to this ducal seat would be incomplete if it did not include an ascent to the Hunting Tower which one is wont to see on every picture and engraving of Chatsworth. In the suburbs of any of our large towns this tower would, by the estate agents, be termed a desirable villa residence. It has a lovely situation, and enough rooms for the accommodation of a family. In the old days it is said that the ladies of Chatsworth were in the habit of climbing hither to see the sport of stag hunting in the park below them. It is really no inconsiderable climb, for the rock upon which the tower stands rises abruptly from the stables of the Hall ; and whether he journeys by the carriage Chatswokth.] VIEW FROM THE HUNTING TOWER, 119 road or the steeper steps, the pedestrian who is out of training will be made to puff and blow. But what a lovely little excursion it is, when the sun is bright in the heavens, and its radiance beams through the lacing of the houghs of fir, oak, cedar, sycamore, silver birch, beeches, and giant hollies, which spring from the medley of lichened boulders on the hill side ! There is water too in the scene. No matter if, in the beginning, the cascading stream which tumbles from the heights of the ridge was the work of the landscape gardener. By this time Nature herself has mellowed the setting of the stream. She has in one rainy season after another dislodged the big upper stones, and sent them bustling down, to take up a position more in accordance with her own ideas of the picturesque. And she has sown ferns and creepers among the rhododen- drons and mossy tree trunks, until the woodland has more the aspect of a morsel of primeval forest than a plot in the adornment of which man has turned his mind and hand to account. Having at length cleared the last step, and clambered up the easy grass slope crested by the tow^er, Derwent Yale for many a mile declares itself. Eight fat little cannon make a pretence of grimness at the base of the build- ing. Doubtless, if need were, they could bombard Edensor finely, and soon scatter the stones of Sir Gilbert Scott’s church. But no one is likely to associate them with any such terrible purpose. The poultry of the family who live on this elevated perch mount the guns, and crow valorously from the very breech-holes. And the children of the house bestride them and play hide- and-seek about and between them with sweet heedlessness of the prime purpose of the things. Well beneath lies Ghatsworth Hall, with its level lawns and sparkling ponds and fountains. The clock of the stable turret strikes the hour with an affectation of remoteness that is almost convincing. The white roads which seam the park in sundry directions tempt the eye to follow their course until they disappear behind some distant knoll, or over the brow of an offshoot of one ot the greater cops. Far and near you may see little black figures on these park highways, even to the vicinity of Baslow, to the north, where the hydropathic establishment looms large, and tells of the popularity of Derwent’s valley in the milder months. And the river itself brightens the whole scene with its silver reaches between the green banks and the sombre foliage of the cedars. It is a royal eyrie, this of the Ghatsworth hunting tower. The leafy hill on which it stands and the river at its base are precious features of the famous Derbyshire palace of the Dukes of Devonshire. Charles Edwardes. rUNSHUEST PLACE. • PENSHURST PLACE. | T is as tlie home of Sir Philip Sidney the hero of Zutphen, of Algernon Sidney who gave his life in the cause of liberty on Tower Hill, and of the Sacha- rissa who was sung in love-sick verse by Waller, that Penshurst Place makes its principal claim to distinction. Without them it probably would only have ranked in common with many another country house scattered over the land, types of the varying phases of our history and progress. When, however, the attention is once riveted upon this beautiful Kentish cradle of the Sidneys, all manner of historical associations cluster around it. It is one of many estates in and around the fair Weald of Kent that one may love for their own sake, hut the poets have thrown over it a distinctive glamour. Though it is generally believed that Sir Philip Sidney wrote Ids “Arcadia” at the Wiltshire seat of his relative, the Earl of Pembroke, there are certain passages in that now little-read romance which show that what plot there is in it, nominally laid in Greece as it is, was coloured by the writer from his memories of home. The imaginary country of Laconia, with its Strephons and pastoral surroundings, is the country around Penshurst Place. Even to this day, albeit it is no longer the scene of shepherd-boys piping as though they would never grow old, the roses to which he likens the cheeks of Parthenia, “blushing when their leaves are with a little breath stirred,” ARMS OF LORD DE L’lSLE AND DUDLEY. Pexsiiuest Place.] ARCADIA. 121 bloom in the shaded gardens around the house. There is a description of the well-ordered ground to which Kalander led Palladios one afternoon that is a faithful picture of what one now beholds in the court behind the mansion — neither field, garden, nor orchard, hut a combination of the three.; and the following words might he a literal transcript of the notes entered in the diary of a visitor of to-day : “As soon as the descending of the stairs had delivered them down, they came into a place cun- ningly set with trees of the most taste- pleasing fruits ; hut scarcely they had taken that into their consideration, hut PEXSIIUEST PLACE, FBOM THE AVEXUE. that they were suddenly stepped into a delicate green ; of each side of the green a thicket, and behind the thickets again new beds of flowers, which, being under the trees, the trees were to them a pavilion, and they to the trees a mosaical floor, so that it seemed Art therein would needs be delightful, by counterfeiting Error, and making order in confusion.” Even the fountain, whose shaking crystal was a perfect mirror of all their beauties, plashes musically in the middle of the lawns. The country around Penshurst is a land of hill and vale, of lane and orchard, of cosy farm-houses and well-kept grounds, of ancient cottages, of hedge-rows abloom with wild flowers and musical with the songs of birds. 16 122 HISTORIC HOUSES. CPenshurst Place. At tlie top of the hill to which the high road from the station conducts, a short tramp along a pretty upland road brings the wayfarer to a turn between high banks, delightfully shaded with trees ; and at a little cottage, embowered in greenery, with a garden amply furnished with bee-hives, a footpath to the left trends towards a wicket-gate, giving immediate entrance to the upper acres of the park. Between the ancestral trees away down the verdant slope, and on the lower level where the faint blue smoke marks the whereabouts of the village, now passing glimpses, and now a full view, will be possible of the long and somewhat low range of hattlemented stone buildings, with their ivied front and slender chimneys of Elizabethan days. The tower of the church, turreted at the four corners, seems from this distance to he part of the mansion, of which indeed, it is, from the northern standpoint, in the immediate background. If the place derives its name from the British pen, signifying top, and liyrst , wood, Penslmrst is truly an appropriate word. This w 7 as a portion of that primeval forest which is commemorated in the Saxon term “ weald.” Ancient Britons hunted wild beasts in its thickets, but the savagery had gone before it became the home of the Sidneys. The de Pencester knights were established lords of the manor in the 13tli century, and in the south chancel of the church there is a battered monument to Sir Stephen Pencester, who was buried there in the time of Edward I. The Sidneys received Penslmrst as a gift from Edward VI., a manor park then of many miles in circumference. Reduced considerably now in dimensions, its character evidently remains substantially what it was, and it may be that the writer of “Arcadia” made mental notes from the self-same mossy mound which any one of us to-day may choose- for our seat of observation. The celebrated trees of this park w x ere the Ladies’ Oak (also called the Bear and the Broad Oak) and Sir Philip’s Oak. There are many venerable oaks in the domain, but there are few more ancient in the country than that weather-beaten patriarch still standing sturdy on the slope in its last year’s, and pointed out as the identical tree under the wide-spreading branches of which the chivalrous knight, whose name is “renowned for whatever is great and good,” was in the habit of sitting as a boy. This wrinkled and hollow remnant of a mighty trunk lias a circumference of ‘27 feet at a yard from the ground, and upholds a few rugged branches that yield their leaves in season at a height of less than fifty feet. The Broad Oak, which when cut down produced 840 feet of marketable timber, could scarcely have been the tree planted to com- memorate Sir Philip Sidney’s birth. Ben Jonson refers to it as “ That taller tree, which of a nut was set At Iris great birth, when all the Muses met.” Sidney’s short career of thirty-two years ended in 1586; Jonson’s “Eorest” Pensiiukst Place.] HISTORIC TREES. 123 was probably written about a quarter of a century later, and an oak of that age would be comparatively an insignificant stripling when he went to Pens- liurst. It might, however, have been the tree mentioned by the same poet in the lines — “ And thence the ruddy satyrs oft provoke The lighter fauns to reach thy lady’s oak,” if, as is said, the wife of Sir Robert Sidney, first Earl of Leicester, was taken suddenly ill under its branches. Besides, Jonson, who has proved Ids love and knowledge of forestry, would not have called the acorn a nut. The birth- day tree of- Sir Philip Sidney must have been either a beech or a chestnut. Tradition has become confused about these individual trees, but the historic oaks are present in literature, and the wonderful old wreck, Sir Philip’s Oak, remains to flourish in its unknown age. Edmund Waller was writing poetry in the middle of the 17th century, and he wandered a good deal at Penshurst, pouring out the plaints of a rejected lover to its deer, and reporting his melancholy flame to its beeches. That there was a memorial oak at Penshurst in his days is shown by the lines — • “ Go, boy, and carve tliis passion on the bark Of yonder tree, which stands the sacred mark Of Noble Sidney’s birth.” Southey, however, in his lines on Penshurst, unless his reference is merely a poetical suggestion of decay, indicates that the memorial oak had disappeared. The notable trees of the park are not by any means exhausted by the oaks. Barbara Gamage’s bower was a copse, according to Ben Jonson “ Thy copse, too, named of Gamage, thou hast here.” A few trees are all that time has left to tell where the lady, whose portrait hangs on one of the walls in the house, was in the habit of feeding the deer. She was the Barbara Gamage of Coity Castle, Glamorganshire, of whom her patron, Queen Elizabeth, wrote that she should marry no mean person. Nor, indeed, did she : Robert Sidney, the first Earl of Leicester of that creation, took her for his wife, and she bore him three sons and eight daughters. Then comes Sacliarissa’s walk, the traditional promenade of Dorothy, daughter of the second earl of Leicester, and sister of the ill-fated Algernon. Waller’s home was Groombridge Place, in the neighbourhood. The poet wooed in vain. Dorothy married two husbands, but not Edmund. Waller, without whose verses her name would probably not be known to posterity. The avenue of lofty beeches that have from time to time been replenished with younger timber, is, doubtless, the true walk, and not the almost perfect rows of lime-trees forming a canopied vista to the east of the grounds. Mention is made in 124 HIS TOE IC HO USES. [Penshurst Place. some of the comity histories, and hy Charlotte Smith in a poem written by her at Penshurst in 1788, of a heronry,, now depopulated, which was once TIIE BARONIAL IIALL. known far and near as the only curiosity of the kind in that part of the county. Pen Jonson’s “ Forest” is in many respects guide-book as well as poem. Tic threw in the fauns and satyrs hy right of his craft, but he saw the seasoned deer, the purpled pheasant, and the painted partridge, in the fur and feather of actual life. The banks yield conies still; the Medway bends as of yore through the lower land at the end of the garden. The ponds that paid tribute of fish when the river was swollen are in summer-time an over- grown mass of glorious lilies; and in the bigger lake, where water-fowl dive Penshurst Place.] THE GARDENS. 125 and the plash of the monster carp is heard, a young Shelley (the family is connected with the Sidneys) met his death by drowning, as in the Mediter- ranean sea did his great kinsman the poet. The formal laying out of the lawns and flower-beds and the closely-clipped edgings and sombre yew-trees admirably suit the general character of the buildings ; and of many lovely views there is none finer than that across the garden to the southerly Kentish hills beyond the village. Great square-walled gardens to the left again bear testimony to the accuracy of Ben Jonson. Just as, having feasted in the baronial hall, he lauds and magnifies the profuse hospitality of his friendly patron, under which the guest ate without fear, and the farmer and the clown, arriving with their offer- ings of home produce, sat down to the free provisions of their lord’s unstinted board, so does the versa- tile dramatist mark the orchard fruit and garden flowers — the early cherry, the later plum, fig, grape, quince, blushing apricot, woolly peach — precisely as they grow in the modern gardens. Penshurst Place, it may be added, is ap- preached from the village highway under a group of quaintly-aged houses that serve the purpose of a lych-gate to the church. It is time now to take a final survey of the park, and, traversing the level, pass through the iron gates and across the drive, bordered on either side by trim lawns. Some of the masonry of Penshurst Place is recent ; aged ivy, closely clinging and strongly climbing, darkens the older portions. The impression, however, is always agreeably and consistently Tudoresque, though the long and irregular buildings display architecture of different ages, and offer abundant evidence that while, like the park, their superficial area lias been much curtailed, they have been improved by the addition of wings and quadrangles. The Sidneys have, apparently, from their earliest occupation, either by chiselled inscription or heraldic date-mark v signified the stages in which Penshurst Place 126 ' HISTORIC HOUSES. [Penshuest Place. has become what it is. During the present century alterations have been made almost amounting to complete restoration, and if we except the Edward YI. gateway, the principal front, a length of three hundred feet, facing north, was virtually rebuilt in 1852. The house generally, having been restored as far as possible on the original lines, has been aptly described as a typical example of the country house of a wealthy Englishman in the time of Edward III. The Sidneys had, previously to the grant of the manor in 1553, been great folks in Sussex, and when Sir William acquired Penslmrst it was from Cranleigli that he removed. The good knight was in sunny favour with Henry YIII., and' received a little of the loot which that great Defender of the Faith swept up at the dissolution of the monasteries. Over the lintels of the hoary Gateway Tower the visitor accustomed to very ancient inscriptions may spell out the fact that the most religious and renowned Prince Edward the Sixth gave the house of Pencester, with the manors, lands, and appurtenances thereunto belonging, unto his trusty and well-beloved servant Sir William Sidney, Knight Banneret, serving him from the time of his birth to his coronation in the offices of Chamberlain and Steward of his household. The further statement is made that Sir William’s son and heir, Sir Henry Sidney, caused this tower to be built and the Boyal Arms to be emblazoned, anno domini 1585. The builder of the tower was a man of mark. The young king Edward A T I. died in his arms, and he heard the lad’s last prayer for Divine mercy. He w T as a prominent public servant under Queen Elizabeth, and the President’s Court derives that designation in memory of his Lord Presidentship of the Marches of Wales. The Maiden Queen visited him at Penslmrst, and the crystal chandeliers hanging from the ceiling of the ball-room were a royal gift to the favourite Leicester. Of this worthy father, Sir Henry, came the worthy son whose name is in- separably associated with Penslmrst. Indeed, lustre was reflected upon it by three of his children. Sir Philip’s sister was the celebrated Countess of Pembroke who inspired rare Ben Jonson’s famous epitaph, and revised and published “Arcadia” after its author’s death; Bobert Sidney was knighted for his bravery at the battle where his gifted brother Philip met his death, and he became first Baron Sidney, and the peer in whom the Earldom of Leicester was revived. This earl lies, like so many of the family, in the Penslmrst graves. The second earl, Bobert, was ambassador for King James on several occasions. Amidst the confusion of the Civil War he was mostly engaged in literary pursuits at Penslmrst, where the children of Charles I. were sent. Two of his numerous offspring are known to fame : Algernon Sidney, beheaded on Tower Hill, and Dorothea, or Dorothy, the aforementioned Sacharissa. There were seven earls of Leicester, and the seventh dying without lawful issue, the peerage Penshuest Place.] TIIE BARONIAL HALL ANI) MINSTRELS’ GALLERY. 127 expired, the estates going to a natural daughter. The rare library was sold in some questionable manner by this last of the earls, who was believed by many to have been mad. All that is left of a splendid collection is its catalogue, privately treasured at Penshurst. The best-known feature of Penshurst Place is its noble Baronial Hall, preserved in the exact condition of the fourteenth century. There is no other building so perfect in this respect in the kingdom. The hall was built by Sir John de Pulteney in 1341, and Ben Jonson set the fashion of picturing it as a scene of old English feasting and revelry. Truly such historic recollections are now its chief furniture. The lofty open roof is of oak, ornamented with mouldings and adorned with grotesque corbels on the faces of the spans, centuries old. The hole aloft, through which the smoke escaped, has been covered in ; otherwise, here is the hall as the Black Prince saw it in his sojourn at Penshurst with the Pair Maid of Kent. On each side of the hall stand massive oak tables, dark with age. The centre of the paved floor encloses the ancient hearth, with the fire-dogs upon which the burning brands sputtered, flamed, and smoked. The broad arrow of the Sidney family is stamped upon the heavy andirons ; and, resting from its labours, is the kitchen spit that five hundred years ago, maybe, did duty in the distant kitchen. Here are the iron brackets which held the rude torches of resinous wood. The tall Gothic windows are distinguished by some fairly preserved specimens of Kentish tracery, and the glass of one of the small windows is said to be a sample of the earliest made in England. A few halberds are hung upon the walls, together with a set of royal antlers, and a few representative pieces of the collection of armour removed to the private apartments. One of the helmets is said to have belonged to Sir Henry Sidney. The Minstrels’ Gallery is supported by a smoke-blackened open screen, and a portion of this is as old as the hall itself. From one of the state-rooms the visitor is shown a small aperture in the wall — a peep-hole, in truth, through which the family would watch the progress of the entertainments below, when the massive oak tables groaned with good cheer, and the retainers made merry after the fashion of the days of Yule log, Lord of Misrule, and open-handed feasting. The planks of oak in the furniture and in the interior of the hall are often roughly hewn by adze and axe, only the upper surfaces of the tables and the ornamented legs making pretence to finish. In an outer building an old dinner-bell, suspended between two ancient posts, bears the inscription, “ Robert Earl of Leicester at Penshurst 1049.” In keeping with the genuine fourteenth century stamp of the hall are the brickwork octagonal tower and Elizabethan chimneys near the entrance to the gateway tower ; the original key behind the heavy panelled folding doors; a wrought-iron knocker showing the initials HISTORIC HOUSES. [Penshurst Place. 128 R. S. and B. S., fixing the date as the time when Barbara Gamage fed her deer in the copse ; oaken settles and screens. The incomparable Baronial Hall, the Gateway Tower, the cool shadowy courts and quadrangle, the black wainscots and screens, the winding stairs, the buttery and kitchens, combine in a grand general idea of an English nobleman’s home of long ago. The contents of the state rooms tenant it again with men and women who have lived there, or had indirect associations with its owners. Reference has already been made to certain crystal chandeliers in the ball-room, and they are one of many reminiscences of Queen Eliza- beth’s visit. The spacious drawing- room named after her was the apart- ment she occupied ; the high-backed chairs and other furniture were used by her ; the beautiful needlework of the card-table was wrought by her slender fingers ; the large portrait was given by her to Sir Henry Sidney ; and, besides a presentment of her favourite Leicester, there hangs in the picture- gallery the well-known painting of Her Majesty, dancing with that gal- lant, a truly farcical scene of un- queenly romp and frolic, in which the Earl is tossing the Queen into the air as one tosses a baby. James I., who visited Pensliurst with his son, presented the exquisite Dutch ehony cabinet in Elizabeth’s room to Robert Sidney. The family portraits are of exceptional interest. Philip Sidney was a fairly handsome man, with chestnut hair, and the best of Iris portraits at Pens- hurst represents him clear-eyed, commanding, refined, with half sad and wholly sweet expression, and the cast of thoughtfulness upon the face that indicates power under control. Lord Brooke, who was his playmate as a child and his friend to the end, lias left us the story of his life, only a span of thirty-two years, but crowded with the elements of a great and spotless career. Scholar, philosopher, soldier, statesman, poet, he was an ornament in a brilliant court ruled by an exacting mistress, and beloved of all. He saw the massacre of St. Penshurst Place.] ALGERNON SIDNEY. 129 Bartholomew’s Day; lie was at his uncle’s castle of Kenilworth when Leicester entertained the Queen ; he was ambassador to Vienna, and might have been King of Poland. In the year 158G his father died in May, his mother in August, and in September lie himself received his fatal wound outside THE TAPESTRY ROOM. besieged Zutphen. In the tapestry room a fragment of mirror, encased in a rough deal frame, is pointed out as his shaving-glass. Amongst the pictures are portraits of his sister the Countess of Pembroke, and his mother, from whom he inherited the blood of the Dudleys. A1 gernon Sidney, sad and stern, looks down with large piercing eyes, a singularly fascinating portrait, in the ball-room. He was the grandson of Robert, Philip’s ennobled brother, and the history of his stormy life is read in the one word, “ Libertas,” title of the large volume upon which he leans; and in the background of the picture, added, as was the custom, after his death, the frowning front of the Tower of London and the headsman’s axe sum up the reward of the patriot’s devotion. Like his uncle before him, this young Sidney studied and travelled, and saw service in Ireland, while in the civil wars at 17 130 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Penshukst Place. home fought on the side ot the Parliamentarians. There exists at Penshnrst a diary of the Earl of Leicester, their father, mentioning that his two sons, Philip and Algernon, came unexpectedly to Penshnrst on Monday, the 22nd January, and stayed there till Monday the 29tli, “so as neither of them w T as at the con- demnation oi the King.” In his long wanderings abroad Algernon sat for the Penshnrst portrait at Brussels, and sent it home. It has a kind of magnetic attraction, so that even the stranger who is unacquainted with his life turns again to gaze upon the face that so unaccountably challenges sympathetic notice. As to the details of his fate, are they not chronicled in the villainies of Judge Jeffreys and the rascalities of the Eye House Plot? We love to think that Philip Sidney strolled through the groves of Penshnrst in company with Spenser ; w-e know that Algernon Sidney w r as frequently visited by William Penn at Penshnrst Place. The wooded park, in which the “Defense of Poesie” and “Arcadia” were conceived, assisted in the contemplations that gave us “Discourses on Government; ” and Algernon Sidney and William Penn together, at Penshnrst and at Warmingliurst, worked out a plan for the constitution of the new country across the Atlantic. Asked by the executioner on Tower Hill whether, having laid his head on the block, lie would rise again, he answered, “Not till the general resurrection. Strike on!” Sorrowing friends bore his body to Penshnrst, and laid it with the earls and knights already at rest in that interesting village church. There are many curiosities of a miscellaneous character in the rooms at Penshnrst — among the rest a standard bushel measure, made of bell-metal by Elizabethan artisans, to do duty in the happier Victorian age as a wine-cooler ; a voiceless spinet, whose faded black and white keys struck out music in the 16th century; inlaid tables and priceless Dutch cabinets; a venerable mandoline, lying on the sofa where Queen Elizabeth herself once reclined. This wms the property of Mary Dudley, wife of Sir Henry Sidney and mother of Sir Philip, and in her portrait she leans upon just such another instrument, as tall as herself. A fine Holbein of Edward VI. is hung in the picture gallery, and in the rooms are portraits by Rembrandt, Vandyck, Kneller, Lely; superb pieces of tapestry manufactured by the Flemings in England; a table showing the ninety-five quarterings which appertained to the Sidney family in 1753, with the Bear and the Ragged Staff, the Porcupine, and the Broad Arrow (oft-repeated in the build- ing), conspicuous ; and a curious page’s closet, now the repository of old china so rare that connoisseurs journey from far countries for the express purpose of gloating over it. A quaint Dutch clock of perfect workmanship, of about 1649, tells dates and months, and a lamp to measure time is close to Elizabeth’s chair of state On the leaf next to the -title-page of Lord Brooke’s life of Sir Philip Sidney, Penshurst Place.] A NOBLE STOCK. 131 the editor, Sir Egerton Brydges, indicates the fruitful branches which have sprung from the parent tree, reckoning its growth from Edward YI.’s grant to Sir William Sidney; and amongst the names in the dedication are George John, Earl of Spencer, Lord Byron, Viscount Strangford, William Robert Spencer, and the Hon. W. Herbert, “ all descended from the illustrious house of Sidney, QXJEEN ELIZABETH’S DRAWING-ROOM. and all worthy of that descent by their attachment to literature.” The Earldom of Leicester, as stated on a previous page, ceased with the seventh peer, hut he was succeeded by a son of the fourth earl, leaving two daughters, Mary and Elizabeth, co-heirs. Their husbands contested the possession with the guardians of the natural daughter Anne. A compromise was ultimately agreed to, and in 1752 Mr. William Perry, the husband of Elizabeth Sidney, procured the right for his children to bear the name and arms of the last earl. Many of the valuable pictures, statues, and works of art at Penshurst were collected by him in Italy, and he spent vast sums of money upon the estate. Mrs. Perry devised Penshurst to John Shelley, son of her daughter, the wife of Sir Bysshe Shelley. In 1793, accordingly, the owner of Penshurst w y as Sir John Shelley- Sidney, whose son, Philip Charles, was created Baron de L’lsle and Dudley in 1835, the present owner of Penshurst Place being the second holder of the title. William Senior. TRENTHAM HALL. rrwo centuries since not many districts in England were quieter than that watered by the streams which combine to form the Trent. Here and there, indeed, was an old market town, here and there a little coal was dug, or kilns had been built, for it was already known that in this part of North Staffordshire were clays well suited for the potter’s art. But though the workers in iron had a local repute, smelting works were practically unknown. The other two great industries were only in their germ. The air was clear, the grass was green, the trees year by year broke forth into full and healthy foliage. Now for many a mile the sky by day is dull with the smoke of smelting works, collieries, and potteries ; by night it glows with their fires. Tunstall and Burslem, Hanley and Etruria, Newcastle- under-Lyme and Stoke-upon-Trent, are almost fused together into one great town, with league after league of streets. Below the last, still out of sight of its houses, though not quite out of reach of its smoke, stands Trentham Hall, the principal country seat in England of the Dukes of Sutherland. Some couple of miles below the parish church of Stoke, the Trent is almost doubled in volume by the influx of the Lyme. Even then, though its waters flow more rapidly, the river is not much larger than an ARMS OF THE DUKE OF SUTHERLAND. Trentham Hall.] THE SITE OF THE HALL. 133 ordinary canai ; but its valley, though of no great breadth, is bounded by steeply-sloping hills, and the stream flows sinuously through flat water- meadows. Yet a mile further down and there was, a century before the time of which we have spoken above, in one of the most pleasant sites in ON THE TEKRACE : STATUE UNDER CANOPY. the valley of the Trent, an old priory by the side of a church. It was on the right bank of the river close to a bridge, and a little off the great road from the north-west to London, if indeed that epithet was deserved in an age of difficult locomotion. At the present day a village borders the road, and extends towards the bridge. Probably there was a hamlet at this place even before the Tudor King fell out with the Pope. This priory carried back its history to a very remote period. The date of the foundation is uncertain, but it was in existence, according to chroni- clers, at least twelve centuries ago. At that time it was a nunnery, and its abbess was St. Werburgh, sister of King Ethelred, who died in the year 699. Of its history for some centuries little more is known, but towards the close of 134 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Trentham Hall. the reign of Henry I. it was rebuilt, or refounded, by Randal, second Earl of Chester, and was occupied by canons of the Augustinian Order. Some authorities indeed ascribe the foundation of the priory to a yet earlier date, and name Hugh Lupus as the first founder, in the days of William Rufus. Be that as it may, the priory met with the usual fate in the reign of Henry VIII., when it had for inmates “ seven religious,” and possessed a revenue of a little more than <£120 a year. The site w’as granted by the King to Charles Brandon, Duke of Suffolk. Before long it became the property of the Levesons, an old family which was originally seated at Willenhall in Stafford- shire. A member of it, Nicholas Leveson, was Lord Mayor of London in 1539. Perhaps for a time the monastic buildings served as a residence, but the first hall of which any remembrance remains was built upon the present site by one of his descendants, Richard Leveson. The latter died without issue, and his estates descended to his grand-nephew William Leveson-Gower, who also succeeded to the estates and title of the Gowers of Stellenham, and thus united the names and properties of the two families, of whom the Duke of Sutherland is the present representative. Two plates in that quaint old volume, “ Plot’s Natural History of Staffordshire,” have fortunately preserved for us the aspect of the first Hall. It occupied only a portion of the site covered by the present building, but still was a mansion of considerable size. It was two storeys in height, having also dormer windows in the roof. The west front, or end, of the house, consisted of two advanced wings with bay windows, between which was a court en- closed by a low balustrade leading to a central porch — the main entrance. In front of this facade was a second or outer court, entered by an ornamental gateway, and bounded by two walls, each of which w T as surmounted by an open balustrade. This was quaint in design ; for in place of the usual ornamental stonework to support the rail was an inscription “not only setting forth the name of the ancient Proprietor and builder of this Seat, but the Time when it was done, the numeral letters put together making up the year of our Lord when it was finish’t — viz., an. 1633, which will appear by the numerals, set in Roman Capitals in the inscription here annext, the other Capitals being set in Italick : — - “CAROLO BRAT ANIsE REGE RIOARDYS LEVESOE EQYES BADEEI CEDES II A SO E 7/IC FIERI VOLVITV’* This house remained standing till the later part of the eighteenth cen- tury, when it was replaced by a large plain structure, built, as we are informed, after the model of the Royal Palace in St. James’s Park. The * Plot, Nat. Hist, Staff., p. 360. Tkentiiam Hall.] HISTORY OF THE FABRIC. 135 topographer who speaks of the house as a “ nohle seat, one of the finest in the country,” states that “ one defect attends it, which is the proximity of the churchyard to the entrance.” In the seventeenth century this did not appear to be an objection ; to the men of that age a memento mori was seemingly less painful than to those of the following century.- In Plot’s views the fine western tower of the Church certainly groups well with the outlines of the mansion. Immediately following the remark noticed above is a general description of the grounds, which, perhaps, is worth quoting as a model of literary style : — “ The inclosures which surround this mansion are very ex- tensive, and finely variegated by umbrageous foliage, and extensive sheets of water, formed by the River Trent, which passes through this. These lakes, with their accompaniments of imperious shade, winding behind a swelling hill covered with trees which approach and hang over the margin of the water, have an effect truly magnificent and worthy of the noble owner.” * Trentham Hall, at the present day, includes the building which we have mentioned, but it was much altered and considerably added to by the late Duke. The works were carried out under the superintendence of Sir Charles Barry. The Hanoverian House, which contains the principal apartments and faces towards the south, remains comparatively unchanged, except that a pro- jecting conservatory was built out at the western end, and a dining-room to correspond at the eastern. The fapade also was crowned by an ornamental balustrade, in order to relieve the extreme plainness of the design. A wing, in a slightly more ornate style, and of a lower elevation, was added on the east, while to the west or entrance end of the house, a semi-circular corridor was attached, in the middle part of which is a richly ornate and massive porch, forming the main entrance to the house. Within this corridor is a paved court open to the sky. In order to relieve the monotony of the sky line, which had been a very marked defect in the old mansion, especially after the destruction of the ancient church tower, Sir C. Barry erected a light and rather lofty campanile. The archi- tectural result of these changes has been the conversion of a very uninter- esting building into a much more worthy successor of old Sir Richard Leveson’s Jacobean mansion. The monotony of the south front cannot, indeed, He wholly cured, hut it is to some extent remedied by the present more broken outline, both in plan and in elevation, while the main entrance is as strking in effect as it is uncommon in design. Very little, if anything, of the old priory buildings now remains. On one side of the spacious courtyard which abuts upon the church garth — for this bit of consecrated ground is almost enveloped by the domestic buildings, and the south-west angle of the church all but touches the mansion — is the * Beaut ies of England and Wales. Trentham. 136 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Trentham Hall. basement of an old wall of red sandstone, which, not impossibly, may have formed some part of the ancient priory, but if there be anything more in exist- ence, it is now masked by much more modern structures. Some fine old trees TRENTHAM HALL: THE SOUTH FRONT. are still growing 4»y the wall, which, if they do not go back to the days before the friars were ejected, cannot well have been planted long afterwards. But a portion of the church belongs to pre-Reformation days, though it was in part rebuilt by the late Duke in 1844. Notwithstanding this, the general style of a fourteenth century church, as depicted by Plot, is still retained, and the plain columns of the nave evidently date from Norman times, and are generally ascribed to the age of Ranulf, Earl of Chester, founder or reconstructor of the priory. The church is rather short, considering its width and height, so that one is tempted to speculate upon the possibility of a part of the original struc- ture having been pulled down after the Reformation. The tower, as we have already stated, was unfortunately destroyed in the last century. It is needless to say that the building is in excellent order, but, apart from one or two family monuments, the only thing within it specially noteworthy is a handsome carved oak screen, which divides the chancel from the body of the church, and Trentham Hall.] THE OFFICES. 137 very possibly was erected by Richard Leveson, the builder of the first bail. The family vault beneath the church is no longer used, interments taking place in the mausoleum, a plain, massive building surrounded by trees, which stands near the London road, in the village, on the other side of the Trent. OLD TRENTHAM HALL. (From a View in Plot's “Natural History of Staffordshire.'') The outbuildings of the Hall, which occupy a broad tract between it and the river, are more than usually extensive. The poultry yard — now no longer ten- anted — suggests by its size a challenge of rival chanticleers which might have been ofttimes a cause of disturbance even in the most distant bed-rooms of the house ; the principal court is like the quadrangle of a college. On the southern side is the wing of the mansion containing the private apartments and other buildings ; these are continued along the eastern and northern side, and the entrance lodge is close to the old church wall of which mention has already been made. The main approach to the mansion is by a road, which, after crossing the Trent by an ancient bridge, leaves on the left the entrance to this series of offices, enters the park by a gate of open iron-work, and, curving round near the 18 138 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Tkentham Hall. south side of the churchyard, enters a great gravelled sweep in front of the western facade. Beyond controversy, the entrance to Trentham Hall is one of its most striking features. The ornamental gates leading into the park, the group of statuary in the centre of the sweep, the richly ornamented porch, and the semicircular portico projecting in front of the mansion, if less picturesque are more grandiose than was the facade of the mansion built hy Sir Richard Leveson. Since that day, one improvement, at any rate, has been made. A high road, enclosed hy formal fences and walls, then passed within a short distance of the west front of the house. This has been diverted ; the park comes up to the open grille which secures the gardens from the intrusion ol casual wanderers, whether bipeds, or quadrupeds yet more mischievous. It gives a sense of freedom and an aspect of comparative wildness, which are all the more welcome from the recent memory of contracted streets and vistas of houses. We pass beneath the sculptured porch into the corridor, which is fragrant with flowers, and green with exotic shrubs. Of its two curved arms, that on the left hand forms the approach to the house. It leads into a hall communicat- ing with the grand staircase and with a corridor running through the building from which access to the state apartments is obtained. The walls of this staircase are covered with family portraits. One of the most noteworthy depicts Sir Bichard Leveson, the builder of the Jacobean hall. There is also a good portrait of the first Marquis of Stafford, and a charming group of his children, dancing, both by Bomney. But while this method of arrangement has the advantage of giving a synoptic view of the historic personages of the family it is not favourable to a study of the pictures. Many of them are hung so high as to be seen with difficulty, so that it is not possible to form any accurate judgment of their value as works of art. Trentham, however, can hardly' be numbered among the mansions of England exceptionally rich in art treasures. There are, indeed, several admirable portraits by Bonmey, some few by Beynolds, one or two by Gainsborough ; there are also sundry pictures not without merit by various Italian artists, but there are no gems of exceptional value. There is no great collection like that at Castle Howard, or at Chatsworth, or that which was once the glory of Blenheim. Indeed, we could hardly expect it: with Stafford House in London, Lilleshall in Shropshire, Dunrobin Castle and another mansion in Scotland, the family treasures must necessarily be scattered, and so Trentham is not generally reckoned among the “show-houses” of England. But it has one characteristic; it has the aspect of a home which can be inhabited with comfort. Some of the historic mansions in this realm are on sc vast a scale that, like a huge hotel, they must be dreary habitations unless filled with company. Now at Trentham Hall, though Tkentham Hall,] THE STATE BOOMS. 