Spring in a Shropshire AbbeyGaskell, Catherine Henrietta Milnes, Lady
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Spring in a Shropshire Abbey
Gaskell, Catherine Henrietta Milnes, Lady
Shropshire (England) -- Description and travel; Wenlock Abby (England)
Besides these fair gardens, I thought in the dawn of gardening, of
Elizabeth of York's bower, "in the little park of Wyndsor," and I
liked to dream of that arbour in Baynarde's Castle in London put up
for her, by order of the king. I should have liked also to have
walked with Sir Thomas More in that fair garden (probably his) from
which he imagined the one in his "Utopia," where "we went and sat
down on a green bank and entertained one another in discourse."
Then I should have liked to have crept into the great gardens at
Hampton Court laid out by the great cardinal, where "there was a
flower garden to supply the queen's bower with roses, and where John
Chapman, the most famous gardener of his time, grew his herbs for the
king's table."
I should have liked to have had the invisible cap, and to have
stepped past the guard and entered the Privy garden, and have read
the mottoes on the sundials, and to have slyly scented the roses, and
pinched the rosemary, juniper, and lavender.
Had I possessed the magic cap, I should not have forgotten to wander
into the Bird garden and to have seen "the beestes," holding in stone
their vanes; and I should have liked also dearly to have seen all the
strange animals, amongst which there were harts, badgers, hounds,
dragons, antelopes, and one stately lion.
Could I have walked there, perhaps I might have caught a glance of
that "sweetest lady from Spain" whom Shakespeare honoured most of all
women; or perhaps in the joyous hey-day of her youth have met Anne of
the slender neck, for whom Fate had reserved so terrible a fate,
although for a time all seemed to go so smilingly with her.
Then I should have liked to have been a favourite guest at Moor Park,
in the days when the stately Countess of Bedford lived there, and to
have heard the wits talk, and perhaps have followed the countess and
Doctor Donne up the trim gravel walks, and have admired the standard
laurels, and rejoiced in the stately fountains in a garden that, in
the words of the great Minister of the Hague, "was too pleasant ever
to forget." I should have liked also to have walked into Sir William
Temple's own garden at Sheen, had a chat with him about his melons,
of which he was so proud, or have paced with him the trim alleys of
his own Moor Park in Surrey. Later, I should have liked to have seen
his stiff beds, reflections of the _parterres_ of Holland, and have
heard from his own lips the account of the Triple Alliance. And
beyond this garden of men's hands, I should like to have seen the
glorious extent of firs and heather that enclosed his garden, and to
have heard the murmur of the distant rivulet, and to have felt the
charm of the distant view that he gazed upon.
Perhaps even, if fortune had been kind, I might have seen Lady
Gifford in all the splendour of silk or satin, or heard some
brilliant witticism from the lips of young Jonathan, or even have
caught a fleeting glimpse of lovely Stella.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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