7 2 



GARDENS OLD AND NEW. 



beautiful in tint with age, but weathering so gradually 

 that the pilasters and panels added by Inigo Jones 

 hardly show the mark of time. The castle, as a 

 whole, looks so much part of the natural order of the 

 whole conception and site, that it is almost impossible 

 to consider the latter apart from the building which 

 it carries. But if by an effort of detachment this is 

 achieved, it will be seen that the high platform or 

 perhaps a score of acres, occupied mainly by buildings, 

 terraces and formal gardens, must always have domi- 

 nated the whole of the surrounding country. It is 

 not merely that the eye carries forward from the 

 terraces across and far beyond and up and down the 

 valley, and " lends long view to distant lands." 

 From the south the eye sees far back into North- 

 amptonshire, towards what was formerly the wild 

 country of Salcey Forest and of Yardley Chase, which 

 was the ancient sporting ground of the lords of Castle 

 Ashhy. A few half-wild deer are still left in this 

 domain. The present deer park was only enclosed 

 in 1765, these "beasts of the chace " having 

 previously roamed at large in their ancient haunt. 

 The chase is full of green rides and thickets ; but 

 most of the natural woodland has disappeared, and its 

 place is now taken by artificially-planted timber. 

 Here and there the old " lawns " still remain, as in the 

 New Forest, and on them the trunks of ancient and 

 gigantic oaks. Three of these are, in a sense, famous, 

 for they inspired Cowper's ode to the " Yardley Oak." 

 Olney, in the valley of the Ouse, where the poet 

 lived, was scarcely more than three miles distant from 

 the chase, and the largest of the three trees, the 

 trunk of which is some 3oft. round a yard from the 

 surface of the turf in which it is set, is, and was, quite 

 impressive enough to inspire a much better poem 

 than that which Cowper indited to it. The whole 

 area of this chase is ancient forest ground, and gives 

 some idea of the condition of Old England in 

 the Phntagenet days, of which, like Whittlebury 

 Forest in the same county, it is a rather unexpected 

 survival. 



Approached from the side of the distant river, 

 the park appears unusually large, while the scattered 

 trees of various kinds and ages, from oaks to giant 

 crab-apples, the mixed timber and huge black poplars 

 by the chains of lakes, break the slopes and valleys 

 pleasantly enough. But, looking southwards, on the 

 other side of the castle, the fact at once impresses 

 itself that this is one of the greatest demesnes using 

 the word as standing for park, gardens and buildings 

 in this country, ranking with Hatfield, Lyme, 

 Castle Howard and Bowood. An avenue not 

 a mere narrow ride between close-set lines of 

 trees, but a wide green space, with a road up its 

 centre, and tall timber trees in lines far back on the 

 turf on either side runs straight away to the chase 

 for three miles from the forecourt. The effect is tar 

 more pleasing than that of the Long Walk at 

 Windsor, and the length is also greater. A word 

 should be said as to the chain of lakes and pools 

 surrounding, at some distance, the castle hill, and 

 making a watery ring in the area of the park. They 

 are a singularly good example of how an originally 

 somewhat waterless landscape can be improved. 

 Their banks are most carefully planted, so that when 

 seen from one of the bridges they look much like a 

 typical reach of the Thames. "Capability Brown," 

 who planned a part of them, if not the whole, 

 might, with equal propriety or impropriety have 



exclaimed, here as at Blenheim, "Thames! Thou 

 wilt never forgive me ! " 



The south side, with Yardley Chase as the base 

 of the great avenue, which also led from the old main 

 Bedford and Northampton Road, was the point from 

 which all the grand approaches were formerly made 

 to the castle. The railway and the access from that 

 side were only an after-thought. It is on the south 

 side that the great forecourt is, with its splendid 

 Italian gates, its flat lawns, and the front so well 

 " converted " into his cheerful English Palladian by 

 Inigo Jones. The great grassy oblong in front might 

 have been anciently a tilt-yard. Now it forms a 

 cricket-ground, and a very fine one. On the right, 

 looking towards the house, with a very little space 

 dividing it from the forecourt, is the church, to the 

 tower of which some past owner of the castle added 

 an exceedingly efFective cupola, which brings its lines 

 well into harmony with the castle. The present 

 marquess caused several of the intervening trees to be 

 cut down, so that the church stands in the same 

 setting of ancient turf with the gardens and terraces, 

 and falls naturally into the general scheme of building 

 and environment. Low spreading plane and chestnut 

 trees link up the precincts of the church with the 

 bright levels of the forecourt and the splendid 

 colouring of the elaborate gardens of the east front. 

 But before going thither, where perhaps the greatest 

 wealth of architectural and of garden beauties is 

 massed, let us look at the double lines, first of the 

 terrace and gates, and then of the south front itself. 

 The terrace and gate-piers, as well as all the other 

 terraces, steps, balustrades, fountains, seats and 

 arcades of these gardens, are of a bright, warm, 

 creamy terra-cotta, admirably made, and, in spite of 

 all that has been said against the use of this material, 

 perfectly well suited and in keeping with both the 

 castle walls on the one side, and the English park, 

 woodlands and distant line landscape on the other. 

 The whole was built, and the gardens designed and 

 constructed, by the third marquess, and much of the 

 work bears the date 1865. The design of the gates, 

 which, it will he seen, has nothing whatever in 

 common with the usual form of English ironwork, 

 was that of some workmen of Italy. They were 

 brought from Padua to the place where they now 

 stand. The elaboration of ornament in the gate-piers 

 is not in the least out of place in relation to their 

 light and delicate lines ; nor is it amiss to note that 

 the whole of the terra-cotta of these gardens was 

 made in England at the Blashfield Works, near 

 Stamford. Passing through into the forecourt, the 

 first effect which arouses interest is the parapet 

 of the house, the stonework of which, as at 

 Hardwick and Temple Newsam, is pierced so as 

 to make both a decorative parapet and to spell the 

 words of the verses sacred to all who wish their earthly 

 mansions to endure and their resting-place to be firm 

 and abiding. The builder chose the Latin version, 

 perhaps from a feeling for that grace of congruity 

 which associates the religious feeling of Western 

 Europe with the ancient sway of Rome and her 

 pontiffs. " Nisi dominus Aldificaverit," says the 

 heading of the psalm, and so the builder continued in 

 the Latin. But how many of the owners and 

 retainers of Castle Ashby must have heard in the 

 church hard by the English version : "Except the 

 Lord build the house, their labour is but lost that 

 build it. Except the Lord keep the city, the 