139 the state rooms are large, they are not so large as to swallow up a party ol moderate size. A billiard-room occupies the centre of the ground floor in the west front. It is adorned with portraits of George III. and Queen Charlotte, of her pre- sent Majesty, taken early in her reign, and of the second Duchess, a daughter of an Earl of Carlisle, and Mistress of the Rohes to the Queen. Each of these two latter portraits was executed in duplicate, and gifts were interchanged between the originals. - It will be remembered that the relations of the Duchess with Hei Majesty were more than merely official, as she was also a valued and trusted friend. She held the above post at the time of the well-known political epi- sode as to the Ladies of the Bedchamber, when, on the defeat of Lord Mel- bourne’s ministry, Sir Robert Peel declined to enter upon office because Her Majesty did not entertain his proposals relating to changes in the higher officials of her household. Among other portraits is one of Lord Chancellor Thurlow, and another of Romney’s work. The billiard-table in itself is a curiosity, since it is made of the wood of the Royal George. In the loss of the Captain, the Eurydice, and a dozen like mishaps, the present genera- tion has almost forgotten how “ Kempenfeldt went down, with twice four hundred men.” But few catastrophes made in their time a deeper impres- sion on the nation than the foundering of his vessel at Spithead. The western end of the south facade at Trentliam is occupied by the drawing-room, which is in form of an oblong with the corners rounded off. This is a bright and cheerful apartment, the most characteristic feature of which is the unusual number of books contained in wall cases, which, if they give it a more studious aspect than is usual to a drawing-room, certainly do not render it the less habitable-looking. Next to it comes a square saloon, and after this the library — a very attractive oblong room, lighted on one side, well furnished with hooks in cases sunk into the wall. The collection at Trentham is not a very large one, but the choicer part of it is kept in this room. It contains several books of considerable value, and is especially rich in handsome editions of classical authors. Above the cases a frieze, adorned with a procession of chariots in bas-relief, gives an appropriate finish to this very pleasant room. Beyond the library comes a breakfast-room, of which the chief ornament is a good picture by Gainsborough, the subject being a rocky land- scape; and next in order is the dining-room. This is a handsome oblong room, which projects southward from the main mass of the house, and is entered from a hall containing a portrait of the mother of the present Duke by Winterhalter. Contrary to the usual custom, the diniug-room does not contain any pictures, but is adorned with statuary, the principal group, at the further end of the room, representing the flight of Paris with Helen. 140 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Trentham Hall. Two handsome columns of cipollino marble, supporting ornaments, are evi- dently memorials of ancient Italy, and of the “grand tour” made by some ancestor of the present owner. The dining-room completes the south facade and the State apartments, but the most home-like and attractive portion of the mansion is yet to come. From this end the new wing, already men- tioned, is entered. It is arranged on a similar plan to the part already described, so as to secure a southern aspect for all the rooms ; these open into a corridor, which is abundantly furnished with books, and runs the whole length of the building. At one end is a private dining-room; at the other, the Duke’s study; in the middle, the Duchess’s boudoir. All these rooms are sufficiently spacious, but not too large for comfort. The first contains a number of pictures of no great size, mostly landscapes or buildings, some of which are of considerable merit; in the second hang various family portraits, the most noteworthy being one by Romney of the first Duchess of Sutherland. She was Countess of Sutherland in her own right when she married the Marquis of Stafford, who was afterwards advanced to a Dukedom. The Teentham Hall.] HISTORY OF THE GOWERS. 141 central room, sometimes called the Venetian Room, is perhaps the most remarkable one in the whole house. Into the walls are inserted, panel-wise, large pictures by the hand of Stanfield, representing some of the most characteristic and charming views in Venice. Thus, when the garden without A DANCING GROUP: THE CHILDREN OF THE FIRST MARQUIS OF STAFFORD. ( From the Painting bg Romney.) is dark and dull with the frosts of winter, the occupants, as if through another series of windows, can watch the Italian sun as it gleams on the marble walls, and on the blue waters of the Queen of the Adriatic. Before we quit the house, a brief outline may be given of the annals of its owners. The Gowers, to one of whom, as already said, the heiress of the Levesons was married, were an old north-country family established at Sitting- ham or Sittenliam hi Yorkshire, even before the days of the Norman Conqueror. They became more prominent in history about a hundred and fifty years later, when one of them took part in the execution of Piers Gaveston, on Blacklow Hill. One of his descendants acted as standard-bearer to the young Prince of Wales at Tewkesbury — a fatal honour, as it proved, for he fell into the hands of the 142 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Teenthaji Hall. Yorkists and was promptly beheaded. But though he lost his head, his family seem to have kept the estates. His son was knighted, and early in the seven- teenth century, a descendant was made a baronet. It was the second baronet who married the heiress of the Leveson property, and thus repaired the losses which had been caused by his loyalty to -Charles I. The family was ennobled in 1703, when Sir John Leveson-Gower was raised to the peerage with the title of Baron Gower of Sittenham. Promotion now came rapidly. His suc- cessor became Yiscount Trentham and Earl Gower. The second Earl married a descendant of Charles Brandon, Duke of Suffolk, and of his wife Mary, sister of Henry YIII., thus acquiring the right to quarter the Royal arms. He filled various high offices of State, received the Garter, and was created Marquis of Stafford. In 1833, his son, the husband of the Countess of Sutherland, was created Duke of Sutherland. To the second Duke, as already said, the Hall owes its present form. His son, the third and present Duke, is a Knight of the Garter, and his Grace’s first wife, who, like his mother, was Mistress of the Robes to Her Majesty, was created Countess of Cromartie in her own right, with remainder to her second son. His second wife was a daughter of the Rev. R. Michell, Principal of Hertford College, Oxford. Trentham is perhaps more noted for its gardens than for its hall. We see in Plot's view that a formal walled garden, a double enclosure, ex- tended for a considerable distance in front of the south fa<;ade. This arrange- ment appears to have been maintained, but the outer walls of the garden have been replaced by balustrades, the central one lias disappeared, the area of the enclosure has been much enlarged, its level dropping in one or two low steps from the broad terrace in front of the ffiyade. A formal style of laying out the garden is still retained, but with such modifications as make it har- monise with the architecture of the house, vases and statues rising here and there among the trim beds of flowers. This vast Harden ends in a terrace walk over- looking the lake course, artificial. This, an expanse of water sixty-four acres in extent, is, of It was made by constructing a dam across the valley and thus arresting the stream of the Trent, which, after skirting the northern margin of the gardens, along a channel masked by trees and shrubs, entered the lake at its north-east angle. But the river no longer flows through the sheet of water. The Trent had become “dank and foul, foul and dank,” so that the lake was likely to be converted into an excellent contrivance for disseminating noisome odours. Fortunately, it was found that its level could be maintained by the springs and rivulets from the adjoining hills, so a new channel was cut for the Trent which now takes its own, and too often still unsavoury, course through the grounds. The view from the terrace walk is grounds. Trentiiam Hall.] THE GARDENS. 14o undoubtedly tlie most beautiful tiling at Trentiiam. Behind us is the long facade ol tlie house, rising above the trim and formal garden, bright with numberless beds ol flowers. In front the contrast is complete. Art seems to have yielded THE VENETIAN ROOM. place to Nature. The valley changes into a mere, the surface of which is broken by one or two small wooded islands which heighten the illusion of distance. On the left hand, fields, dotted with trees, rise beyond the fringe of shrubbery ; on the right, the wooded slope of bolder hills descends steeply to the water’s edge. The view is never more beautiful than when, in the even- ing, a faint haze hangs over the water, and is kindled by the setting sun into a golden glow, in which the lake appears to lose itself, and the wooded hills to melt away, fold after fold. The gardens, however, at Trentiiam, are by no means restricted to the trim parterres in front of the house. There are pleasant walks through shrub- beries and beneath old trees by the side of the Trent, there are on its opposite hanks acres of kitchen-garden, with almost a village of glass-houses of 144 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Trentham Hall. various temperatures and for different purposes — full in their season of choice flowers, not the least beautiful being the collection of orchids. But on these, PORTRAIT OF THE FIRST MARQUIS OF STAFFORD. ( From the Painting by Pomney.) or on the line park, it is needless to enlarge ; suffice it to say, that the grounds at Trentham are yet more attractive than the house itself. May it he long before the great towns approach sufficiently near to ruin them utterly with their smoke and filth ! T. G. Bonney. ST. GILES' HOUSE. ANOTHER VIEW OF ST. GILES’. ST. GILES’ HOUSE. A SSOCIATED as it is with names famous in history, 1 ' literature, and social progress, it is curious that St. Giles’ House, the seat of the Shaftesbury family in Dorsetshire, should be comparatively so little known. True, it has not the antiquity of a Berkeley or a Warwick Castle, nor is it filled with, rare pictures and other art treasures like Knole or Wilton, hut it is a typical example of a great ancestral home, founded in the reign of Charles I., and added to at subsequent periods. It contains some good examples of interior decorative work by Inigo Jones, and has in the drawing-rooms a large collection of Chippendale furniture, belonging to the finest period of the great craftsman’s art. Stately and solid are the words to apply to the general appearance of the house, with its em- battlements and long low lines, forming an almost perfect parallelogram. But who shall say how much the course of English history was affected from the ARMS OF THE EARL OF SHAFTESBURY. 19 146 HISTORIC HOUSES. [St. Giles’. oldest or eastern end of the house, when the first Earl of Shaftesbury, the Ashley of the “ Cabal,” was framing, with Clifford, Arlington, Buckingham, and Lauderdale, the policy which brought about the Dutch War of 1671-2, and the Popish Plot ? And who shall say, coming down to our own century, how much of factory legislation, of help for the children of the poorest, of bettered con- ditions of working life, was first thought out within its walls, by the seventh Lord Shaftesbury — “the Good Earl,” as popular phrase has christened him? SOUTH FRONT HIGH BRICK WALL STONE STEPS NORTH WING Scale of Feet 9 8 16 24 32 40 48 56 PLAN OF ST. GILES’. Long before the creation of the Shaftesbury title a house stood upon the same site and was occupied hy the knightly family of the De Plecys. Egidia de Plecy, during the reign of Edward IV., appears from the public records to have married a member of the family of Ashley, and, through her, the estates came to her son. The first of the name, however, of whom there are any more notable records than that they were honourable soldiers, was Anthony “Assheley,” who was present at the taking of Cadiz; in 1597, and, among sixty others, was knighted by Queen Elizabeth for his services during the siege. He seems to have acted as War Secretary, and was specially deputed to bring home the accounts of the fighting to the Queen. It is a tradition in Dorsetshire that lie introduced the cabbage from Holland into England, but the legend seems to rest simply upon the fact that, upon his tomb, in the parish church — which, by the way, he built — is an inexplicable ball of granite, St. Giles’.] THE FIRST EARL OF SHAFTESBURY. 147 which, enclosed in a network of gilding, may by a stretch of imagination he said to resemble one of these vegetables. It was the grandson of this Sir Anthony who succeeded to the baronetcy at the age of ten years and became the first Earl. The story of his life has been fully told by Locke, and in its curious admixture of intrigue, imscrupulousness, and violence, allied with attachment to the cause of religious liberty, a passionate desire to counteract the growing power of France, and judicious efforts to encourage commerce and trade, it stands out as one of the most interesting and problematical of even those stirring days. The Earldom of Shaftesbury was conferred upon him shortly after the Res- toration, and he became Lord Lieutenant of the county in 1672. Charles II. held a high opinion of him personally, as well as politically, not only making him Lord Chancellor in recognition of his “ uninterrupted services,” hut pronouncing him “ a master of more law than all his Judges, and pos- sessed of more divinity than all his bishops.” Tw t o odd mementoes of those days are preserved. One of them is a huge beer-cask, hearing the Royal Arms, and inside whose Great-Tun-of-Heidelberg-like proportions is ample space for four men ; the other is the code of rules for domestic servants, drawn up by His Majesty of fickle and witty memory. These have been so rarely printed that they merit reproduction. They are painted under the Royal Arms on a hoard which still hangs in the Servants’ Hall, and run thus : — Prophane Touch Urge Pick Maintain Encourage Repeat Reveal Make Keep Make Lay 1 J 1 J I 1 I J no Divine Ordinance. no State Matters. no Healths. no Quarrells. no Ill Opinions. no Vice. no Grievances. no Secrets. no Comparisons. no Bad Company. no Long Meals. no Wagers. “ These rules observed will obtain Thy peace and everlasting gain.” One of the finest of Lely’s portraits is that of the first Earl, which hangs in the Library. Meantime, the house itself remained a comparatively small one, built of red brick with stone dressings. Of the second Earl there is nothing to he said, and though the story of the capture of the Duke of Monmouth after Sedgemoor in 1688, upon the estate, brings a number of the “ county names” into the accounts of the Pretender’s appearance before Anthony 148 HISTORIC HOUSES. [St. Giles'. Ettricke, at Holt, and the preliminary trial at Ringwood, his is not among them. The literary glory of the race was the third Earl, who, in the “Characteristics” embodied much wisdom, as well as observation made during his travels. He was only a little over forty when he died, but his name is respectfully remembered yet by all true scholars, in spite of a certain affectation of manner THE STONE HALL. which runs through his works. His monument is the finest one to any member of the family in the church, though it used to bear a very pedantic and diffuse inscription, which the sixth Earl caused to be altered to the simple but not less eloquent words, “A celebrated author.” To the fourth Earl belongs most of the artistic credit of the house as it now stands. His monument in St. Giles’ Church speaks of him as “ one who received and diffused happiness,” and he seems to have been a man both of taste and of learning. Most of the Reception Rooms and the Dining Room were added by him, and the Grotto in the gardens, which is almost unique in this country, was built by his wife. It is an article of local faith that, when the palace designed and commenced by George Doddington at Eastbury, a few miles distant, and bequeathed by him to the “ great ” Earl of Melcombe, his St. Giles’.] THE STORY OF EAST BURY. 149 nephew, was pulled down, a quantity of the building materials was used at St. Giles’, and if so, this might account for the vastness of the additions made. The story of Eastbury, it may he parenthetically mentioned, is one of the strangest in the annals of our country mansions. Lord Melcombe spent £140,000 upon it between the year he inherited it (1724) and the year (1738) the house SMALL DKAWING-BOOM. itself was completed, and in the course of the twenty years or so that it stood, rivalling Canons or Stowe in magnificence, it was visited by Voltaire, and was the resort of every wit and scholar in England. The furniture of this really wonderful house was sold in 1763, and the house itself was quickly demolished. All that remains of it now is some out-builclings which have been converted into a farm-house, and traces of the not less nobly-plauned park, with its broken avenues of splendid trees, some of which were transplanted, at a distance of many miles, when weighing three tons. Few houses stand better in their splendid frame of trees and broad expanse of grassy park than does St. Giles’. Before the stone portico, with steps which lead up to the front door, is a fine gravel sweep, giving an effect of 150 HISTORIC HOUSES. [St. Giles’. ample space, while the suggestion of age is present in the ivy which climbs the western end of the house. There is little to note in the Entrance Hall, save an exceedingly ancient “Black Jack,” of unusually large size; hut in the tine oak-panelled Hall to which it leads, stands the curious little round table on which Thomson wrote almost the whole of the “ Seasons,” and which appears a particularly unsteady and uncomfortable piece of furniture for literary purposes. Another object to notice here is the portrait of old Henry Hast- ings, of Woodlands House, a worthy famous in Dorset history for many eccentricities. One of his manias was to eat oysters twice a day the whole year round, these being brought to him from Poole Harbour ; another was to use the pulpit of the domestic chapel as a larder. He was a brother to the Earl of Huntingdon, and an extraordinarily keen sportsman, riding to hounds with the best of the field almost up to his death, at the patriarchal age of a hundred. From this Hall one passes into what is called the Stone Hall, originally an open courtyard, around which the reception rooms were built. But it has long been roofed over for greater warmth and comfort, and now forms a fine addition to the Sitting Rooms, with a gallery round it, and several family portraits on the walls. A place of honour in it belongs to the splendid bust, by Noble, of the seventh Earl of Shaftesbury, presented to his wife by the grateful cotton operatives in the factory districts after his hrave exertions on their behalf, which resulted in the passing of the Factories Acts. As a piece of domestic architecture, there is no finer room in the house than the Dining Room. Its propor- tions are perfect, and its designer, Wright, had a keen appreciation of its primary object, for it possesses that rare advantage of not looking like a barren public hall if the table be laid for only four persons, while there is ample room and suggestion of space should eighty be in it. There are very few rooms left in England with original Louis NY. decorations that have not been more or less tampered with, but here, the elaborate scheme, worked out with characteristic charm in white and gold, is absolutely untouched, though all proper care has been taken of it. In fact, the room is exactly as it was left by the fourth Earl, and is a very satis- Thomson’s table St. Giles’.] CHIPPENDALE'S WORK AT ST. GILES'. 151 factory tribute in our modern eyes to bis taste. Chippendale’s name is so much more generally associated with chairs and tables, cabinets and bureaus, that one examines a chandelier from his hands with considerable interest. This hangs over the table in the centre of the room, and in its bold outline and delicate detail shows that Chippendale could, like a true artist, work in more mediums than one. The chandelier itself is heavily gilt, and is well placed for com- parison with the charming suite of chairs, all of which, with their tine lines, curved legs, and straight backs in carved wood, are examples of bis more familiar style. This chandelier is a characteristic feature of the St. Giles’ collection of his work, for, if we pass across the Stone Hall to the Drawing Rooms which stretch along the whole of the east front of the house, we see that all the pier-glasses are in frames made by him, and are among the finest examples that could be found of this branch of his work. The designs, with their quaint convolutions and richly elaborated effects, are carried out in gilt, and in the first of the hand- some suite of rooms they form part of what, even for the last century, was an uncommonly bold scheme of colour. The walls are hung and the furniture covered with striped satin of a vivid, clear yellow, about half-way between the tones of lemon and amber. From this, Chippendale’s carvings, the gilt of which now possesses the deepened richness of age, stand out with great salience. Dainty secretaires and tables of the same master’s hand are to be seen in tempting abundance, and all are examples to make collectors feel envious. But these are not the sole claims to notice possessed by the Drawing Rooms. The ceilings, rich in fantastic mouldings, carving and gilt, show the possibilities for decorative treatment belonging to this often-neglected part of a room under the hands of such a master as Inigo Jones — who also designed the massive chimney-piece of carved stone which stands in one of them. These rooms contain few pictures, but there are two fine Salvator Rosas here. The most interesting pictures in the house are, however, in a smaller room, called the Green Room, on the opposite side of the Stone Hall, where, besides a Velasquez portrait, and a Vandyck of the Countess of Northumberland, are several fine examples by Sir Peter Lely. The second Earl and his Countess, the Duchess of Cleveland, Lady Gainsborough, the Hon. John Noel, and two or three more, are hanging here, and are among the few pictures of any im- portance in the country that have not been brought up at one time or another to the “ Old Masters ” exhibitions at Burlington House. Contemporary por- traits of Milton are very scarce, but there is one of him at St. Giles’ by J anssen. The finely-proportioned Billiard Room is hung with Gobelins tapestry of the seventeenth century. The bright colours seem scarcely dulled at all, and the 152 HISTORIC HOUSES. [St. Giles’. pictorial effect of the room is due to. a more correct appreciation of the laws of perspective than is usually shown by the patient embroiderers of these decorations. To the casual visitor the Library is by far the most imposing room in the house. It is a curious testimony to the sleeping habits of a bygone day that the three principal Bed Rooms should have adjoined the Sitting Rooms on the ground floor, as in the earliest plan they appear to have done ; and when Charles II. visited the first Earl here he occupied one of them. One odd memento of this visit is the medicine-chest which he left behind him, and which has been carefully preserved in the family. The room is long and comparatively low, and contains three firejdaces, all set under handsome marble chimney-pieces, and the whole answers exactly to one’s idea of what a great statesman’s library should be. It is literally lined from floor to ceiling with hooks, which include the large collection of early editions of the classics formed by the third Earl, and added to by its subsequent owners with great discretion. There is a vague tradition that Handel was a frequent visitor at St. Giles’, but this legend is not supported by any of the great musician’s biographers, and appears to rest only upon the fact that he had an appreciative friend in Susan, Countess of Shaftesbury (the wife of the fourth Earl), from whose hand there is in the library a clever and characteristic pastel portrait of him. Some good manuscripts of several of Ids oratorios are kept in the strong room, and have occasionally been referred to by musicians with a view to the settlement of disputed readings. But to those of us who remember St. Giles’ under the gentle rule of the good seventh Earl there is no more interesting spot than his little sanctum sanctorum, far away in the quiet western end of the house. Very wisely, his successors have left it untouched, and it remains just as it was when Living- stone visited him, and great missionary and exploration schemes were discussed in it; when philanthropists cognizant of the horrible conditions of work in mines and mills disclosed their knowledge ; when earnest city missionaries and ragged-school workers, who had been invited to enjoy a peaceful change from the dismal streets, came here to talk over the problems of housing the poor and helping the children. The carpet on the floor is worn and shabby, the green paper on the walls is in the ugly and inartistic style of about forty years ago, a common, cheap cloth covers the table. In startling contrast to these things are a magnificent Chippendale bureau and delightful Bartolozzi prints. But it is not the furniture that interests. It is the records of gratitude and affection which fill the room to overflowing, and which also tell that if people were thankful to him for his labours on their behalf, he equally St. Giles’.] “THE GOOD EARLS ” ROOM. 153 appreciated their tributes in proof of it, since he brought them down to the place where they would be constantly before him. Framed addresses from public bodies, ragged schools, or representatives of classes helped by him, cover the walls. Illuminated congratulations are piled one above another in cases, THE GROTTO. high upon the table ; woollen mats from a poor widow, a marked pocket hand- kerchief from a child, a cripple’s little effort in modelling or carving, a motto depicted according to some poor street-seller’s mistaken aesthetics, and ambitious efforts from budding poets and aspiring artists of evening classes, occupy every inch of space, while the patchwork quilt worked for the Earl by the little girls of the Ragged School Union, and under which he always slept, has been fittingly and reverently laid in this memorial museum of a good man’s life. In the Justice Room adjoining is kept one of the presentations he most valued — the harrow which, with its handsome “moke,” was the gift of the London 20 154 HISTORIC HOUSES. [St. Giles’. costermongers, who paid him the highest honour of their order in thus making him one of themselves. The donkey, after a peaceful existence, whose greatest exertions were concerned with the lawn mower, died at St. Giles’, but the harrow remains, for Lord Shaftesbury preferred to lend another barrow and donkey bearing his name to any deserving man who needed the loan for a time to enable him to make a start for himself, and to keep safe from harm the one which had been given to him. It was in this same “Justice Room,” also hung round with addresses and pictures of Homes and Refuges in which he was in- terested, that he was in the habit of meet- ing his poorer tenantry, to whose grievances or troubles he always listened with the utmost consideration. It is well remem- bered on the estate how, at the time that Mr. Arch was preaching the then new doc- trines of the Agricultural Labourers’ Union, he w T as asked to receive a deputation of the farm hands who professed to want “ a little holdin’ for theirzelves.” He listened quite patiently to their claim, heard also quite calmly how such and such given farms were to be broken up for the purpose, and small buildings put conveniently upon them; but at the end of their speech-making he put the simple question to them: “In the event of my agreeing to your suggestions, I should like to know how you propose to find the capital for stocking the holdings?” A silence fell upon them all, till one found his tongue to say: — “Well, my Lord, we would borrer zome o’ you for ’t.” Then even the slow Dorset mind saw that the Earl had touched the weak point of the scheme, and they turned and went out without a further word. But he was a kindly and wise landlord, though he was in the habit of saying that, like an old cab horse, he was not at home out of the streets of London. The stables are a fine group of out-buildings, and have been scarcely, if at all, touched since their erection in the later Jacobean days, and the high walled gardens, which are entered through a gate of admirably wrought iron, are pleasantly reminiscent of the same period. A gentle and poetic fancy was that of the seventh Earl to build here a hot-house to the memory St. Giles'.] THE GROT TO. 155 of his wife, in which could he raised to her memory continually the flowers of which she was so fond. A graceful Latin inscription upon a slab records this sweet dedication, and it may he added here that the inscription which he wrote also for her tombstone in the church, in which he speaks of her as <£ a wife as devoted and as loving as God in Llis mercy ever gave to man,” is one of the most touching tributes of the kind ever composed. The Grotto to which allusion has been made stands away from the lawns and flower gardens on the south-eastern side of the house, under a mysterious bower of cedars and other large trees. It was built about the middle of the last century, from the design of an Italian architect, and consists of two chambers. The outer one of these represents a fanciful cave under the sea, great branches of coral, blocks of crystals, and huge shells, lining the walls and hanging from the ceiling. In the inner room almost every inch of the walls is covered with small shells laid upon a foundation representing the uneven surface of a rock, the effect being much more curious and romantic than could be imagined from any description. There are still one or two pearl oyster-shells to be seen, which escaped the notice of some thieves who in the earlier part of the century succeeded in breaking in and stealing nearly all the most valuable of the shells. More than TT0,000 was spent by the fourth Countess upon this curious toy, which took some seven years to build. In the original design there was to have been water always running through it, but this notion was abandoned on account of the destructive influences of continuous damp. The Grotto is in very fair preservation still, though any unusually hard frost does it more or less damage. There are several good parks in Dorsetshire, but St. Giles’, with its wealth of line timber, ranks among the best in extent and picturesqueness. It is surrounded by a broad belt of trees, under which runs a narrow walk or drive, called from its sheltered quietude the “ Old Man’s Path,” and some nine miles round. No great house would be complete without its ghostly legend, which here has its locale just outside the park, upon the Cranborne road, THE FIRST EARL OF SHAFTESBURY. (From the Portrait by Lely, at St. Giles'.) 156 HISTORIC HOUSES. [St. Giles’. where some magnificent fir-trees tower high above tlie wood, and under these, it is said, the crashing of a waggon driven fast is to be heard, while a headless figure wrings its hands and disappears into the wood. Outside the park to the south are the Brockington Beeches, about half a mile in length, one of the finest beech avenues in England. The individual trees compare well with the better known ones at Burnham, while they surpass those at Cambridge, besides being planted with better judgment as to distance and width. The idea obtains that it was intended to carry them up to the house as a chief entrance, and had this been done the effect would have been superb ; as it is, this beautiful vista of arching branches has no pur- pose, and stands like an unfinished or disused cathedral of nature. Mary Frances Billington. GENERAL VIEW OF BERKELEY 1 CASTLE. BERKELEY CASTLE. F FAMILIARITY with the achievements of modern engineering science, which bores tunnels through the Alps, annihilates valleys by means of long em- bankments, and even throws bridges across arms of the sea, has done much to blind our eyes to the natural advantages of high-lying ground which had very real military importance in the eyes of Norman builders of castles. Berkeley, to the visitor of to-day, is quaint and picturesque, because of its antiquity and the reverent care with which it is maintained ; and its situation is delightful, overlooking smiling meadows which stretch away towards the well-wooded Cotswold Hills, or towards the Severn and the distant Welsh hills. It is clear, however, that the castle stands upon a considerable height, and when the low T er ground was undrained, and marshy from the waters of the Severn, the position was naturally a strong- one, which art was made use of to improve. The castle is built on the edge of some higher ground, and on its accessible side, where the town of Berkeley has grown up under its protection, a deep wide ditch was scarped out of the rock. ENTRANCE TO KING EDWARD’S ROOM IN THE KEEP. 158 HISTORIC HOUSES. There is plenty of water about Berkeley — indeed, it is a saying in the place that no road leads out of it which does not pass over water. A little rill runs at a short distance from the northern side of the castle, down to the estuary of the Severn, and now serves the peaceful purpose of a passage-way for coal barges. In the olden times it was easily used to till the moat, wherein salt water and fresh were often mixed. There is no actual visible work in the castle older than the Norman pe- riod, but one authority, Mr. G. T. Clark, holds that there was an earlier castle here, as the keep is not in the usual Norman form, hut encircles a mound, so practically the head of the Empress’s faction. Most probably he took Berkeley from the enemy, at any rate it was granted to him, with power to build a castle as he chose — the original charter is still preserved in the muniment room of the castle — and King Henry If. visited his loyal supporter here in 1155. Of all the mediaeval castles along the course of the Severn this alone remains complete, the far mightier stronghold of Bristol having been so thoroughly swept away that nothing but a bit of vaulting remains in a stable to show what it was like. a. The Keep. B. Thorpe's Tower, e. Ancient Chapel, now the Evidence Room (Well underneath), d. Dungeon Chamber, e, e, e. Bed Chambers, f, f. State Rooms. g. “Nowhere.” h, h, h. Drawing-rooms, i. The. Chapel. J. Ante-room. K. The Great Hall. L. Lobby. m. Still-room. n. Kitchen. o, o, o, o. Scullery and Larders (Bed-rooms over). p. Bath-room. q. Billiard-room. K. King Edward’s Room — viz. : the Guard-room ovpr Steps leading to the Keep. PLAN OF BERKELEY CASTLE. that the level of the ground within it is many feet higher than that outside. Domesday, however, does not mention the existence of a castle, and its recorded history dates from the wars of King Stephen, when so many baronial fortresses weie constructed. Roger of Berkeley, the represen- tative of the family who held it at the time of the Great Survey, was a fol- lower of the King. But the great stronghold of the Empress Maud’s party was at Bristol, and so poor Roger was turned out of Berkeley, and the domain given to Robert Fitzhard- inge, who, besides being Governor of Bristol, was Berkeley Castle.] APPROACH TO THE CASTLE. 159 The town of Berkeley grew up simply because the castle was there, and has remained in a stationary condition for centuries. Passing through the main street and across the churchyard, the principal entrance to the castle is reached. The ditch is crossed by a stone bridge, with which, in 1589, Henry Lord Berkeley replaced the older drawbridge. The outer Gate-house is a plain rectangular building, with vaulted passage, but no portcullis. It opens upon a triangular court, of which the inner Gate-house and one face of the Keep are the base. With its well-kept turf, such as is only to be seen at old English country seats, it presents a very pretty picture. With the breach in its walls, presently to be mentioned, the frowning Keep can no longer inspire an emotion of terror, but simply appeals to one’s admiration for the antique and pic- turesque. Some small cannon, mere toys to the modern artillerist, give a martial tone to the low wall on the right-hand side, overlooking the scarp of the ditch, now turned into a flower garden. The smiling meadow beyond, called “ The Worthy,” was once the deer park, but Henry Lord Berkeley, incensed at a great slaughter made when Queen Elizabeth was on a visit to the castle, removed the deer to a greater distance. The buildings in view from this spot are the Kennels, for the Berkeley Hunt lias long been an honoured institution. In the centre of the outer court is suspended, on an iron frame, a large and powerful Chinese bell, taken from the ruins of a Buddhist temple at the town of Tszekee, in China, and presented by Captain Boderic Dew, C.B., to Admiral Lord Fitzhardinge, under whose auspices he entered the Royal Navy, and under whom he served in the Hercules and the Thunderer. The bell is covered with Chinese inscriptions. The inner gateway, which on its inner archway still has the groove for a portcullis, pierces the main w^all of the castle and leads into the great court-yard. The Keep, which stands at the north-west corner, is the oldest part of the castle, but to this w^as added in Norman times, to be strengthened at later dates, much of it apparently in the Decorated period, a strong and lofty curtain w T all some fourteen feet thick, forming a roughly quadrangular enclosure. All the buildings required by the lord and his retainers were constructed on the inner side of this wall, and as they still remain, but little changed except as to their uses, it is evident to the least trained mind that with the portcullis down the place could offer a very stout resistance to the besieger who had no modern artillery to aid him. The disadvantage, for the purposes of a modern residence, is that it is necessary to cross the court-yard to get from one block of buildings to another, and as there is no space for passages, the bed-rooms open into one another. On the sides of the court facing the gate is the finest apartment in the castle, the Great Hall, 32 feet wide by 61 feet long, entered by a handsome 160 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Berkeley Castle. porch, which has the characteristic Berkeley arch, formed hy four straight lines, also to be seen on the tombs of the family at Bristol. This porch leads into a narrow and somewhat dark passage. The left side of this, which is really the east wall of the Hall, contains three fine Berkeley arches, com- municating with the butteries, the hexagonal kitchen, and other offices which THE CASTLE, FROM THE BOWLING-GREEN follow the line of the curtain wall. High up in the wall is the music gallery, which is, however, of late date. The right-hand side of the passage is formed hy a lofty screen of wood. The Great Hall is lofty, and has a pointed roof with intersecting timbers, said to date from the fourteenth century. The windows piercing the castle wall would appear to be of the Decorated period, and certainly replace the narrow loop windows which are all the early builders would have inserted in such a position. The inner side contains four large, flat-topped A BIT OF THE GREAT HALL. 21 162 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Berkeley Castle. windows, in wliicli is placed stained glass, illustrating the various marriage alliances which the family entered into between 1115 and 1785. At the further end of the hall is the dais, where the lord and his friends of high degree would sit above the salt, with his retainers below. There is much to recall the past in the decorations and furniture of the Hall. Behind the dais is a handsome fireplace, adorned with crosier and mitre, hut old as this is, the Hall is older. The more ancient method was to have an open fire, from which the smoke escaped through openings in the roof. Here are two small lead domes, so to speak, which served this purpose, although their preservation is very unusual. It may he said, indeed, that history repeats itself, for they hear a family resemblance to the contrivances which are often placed upon modern roofs for purposes of ventilation. Over the fireplace are grouped old weapons and armour, forming a suitable background to two faded and tattered flags, which were carried by the regiment under the command of Augustus Earl of Berkeley at the battle of Culloden. On the walls are many interesting family and other portraits, among them William III. and Mary, Anne and Prince George of Denmark, Strafford, Admiral Sir Cranfield Berkeley by Gains- borough, and Frances, daughter of Sir John Temple, wife of William Francis Lord Berkeley, and her sister Jane Martha, by Ivneller. Many objects of interest are placed about the room. Forming a screen in front of the door- way is a very fine piece of old tapestry, representing the famous meeting on the Field of the Cloth of Gold. A handsome trophy of plate w 7 as jwesented to William Earl Fitzhardinge in 1852, by gentlemen wdio had followed the Berkeley hounds, some of them for forty years ; a similar trophy portrays the memorable family incident of the battle of Nibley Green. A glass case con- tains the mace from Wotton-under-Edge, originally presented by the lord of Berkeley, and therefore returned here when the small corporations were dissolved. In one corner is a bust of Dr. Jenner, a native of Berkeley, who first practised his new system of vaccination in a summer-house at the bottom of the old Vicarage garden, where he lived. From the end of the dais a broad wooden staircase of the seventeenth century leads to the family apartments. On this staircase, in a better light than the Hall affords, are many other interesting portraits, including one of the fifth earl by Pompeo Battoni, and of Henry Percy, Earl of Northumberland (died 1632), by Hoppner. There are several by Lely — Charles II. and James II., two thoroughly characteristic portraits of Henrietta Lady Berkeley, and Lady Sunderland, besides the well-known picture of the Countess of Berkeley with her negro. Portraits of Lady Jane Grey and of the unhappy Jane Shore are also to he noticed. Upon the landing is some splendid ebony furniture, beautifully carved, probably by Spanish hands. This is said to have been Berkeley Castle.] THE CHAPEL AND DRAWING-ROOMS. 