The Stately Homes of EnglandJewitt, Llewellynn Frederick William
History
The Stately Homes of England
Jewitt, Llewellynn Frederick William
Historic buildings -- England
The EMPEROR FOUNTAIN is one of the great attractions of Chatsworth,
and one that to see is to remember. This marvellous fountain throws
up a thick jet of water no fewer than 267 feet in height, which,
spreading out as it falls, forms a liquid sheet of spray, on which, not
unfrequently, the sunlight produces an exquisite rainbow. The quantity
of metal, we are told, required in the formation of the pipes, &c.,
for this gigantic work, amounts to nearly 220 tons. The force of the
water is so great that it is said to rush out of the pipe at the rate
of a hundred miles a minute. Near the “Emperor” are other fountains
of great beauty, and when all are playing, the effect is beyond
description.
[Illustration: _The Garden on the West Front._]
Of the truly elegant and indeed wondrous gardens and parterres on the
west and south fronts of the mansion, and of the thousand and one
other attractions of the place, we have not time to speak, so lengthy
has our article upon this “Palace of the Peak” already become; but
there are yet two or three objects before passing out into the outer
grounds and the kitchen-garden &c., on which we must say a word. These
are the trees that were planted by royalty, and which most loyally
have been tended, and grown up to a wondrous size. One of these is an
oak-tree planted (well do we remember the circumstance, and the pretty,
simple, earnest, and interesting appearance of the youthful princess
at the time) in 1832, by our present beloved Queen, when, as a child
of thirteen, then the “Princess Victoria,” she visited Chatsworth,
with her august mother the Duchess of Kent. This tree, which in its
forty years’ growth has become a stately oak, bears the label,—“This
Oak planted by Princess Victoria, October 11th, 1832.” Near it is a
Spanish chestnut thus labelled—“Spanish chestnut, planted by the
Duchess of Kent, October 17th, 1832.” Then comes a sycamore planted
when the Queen and the Prince Consort, “Albert the Good,” visited
Chatsworth in 1843; it is labelled—“This Sycamore planted by Prince
Albert, 1843.” In another part of the garden, opposite the west front,
are a “Sweet Chestnut, planted by the (late) Emperor of Russia, 1816;”
and a “Variegated Sycamore, planted by the Archduke Michael of Russia,
1818.” A tree was also planted by H. R. H. the Prince of Wales, on the
visit of himself and H. R. H. the Princess of Wales, to Chatsworth, in
December, 1872.
[Illustration: _West Front from the South._]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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