GLEANINGS ON GARDENS. 91 



hung with very excellent tapestry of Rubens, which 

 was a present from the King of Spain to the Earl of 

 Bristol in his embassy there. This stands in a park 

 finely crowned with very high woods on all the tops 

 of the hills, which form a great amphitheatre sloping 

 down to the house. On the garden sides the woods 

 approach close, so that it appears there with a thick 

 line and depth of groves on each hand, and so it shows 

 from most parts of the park. The gardens are so 

 irregular that it is very hard to give an exact idea of 

 them but by a plan. Their beauty arises from this 

 irregularity ; for not only the several parts of the 

 garden itself make the better contrast by these sudden 

 rises, falls, and turns of the ground, but the views 

 about are let in and hang over the walls in very 

 different figures and aspects. You come first out of 

 the house into a green walk of standard limes, with a 

 hedge behind them that makes a colonnade ; hence 

 into a little triangular wilderness, from whose centre 

 you see the town of Sherborne in a valley interspersed 

 with trees. From the corner of this you issue at once 

 upon a high green terrace, the whole breadth of the 

 garden, which has five more green terraces hanging 

 under each other, without hedges, only a few pyramid 

 yews and large round honeysuckles between them. 

 The honeysuckles hereabouts are the largest and finest 

 I ever saw. You'll be pleased when I tell you the 