16:: brought from the cabin of Sir Francis Drake after his voyage round the world. It was given by Queen Elizabeth to Lord Hunsdon, whose heiress married Thomas Berkeley. The Chapel rests upon the vault of the great cellar, and is entered from this staircase by a modern door on the north side. The old winding stair to the court-yard still exists. The south is the outer wall, fourteen feet thick, which is pierced by a narrow aisle or passage, opening into the chapel by four foliated arches corresponding to windows in the outer wall. The roof is flat, divided into square panels by intercepting ribs of oak. On the sides of these timbers, notwithstanding the effects of time and of careless treatment, may be seen in various places traces of black letter inscriptions. These were the work of John Trevisa, a native of Cornwall, who was vicar of Berkeley and chaplain to three successive lords, dying in 1412 in his 90th year, and being buried in the parish church. He had imbibed some of the ideas of the Lollards, and is said to have translated the Bible into Norman French. The inscriptions which remain have been identified as passages in that tongue from the Book of Bevelations, the whole of which he originally inscribed here. The Chapel is of fourteenth century date, but the family pew at the west end is ingeniously put together with carved timber of Jacobean workmanship. A copy of Babeiis’ “Tribute Money” was formerly placed over the altar, but this has given place to a more showy Italian altar-piece. Special privileges were obtained for this chapel, and that in the Keep, by bull from Pope Urban II. in 1364; it is under the seal of eleven cardinals, for the reason that there were then rival popes in the Church. The Drawing-rooms occupy the space on the south of the court-yard, between the Chapel and the Gate-house, and are crowded with pictures and objects of value. The first is surrounded with high oak panelling, on which are painted some striking portraits, including one of Queen Elizabeth, in which no attempt is made to delineate dress naturally. There are two views of White- hall and St. James’s Palace from the Park, painted for Charles II. by Danckerts, and some fine sea pieces by Yandevelde. Among the family portraits is one of George Lord Berkeley (1625), by Cornelius Janssens, a Vandyck, and a Beynolds. There is a splendid head of Henry VIII., painted by Holbeiu. A case contains a valuable and curious collection of snuff-boxes. A very beautiful stone is the Hunsdon, bequeathed in 1599 to Elizabeth Lady Berkeley, and from the same source came also Queen Elizabeth’s toilet service. Crossing the Court-yard we come to the Keep, which was the nucleus and afterwards the citadel of the castle. The ground within it being twenty- two feet higher than that outside, it was possible to construct a strongly defen- sible entrance. This consists of stone steps, over which is built a Guard-room, 164 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Berkeley Castle. from which burning and melted missiles could he thrown down upon as- sailants who had forced the tower gate and were struggling up the steps to THE DRAKE FURNITURE. reach that at the top. The platform is still outside the Keep, which is entered by a gateway on the left. At the head of the stairs, however, a ledge leads to the Guard-room, which has now large Tudor windows instead of the Berkeley Castle.] KING ED WAllD'S DOOM. 165 original loops, of which only one remains. The accepted tradition is that King Edward was done to death in this room, although antiquaries are not agreed, and there is really no evidence to decide the point. In the room, however, are displayed a bedstead, certainly not so old as his time, and some crimson needlework bed hangings, which, if they are not of the age of Edward II., are certainly very ancient. But who can doubt when an unmistakable modern fencing foil is shown as the plumber’s iron w T ith which the deed was ac- complished ? Although the castle was built in the Norman period, and many of the original walls remain, it was so far modified in details as years rolled on that the 166 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Berkeley Castle. principal remnant of Norman ornamentation is the semicircular arch, with closed tympanum and zigzag mouldings, which leads into the Keep. The court of the Keep is now a grass plot, and, notwithstanding its height above the outside ground, the strong walls tower some forty feet above it, with a broad walking- space on the summit, and a breastwork for the defenders, which ran round its whole circuit before the breach was made. Round the court, resting against the walls, were constructed the quarters for the garrison — probably of wood. In order to give the defenders the advantage of flank attack upon assail- ants of the walls, four projecting towers were constructed in the circuit, three circular and one rectangular. Without water, it would be impossible to stand a siege, and therefore, before building a stronghold it was necessary, first of all, to make sure of a good well, which was sometimes sunk to a very great depth. At Berkeley the easternmost tower of the Keep is built over a well, while above was the Oratory or Chapel, appropriately dedicated to St. John the Baptist. This is now occupied as the Muniment-room, and contains a note- worthy collection of charters, documents, and pedigrees relating to the Berkeley property and the history of the family, dating from the twelfth century to the present time. Lord Fitzliardinge lias recently had the whole of these records thoroughly re-arranged and described by Mr. Jeayes, of the British Museum, and a selected few are now shown to visitors. An interesting record is the elaborate marriage contract which united the families of Fitzliardinge and Berkeley about 1153. An exquisite miniature book contains in manuscript the dying prayer of Edward VI., written by his sister, Princess Elizabeth. Nearly a century later is the original MS. of Smyth’s “Lives of the Berkeleys” [1066 — 1618] , a work in folio, which has lately been printed. Lord Fitzliardinge has allowed the county archaeological society to publish a work entitled “ The Berkeley MSS.” The tower to the south of this commands the inner side of the Gate- house and the approach to the Keep. This is the Dungeon-tower, and gives a striking object lesson in the rude sort of justice practised in the good old times. The Dungeon-room is a small chamber without window or light of any kind, so that the prisoners thrust into it were unable to perceive the great hole which yawned in the centre of the floor. A trap-door, which lifts up, and strong bars below, rentier it perfectly safe for the modern visitor, but would be considered by its builders to defeat its object. The victim who fell in would have a sheer descent ot some twenty-five feet into a pit of water at the foot, a dismal hole to which there is no access but from the top. Some think that King Edward II. was murdered while confined in this dungeon. At any rate it seems to be agreed that violent hands were not laid upon him until it had been found that confinement here would not effect his death by what would, Berkeley Castle.] THE TOWERS. 167 no doubt, have been given out as natural causes. One device of his gaolers was to place putrid carcases of horses and other animals down the well, in the expectation that he would be poisoned by the stench. Such a dismal place would naturally appeal to the ignorant and super- stitious imagination, and therefore, in addition to the legend of the witch of Berkeley, told by William of Malmesbury, which belongs more particularly to the parish church, we read of a toad of “an incredible bigness” drawn forth in the reign of King Henry VII. from the well, where it had “ doubt- less lived divers hundreds of years.” Of this fabled monster “ many strange and incredible wonders ” were believed, and it was drawn in colours upon the door of the Great Hall and upon the side of the porch. No doubt one of the capitals in the Chapel, upon which is carved a huge toad resting on the heads of two nuns, refers to one of these wonders. Between this tower and the third, which is almost in a line with the inner gateway, are built a number of domestic apartments, which are now con- nected together, and with the rooms over the gateway, by doors for which the thick walls have been pierced. On the north side is a much larger work, rectangular in shape, forming, as will be understood from the description of its position, a part of the exterior line of defence. It is sixty-four feet long by seventeen feet deep, and lias a square turret at either end. It is somewhat higher than the wall, with which it does not communicate, and is supposed to have been originally still higher. As it is the highest part of the Castle, the family banner flies on its summit when Lord Fitzhardinge is at home. It is known as Thorpe’s Tower, because it is said that the family of this name, long since extinct, held the adjacent estate of Wans well Court by the tenure of its defence, a custom which obtained also in other parts of England. If the material preservation of the castle is remarkable, still more so is the fact that it has been held for all these years by the same family, except for a temporary alienation to the Crown. The original Berkeleys did not take kindly to their dispossession, but the state-craft of the time found a rough and ready method of preventing a feud by marrying a son and daughter of one house to a daughter and son of the other. The male branch of the original Berkeleys went elsewhere and died out, the Fitzhardinges held Berkeley, and in a generation or two took the name of the place. From the Norman Conquest the Lords of Berkeley were barons of the realm, first by tenure, and, when this died out, by writ, and their descendants have always had a seat in the House of Lords. Few of the old nobility can show such a record, but the family has had its times of difficulty and disfavour with ruling parties, and at times in its history the most diplomatic tact has been exercised 168 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Berkeley Castle. to preserve its position. Maurice Lord Berkeley, to whom King Edward II. was sent to he done to death, was able to show afterwards that the murder here was committed without his knowledge, and to enjoy the favour of King Edward III. Again, in the great Civil War, Lord Berkeley was a Loyalist, with many friends on the Parliamentary side, and his property hy no means suffered as others’ did. In 1G45 the castle was attacked by the Parliamentary forces from the church- yard front, and when these had obtained possession of the church, where the real struggle took place, there was nothing to do hut to surrender. In the following year, the breach to which allusion has been made was effected in the wall of the Keep, so that the place should not he defended again, hut the evident intention was to preserve it to the family as a residence, or it would have been blown up. Nor has the history of the family been without its romantic episodes. Lord Thomas Berkeley, who pronounced the deposition of King Richard II. in Parliament in 1399, left only a daughter, married to Richard Beauchamp, Earl of Warwick, who strove, on his father-in-law’s death, to oust the heir male, and appeared before the castle with an armed force in 1418, hut did not capture it. The affair was then carried into the Courts of Law, and a suit ensued which, lasting for 150 years, outdoes anything that even Dickens has written against the Court of Chancery. Its monotony was relieved by various personal combats, one of which finally led to the settlement of the dispute. This was the battle of Nibley Green, in which Lord William Berkeley slew the claimant, Lord Lisle. The Berkeley peerage is also associated with other proceedings of a most romantic and remarkable character. Frederick Augustus, fifth Earl of Berkeley, was a man who lived his life, as the saying is. He married a young woman, named Mary Cole, of great personal beauty, although of humble origin, and she bore him several children. He was publicly married to her at St. Mary’s, Lambeth, on May 16th, 1796. But there were children born before that date, and the contention put forward by the Countess was that there had been a previous marriage at Berkeley on March 10th, 1785, and that the later ceremony was merely a ratification, for fear the record of the former had been lost. The claim of the eldest son — to whom the Berkeley estates had been left — -to the Earldom of Berkeley came before the Committee of Privileges in the House of Lords in the year 1811, and excited the keenest possible interest. The name of the Prince Regent was dragged into the matter, and the Countess, whether her story was true or false, fought superbly for her offspring. The contention on one side was that the fifth Earl, finding he could not obtain possession of Mary Cole by any other means, was married to her hy his own chaplain at Berkeley, and had the entry made on a separate leaf of the register, and pasted down, so that if he desired he could repudiate her at a later date — Berkeley Castle.] NOT PROVEN. 169 which does not show him in a very amiable light. On the other side, it was contended that Mary Cole was the Earl’s mistress until the marriage of 1796 converted her into his Countess, and considerable weight appears to have been attached by the Lords Committee to the evidence of a clerical witness who had received from her the story of her seduction, which reads like a page from one of Richardson’s novels. “ I have been as much sold,” she declared at the end of her story, “ as any lamb who goes to the shambles.” The Committee of 1811, over which Lord Eldon presided, decided that the private marriage was not proved, but none of the younger descendants of Mary Cole would assume the title of Earl of Berkeley, because their doing so would have cast reflections upon her good name. This is the brightest feature of the whole business. The disappointed claimant, William Eitzliardinge Berkeley, was raised to the House of Lords as Baron Segrave in 1831, and was created Earl Fitz- hardinge in 1841. He died unmarried, and was succeeded by his brother Maurice, a distinguished admiral, and sometime Lord of the Admiralty, who sat as memher for Gloucester in five parliaments, and was created Baron Fitzhardinge in 1861. In 1867 he in turn was succeeded by his son Francis William, the present peer. In 1891 the Berkeley peerage question was again brought before the Committee of Privileges. The male issue of the marriage of 1796 being extinct, the Earldom was claimed by Randal Mowbray Thomas Berkeley, a descendant of the fourth Earl, and undoubtedly the next heir, unless the alleged marriage of 1785 could be established. This Lord Fitzhardinge attempted, but after listening to very able and ingenious arguments, their Lordships declared that they found no reason for disturbing the decision of 1811. The present Lord Fitzhardinge, it may be added, takes great pride in maintaining Berkeley Castle, and is a typical country gentleman, showing a keen interest in the furtherance of agriculture in the county of Gloucester, and being a master of foxhounds Harold Lewis. 22 IN THE DUNGEON. CAWDOR CASTLE. A WORLD of fate and mystery breathes in the very L"A- name of Cawdor Castle. Tradition lias associated it indissolubly with the ambition of Macbeth and the slaughter of “ gracious Duncan.” Nor does the aspect of the ancestral home of the Thanes of Cawdor belie its reputation. The embattled walls of the tower, boar with antiquity, seem to hide secrets which it would be dangerous to drag to the light. The aged ashes and sycamores which throw their shade around the Castle still give shelter to the “night-boding owl.” At such an “iron yett ” might the messengers have thundered at midnight, while murder was being done within. The echoing drawbridge and sunken court-yards, the donjon keep and grated iron doors, the winding turret-stairs and rambling passages, the hidden chambers and the antique hanging tapestries of Cawdor might be the setting of a gloomy mediaeval romance. And here, should there be any visitor still doubtful of the testimony of legend and the impressions of fancy, is the chain-armour of King Duncan, to convince him that he is at the scene of dark and fateful deeds. & CAWDOR. Cawdor Castle.] SITUATION OF THE CASTLE. 171 It is true that there are historical considerations that stagger belief in this relic, one of these being the circumstance that the Castle itself did not come into existence till four centuries after the date assigned to the crime of Cawdor’s Thane. “But then,” as says a local antiquary, “a portable witness to the truth of tradition, like a suit of armour, need not be of the same age as the walls that enclose it.” And in face of this simple faith, the sceptic, especially if he lias come within the enchantments of Cawdor, must remain dumb. He is absolved from all critical duty except that of pointing out where the Castle and its surroundings are in harmony with its legendary story. Of Cawdor it may truly be said — “ This castle hath a pleasant seat ; the air Nimbly and sweetly recommends itself Unto our gentle senses.” It is situated on the right bank of the Cawdor Burn — Goille-dur , the “ wooded stream — a little distance above where it joins the impetuous Nairn. Behind it and its woods are the moorlands and hills that stretch away to the heart of the Highlands ; below it the glen opens into the rich plain of Morayland, to which, in ancient times, kings and courts resorted on account of its fertile soil and its genial climate. Cawdor has from time immemorial been on the border- line between wild and cultivated nature : between Highland and Lowland races, tongues, and customs. Within six miles are the waters of the Moray Firth, with PLAN OF CAWDOR CASTLE. 172 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Cawdor Castle. the county town of Naim, now a cheerful summer resort of golfers and sea- bathers, where the Thanes of Cawdor once held hereditary authority as Sheriffs and Constables of the King’s House. “ How far is ’t called to Forres ? ” At Cawdor the answer is, some twelve miles to the eastward. CAWDOR CASTLE, PROM THE BURN. Inverness — another formidable rival of Cawdor as the scene of Macbeth’s misdeeds— is about the same distance to the west. Half-way to the former place is the “ blasted heath ” and Macbeth’s Hill, the fabled scene of meeting with the Weird Sisters ; and half-way to Inverness is another spot charged still more deeply with the blood of warriors and the fate of dynasties — the Moor of Culloden. Its next neighbour, and its contemporary in age, is the ancient Tower of Kilravock, where Boses have been settled continuously for six hundred years. The entrance-gate of Cawdor is a venerable moss-grown archway, shaded Cawdor Castle.] THE SUURO UNDINGS. 173 by gnarled old plane- and ash-trees, with the burn, spanned by a bridge, separating it from Cawdor village. A short walk from it brings one into the heart of a rich corn-bearing country, or into the solitudes of glen and moor, THE CASTLE, FROM THE NORTH-WEST. Thickly sprinkled over the district are ancient hill-forts, chambered cairns, sculp- tured monoliths, and stone circles, of which last no fewer than lrve-and -twenty are counted in the valley of the Nairn. Above, on the Donne of Cawdor, is a remarkable vitrified fort. On the Hill of Geddes, not far off, is another, which bears the local name of Castle Finlay, and which the ingenious seeker for traces of Macbeth might connect with the father of the Usurper, Finlay MacRory, Mormaor of Moray. These old Mormaors of Morayland held themselves as independent kings, and were often masters of the region “ north of the Mounth,” or line of the Grampians. Repeatedly “Kings of Scotland” who ventured as far as Forres or Auldearn to subdue them lost their lives for their pains. One of these Northern Princes was Gillacomgan, the first husband of Gruoeh — “Lady Macbeth.” He was burned in his own Rath, or stronghold 174 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Cawdor Castle. — could it have been Cawdor? — by Macbeth, according to some historians: an unwritten tragedy, before that of Duncan. The Castle tradition is that the Thanage of Cawdor, or Calder — to use the old and local name — was surrendered by Macbeth to his brother, with whose male descendants it remained for five hundred years. Their home, when not residing in the “King’s House” at Nairn, was at Old Cawdor, half a mile from the present Castle : a rude timber dwelling, with draw- bridge and ditch, of which traces still remained when Lachlan Shaw, the historian of Moray, was minister of Cawdor, between 1719 and 1734. It is a curious and not insignificant fact that the ancient title of Thane clung more persistently to the owners of Cawdor than to any other lords of the North. The “ Laich ” of Moray had been overrun by incomers from the south, and all the country between the mountains and the sea fell under feudal tenures and “ bristled with Norman spears.” But the old masters of Cawdor seem never to have borne any patronymic except that which they derived from the lands. The first of them known to us by name is Donald— “ Thanum de Kaledor ” — who was present at the inquest of the bounds and value of Kilravock and Geddes, in 1295. His grandson, Andrew, was murdered in the neighbouring hold of Bait Castle by the laird of that ilk. In the next generation the Thanedom was greatly enlarged ; it comprehended Ferintosli — the land of the Toschach, or Thane — in the Black Isle, and extended to Loch Ness and the sources of the Nairn. When the present Tower of Cawdor was built, in 1454, William was Thane. He was the “loved familiar squire” of James II., was “ King’s Chamberlain beyond Spey,” and had an education beyond that of the rude barons of his time. The King employed him in crushing the power of the Douglases in the North, in wresting from them the Earldom of Moray, and in demolishing the island stronghold of Lochindorb, in the wild moorland Brae Country. It was then, according to legend, that the Thane carried away “on his back” the ponderous iron “yett” of Lochindorb Castle, which, with its little wicket, large enough for a man’s body to pass through, still guards the keep of Cawdor Castle. The story of how the Castle came to be founded on its present site, on the high sandstone bank of Cawdor Burn, below the meeting of two moor- land streams, is familiar in the North. The Thane, it is said, was directed in a dream to load fin ass with the gold with which he purposed to build bis strength, and choose the spot where the animal lay down to rest. The ass passed two hawthorn-trees, the aged stumps of which were pointed out some half a century since, and halted at the third. The Lord of Cawdor built the four strong walls of his keep round the thorn tree. It still exists, growing out of the rocky floor of the lowest vault of the tower, and it shows Cawdor Castle.] GROWTH OF TIJE CASTLE. 175 such signs of antiquity as persuade the visitor that it must have been in existence before the Castle. The “ Cawdor Toast ” is drunk by standing round this family tree, and quaffing “ Freshness to the Hawthorn, and Prosperity to the Line of Cawdor.” To confute the doubters of the tale, there still lies beside the venerable stem the identical iron coffer in which the Castle gold was stored. Around the tower, which rises from a rocky platform to a height of eighty feet, and is crowned by boldly corbelled angle-turrets, battlements, and steep- pitched roof, the other buildings have gathered in the course of time, and admirably illustrate the growth of the family fortunes and the changes in taste and style of a Scottish baronial residence during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. For more than two hundred years the Castle has remained almost unaltered in its outward features, while in the interior the old arrangement of rooms and the old furniture and hangings have, as far as possible, been preserved. Though the owners of Cawdor have, since the beginning of last century, had their chief residence and interests in Wales, they have always intelligently concerned themselves with their hereditary seat in the North, with the result that it offers, perhaps, the most intact and curious example of the old-time castle to be found among our inhabited historic houses. The later buildings cluster about the keep like a husk about its kernel, completely enclosing it on all sides. They probably represent the line of the old enceinte , and follow the edges of the Cawdor Burn and of the dry ditch which defended the building on the land side. The lower portion rises without break or ornament ; while above the grey walls and clustering ivy is a sheaf of crow-stepped gables and gablets, turrets, angle-chambers, and dormer-windows, over which appears the square, massive shape of the tower. The basement storey, especially in the long western wing facing the burn, offers an appearance of great antiquity, and its narrow windows are little larger than shot-holes. This western side is, after the tower, the oldest portion of the Castle, and it shows signs, as do other parts of the building, of having- had storey added to storey, as the family demands for more space and comfort increased. The entrance, approached by a screen of tall limes, and guarded by four ancient elms, occupies to all appearance the original site on the east side. The moat is partly filled up, but the drawbridge, poised by a huge wooden beam projecting into the court-yard, is still in place, and the arched and moss-grown doorway, with its iron-grated gate, its belfry, and its loopholes has a grim aspect well according with the traditions of Cawdor. It gives access to a court-yard the west side of which is bounded by the ivy-mantled wall of the keep, and lined with ancient “querns” and cup-marked stones, 176 HIST OB 10 HOUSES. [Cawdor Castle. wliile to the south and to the north flights of steps descend to other two court-yards. The kitchen offices are ranged round the South Court, while from the North Court, without preface of entrance-hall or vestibule, ascends the main staircase of the mansion, and on a level with the first landing is the doorway of the Keep of Cawdor. Into the vaulted bottom chamber, guarded by the iron “yett” and containing the hawthorn-tree, we have already peeped. It could tell some strange tales : of Callum Beg, the never, for instance, a humble clansman of the house, who was at length caught red- handed with a stolen sheep in his possession, and haled by angry neighbours before the Thane of the day. While they were being hospitably entertained outside, a knife was passed through to the dungeon where the robber and the sheep were confined ; and he lost no time in cutting the evidence of his guilt into pieces, and flinging them out of a window to the kennel of hungry dogs behind. Callum went free ; hut next time he fell into the hands of the Laird of Kilravock, and although his chief went to beg his life “as a New Year’s gift,” he met his fate on the gallows. Within living memory the skeleton of this “ obdurate thief,” with the remains of a rope still about the neck, was dug up in a field near Cawdor Castle. A winding turnpike leads to the three upper floors of the tower. The chambers have been modernised, and the windows, cut through nine feet thick- ness of wall, enlarged; but the old “bole-lioles” and recesses remain. The lofty vaulted upper room was known as the “ Cape House ” ; here, it is said, the Steward of Cawdor used to dwell, and to summon the castle retainers by blowing a horn on the bartisan. “King Duncan’s Chamber” is below, but one now looks in vain for the “Bed of Duncan,” which formerly excited the wonder and tried the faith of visitors. The jackdaws found the old tower a suitable place to haunt and breed in, and after surveying each “jutty, frieze, buttress, and coign of vantage,” had ensconced themselves in one of the chimneys. Hence arose, in the Waterloo year, a fire, in which perished the piece of furniture that claimed so high an antiquity. “ Duncan’s chain- armour ” and the key of the wicket at which the knocking was heard at the witching hour o’ night are shown in a cabinet, and rough but vigorous charcoal drawings of scenes from “ Macbeth ” fresco the room. The turrets of the tower are of peculiar shape, heavily corbelled, circular at the base, octagonal in the upper part, and surmounted by conical roofs. Not here, but in another part of the roof of Cawdor Castle, is the ingenious hiding-place where the notorious Simon, Lord Lovat, found shelter after the Rebellion of 1745. Access to tliis is obtained from the wing which connects the tower with the outer envelope of buildings. Over the entrance-staircase is a vaulted chamber, in which is kept the rich collection of charters and Cawdor Castle.] LOUD LO VAT’S HIDING-PLACE. 177 other papers of the Cawdor family. Above it, under the rafters, is a small room with a window near the floor, and reached only by a kind of man-liole, i i a passage along the outer gutters, and a stone staircase ascending the slope of the roof; and to this singular place of concealment Lovat is said to have retreated when the search for him grew hot after Culloden, returning again to the lower apartments as soon as pursuit drew off. The great western wing, extending for 220 feet along the margin of the stream, and rising to a height of three storeys, flanked by turrets and gables, ranks next to the Tower of Cawdor in point of age. The Thane’s Kitchen suffered descent from the attics of the keep to the basement of this wing. It is a long, low, crypt-like chamber, with an uneven floor partly formed of 23 178 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Cawdor Castle. the solid rock ; and the strong lights and shadows from its range of deeply recessed windows, falling on vaulted walls and kitchen ware, would have delighted an old Dutch etcher. The Morning Doom above is hung with fine Dutch and Gobelins tapestries, the latte]- containing almost life-size figures, representing the adventures of Don Quixote; and it has a beautiful modern carved mantel-piece decorated with the Cawdor and allied arms. Much more noteworthy is the mantel-piece of another tapestried and wainscoted chamber — the adjoining Dining Room. Among the grotesque figures in this ancient piece of sculpture is one whicli has been a sore puzzle to archaeo- logists, for it represents a fox in the act of smoking a tobacco-pipe, while alongside is the date 1510, apparently assigning this enigmatical piece of sculpture to a time earlier by three-quarters of a century than the year when Sir Walter Raleigh is said to have introduced the fragrant weed to this country. The initials “ S.I.C.” and “ D.M.C.” are also to be read, together with the motto “ Ceri mani memineris mane.” They point to the most critical and curious episode of the Cawdor family annals, and indicate that this portion of the building was erected, at the time of their marriage, by “John of Lorn,” third son of the second Earl of Argyll, and his wife, Dame Muriel Calder, the heiress of the old family of Cawdor. Towards the close of the fifteenth century it did not appear as if the ancient race of Thanes was about to become extinct in the male line. Thane William, son of the builder of the tower, wars alive, and he had six sons. To appease an old feud with “ Hutcheon the Rose,” a marriage w 7 as arranged between a daughter of the house of Ivilravock and John, the second son of Cawdor, and the succession fixed upon him and his descendants “ as sicker as men’s wit could devise,” the eldest son being put aside as “ lame and weak in body,” and thrust into the vicarane of Barevan, the old church the remains of which are still visible on the banks of the neighbouring burn of Ault Dearg. Events turned out very differently from expectation, for John, the heir, soon died, leaving an infant daughter. What followed is variously told. It is said that the four “ Uncles of Cawdor” concerted with their kinsman, John Calder, the Precentor of Ross, a scheme for proving their niece to he illegitimate. Meantime Argyll, using his influence with King James IV., obtained the donation of the ward and marriage of the baby-heiress of Cawdor, and destined her for his son John, “a Campbell of the old stamp,” says Mr. Cosmo Times, “seeking incessantly to increase his possessions and extend his influence.” Dowm to Cawdor came a band of sixty Islesmen, under Campbell of Inverliver, to bring aw r ay the heiress, and since they could not get her by w r ile, they took her by force. It is said that before little Muriel was seized, her nurse bit off a joint of the child’s Cawdor Castle.] BOUGH WOOING. 179 little finger, so that she might have a mark to be known by ; while, according to another story, it was her grandmother, the Lady of Kilravock, who made her “ hen-speckle ” by searing her in haste with the key of the Cawdor coffer. The harsh precaution was not uncalled for ; the contingency being discussed of what would happen were the child to die before reaching a marriageable age, Campbell of Aucliinbreck had meaningly remarked “ She’ll never die so long as a red-haired lassie can be found on Loch Awe side.” The uncles followed hot-foot, and overtook the Campbells at Daltulicli, just beyond the Seven Stone Circles of Clava, as they were retreating up Nairn- side. Inverliver hurried forward with his prize, after calling out the phrase that has become proverbial in the Highlands, “ It’s a far cry to Locliow,” leaving the body of his force, ranged round a sheaf of corn dressed in the clothes of the “ red-haired lassie,” to dispute the ground with the Calders. The six sons of Inverliver were slain, but the heiress of Cawdor was con- veyed safely into the hands of John of Lorn. In due time, in 1510, she married him, and the present owner of the Castle is of the offspring of this rough wooing. It’s a far cry to Locliow ; and though the Campbells of Cawdor resided here and added largely to the buildings, the Castle by-and-by fell into neglect, while the chiefs of the house were protecting their lands in the “Wild West,” and conquering, as they did a couple of generations later, the great principality of Islay. It is singular how soon the old race of Calders dis- appear from the scene. The last of the uncles we hear of is Andrew, a truculent and violent man, who came skulking to the neighbourhood, no doubt with thoughts of murder in his heart, when the new lord appeared to take possession, and was shot dead behind “ Calders Stone,” beside the ill-omened Tower of Eait. “ All this,” as the worthy Lachlan Shaw would say, “ w T e give on tradition.” Nor did all go happily with the supplanting line of Thanes. Islay proved a “white elephant” to its masters. Tt, was costly and dangerous work collecting the kain and rents, in the shape of herds of black cattle, and defending the distant island possession against rival claimants. Thane John, the grandson of Muriel, was treacherously slain at the house of Ivnepoch in Lorn, in a quarrel with his kin over the wardship of the young Earl of Argyll. Debts accumulated on his namesake and successor, and decay fell on Cawdor: “the roof rotted, the glass, timber, windows, and doors fell in; the very drawbridge was broken down by a storm.” Worse misfortunes followed. The lands were resigned, about 1622, into the hands of John, the eldest son of the Thane, known as the Liar of Cawdor. He married a sister of that eccentric Sir Thomas Urquhart of Cromarty who translated Rabelais, 180 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Cawdor Castle. fought at Worcester, and traced liis descent hack to Adam. There is a weird legendary tale that the Fiar, riding homeward to Cawdor across a waste heath between the ferry of Chanonry and the Castle — on his way from Cromarty, no doubt — saw seated by the path an ancient crone, “withered “ ICING DUNCAN’S CHAMBER.” and wild in her attire,” who mopped and mowed at him as he passed. An incurable melancholy fell upon him ; and the chronicles of the time are responsible for a scandal that the young Laird of Cawdor, having become mad, his lady had no pleasure of him, and at a banquet at Cromarty prepared “ a potion in a quairt stoup,” which three other gentlemen inadvertently drank of, so that they died. Building was resumed at Cawdor after Tutors had been appointed for the distraught Laird. It is to this time, just before the outbreak of the Civil War, that the erection of the northern wing of the Castle must be attri- buted. Nairn masons were engaged to do the work, the Tutor of Cawdor, Colin Campbell, requiring that the “ annes, names, and siferis upon the windockis ” should bo wrought to his contentment. Without and within Cawdor Castle is profusely ornamented with these “siferis” and heraldic insignia, among which constantly figure the three buckles and “ deer’s head Cawdor Castle.] IMPROVEMENTS AND ADDITION X 181 caboshed ” of the Calders, and the Galley of Horn and “ gyrony of eight” of the Campbells. There are traces showing that the Castle at this time was surmounted by a fine of battlements, and the small staircase which gave access to them exists in the thickness of the northern wall. Montrose, after defeating the Covenanting Army at Auldearn, close by, paid a pillaging visit to THE DINING-ROOM. Cawdor; but this and all other damage it had suffered at the hands of time and war was amply repaired when Sir Hugh Campbell, the son of Colin the Tutor, came into possession. It is to him that the Castle owes a long series of improvements and additions ; and in all its main features, external and internal, it is to-day pretty much what he left it at his death, in 171G. He came of age in the year of the Restoration, and soon after began building, making contracts with local masons in 1676, in 1681, and in 1600. The portion of the eastern elevation to the left of the drawbridge is of his time, as shown by the date, 1702 ; the remainder, built in 1855, being the only really modern part of the structure. The Blue Room, or Boudoir, the angle-chamber of which projects from the upper storey of the "west wing, lias Sir Hugh’s initials and the figures 1667, and the motto Feare the Lord ” on its 182 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Cawdor Castle. quaintly carved mantel-piece. To a rather later period belongs the staircase block connecting the keep with the enveloping buildings. The quartered arms of Sir Hugh and of his wife, Lady Henrietta Stewart, sister of the Earl of Moray, with the date 1672, are above the main doorway, and on the lintel is graven the year of the Thane’s death, 1716. The dormer-windows are ornamented with ramping lions, hounds, and griffins, surmounted by rose- and-thistle finials and the date 1674. Sir Hugh also planned the approaches, embellished the grounds with the rugged old ash-trees and sycamores, laid out the gardens, and began the work of planting ; he formed a deer-park, and brought red deer from Islay and Jura to stock it. But no part of Cawdor hears more strongly the impress of Sir Hugh and his times than the Great Hall, now the Drawing Boom, in the north wing, and the State Bed-room overhead. The latter looks a more likely place for a spectre to haunt than King Duncan’s Boom itself. There are concealed doors behind the faded tapestries, which screen the hare stone of the walls, and make ghostly movements in the half-light. From the Cawdor Accounts, we know that this “ suit of arras longings of wirsit mixt with silk for my Lady’s State Bed-room,” and representing scenes from Scripture, came from Oudenarde, in Flanders, and cost before delivery the sum of £483 7s. 6d. Scots. Sir Hugh’s portrait and that of his wife — like the other paintings in Cawdor, of no great artistic merit — are above the huge yawning fireplace of the Drawing Boom be- neath, from which an incense of peat still ascends and pervades the grand old chamber. The pair look down upon stiff high-hacked chairs, antiquated desks and cabinets, and other belongings left unchanged since their day. Some of the curiosities were old even in Sir Hugh’s time : such as the urns and pike-heads dng up in the neighbourhood, and the curious Communion cups presented in 1619 to the parish church. Other orna- ments — trophies of the chase and prizes for Highland cattle and Clydesdale horses of the Cawdor stock — have been added by his de- scendants. Above the allegorical tapestries are stone brackets, on which rest great joists of stained Scotch fir supporting the roof ; and at the further end is the “ Fiddlers’ Gallery.” TDK “ IRON YETT. Cawdor Castle.] THE GARDENS AND WOODS. 