MELBOURNE 



The gardens of Melbourne Hall in Derbyshire, the property of Earl 

 Cowper, but occupied for the last five-and-twenty years by Mr. W. D. 

 Fane, though perhaps less well preserved than those of Bramham, still 

 show the design of Henry Wise in the early years of the eighteenth 

 century. There had formerly been an older garden. Wise's plan 

 shows how completely the French ideas had been adopted in 

 England, for here again are the handsome pools and fountains, the 

 garden thick-hedged with yew, and the bosquet with its straight paths, 

 green-walled, leading to a large fountain-centred circle in the thickest 

 of the grove. 



The whole space occupied by the house and grounds is not of great 

 extent ; it is irregular and even awkward in shape, and has roads on two 

 sides. 



The treatment is extremely ingenious ; indeed, it is doubtful whether 

 any other plan that could have been devised would have made so much 

 of the space or could have so cleverly concealed the limits. 



The garden lies out forward of the house in a long parallelogram. 

 Next to the house-front is the usual wide gravel terrace, from which paths, 

 inclosing spaces of lawn, lead down to a lower level. The whole lawn, 

 with its accompanying paths, slopes downward ; where a steeper slope 

 occurs above and below, the path becomes a flight of steps. 



The lower level is intersected by paths. As they converge, they 

 swing round the pedestal of the Flying Mercury that stands upon a 

 circular grass-plot. The main path soon reaches the edge of the 

 handsome pool known as the Great Water. It is four-sided, with a 



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