The Natural History of Wiltshire Part 19

THE STABLES, of Roman architecture, built by Mons. de Caus, have a n.o.ble avenu to them, a square court in the middle; and on the four sides of this court were the pictures of the best horses as big as the life, painted in severall postures, by a Frenchman. Among others was the great black crop-eared stone horse on which Gustavus Adolphus, King of Sweden, was killed at the battle of Lutzen, two miles from Leipzig. Upon the comeing of the Scotts, in 1639, Sir. .. Fenwyck and. .. fearing their breeds of horses would be taken away by the Scotts, did sell their breeds of horses and mares to Philip (first) Earle of Pembroke. His Lords.h.i.+p had also Morocco horses, and for race horses, besides Peac.o.c.k and Delavill, he had a great many more kept at the parke at Ramesbury and at Rowlinton. Then for his stagge-hunting, fox-hunting, brooke-hawking, and land-hawking, what number of horses were kept to bee fitt at all seasons for it, I leave the reader to guesse, besides his horses for at least halfe a dozen coaches. Mr. Chr. Wroughton guesses not lesse than an hundred horses. [In the notice of William, first Earl of Pembroke, in Aubrey's "Lives of Eminent Men," he says, "This present Earl (1680) has at Wilton 52 mastives and 30 greyhounds, some beares, and a lyon, and a matter of 60 fellowes more b.e.s.t.i.a.ll than they." - J. B.]

OF HIS LORDs.h.i.+P'S HOUNDS, GREYHOUNDS, AND HAWKES. His Lords.h.i.+p had all sorts of hounds, for severall disports: sc. harbourers (great hounds) to harbour the stagges, and also small bull-dogges to break the bayes of the stagge; fox-hounds, finders, harriers, and others. His Lords.h.i.+p had the choicest tumblers that were in England, and the same tumblers that rode behind him he made use of to retrieve the partridges. The setting-doggs for supper-flights for his hawkes.

Grayhounds for his hare warren, as good as any were in England. When they returned from hawking the ladies would come out to see the hawkes at the highest flying, and then they made use of their setting dogges to be sure of a flight. His Lords.h.i.+p had two hawkes, one a falcon called Shrewsbury, which he had of the Earle of Shrewsbury, and another called the little tercel, which would fly quite out of sight, that they knew not how to shew the fowler till they found the head stood right. They had not little telescopes in those dayes; those would have been of great use for the discovery which way the hawke's head stood.

TILTING. Tilting was much used at Wilton in the times of Henry Earle of Pembroke and Sir Philip Sydney. At the solemnization of the great wedding of William, the second Earle of Pembroke, to one of the co-heires of the Earle of Shrewsbury, here was an extraordinary shew; at which time a great many of the n.o.bility and gentry exercised, and they had s.h.i.+elds of pastboard painted with their devices and emblemes, which were very pretty and ingenious. There are some of them hanging in some houses at Wilton to this day but I did remember many more.

Most, or all of them, had relation to marriage. One, I remember, is a man standing by a river's side angling, and takes up a rammes-horne: the motto "Casus ubiq{ue} valet". - (Ovid de Arte Amandi.') Another hath the picture of a s.h.i.+p at sea sinking in a storm, and a house on fire; the motto "Tertia pestis abest"; meaning a wife. Another, a s.h.i.+eld covered with black velvet; the motto "Par nulla figura dolori".

This last is in the Arcadia, and I believe they were most of them contrived by Sir Philip Sydney. Another was a hawke lett off the hand, with her leashes hanging at her legges, which might hang her where'ere she pitcht, and is an embleme of youth that is apt to be ensnared by their own too plentifull estates.

'Tis certain that the Earles of Pembroke were the most popular peers in the West of England; but one might boldly say, in the whole kingdome. The revenue of his family was, till about 1652, 16,000li.

per annum; but, with his offices and all, he had thirty thousand pounds per annum, and, as the revenue was great, so the greatnesse of his retinue and hospitality was answerable. One hundred and twenty family uprising and down lyeing, whereof you may take out six or seven, and all the rest servants and retayners.

FOR HIS LORDs.h.i.+P'S MUSICK. Alphonso Ferrabosco, the son, was Lord Philip (the first's) lutenist. He sang rarely well to the theorbo lute. He had a pension and lodgings in Baynard's Castle.

PART II. - CHAPTER III.

OF LEARNED MEN THAT HAD PENSIONS GRANTED TO THEM BY THE EARLES OF PEMBROKE.