183 With Sir Hugli departed the glory of Cawdor. He was buried, not with his forefathers in the ruined church of Bare van, but in a new vault in the parish church. His son married the sister and heiress of Sir Gabriel Lort, of Stackpole Court, Pembrokeshire, and his grandson another Welsh heiress, Mary Pryse, of Gogirthen. The head of the house was made Baron in 1796 and Earl in 1827, and the Earls of Cawdor have their chief seat at Stackpole — a mansion which, like Cawdor itself, is backed by hills and over- looks woods and waters. The vast Argyllshire property was sold to clear off the debts upon it ; but Cawdor Castle has been religiously preserved as a relic of the past. The old-fashioned gardens, like the house, still bear traces of the hand of old Sir Hugh. But the surrounding walks and woods have been vastly improved and extended since his day. Paths wind up the glen to the Hermitage, now revealing prospects of hill and plain and sea, and again opening up romantic glimpses of the deep bosky dell through which the burn rushes, hollowing out on its way caves in its rocky banks. The Old Oak Wood of Cawdor, with its giant boles and spreading foliage, forms one of the finest bits of sylvan scenery in Scotland. Beyond it are great pine-woods, and the plantations are carried far up the glens and hills, and intrude upon the primeval moor and heath. John Geddie. MANTEL- PIECE IN DINING-ROOM. HOGHTON TOWER. IT ARMS OF SIR CHARLES DE HOGHTON. OGHTON TOWER lias been called “ the heart of Lancashire.” Bold and picturesque in its lordly isolation, it stands out like some sentinel on duty, keep- ing watch and ward over the county. From the plateau it covers, far-reaching views are obtained in every direc- tion. To the north the landscape sweeps on until it loses itself in the grey masses of the Lake country ; to the west the prospect takes in the broken line of the Lancashire coast; to the east the distance blends into the fells of Yorkshire; to the south the mountains of South Wales stand revealed. It is a standpoint from which one may get a glimpse on a clear day, on one side or the other, of the ships in the Channel, of Ingleborough, of Coniston Old Man, of Great Onne’s Head. All around are farmsteadings, nestling townships, and some of the sweetest scenery Lancashire has to show ; with signs enough also of the industrial energy that has made this the busiest, the most populous, and the most productive of English shires. “The Tower” seems a strange name for what has the appearance rather of a well-planned village than the seat of an ancient family ; but IIoghton Tower.] THE CENTRAL TOWER . 185 investigation shows intelligent method in the disposition of the pile, and one must indeed he a stranger to the history and associations of the place not to know that here there rose at one time a central structure, which in height and grandeur dominated the general fabric as effectively as the great mound on which the buildings are placed dominates the plain. The Tower proper was blown up in the wars of the Com- monwealth. It had not then stood for any lengthened period, hut it had been there long enough to give character to the locality, and the com- mon usage of generations has served to retain the name, and to link it inseparably with the titular distinctions of the family owning the property. Unmistakably Tudor in their architectural features and ar- rangements, the buildings do not go farther back in date than the reign of Elizabeth, but the family held possessions here long before that period ; and in the same way, while the baronetage implies a comparatively modern claim — though a claim that in this case goes back to the institu- tion of the Order by James I. — the title of knighthood was held by the De Hoghtons early in the Norman era. Written history, ' in fact, does A quaint gaelr. not reveal a time when the Hoghtons were not identified witli this part of Lancashire. The tradition is that the name came to them from the hill that is covered by their seat ; and if there he anything in this, it is not unreasonable to suppose that there were Hoghtons here before the epoch embraced in the clear line of their descent. 24 186 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Hoghton Towee. That line goes hack uninterruptedly to the reign of William Rufus. The record tells how, in 1087, Warm Bushel, Baron of Penwortham, gave two carucates of land, in Hocton and Eccleston, to Hamo Pincerna, in free marriage with his daughter ; how the place went from the mother, after the father’s death, to a second son, Richard ; and how, from this Richard, it passed in turn to his son, Adam, who, in succeeding to the title, was styled Adam de Hocton. This Adam is described as a knight, and many of his successors are found with the same title. Some of them are met with in the office of Sheriff for Lancashire ; others figure as representatives of the county in Parliament. Lying about midway between Blackburn and Preston, Hoghton Tower is reached after a pleasant walk or drive by road and a few minutes’ ride by rail. From the station there is a gradual ascent to the picturesque mass of buildings. The plateau rises about 600 feet above the sea-level. It is 500 feet long by about 300 feet wide, and nearly the whole of this space is occupied by the various structures and their accessories. The entrance faces the south-west, and was formerly approached from an avenue that led straight up to it. Now the road sweeps round by the north side, and is continued to the north-eastern end, where at one time a small chapel ran out obliquely, so as to orientate from the wing to which it was attached. Roughly speaking, the ground-plan takes the form of the letter IT, the bar in the H marking the division between the two court-yards. The entrances to each court are in a direct line, and from each interesting glimpses of the various buildings are obtained. Jacobean gate- . posts stand out like advanced guards well in front of the main gateway on the south-west, and rise from a low wall enclosing a fine stretch of pasture, together with the great barn and other outbuildings. The main gateway is under a square, battlemented tower of two stages, with a flanking tower on each side, separated by connecting walls. To the right of the entrance is a building of three storeys, which, in the old days, served as a sort of barracks for retainers and men-at-arms ; on the other side are the stables and kitchen offices. A terrace, formed out of the natural slope of the ground, intervenes about half- way across the outer court-yard, and is broken in the centre by a flight of steps and a wicket attached to Jacobean posts. Beyond this the ground is level. The inner court is the smaller of the two, and is surrounded by the older and more interesting portions of the structure, including what are known as “the King’s Rooms.” On the left hand from the inner gateway is the Great Hall, with its main window facing the quadrangle. This window is of immense size. It covers the greater part of one side of the room, and rises nearly to the roof, its long mullions being effectively broken by three rows of transoms. At the end the hall is widened on each side by a deeply recessed transeptal bay, each bay Hoghton Tower.] THE BANQUETING HALL. 187 forming five sides of an octagon, and with mullions and transoms in keep- ing with the main window. The hall is entered from the north side of the inner court, a flight of semicircular steps leading to a low-pointed, square- headed arch under a galiled roof-line. A panelled oak screen runs along the width of the hall at the entrance, and is carried up into a balustrade, where it forms the front of a Minstrels’ Gallery, from which point the proportions of L FIRE-PLACE IN THE BANQUETING HALL. the Banqueting Hall are best seen. The apartment is about fifty-four feet in length by about twenty-six feet in breadth. The ceiling is flat, with moulded ribs. What is still a noble ingle, though greatly contracted from the original size, is set in the wall opposite the main window. The furniture includes the old “ high table ” of polished oak, which stood originally at the end of the hall, between the oriels. Much of the panelling of the apartment is new, and. in the centre of that at the end of the hall are introduced the initials of the baronet who began the work of restoration. With the Banqueting Chamber as a starting-point, one may go pretty nearly over the wdiole range of the buildings without any retracing of steps, although 188 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Hoghton Tower. there is an almost complete absence of corridors, so consecutively do the rooms lead into each other ; and the process is facilitated by the recent addition of an underground passage between the court-yards. From the chief entrance, the “King’s Staircase,” as it is called, leads to the “King’s Reception Room,” on the upper door, a commodious chamber, wainscoted in oak and deeply panelled. Close at hand is the “King’s Bed- room,” and other State apart- ments, panelled in most cases, or showing traces of panelling. A snug chamber apart is known as the “ Guinea Room.” It gets this name because of a series of gilt discs, of the shape and size of the old guinea, that decorates each corner of the panels in the wainscoting. Probably we have here the original treasury of the Tower. Locally, there is a tra- dition that the discs were in- troduced to symbolise the yearly income of the Hoghton estates ; but they are not numerous enough to support such an idea. Even if every disc represented a separate estate, the number would hardly represent the extent of the Hoghton possessions at the time this peculiar form of decoration was bestowed upon the room. Another noteworthy feature in the “sights” at Hoghton Tower is the draw-well, carried down forty yards through the rock, and yielding, in ordinary seasons, an abundance of good water. A small building abutting on the outer court-yard protects the old windlass by means of which the water was drawn in ascending and descending buckets. The Tudor style does not lend itself freely to ornamentation, and at Hoghton Tower there is even less of either external or internal architectural display than is common in similar buildings. The aim of the founder seems to have been to combine solidity with simple neatness ; and it is noteworthy that ENTRANCE ARCH TO BASE COURT. Hoghton Tower.] THE CAIi VING. 189 the later additions have been carried out in the same spirit. Consequently, there is little carving to be met with, though what one sees is in good taste and effective. On the outer gateway, above the arch, is a panel with the initials of the founder of the Tower (“ T. H.”), and showing traces of sculpture. r THE NO'RTH TERRACE. 190 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Hoghton Tower. Another sculptured panel on the entrance side of the gateway leading to the second court is in excellent preservation. It shows the family arms — Hoghton (sable three bars argent) quartered with Asheton (argent on mullet sable), helm, and crest (a bull passant). These bearings are repeated on a corresponding panel on the inner side of the gateway, with traces of the date of erection (1565); and here also, in each case, the “T. II.” initials are introduced. There were a number of old family portraits in the Tower before the work of restoration began. These, with other art treasures, were then removed to London for safe keeping, and were unfortunately destroyed by an outbreak of fire in the building in which they had been placed. One old picture that has been preserved gives a distant view of Hoghton Hill, showing the Tower build- ings. A fine water-colour of recent date represents the mansion as it wms left by its founder, and recalls the gay scene of that August afternoon in 1617 when James I., with his retinue, paid his memorable visit to the place. Hoghton Tower is in the literal sense part and parcel of the hill, the great mass of gritstone on which it stands having furnished a convenient quarry on which to draw as building material was required. The founder of the Tower was Thomas Hoghton, who succeeded his father, Sir Richard, in 1558. Kuerden, the antiquary, says of him that he “ translated the manor-house, formerly placed below the mill near unto the water side.” The change is supposed to have been made for the double purpose of securing a healthier site, and ob- taining a house that, while in a conspicuous situation, could be readily defended. As a matter of fact, the manor-house was so placed and so constructed as to be impreg- nable. The structure, as originally designed, had hardly, however, been completed before its owner was forced to leave the country. Thomas Hoghton stood firmly by the old faith. He had enemies on the other side, who denounced him at Court, with the re- sult that he went over to the Netherlands, where he died, after eleven years’ exile. The incident is set forth plaintively in some verses printed in Harland’s “ Ballads and Songs of Lancashire,” under the title “ The Blessed Conscience.” A brother, Alexander, succeeded to the estate, and wars followed THE DRAW-WELL. Hoghton Toweii.] 191 A ROYAL VISIT. by another, Thomas, a half-brother of the builder of the Tower, and the son of a man who had a fancy for naming several of his children alike. Thomas, the half-brother, was killed in 1589 by Thomas Langton, of Walton, while preventing a cattle -lifting raid ; and it is said that Thomas Langton, dying without issue, ceded the Manor of Walton to the Hoglitons in condonation of this act. Bichard, the successor of the slain Thomas, was favoured in other important respects. He became Sheriff of Lancashire when he was a few years out of his minority. He threw in his lot with the Earl of Essex in Ireland, and was knighted by that nobleman. He went up to Parliament as a knight of the shire. At Court he won the esteem of James I., and it wars upon him that that monarch conferred a baronetage on the institution of the Order. His son, while yet a lad of fifteen, was knighted by the King at Whitehall. It was the fortune also of Sir Bichard Hogliton to entertain his sovereign. This he did with a pleasant tact and unstinted provision in the month of August, 101 7, when James was on his way back to London, after the only journey he made to Scotland following upon the Union of the Crowns. The visit of James I. remains, indeed, one of the chief memories of Hogliton Tower. His Majesty had previously spent a few days at Hornby Castle and Myerscougli Lodge. He was at Preston on the 15th, where a banquet was given in his honour. From the banqueting-room the King and his suite went forward to Hogliton Tower. They marched up the Grand Avenue, which is said to have been laid with velvet cloth along its whole length in honour of the occasion. Bichard Hogliton received the monarch at the foot of the hill, and it w r as a tribute to the great popularity of the lord of the manor that the gentry of the country round about were not only present in full muster, but were dressed in the Hogliton uniform. Says Nicholas Asheton, in a diary of the visit : “ My brother Sherborne’s taylor brought him a suit of apparel and us two others, and a livery cloak from Sir Bichard Hogliton, that we should attend him at the King’s coming, rather for the grace and reputation than any exacting of mean service.” This genial chronicler tells us also that “ a speech ” was made on the arrival of his Majesty at the Tower. The “ speech ” seems to have been in rhyme, and had, no doubt, been committed to memory. Two retainers, “ conceaved to be the household gods,” were responsible for its delivery. One, “dressed in a purple Taffeta mantle,” took the part of the divinity of the house; the other, in huntsman’s attire, came forward as the divinity of the estate. The object w T as to give assurance to the King that he was heartily welcome to all the manor could yield in in-door hospitality and out-door sports. Thus we have the household god telling the august visitor : — 192 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Hogiiton Tower. the landlord of this ancient Tower, Thrice fortunate from this happy hour, Whose trembling heart thy presence sets on lire, Unto this house (the heart of all the shire) Does bid thee hearty welcome, and would speak it In higher notes, but extreme joy doth break it. He makes his guest most welcome in whose eyes Love tears do sit ; not he that shouts and cries. And we, the gods and guardians of the place, I of this house, he of the fruitful chace ” THE OUTER COURT-YARD. At an appropriate pause in the discourse “ lie of the fruitful chace ” starts in grandly with the words : “ Thou greatest of mortals ! ” and suddenly falters, leaving his neighbour to apologise in this fashion “ Dread lord! the splendour, and the glorious ray Of thy high Majesty, hath stricken dumb His weaker godhead ; if t’ himself he come, Unto thy service straight he will commend These foresters, and charge them to attend Hoghton Tower.] HUNTING THE STAG. 193 Thy pleasure in this park, and show such sport To the Chief Huntsman, and thy princely Court, As the small circuit of this round affords, And be more ready than he was in words.” This seems to have pleased the King greatly. “ A-himting he would go ” there and then, though the day must have been passing into the THE INNER COURT-YARD. twilight. As it happened, sport was not far to seek. The party had hut to enter the park close by, then so full of timber that a man passing through it could scarce have seen the sunshine at the middle of the day,” then also giving shelter to wild hoars and cattle and red deer. A stag was speedily run down and killed; and then to supper. King James had come prepared for work of this kind. He was dressed in green, with a feather in his cap and a horn at his side. He was up and out in the park betimes next morning. Says Aslieton, under date August 16tli, “The King hunting; 25 194 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Hoghton Tower. a great companie. Killed affore dinner a brace of staggs. Verie hott ; soe lie [the King] went in to dinner.” It is the record of an eye-witness; and we are told in it that after dinner there was more hunting, and the party ££ came late into supper.” The next day (the 17th) was Sunday. A service was held in the Great Hall, and a sermon was preached by Hr. Morton, Bishop of Chester. Dinner that day was followed by ££ a rush-bearing and pipeing,” and supper by ££ a maske of noblemen, knights, gentlemen, and courtiers affore the King, in the middle round in the garden.” The visit lasted till about noon on Monday, when James proceeded to Lathorn House. Certain ££ notes of the diet at Hoghton at the King’s coming there ” have been preserved. They show an abundance of substantial fare, but an almost entire absence of fancy dishes. It was an occasion unquestionably when good digestion waited on appetite ; and the story goes that the King was in a right merry mood, and that, either at the Saturday or the Sunday dinner, he, in the exercise of his prerogative, gave titular distinction to the great succulent roast of beef that in due course was placed before him : — “ The god, in guise of yeoman tall, Pass’d along the crowded hall, And, with his portly mien and bland, Gave this to the monarch’s hand. The well-known dish the king survey’d, And then drew forth the shining blade ; He wav’d it thrice ; with gentle tap, Thrice imposed the kingly slap.” The manner in which the King enjoyed himself on the Sunday he spent at Hoghton Tower was in itself sufficient answer to a, memorial sent to him during the visit, complaining of the restrictions that had been placed upon out-door sports during the first day of the week, and on holidays generally. But by precept, as well as example, James gave his view of the matter, expressing himself right sorry that there should be any interference with the ££ lawful recreations and honest exercises” of liis people. His Majesty went further than he knew. About six months afterwards there appeared the notorious “ Book of Sports,” issued first under the direct authority of James, and reproduced by command of his son, Charles — a work that virtually legalised every variety of festivity on the Sunday. The liberty thus given, carried to the verge of excess, was not without stimulating effect on the movement which ended in the overthrow of the Stuarts. When the nation divided between the authority of the King and the rights of Parliament, the chief of the Hoghtons stood faithfully by the sovereign. The Tower was then held by the Sir Gilbert who had been knighted at Whitehall in his boyhood. In him Charles I. had a devoted Hoghton Tower.] DESTRUCTION OF THE CENTRAL TOWER. 195 and influential supporter. Two of Sir Gilbert’s sons were Royalist officers, and one of them was “ slain with a cannon bullet at Hessam Moor, fighting on the King’s side.” Supported by willing levies from his own and neighbouring estates, Sir Gilbert Hoghton did his utmost to stem the Revolutionary move- ment in North Lancashire. He had his head-quarters at Preston when that town was attacked by Sir John Seaton. When Preston fell into the hands of the Parliamentarians, he managed to escape to Wigan, but Lady Hoghton, with other women of distinction, was captured. Hoghton Tower had been left to the care of a small garrison ; and as it was an important strategical position, the Parliamentarians resolved upon an effort to secure it. It was an expedi- tion in which they fared both better and worse than they exj^ected. The small force left behind by Sir Gilbert was summoned to surrender, “ whereupon they in the Tower desired half- an -hour’s time to consider what they should do, which -was granted to them accordingly.” The result was an agreement to deliver up the place £< upon quarter.” The request was granted, and the Parliamentarians took possession. While the captors were celebrating their easy victory, an explosion occurred in that part of the building which then gave name to the wdrole pile, as it does still. An old record of the event states that, “ through want of lieedfulnesse, some gunpowder was set on fyre, which blew up and threw downe some part of the house, and slew divers souldiers, amongst whom Captain Starkie, the Colonel’s son, was one, which was great sorrowe to his father.” It has been asserted also that the explosion was an act of treachery ; but in other contemporary accounts than the above — - even in one unfavourable to the Royalists — it is spoken of as an accident, and, in the absence of direot testimony to the contrary, it is fair to look back upon it in this light. Had it been intentional, it is not unreasonable to suppose that vengeance would have completed what treachery had begun. As it was, the destruction of “ the tall strong tower within the inner and outer courts ” ■was the only evil that befell the Hoghton possessions wdiile the war lasted. Sir Gilbert died before the struggle came to an end, and the son, Richard, wdio succeeded him was as sturdy a Roundhead as his father had been an active Cavalier. Acting throughout from deep conviction, Sir Richard held firmly by bis opinions after the Restoration, throwing in his lot with the Presbyterian party ; and the ejected clergymen found in him an attached friend and a willing supporter. The descent of the Hoglitons runs strongly along the male line. It is seen that where a son is wanting to take up the titles and estate there are brothers enough on whom to fall back and secure the direct succession. The Hoglitons are found also to be active, energetic men, taking their full share in the public work of the county. Hoghton Tower was occupied 196 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Hoghton Towee. by them until the time of William III. The Sir Charles who was then the hearer of the title warmly espoused the devolution. He made a consider- able addition to the Tower buildings, and, in his admiration of the new THE BANQUETING HALL. order of government, erected the lead statue of William III. which adorns the inner court-yard. Soon after his death the family deserted the Tower, and its various buildings became the common dwelling-place of people in the neighbourhood. This privilege of “open -house” was greatly abused. From the walls of many of the rooms the wainscoting was torn to keep the fires going, and gradually the buildings fell into decay. They were in a Hoghton Tower.] THE ERA OF RENOVATION. 197 dilapidated state up to about thirty years ago. The Norman form of the name had been dropped in the fifteenth century, and early in the present century the name underwent another change, when Sir Henry Hoghton assumed, by royal licence and as a consequence of marriage, the additional name and arms of Bold. When Sir Henry died (in 1862), his son, another Sir Henry, dropping the interpolated name, resumed the ancient title, and set himself with all the resources at his command to restore Hoghton Tower in such a way that it should be habitable in accordance with modern ideas of comfort, and yet retain its ancient features. He died in 1876, while the work was in progress. The title and estates then passed to his brother, Sir Charles de Hoghton, the present baronet, who has given much attention to Hoghton Tower, and has carefully carried out the scheme of rehabilitation. W. S. Cameron. KING JAMES'S STAIRCASE. CASTLE HOWARD, FROM THE BACK. ' CASTLE HOWARD. ALTHOUGH the soul that loves not the Renaissance LA. must resent the intrusion of any modern classical building amidst the quiet pastoral scenery of this part of the East Riding of Yorkshire, even as Charles Y. resented the insertion of a Renaissance cathedral in the forest of pillars in the mosque at Cordova, and although there is at Castle Howard nothing of the “ feudal castle ” except the name, and perhaps as little of the “stately home ,” this magnificent mansion must always take a high place among the great houses of England, and he acknowledged to have, as a museum of art, few rivals in the country. Built at a time when the rejuvenated classics ran riot in Yorkshire, it stands as a fitting memorial of the sense of artistic fitness possessed by the founder, inasmuch as he transformed the face of the surrounding uplands to harmonise with his newly built palace. On entering the park the visitor becomes at once sensible that he is within a classic grove. No intrusive brushwood is to he seen hiding the carpet of primroses which in spring covers every slope ; the trees have clearly not been planted at random, hut are in studied groups or stately avenues. The principal avenue, which goes up hill and down dale, nearly north and south, for about two miles, is formed for a considerable distance of large clumps of trees, arranged on each side, instead of in the usual lines. The effect is exceedingly fine. At one of the most elevated points is a gateway, surmounted by a pyramid, which is visible for some miles. This long avenue is crossed at right angles by one Castle Howard.] THE OBELISK. 199 which leads to the house, and at the point of intersection stands a quadrangular obelisk, 100 feet in height, the inscriptions on which form a suitable intro- duction to a survey of the domain. That on the east side, facing the avenue that leads to the house, runs thus : — - “ Virtuti et Fortunse Johannes, Marl burke Duc-is, Patriae Europseque Defensoris, Hoc Saxum Admiration! ac fame sacrum Carolus, Comes Carliol, posuit Anno Domini MDCCXIY.” On the opposite side of the obelisk, facing the western avenue, we read : — “ If to perfection these plantations rise, If they agreeably my heirs surprise, This faithful pillar will their age declare, As long as time these characters shall spare. Here then with kind remembrance read his name. Who for posterity performed the same. Charles, the third Earl of Carlisle, Of the family of the Howards, Erected a Castle Where the old Castle of Hinderskelf stood, And called it Castle Howard. He likewise made the plantations in this park, And all the outworks, monuments, and other plantations Belonging to this seat. He began these works in the year MDCCXIL, And set up this inscription Anno Dorn. MDCCXXXI.” Of the Castle of Hinderskelf, long the home of the Greystockes and I) acres, not a vestige now remains. Possibly the destruction by tire was complete; but, at any rate, the site was too good to he left occupied only by ruins, and hence in 1702 the new edifice was begun. Sir John Vanbrugh was the architect, concerning whom were written the oft-quoted lines : — “ Lie heavy on him, Earth, for he Laid many a heavy load on thee.” The house stands upon an elevated ridge, commanding a tine view in both directions. The grand facade or garden front faces the south, and con- sists of a central block and two side wings. The central block, which is approached by a broad flight of steps, is considerably higher than the wings, THE SOUTH FRONT. Castle Howard.] THE FAQADE. 201 and has two tiers of windows, nine in each tier. It has a pediment and entablature, supported by ten fluted Corinthian pilasters and finished off by a balustrade of small pillars, the whole surmounted by a lofty dome. The wings have but one tier of windows, except at each end, where there are two ; tho effect of the variety in height of different jq parts of the building being very graceful. At all available points vases or statues are introduced. The facade, 323 feet in length — twenty feet longer than that at THE TEMPLE, WITH THE MAUSOLEUM IN THE DISTANCE. Blenheim Palace, the work of the same architect — has twenty-seven windows in a row, divided by fluted Corinthian pilasters, those of the wings correspond- ing with those of the central portion. The absolute uniformity of the building is marred by a small extension of the west wing, which was erected at a later date than the rest, after the design of Sir James Robinson, and is, unfortunately, not quite in accordance with the original design. As a defect this is, however, scarcely worth mentioning. The fa 32 250 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Longleat. their castles for safety against warlike attack, but chose the loveliest spots they could find and built mansions for comfort and luxury. The modern Loon of security is illustrated in examining the apartments and the literary and artistic treasures of Longleat ; they have never been ransacked or de- spoiled, hut have all the added wealth that completeness gives. There are three approaches to Longleat — from the village of Horningsham, outside the gates, from Warminster, and from Frome. They each differ in character ; the last-named gives a singularly charming succession of woodland scenes, the first-named gives the finest prospect of the House, which is seen for nearly a mile at the further end of a long avenue of aged elms, with water on one side and pleasure-grounds on the other. What, however, even more than its material beauty, makes the prospect of the building attractive is that it is sanctified by memories of the saintly Bishop Ken — gentlest of nonjurors. The priest who refused to lodge Nell Gwynne in his prebendal house at Winchester, even at the request of a Stuart king, was one who would dare much for conscience’ sake ; and although Monmouth’s followers had sorely damaged his cathedral at Wells, yet, when they were crowded into the prisons of Somerset and Dorset, he retrenched his episcopal state to relieve their sufferings, and did all he could to stand between them and their brutal butcher Jeffreys. When the seven bishops presented to the tyrant James their petition against the dispensing power, Ken was the most manly and dignified in his answers to the royal browbeaten When the Revolution followed, Ken became a nonjuror on the fine point of conscience that allegiance once given to the Jjord’s anointed w r as not his to withdraw, but he counselled those who acted with him to be patient, and the schism in the Church would die out with them. It may be said, indeed, that he acted with superhuman resolution in resisting the temptation to form a new sect of his own. His character did not wait till our day for appreciation ; among his contemporaries who were not nonjurors, Thomas Tliynne, first Viscount Weymouth, who had been his college friend at Christ Church, Oxford, offered him an asylum at Longleat, where he spent the evening of his days in the way which delights a student and a poet. A lovely spot of high ground in the park, commanding a beautiful view, is known as Heaven’s Gate, because it was a favourite resort of Bishop Ken, and the tradition runs that he there composed his morning and evening hymns, which are remembered although his more laborious and learned works are forgotten. When he died, on his way to Bath, he was buried at Frome, a parish within his diocese, and at his request outside the east end of the church, but the heavy monument placed over the grave somewhat spoils the pretty symbolic notion the Bishoji had. Longleat.] THE THYNNES. 251 Ecclesiastical in its noblest tradition, Longleat is also ecclesiastical in its early history. In the reign of Henry III. a small priory of black canons of the order of St. Augustine was established here, dedicated to the Thuringian saint Radegunde. The house was a small one, consisting only of a prior and four canons, and for some reason seems to have wasted its means, so that it could not keep up its services, and was annexed in 1530 to the Abbey of Hinton Charterhouse, near Bath. Ten years later came the disso- lution of religious houses, and in 1541 the property was sold to Sir John Tliynne, whose descendants have held it to the present day. No remains of the old priory exist except a piece of wall incorporated into the interior of the mansion, and some coffins which were dug up early in this century near the foot of the grand staircase and reinterred in Horningsham churchyard, which lies just outside the park gates. The Thynnes trace their descent from Geoffrey Botevill, who came from France, in command, with his brother, of a force of Poitevins to fight for King John against the barons. He helped to take Belvoir Castle, and as a result of being made governor thereof was granted lands in Shropshire by its owner, the Earl of Arundel. His descendant Adam was attainted for the part he took in the battle of Boroughbridge, and a later descendant forfeited his land for opposing his feudal lord, the Earl of Arundel. But they managed to come to the front again. John Botevill, who lived in the reign of Richard II. and Edward IV., was first surnamed “ John le Tliynne,” and from him this branch of the family took the name of Tliynne. William Tliynne, who was Master of the Household to Henry VII., collected and published the first edition of Chaucer’s works. Sir John Tliynne, the purchaser of Longleat, was his nephew. He entered the service of the Lord Protector Somerset, and rose to a high position in his confidence, so that twice when his master was sent to the Tower he was with him, the second time having to pay the heavy fine of T6,000. He was knighted on the field of Musselborough. In the reign of Queen Mary he was Comptroller of the Household to the Lady Elizabeth, but presumably did not enjoy her confidence, as he came little to Court after her accession. He appears to have been a man of taste and of travel, as we should expect from his work at Longleat, and it is worthy of note that his first wife, Christiana, was sister to Sir Thomas Gresham, the famous merchant prince who founded the Royal Exchange. As his son, Sir John the younger, married the well-dowered daughter of another Lord Mayor, it would appear that the family at this time had intimate and profitalde associations with the City of London. The former Sir John Tliynne devoted the last twelve years of his life to the building of Longleat House, and his accounts in connection therewith, 252 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Longleat. which commence on January 21st, 1567, and continue till March 29th, 1578, are still preserved at Longleat, and reveal an expenditure of over £8,000, representing, of course, a much larger sum in the currency of the present day. He completed the exterior of the building, with the exception of the LONGLEAT, FEOM THE LAKE. west front, virtually as it stands to-day. Tradition identifies the architect of this magnificent design — with its wonderful adaptation of classical styles taking the place of the Gothic orders which had prevailed during the preceding centuries — with John of Padua. Some antiquaries have thrown doubt upon this statement, but there is no direct evidence either for or against. Little is known of the ingenious Italian in question, except that he was the architect of old Somerset House and Surveyor of Buildings to King Henry VIII. Sir John Thynne was visited at Longleat by Queen Elizabeth in 1675, and died in 1680. The work was continued by Sir John the younger, who added the oak- screen and wainscot of the hall ; and the fourth owner, Sir James Thynne, called in the services of Sir Christopher Wren, who designed a staircase and a principal entrance — since removed to a sclioolhouse at Warminster. Sir James’s nephew, who succeeded in 1670, was known as “ Tom of Ten Thousand,” from the popular estimate of his income. He was a personal friend and partisan of the Duke of Monmouth, whom he entertained twice Longleat.] TIIE ASSASSINATION OF MR. THYNNE. 