A DAY AT PENSHURST 
By CLINTON GARDNER HARRIS 
With Photographs and Plan especially made for “ House and Garden " 
P ENSHURST in Kent lies in a quiet 
valley watered by the Medway, which 
winds sleepily through meadows and past 
fields where sheep graze deep in rich pasture 
lands. Much as it appeared in the days 
when Sir Philip Sidney wandered amidst its 
splendid woods and through its sunken 
lanes does it appear to-day. Remote from 
the main highways of travel, and yet within 
easy reach of the great and busy metropolis, 
it seems content that the march of progress 
should follow other routes, while to its lot 
remains the simplicity and repose of bygone 
centuries. 
Our first glimpse of the village is from 
the surrounding hilltops, as the Tunbridge 
road descends into the valley and over the 
bridge, whence this lovely country seat of 
Lord de TIsle and Dudley comes into view. 
Dominating the landscape, with its towers 
and battlemented walls, it seems to stand, 
still a guardian over the neatly kept cottages 
which nestle as of yore under its protecting 
wing. Behind the castle loom up the tall 
trees of the park, their boughs well laden 
with mistletoe ; and over the yew hedges we 
see the famous old gardens with their ponds, 
and with their flower-beds and fruit trees 
just bursting into blossom. 
A sudden turn in the road cuts off' the 
distant view, but below the bridge, the 
usually placid stream, now turbulent from 
the early rains, boils beneath the arches. 
Near by the fields, already bedecked with 
little daisies, lead up to the hedge-rows and 
fences, where magnificent old oaks stand 
forth, with all their splendid tracery of 
branches against the April sky. 
Already Penshurst seems to satisfy our 
ideal of the English countryside, and we feel 
anxious to make further acquaintance with 
its charms. Before us looms up the church, 
—its square pinnacled tower just peeping 
over the roof of the village post office. 
Here in this quaint half-timbered building 
is received most of Penshurst’s knowledge 
of the outer world, here the daily mail is 
opened, "and around the gnarled trunk of 
the tremendous oak before its door, centers 
all the life of this quiet village. Exactly 
the age of this glorious tree no one seems 
to know. It blocks the very entrance to the 
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