EARLY TUDOR GARDENS. 87 



frequenti}- been spared even b}- the landscape gardener, who would 

 rather alter than destro}' it. At Cirencester, the present parish 

 church is a fine building, but the abbey church beside it, in 

 times past, was so infinitel}' larger, as quite to eclipse it. Yet now 

 the abbey church and adjoining buildings have so completely 

 disappeared, that almost the only trace of monastic times, in the 

 grounds of the house, built on the same spot, is a small piece 

 of water, the remains of the old fish-ponds. At Hurley-on- 

 Thames the monks' fish stews are still in existence, while at 

 Bisham Abbey, only a mile distant, the garden is surrounded on 

 three sides by a moat, also a relic of monkish days. At Hackness, 

 in Yorkshire, the monks' ponds have been transformed into the 

 present lake, but at Newstead Abbey, Nottingham, the monks' 

 stew, overshadowed by old yews, is untouched, and the eagle pond 

 (see illustration, page 29) there, is also undoubtedly a relic of the 

 Black Friars, a brass eagle lectern having been found in its depths, 

 full of valuable deeds relating to the monastery, there hidden by 

 the friars at the time of their dissolution. \i Hatton Grange, in 

 Shropshire, on the site of a cell, Buildwas Abbey, the ponds also 

 remain as originally made by the monks. There are four pools, 

 still bearing their old names — the Abbot's, Purgatory, Hell, and 

 the Bath Pools, They are in sequence, separated by broad dams 

 of earth, and are dug deep into the ground, with steep banks. 

 Thus although the original gardens have vanished, the monastery 

 lands were granted to the great families of the day, and since 

 they passed into secular hands, stately houses have been built, 

 and beautiful gardens, though of a totally different character, 

 have been made, and now adorn what once were the precincts of 

 the old abbeys and priories. Woburn, Welbeck, Burghley, Syon, 

 Battle, Beaulieu, Ramse}', Audley End, and many others, are 

 among the number. 



The Earl of Surrey made extensive gardens round the house 

 he built on the site of St. Leonard's Priory, near Norwich, which 

 he called Mount Surrey. About this time the closing of some of 

 the common lands caused some considerable riots, and in 1549 

 all the trees in the appleyards at Mount Surre}- were destroyed by 

 the rebels, and used for making tents and huts. This was one of 

 the most important gardens laid out on the site of a religious 