253 at Longleat, where he resided ; and he laid out a new road to Frorne, planting trees along the way. Although he was the hero of the “ hospitable treate of Dryden’s “ Absalom and Acliitophel,” his end was painfully tragic and terrible. The Lady Elizabeth Percy, daughter of Jocelyn, eleventh Earl ol Nortli- umberlaud, being an heiress, was married, like a young Hindoo, at the early THE GAEDEX TEEEACE. age of twelve, to Henry, Earl of Ogle. She was, however, soon left a widow, and before she was fifteen she was married to Thomas Thynne. Possibly she did not like the match, for, although great preparations had been made for her reception at Longleat, she never came here, but at once went abroad with Lady Temple. Although no details are preserved, it is easy to read the true meaning of this transaction in the modern Babylonian marriage-market. Un- fortunately the disappointed rival was not a matter-of-fact Englishman, but Count Konigsmark, the head of an old and noble Swedish family. His revenge took the form of a most atrocious plot. He hired two German officers and a Polish soldier as bravoes to assassinate Mr. Thynne, and came over to London himself to superintend the execution of the plan. On the night of Sunday, February 12th, 1682, as Mr. Thynne was returning from the house of the Countess of Northumberland in St. James’s Street, these three ruffians rode alongside his carriage, and the Pole shot four or five bullets into 254 HIST OHIO HOUSES. [Longleat. his body. He lingered all night, tended by the Duke of Monmouth, but died in the morning and was buried in Westminster Abbey, where a bas- relief on his monument represents the murder. The four conspirators w r ere arrested and put on their trial, but the prime mover, Count Konigsmark, w r as acquitted “ by a corrupt jury,” as Evelyn puts it ; so he got away, entered the Venetian service, and w r as killed at the siege of Argos, in 1686. The other three were convicted, and hanged in Pall Mall. The lady married, it is to be hoped this time by her owm choice, Charles Seymour, seventh Duke of Somerset. The estate now passed to Thomas Thynne of Kempsford, wdio was at once created Baron Thynne and Viscount Weymouth. During his long- occupancy of thirty-two years he made considerable alterations in the house and grounds. He was the friend and protector of Bishop Ken. On the death of the first Lord Weymouth in 1714 the property again passed to a second cousin, an infant of four years. When his long minority w r as at an end, he preferred to live at the old manor-house of Horningsham until his death in 1751. His son, however, on coming of age in 1754, took up his residence at Longleat, and devoted his attention to the improvement of the grounds. Hitherto the gardens had been laid out in the formal Dutch style ; but he employed the celebrated landscape-gardener, “Capability” Brown, who laid out the pleasure- grounds and gardens as they are now. In 1789 he w T as advanced to the dignity of Marquis of Bath, a title now held by his great-grandson. In September of the same year he entertained King George III., the Queen, and a numerous company at Longleat, his Majesty being on his w r ay back from a course of sea-bathing at Wevmouth. In 1808 the second Marquis, who had succeeded in 1796, employed Jeffrey Wyatt, afterwards known as Sir Jeffrey Wyattville, upon important alterations. He constructed the present north front, removing the stables to a distance from the house. He also remodelled the principal apartments, and constructed the present grand staircase, but wvas careful to respect the original design of the building. The present Marquis, who had a long minority, has played his part in the country and in the House of Lords as a great territorial magnate ; but he has done much to beautify and adorn his favourite dwelling-place. The picture of the hall on the next page but one, compared with the plate of the same apartment in Hoare’s “Wiltshire,” will show how completely its cold and cheerless aspect at the beginning of the century has been transformed, by artistic furnishing and by judicious arrangements of colour in accessories, until it breathes the pleasures of home. The hall Hoare foolishly speaks of as baronial, and refers to the reception of vassals, whereas it is subsequent to that system altogether. It is, Longleat.] THE PICTURES. 255 however, a noble and lofty room, and has a fine timbered roof, with flat panels. The screen supporting the gallery is surmounted by the arms of Thomas Batcliffe, Earl of Sussex, the Protector Somerset, and William Cecil, Lord Burghley, while below are shields showing the alliances of the Thynne family. At the other end of the hall is seen the grand staircase of black oak, a very handsome work of its date. The handsome carved fireplace, with caryatides, is also worthy of attention. The walls are adorned with antlers, the trophies of the chase, and above them large hunting-pictures of the time of the second Lord Weymouth. The stone corridor, which runs right and left of the grand staircase, and leads to the series of apartments on the ground floor, contains an old spinet which belonged to Queen Elizabeth. Here commences the fine series of paintings, which are the principal objects of interest to a visitor who enters Longleat ; for although they are mainly family portraits, they are by such distinguished artists as to he of great value simply as works of art. Those on the staircase are the “ Lion Hunt,” after Bubens ; “ Bear- Hunting ” and “ Stag-Hunting,” by Snyders; the Duke of Buckingham and the Duke of York, afterwards James I., by Sir Peter Lely; Sir Walter Baleigli and Bobert Dudley, Earl of Leicester, by Zuccliero ; and Fisher, Bishop of Bochester. In the lower corridor are portraits of Lady Lansdowne, mother of the second Viscountess Weymouth, by Godfrey Ivneller ; Grace, Countess of Granville, and the Earl of Jersey, both by the same artist; the first and second Viscountesses Weymouth; Sir Walter Covert, by My tens ; Lady Isabella Thynne, by Dobson ; the first and second wife of Sir James Thynne, by Dobson; Sir Thomas Thynne, his father, by Mytens ; Lady Thynne, wife of Sir F. H. Thynne, by Sir Peter Lely; and Gustavus Adolphus (the famous King of Sweden). The Bed Library has a new and very ornamental panelled ceiling. The doors and shutters are Florentine work, and richly inlaid. Here there is a portrait of Lord Chancellor Tlmrlow, by Beynolds. In the Green Library, which is also used as a billiard-room, there is a fine collection of paintings. There are no less than three Holbeins— one of King Henry VII., another of Thomas Seymour, Lord Sudeley, and a third of the Protector Somerset. Bishop Ken and his friend, the first Viscount Weymouth, both look down upon us from the canvas of Lely. In the lesser dining-room, which was formerly the billiard-room, are portraits of the second Marquis of Bath, of Lady Bath, by Watts, and of Frances Howard, Duchess of Bichmond, by Vandyck. The dining-room is a fine apartment, the walls panelled with oak, and the ceiling of elaborate design. The sideboard is a handsome piece of work, carved in ebony. The paintings are of great interest, and include portraits of the first Marquis THE HALT Longleat.] TIIE POET BAITS. 257 of Bath, by Sir Thomas Lawrence, and the present Marquis, by W. B. Richmond ; of the first Viscount Weymouth and the Viscountess, by Sir Peter Lely; and of Sir John Thynue, the founder of Longleat, by Holbein. There are also portraits of Lord Keeper Coventry, Sir Egremont Thynne, THE SALOON FIREPLACE. Sir James Thynne, Thomas Thynne (who was murdered in Pall Mall), Henry Coventry, fourteenth Viscount Torrington, Lady Lansdowne, Lady Isabella Thynne — of whom there are also portraits in the corridor — and James Thynne. In the upper corridor are more paintings of great interest, such as the Earl of Arlington, by Sir Peter Lely; the Earl of Nottingham, also by Lely ; George Monk, Duke of Albemarle ; Thomas Thynne ; William, Duke of Hamilton ; Queen Henrietta Maria ; the Earl of Strafford ; Archbishop Laud; and Bishop Juxon, who attended Charles I. on the scaffold; as well as a portrait of Martin Luther. 33 258 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Longleat, This corridor leads to the drawing-room, in which there is the study of a head, hy Raphael a St. Jerome, by Andrea del Castagno ; the Madonna and Child, hy Ghirlandais ; and a Holy Family hy Titian. Among the articles of interest in this room is a timepiece of Louis XIV. The drawing- room opens into the saloon — a noble room, 100 feet long, which extends along one front of the house, and has been completed by the present Marquis. The walls are hung with Gobelins tapestry three hundred years old, and priceless in value. The fireplace is a splendid work in white marble, the pediment supported by boldly carved figures. It is Venetian work, and is a copy of one in the Doge’s palace. In this saloon will be seen a unique Florentine cabinet of coral, and some very elegant buhl cabinets. A very curious ornament is the model of a temple, of considerable size, made in Dresden china. In the chapel corridor are portraits of the second Marchioness of Bath and her three children, by Sir T. Lawrence ; of the Earl and Countess of Carnarvon, by Vandyck ; and of the present Marquis, by Swinton ; as well as a picture of the three children of Charles I. The chapel, which was consecrated in 1684, is very plain, with a gallery at one end, and is draped in red. The family, however, generally attend service at the parish church of Horningsham. To see all the Longleat portraits is a most enjoyable lesson in the history of England, which seems to become something more than a tradition when we stand face to face with the counterfeit presentments of so many who played their part in shaping its course ; and there are many here whose lineaments, have not been made familiar by means of published portraits. The literary treasures of Longleat cannot give pleasure to the same number as its artistic wealth, but they are of very great value. It, is a mistake, however, to suppose that Bishop Ken’s library is here. It was bequeathed to his family, subject to the selection hy his friend, Viscount Weymouth, of any works not already here, an indication that the library of Longleat, even then, was not a poor one. Bishop Iven’s bequest includes some very fine MSS. The Longleat records are in themselves of great value, including documents which relate to the Priory of St. Radegunde, as well as accounts and papers which are of the utmost interest to the social historian. For many years the late Canon Jackson, the Rector of Leigli Delamere, spent a large part of his time under the roof which once sheltered Bishop Ken, studying and arranging the MSS. which the Marquis of Bath possesses. Canon Jackson was one of the most useful members ol the long-established county archaeological society, and contributed to the pages of its magazine a series of articles on the Longleat papers. There is a pleasant sheet of ornamental water on one side of the House, and it is worth the delightful walk through the woods, in which flourishes the Longleat.] ETYMOLOGICAL. 259 Weymouth piue, introduced from North America by the first Lord Weymouth, to see the large lake, known as Shirewater, for it is admirably surrounded with plantations, which run down to the Water’s edge, and boating upon it is highly enjoyable. Sir E. C. Hoare, wdio did so much in his day for the study THE LIBRARIES. of Wiltshire antiquities, interpreted Longleat as “ longa lata,” because the valley is long and broad. There are no earlier spellings of the name to give colour to this ingenious theory, and the generally accepted interpretation is that “ leat ” stands for stream or aqueduct. There was a mill here probably before the Priory, and the water w r as brought to it in a long leat from Horningsham, as it is brought at the present day, though now for a different purpose. Harold Lewis THE EXTERIOR. N A WORTH CASTLE. TO think of Naworth Castle is to call to mind the mass of legend- and story T which has accumulated around the name of one of the great nobles of the first James’s reign. Scott apologises for the particular anachronism by means of which the renowned ancestor of the Earis of Carlisle was introduced into “The Lay of the Last Minstrel” “a few years earlier than he actually flourished.” The passage in which the Lord William Howard appears has already been quoted in this volume A and need not he repeated here. A right noble and spirited description it is ; but one that leaves more than a more anachronism to he explained away, though the account of some parts of the noble warrior’s dress is possibly correct enough, for Scott had much knowledge of such things. The extreme costliness of the garb may, however, lie reasonably doubted. Probably he was never so well-dressed as a less law-observing Borderer, Johnnie Armstrong to wit. The dress in which Belted Will stood when he was painted by Cornelius Janssen cost .£17 7s. Gd., as bills still in existence suffice to show. * Soe page 208. Naworth Castle.] BELTED WILL’S TOWER. 261 Lord William Howard falls to be mentioned thus early in a description of Nawortli because lie it was who first made the Castle habitable by others than servants and men-at-arms. One of the towers, known to this day by his name, was set apart for his special occupation. Here, confined within a narrow space, accessible by a winding stair, and still remaining pretty much as he left them, are his bed-chamber, his dressing-room, his oratory, his library, and, as some say, his private dungeon. Ascending to the leaded roof, one may look far away to the blue line of the Scottish Border, over an undulating landscape, which fades into far-stretching blue distances such as Turner loved to paint. Along the nearer hills, above the valley of the river Irtliing, runs 262 HIS T01UC HOUSES. [Naworth Castle. the Roman or “Piets’ Wall,” still to be clearly traced even at this distance of a mile or more. Immediately below, so near to the walls of the Castle that one seems to be peering into an abyss, a narrow stream sings its song to quiet woods, which here clothe with beauty the sides of a deep ravine. Over this flashing strip of water, and in among brambles and wild-flowers and strewn leaves, and up the steep side of the valley, winds the pathway to Lanercost, the Priory where the Dacres and the Howards have been buried for these many generations. There is an air at once of confident strength and of alert watchfulness about the situation of Naworth Keejn Approached on the eastern side, where it was formerly defended by a moat, it seems to occupy a low and exposed situa- tion. The road slopes downward through a noble park; and above the grey walls of the Castle, more than half hid in trees, one may see the wide country beyond, beautifully pastoral, and with no building in sight for many a mile. On a nearer view, the towers of Naworth, lovely in their mixture of lichen- Naworth Castle.] SITUATION OF NAWORTH. 263 encrusted red and grey, assume an unexpected loftiness, commanding such a stretch of landscape that those who manned them aforetime must indeed have been strangely unwary had it been possible, in anything but a night attack, and on any but a moonless night, to take them by surprise. The deep ravine, through which two small streams flow to a point of junction far below the Castle walls, w r as a defence ample and complete to three of the faces of this Border stronghold, the eastern face being defended by a drawbridge and moat. It has been noted that Naworth, rising from the summit of a natural escarpment of rock and cliff, is an exact realisation of the ideal fortress of Viollet-le-Duc, planted on just such a promontory as he would have chosen, with just such a natural defence of wood and rock and deep ravine. It says much for the admirable choice of site that this castle, fronting the Border, bidding defiance to the whole of Scotland, as it were — to king’s men and to moss-troopers alike — should never have been called upon to bear a siege. But, indeed, the part which Naworth has played in Border warfare has been greatly exaggerated. The circumstance is owing for the most part to the false reputation which has grown up around the name of a man of much cultivation and a gentle life, the famous ancestor of the present owner, the carefully dressed figure of Sir Walter Scott’s poem, the hero of romance who is known as “ Belted Will.” The early life of Lord William Howard was almost as sorrowful and clouded as that of the first James of Scotland, the sometimes grave and sometimes humorous monarch who wrote “ Peblis to the Play.” It was alike his good and his ill fortune to have a rapacious father. Thomas Howard, fourth Duke of Norfolk, ultimately beheaded on Tower Hill for sympathy with the Queen of Scots, married for his third wife the widow of Thomas Lord Dacre of Gilsland and Greystoke. The Dacres, who kept the Borders with a ruthless hand for generation after generation, obtained the barony of Gilsland from a De Meschines, whom the Conqueror had created Earl of Cumberland. The barony of Greystoke afterwards came into the family by alliance. Through his marriage with the widow Dacre, the Duke of Norfolk became the guardian of her three daughters, co-heiresses of the Dacre estates, and he prudently formed the resolution that one of these should be married to each of his sons. He was put to death before the whole of the project was carried out, and be bequeathed Lord William Howard, then a mere boy, to the care of his elder brother, as one who had “nothing to feed the cormorants withal.” Yet the marriage which had been designed for the child came to pass, for the young lord and the young lady were wedded in 1577, when the united ages of both were short of eiglit-and-twenty years, the bridegroom being no more than fourteen, and the bride being by a few months his junior. It was a happy marriage enough in the long run, but was in the first 264 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Nawokth Castle. instance followed by much tribulation. Queen Bess, for example, threw Lord William Howard and his brothers into the Tower, and withheld the estates of the young wife, her namesake, for many years, only relaxing her grip upon them on payment of a tine of ,£10,000. The Lady Elizabeth Howard afterwards, came to be known by a nickname, as also her husband did. She was called “Bess of the braid apron,” not, as has been surmised, because of some peculiarity of an article of clothing which she wore, but on account of the breadth of her lands. A notable and kindly woman she seems to have been, a great manager, a faithful and devoted wife. There is a portrait of her in the Great Hall at Naworth, painted when she was well advanced in years, exhibiting her as a severely dressed but most likeable old lady, one who, as one may surmise, was precise, dignified, and kind. It was from the Dacre family that a reputation for inexorableness descended upon Belted Will. From his succession to them, also, has come the idea that he was Lord Warden in the West. The Lords Dacre so kept the Marches that, in the language of Tacitus, they made a solitude and called it peace. Writing in Henry VIII. ’s reign, Lord Thomas Dacre said of the Debatable Lands that “ there were in times past 400 ploughs and above, which are now clearly wasted, and no man dwelling in any of them to this day.” There was but a short shrift for the moss-trooper under the Dacre rule, which destroyed such chivalry as there may have been in Border warfare, so that the Borderers became mere marauding gangs of ragged rascals, each so nearly reduced to savagery, and so constantly on the verge of starvation, that a death in the halter seemed scarcely a thing to fear. As for the Dacre raids into Scotland, they assumed the proportion of invasions. Lord Dacre made what he calls “a journey ” northward in 1525. As a preliminary, he summoned “ the garrison, with the inhabitants of the county,” to meet at an assigned spot on the 29th of June. Then, “with the sufferance of God,” they were to ride into Scotland, to cast down the tower of Kelso Abbey, to burn the town of Kelso, and like- wise to burn three other towns in its neighbourhood. All which was done as it had been set forth in the instructions. In 1332 — to jump back a couple of centuries — Lord Archibald Douglas made a raid into Cumberland, and before he retired lie had laid the country desolate for thirty miles around Gilsland. Three years later, one of these fierce Dacres, Banulph of that name, obtained a licence to crenellate Naworth. What be found at that date, probably, was no more than a peel tower, then in decay, it may be, and dating, as is supposed from some portions still remaining, to at least as early as the tenth century. The historian of Cumber- land conjectures that Banulph de Dacre battlemented this tower, which is still known by bis name, as “The Dacre Tower,” that he constructed the 34 NA WORTH CASTLE : THE COURT YARD. 2G6 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Naworth Castle. walls of the bailey and the formidable gateway which yet remains, and that he built certain offices under the protection of the curtain wall. Then it was that the Castle obtained the name of Naward, or Nawork, “ the new work,” a designation which, with a slight change of spelling, it has retained until the present day. The lower portion of the Dacre Tower is now called the Dungeon. One obtains access to it through a heavy iron gate, which requires a man’s strength to swing it open. The roof is vaulted and boldly ribbed, and there is in the vast thickness of the wall one of those single-light windows which are but narrow slits widening inward into a broad recess, in this case spacious enough to hold several men, whom one imagines craning over each other to smell the sweet fresh air, and to gaze on the sunny liberty of the woods and the fields that seemed to be mocking their in- carceration. Two hundred years after Ean- ulph’s day there was another stout Dacre, who became renowned as one of the most determined castle- builders of the North. It was he wdio made that “journey” into Scotland aforementioned. Besides building strongholds at Askerton, at Dacre (the place whence the family name was taken), at Ivirkoswald, and at Drumburgh, he, as is supposed, for the first time made Naworth reasonably habitable. First of all, it is probable, he completed the Dacre Tower, which is of magnificent height, and is nobly battlemented. What is called Lord William’s or Belted Will’s Tower is also credited to this builder. If it be really his work, he must have been, or must have employed, an architect of singular resources in that period, for the tower is carried in mid-air by an arch, and is altogether a piece of most daring and ingenious construction. This Lord Thomas Dacre was likewise the builder of the Great Hall, and he it was who completed the Castle in its present quad- rangular form, enclosing a large court-yard, building high towers on the southern front, and constructing an outer bailey, somewhat circumscribed as to space Nawokth Castle.] A LEGENDARY HERO. 267 because of the proximity of the moat. Under so vigorous a restorer, Naworth became a feudal fortress of great strength, as well as of much picturesqueness and of unequalled beauty of situation. Nevertheless, those who followed him seem to have cared for the place but little. It was left unoccupied for thirty years, and in an inquisition taken in Elizabeth’s reign it was described as “ now in very great decay in all parts, and the outhouses and other houses and offices are utterlie de- cayed.” It was not until Lord William Howard came into posses- sion that Naworth was made habit- able and famous. The idea of the Dacres had been to build a fortress ; that of Lord William was to make a home. Naworth Castle now became, as to its interior, a notable example of the Jacobean style of arrangement, and the almost constant residence of one who for his rank and time possessed singular cultivation, who was a scholar and antiquary, a col- lector of manuscripts which are still treasured iii the British Mu- seum, a decipherer of Roman in- scriptions, the friend of Camden and Cotton, and other learned men of the day, possibly the associate of IN THE GARDENS. Shakespeare, though that this sug- gestion should lead to new conjectures as to who was the W. H. of the sonnets, heaven forfend. It was of such a man that a legendary hero lias been made. The local historian, following tradition, derives his nickname not from the character of his belt, as Sir Walter Scott does, but from the popular habit of speaking of him as “ bauld,” or “bold” Will, though the connection, it must be admitted, does not seem quite clear. A suit of black armour that he was wont to wear is preserved in the Hall at Naworth Castle. It proves him to have been a small and slight man, and could scarcely be worn nowadays by a well-grown boy. He is also slight and lithe in the contemporary portrait which hangs in the same fine apartment, but the artist lias given height to the figure, and lias presented Lord William 268 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Naworth Castle. as a noble and dignified gentleman, of handsome and gentle but alert counten- ance, with fine eyes under well-arclied eyebrows, and a tinge of red in his short beard and hair. One of Lord William Howard’s descendants was made Baron Dacre, Viscount Morpeth, and Earl of Carlisle, at the ^Restoration. In his day the Castle had once more fallen into disrepair, and he made it “fit for the BELTED WILL’S CHAMBER. reception of a family.” It was the fate of the place to lie neglected for long intervals. The third Earl employed Sir John Vanbrugh, dramatist, to place a music-gallery and screen in the hall ; but he had ornate tastes, and the same architect was employed to design and build Castle Howard in Yorkshire, which then became the favourite residence of the Earl’s family. In 1844 a disastrous fire destroyed the whole interior of Naworth, with the exception of Lord William Howard’s Tower, and the present beautiful arrangement of the rooms and furnishings is entirely modern, having, indeed, been completed only, as it were, the other day. A striking and beautiful feature of Naworth is the intermixture of red and white stone in its walls, the white belonging to the earlier period, and the red having been introduced at the various restorations. This characteristic appears first in the Gatehouse, now a detached outwork, half in ruins, formerly the Nawouth Castle.] THE EASTERN FRONT. 209 entrance to the Castle over the drawbridge and moat. Passing through this massive archway, which hears the heraldic achievement of Thomas Lord Dacre, with the motto, Fort en Loialte , you at once see the whole eastern face of the Castle, a long, unbroken line, with the Dacre Tower to the left and the Howard Tower to the right. A doorway in the centre of this some- what plain line of grey building gives access to the inner quadrangle, whose BELTED WILL’S LIBRARY. most immediately impressive feature is a great gate in the curtain wall to the south, with an arch so vast that a mounted company might have ridden out without lowering the tallest of its banners. A fine stone stairway on the opposite side of this inner court leads to the doorway of the Great Hall, a room of the most noble proportions, recent in much of its decoration, but hung with old tapestry of classical design, and containing a remarkable tapestry screen. Here, among ancient arms and coats of mail, are the famous heraldic beasts of Naworth, huge carven creatures — the red hull and the gryphon of the Dacres, the dolphin of the lords of Greystoke, and a fourth beast whose nature and whose meaning are alike unknown. The Castle is exceptionally rich in portraits, not all pertaining to the family, and many having much historic consequence. In the Hall, for example, are to he found a fine Charles I. by Vandyck, and a 270 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Naworth Castle. remarkable portrait of Cromwell, entirely unconventional, and quite unlike the popular conception of that grim Puritan. Here he is represented as a slim, fine- featured man, very noble and defiant in his bearing, and with a marshal’s baton in his hand. In his close neighbourhood hangs a portrait of General Monk, obviously unidealised ; but more attractive by far is a small, vigorously painted head of Ben Jonson, marvellously lifelike and convincing. The poet is young — not much more than thirty years of age, one would say — round-featured, with a head of the combative sort, not so red as tradition has represented, with a slight moustache, beardless cheeks, and altogether a full, sensual, hut keen, humorous, and most discerning face. After leaving the Hall, the rooms at Haworth, excepting only the Library, seem small. The great thickness of the walls, through which long passages have been driven in some instances, has robbed them of space. They have in consequence, however, an air of warmth and liome-like comfort. Never, in going through Naworth Castle, does one feel as if it were less a place to dwell in than a museum of costly objects of interest. It is so obviously a domestic establishment that description seems almost like an invasion of privacy. None of the marks of fire are now visible. The restoration has been complete, and has been carried out in all details with a fine artistic taste. At Naworth, indeed, one seems to breathe an atmosphere of art and culture. Perhaps the most famous picture is Mabuse’s “Adoration of the Magi,” which was to he seen in the winter Exhibition of the Loyal Academy a few years ago. It hangs in the Music Room, where there are many other works of the old masters, including a marvellous contemporary portrait of Henry VIII., with every detail of the kingly dress cut out and laid on, as it were, the painter lavishing himself on points of embroidery. Mabuse’s great picture, of its kind one of the grandest in the world, has a similar faithfulness, but immeasurably more of the feeling of a true artist, of one whose strongest fault was that he attempted to express too much. The Library, formerly the chapel, a spacious apartment, with an air of great compactness nevertheless, lias a metal bas-relief of a Border fight above the fireplace, the drawings for which, by Mr. E. Burne-Jones, are to be seen in the Earl’s smoking-room, together with other drawings by the same artist. The books so nearly cover the entire wall-space as to leave room for only two or three pictures by the large Gothic windows. It is a library representative of the best literature of all ages, and expresses the tastes of the owner by containing books so recent as Mr. William Morris’s “ The Story of the Glittering Plain.” A panelled staircase in its neighbourhood leads to a small museum in a window recess, containing, among other objects of interest, pencil portraits of Snyders and of Oliver Cromwell. A terra-cotta bust of the present Naworth Castle.] BELTED WILL'S CHAMBER. 271 Earl of Carlisle seems to speak a welcome to the Gallery, which has panelled wardrobes along one of its sides, and on the other a quaint collection of old pictures, most of them of small dimensions, and for the main part belonging to the Dutch and Venetian schools. There are pictures everywhere, indeed, as at Castle Howard, and in the private apartments are many of the Earl’s THE UREAT HALL. own performances — scenes round Naworth, reminiscences of travel in Egypt, portraits of the young Howards, and what not — all marked by conscientious workmanship and truth of feeling, with a tendency, it may be, to somewhat too laboured a finish. The tower containing the rooms occupied by Belted Will Howard is, of course, that portion of the Castle which is first inquired for by the visitor at Naworth. Excepting the little oratory, from which the altar has been removed, the place is pretty much as it was left by its renowned tenant. The fire swept past it without doing material injury. The small, severe-looking bed- room, with its great four-poster occupying nearly half the space, its triangular fireplace, its diamond-paned window, its vaulted retiring-room, formerly guarded by a sliding panel, is such a pla.ce as might lead one to dream of chivalry, of Border fights and forays, of priests hiding away for safety from their enemies, and of prisoners groaning in their dungeons in expectation of death. In the 272 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Naworth Castle. library above, the books of this singular scholar are still preserved, in a sort of wire cage. Massive tomes most of the volumes are, such as in reading must have been very wearying to the knees. There is a beautiful timbered roof to this library, with rich fourteenth-century mouldings, and panels filled with tracery. In the oratory is a quaint Flemish altar-piece, almost of the breadth of the room, together with nine carvings in alabaster, parts of the decorations of some reredos or screen. Lord William Howard had that artistic sense which has been a characteristic of his descendants ; but how far he must have been behind them in appreciation of the comforts of life ! At Naworth Castle there is no absolute luxury — everywhere there is a combination of beauty and usefulness — but to ascend from the Hall, or to plunge from the Gallery into the Howard Tower, is to come face to face with that plain living and high thinking which, by Wordsworth’s account, have ceased to be. Aaron Watson. ENTRANCE FRONT FROM THE TARK. KNOLE HOUSE. A S we mount the long liill leading from the railway station to the bright and modern- looking little town of Sevenoaks, and note the rich and highly cultivated country which stretches away beneath us for many a mile, everything seems to speak of the close of the nineteenth century : of its thousand arts, luxuries, and ap- pliances ; of its somewhat prosaic comforts and its somewhat utilitarian aims. But once, having left the High Street opposite the old church, we gain the entrance to Ivnole Park through a short beech-shaded avenue rich with every tint, from palest ochre to warmest burnt sienna, no feeling remains but one of calm delight at the new world we have entered ; where everything is serene, still, and stately, with the dignity born of centuries of noble seclusion. Probably the etymology of Ivnole House may be derived from its position on the top of a gentle hill, where, with its severely simple front — weather- beaten by the storms of centuries to a rich variety of tints — it forms an imposing termination to the view. Once inside its gates such a treasury of 35 274 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Knole House. art will tempt — nay, demand — our undivided attention, that we may find this the best time for reviewing its history previous to its possession by the Sack- ville family. Old records all agree that a great house has stood here from time immemorial, hut its authentic history begins only with the reign of King John. At that time we find it in the possession of Falcatius de Brent, from whom it passed, through the de Betlmnes, Maresclials, Bigods, Grandisons, de Says, and Leglies, to the Fiennes. James Fiennes was created by Henry YI. Baron Say and Seale, and loaded with so many honours th of the Commons, who impeached him for treason and removed him from the office of Trea- surer. The troubles of the time forced his son to sell Knole to Thomas Bouchier, Archbishop of Canterbury, who bought it for four hundred marks, to- gether with “all the tymbre, wood, ledde, stone, and breke lying within the said Manor at the quarry in Seale.” From this comprehensive list we may conclude that Lord Say and Seale had looked forward to restoring Knole rather than to parting with it. But his preparations were not wasted, for its new owner proceeded at once to enclose the park and make great additions to the House. All the oldest part of the present building belongs to his time, with the exception of a little of the north-east end (now indistinguisliably built in with the more modern work), which belongs to the time either of the Maresclials or the Bigods. On his death, in 1486, Bouchier bequeathed Knole to the see of Canterbury, from which date it became the chief archiepiscopal residence. His celebrated successor, Archbishop Morton, who appears to have had a passion for bricks and mortar, proceeded with the enlargement of the House. The present north-west front, with its tower portal, is believed to be bis work ; only the ornamental dormers appearing to be of later date. In fact, save for the decorations and alterations made by the first Earl of Dorset in 1603-8, at he incurred the jealousy ENTRANCE TO THE PORTER'S LODGE. Knole House.] CHANGES OF OWNERSHIP. 275 whicli gives the whole place its strong Elizabethan character, the main body of this magnificent range of buildings — covering over five acres — may be dated from the time of these two ecclesiastics. And they did their work well, Knole being counted to rank w T ith Penshurst and the colleges of Oxford and Cambridge, as <£ the most perfect type we have remaining of the larger houses of the 15th century.” The type of house here referred to is that of the slightly fortified manor- house — which fortification was as much for show as for use — which had been gradually evolved from the strongly fortified castle, where the great keep was the principal feature. Like many colleges of the same period, Knole is built in quadran- gular form ; the principal buildings surround two large courts, with many smaller ones behind, while great square embattled towers and tall Tudor chimneys in red brick add dignity, variety, and picturesque- ness to the whole. Knole remained an archiepis- copal palace until the time of Cranmer, when Henry VIII. cast envious eyes upon it. The Arch- bishop, who, so to speak, had to purchase certain possessions of his see at the cost of others, got a strong hint that here was one which must be surrendered ; the King remarking that the neighbouring palace of Otford, which Cranmer had relinquished, was too low for his health, while Knole was not large enough for his retinue. During the next few years the place was buffeted about between many owners. The King granted it successively to the Protector Somerset and to John Dudley, Earl of Warwick, afterwards Duke of Northumberland, both of whom died upon the scaffold. It w r as next bestowed by Mary on her kinsman, Cardinal Pole, on whose death, in 1558, it again reverted to the Crown. Three years later Elizabeth gave the manor, with the park, to her favourite Leicester, and on his surrender of it she conveyed the fee-simple, in 1569, to Thomas Sackville, Baron Buckhurst and first Earl of Dorset, who w 7 as connected with her through her REFERENCE, r. Housekeeper’s bedroom. 2. Housekeeper’s room. 3. Smoking room. 4. Pheasant court. Scale of Feet. i oo i^o PLAN OF KNOLE. 276 HIS TO B IC HOUSES. [Knole House. mother, Anne Boleyn. It is said she bestowed Knole on him in order to keep him near her Court, as the roads to Surrey, where lay his own still more mag- nificent seat of Buckhurst, were then frequently impassable in bad weather. We can here give but a brief resume of the chief events in the public career of a nobleman celebrated alike in poetry, politics, and art. After being ambassador to France and one of the commissioners on the trial of Mary Queen of Scots, he wars sent as Ambassador Extraordinary to arrange the dispute between Leicester and the States- General. But it was dangerous in those days to sit in judgment on a queen’s favourite. Although his talents and candour were conspicuously shown in his management of this affair, Leicester procured an order for his arrest, and he w r as confined in his house for nine months, until the favourite’s death allowed him to be restored to favour. He was Chancellor of the University of Oxford wdien Elizabeth visited it in 1594, on which occasion he entertained her at great expense with plays, masques, and pageants ; and on Burleigh’s death he succeeded to the office of Lord High Treasurer. The Earl did not come to reside at Knole until 1603, when we find him at once setting about various repairs and alterations. From this time until his sudden death at the council-board, in 1608, he is said to have constantly employed two hundred workmen on the place. He it was who added the ornamental dormer windows ; wainscoted the Great Flail and most of the other rooms and galleries ; put up many of the charming stucco ceilings ; and furnished the King’s Bed-room at a cost of £20,000. The leaden waterspouts, with his initials and the dates 1603 and 1605, are to be found both within and without, so that he must have repaired the House in every part. Passing through the gate-house in the central tower — where the quaint old horn lanterns, flint-lock muskets bearing the name “ Dorset,” and silver maces, take us back at once two hundred years — the visitor enters the Green Court, the exquisitely verdant sward of which forms a delicious contrast wfitli the time-tinted stone-work of the surrounding buildings. Two bronze replicas of the “Gladiator repellens ” and “Venus Anadyomene,” decorate the turf, and show up their classic grace strangely against a background of domestic Gothic architecture. The inner gatehouse, leading into the Stone Court, appears to belong to the very earliest portion of the building. Opposite this runs a pseudo-classic colonnade, erected by the fifth Earl, the arms of whose countess are shown on a shield above. Beneath it is the entrance to the Great Hall, which is a splendidly proportioned apartment, seventy-five feet long. It takes but little stretch of imagination to picture it as it was in good Queen Bess’s days, when filled with the great household of the Lord Treasurer — when the long table, that still stretches down the centre, was groaning beneath larded capons, venison-patties, STONE COURT. 