88 GLEANINGS ON GARDENS. 



CHAPTER VII. 

 MR. POPE'S LETTER TO MARTHA BLOUNT, 



Describing the seat of Sir W. Raleigh* 



I PROMISED you an account of Sherborne 

 before I had seen it, or knew what I under- 

 took. I imagined it to be one of those fine old 

 seats of which there are numbers scattered over 

 England. But this is so peculiar, and its situation 

 of so uncommon a kind that it merits a more particular 

 description. The house is in the form of an H- The 

 body of it, which was built by Sir Walter Raleigh, 



* In the note to the first page of the Preface to this present 

 volume, a brief description is given of Sir W. Raleigh's seat and 

 garden, which I copied from Coker's Survey of Dorset. A more 

 modern description of that seat appears in the above letter of 

 Pope's. In one of Digby's letters to Pope, he mentions his 

 frequent meditations in Raleigh's grove. Sir Walter's predilec- 

 tion for gardens, and for the choice and curious productions of 

 nature, appears in many instances. Gerard dedicates the second 

 edition of his list of his own garden in Holborn, to his patron, Sir 

 W.;Kaleigh. Sir Walter married a daughter of Sir . Nicholas 

 CareWj'of Beddington, the gardens of which were much celebrated 

 uT* the sixteenth century. In Hutchin's History and Antiquities 

 of Sherbourne, augmented and continued to the present time, 

 by R. Gough and J. B. Nichols, are given some particulars 

 of this estate and some very curious ones respecting Sir 

 Walter. Aubrey, in his Diary, speaking of Sherbourne says : 