IN the former Chapter I endeavoured to adumbrate Wilton House as to its architecture. We are now to consider it within, where it will appeare to have been an academie as well as palace; and was, as it were, the apiarie to which men that were excellent in armes and arts did resort and were caress't, and many of them received honourable pensions.

The hospitality here was very great. I shall wave the grandeur of William the first Earle, who married [Anne] sister to Queen Katharine Parre, and was the great favourite of King Henry 8th, and conservator of his will, and come to our grandfather's memorie, in the times of his sonne Henry Earle of Pembroke, and his Countess Mary, daughter of Sir Henry Sydney, and sister to that renowned knight Sir Philip Sydney, whose fame will never die whilest poetrie lives. His Lords.h.i.+p was the patron to the men of armes, and to the antiquaries and heralds; he took a great delight in the study of herauldry, as appeares by that curious collection of heraldique ma.n.u.scripts in the library here. It was this earle that did set up all the painted gla.s.se scutchions about the house. Many a brave souldier, no doubt, was here obliged by his Lords.h.i.+p; but time has obliterated their names.

Mr. Robert Barret dedicated the "Theorick and Practick of Moderne Warres", in folio, London, 1598, to this n.o.ble Earle, and William Lord Herbert of Cardiff, his son, then a youth. It seemes to have been a very good discourse as any writt in that time, wherein he shews much learning, besides experience. He had spent most of his time in foreigne warres, as the French, Dutch, Italian, and Spanish; and here delivers his military observations.

John Jones, an eminent physician in his tyme, wrote a treatise of the bathes at Bath, printed in a black letter, Anno Domini 1572, which he dedicated to Henry, Earle of Pembroke. [These dedications were doubtless acknowledged by pecuniary gifts from the patron to the authors. - J. B.]

I shall now pa.s.se to the ill.u.s.trious Lady Mary, Countesse of Pembroke, whom her brother hath eternized by his Arcadia; but many or most of the verses in the Arcadia were made by her Honour, and they seem to have been writt by a woman. 'Twas a great pity that Sir Philip had not lived to have put his last hand to it. He spent much, if not most part of his time here, and at Ivychurch, near Salisbury, which did then belong to this family, when he was in England; and I cannot imagine that Mr. Edmund Spenser could be a stranger here. [See, in a subsequent page, Chap. VIII. "The Downes". - J. B.]

Her Honour's genius lay as much towards chymistrie as poetrie. The learned Dr. Mouffet, that wrote of Insects and of Meates, had a pension hence. In a catalogue of English playes set forth by Gerard Langbain, is thus, viz.: "Lady Pembrock, Antonius, 4to." [This was an English translation of "The Tragedie of Antonie. Doone into English by the Countesse of Pembroke. Imprinted at London, for William Ponsonby, 1595." 12mo. The Countess of Pembroke also translated "A Discourse of Life and Death, written in French, by Phil. Mornay", 1600, 12mo.- J. B.]

"Underneath this sable herse Lies the subject of all verse, Sydney's sister, Pembroke's mother, Death! ere thou kill'st such another, Fair, and wise, and learned as SHE, Time will throw a dart at thee."

These verses were made by Mr. (William*) Browne, who wrote the "Pastoralls", and they are inserted there.

*(William, Governor afterwards to ye now E. of Oxford. - J. EVELYN.)

[In the Memoir of Aubrey, published by the Wilts.h.i.+re Topographical Society in 1845, I drew attention to this pa.s.sage, which shews that although the above famous epitaph on the Countess of Pembroke is almost always attributed to Ben Jonson, it was, in fact, written by William Browne. That such is really the case does not rest only on the authority of Aubrey and Evelyn; for we find this very epitaph in a volume of Poems written by Browne, and preserved amongst the Lansdowne MSS in the British Museum (No. 777), together with the following additional lines:

"Marble pyles let no man raise To her name for after-dayes; Some kind woman, borne as she, Reading this, like Niobe, Shall turne marble, and become Both her mourner and her tombe."

To the epitaph is subjoined an "Elegie" on the Countess, of considerable length. When or by whom the epitaph was first ascribed to Jonson it is not easy to ascertain; but certainly no literary error has been more frequently repeated. Aubrey is wrong in stating that the lines were printed in Browne's Pastorals.- J. B.]

Mr. Adrian Gilbert, uterine brother to Sir Walter Raleigh, was a great chymist, and a man of excellent parts, but very sarcastick, and the greatest buffoon in the nation. He was housekeeper at Wilton, and made that delicate orchard where the stately garden now is. ........... He had a pension, and died about the beginning of the reign of King Charles the First. Elias Ashmole, Esq. finds, by Dr. John Dee's papers, that there was a great friends.h.i.+p and correspondency between him and Adrian Gilbert, and he often mentions him in his ma.n.u.scripts.