278 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Knole House. and flagons of sack; with great rounds of beef and jugs of “Old October” for the less dainty guests ; while the musicians, hidden in the gallery above, gave out some merry country dance, that set the blood of young and old a-tingling, or a courtly pavane, to be gone through with stately grace by the noble dames and gallant gentlemen whose seat was at the higher table on the dais. The chief glory of the Hall is its magnificently carved Jacobean screen, enclosing the music-gallery. It has, alas ! suffered all the degradation of paint and varnish at the hands of some eighteenth-century decorator, who also has painted the beautiful old oak chimney-piece to imitate coloured marbles ! The firedogs in the open fireplace are worth notice, both for their re- markably graceful design, and from the fact that they belonged to Henry VIII. and Anne Boleyn, whose initials they bear. Leaving the Hall by a door on the left of the dais, we ascend the Grand Staircase, one only of the sixty which Knole contains. It is very charming with its massive carvings and artistic effects of light and shade ; and one almost forgives those who painted the beautiful old oak, in consideration of the quaint effect of the Elizabethan arabesques in time-softened tints of grey, brown, and subdued yellow. The Brown Gallery, a long and narrow one, dating from Archbishop Bouchier’s time, takes its name from the beautifully panelled walls, which have fortunately been left untouched. It is closely hung with portraits of the Holbein school, which form a complete collection ' of the leading characters in the political, religious, and social worlds of the Elizabethan age. One, of which a replica hangs in the ball-room, by Gheerardts, is of the first Earl. His is a grave, thoughtful face, and he seems to look out on the world with sad, reflective eyes. He wears a plain ruff and high-peaked hat, and looks far more the statesman burdened by the cares of office than the poet who wrote the Induction to the “ Mirror for Magistrates.” He also, conjointly with Thomas Norton, wrote “ Gorboduc,” the first tragedy in English verse, performed before Elizabeth by the gentlemen of the Inner Temple, and declared by Sir Philip Sidney to be “full of notable morality, which doth most delightfully teach.” Here hangs also an interesting old list of those who sat at the various tables in the time of the third Earl, by which it appears he had a household of about 129 domestics, including such officials as the chaplain, master of the horse, gentleman-usher, scrivener, falconer, armourer, etc., with two French- men and two “ blackmoors.” So great was the state he kept up here and at Court, that he is said to have spent at the rate of T100 a day from His birth to His death, at the age of thirty-five. His extravagance forced him to part with Knole, retaining only a lease, to a Mr. Henry Smith, who founded a trust with it and other estates for charitable purposes. Not till Knole House.] LADY BETTY GERMAINE. 279 the time of Charles II. was the fee-simple restored to the Sackville family, in consideration of a perpetual yearly rent of £130. Going down the gallery, where the air is sweet with pot-pourri lying in great china bowls, one notices the antlers of a favourite deer belonging to some long-gone children of the house, hanging over the fireplace — there is a charming picture of the little group, by Kneller, in another room. The large end-window looks out on an old-world garden, all grass alleys and scattered trees and shrubs, with here and there an old stone pillar, an urn, or a sun-dial. Tame herons pace sedately about, and the cooing of pigeons fills the air as they go to and fro in the mellow autumnal sunlight. Eight and left of the Brown Gallery are Lady Betty Germaine’s Bed- room and the Spangled Bed-room, with their dressing-rooms. The former is said to be now in the exact state in which it was when Knole was pre- sented to Sir Thomas Sackville by Elizabeth, and is charming with its tapestried hangings, high-backed chairs, and elaborately worked bed-furniture. Lady Betty herself, the Court beauty of George II. ’s time, who left all her property to Sir George Sackville, looks down from the walls, magnificent in blue and yellow brocade. Would she but step from her frame and seat her- self at the dainty spinning-wheel that stands beneath, the old-world room would be complete. The bedstead and furniture of the Spangled Bed-room were given by James I. to Lionel, Earl of Middlesex, and the various Chinese 280 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Knole House. curiosities were brought home by the late Earl Amherst. Well worth notice are the massive carved ebony wardrobe and the great brass dogs and brazier, accompanied by quaint green rushlight shields, that stand in the open tire- place. The dressing-room is devoted to a collection ol portraits of Court beauties by Sir Peter Lely. That of the Duchess of Cleve- land is probably the one referred to by Prior THE BROWN GALLERY, AND FIREPLACE THEREIN. in 1 1 is eidogy on Lord Buckhurst (sixth Earl of Dorset), when lie says, “ King Charles did not agree with Lely that my Lady -Cleveland’s picture was finished, till it had the approbation of my Lord Buckhurst.” The billiard-room and Leicester Gallery together form an irregularly shaped L. The shorter arm contains a curious antique billiard-table, with all the Knole House.] BACK TO HOLLO THE BANE. 281 necessary adjuncts. The walls are lnmg with capital examples of Correggio, Tintoretto, and Salvator Rosa, and the large window, round the inside of which trails of ivy have been taught to grow, has a charming outlook on the garden. The Leicester Gallery is full of interest. Here are the celebrated Sackville and THE CRIMSON DRAWING-ROOM. Curzon pedigrees, prepared in 1623. The former commences with Herbrandus de Sackville, of whom the end window in this gallery contains a portrait on very old glass. He is clad in armour, and beneath is the inscription, “ Herbrandus de Sackville, praepotens Normannus, intravit Angliam cum Gulielmo Conquestore, anno 1066.” But the Sackvilles trace back much further than the Conquest, even to one of the followers of Rollo the Dane, who w r as rewarded for his services with the town and seignory of Sackville, in Normandy, anciently written Salcliivilla, Salcavilla, or Saccavilla. Beneath this 36 282 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Knole House. window stands a great square sofa, gaily covered with scarlet cloth, which once belonged to the great Napoleon. The gallery is hung with a collection of portraits which would need days to study, chiefly by Yandyck and My tens. Here is Charles, the celebrated sixth Earl, with his wife, and several of his children. This handsome man is the most famous of his line, save, perhaps, his ancestor, the first Earl, many of whose qualities he appears to have inherited. Clever and accomplished, it was the fault of the frivolous age in which he lived that he has not left more numerous proofs of his undoubted claim to be ranked as a poet. As it is, he has proved what he could do by the fragments he has left. The splendid ballad beginning, “ To all you ladies now on land,” will endure as long as the English language, both for its own intrinsic merit, and as a proof of the courage of its author, who either composed or completed it the night before a great naval battle in the Dutch war of 1664, in which he attended the Duke of York as a volunteer. He was also a liberal patron of other poets, who repaid his kindness by somewhat extravagant eulogiums. Dryden, whom he supported when the Revolution of 1688 had deprived him of his numerous offices and pensions, couples Dorset’s wit and Shakespeare’s tragedy together, as being the highest of their kind ; and Congreve, Addison, Prior, and Pope wrote in his praise. Charles II. frequently employed him on embassies to France on account of his exquisite tact and perfect breeding ; and he was held in much esteem by William ITT. The Venetian Bed-room, named after the Venetian Ambassador, Nicolo Molino, who slept here, opens off this gallery. It is a fine room, with a very beautiful ceiling, cornice, and chimney-piece, of eighteenth-century renaissance work. The tapestry which covers the walls is considered the finest in the house, and the bed, which was prepared for James II., is hung with green cut velvet, which must have been wondrously handsome when in its first beauty. Over the mantel-piece hangs a Doge of Venice, by Veronese, and much of the furniture is of ebony and silver. The dressing-room is panelled in oak and has a fine cornice. Amongst its pictures is “ The Masked Ball,” by Tintoretto, given by Cardinal Wolsey to Henry VIII. and Anne Boleyn, probably as a marriage gift. Lady Betty's China Closet contains a profusion of brittle treasures. The blue china is particularly fine, some of the pieces being very rare. Enormous bowls and dishes stand on the floor — the shelves are not wide enough for them — and are filled with pot-pourri, which sweetens the air with its old- fashioned fragrance. There is here some fine Oriental china, also Spode, Leeds, and Wedgwood ware, gathered by the late Lady Sackville. Next in order comes the Chapel suite of rooms. Here is to be seen a Knole House.] THE CHAPEL ROOMS. 283 curious organ, supposed to be the second of its kind built in England, with many other strange old treasures, including a wonderful “Jeroboam ” and other quaint drinking-glasses, of which the very oddest are the “yard” and “half-yard of ale”; great “leather bottels ” ; and an iron chest, a relic of the Armada. A large screen worked by Queen Elizabeth stands here, blue china abounds every- where, and queer old fire-screens, representing life-size figures in the costume of the time of George II., are so startlingly realistic that at the first glance we think we have conjured up the ghosts of some of the former occupants of the apartment. It is difficult to realise that the Chapel was built four hundred years ago by Archbishop Bouchier, so fresh and bright-looking is it. The most remarkable feature of it is the magnificent tapestry which covers the walls, one small piece, worked in gold thread, being valued at £2,000. On the altar is an interesting wood-carving, representing the history of the Crucifixion, given hy Mary Queen of Scots to the first Earl of Dorset shortly before her execution. The Ball-room is an apartment richly decorated in the elaborate style of the eighteenth century ; the magnificent black-and-white marble chimney-piece being a perfect example of renaissance work. Very wonderful also is the frieze of figures, in the strangest of shapes and attitudes, which surrounds the room. Among the much hegilt furniture is a clock, presented to Lord Whitworth by Louis XVI., and some Sevres china given by Napoleon ; while the great Florentine bridal-chest is worth looking at, if only for the fourteenth-century paintings which decorate its panels. The chief interest of the room centres, however, in the family portraits which cover its walls. Here is a Vandyck of the fourth Earl, who, when Sir Edward Sackville, had the misfortune to slay Lord Bruce of Kinross in one of the most celebrated duels of the century. The cause of the quarrel was never made public, though Lord Clarendon, who was in the secret, hints that a lady was at the bottom of it. Sir Edward, however, who learned that he was much censured for the deadly rancour which had distinguished the encounter — they having made it a duel ci la movie, with no spectators save the attendant surgeons— wrote a full account of it from Louvain to a friend in England. This letter is most interesting reading, giving as it does a vivid picture of the duelling practices of the time. According to it, not only the challenge, but the decision to pursue the quarrel to its bitterest end, came entirely from Lord Bruce, who owed the loss of his own life to the insatiable passion with which he sought his adversary’s. The Earl afterwards suffered much in the Loyalist cause. He it was who led the troops that so gallantly retook the royal standard at the battle of Edgehill, and the 284 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Knole House. execution of -his sovereign so affected him that he never again left his house, but died shortly after. Some years before his death Knole was plundered by the rebels, who did much damage; and in 1645 the Parliament- ary Commissioners deprived him of the whole property. The Crimson Drawing-room contains another fine marble chimney-piece, an elaborate ceiling, richly chased silver fire-dogs, and graceful eighteenth-century furniture, covered, like the walls, in cut velvet ; but all fade into in- significance before the pictures, which are the loveliest in the house. Those on easels are Gainsboroughs ; that of Miss Linley (Mrs. Sheridan) is believed to be the finest Knole contains. All the others are Sir Joshuas, and include the exquisite “ Kobinetta,” “ The Child Samuel,” and “ The Chinese Boy.” Next comes the great Cartoon Gallery, so called from copies of the celebrated Raphael cartoons, painted by Mytens, which hang here. The richly chased brass door-locks were given by William III., and bear his initials ; and amongst other interesting things is the Treasurer’s chest of the first Earl, a solid-looking affair, covered with Russian leather, and studded with brass nails. Off the Cartoon Gallery is that abode of seventeenth-century magnifi- cence, the King’s Bed-room, which was furnished, as told before, by the first Earl, at a cost of <£20,000. As in the days of Solomon, so here, silver is “ nothing accounted of,” the tables, mirrors, sconces, washing- and toilet- sets being all of that precious metal. The bed, which is hung with gold and silver tissue, cost £8,000, and two magnificent Indian cabinets, in ebony and stained ivory, are valued at £12,000, After so much cold and disused splendour the private parts of the House greet us with a warm and friendly welcome. The dining-room, or Poets’ Parlour, at once transports us to the days when a gay company of wits and poets assembled here. Some sixty of them still look down from the panelled walls on the scene of their former festivities. The wood fire blazes on the open hearth, and it and a great eight-fold Chinese screen make the neigh- bourhood of the dining-table cosy and liome-like. Quantities of gold and silver plate, decorating the sideboards, throw an air of splendour over the room. Some of the pieces have an historical interest of their own, as, for example, the gold table-bell given by William III. Passing through the drawing-room, or Colonnade, the guard-room, hung with historic swords and strange old weapons, is reached. Here is a charming statuette of Her Majesty, given by her to the late Lord Sackville ; while a photograph of the Duchess of Edinburgh, in a gold and onyx-studded frame, is a souvenir of her stay at Knole in the late Lady Sackville’s time. Passing through the organ-room, where is a banner presented to the Hon. Mrs. Sackville West (then the Hon. Miss Sackville Knole House.] MRS. SACICVILLE WEST'S BOUT) VIE, 285 West) by the Prince of Wales at the Nice Carnival of 1889, we come to Mrs. Sackville West’s bondoir, the most delightful room in Knole. Imagine a background of pale green, with hangings of brown, and an elaborate chimney-piece of white marble, the knickknacks on which are all of gold. THE CHAPEL. On the softly tinted walls place old family pictures, amongst them a lovely group of children by Hoppner, and put Lady Betty looking down on an altered world from her place of honour over the mantel-piece ; fill the room with dainty furniture, and tables covered with gold and silver trifles of historic interest and exquisite workmanship ; scatter books and china, palms and flowers, all around, — and you may have a slight idea of its charm. A 286 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Knole House. cabinet is filled with treasures of gold ; one screen is thickly covered by delicately painted miniatures, and on another hang the golden keys of the fourth and sixth Earls, both of whom held the office of Lord Chamberlain. A beautiful screen, embroidered by Mrs. Sackville West, proves that the very latest descendant keeps up the family traditions by adding to the art-treasures of the House. The Library is not less pleasant in its own way, with its book-cases filled with rare editions, its huge sofas, Chippendale chairs, velvet hangings, and Persian carpets. Over the fireplace is a lovely portrait of the late Lady Plymouth; and an engraving of Millet’s “ Angelus,” on an easel, proves that modern art is not neglected here. Passing upstairs, through Lord Sackville’s smoking-room, which is hung with old engravings, we come to Archbishop Cranmer’s private chapel, now turned - into a morning-room. The ceiling is very lofty, and is supported by great stone bosses ; the great window is the finest in the house. To reach Cranmer’s Bed-room it is necessary to descend again, and traverse several corridors, all hung with Lelys and Knellers, and furnished with quantities of old oak and with cabinets laden with valuable china. In one hangs a portrait of the celebrated Anne Clifford, Countess to the third Earl, looking every inch the dame who sent that pithy letter to Charles the Second’s Secretary of State, who had dictated to her a member for the borough of Appleby “ I have been bullied by an usurper ; I have been neglected by a court ; but I will not be dictated to by a subject. Your man shan’t stand ! “ Anne, “ Dorset, Pembroke, and .Montgomery.” It is to be feared that the Archbishop would find it hard to recognise his old chamber in its present pretty dress of blue and grey. A beautiful oak chimney-piece is all that he would be likely to remember, and, perhaps, a certain richly carved old press. He certainly would not know the use of the two “ patch stands,” which only date from our great grandmothers’ time. Near this is the Queen’s Koom, which is reserved for any of the royal family who may visit Knole, the last to occupy it being the Princess Louise (Marchioness of Lome). It is all upholstered in red silk, a great walnut cabinet is filled with lovely china, valuable blue Wedgwood decorates the mantel-shelf, and a magnificent toilet-service of porcelain mounted in silver reposes in a blue satin-lined case. Tbe Great Kitchen is a vast apartment with an arched Gothic roof, supposed to be of the time of Archbishop Bouchier. Both chimneys are of enormous size, one being eighteen feet wide and five deep. The servants’ Knole House.] THE PARK. 287 hall is also furnished with these great chimneys. Here may be seen the hatches through which the menials were served from the larder, cellars, or buttery, in those old times when such households observed a splendour and ceremony now only known in royal palaces. Rich as are the treasures within Knole House, the surrounding park is quite as remarkable in its own way. It measures a thousand acres, and is formed of beautifully diversified ground, lovely valleys and swelling hills, affording a delicious variety of scenery. Nature, too, has been admirably seconded by art. The scheme of planting leaves nothing to be desired. Great masses of trees line the hill-sides, and give that artistic boldness to the landscape that mere clumps, dotted about here and there, -could never do. Stately beeches, graceful sycamores, and venerable oaks are to be seen wherever one turns. One of the oaks, whose girth exceeds twenty- eight feet, has probably sheltered the Bethunes and Mareschals beneath its branches. Among the many beautiful views the park contains, two are particularly fine. One, best seen at sunset, is from the end of a valley running south-west from the House. At that hour the great pile of Knole, which terminates the vista, stands out from the heavily shaded foreground in all the beauty of battlemented towers, quaint gables and oriels, and tall Tudor chimneys of red brick, with finely moulded heads. The other view, from the rising ground half-way down the same valley, commands a great stretch of country, which includes most of West Kent, much of Sussex, and the distant hills of Hants. In the wooded foreground white spires rise among the trees ; while Penshurst, the ancient home of the noble Sidneys, stands on a gentle rise in the middle distance, and is backed by the South Downs, that sleep on the horizon like a cloud. E. Feazee Ceichton. THE FRONT ENTRANCE. LI SMOKE CASTLE. +o* TN the year 1185, the young Ear] of Moreton, afterwards King John, built -®- a fortress at Lismore, on the site of what had previously been a famous Irish monastery. The fortress of the Anglo-Norman prince was the forerunner of the castle of the English duke. Of King John’s fortress, however, not one stone now remains upon another, and the castle as it is to-day is but a remnant, largely remodelled and rebuilt, of a later fortress erected upon the ruins of the earlier one, which only four years after its erection had been surprised, captured, and destroyed by the native Irish. Modern additions and improvements there have been in plenty since those far-off days, yet even to the present moment the ancient characteristics of the building have been jealously and most successfully preserved. Battleinented towers, loop-holed grates, and flanking walls, are to be seen at Lismore Castle to-day ; while the elements of the antique and the picturesque, blended together till they LISMORE CASTLE. Lismoee Castle.] THE CHIEF ENTRANCE HALL. 289 have grown into one harmonious whole, surround the place with a beauty and grace charming to everyone gifted with a sense of historic association or of the beauty of nature. Just beyond the little town of Lismore is the entrance to the Castle. The gateway is of grey stone, and is called the “ Riding-House,” from the fact of its having been built to accommodate two horsemen, who mounted guard day and night, and for whose reception there were two spaces which are still visible under the archway. A perfectly straight avenue, lined on either side by tall trees and flanked by high stone walls, leads up to an inner gateway, the grand entrance into the court-yard. The Castle buildings surround this court-yard on four sides. The several points of the square of masonry are broken by embattled towers, called respectively King John’s Tower, the Carlisle Tower, and the Flag Tower. Facing the gateway is the principal entrance to the house itself — a Doric portico set in the centre of one of the connecting curtains or wings. It is said — we will not vouch for the statement — that this portico, which is of Bath stone, was designed and carved by Inigo Jones ; and it is just possible that the stones may have been sent over from England ready cut. The chief entrance-hall (which is also the billiard-room) is square, with a stone staircase at the left side. Here are to he found two objects of great historic interest. Near the door, in a glass case, lie the sword and mace of the Corporation of Youglial in the sixteenth century. This old town of Youglial, a few miles farther down the* river from Lismore, is replete with associations of Raleigh and Spenser. Here the former planted the first potato and the latter wrote the “ Faerie Queene.” The story goes, anent this old sword and mace, that the Corporation pawned them, and that they were redeemed by one of the Dukes of Devonshire and brought to Lismore Castle, where they have since remained. The other object of interest is reminiscent of the days when Lismore Castle was a bishop’s palace. It is indeed none other than the crozier ol Mac Meic dEducan, or McGettigan, Bishop of Lismore, who died upwards ol 750 years ago. This beautiful old crozier was accidentally discovered, together with the famous “ Book of Lismore,” built up in a recess of one ol: the Castle walls. The crozier is made of brass and oak. Some antiquarians believe that it contains within it the actual pastoral staff of the bishop. Certainly it is easy to see that it has been constructed to hold such an object. The in- scription borne by the crozier is in old Irish characters, and when translated runs thus: “A prayer for Niall, son of Mac Bid a can, for whom was made this ornament. A prayer for Nectan, who made this ornament.” Thus much of the chief entrance-hall and its contents. On the stair- case hangs a large oil painting of the fourth Earl of Cork and his daughters, 37 290 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Lismore Castle. the eldest of whom married a Duke of Devonshire, and thus brought Lismore Castle to the Cavendishes. Of the Castle rooms, the great banqueting-hall, or ball-room, is by far the finest. Here, too, is a memorial of the episcopal palace, for this hall was originally a chapel. It is a room of nohlc proportions, and has a pointed Gothic roof of open wood-work, which still gives the room a semi-ecclesiastical appearance, not lessened by the church-like window at either end, each filled with deep, richly tinted stained glass. The only light which the room possesses comes through these windows, and the softened glow of the sunlight, pouring in upon the illuminated roof and down upon the red and gold of the walls and the dark oak of the wainscoting, produces an effect which is, with- out exaggeration, truly exquisite. The window at one end is filled with the heraldic arms of the Boyle and Cavendish families, that at the opposite end, above the old gallery for the musicians, having representations of St. George and St. Patrick, between the patron saints of England and Ireland being the arms of Great Britain. All around the hall are quaint oaken seats, carved (after the fashion of cathedral stalls) out of the wainscot, and raised about two feet above the level of the floor. One likes to linger in this dim banqueting- hall, with the ever-changing light casting fresh tints on the sombre oak, and turning into living gold the gilded letters of the heraldic mottoes in the frieze and in the roof above. All the glowing colours, red and blue and green and purple, true prismatic shades, delight the eye with the harmony of their mellow beauty. The room is, in fact, a study in colour ; and we tear our- selves reluctantly away, just glancing first at the high chimney-piece, carved in stone (the only bit of white amid the wealth of colour), with its Irish inscription — Ceacl Mille Fciiltlie — “ a hundred thousand welcomes.” So we leave the banqueting-hall and pass onwards to the dining-room. Here are a few pictures, chiefly copies after Titian, Correggio, and Raphael. Over the sideboard, however, is a small, original portrait, by Sonest, of Robert Boyle. The face in this portrait, which is that of a man in his earliest youth, is long and thin and pale. As we gaze at it we can well believe the story of the great philosopher’s life, which tells us that he was of c weak health, and possessed but a feeble, emaciated frame ; the features are pinched and drawn, and upon the whole face is stamped the impress of pain. Among the other pictures are a “St. Cecilia” after Titian, a “Holy Family” after Raphael, and a “Virgin and Child” after Correggio. Like all the other rooms, tins room is wainscoted in oak, and it has very pretty old oak doors and an illuminated ceiling. The next room in point of interest is the. large drawing-room. It is approached by a smaller drawing-room, the windows of which look out upon Lismoue Castle.] KING JAMES’S WINDOW. 201 lovely scenery, and which is prettily furnished with chairs and couches in blue and silver poplin. The larger room is an historic apartment. Its chief claim to special beauty lies, however, in the superb view which is obtained from the great bay-window. This, by the way, is known as “ King James’s Window,” for the story goes that in 1689 James II. spent a night at Lismore Castle and dined in this room ; and that on looking out of the window he started back quite appalled by the unexpected precipice which seemed to yawn beneath his feet. To look through the window suddenly, without any previous knowledge of the situation of the Castle, might well startle the nervous. Not until the visitor stands here has he any idea that the Castle is not situated on level ground, or that, so far from this, it is placed on the edge of a fearfully precipitous hill at an immense height above the river Blackwater. As we stand in King James’s Window and look downwards, it seems, indeed, as though the solid earth has sunk be- neath our feet and we are poised in mid-air over the river which lies broad and glittering below. From this window, and from the summit of the Hag- tower overhead, the view which spreads itself far and wide along the valley of the Blackwater is lovely in the extreme. Mountain and river and valley, 292 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Lismoke Castle. green undulating pasture and dark wooded glen, with the lofty ridge of the Knockmealdown Mountains outlined sharp and deeply blue against the far horizon — this is the panorama which stretches above and below the Castle as far as the eye can reach. If anything surpasses this view of the river and its hanks, it is perhaps that which is obtained from Lismore Bridge, outside the DINING-ROOM. Castle boundaries. From this point the long reach of the wide valley, cleft by the shining river, and bordered with deep woods, the ivy-grown towers of the grey Castle rising in stately solitude over all, is in truth like a hit of the Rhineland. The gardens and terraces of Lismore are not especially remarkable. The ground itself, however, is very undulating and beautifully wooded ; and as we step down to the terrace through one of the little postern gates which give ingress and egress to the Castle at several points, the scene is thoroughly in accord with the antique character of the whole place. There are no formal flower-beds or miles of glass-houses at Lismore, hut there is, close to the Castle, an avenue of yews that, with the exception of the Yew Walk at Haddon Hall (which, by the way, this avenue closely resembles), is probably Lismore Castle.] THE AVENUE. 293 unrivalled in the United Kingdom. The avenue is about 180 feet long, the trees, which are singularly symmetrical, meeting in a trellised archway above. One peculiarity it shares with the walk at Haddon Hall, namely, the individual trees have grown one into the other ; that is to say, not merely are the branches laced and interlaced, hut the trunks are grappled together in the closest embrace. The lights and shadows here are very beautiful, and the glimpse which anyone standing at the entrance to this great aisle of trees obtains of river and mountain in the far distance is truly delectable. Lismore Castle, and the little town which shares its name, have had a chequered existence. Ancient as the Castle is, however, it is hut a late addition to the far older town. Long before the English set foot in Ireland, Lismore, or Lios-mor, i.e , the great habitation, or great fort, was celebrated far and wide as the home of a notable religious house, a great missionary college or university, and a well-known cathedral. Ptolemy speaks of Lismore and its river ; and we are told by the biographer of St. Carthagh, the great THE BANQUETING- II ALL. 294 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Lismore Castle. Irish bishop who founded its abbey and its university, that it was a “ famous and holy city, half of which is an asylum into which no woman dare enter ; but is full of cells and holy monasteries, and thither in great numbers holy men Hock together, not only from Ireland, but also from England and Britain.” It has been aptly said of this ancient and noble town, that £< at present a traveller would hardly take this town to have been a university, a bishop’s see, or much less a city. Instead of its ancient lustre, the cathedral, a few tolerable houses, and the castle, are all that appear.” Eor precisely four centuries from the time of its second erection, in 1189, the Castle of Lismore was the episcopal palace of the diocese. In 1589 the celebrated Miler Magrath, Archbishop of Cashel and Bishop of Lismore, on his resignation of the latter see, granted the Castle manor and lands of Lismore, at a yearly rent, to Sir Walter Raleigh. Only three years later Raleigh was compelled to relinquish the estate. Although he expended a good deal of money on the lands and on the Castle itself, and though, of course, Lismore Castle will ever retain peculiar historic interest from the fact of his ownership, yet it must be confessed that the restless spirit of the Elizabethan courtier could not find wherewithal to satisfy it in the seclusion of an Irish castle. In 1602 Sir Walter Raleigh sold the Castle and lands to the first Earl of Cork. The terms of the sale are preserved in the Boyle papers at the Castle. In these papers the Earl tells us of his castle — which he had greatly added to and strongly fortified— and of “ my orchard and my garden, and the turrets which did so beat and clear the curteyn wall.” The diary from which this is taken is the Autobiography of Richard Boyle, first Earl of Cork, and it is a noble chapter in the romance of history. This man, who lived to he a millionaire, a peer of the realm, and the founder of an illustrious family, tells us, in his own quaint words, how he came to Ireland with T27 in liis pocket. Here is the entry in the diary, and it shows what manner of man he was who, alike in the most splendid prosperity and in the greatest reverses, could say, calmly, “Clod’s Providence is mine inheritance”: — “I arrived out of England into Ireland, where God guided me first hither, bringing with me a taffeta doublet and a pair of velvet breeches, a new sute of laced ffustien, cutt upon taffeta, a bracelet of gold with x 1 ', a diamond ring, and xxvij 11 iij s in money in my purse. And, since, the blessing of God, Whose Divine Providence brought me hether, hath enritched my poor estate and added no care thereunto.” And another paragraph adds : “ It pleased the Almighty, by His Divine Providence I may say, to take me, just as it were by the hand, and lead me into Ireland, where I happily arrived at Dublin on midsummer eve, the 23rd of June, 1588.” Lismore Castle.] THE FIRST EARL OF CORK. 295 Fourteen years later this almost penniless and friendless young man could purchase one of the finest estates and castles in the South of Ireland. Such was the man to whom, it has been well said, Ireland owes what manufactures she has even at this day ; who, when honours were heaped upon him and upon Lis family, felt no shame for his humble circumstances or for his money made in trade and commerce ; who, when enemies slandered him to his sovereign, went before the Council boldly to answer his traducers, and justified himself so perfectly that Elizabeth swore, as the Tudors could swear, with a quick, passionate oath, that must have made Richard Boyle’s accusers shake in their shoes, “By God’s death, we find him to be a man fit to be employed.” This was the man whose benefits to the country of his adoption were so great that Oliver Cromwell declared — “Had there been an Earl of Cork in every province there could have been no rebellion in Ireland.” By him Lismore Castle was made a home. Of his affection for the place which his own talents and industry enabled him to purchase, his diary and his letters are full. Here he spent every moment he could snatch from the busy life which claimed him. Almost all his fifteen children were born here ; and his own written words tell us how happy was the home at Lismore. Lew men have lived to see their sons ennobled as were the sons of the Earl of Cork. Three of them were granted patents of nobility ; but one, his sixth and youngest son, bom here at Lismore, was to remain unennobled, only to obtain a more imperishable fame than the honours of any sovereign could confer upon him. The entry of Robert Boyle’s birth is recorded in the Earl’s diary, 25th January, 1626, and there are, besides, numbers of letters showing how deeply the father had his son’s welfare at heart, and giving many details of the education of the future philosopher. Here at Lismore, too, the first Earl of Cork seems to have made welcome the crowd of kinsmen and kinswomen who sprang up on all sides to claim relationship with him. Never man had more cousins than the great Earl, and he seems to have admitted the slightest tie of consanguinity with the utmost good-nature and benevolence. The wife of Edmund Spenser appears to have received from her “Cousin Cork” many kindnesses. The Boyle papers prove incontestably that the poet’s wife was Elizabeth Bojde, of the Herefordshire family, and entirely upset the supposition of a low-born wife. Whether the poet and Lord Cork ever met is not certain, but there is no doubt that the poet’s only son, Peregrine Spenser, was acknowledged as a kinsman of the Earl, and was received more than once at Lismore Castle. During the Civil War of 1641 the Castle was besieged three times. On the first occasion 5,000 Irish, under Sir Richard Beling, laid siege to it, and HISTORIC HOUSES. [Lismore Castle. 296 it was gallantly defended by young Lord Broghill, the Earl’s third son. The letter to his father, giving an account of this attack, lias often been quoted. It concludes with the following brave words : — “My lord, fear nothing for Lismore ] for if it be lost it shall be with FAMILY GROUP.* (From an old Print at Lismore Castle.) the life of him who begs your lordship’s blessing, and styles himself your lordship’s most humble, most obliged, and most dutiful son and servant, “ Beoghill.” Two years later the Irish again unsuccessfully attacked the Castle. A circumstantial account of this is given in the diary, in which the Earl says : “ Monday night, when they could not enter my house, they removed their siege and withdrew the ordnance and army, two or three barrels of powder, * The figures in the group, beginning with the one on the left, are those of (1) Lady Louisa Cavendish, nee La scelles. wife of the late Lord George Cavendish (No. 4) ; (2) Lord Edward Cavendish, youngest son of the late Duke; (:>) Lord Frederick Cavendish, second son of the late Duke; (4) Lord George Cavendish, brother of the late Duke; (5) the 6th Duke of Devonshire, predecessor of the late Duke; (6) the present Duke; (7) Lady Louisa Cavendish, daughter of the late Duke, now Lady Louisa Egcrton ; (8) the late Duke. Oidy Lady Louisa Egcrton and the present Duke are now living. Lismoee Castle.] THE HE VON SI II EES. 29 ' two or three pieces of ordnance of twenty-three pounds, and killed hut one of my side — God he praised ! ” Once more, after the lapse of two years, the old fortress was besieged, and this time it was taken. It was defended by Major Power, with a garrison numbering one hundred men of the Earl’s tenants and retainers, and it is said that before they surrendered, this tiny force killed live hundred of the enemy, who were commanded by Lord Castleliaven. On the restoration of peace, the Castle was once more repaired and inhabited by the Boyle family. It remained with them till the fourth Earl of Cork died in 1753 without male heirs, when the greater portion of his English and Irish estates passed to his eldest daughter, Lady Charlotte Boyle, who, in 1748, had married William Cavendish, fourth Duke of Devonshire. The Castle has remained with the Cavendishes ever since, and is now the Irish residence of the Duke of Devonshire. By the Devonshire family it has been much improved, and at the same time most carefully preserved. They have, indeed, beautified it without destroying its ancient characteristics in the smallest degree. Below the Castle is a great salmon weir, of considerable length, which runs through a picturesque rapid, thus forming, on a small scale, a kind of artificial cataract; this, though not high, is, owing to the great breadth of the river Blackwater (not inaptly sometimes called the Broadwater), of considerable extent, the rush and flow of the water being extremely effective. Near the weir are the Balleen Gardens; and the reach of the river just here has been compared with the Thames at Clieveden. Lismore Castle has suffered from fire as well as from the sword. One of the worst attempts at incendiarism was that of a party of rebels in 1G42. A tenant named Philip O’Cleary gave the alarm to Lord Brogliill’s troops, then in the Castle, and the incendiaries were pursued to the mountains before they could succeed in burning more than a few poor cabins. The whole account of this affair is given in the MSS. at the Castle. Early in the present century a very serious fire occurred, and, though the damage then done has since been to a great extent repaired, some of the losses were irretrievable. Ella MacMahon. 38 ' DISTANT VIEW OF NEWSTEAD ABBEY NEAVSTEAD ABBEY 7ITH0UT the Abbey gates the workaday world is toiling and moiling. Industry lias invaded the woodland realm famed in story and in song. Where the Muse flourished, and the Chase gathered the gallant and the fair, the collier now descends to his task in the bowels of the earth, and the noise of machinery fills the air. The Great Northern Railway crosses the private road of the owner of Newstead Abbey, the ornamental ironwork which adorns the overhead bridge doubtless being a concession to those rights of way which the feudal lords long exercised over the wide domains of New Place. Beyond the bridge, to the right, rise the tall chimney-shafts of the Newstead Colliery, clustered about which is the little mining village with its population of a thousand odd. But not even the aesthetic sold of Air. Ruskin would he seriously troubled by this juxtaposition of scenes so characteristic of the old and the new world. The Alibey lies in the hollow created by that gentle depression of the country between us and the woodland, as we look down the straight drive to the lodge and beyond it without observing any indication of the historic house which is now the Alecca of many a literary pilgrimage. Less than a mile of pleasant walking — first between the green fields, next under high banks, and then through a shady avenue, which is the vista that opens on the magnificent west front — ■ parts the colliery and the Abliey. And yet from the mine only the beautiful demesne is visible; while where New Place lies in the valley there is neither sight of mineral wealth nor sound of industry. Might the shade of Lord Newstead Abbey.] THE ASSOCIATIONS OF NEWSTEAI). 