This horizontal air-mill served as a landmark for many miles round: the proprietor was Mr. Hodgson, a maltster and distiller. It was visited by Sir Richard Phillips in his _Morning's Walk from London to Kew_, in 1813, who says: "The mill, its elevated shaft, its vanes, and weather or wind-boards, curious as they would have been on any other site, lost their interest on premises once the residence of the illustrious Bolingbroke, and the resort of the philosophers of his day. In ascending the winding flights of its tottering galleries, I could not help wondering at the caprice of events which had converted the dwelling of Bolingbroke into a malting-house and a mill. This house, once sacred to philosophy and poetry, long sanctified by the residence of the noblest genius of his age, honoured by the frequent visits of Pope, and the birthplace of the immortal _Essay on Man_, is now appropriated to the lowest uses. The house of Bolingbroke become a windmill! The spot on which the _Essay on Man_ was concocted and produced, converted into a distillery of pernicious spirits! Such are the lessons of time! Such are the means by which an eternal agency sets at nought the ephemeral importance of man! But yesterday, this spot was the resort, the hope, and the seat of enjoyment of Bolingbroke, Pope, Swift, Arbuthnot, Monson, Mallet, and all the contemporary genius of England--yet a few whirls of the earth round the sun, the change of a figure in the date of the year, and the group have vanished; while I behold hogs and horses, malt-bags and barrels, stills and machinery! "'Alas!' said I to the occupier, 'and have these things become the representatives of more human genius than England may ever witness on one spot again--have you thus satirised the transitory state of humanity--do you thus become a party with the bigoted enemies of that philosophy which was personified in a Bolingbroke or a Pope?' 'No,' he rejoined, 'I love the name and character of Bolingbroke, and I preserve the house as well as I can with religious veneration: I often smoke my pipe in Mr. Pope's parlour, and think of him with due respect as I walk the part of the terrace opposite his room.' He then conducted me to this interesting parlour, which is of brown polished oak,[80] with a grate and ornaments of the age of George the First; and before its window stood the portion of the terrace upon which the malt-house had not encroached, with the Thames moving majestically under its walls.