The iron gates and railings of the period from William III. to George II. afford some of the finest specimens of craftsmanship which the country can boast. Those at Drayton House have already been mentioned. They were mostly wrought for the Duchess of Norfolk about the year 1700, and much of the work bears her monogram. From the wealth of examples which the gardens and park offer, two have been selected, one from the side of the front court (Fig. 176), and one from the broad avenue which runs westward from the entrance front (Fig. 177). In the former the device of placing the massive hammered leafage in the tympanum of the arch, with the bright sky as a background, is singularly happy. In the latter the combination of the delicate ironwork with the lofty stone piers crowned with large lead urns produces a noble effect, which is heightened by the remote position of the group from the house at the end of an avenue never meant for traffic. It was only a lordly munificence which could place so notable a feature where in the ordinary way it would be but dimly visible. [Illustration: 178. Gates at Eaton Hall, Cheshire.] [Illustration: 179. Railings and Gates at Carshalton House, Surrey (1723).] At Eaton Hall in Cheshire is another fine example (not, however, in its original position) of somewhat unusual design (Fig. 178). Here, too, the more elaborate part of the work is high up, where it now shows against the sky; the lower parts are plain, and veil, without obscuring, the view. The pillars instead of being in stone are built up of ironwork. Clever as the idea is, the effect is not so monumental as when the delicacy of the metal is bounded by the solidity of stone or brick. There is a splendid range of gates and railing at Carshalton in Surrey, erected in 1723 (Fig. 179) as part of the embellishments of the gardens and park of Carshalton House, which was to have been built for Sir Thomas Scawen from the designs of Giacomo Leoni. It never was built, however, and these gates (of which the designer is not known), together with some others of less pretension, and a bridge, are all that remain of an ambitious scheme. The stone piers at either end, surmounted by lively lead figures, help the monumental effect, an effect which would perhaps have been even finer had the range of ironwork not been quite so long. [Illustration: 180. Gate to a House in High Street, Richmond, Surrey.] But it was not only large houses to which these fine adjuncts were applied. The neighbourhood of London abounds in charming specimens attached to houses of quite small size, such as that in Fig. 180; and even in London itself there are still left interesting examples, many of them yet retaining the extinguisher used by the linkboys after piloting their patrons through the difficulties of the dark and ill-paved streets. CHAPTER XIV.