299 Byron visit these glimpses of the moon, lie would find the scene but little altered since he accurately pictured it in the thirteenth canto of “ Don Juan — “ It stood embosomed in a happy valley, Crowned by high woodlands where the Druid oak Stood, like Caractacus, in act to rally His host, with broad arms ’gainst the thunder stroke; And from beneath his boughs were seen to sally The dappled foresters ; as day awoke, The branching stag swept down with all his herd, To quaff a brook which murmured like a bird.” The little Been still brawls in its rocky bed, and monarclis of the wood yet spread their branches, though the antlered quarry no longer repose in their shadow, nor the merry men, clad in russet and green, respond to the call of the horn. Else there is little change, if we may judge from the vivid picture drawn by graphic pencils two generations agoiie. At least, the essentials have been preserved, the necessary alterations and additions having been made in that true spirit of restoration which lias supreme regard for all that is interest- ing, historical, and allusive. When Sir Richard Phillips wrote his “Personal Tour,” the first of a long list of itineraries, ending with the glowing description of Thomas Moore and the graceful* sketch of Washington Irving, the domain of Newstead covered almost four thousand acres, and the house as nearly as possible stood in the centre. The present owner of the Abbey and the estate, who is also lord of the manor, has wisely encouraged arable cultivation on a portion of his property, and utilised yet another stretch of it for purposes of pasture. From prosperous homesteads on the outskirts of the Abbey grounds the visitor observes spiral wreaths of smoke ascending in an atmosphere otherwise unpolluted. For the rest, to the north there is Sherwood Forest, and to the south-west Annesley Copse, remnants of the merry greenwood in which the Sheriff of Nottingham, Robin Hood, Little John, and Maid Marian played their several engaging parts in that old English romance which is the evergreen theme of many a ballad, and to-day has given a master of melodious verse an inspiration and a story that, wedded to the skill of the playwright and the art of the actress, have won a popular triumph. It is the glory of Newstead Abbey to-day that in itself and its surroundings it is the custodian and guardian of so much wealth of associ- ation, and is so saturated with the perfume of reminiscences which we would not willingly let die, that there are few sanctuaries of the past for which the antiquarian and the litterateur , the archaeologist and the artist, together with cultured men and women of all classes, retain a greater or more reverent regard. 300 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Newstead Abbey. And yet the Abbey plays no part in tale of battle or record of statesman- ship. It is, however, inalienably bound up with the strange, meteor-like course of that great genius who learned in suffering what he taught in song. More- over, the architectural features of the building are of surpassing interest. It owes its existence to the expiatory zeal of Henry II., who, in his remorse on account of the murder of Thomas a Becket, raised many a martyr’s memorial in the form of ecclesiastical structures, endowed with lands and incomes, through- out the length and breadth of the kingdom. The Abbey was founded as a home for Black Canons in 1170, and dedicated to God and the Virgin. Above the west front of the Abbey church, which invariably suggests to the observer the west end of a cathedral, adorned with rich carvings and lofty pedestals, appears in a canopied niche an effigy of the Blessed Virgin : — “In a higher niche, alone, but crowned, The Virgin Mother of the God-born child, With her Son in her blessed arms, looked round, Spared by some chance when all beside was spoiled.” This is a further allusion in Lord Byron’s “Bon Juan” to the single feature now remaining of the old Ahbey church. As the visitor emerges from the short avenue at the end of the drive his attention is immediately arrested by this beautiful remnant of the ancient glory of the Abbey : — “ A mighty window, hollow in the centre, Shorn of its glass of thousand colourings, Through which the deepened glories once could enter, Streaming from off the sun like seraph’s wings, Now yawns all desolate : now loud, now fainter, The gale sweeps through its fretwork, and oft sings The owl his anthem where the silenced quire Lie with their hallelujah quenched like fire.” The steps to the gate of the west front are worn here and moss-covered there ; but the rare delicacy and splendour of the structure which rises above them are as marked to-day as when the builders looked upon their great work, and saw that it was good. The art of the carver is revealed in figure and flower and tracery and many a cunning geometrical device. The beauty of the conception is almost excelled by the delicacy of the execution ; hut both carving and composition are masterpieces of that architectural style which for ecclesiastical purposes approaches to the ideal. The cloisters of the Abbey, which are still intact, stand nearly in the middle of the large and somewhat irregular building, of which only the Ahbey church itself lias suffered destruction. Above the cloisters runs a range of NEWSTEAD ABBEY, FROM THE SOUTH. 302 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Newstead Abbey. corridors and nected :■ — galleries, by which all the rooms of the house are con- “ Huge halls, long galleries, spacious chamber, joined By no quite lawful marriage of the arts, Might shock a connoisseur; but when combined Formed a whole, which, irregular in parts, Yet left a grand impression on the mind, At least of those whose eyes are in their hearts.” The southern aspect of the principal front gives a delightful view of falling water, which, between two thickly grown groves. Hows to the lake below. This splendid sheet of water is one of the two in which the poet was wont to enjoy what of aquatics was obtainable in his Midland retreat. Beyond lies the woodland. A very distant prospect is precluded by the situation of the Abbey in the Leen valley, for which Byron facetiously offers an ingenious explanation hi an aside which is a pleasant relief from his gloomier mood: — UT , r , , 0 Jt lies perhaps a little low, Because the monks preferred a hill behind, To shelter their devotions from the wind.” On the east side of the cloisters is the chapter-house, with its clustered columns and intersecting arches. Much of the originally great beauty of this structure remains. To-day it is used as a chapel, in which the household of the Abbey and the tenantry of the Newstead estate worship. Besides the enriched features mentioned, there are the ancient sedilia and the stained windows, through which the dim religious light falls in rainbow rays of a beautiful harmony of tints. In adapting the chapter-house to its new use, a rare regard has been shown for architectural consistency, as the result of which the chapel interior impresses both the antiquarian and tl le aesthetic temperament. Bestoration and embellishment still proceed under the judicious care of the present owner; and it is quite safe to speak of the remaining portions of the building, for their permanence is assured. The servants’ hall — which was formerly the xenodochium or guesten chamber — and the entrance-hall are groined. The crypt is more extensive, perhaps exceptionally so. The inhabited rooms of the house open into a quadrangular court ; and here again we are struck with the familiarity of the scene depicted in Byron’s graphic verse : — - “ Amidst the court a Gothic fountain played, Symmetrical but decked with carvings quaint — Strange faces like to men in masquerade, And here, perhaps, a monster, there a saint ; 'flic- spring rushed through grim mouths of granite made, And sparkled into basins, where it spent Its little torrent in a thousand bubbles, Like man’s vain glory and his vainer troubles.” Newstead Abbey.] GOOD KING JOHN" 303 It will be seen from this description that, whilst sufficient of the monastic characteristics of the Abbey are observable on the surface to predicate the purpose of its erection, yet time and time’s vicissitudes have wrought many changes. It was a fine abode when Throsby wrote of it with affectionate contemplation: “Calm religion sweetened the hours of those retired from the world and its vain allure- ments. And here the poor, the sick, the fatherless, the widow, and the weary traveller found at all times a comfortable asylum.” The Abbey had not been endowed by Henry II. alone. Other pious benefactors increased the possessions and the privileges of those canons regular of the Order of St. Augustine who inhabited the retreat in the midst of the famous forest of Sherwood, where also existed those other abbeys of Welbeck and Bufford. Benefactions, like other acceptable gifts, go by favour; and to the fact that John de Lexington was Abbot of Newstead may be ascribed the other interesting circumstance that Bobert Lord Lexington was a generous donor of territory to the Abbey. That good King John who, according to the ballad, was somewhat envious of the lands and the livings of the Abbot of Canterbury, was much more favourably disposed toward his reverend brother of Newstead. In his several visits to the county this monarch confirmed the holding of the Black Canons, and extended the boundaries of their possessions. In his visits, as in his benefactions, he was a worthy successor to Henry II. Some record of the foundation charter is preserved, and it is a well-attested fact that the witnesses to the document included Geoffrey, Archdeacon of Canterbury, who became Bishop of Ely in 1174; and Manassar Byset, the owner of East Bridgford, Notts, who, according to the county historian (Mr. Cornelius Brown) was a member of a great and powerful family. The original endowment of Henry II., by the way, included the church and town of Papelwick (a mile away), large wastes about the monastery and within the forest, and a park of ten acres, contiguous to the town of Mansfield (six miles to the north of Newstead). And here it should be borne in mind that the Abbey owes its existence in this situation to the fact that Mansfield was the frequent residence of the early Norman kings, who sallied forth from thence to enjoy the chase in the surrounding forest of Sherwood. In ballad literature considerable celebrity attaches to the “ King and the Miller of Mansfield.” It is said to have been written in the second Henry’s time, Sir John Cockle being the miller. In the hands of Colonel Wildman and of the trustees who administered the estate after his death, and those of the present owner, who purchased it from them, Newstead Abbey has regained much of its pristine magnificence and in- terest. The visitor is shown the abbot’s apartments, which were also occupied by the poet. Byron furnished many of the rooms sumptuously, but, with more of the 304 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Newstead Abbey. poet’s imagination than practical knowledge, allowed the porous roof to remain, with the consequence that “ in half-a-dozen years the rain had visited his proudest chambers, the paper had rotted upon the walls, and fell upon glowing carpets and canopies, upon bedsteads of crimson and gold, clogging the wings of glittering eagles and dimming gorgeous coronets.” WEST FRONT OF THE ABBEY CHURCH. In 1828, Sir Richard Phillips, for whom “the splendid hospitality of Colonel Wildman was kindly exerted,” slept “in Byron’s bed and Byron’s room,” and witnessed to the revival of the early magnificence of the Abbey. The bed was “ elegantly surmounted with baronial coronets; “ but,” writes the enthusiastic tourist, “it was Byron’s, and I cared nothing for the coronets.” This apartment is remote from the bed-rooms of the family, the ascent to it being by a newel stone staircase. The suite of apartments on the west front, bearing the poet’s name, consists of Lord Byron’s bed-room, dressing-room, and the room called the haunted chamber : “ Some deem it but tlie distant echo given Back to the night wind by the waterfall, And harmonised by the old choral wall.” By the instruction of Mr. AV. P. AVebb, who acquired the Abbey and Newstead estate in 1860, since occupying it as one of his seats, these Newstead Abbey.] BYRON RELICS. 305 apartments are kept in as precisely as possible the same state as when they were occupied by the poet. There are the bedstead with the gilded coronets, the picture of his Alma Mater — which was only second in his affections to Newstead itself — the portraits of Murray his valet, and the noted pugilist “Gentleman Jackson ” ; and in the oriel window the poet’s writing-table, inkstand, and other personal relics. THE “ BOATSWAIN ” MONUMENT. yards long, with a Gothic roof and plaster ornaments, furnished in 1833, hy Early Italian artists. The grand saloon, with its oak ceiling, richly decorated and upholstered, is indeed a nohle room, and its interest for the visitor is greatly enhanced by the fact that among the paintings, principally por- traits, is Phillips’s celebrated “ Lord Byron.” Of greatest historic attraction are, among the other apartments, the monks’ parlour on the floor beneath ; the great dining-hall, furnished in the olden style, which was the ancient refectory of the Abhey ; the abbot’s parlour, now the breakfast-room ; and the bed-room of Edward III., the apartment of Henry VIII., and the chamber of Charles II., all three richly hung with tapestry, and reputed to have been occupied respectively by the monarclis named. Among other treasures collected by Mr. Webb and exhibited to visitors — who are, with a judiciously exercised liberality, permitted to enter the Ahbey and admire its contents — are Dr. Livingstone’s cap and swords, appropriately 39 306 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Newstead Abbey. displayed in tlie room bearing the name of the great African explorer, wherein he wrote “The Zambesi and its Tributaries”; a plain circular table, on which a portion of “ Childe Harold” was written, and other Byronic relics, including ware, spill-cups, candlesticks, inkstands, swords, singlesticks, boxing-gloves, face- guard, “ Boatswain’s ” collar, etc. ; carved oak chairs containing embroidery- work by Lord Byron’s sister Augusta, and the rapier with which Mr. Chaworth was killed. In the grounds Livingstone planted a tree ere he went upon his last lone quest ; and, later, Mr. Stanley signalised his enjoyment of the hospitality extended by Mr. Webb, who is himself no mean traveller, by a similar act of commemoration. Looking through the gate of the Abbey church west front, a conspicuous object is the dog’s tomb — Byron’s generous tribute to “ Boatswain,” his one faithful friend, to whose memory he penned the celebrated epitaph that appears upon one of the four marble tablets with which the elegant memorial is panelled — the one facing the gardens and the pond. Placed on an ascent of several steps, and crowned with a lambent flame, it forms a pathetic expression of the affection with which Byron regarded his constant companion, while the powerful lines show how keenly he felt the w r ant of human sympathy, tlie dejection and loneliness which led him to look upon his favourite dog as his only and his ideal friend. Sixty acres in all of undulating and beautifully wooded grounds surround the Abbey. The pleasaunce of five or six acres was laid out in terraces and walks by Le Notre in the style of Hampton Court and Versailles. On a perfect June day, it is now a dream of loveliness, the emerald of the turf forming a beautiful setting for the geometrical flower-beds, aflame with colour, wdiile the air is perfumed with a thousand fragrant sweets, the shrubs and trees are shadowed in the cool pond, and the walks and terraces gracefully frame the pleasant scene. But, besides the magnificent pleasure-gardens, there is a kitchen-garden of three acres, and a lawn or shrubbery of ten or twelve acres more. A fair English home indeed is the Newstead Abbey of to-day. Byronic associations with the Abbey begin with the dissolution of the monasteries by Henry VIII. Then it was that the sacred edifice took upon itself more of the nature of a residential mansion : — “ One holy Henry reared the Gothic walls, And bade the pious inmates rest in peace ; Another Henry the kind gift recalls, And bids devotion’s hallowed echoes cease.” Sir John Byron was lieutenant of Sherwood Forest, and it was he whom Henry VIII. delighted to honour with the great gift of Newstead, possibly in return for services rendered or in consideration of some quid pro quo received. Newstead Abbey.] THE BYRONS. 307 The Byrons were of noble birth, dating their investiture witli high rank from the Conquest. They undoubtedly held divers “sweet manors” in Notts and Derbyshire, for so much is set down in Domesday Book. The chief seat of the family was Horistan Castle in Derbyshire. A grant of “the Priory of Newstade with the Manor of Papelwick, a rectory of the same, with all the closes about the priory, etc.,” to Sir John Byron, Kt., of Colwick, Steward of Manchester and Rochdale, received the royal seal in 1540. In the traditions of the family the first private owner of Newstead Abbey quaintly figures as “ Sir John Byron the Little with the Great Beard.” It must be charged against Sir John that he was not unduly impressed with the sacredness of the sanctuary of which he had come into possession. He converted a portion of the monastic buildings into a residence, giving to its exterior that castellated appearance which characterises it to-day, and wholly neglected the magnificent Abbey church, which dates its decay from that time. He or his immediate successors incorporated the south aisle of the edifice with the mansion, and for all time the western front became a picturesque ruin. Lord Byron himself has briefly described for ns the leading events in the lives of his ancestors. They are recorded in some lines, “On Leaving Newstead Abbey,” written but a few years prior to the sale of his patrimony and estate to Colonel Wildman. Nothing of interest connecting the Byron family with Newstead occurs till, descending the line of succession, we come to the grand-uncle of the poet, from whom the latter inherited the Abbey, succeeding to the estate when lie was but a lad. Through all the years Newstead had been sinking into decay and desuetude. The Lord Byron whose morose nature and strange life supplied the bar sinister of the family history led the existence of a recluse ; and the deplorable condition into which the mansion and grounds had already fallen became yet more marked, justifying the mournful dirge which the last of the Byrons of Newstead sang over the desolated dwelling. The nobleman who became notorious in 1765 on account of the duel which he forced upon his neighbour, Air. Chaworth, of Annesley Hall, had an evil reputation throughout the country-side. He is credited with the possession of “a dark, haughty, impetuous spirit,” and “mad deeds” are laid to his charge. The neighbouring peasantry long held in superstitious fear “ tld oud laird’s devils.” Annesley Hall is just on the confines of Newstead — a dwelling embowered in trees. “ Hills of Annesley, bleak and barren,” wrote the poet when separated from his love, Mary Chaworth. It is one of the many elements of romance in the ill-starred career of the author of some of the most spirited verse in the English language that he should have become 308 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Newstead Abbey. enamoured of the daughter of the house whose prop his grand-uncle felled in cold blood. It all arose out of a foolish pique concerning the amount of game on Lord Byron’s manors. Both the noble lord and his neighbour were members of the Nottinghamshire Club, which met at the “ Star and Garter ” tavern in Ball Mall. The best method of preserving game was the very attractive subject for country gentlemen debated at the club on January 26th, 1765. Mr. BYRON’S BED-ROOM. CJiaworth, of Annesley Hall, asserted that Sir Charles Sedley had more game on five acres than Lord Byron could hoast of in all his manors. This led to the fatal quarrel, of which Mr. Chaworth left a plain account in his own words. In the sequel Lord Byron was tried hy his peers in the Upper House, and dismissed on paying his fees. The world heard nothing of him again until the news came, early in 1708, of Lis death. It is agreeable to turn to the account which Tom Moore gives, in his preface to the “ Life and Letters of Lord Byron,” of the poet’s first sight of his ancestral home. It was in the summer of 1708 that Lord Byron, then a boy of ten, had his first glimpse of Newstead. He was accompanied by his mother (who claimed direct descent from the Royal house of Stuart) and nurse. When they reached the Newstead toll-bar, and saw the woods of the Abbey stretching Newstead Abbey.] MAE Y OH A WOE TIL 309 out to receive them, their minds were filled with varied and impressive emotions. Mrs. Byron, affecting to he ignorant of the place, asked the woman at the toll-bar to whom that seat belonged. She was told that the owner of it, Lord Byron, had been some months dead. “And who is the right heir?” asked the proud and happy mother. “ They say,” said the old woman, “ that it is THE DINING HALL. a little hoy who lives at Aberdeen.” “ And this is he, bless him ! ” exclaimed the nurse, no longer able to contain herself, and turning to kiss with delight the young lad who was seated in her lap. At Newstead Abbey the poet undoubtedly spent the happiest hours of a life none too full of solid pleasures. We know that even as a youth he was an adept at swimming and rowing. Here he made many friends, and formed his attachment for Mary Chaworth. The family feud had died out with the duel, and, if we believe the protestations of the bard, the dearest purpose of his heart would have been compassed could he have united the two families by the marriage of the “ sole remnant of that ancient house ” with the lady who was afterwards known as the “ amiable Mrs. Musters,” the Mary of bis poetry. In the “Dream ” we have the history of their mutual attachment, and for the visitor 310 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Newstead Abbey. to Newstead the descriptive lines recall familiar scenes. As for the thirteenth canto of “Don Juan,” Sir Richard Phillips vouches for its literal accuracy in his day. In college days the poet kept high revelry with his University friends at Newstead. According to the descriptive letter of Mr. C. S. Matthews, Byron dispensed most generous hospitality to his familiar spirits. On these occasions it was the custom or whim to hand Burgundy round after dinner in a skull which had been mounted in silver and converted into a drinking-cup. In 1809 the poet wrote, impassionately, “ Newstead and I stand or fall together. I have now lived on the spot, I have fixed my heart upon it, and no pressure, present or future, shall induce me to barter the last vestige of our heritage.” But Lord Byron had over-estimated his powers of resistance- The utmost that can he said is that when he was constrained by circumstances to allow Newstead to be sold, he acted wisely in disposing of it to his old schoolfellow, Colonel Wildman, who was in the same form with him at Harrow. The poet retired to Tuscany, and, as every schoolboy knows, breathed his last at Missolonghi, April 19th, 1824, at the age of thirty-seven. Pacing the terrace walk, over which “ Proudly majestic frowns the vaulted hall, you look over the beautiful demesne in these tranquil times, and let the chequered history of the house pass slowly in review before the mind. You see again, with the eye of imagination, the twelfth-century monks passing, in calm contemplation, their hearts at ease, and their hopes dwelling on the fair promises of their faith. Then that other, stormier spirit appears, and you look upon the face where passion and the poet’s ecstasy have played their part. He it is whose profound affection for his ancestral home has made it famous in modern times — the lonely genius with bent head and thoughts that do lie too deep for tears. Hugh \V. Steong. CHILLINGHAM CASTLE. CHILLINGHAM CASTLE. /AHILLINGHAM CASTLE lies midway between the LA Cheviots and the Northern Sea. The railway does not approach it by some miles on either hand, and among the tree-clothed heights which shelter it from the east wind there roams the last herd of the aborig- inal wild cattle of these islands. With Chillingham and its surroundings the ordinary tourist has not greatly concerned himself. It is out of the beaten track ; it is remote from the great highways ; it is apt to he missed even by the discursive traveller who crosses the moors from Belford to Chatton, and who follows the winding road which leads from Chatton to the ancient town of Woofer. Whoso chooses this route for his wanderings will pass by Whitsunbank Hill, where the grandfather of Sir Walter Scott bought a high- mettled hunter with the money that should have been expended on a flock of sheep, and rode homeward proud and happy to a farm that was grievously destitute of stock. There are British camps in all the country round about. Hut circles, hidden in the purple hloom of the bell-heather, may be found on almost all the hills. When the Chillingham wild cattle roamed at large, in days so far off that even their traditions are lost, this must have been among the ARMS OF THE EARL OF TANKERVILLE. 312 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Chillingham Castle. most thickly populated districts between the two seas. Its folk are few and scattered in these present days. The farmers are lords of broad acres; a few cottages of workpeople cluster around the farmsteads ; there is a village here and there among the hills, looking much as it must have looked two PORTICO, STAIRCASE, AND BALCONY. centuries past, hut with fewer inhabitants, it may be, than when it needed to defend itself in its church tower or its Border peel. Chillingham Castle dates from the reign of Edward III. Before that time there was a manor of Chevelyngham, the property of one Thomas de Heton, concerning whom if may be safely affirmed that he would be hard set to make his dwelling secure against his own and the king’s enemies. There has been preserved a curious record of a day’s doings at this place towards the end of the fourteenth century. Margaret, the youngest daughter of Sir Henry de Heton, was christened at Chillingham church early in 1395. On that day Nicholas Heron was married, and John Serjeant took Alice de Wyndegaltes to wife. Sir Henry de Heton bought a white horse, and despatched one of his retainers on the dangerous journey to Newcastle, to purchase wine. John Horsley was carried off by the Scots; but, on the other Chillingham Castle.] A STIRRING DAY. 313 hand, and perhaps in the same conflict, a Scot named Thomas Turnbull was captured by John Wytton, and lodged in the Castle of Chillingham. A doe was slain in the park, and John Belsise, possible ancestor of one of Thackeray’s IN THE GARDENS. characters, was sent to Alnwick with a letter to the Earl of Northumberland. On that same day, also, Sir Thomas Grey seized upon Robert Horne, and carried him off to Norham Castle against his will. Stirring times were these, such as are difficult to realise as one stands at the gates of Chillingham Park, where only the whirr of a pheasant’s wings disturbs the peace of the slumbering fields. The licence granted by Edward III. to “ his beloved and faithful Thomas de Heton ” gave permission f*a fortify Chevelyngham Manor House with a 40 314 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Chillingham Castle. wall of lime and stone, to crenellate it, and to make it a castle or fortalice. Already this manor-house must have had a considerable importance of its own, for Henry III. was resident there for a while in 1255, and thence it w r as that he sent a safe conduct to Alexander III., King of Scotland, and his Queen, that they might meet him at Wark, or some other convenient place on the Marches. A century and a half afterwards died the last male representative of the de Iietons. In 1443 Cliillingham Castle had, in some fashion which cannot now be traced, come into possession of the Greys. The first Grey of Cliillingham is splendidly commemorated in the beautifully situated little church of St. Peter, where the finest altar tomb in all the north country bears the effigies of himself and wife, who was the daughter of Henry, Lord Fitzlmgh of Havens worth. The tomb, with all its elaborate carvings, is singularly well preserved, and still bears distinct traces of the colour with which it was formerly ornamented. Very differently has fared the similar tomb of the Nevilles, which fills up a dark corner of the beautiful church at Staindrop, by the gates of Baby Park. It is commonly affirmed that Sir Walter Scott had Cliillingham Castle in mind when he was describing Osbaldistone Hall, in “ Kob Boy.” But there seems to be no good reason for crediting the surmise. Bob Boy mentions the Whitsun Tryste, a fair which was held only about four miles away ; but the home of the Osbaldistones is plainly stated to be among the Cheviot Hills, and Chillingham Castle is at a distance of at least five miles from the nearest spur of that sombre range. Nor is this noble and massive building of the character of the house described by Scott. It is a castle of the quadrangular type, with four strong Border towers, that appear to date from about the middle of the fourteenth century. These are connected by buildings of the seventeenth century, which form a court-yard measuring about twenty yards by seventeen yards. An arcade by Inigo Jones, in the Italian style, with a projecting stone stair of fine proportions, gives distinction to the east side of the Castle, and redeems the cold severity of the towers. Here are to be found effigies of certain of the Nine Worthies, all dressed in classical habiliments. When the series was complete it consisted of three Jew 7 s — Joshua, David, and Judas Maccabeus; three Pagans — Hector, Alexander, and Julius Caesar; and three Christians — King Arthur, Charlemagne, and Godfrey de Bouillon. The figures appear to belong to the early part of the seventeenth century, and are similar in character to the statues of the Nine Worthies that are to be seen at Montacute in Somersetshire. The title of the present owners of Chillingham is a concrete bit of history. The county of Tanquerville, in Normandy, was granted by Henry Y. to Sir John de Grey in 1419. It was to be held by homage and annual Chillingham Castle ] THE TANKER VILLE TITLE. 315 delivery of a bascinet, or lielmet, at the Castle of Ronen, on the feast of St. George, but it remained in the family for ouly thirty years, being in some manner lost by Henry Grey in 1449. When, however, a second peerage was conferred on the Greys, after the lapse of two centuries and a half CHILLINGHAM CHURCH. from this time, the memory of the old Norman dignity was recalled, and Lord Grey of Wark and Chillingham became Viscount Glendale and Earl of Tankerville. The titles became ex- tinct in 1701, when they had only been enjoyed for six years, but that of Earl of Tankerville was a few years later revived in favour of Charles Bennet, Lord Ossulston, who had married the daughter and heiress of the last Earl. From this marriage the present owner of Chillingham Castle is descended. It would be pleasant to linger over the history and traditions of this noble house. Going back to the. fifteenth century, we find Sir Ralph Grey anticipating trouble, and conveying the Castle of Chillingham to William Hepsone, Vicar of Wooler, and to Edmund Burrell, in trust for his family. For rebelling against Edward IV. this Ralph Grey was beheaded at Doncaster in 1464, but, in consequence of the ingenious and foreseeing arrangement which had been made, there was no sequestration of the estate, and his widow lived at the Castle till her death. Forty years later the place was nominally in the 316 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Chillingham Castle. keeping of the Bisliop of Durham, as the guardian of Thomas Grey, a minor, hut the actual occupant was Sir Edward Grey, in whose time the Castle was capable of accommodating a garrison of a hundred horse. There was a ghost at Chillingham in years past, it seems proper to note. THE DINING-ROOM. It was spoken of throughout the country-side as “ The Radiant Boy.” Who it was supposed to he, and why it appeared, is not now known ; but the hones of a child, discovered in one of the walls of a bed-room, were buried with proper ceremonies in the churchyard, and then the Radiant Boy was seen no more. In the dining-liall at Chillingham, from which there is a fine prospect over the richly wooded park, there are several portraits of great historic value, among others, those of Bacon, Burleigh, Buckingham, Charles I., and Charles TI. Here, also, is Judge Jeffreys, by Sir Godfrey Kneller, together with the Earl of Arlington, by Lely. Landseer knew Chillingham well, and the Castle contains three of his most famous pictures. The studies which he made for these were the occasion of probably the greatest fright that the painter ever experienced, for he was stalked by a part of the herd of wild cattle, from which he escaped only by taking to his heels and flying with all speed into the forest. Bewick, if all stories be true, had a perilous experience of the same Chillingham Castle.] CHILLINGHAM L> UNGEON. 317 kind. When lie was sketching his celebrated “ Chillingham Bull,” that splendid creature, which was just then the king of the herd, took objection to his presence, and pursued him with a mighty roaring until he “shinned up a tree,” whence he calmly continued his occupation whilst the infuriated bull was bellowing and pawing the ground below. THE DRAWING-ROOM. The drawing-room of the Castle contains many of the treasures of the house. Its principal pictures are Hurlstone’s “Prisoner of Chillon,” and a hue painting of Dunstanburgh, on a wild part of the neighbouring coast. A piece of china on which its owner sets great store is said to have belonged to the unfortunate Marie Antoinette. The furniture, as is fitting in such a place, is mainly in the antique style, and the room contains a screen richly hung with miniatures and enamels. At Chillingham, as in all these grim northern castles, there is a cruel- looking dungeon. A thin stream of light is admitted through a narrow slit in the wall. As at the Tower of London, the prisoners, who seem, on occasion, to have been kept in confinement for long periods, have left rude records of their captivity on the walls. And as at Alnwick, there is beneath this forbidding chamber a still lower prison, to which access is obtained by a trap-door — a 318 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Chillingham Castle. place to die in, it may be, but not, as it would seem, a place in which any human being could live. Cautious minds will always listen with a considerable amount of incredulity to stories of the discovery of live loads in the solid rock ; but if any evidence is good in such a case, then a live toad was found in the solid rock at Chillingham. One of the wonders pointed out to visitors is the toad-stone, an oblong slab, which, on being sawn open, disclosed a toad of quite amazing magnitude. The event is recorded in a painting in the steward’s room, which also contains a curiously carved mantel-piece, representing Susanna and the Elders. Chillingham Park, which contains 1,500 acres of ground, and has been enclosed since the thirteenth century, is peculiarly picturesque, wild, and beautiful. Eastward of the Castle flows the Chillingham Burn, fringed by fine alders, and rippling along to the Till through a deep and ferny dell. Not far from the Castle one might lose oneself in a forest that seems to be primeval. Here the wild cattle roam, and keep human kind away from their wilderness. They are said to represent the purest type of the gigantic creature which is known to geologists as Bos jprimigenius, though they have much diminished in size from their progenitors. How they survived here, in particular, when they died out of all the rest of the island, can only be surmised; but early in the thirteenth century they were already a subject of curiosity, for in a document dated 1220 Chillingham is mentioned as probably one of the last retreats to which these wild cattle were driven by the increase of population. The best description of these beautiful and splendid creatures is to be found in Bewick’s “ History of Quadrupeds.” They are white, with a black muzzle. The whole of the inside of the ear, and one-third of the outside, is red. They have white horns with black tips, very fine in shape, and bent upwards. Some of the bulls have a thin, upright mane. Though the herd nearly became extinct at one time, and though the in-breeding which restored it was necessarily very close, they retain all the characteristics of wild animals. They hide their young for a week or ten days in the depth of the forest, suckling them two or three times a day. They feed during the night, basking or sleeping during the day. They are some- times very fierce and sometimes very timorous. The herd keeps well together, and is singularly regular in its habits. Persons living at a distance, and accustomed to the ways of these cattle, look out at certain times of the day for a white spot on the liill-side in the park. As the evening advances this moves farther up the hill, until at last the herd is lost among the trees. A singular amount of care is exercised lest the cattle should be frightened or disturbed. When the present writer was taken through the park, the Chillingham Castle.] THE WILD CATTLE. 319 keeper who liacl him in charge insisted on a distance of half a mile or so, and on one’s remaining hidden behind trees. This caution seemed excessive, but in view of what has taken place in the past it may have been no more than was necessary. The present Earl of T anker ville, for instance, narrowly escaped death from an infuriated bull whilst he was still in liis youth. He was attacked as he was riding through the park. His pony was gored under him, and he was narrowly saved by the fortunate shot of a keeper, bred as the bull was about to renew its charge. The incident is commemor- ated in one of Landseer’s pictures, “ The Hying Bull,” which was so great a favourite with the artist that he is said to have kept it in his studio for the long period of twenty- five years. When the Prince of W ales shot a Chillingham bull, in 1872, the Northumbrian humorists found amuse- ment in the fact that the fortunate shot was made from the top of a load of hay. Thus, for instance, sang a pitman poet, in lines that are in- teresting as an example of the pure Morpeth dialect : — “ He’s a warrier, ye knaa, and the papors are full Iv a tumble encoonter he had wiv a bull ! He slowtered the bull, but his critics will say That the Prince was cuncealed in a bundle iv hay ; An’ th it it was ne feat at a’ te lie hid An’ slowter the bull in the way that he did ; But some fokes are selfish, an’ winna hear tell Iv ony greet feats unless dune be thorsel.” There can scarcely be said to be any village of Chillingham. There are a lew pretty little cottages near the gates of the park, at one of which photographs of the house and of the wild cattle are to be obtained, the others being occupied by servants on the estate. The village of Chatton, on the other side of the Till, is a mile and a half northward. Chillingham Church, with which, until cprite recently, the oldest clergyman in the Church of England was associated, is reached by a broad carriage-drive from the park gates. It dates from the thirteenth century, and, besides containing the splendid monument already mentioned, is interesting by reason of the 320 HISTORIC HOUSES. [Chillingham Castle. preservation of the original Norman doorway. The country immediately round about, watered by the sluggish Till, is mainly rich pasture-land, opulently wooded, but from the park, whence the Castle itself seems to lie in a hollow, it slopes gradually upward to the rocky height which is known as Nos Castle. Here, standing amid the rampiers of a Celtic camp, and with Chillingham heronry down below, one beholds a vast stretch of country, ranging on the south from Alnwick to the Cheviots, with Berwick and the Lammermoors on the north, and eastward the Fame Islands, Lindisfarne, Bamborough, Dunstan- burgh, and the sea. Aaron Watson. HEAD OP CHILLINGHAM BULL SHOT BY THE PRINCE OP WALES. INDEX Abbey of Hinton Charterhouse, 251 “Absalom and Achitophel,” and Mr. Thynne, 253 Addison and the Earl of Dorset's poetry, 282 Albert, Prince, visit to Warwick Castle, 27 Alexander III., King' of Scotland, 314 Alfred the Great, 1(1 Alnwick, 64, 79 Alnwick Castle, the prison, 65 ; origin, and first owners, 66 ; tragic fate of the first earls, 66, 67 ; its restora- tion, 67 ; “ The Windsor of the North,” and picture by Canaletto, 68 ; descent of the Percies, 69 : restora- tions by Hugh, Duke of Northum- berland, and the fourth duke, 71, 72 ; the Prudhoe Tower, 72 ; the Outer Bailey, the towers, and the guard-chamber, 74 ; pictures by Dossi, Poussin, and others, 75 ; by Giorgione, Vandyck, Claude, etc., 76, 77 ; by Wilkie, Landseer, and Ward, 78; museums, relics, sur- rounding scenery, etc., 79 Altini, Bust of Shakespeare by, at Alnwick Castle, 75 Amherst, Earl, 280 Ancmm, The Laird of, 38 Angelo, Michael, Outline of mural picture by, at Alnwick Castle, 76 Anne, Queen, Visit of, to Warwick Castle, 27 ; portrait at Malahide Castle, 95 Annesley Hall, 307 Armour at Warwick Castle, 22 Arundel, Earl of, Portrait of, by Rubens at Warwick Castle, 23, 210 ; and Belvoir Castle, 251 Ascham, Roger, 51 Asheton, Nicholas, and the visit of Janies I. to Hoghton Tower, 191, 193 Assheley. Anthony, 146 Audley End, past history, situation, and park, 80 ; first owner, 82 ; Earl of Suffolk builds the mansion, 83 ; sold to Charles II., 84 ; re-con- veyed to the fifth Earl of Suffolk, and afterwards sold to the Countess of Portsmouth, 85 ; the Lords Braybrooke, 86 ; general appearance and arrangement of buildings, 86, 87 ; portraits in the hall, 88 ; state apartments and pictures, 89 ; pri- vate apartments, and park, 90 Audley, Thomas, 82, 88, 211 Augustine, St., Priory of Black Canons of, 251 Bacon, Sir Francis, and Robert Cecil, 55 Barnet, Battle of, 16 41 Barrett, Oak-trees painted by, at Welbeck Abbey, 15 Barry, Sir Charles, and Trentham Hall, 135 Baslow, 119 Bath, First Marquis of, 254 „ The present Marquis of, 254 Battoni, Portrait of the Duke of Roxburghe by, 39 ; portrait at Berkeley Castle, 162 Bauer, Gustave, Pictures by, at Cardiff Castle, 218 Bear and Ragged Staff, Device of the, 17, 24, 130 Beauchamp, Richard de, 30, 168 „ William de, 30 Beaupre, Sir Richard, and Cardiff Castle, 224 Becket, Thomas a, 300 Beech, Sir William, Pictures by, at Kilkenny Castle, 242 Belford, 311 Beling, Sir Richard, and the siege of Lismore Castle, 296 Bellini, Giovanni, Picture by, at Alnwick Castle, 77 “ Belted Will.” (See Howard, Lord William.) Belvoir Castle : lofty situation, 226 ; foundation and owners, 227 ; fire of 1816,227 ; Staunton Tower, 227 ; gold and silver plate, 228 ; paint- ings, 230, 231, 232 ; the Regent’s Gallery, 231, 232 ; visit of George IV., 231 ; the Don Quixote tapestry, and view from windows, 232 ; pic- ture gallery and dining-room, 232, 233 ; library, Belvoir monuments at Bottesford, 234 ; the mausoleum, 235 ; alleged witchcraft, 235, 236 ; Duke of Buckingham and Kath- arine Manners, 237 ; surrounding landscapes, 237 ; and Geoffrey Botevill, 251 Benedictine Monks at Audley End, 82 Bentinck, Lieut.