MR. DOWNING'S LETTERS FROM ENGLAND. 



London are " squares" — open places of eight or ten acres, filled with trees, shrubs, grass 

 and fountains — like what we call " parks" in our cities at home. Besides these, a large 

 new space called the Victoria Park — of two hundred and ninety acres, has been laid out 

 lately in the East part of London, expressl}' for the recreation and amusement of the poor- 

 er classes who are confined to that part of the town. 



You see what noble breathing-places London has, within its own boundaries, for the 

 daily health and recreation of its citizens. But these by no means comprise all the rural 

 pleasures of its inhabitants. There are three other magnificent public places within half 

 an hour of London, which are also enjoyed daily by thousands and tens of thousands. I 

 mean ILimpton Court, Richmond Park, and the National Gardens at Kew. 



Hampton Court, is the favorite resort of the middle classes on holidays, and a pleasanter 

 sight than that spot on such occasions, — when it is thronged by immense numbers of citi- 

 zens, their wives and children, with all the riches of that grand old palace, its picture-galle- 

 ries, halls, and splendid apartments, its two parks and its immense pleasure grounds thrown 

 open to them, is not easily found. Indeed, a man may be dull enough to care for neither pa- 

 laces nor parks, for neither nature nor art, but he can scarcely be human, or have a spark of 

 sympathy in the fortunes of his race, if he can wander without interest through these mag- 

 nificent ILills, still in perfect order, built with the most kingly prodigality by the most 

 ambitious and powerful of subjects — Woolset : halls that were afterwards successively the 

 home of Henry the VIII, Elizabeth, James, Charles and Cromwell; halls where 

 Shakespeare played and Sidney wrote, but which, with all their treasures of art, are 

 now the people's palace and normal school of enjoyment. 



I am neither going to weary you with catalogues of pictures or dissertations upon palace 

 architecture. But I must give you one more impression — that of the magnificent surroundings 

 of Hampton Court. Conjure up a piece of country of diversified rich meadow surface, 

 some five or six miles in circuit ; imagine, around the palace, some forty or fifty acres of 

 gardens, mostly in the ancient taste, with pleached alleys, (Queen Mary's bower among 

 them,) sloping banks of soft turf, huge orange trees in boxes, and a "wilderness" or 

 labyrinth where you may lose 3'ourself in the most intricate perplexity of shrubs; imagine 

 an avenue a mile and a quarter long, of the most gigantic horse-chestnuts you ever beheld, 

 with long vistas of velvet turf and highlj^ -dressed garden scenery around them ; [see Fron- 

 tispiece] imagine other parts of the park where you see on all sides, only great masses and 

 groups of oaks and elms of centuries growth, and all the freedom of luxuriant nature, 

 with a broad carpet of grass stretching on all sides ; with distant portions of the park quite 

 wild-looking, dotted with great hawthorn trees of centuries growth, with the tangled copse 

 and fragrant fern which are the belongings of our own forests, and then fill up the scene 

 in the neighborhood of the palace and gardens as I have before said, on a holiday, with thou- 

 sands of happy faces, Avhile in the secluded parts of the park the timid deer flits before 

 you, the birds stealthily build their nests, and the insect's hum fills the silent air, and 

 you have some foint idea of the value of such a possession for the population of a great 

 city to pass their holidays in, or to go pic-uic-ing! 



I am writing you a long letter, but the parkornanie is upon me, and I will not let the 

 ink dry in my pen without a word about Richmond Great Park — also free to the public, 

 and also within the reach of the Londoner who seeks for air and exercise. Richmond 

 Great Park was formerly a Royal hunting ground, but, like all the parks I have men- 

 tioned, has been given up to the people — at least the free enjoyment of it. It is the lar 

 all the parks I have described, being eight miles round, and containing 2,250 acres 

 piece of magnificent forest tract — open forest, with grass, tufts of hazel, thorns and 



