Xlviii PROCEEDINGS, 



seven acres in area, the creation of the late Earl of Lytton. 

 The following account of it, and of the park and woods, is con- 

 tributed by Mr. Kipling : — 



" In the Wilderness have been brought together flowering trees and shrubs 

 in vast numbers, various kinds of native wild plants, and many old-fashioned 

 garden flowers — flowers which appealed to the late Earl's poetic fancy, having 

 been loved and cherished by him in his boyhood. Of these may be mentioned 

 "wall-flowers, pinks, cabbage-roses, sweet-briar, and rosemary, and of the 

 wildings, fox-gloves, toad-flax, primroses, columbines, corn- and marsh-marigolds, 

 and many native orchids. But its leading feature is the unique collection of 

 thorns, there being some thirty-seven species and varieties, which when in 

 blossom make a grand floral display. It is now rapidly filKng iip with thousands 

 of trees, shrubs, and more lowly plants, and each succeeding year finds it the 

 haunt of ever-increasing numbers of the feathered tribe, both resident and 

 migratory, as well as of insects innumerable. 



" This Wilderness was the favourite garden of the late Earl. Here he came 

 from his hard literary labours for his morning or afternoon walk, to watch the 

 progress which his favourite plants were making, and to enjoy them in the only 

 way that the true lover of flowers can do so, that is, to see them on the plants 

 on which they grow, not caring to have them cut and placed in the house in 

 vases, where they would to him be shorn of their greatest interest and beauty. 

 It was a daily pleasure to him when in residence at Kuebworth to watch the 

 development of this his semi-wild garden. Here I have spent hours with him 

 planning and planting, as I had spent hours with his father before him in other 

 parts of the grounds, at such times going about together more as friend and 

 companion than as master and servant, the longest day's toil then being a pleasure. 



" Knebworth Park is noted for its old avenues of lime and horse-chestnut 

 trees, its groves of oak, beech, elm, and hornbeam, and two or three venerable 

 individuals of Spanish chestnut, the largest of these being 26 feet in circumference 

 at 2 feet from the ground. The mistletoe is found growing plentifully on many 

 of the trees, including the lime, poplar, crab, thorn, sycamore, and mountain-ash, 

 but none grows on the oak. 



"Kuebworth Woods are extensive and not without interest to the botanist, 

 entomologist, and archajologist. Of native plants which delight in the shady 

 haunts of the woodland may be mentioned the pui'ple helleborine {Epipactis 

 latifolla), the bird's-nest orchis [Neottia nidus-avis), and the large-flowered 

 butterfly orchis {Plata idhira chlorantha) . Ferns are plentiful, including Blechnum 

 spicaiit, Athy linm Jilix -fveiiii na , and Lastrea spiviilofta and dUatata. 



" In Himiley's and Grafridge Woods are two Roman tumuli, and the outlines, 

 which can yet be traced, of a Roman encampment. When a long low-lying 

 meadow beside the latter wood was being drained I picked up a well-preserved 

 specimen of a quern or Roman millstone which had been thrown out in the 

 cutting of the drain. It was made of the Hertfordshire conglomerate, consisting 

 of small roimded pebbles embedded in a siliceous matrix." 



From the gardens the park was crossed to the lake, which is an 

 artificial expansion of a small tributary- of the Beane some distance 

 from the house. The ornamental grounds around it are prettily 

 laid out, and the situation in the valley with the woods in the 

 background is one of much natural beauty. 



lleturning to the church the party separated, some leaving by 

 train, and the cyclists, with a few who were driving, crossing the 

 park to Codicote. Here nearly twenty had tea by previous 

 arrangement, after which some returned to St. Albans, etc., by 

 AV'elwyn, Lemsford, and Astwick Manor, and others by Wheat- 

 hampstead and Sandridge. 