-Gen., Portrait of, by Richmond at Welbeck Abbey, 10 Bentinck, William. (See Portland, First Earl of. ) Bentinck, William ( See Portland, Second Duke of.) Berkeley, Town of, 159 Berkeley Castle, situation and pic- turesque surroundings, 158 ; early owners, 158 ; visit of Henry II., 158 ; external appearance and approach, 159 ; visit of Queen Elizabeth, 159 ; great hall, 159 — 162 ; portraits, tapestry, etc., 162 ; chapel, drawing-rooms, and pic- tures, 163 ; keep and guard-room, 163, 164 ; murder of Edward II., 165 ; muniment-room, charters, manuscripts, etc., 166 ; the dungeon tower and its well, 166 ; legend of a monster toad, 167 ; Thorpe’s tower, 167 ; the Berkeleys and Fitzhardinges, 167 ; romantic mar- riage of the fifth earl, and law- suit of the countess, 168 ; the Berkeley peerage question, 169 Berkeley, Augustus, Earl of, 162 ,, Frederick Augustus, fifth Earl of, his romantic marriage, 168 Berkeley, Maurice, Lord, 168 „ Lord Thomas, 168 Bess of Hardwick. (See Shrews- bury, Countess of, wife of sixth earl.) Bewick and his picture of the Chil- lingham bull, 316, 317 Boleyn, Mary, Portrait of, by Holbein at Warwick Castle, 28 Bolsover, Baroness, Portrait of, by Sant at Welbeck Abbey, 10 “ Book of Sports,” The, 194 Botevill, Geoffrey, ancestor of the Thynne family, 251 Botevill, John, “ John le Thynne,” 251 Both well, Francis Stewart, Earl of, 38 Bottesford Church and Belvoir mem- orials, 234 ; Bowmont, Marquis of, 39 [ Boyle, Robert, 290 Brandon, Lady Frances, mother of Lady Jane Grey, 51 Braybrooke, Baron, 86 Braybrooke, The fourth Lord, 80, 83, 86 Braybrooke, The present Lord, 86 Bridgewater, Duke of, and the Orleans Collection, 204 Broghill, Lord, and the Siege of Lismore Castle, 296 j Brooke, Fulke Greville, First Lord, 31 „ Lord, and Philip Sidney, 128, 130 Brooke, Lord, Recorder of Warwick, 31 Brooke, Lord and Lady William, Por- traits of, by Dahl at Warwick Castle, 26 Brooke and Warwick, Earl, 18 Brown, “Capability,” landscape- gardener, 254 Brown, Mr. John, and the carving at Alnwick Castle, 72, 75 Buckingham, Duke of, and Katharine Manners, 237 Bulletti, Signor, and the carving at Alnwick Castle, 72 Burgess, W., A.R.A., and Cardiff Castle, 214, 215 Burghley, Lord, 55 ; portrait at Hat- field House, 62 Burke, Edmund, and the king’s privy purse, 70 Burne-Jones, Mr. E., Drawings by, at Naworth Castle, 270 322 Burns. Robert, and Flooi's Castle. 39 Bute Docks, 21(1 „ John, fourth Earl of, 225 ,, Lord, and Cardiff Castle, 214 Butler. Picture bj, at Hatfield House, 58 Butlers of Ormonde, History of the, 245 Byron, Lord. 131 ; allusions to New- stead Abbey, 299, 300, 302 ; his affection for Newstead Abbey, and his residence there, 307 — 310 Byron, Sir John, presented with Newstead by Henry VIII., 306 Cabbage, introduction into England, 146 Campbell, Sir Hugh, and Cawdor Castle, 181, 182 Canaletto, Pictures by, at Alnwick Castle, 68 ; at Audley End, 89 ; at Castle Howard, 206 Canina, Signor Luigi, and Alnwick Castle, 72 Canmore, Malcolm, 66 Canova, Sculpture by, at Chatsworth, 116 Canterbury, Archbishop of (Thomas Bouchier), and Knole House, 274 Canterbury, Archbishop of (Thomas Cromwell), and Knole House, 275 Canterbury, Archbishop of (John Morton), and Knole House, 274 Canute and Warwick Castle, 16 Caracci, Annibale, Pictures by, at Castle Howard, 204, 206 Caracci, Ludovico, Picture by , at Castle Howard, 204 Caradoc of Llancarvan, 219 Cardiff, 212 ; origin and former name, 219 Cardiff Castle, approach, 212 ; as it was, 213 ; Roman handiwork, 214 ; restoration and designs for new buildings, 214, 215 ; interior decor- ation, 215 ; library and banquet- ing hall, 215 ; Lonsdale's pictures, wealth of ornamentation, private chapel, Palestine collection, the Chaucer Room, the Children’s Room, etc., 216 ; winter smoking-room, pictures, and proposed plan of completion of castle, 218 ; its his- tory, 218—225 Carey, Sir Robert, 38 Carlisle, Earl of, Secretary for Ireland, 203 Carlisle, First Earl of, 211. 268 „ Present Earl of, 270, 271 Carne, Mr., and Cardiff Castle, 223 Carthagh, St., and Lismore, 294 Caryl, Sir John, 211 Castagno, Andrea del, Picture by, at Longleat, 258 Castle Howard, approach and ave- nues, 198 ; inscriptions on obelisk, 199 ; the Castle of Hinderskelf, 199 ; architectural features, gar- dens, and principal entrance, 201 ; the hall and Peligrini's frescoes. 202 ; richness of decoration and furniture, collection of china, large wine-cooler, altar from the Temple of Delphi, etc., 203 : collection of pictures, 204, 206,207 ; the Carlisle branch of the Howard family, 210 HISTORIC HOUSES. Cattle of Chillingham, 311. 317, 318, 319 Castlehaven, Lord, and the siege of Lismore Castle, 297 Cavendish. Lord Frederick Charles, 118 Cavendish, Sir Charles, 2 „ Sir William, 2 Cavendish-Harley, Lady Margaret, 2 Cawdor Castle, the Macbeth and Duncan traditions, 170; situation, 171 : entrance gate and surround- ings, 172, 173 ; the thanedom. 174 ; growth of the castle, 175 ; entrance, “ King Duncan’s Chamber.” and tower, 176 ; hiding-place of Lord Lovat, 176 ; wooing of Muriel Calder by John of Lorn, 178, 179; quarrels of rival claimants, 179 ; legend of a witch, 180 ; a mad laird, 180 ; improvements by Sir Hugh Campbell, 181 ; old tapestry and curiosities, 182 ; present owners, 183 Caxton’s “ Recuyell of the Historyes of Troy,” 40 Cecil, Robert. 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ORDER FORM TO BE DETACHED. INDEX. 323 De Eos family, The, and Belvoir Castle, 227 De Todeni family, The, and Belvoir Castle, 227 “ Decameron,” Boccaccio’s, price paid for a first edition, 39 Delaroche, Portrait of Napoleon by, at Welbeck Abbey, 10 Devonshire. Duchess of, Sir Joshua Reynolds’s picture of, 115 Devonshire, First Duke of, 107 ; and Colepepper, 108 Devonshire, Fourth Duke of, and Lismore Castle, 297 Devonshire, Origin of the house of, 2 Didius, Aulus, 219 Dobson, Pictures at Warwick Castle by, 26 ; at Longleat, 255 Dolci, Carlo, Picture by, at Welbeck Abbey, 10 ; at Alnwick Castle, 77 Domenichino, Picture by, at Castle Howard, 206 Dorset, Anne Clifford, Countess of, pithy letter of, to the Secretary of State, 286 Dorset, Charles, sixth Earl of, and his poetical gifts, 282 Dorset, First Earl of, and Knole House, 274, 275, 276 Dossi, Dosso, Picture by, at Alnwick Castle, 75 Douglas, Earl of, 42 Douglas, Lord Archibald, 264 Dou w, Picture by, at W arwickCastle, 27 Dryden, “ Absalom and Achitophel,” . and Mr. Thynne, 253 ; and the Earl of Dorset’s poetry, 282 Dublin, under the Danes and Nor- mans, 99 Dudley, Henry, and Audley End, 82 Duel between Sir Edward Sackville and Lord Bruce of Kinross, 283 ; between Lord Byron and Mr. Cha- worth, 308 Dunrobin Castle, 138 Diirer, Albert, Cabinet supposed to be carved by, 94 ; altar-piece at Mala- hide Castle, 95 Durham, Dr. Cosin, Bishop of, and the toad-stone at Chillingham, 318 Eastbury Palace, 148, 149 Edensor, 1 1 7 Edgar, King, and Hatfield, 48 Ed ward, Prince, son of Henry VI., and Warwick Castle, 22 Edward II., Murder of, 165 Edward III., and Chillingham Castle, 313 Edward VI., tuition at Hatfield House, 51 ; portrait at Penshurst Place, 130 Eildons, The, 34, 43 Einon, Welsh Ambassador, 219, 220 Elizabeth, Queen, Gift to Leicester at Warwick Castle from, 23 ; at Hat- field House, 52 — 54 ; “ Reviewing the troops at Tilbury ” — picture at Hat- field House, and other memorials of her, 59, 60 ; portrait at Hatfield House by Zucchero, 61 ; portrait at Malaliide Castle, 95 ; visit to Pens- hurst, 128 ; visit to Berkeley Castle, 159; portrait at Berkeley Castle, 163 ; visit to Longleat, 252 ; her screen at Knole House, 283 Ely, Early Bishops of, 50 j Ely, See of. 48 Enamels, Limousin, at W arw ick Castle , 25 Essex, Geoffrey de Mandeville, Earl of, and the Priory at Audley End, 82 ; and Cardiff Castle, 221 Ethelfleda, Princess, and Warwick Castle, 16 Eure, Lord, 211 Evelyn, John, and the vinery at Hat- field House, 56 Fenelli, Sculpture by, at Chatsworth, 116 Ferrara, Mazzolini da, Picture by, at Alnwick Castle, 77 Fesch, Cardinal, 76 Fife, Duke of, and the Innes Estates, 41 Fitzhamon, Robert, 219, 221 Fitzhardinge, Lord, and the Berkeley Manuscripts, 166 ; and the Berkeley peerage, 169 Fitzhardinge, Robert, and Berkeley Castle, 158 Floors Castle, rivers in the vicinity, 32 ; origin of name, and external appearance, 34 ; avenues, gardens, etc., 35; the “Fishing Shiel ” and Entrance Hall, 36 ; pictures and various rooms, 37 ; various owners, 38 ; historical connections, the Dining-room, Library, and portraits, 39 ; visit of Queen Victoria, 40 ; the Innes-Ker family, and present owners, 41 ; fishing and hunting trophies, and history of the Kers, 42, 43 ; neighbouring castles and monastic houses, 43 ; surrounding scenery, etc., 44 Florentine table at Warwick Castle, 26 Frame, Mr. W., and Cardiff Castle, 214 Gainsborough. Pictures by, at Trent- ham Hall, 138, 139 ; at Berkeley Castle, 162 ; at Castle Howard. 207 ; at Belvoir Castle, 231, 232 ; at Knole House, 284 Gamage, Barbara, afterwards Coun- tess of Leicester, 1 23 Garafolo, Picture by, at Alnwick Castle, 75 Gaveston, Piers, 141 Gentileschi, Orazio, Picture by, at Castle Howard, 204 George II., Portrait by Pine at Aud- ley End, 89 George III., and Warwick Castle, 27, 29 ; portrait by Kneller at Floors Castle, 40 ; visit to Hatfield House, 57 ; portrait by Reynolds at Hat- field House, 62 ; portrait at Trent- ham Hall, 139 ; visit to Longleat, 254 George IV., visit to Belvoir Castle, 231 Gerard, Sir Charles, 223 Germaine, Lady Betty, and Knole House, 279 Gheerardts, Picture by, at Knole House, 278 Ghirlandais, Picture by, at Longleat, 258 Ghost of Chillingham, The, 316 Gibbons, Grinling, 110; work at Chatsworth, 114 Gibson, Sculpture by, at Chatsworth, 116 Gildas, Gibbon’s opinion of, 219 Giordano, Picture by, at Kilkenny Castle, 242 Giorgione, Pictures by, at Alnwick Castle, 76, 77 Gladstone, Mr. and the oaks in the park of Hatfield House, 48 Glamorgan, Conquest of, 220 Glendower, Owen, burns Cardiff, 222 Gloucester, Robert Consul, Earl of, 221 Gloucester, Robert, Duke of, 216 Gloucester, William, Earl of, 221 “ Gossart, Jan” (Mabuse), Picture by, at Castle Howard, 206 Gowers, History of the, 141, 142 Granby, Marquis of, 233 Grant, Sir Francis, Picture by, at Belvoir Castle, 234 Grapes at Welbeck Abbey, 14 Gresham, Sir Thomas, 251 Grevilles, Motto of the, 31 Grey, Lady Jane, 51, 82, 88, 162 Greys, The, of Chillingham Castle, 314 Greystocke, The lords of, 211 Guido, Picture by, at Alnwick Castle, 77 Guy's Cliff, 30 Gwynne, Nell, and Bishop Ken, 250 Haddon Hall. 292, 293 Hadrian, Emperor, his bridge at New- castle, 75 Handel and St. Giles’ House, 152 Hardwick, Elizabeth (Sre Shrews- bury, Countess of, wife of sixth earl.) Hardwick, John, 1 Hardwick, Sir William, 105 Hartington, Lord (now Duke of Devonshire), 111 Hatfield House, external appearance on south side, 45 ; approach from railway, dimensions, gardens, etc., 46 ; the park and surrounding country, 47 ; history and origin of name, 48 ; mediaeval history and residence of the Bishops of Eiy, 50 ; in the time of Henry VIII., 51 ; pageants given by Sir Thomas Pope, and his entertainment of Princess Elizabeth, 52, 53 ; Queen Elizabeth’s oak, 54 ; Robert Cecil and Queen Elizabeth, 55 ; Robert Cecil be- comes possessor, and makes great extensions, 56 ; visit of Duke of York. 57 ; visit of George III., 57 ; chapel, Marble Hall, great hall, etc., 58 ; grand staircase, King James’s Room, etc., 60 ; portraits of Robert Cecil and Queen Elizabeth. 61 ; pictures by Lely, Vandyck, Rey- nolds, and others, 62 ; picture with two faces, 62, 63 ; collection of manuscripts, 63 ; monument to the first earl, 63 Henrietta, Queen, Portrait of. by Van- dyck at Warwick Castle. 22 Henry I. and the See of Ely, 48, 221 Henry II. and the conquest of Ireland, 99 ; and the murder of Thomas a Becket, 300 324 Henry III. and Chevelyngham Manor House, 314 Henry Y. and tlie county of Tanquer- ville, 314 Henry VIII., portrait by Holbein at Warwick Castle, 27 ; and Audley End, 82 ; portraits by Holbein at Chatsworth, 115; portrait by Hol- bein at Belvoir Castle, 230 ; portrait at Na worth, Castle, 270 ; and Knole House, 275 Herbert, Baron, of Cardiff, 225 „ Hon. W„ 131 Herbert, Lady Charlotte, and Cardiff Castle, 225 Herbert, Sir William, afterwards Earl of Pembroke, 222 Herkomer, Picture by, at Belvoir Castle, 234 Hertford, Marquis of, and Cardiff Castle, 222 Hetons, The De, of Chilling-ham, 312, 313 Hinderskelf, Castle of, 199 ; deriva- tion of name, 210 Hoare, Sir B. C., and Longleat, 259 Hoghton, Sir Gilbert, sides with the Royalists, and loses Hoghton Tower, 195 Hoghton, Sir Henry, 197 ., Sir Richard, entertains J ames I. at Hoghton Tower, 1 90 — 1 94 Hoghton, Sir Charles de, present owner of Hoghton Tower. 197 Hoghton, Thomas, and Hoghton Tower, 190 Hoghton Tower, situation and sur- roundings, 184 : blowing up of the tower, and Norman origin of the family title, 185 ; approach and arrangement of buildings, 186; Great Hall and Banqueting Hall, 186,187; “King’s” rooms, Guinea Room, and draw-well, 1 88 ; family arms and portraits, 1 90 ; various owners, and visit of James I., 191 ; King James hunting, 193 ; cap- tured by the Parliamentarians, 195; statue of William III., 196 ; later history, and present owner, 197 Holbein, Portraits by, at Warwick Castle, 27, 28 ; at Audley End, 88 ; at Chatsworth, 115 ; at Penshurst Place, 130 ; at Berkeley Castle, 163 ; at Castle Howard, 207 ; at Belvoir Castle, 230 ; at Kilkenny Castle, 242 ; at Longleat, 255, 257 ; at Knole House, 278 Iloppner, Pictures by, at Berkeley Castle, 162; at Castle Howard, 210; at Belvoir Castle, 231 ; at Knole House, 285 Hornby Castle, 191 Horsemanship, Duke of Newcastle’s book on, 13 Houthurst, Picture attributed to, at Castle Howard, 204 Howard of Effingham, Lord, 83, 85 Howard, Lord William (“ Belted Will”), 207, 208; his chequered career, 209, 210, 260, 263, 264, 266, 267 Hulne Park, 79 Hume Castle, 43 Hurlstone, Picture by, at Chillingham Castle, 3 1 7 Hussey, Sir Walter, 94, 103 HISTORIC HOUSES. Innes, and Floors Castle, 35 „ Sir James, and the Roxburghe Estates, 41 Iorwerth, Llewelyn ab, and Cardiff Castle, 222 Ireton, Portrait of, at Malahide Castle, 95 Isabev, Picture by, at Welbeck Abbey, 10 Jackson, Canon, and the Longleat Manuscripts, 258 James I. and Robert Cecil, 55 ; statue at Hatfield House, 60 ; visit to Hoghton Tower, 190 — 194 ; and witchcraft at Belvoir, 237 James II. and Lady Talbot, 94 ; por- trait at Malahide Castle, 95 ; visit to Lismore Castle, 291 James II., King of Scots, 40 Jameson, George, Portrait by, at Floors Castle, 38 Janssen, Portrait at Warwick Castle by, 26; portrait of Charles I. at Chatsworth, 115; portrait of Milton at St. Giles’ House, 151 ; portrait of Lord Berkeley at Berkeley Castle, 163 ; at Castle Howard, 207 Jeffreys, Judge, and the fate of Alger- non Sidney, 130, 250 Jenner, Dr., Bust of, at Berkeley Castle, 162 Jennings, Frances, afterwards Lady Tyrconnel, 95 Jennings, Sarah, afterwards Duchess of Marlborough, 95 John, King, and Cardiff Castle, 221, 251 ; and Lismore Castle, 288 John of Padua and Longleat, 252 Jones, Inigo, and St. Giles’ House, 145, 151 ; and Lismore Castle, 289 ; and Chillingham Castle, 314 Jonson, Ben, and Penshurst, 122, 123 ; portrait at Naworth Castle, 270 Justin, lord of Morgan wg, 219, 220 Kale, River, 43 Kelso Abbey, 38, 43, 264 „ Tower of, 32 Kemys, Sir Charles, and Cardiff Castle, 223 Ken, Bishop, his connection with Longleat and the Thynne family, 250, 254, 258 Ker, and Floors Castle, 35 Ker Clan, The, 42 Kilkenny Castle, situation, and stately appearance. 238 ; Anglo- Norman origin and alterations, 239 ; tapestry, 240 ; dining-room, and gold plate, 241 ; pictures, 242, 243 ; Moorish staircase, surround- ing landscape, library, etc., 243 ; Correggio’s “Madonna and Child,” and pictures in drawing-room, 244 ; crystal ball and gilt key, 244 ; rise of the Butlers, 245 ; history of the Ormondes, 247 ; besieged by Crom- well, 247 ; the Anglo-Norman room, 248 “ King’s burgh,” 32 Kneller, Sir Godfrey, Portrait of Queen Anne at Warwick Castle by, 27 ; portrait of George III. at Floors Castle, 40 ; at Malahide Castle, 94. 95 ; at Penshurst Place, 130 : at Berkeley Castle, 162 ; at Cardiff Castle, 218 ; at Belvoir Castle, 231 ; at Kilkenny Castle, 242 ; at Longleat, 255 ; at Knole House, 279, 286 ; at Chillingham Castle, 316 Knockmealdown Mountains, 292 Knole House, surrounding country and etymology, 273 ; early history, 274 — 278 ; restorations and addi- tions by the Archbishops of Canter- bury and Earl of Dorset, 274, 275 ; general plan, and ownership between reigns of Henry VIII. and Elizabeth, 275 ; gate-house and great hall, 276, 278 ; Jacobean screen, 278 ; the Brown Gallery and its panelled walls, 278 ; transfer of ownership, 278, 279 ; pictures, 278, 280 — 282, 284 —286 ; Lady Betty Germaine’s Bed- room, 279 ; billiard-room and Lei- cester Gallery, 280, 281 ; Sackville and Curzon pedigrees, 281 ; tapestry and old china, 282, 283 : screen of Queen Elizabeth and frieze of figures, 283 ; plundered by the Par- liamentarians, 284 ; the Crimson Drawing-room and its portraits, the Cartoon Gallery and the King's Bed-room, dining-room, and gold and silver plate, 284 ; Mrs. Sack- ville West’s boudoir, 285 ; library, and Archbishop Cranmer’s rooms, 286 ; dimensions of the park, and extensive views, 287 Konigsmark, Count, and the assassin- ation of Mr. Thynne, 253 Lammermoors, The, 43 Landseer, Pictures by, at Alnwick Castle. 78 ; at Chatsworth, 115 ; and the Chillingham cattle, 316, 319 Langharne, Major-General, and Car- diff Castle, 224 Lawrence, Sir J., Pictures by, at Longleat, 258 Lawrence, Sir Thomas. 23 ; picture at Kilkenny Castle by, 242 ; at Long- leat, 257 Le Despenser, Family of, 222 Leicester, First Earl of, 123, 275 Lely, Pictures by, at Warwick Castle, 27 ; at Hatfield House, 62 ; at Mala- hide Castle, 94, 95 ; at Penshurst Place, 130 ; at St. Giles' House, 147, 151 ; at Berkeley Castle, 162 ; at Castle Howard, 207 ; at Belvoir Castle, 231 ; at Kilkenny Castle, 242 ; at Longleat, 255, 257 ; at Knole House, 280, 286 ; at Chilling- ham Castle, 316 Leslie, General, and Floors Castle, 39 Leveson, Nicholas, 134 Leveson, Richard, 134, 138 Leveson-Gower, Sir John, 142 Leveson-Gower, William, 134 Lichfield, Siege of, 23 Lilleshall, 138 Limerick, Treaty of, 95 Limousin enamels at Warwick Castle, 25 Lindsay, Earl of, portrait by Janssen at Warwick Castle, 26 L’lsle and Dudley, Baron de, 131 INDEX. 325 Lisle, Dudley, Viscount, and Warwick Castle, 30 Lisle, Lord, slain, at Nibley Green, 168 Lismore, Bishop of, old crozier at Lismore Castle belonging to, 289 Lismore Castle, Earl of Moreton’s original fortress, 288 ; entrance- hall, the Youghal sword and mace, and the Bishop’s crozier, 289 ; ban- queting-hall and dining-room, 290 ; pictures, 290 ; drawing-room and view from windows, 291 ; visit of James II., 291 ; the grounds, 292 ; avenue, 293 ; early history, 293 — 296 ; transfer of ownership from the Earl of Cork to the Cavendishes, 297 ; disastrous fire, 297 ; the sal- mon weir, 297 Livingstone, Dr., and Newstead Abbey, 305 Llancarvan, 219 Llandaff Cathedral, and its records. 219 Longleat, allusions of Lord Macaulay, and general architectural style, 249 ; various approaches, and con- nection of Bishop Ken with it, 250 ; early history, 251 ; purchased by Sir John Thynne, 251 ; visit of Queen Elizabeth and various ad- ditions to the building, 252 ; assass- ination of Mr. Thynne, 253 ; visit of George III., and improvements in the last and present centuries, 254 ; paintings, the Red Library, etc., 255, 257 ; Gobelins tapestry in drawing-room, the chapel, portraits, and literary treasures, 258 ; the Weymouth pine and the Shirewater lake, 259 Lonsdale, Paintings by, at Cardiff Castle, 216 Lort, Sir Gabriel, 183 Louvain-Percies, The, 70 Loyola, Ignatius, Portrait of, at War- wick Castle, by Rubens, 26 Lucan, Earl of, 95 Lucas, Sir Charles, 89 Lunsford, Sir Thomas, 88 Mabuse, Pictures by, at Castle How- ard, 206 ; at Haworth Castle, 270 Macaulay, Lord, allusion to the Duke of Portland and Prior the poet, 12 ; reference to Earl of Salisbury, 57 ; on the first Duke of Devon- shire, 107 ; allusions to Longleat, 249 Magrath, Miles, Archbishop of Cashel and Bishop of Lismore, 294 Malahide and St. Patrick, 98 ; under the Danes and Normans, 99 Malahide Castle, antiquity, and ex- ternal appearance, 92 ; the Oak Room and great dining-hall, 94 ; pictures, 95 ; Diirer's altar-piece, 95, 96 ; loyalty of the Talbots to the Stuarts, 97 ; seized by Cromwell and given to Myles Corbet, 98 ; re- stored to the Talbots, 98 ; how the Talbots originally came into pos- session, 98, 99 ; the tenure on which the lands are held, 100, 101 ; his- toric relics and ancient church, 102 ; Lady Maud Talbot, 103 Manners family, The, and their love for Art, 230 Manners, Katharine, and the Duke of Buckingham, 237 Manners, Sir Robert, and Belvoir Castle, 227 Mantovani, Frieze by, at Alnwick Castle, 75 Manuscripts at Hatfield House, 63 ; at Alnwick Castle, 75 ; at Chats- worth, 117 ; at Cardiff Castle, 215 ; at Longleat, 258 Maratti, Carlo, Picture by, at Castle Howard, 206 Marie Antoinette, Table at Warwick Castle once belonging to, 24, 317 Marlborough Library, The, and Boc- caccio’s “ Decameron,” 39 Mary II., Jewel-case of, at Welbeck Ahbey, 10 Mary, Queen of Scots, portraits at Hatfield House, 62 ; and the Duke of Norfolk, 83, 95, 106, 115, 263, 283 Matsys, Quentin, Picture by, at Aud- ley End, 88 Maudit, William, and Warwick Castle, 30 Mazo, Picture by, at Castle Howard, 207 Melcombe, Lord, 149 Melville, Lord, 58 Middlesex, Lionel, Earl of, 279 Millet’s “ Angelus,” engraving at Ivnole House, 286 Milton, portrait by Janssen at St. Giles’ House, 151 Monk, General, portrait at Naworth Castle, 270 Monmouth, Duke of, portrait at Hat- i field House, 63, 147, 249, 250, I 252, 254 Montiroli, Signor Giovanni, and Aln- wick Castle, 72, 77 Montrose, Earl of, Picture of, at War- wick Castle, by Dobson, 26 Moore, Tom, “Life and Letters of Lord Byron,” 308 More, Sir Antonio, Picture by, at Castle Howard, 207 Moroni, Portrait at Warwick Castle by, 26 ; portrait at Alnwick Castle, 77 Morpeth, Lord, afterwards Earl of Carlisle, 203, 268 Mortimer, Roger, and Cardiff Castle, 222 Morton, Dr., Bishop of Chester, preaches before James I. at Ilogh- ton Tower, 194 Murillo, Picture by, at Warwick Castle, 28 ; at Chatsworth, 115; at Belvoir Castle, 230, 231 ; at Kil- kenny Castle, 242 Myerscough Lodge, 191 My tens, Pictures by, at Longleat, 255 ; at Knole House, 282, 284 Napoleon I., portrait by David, at Warwick Castle, 28 Naworth Castle, 210 ; Lord William Howard’s rooms, 261 ; situation and surrounding scenery, 262 ; early history, 263, 264 ; origin of name, 266 ; the dungeon, Belted Will’s Tower, and completion of castle by Lord Thomas Dacre, 266 ; work of | Lord William Howard, 267 ; de- structive fire of 1844, 268 ; gate- house, archway, and great hall, 269 ; pictures, 270, 2V 1 ; library and music-room, 270 ; reminiscences of Belted Will, 271 Neilson’s tapestry at Welbeck Abbey, 10 Nevil, Richard, and Warwick Castle, 30 Nevilles, Tomb of the, 314 Newcastle, (first) Duke of, and the building of Welbeck Abbey, 5, 12 ; his book on horsemanship, and portrait, 13 Newstead Abbey, position and sur- roundings, 298, 299 ; Lord Byron’s allusions, 299, 300, 302 ; ecclesias- tical origin, 300 ; lake, chapter- house, etc., 302 ; endowment of Henry II., 303 ; Byron’s rooms, 304 ; memorials of Byron and Dr. Livingstone, 305, 306 ; presented to Sir John Byron by Henry VIII., 306 ; purchased by Colonel Wild- man, 307, 310 ; Lord Byron's affec- tion for it, and his life there, 309, 310 Noble, Bust by, of Earl of Shaftesbury, 150 Nollekens, Bust by, at Chatsworth, 1 16 Norfolk, Thomas. Duke of, 83, 263 Normans and Welsh, Coalition of, 219 Northumberland, Algernon, fourth Duke of, 68, 71, 72 Northumberland, Algernon Percy, Earl of, portrait by Dobson, at War- wick Castle, 26 Northumberland, Hugh, first Duke of, 68, 70, 71, 77 Nucci, Sculpture by, at Alnwick Castle, 77 Oak. The Greendale, at Welbeck Abbey, 14 Oaks, painted by Barrett, at Welbeck Abbey, 15; of Penshurst, 122 Ogle, Henry, Earl of, 253 Orleans Gallery, The, 24 : sale of Collection, 204 Ormonde, First Duke of. 241, 246 ,, Piers, Earl of, 240 „ Second Duke of, 239 Ormondes, History of the, 246, 247 Ossulston, Lord, 315 Ostade, Van, Pictures by, at Cardiff Castle, 218 ; at Kilkenny Castle, 242 Oxford, Countess of, 9 Pageants at Hatfield House, 52 Paris, Matthew, and the history of Hatfield, 50 Patrick, St., 98 Paul III., portrait byTitian at Alnwick Castle, 76 Paxton, Sir Joseph, and Chatsworth, 110, 111 ; and the Crystal Palace, 111 ; his plan for a London hos- pital, 111, 112 ; burial-place, 118 Pedigrees, The Sackville and Curzon, 281 Peligrini, Frescoes by, at Castle Howard, 202, 203 Pembroke, Countess of, 126, 129 326 Pembroke, Richard, Earl of, deeds at Kilkenny Castle, 244 Pembroke, William Mareschal, Earl of, and Cardiff Castle, 222 Pencester, Sir Stephen, 122 Penn, William, and Penshurst Place, 130 Penshurst Place, the home of Sir Philip Sidney and Alger- non Sidney, 120 ; surrounding country, 121 ; origin of name, the park and its oaks, 122 ; Jonson's Forest ” and Waller’s poems, 123, 124 ; lakes, gardens, and park, 124, 125 ; ancestors of Sir Philip, and the various Earls of Leicester, 126 ; Baronial Hall, 127 ; portraits, 128, 129 ; curiosities and pictures, 130 ; present possessors, 131 Pepys, Samuel, and the vinery at Hatfield House, 56, 57 ; and Audley End, 87 Percies, Descent of the, 69, 70 Percy, Agnes, Portrait of, at Sion House, 70 Percy, Henry de, and Alnwick Castle, 66, 67 Percy, Lady Elizabeth, and Mr. Thynne, 253 Perry, Mr. W., and Penshurst Place, 131 Perth, Duke of, 40 Philip III. of Spain, Portrait at Hatfield House by Velasquez, 62 Phillip, John, Portraits (copies) by, at Alnwick Castle, 77 Pine, Portrait by, of George II. at Audley End, 89 Piombo, Sebastian del, Painting by, at Alnwick Castle, 76 Plate, Gold and silver, at Belvoir Castle, 228 Playfair, and Floors Castle, 34, 35 Plessit, John de, and Warwick Castle, 30 Pole, Cardinal, and Knole House, 275 Pope, and the Earl of Dorset’s poetry 282 Pope, Sir Thomas, and the pageants at Hatfield House, 52 Portland, Duke of, 2 ,, Duke of, and the tunnel at Welbeck Abbey, 6 Portland, Second Duke of, 2 ,, William Bentinck, first Earl of, his friendship with Wil- liam HI., II Portsmouth, Countess of, and Audley End, 85 Portsmouth, Duchess of, 95 Pottery at Warwick Castle, 25, 26 Poussin, Nicholas, Picture by, at Alnwick Castle, 75 ; at Belvoir Castle, 232 Power, American sculptor, Bust of Proserpine at Warwick Castle by, 25 Power, Major, and the siege of Lis- more Castle, 296 Premonstratensians, Abbey of, 2, 5 Prior the poet, 11 ; anecdote of the Duke of Portland and, 12 ; and Lord Buckhurst, 280, 282 Ptolemy, allusion to Lismore, 293 Pulteney, Sir John de, and Penshurst Place, 1 27 Punch-bowl, Great silver, at Belvoir Castle, 228 HISTORIC HOUSES. Quixote, Don, tapestry at Belvoir Castle, 232 Raeburn, Portraits by, at Floors Castle, 40 Raleigh, Sir Walter, and Lismore Castle, 289, 294 Ramsay, Allan, Portrait of Duke of Roxburghe at Floors Castle by, 39 ; pictures at Cardiff Castle, 218 Ranulph de Glanvil, 66 Raphael, Pictures by, at Welbeck Abbey, 10 ; at Warwick Castle, 24 ; at Alnwick Castle, 77 ; at Long- leat, 258 ; cartoons at Knole House, 284 ; (copies) at Lismore Castle, 290 “ Recuyell of the Historyes of Troy,” Caxton's, 40 Rembrandt, Pictures by, at Warwick Castle, 23 ; at Malaliide Castle, 95 ; at Chatsworth, 115 ; at Penshurst Place, 130 Reynolds, Sir Joshua, Pictures by, at Welbeck Abbey, 12 ; at Floors Castle, 39 ; at Hatfield House, 62 ; at Malahide Castle, 94 ; at Chatsworth, 115 ; at Trentham Hall, 138 ; at Berkeley Castle, 163 ; at Castle Howard. 207, 210 ; at Bel- voir Castle, 230, 231, 233 ; at Long'- leat, 255 ; at Knole House, 284 Rhys-ap-Tudor, 219 Richard II., 30 Richard III. and Warwick Castle, 19 Richardson, Portrait of Prior by, at Welbeck Abbey, 11 Richmond, W. B., Pictures by, at Welbeck Abbey, 1 0 ; at Longleat, 257 Riding-school at Welbeck Abbey, 12 Rinaldi, Sculjffure by, at Chatsworth, 116 Robert, Duke of Normandy, and Car- diff Castle, 213, 221 Robinson, Sir James, and Castle How- ard, 201 Rockingham, Marquis of, 14 Roger of Berkeley, 158 Roman remains at Audley End, 90 ; at Cardiff Castle, ,218 ; near Chil- lingham Castle, 311 Romano. Giulio, Pictures by, at Aln- wick Castle, 75 ; at Castle Howard, 206 Romney, Pictures by, at Trentham Hall, 138, 139. 140 ; at Castle How- ard, 207 ; at Cardiff Castle, 218 Rosa, Salvator, Pictures by, at War- wick Castle, 28 ; at St. Giles’ House, 151 ; at Castle Howard, 206 ; at Bel- voir Castle, 230; at Kilkenny Castle, 242, 244 ; at Knole House, 281 Roxburgh Castle, remains of, 32 Roxburghe, (the present) Duchess of, 41 Roxburghe, James, fifth Duke of, 40 ,, James, sixth Duke of, 34 ,, John, first Duke of, 34, 39 ,, Robert, second Duke of, 39 „ Robert, third Earl of, 40 „ Robert Ker, first Earl of, 38, 41 Royal George-, The, and the billiard- table at Trentham Hall, 139 Rubens, Pictures by, at Welbeck Abbey, 10; at Warwick Castle, 23, 24, 26, 27, 29 ; at Castle Howard, 206 ; at Kilkenny Castle, 244 ; at Longleat, 255 Rupert, Prince, portraits by Vandyck at Warwick Castle, 26 Rusk in, John. 216 Russell, Lord William, portrait at Warwick Castle, 26 Rutland, First Earl of, 227 „ Seventh Duke of, 227 „ Seventh Earl of, and the tombs at Belvoir, 234 Rutland, Sixth Earl of, and the death of his two sons, 235, 236 Rutland, Third Duke of, 230 Sackville, Lady Margaret, 210 Sackville, Sir George, and Lady Betty Germaine, 279 Sackville, Sir Thomas. (See Dorset, first Earl of.) Saffron Walden, 80, 90, 21 St. Giles’ House, foundation, 145 ; first owners, 146 ; the De Plecys and the Ashleys, 146, 147 ; additions by the fourth earl, 148 ; trees and park, 149 : Thomson’s table, eccentricities of Henry Hastings, and Noble’s 'bust of the seventh earl, 150 ; Louis XV. Dining-room, 150; Chippendale chandelier, 151; pictures, 151 ; visit of Charles II., Handel manuscripts, and the study of the seventh earl, 152 ; memorial to the countess, 155; Grotto and Park, 155 ; ghostly legend, 156 Salisbury, First Earl of, 55 ; portrait at Hatfield House, 61, 63 Salisbury, Fourth Earl of, 63 ,, Marquis of, 48 „ The present Marquis of, 58 „ Second Marquis of, 58 San Sebastian, Picture of, by Vandyck at Warwick Castle, 27 Sant, Portrait of Baroness Bolsover at Welbeck Abbey by, 10 Sarto, Andrea Del, Picture by, at Alnwick Castle, 77 Say and Seale, Baron (James Fiennes, created by Henry VI.), 274 Scapula, Ostorius, 218 Schidone, Picture by, at Alnwick Castle, 75 Schwanthaler, Sculpture by, at Chats- worth, 116 Scott, Michael, 32 Scott, Sir Gilbert, Church at Chats- worth designed by, 118 Scott, Sir Walter, 32 ; and the Duke of Roxburghe, 39, 43, 44 ; and Lord William Howard (“Belted Will”), 208, 260, 263, 311, 314 Sculpture, at Warwick Castle, 25 ; at Alnwick Castle, 76, 77 ; at Chats- worth, 116 ; at Trentham Hall, 139, 140 Sedley, Sir Charles, 308 Seymour, Lady Elizabeth, 77 Shaftesbury, First Earl of, 146 „ Seventh Earl of, 146 ; his study at St. Giles’, 152, 153, 154 Shakespeare, Bust by Altini at Aln- wick Castle, 75 Shelley, kinsman of the poet, death by drowning at Penshurst, 125 Shelley, John, 131 Shelley-Sidney, Sir John, 131 Shelley, Sir Bysshe, 131 Sheriffmuir, Battle of, and the Duke of Roxburghe, 39 Sherwood Forest, 2, 4, 10 Shore, Jane, Portrait of, 162 Shrewsbury, Countess of (wife of sixth earl), 2 ; her portrait at Wel- beok Abbey, 3, 8, 104 Shrewsbury, John Talbot, Lord of, 94 Shrewsbury, Sixth Earl of, 2 Sidney, Algernon, and Penshurst Place, 120, 129 ; execution, 130 Sidney, Dorothy, 123, 126 „ Elizabeth, 131 „ Sir Henry, 126, 130 „ Sir Philip, and Penshurst Place, 120; appearance and charac- ter, 128 Sidney, Sir William, 126, 131 Siward de Arden and Warwick Castle, 18 Smailholm Tower, 43 Smith, Charlotte, Poem on Penshurst by, 124 Smithson, Sir Hugh, 77 Snyders, Pictures by, at Longleat, 255 ; at Haworth Castle, 270 Soissons, Picture by, at Welbeck Abbey, 10 Solly, Portrait of Queen Victoria at Kilkenny Castle by, 242 Somerset, Algernon Seymour, Duke of 77 Somerset, Charles Seymour, seventh Duke of, 254 Somerset, The Lord Protector, 251, 275 Somerset, Bobert Carr, Earl of, por- trait at Audley End, 89 Sonest, Picture by. at Lismore Castle, 290 Southey and Penshurst, 1 23 Spencer, George John, Earl of, 131 Spencer, William Robert, 131 Spenser and Penshurst Place, 130 ; and Lismore, 289 Spenser, Peregrine, 295 St. Loe, Sir William, 2 Stacpole Court, chief seat of the Earls of Cawdor, 183 Stafford, Marquis of, portrait by Romney, 138, 140, 142 Stafford House, 138 Stanfield, Pictures by, at Trentham Hall, 141 Stanley, Mr. H. M., and Hewstead Abbey, 306 Steen, Jan, Pictures by, at Belvoir Castle, 233 Stephen, King, 216 Stephenson, Robert, and Sir Joseph Paxton, 111 Stone, Portrait of the Earl of War- wick, after Vandyck, at Warwick Castle, by, 26 Stradling, Sir Edward, and Cardiff Castle, 224 Strafford, Earl of, and Malahide Castle, 98 ; portrait by Vandyck at War- wick Castle, 26 Strangford, Viscount, 131 Strazzi, Sculpture by, at Alnwick Castle, 77 Suffolk, Charles Brandon, Duke of, 51, 134 Suffolk, Thomas Howard, Earl of, and Audley End, 83, 91 Sutherland, Duke of, 134, 142, 204 Sutherland, First Duchess of, 140 INDEX. >7 Table, Florentine mosaic, at Warwick Castle, 26 Talbot de Malahide, Lord, 102 ,, Lady Maud, 94, 103 ,, Sir Richard, 94, 98 „ “ Witty” Lady, and JamesII.,94 Talbots, The, of Shrewsbury, 100 Tankerville, the present Earl of, 319 Tanquerville, Earl of, and Chilling- ham Castle, 315 Tapestry at Welbeck Abbey, 10, 13 ; at Hatfield House, 58 ; at Penshurst Place, 130 ; at St. Giles’ House, 151 ; at Cawdor Castle, 182; at Belvoir Castle, 232 ; at Kilkenny Castle, 240 ; at Longleat, 258 ; at Ivnole House, 282, 283 Temple, Lady, 253 „ Sir William, opinion of the first Earl of Portland, 11 Temple of Delphi, Altar from the, at Castle Howard, 203 Teniers, Pictures by, at Warwick Castle, 28 ; at Cardiff Castle, 218 ; at Belvoir Castle, 232, 233 Teviot, The, 32, 43 Theobalds, 55 Thomson’s table at St. Giles’ House, 150 Thorpe, John, and Audley End, 86 Thorwaldsen, Sculpture by, at Chats- worth, 116 Thynne family, The, 249 — 255 Thynne,Mr. Thomas, Assassination of, 253 Tintoretto, Pictures by. at Castle Howard, 206 ; at Kilkenny Castle, 242 ; at Knole House, 281, 282 Titian, Portrait of Paul III. at Aln- wick Castle by, 76 ; picture at Aln- wick Castle, 77 ; at Malahide Castle, 94, 95; at Chatsworth, 115; at Castle Howard, 204, 206 ; at Long- leat, 258 ; (copies) at Lismore Castle, 290 Toad-stone atChillingham, 318 Trentham Hall, situation, 132 ; origin, 133, 134 ; the present building, 135 ; the church, 136; plan of building, and approach, 137 ; pictures, bil- liard-room, drawing-room, etc., 139 ; family portraits, 140; Venetian Room and pictures by Stanfield, 141 ; history of the Gowers. 141 ; gardens and surroundings, 143 Trevisa, John, black-letter inscrip- tions at Berkeley Castle, 163 Tunnel at Welbeck Abbey, 4, 6 Turner, Picture of Alnwick Castle by, 68 Tweed, The, 32, 43 Tyrconnel, Duke of, 94 Vanbrugh, Sir John, and Floors Castle, 34 ; and Audley End, 88 ; and Castle Howard, 199; and Haworth Castle, 268 Vandevelde, Pictures by, at Berkeley Castle, 163 Vandyck, Pictures by, at Welbeck Abbey, 10 ; at Warwick Castle, 22, 23, 26, 27 ; at Hatfield House, 62 ; at Alnwick Castle, 75, 77 ; at Mala- hide Castle, 95 ; at Penshurst Place, 130; at St. Giles’ House, 151; at Berkeley Castle, 163 ; at Castle Howard, 207 ; at Cardiff Castle, 218 ; at Belvoir Castle, 233 ; at Kilkenny Castle, 242, 244 ; at Long- leat, 255, 258 ; at Haworth Castle, 269 ; at Knole House, 282, 283 Velasquez, Pictures by, at Hatfield House, 62 ; at Malahide Castle, 94, 95 ; at St. Giles’ House, 151 ; at Castle Howard, 204 Veronese, Picture by, at Knole House, 282 Verrio, Frescoes by, at Chatsworth, 113 Vescy, Ivo de, founder of Alnwick Castle, 66 Victoria, Queen, visit to Warwick Castle, 27 ; visit to Floors Castle, 40 ; visit to Hatfield House, 55 Viollet-le-Duc, ideal Fortress of, and Haworth Castle, 263 Voltaire and Eastbury Palace, 149 Walden, Castle of, 82 Wales, Prince of, and the Chillingkam bull, 319, 320 Waller and Penshurst, 123 Walton, Manor of, 191 Ward, Pictures by, at Alnwick Castle, 78 Warwick, Guy of, Relics of, at War- wick Castle, 23, 30 Warwick, Henry de Hewburgh, first Earl of, 30 Warwick, John Dudley, Earl of, and Knole House. 275 Warwick, Richard Beauchamp, Earl of. 222 Warwick, Robert Rich, Earl of. por- trait by Stone at Warwick Castle, 26 ; earldom bestowed upon, by James I.. 31 Warwick, Antiquity of, 20 Warwick Castle, early history, 16 ; external appearance, 18 ; improve- ments made by the first Lord Brooke, 19 ; the Great Hall, 20, 22 ; injuries from fires, 20 ; his- torical relics and armour, and portraits of Charles I. and Queen Henrietta, 22 ; the Red Drawing- room, and pictures by Rubens. Van- dyck, and Raphael, 23, 24 ; the Cedar Drawing-room and its sculpture, etc., 25 ; the Green or Gilt Drawing-room and its pictures, 26 ; State bed-room, boudoir, and their pictures, 27 ; armoury, com- pass-room, and Great Dining-room, and their curiosities, 28 ; chapel, Shakspeare Room, and private apartments, 29 ; its various owners, 30, 31 Watson, Samuel, and Chatsworth, 110 Watteau, Picture attributed to, at Cardiff Castle, 218 Watts, Pictures by, at Longleat, 255 Webb, Mr. W. F., owner of Hew- stead Abbej r , 304 W elbeck Abbey, Foundation of, 2 ; approach to, 3 ; general appearance and architectural style, 4 ; rebuilt by the first Duke of Hewcastle, 5 ; the woods and the tunnel, 6 ; internal arrangements, 8 ; the Oxford wing, 9 ; curiosities and pic- tures in the drawing-rcoms, etc., 10 ; 328 picture-galleries. 1 1 ; riding'-school, 12 ; library and chapel, 12 ; Duke of Newcastle's portrait. 13 ; stables, workmen’s club-house, gardens, hot- houses, and the Greendale Oak, 11 Wellington, Duke of, presentation of his charger to the Marchioness of Salisbury, 50 Werner. Carl, Pictures by, at Cardiff Castle, 216 West, Hon. Mrs. Sackville, and Knole House, 285, 286 Westlake, Pictures by, at Cardiff Castle, 216 Westmacott, Chimney-piece by, at Chats worth, 115,116 Weymouth, Thomas Thynne, first Viscount, 250 Whalley, Richard, 2 Whitwell, John Griffin. QSee Bi'ay- brooke, Baron.) Wilberforce, Bishop, and Mr. Glad- stone at Hatfield House, 48 HISTORIC HOUSES. Wilkie, Picture by, at Alnwick Castle, 78 ; at Kilkenny Castle, 212 William the Conqueror and Warwick Castle, 16 William the Lion, 66 William Rufus, King, 91, 220 William III., nursed by the first Earl of Portland, 11 ; and Audley End, 85, 95, 107, 108 ; statue at Hoghton Tower, 196 Windsor, Viscount, 225 Wine-cooler, Enormous, at Castle Howard, 203 Winterhalter, Pictures by, at Trent- ham Hall, 139 Witchcraft at Belvoir, 235, 236 Wooler, 311 Worcester, Richard Beauchamp, Earl of, 222 Worthies, Nine, effigies at Chilling- ham, 314 Wouvermans, Pictures by, at Cardiff Castle, 218 Wren, Sir Christopher, and Chats- worth, 108, 118 ; and Longleat, 252 Wyatt, Altar figure of the Duchess of Rutland at Belvoir by, 235 Wyattville, Sir Jeffrey, and Longleat, 254 York, Duke of (afterwards James II.), visit to Hatfield House, 57 Youghal, Old sword and mace of, 289 Zuccarelli, Pictures by, at Castle Howard, 206 Zucchero (Zuccaro), Portrait of Queen Elizabeth by, at Hatfield House, 61 ; of Lord Burghley at Hatfield House, 62 ; of Mary Queen of Scots at Chatsworth, 115 ; at Castle Howard, 207 ; at Longleat, 255 Printed bv Casseli, & Company, Limited, La Belle Sauvaoe, London, E.C.