3 i6 LONDON PARKS & GARDENS 
little better, for the garden is pleasanter, and one goes 
to it by water.” Two years later he wrote in a very 
different strain, “ Every night constantly I go to 
Ranelagh, which has totally beat Vauxhall. Nobody 
goes anywhere else—everybody goes there. My Lord 
Chesterfield is so fond of it, that he says he has 
ordered all his letters to be directed thither.” Fanny 
Burney, in “ Evelina,” to bring out the character of 
the “surly, vulgar, and disagreeable man,” makes him 
abuse the place which fascinated polite society. “There’s 
your famous Ranelagh, that you make such a fuss 
about; why, what a dull place is that! ” The chief 
amusement was walking about and looking at each 
other, as the poem by Bloomfield puts it— 
44 We had seen every soul that was in it, 
Then we went round and saw them again.” 
The great attraction was the Rotunda, supposed to 
be like the Pantheon at Rome. The outside diameter 
was 185 feet. An arcade ran all round, and above it a 
gallery, with steps up to it through four Doric porticos. 
Over the gallery were sixty windows, and the whole was 
surmounted by a slate roof. In the middle, supporting 
the roof, was a huge fireplace, on the space at first 
occupied by the orchestra. “ Round the Rotunda,” 
inside, were “ 47 boxes . . . with a table and cloth 
spread in each; in these the company ” were “ regaled, 
without any further expense, with tea and coffee.” The 
whole was adorned with looking-glasses and paintings, 
imitation marble, stucco, and gilding. Dr. Arne wrote 
music for the special performances ; breakfasts were at 
one time the rage, and at another masquerades were the 
order of the day; while fireworks and illuminations 
