Natural history -- England -- Wiltshire; Wiltshire (England) -- History
[The gardens of Wilton were illustrated by a series of twenty-six folio
copper plates, with the following title; “Le Jardin De Wilton,
construct par le trés noble et trés p. seigneur Philip Comte Pembroke
et Montgomeri. Isaac de Caux invt.” The above description is copied
from one of these plates. Solomon de Caus was architect and engineer to
the Elector Palatine, and constructed the gardens at Heidelberg in
1619. Walpole infers that Isaac and Solomon de Caus were brothers, and
that they erected, in conjunction with each other, “the porticos and
loggias of Gorhambury, and part of Campden house, near Kensington.”
(Anecdotes of Painting.) As the engravings of Wilton gardens bear the
name of Isaac, he had probably some share in the arrangement of the
grounds, and perhaps also in building the house. In Campbell’s
Vitruvius Britannicus, vols. ii. and iii. are several views, plans, and
sections of Wilton House and grounds.—J. B.]
The grotto is paved with black and white marble; the roofe is vaulted.
The figures of the tritons, &c. are in bas-relieve, of white marble,
excellently well wrought. Here is a fine jeddeau and nightingale pipes.
Monsieur de Caus had here a contrivance, by the turning of a cock, to
shew three rainbowes, the secret whereof he did keep to himself; he
would not let the gardener, who shewes it to strangers, know how to doe
it; and so, upon his death, it is lost. The grott and pipes did cost
ten thousand pounds. The garden is twelve acres within the terrace of
the grott.
The kitchin garden is a very good one, and here are good ponds and a
decoy. By the kitchin garden is a streame which turnes a wheele that
moves the engine to raise the water to the top of a cisterne at the
corner of the great garden, to serve the water-workes of the grotto and
fountaines in the garden.
Thomas, Earle of Pembroke, told me that his sister-in-law’s priest, a
Frenchman, made a pretty poem or poemation on Wilton House and Garden,
in Latin verse, which Mr. Berford, his Lordship’s Chaplain, can
procure.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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