SION 



the famous eighteenth- century architects, and is a fine monument 

 to their genius, particularly to that of Robert Adam, who, says 

 Colonel Balfour, " drew his inspiration straight from Italy, where he 

 studied for several years. He succeeded in adapting with great 

 elasticity and considerable originality the later Roman style to 

 English uses. His plan had included a central dome over the 

 quadrangle, and a fine entrance and staircase in the north side, as 

 well as a beautiful bridge in the grounds." These plans were 

 never carried out. But the elegant gateway on the Isleworth and 

 Brentford Road which is so familiar to passengers on the Hampton 

 Court trams was completed, and remains as a characteristic 

 example of Adam's work. " It certainly possesses," says Colonel 

 Balfour, " all the delicate qualities for which Adam was remark- 

 able, the fine mouldings, the chaste composition and the slight 

 relief of the severe but well-cut ornament. We must never seek 

 in Adam's work the boldness of great projection. He belonged to 

 the school of reaction against the fashion of Rococo, with its huge 

 undercut twists and scrolls, and its heavy cornices. But in dealing 

 with his masses Adam was never weak, and he clearly acted on the 

 principle of subordinating ornament to proportion." . . . With all 

 this I am in cordial agreement, and the gateway, as Colonel Balfour 

 says, " forms a very dignified and fitting entrance to the flat but 

 finely timbered park, which stretches, with its broad avenues, 

 between the public road and the river." 



Many historical associations cluster around the walls of Sion 

 House and they are chiefly tragic ones. The Protector Somerset 

 did not long remain in the enjoyment of his beautiful estate 

 indeed, in one way his possession of it contributed to his undoing ; 

 because his great building-works at Sion and elsewhere were 

 brought up against him in his attainder. By the machinations of 

 his enemies he was found guilty, not of treason, but of felony, and 

 was executed in 1552, and in the following year Sion was bestowed 

 upon his arch-enemy, John Dudley, quondam Earl of Warwick, 

 who had already contrived to secure the vast estates of the Earl- 

 dom of Northumberland, then in abeyance, owing to the death, 

 in 1537, of the last Earl without children, and the attainder of his 

 brother, Sir Thomas Percy. 



Dudley not only received the estates, but a dukedom with them, 

 and thus it will be seen that the first holder of the title of Duke of 



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