96 THE FORMAL GARDEN IN ENGLAND v 



the centre bay of the facade, with grass plots 

 on either side spaced out with standard-trees 

 in cases. At Althorp the house Court was 

 separated from the fore court by a moat, with 

 a bridge opposite the outer entrance to the 

 fore court. In some instances, and particularly 

 in the case of houses built after the middle of 

 the seventeenth century, a terrace running 

 along the front of the facade took the place of 

 the house court, as at Chatsworth before it was 

 altered. Wrest House, in Bedfordshire, Wimple, 

 in Cambridgeshire, and the house of Sir W. 

 Blackett at Newcastle (Kip, 54) ; and eventually, 

 as the quadrangular plan for the house was 

 abandoned, and the long symmetrical facade 

 superseded the |-| or half n plan, the house 

 court slipped out of use, and the fore court was 

 brought up immediately in front of the entrance 

 door of the house, as in old Burlington House 

 (Kip, 29). Few instances remain of the house 

 court proper, owing to the inconvenience of 

 having to walk a considerable distance from the 

 carriage to the front door ; but examples of 

 what are practically house courts still exist in 

 old almshouses, as, for instance, in the almshouse 

 at Etwall, in Derbyshire. 



The fore court lasted well into the eighteenth 

 century. The simplest form of a fore court is 

 a square walled -in enclosure in front of the 

 entrance door, with a gateway in the centre of 

 the wall to the road, and either buildings or 