Now there can be no doubt made but that his half-brother Sir Walter Raleigh, which was "tam Marti quam Mercurio", had a great acquaintance with the Earle Henry and his ingenious Countesse.

There lived in Wilton, in those dayes, one Mr. Boston, a Salisbury man (his father was a brewer there), who was a great chymist, and did great cures by his art. The Lady Mary, Countesse of Pembroke, did much esteeme him for his skill, and would have had him to have been her operator, and live with her, but he would not accept of her Ladys.h.i.+p's kind offer. But after long search after the philosopher's stone, he died at Wilton, having spent his estate. After his death they found in his laboratory two or three baskets of egge sh.e.l.les, which I remember Geber saieth is a princ.i.p.all ingredient of that stone.

J. Donne, Deane of St. Paule's, was well known both to Sir Philip Sydney and his sister Mary, as appeares by those excellent verses in his poems, "Upon the Translation of the Psalmes by Sir Philip Sydney and the Countesse of Pembroke his sister."

Earl William [the second of that name] was a good scholar, and delighted in poetrie; and did sometimes, for his diversion, write some sonnets and epigrammes, which deserve commendation. Some of them are in print in a little book in 8vo. int.i.tuled "Poems writt by William Earle of Pembroke, and Sir Benjamin Ruddyer, Knight, 1660." [See ante, page 77. A new edition of these poems was published by Sir Egerton Brydges in 1817.] He was of an heroique and publick spirit, bountifull to his friends and servants, and a great encourager of learned men.

Philip Earle of Pembroke [the first of that name], his brother, did not delight in books or poetry; but exceedingly loved painting and building, in which he had singular judgment, and had the best collection of any peer in England. He had a wonderful sagacity in the understanding of men, and could discover whether an amba.s.sadour's message was reall or feigned; and his Majesty King James made great use of this talent of his. Mr. Touars, an ingenious gentleman, who understood painting well, and did travell beyond sea to buy rare pieces for his lords.h.i.+p, had a pension of lOOli. per annum. Mr.

Richard Gibson, the dwarfe, whose marriage Mr. Edm. Waller hath celebrated in his poems, sc. the Marriage of the Dwarfs, a great master in miniture, hath a pension of an hundred pounds per annum.

Mr. Philip Ma.s.singer, author of severall good playes, was a servant to his lords.h.i.+p, and had a pension of twenty or thirty pounds per annum, which was payed to his wife after his decease. She lived at Cardiffe, in Glamorgans.h.i.+re. There were others also had pensions, that I have forgot.

[Arthur Ma.s.singer, the father of the poet, was attached to the establishment of the Earl of Pembroke; and Gifford, in his Life of Ma.s.singer, seems inclined to think that Philip was born at Wilton. He was baptized in St. Thomas's Church, Salisbury, 24 Nov. 1583. His biographers have all been ignorant of the fact above recorded by Aubrey. A brief memoir of the life of Ma.s.singer will be found in Hatcher's History of Salisbury, p. 619.- J. B.]

William (third) and Philip (third) earles were gallant, n.o.ble persons, and handsome; they espoused not learning, but were addicted to field sports and hospitality. But Thomas Earle of Pembroke has the vertues and good parts of his ancestors concentred in him; which his lords.h.i.+p hath not been wanting to cultivate and improve by study and travell; which make his t.i.tles s.h.i.+ne more bright. He is an honour to the peerage, and a glory and a blessing to his country: but his reall worth best speakes him, and it praises him in the gates.

PART II. - CHAPTER IV.

OF GARDENS: - LAVINGTON GARDEN, CHELSEY GARDEN.

[THE stately gardens of the seventeenth century were less remarkable for the cultivation of useful or ornamental plants than for the formal arrangement of their walks, arbours, parterres, and hedges. Amongst the various decorations introduced were jets d'eau, or fountains, artificial cascades, columns, statues, grottoes, rock-work, mazes or labyrinths, terraces communicating with each other by flights of steps, and similar puerilities. This style of gardening was introduced from France; where the celebrated Le Notre had displayed his skill in laying out the gardens of the palace of Versailles; the most important specimens of their cla.s.s. The same person was afterwards employed by several of the English n.o.bility.

