236 SOME REMAINING FORMAL GARDENS 



The adoption of a dignified lay out, large or small, to every 

 house of any pretensions at this period, is exemplified in many 

 contemporary prints and books, notably in Kip's " Britannia 

 Illustrata" and Campbell's " Vitruvius Britannicus." Many of 

 these formal gardens have been destroyed, submerged by the 

 wave of landscape gardening, on which "Capability" Brown 

 floated to fame ; but there still remain admirable examples 

 besides those already mentioned. There are the placid canals of 

 Wrest, in Bedfordshire ( Fig. 158); the sloping vistas of Melbourne, 

 in Derbyshire; the terraces of St Catherine's Court, in Somerset; 

 and the pleached walks and broad parterres of Drayton, in 

 Northamptonshire (Fig. 1 59), where the forecourt with its beauti- 

 ful gates and screen of ironwork, the steps from one level to 

 another, and the lead vases, placed on the terrace walls, or raised 

 on pedestals as a dominating part of the scheme, all combine to 

 render the lay out one of the most fascinating of its kind (see 

 plan, Fig. 160). Indeed, examples may be found in every county, 

 although not a tithe of what once existed ; and on their terraces, 

 amid their canals and straight walks may be found groups of 

 figures, delightful temples, monuments, urns, and garden-houses, 

 like that at Groom's Hill, Greenwich (Fig. 161), which are not only 

 charming in themselves, but give point to the whole conception. 

 And those conceptions are the most satisfactory which are on a 

 scale moderate enough to enable the mind to grasp them on the 

 spot, without the aid of a plan. 



FIG. 163. Bramham Yew Hedge. 



