74 



GARDENS OLD AND NEW. 



watchman waketh but in vain." For two and a-halt 

 centuries the solemn monition with which it pleased 

 the original builder and Lord of Castle Ashby to 

 crown his stately work had displayed its warning 

 from parapet and turret over the lands where his 

 descendants dwelt. For all those generations they 

 followed its silent monition, and lived wisely and well, 

 and maintained and augmented the glory of their 

 house ; and what could they do better, when enlarging 

 its borders, than once more to take up the burden of 

 the ancient text and add other verses to guard the 

 precinct added to the castle walls ? On the new 

 parapets around the terraces and the stately garden 

 walls added in 1865 the echo has changed its 

 language, but not its inspiration. Even round the 

 gardens of flowers and the vine-entwined balconies 

 we are bidden to mark the lilies of the field " that 



Sir William's son married a daughter of the Earl ot 

 Shrewsbury, and their son, in the eighth year of 

 Elizabeth, became Baron Compton, and his son and 

 successor was created Earl of Northampton. The 

 first Earl built the greater part of the present house, 

 while his son, the second Earl, typical of all that was 

 most chivalrous in the Cavalier party, was killed at 

 the battle of Hopton Heath, in 1643, " a l ss f r 

 which a greater victory had been an unequal 

 recompense." The third Earl was as true to his 

 King, and the Restoration saw him raised to the 

 rank of Marquess. Nor must we forget that later 

 Henry Compton, sixth son of the second Earl, and 

 then Bishop of London, setting aside all inherited 

 feeling in face of the danger to the liberties of the 

 Church and of his country, was among those leaders 

 of England who signed the invitation to William of 



EAST GARDEN STAIRWAY. 



they toil not, neither do they spin, and that Solomon 

 in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these." 



The very story of the present house, told almost 

 as plainly as words could write it, suggests long 

 continuance and abiding soundness and judgment. 

 There is not a vestige of the original castle or 

 crenellated house of Walter de Langton, Bishop of 

 Coventry and Lichfield in the days of Edward I., 

 except a well, which has been " recapped " and 

 embodied in the outer wall of the new gardens. Yet 

 a well is at least a symbol of perpetuity. But since 

 the days when Sir William Compton, owner of that 

 ancient house of Compton Wynyates which Lord 

 Northampton still holds, and is the despair of modern 

 builders in search of a logical beauty which they may 

 re-create, bought Castle Ashby of the Earl of Kent 

 in the days of Henry VIII., the fortunes of the house 

 have steadily increased, and always with honour. 



Orange to come over and vindicate the freedom of 

 England. 



In speaking of the alteration of the south front 

 of Castle Ashby by Inigo Jones, justice must be done 

 to this genial master of English Palladian art. He 

 altered a part of the Tudor east front, blending his 

 classic design with the older work in the happiest 

 way. But the central part of the south front, with 

 its rustic columns below and its classic pillars 

 and pilasters above, its dividing lines of cornice, 

 and its fine pediments, seems to have been 

 actually constructed to his designs. The whole 

 is brought together by a lettered parapet, following 

 the general plan which crowns every line of 

 wall and the parapet of every turret with admonitory 

 versicles or verses. Over his new entrance he placed 

 the words, "Dominus custodial introitum tuum.' 

 The filling in of the south front by this Palladian line 