The gardens at Wilton, described in the last chapter, were completely in the style referred to. Solomon de Caus, to whom they are attributed by Aubrey, is supposed by Mr. Loudon, in his valuable "Encyclopaedia of Gardening", to have been the inventor of greenhouses. The last mentioned work contains the best account yet published of the gardens of the olden time. Britton's "History of Ca.s.siobury" (folio, 1837), p. 17, also contains some curious particulars of the original plantations and pleasure grounds of that interesting mansion.

The gardens at Lavington, which are described in the present chapter, were evidently of the same character with those of Wilton. Chelsey- garden is very minutely described by Aubrey, but our limits forbid its insertion, especially as it is irrelevant to a History of Wilts.h.i.+re.- J. B.]

O janitores, villiciq{ue} felices: Dominis parantur isti, serviunt vobis.

MARTIAL, Epigramm. 29, lib. x.

To write in the praise of gardens is besides my designe. The pleasure and use of them were unknown to our great-grandfathers. They were contented with pot-herbs, and did mind chiefly their stables. The chronicle tells us, that in the reign of King Henry the 8th pear- mains were so great a rarity that a baskett full of them was a present to the great Cardinall Wolsey.

Henry Lyte, of Lyte's Cary, in Somerset, Esq. translated Dodoens'

Herball into English, which he dedicated to Q. Elizabeth, about the beginning of her reigne [1578]. He had a pretty good collection of plants for that age; some few whereof are yet alive, 1660: and no question but Dr. Gilbert, &c. did furnish their gardens as well as they could so long ago, which could be but meanly. But the first peer that stored his garden with exotick plants was William Earle of Salisbury, [1612-1668] at his garden at [Hatfield? - J. B.] a catalogue whereof, fairly writt in a skin of vellum, consisting of 830 plants, is in the hands of Elias Ashmole, Esq. at South Lambeth.

But 'twas Sir John Danvers, of Chelsey, who first taught us the way of Italian gardens. He had well travelled France and Italy, and made good observations. He had in a fair body an harmonicall mind. In his youth his complexion was so exceeding beautiful and fine that Thomas Bond, Esq. of Ogbourne St. .... in Wilts.h.i.+re, who was his companion in his travells, did say that the people would come after him in the street to admire him. He had a very fine fancy, which lay chiefly for gardens and architecture.

The garden at Lavington in this county, and that at Chelsey in Middles.e.x, as likewise the house there, doe remaine monuments of his ingenuity. The garden at Lavington is full of irregularities, both naturall and artificiall, sc. elevations and depressions. Through the length of it there runneth a fine cleare trowt stream; walled with brick on each side, to hinder the earth from mouldring down. In this stream are placed severall statues. At the west end is an admirable place for a grotto, where the great arch is, over which now is the market roade. Among severall others, there is a very pleasant elevation on the south side of the garden, which steales, arising almost insensibly, that is, before one is aware, and gives you a view over the spatious corn-fields there, and so to East Lavington: where, being landed on a fine levell, letteth you descend again with the like easinesse; each side is flanqued with laurells. It is almost impossible to describe this garden, it is so full of variety and unevenesse; nay, it would be a difficult matter for a good artist to make a draught of it. About An. 1686, the right honourable James Earle of Abingdon [who had become possessed of the estate in right of his wife], built a n.o.ble portico, full of water workes, which is on the north side of the garden, and faceth the south. It is both portico and grott, and was designed by Mr. Rose, of ...... in Oxfords.h.i.+re.

Wilton Garden was the third garden after these two of the Italian mode; but in the time of King Charles the Second gardening was much improved and became common. I doe believe I may modestly affirme that there is now, 1691, ten times as much gardening about London as there was Anno 1660 ; and wee have been, since that time, much improved in forreign plants, especially since about 1683, there have been exotick plants brought into England no lesse than seven thousand. (From Mr.

Watts, gardener of the Apothecary's garden at Chelsey, and other botanists.)

As for Longleate Garden it was lately made. I have not seen it, but they say 'tis n.o.ble.

Till the breaking out of the civill warres, Tom o Bedlam's did travell about the countrey. They had been poore distracted men that had been putt into Bedlam, where recovering to some sobernesse they were licentiated to goe a begging: e. g. they had on their left arm an armilla of tinn, printed in some workes, about four inches long; they could not gett it off. They wore about their necks a great horn of an oxe in a string or bawdrie, which, when they came to an house for almes, they did wind: and they did putt the drink given them into this horn, whereto they did putt a stopple. Since the warres I doe not remember to have seen any one of them. (I have seen them in Worcesters.h.i.+re within these thirty years, 1756. MS. NOTE, ANONYMOUS.)

[This account of the " bedlam beggars" so well known to our forefathers, is repeated by Aubrey in his "Remains of Gentilism,"