GARDENS OF CELEBRITIES 



Merely because the author of " Christabel " walked that garden, 

 and watched the sunsets over the valley from his window, both 

 house and garden are hallowed ground. That is the human 

 interest, and it is paramount at Fulham. 



Therefore, although the fifteenth century quadrangle, with its 

 low-arched gateway and ponderous, iron-studded gates open in the 

 drawing its quaint porch, of which I have shown a pencil sketch, 

 its vine-clad walls and creeper- covered windows, and beautiful 

 ornamental brick-work, is not exactly part and parcel of the gar- 

 dens, yet, in order to carry out the original scheme of this book, 

 and to fulfil the promise of its title, which associates the garden 

 with the man, and man with the garden, it is necessary to introduce 

 it here. The porch, with the clock and Bishop Juxon's arms above 

 it, and the great quadrangle itself, are not only the oldest, and 

 architecturally most interesting, part of the group of buildings, 

 and on the direct route to the gardens, but, if these ancient walls 

 could speak, what could they not tell us of the past ? Hither, in 

 all probability, to visit the bishops of the diocese among whom, 

 as we have seen, were many makers of history came, in the 

 summer days, the great churchmen of the contending parties of 

 the state what time the Church of England was in the making ; 

 hither came the compilers of the Book of Common Prayer, and 

 the translators of the Bible ; and, antecedently, Cardinal Wolsey, 

 and Thomas Cromwell, and Sir Thomas More. Hither came all 

 the wisest of English statesmen, from Burleigh to Pitt ; Queen 

 Elizabeth, James I., William and Mary, and the Princess after- 

 wards, Queen Anne. Poets and authors, from Spenser to Pope, 

 and from Bacon to Addison. Evelyn, the diarist, who did 

 so much to revive and improve horticulture and to encourage 

 forestry. Sir Isaac Newton, and the founders and members 

 of the Royal Society ; Vanbrugh, and Sir Christopher Wren ; 

 Sir William Temple, the statesman but in this connection still 

 more interesting as the passionate lover of gardens and with 

 him probably his secretary, Jonathan Swift. Sir Hans Sloane, 

 Horace Walpole, and a host of others more or less famous. Of 

 the visits of some of these to Fulham there is written record- 

 it is very probable that all the rest, and others besides, 

 whom it would take too long to recall, came here from time 

 to time 



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