Flowers And Flower-Gardens Part 5

But in sober truth, Pope, whether as a gardener or as a poet, required no enlarger or improver of his works. After Sir William Stanhope had left Pope's villa it came into the possession of Lord Mendip, who exhibited a proper respect for the poet's memory; but when in 1807 it was sold to the Baroness Howe, that lady pulled down the house and built another. The place subsequently came into the possession of a Mr. Young.

The grounds have now no resemblance to what the taste of Pope had once made them. Even his mother's monument has been removed! Few things would have more deeply touched the heart of the poet than the antic.i.p.ation of this insult to the memory of so revered a parent. His filial piety was as remarkable as his poetical genius. No pa.s.sages in his works do him more honor both as a man and as a poet than those which are mellowed into a deeper tenderness of sentiment and a softer and sweeter music by his domestic affections. There are probably few readers of English poetry who have not the following lines by heart,

Me, let the tender office long engage To rock the cradle of reposing age; With lenient arts extend a mother's breath; Make langour smile, and smooth the bed of death; Explore the thought, explain the asking eye, And keep at least one parent from the sky.

In a letter to Swift (dated March 29, 1731) begun by Lord Bolingbroke and concluded by Pope, the latter speaks thus touchingly of his dear old parent:

"My Lord has spoken justly of his lady; why not I of my mother?

Yesterday was her birth-day, now entering on the ninety-first year of her age; her memory much diminished, but her senses very little hurt, her sight and hearing good; she sleeps not ill, eats moderately, drinks water, says her prayers; this is all she does. I have reason to thank G.o.d for continuing so long to me a very good and tender parent, and for allowing me to exercise for some years those cares which are now as necessary to her, as hers have been to me."

Pope lost his mother two years, two months, and a few days after the date of this letter. Three days after her death he entreated Richardson, the painter, to take a sketch of her face, as she lay in her coffin: and for this purpose Pope somewhat delayed her interment. "I thank G.o.d," he says, "her death was as easy as her life was innocent; and as it cost her not a groan, nor even a sigh, there is yet upon her countenance such an expression of tranquillity, nay almost of pleasure, that it is even amiable to behold it. It would afford the finest image of a saint expired, that ever painting drew, and it would be the greatest obligation which even that obliging art could ever bestow upon a friend if you would come and sketch it for me." The writer adds, "I shall hope to see you this evening, as late as you will, or to-morrow morning as early, _before this winter flower is faded_."

On the small obelisk in the garden, erected by Pope to the memory of his mother, he placed the following simple and pathetic inscription.

AH! EDITHA!

MATRUM OPTIMA!

MULIERUM AMANTISSIMA!

VALE!

I wonder that any one could have had the heart to remove or to destroy so interesting a memorial.

It is said that Pope planted his celebrated weeping willow at Twickenham with his own hands, and that it was the first of its particular species introduced into England. Happening to be with Lady Suffolk when she received a parcel from Spain, he observed that it was bound with green twigs which looked as if they might vegetate. "Perhaps," said he, "these may produce something that we have not yet in England." He tried a cutting, and it succeeded. The tree was removed by some person as barbarous as the reverend gentleman who cut down Shakespeare's Mulberry Tree. The Willow was destroyed for the same reason, as the Mulberry Tree--because the owner was annoyed at persons asking to see it. The Weeping Willow

That shows his h.o.a.r leaves in the gla.s.sy stream,[013]

has had its interest with people in general much increased by its a.s.sociation with the history of Napoleon in the Island of St. Helena.

The tree whose boughs seemed to hang so fondly over his remains has now its scions in all parts of the world. Few travellers visited the tomb without taking a small cutting of the Napoleon Willow for cultivation in their own land. Slips of the Willow at Twickenham, like those of the Willow at St. Helena, have also found their way into many countries. In 1789 the Empress of Russia had some of them planted in her garden at St.

Petersburgh.

Mr. Loudon tells us that there is an old _oak_ in Binfield Wood, Windsor Forest, which is called _Pope's Oak_, and which bears the inscription "HERE POPE SANG:"[014] but according to general tradition it was a _beech_ tree, under which Pope wrote his "Windsor Forest." It is said that as that tree was decayed, Lady Gower had the inscription alluded to carved upon another tree near it. Perhaps the subst.i.tuted tree was an oak.

I may here mention that in the Vale of Avoca there is a tree celebrated as that under which Thomas Moore wrote the verses ent.i.tled "The meeting of the Waters."

The allusion to _Pope's Oak_ reminds me that Chaucer is said to have planted three oak trees in Donnington Park near Newbury. Not one of them is now, I believe, in existence. There is an oak tree in Windsor Forest above 1000 years old. In the hollow of this tree twenty people might be accommodated with standing room. It is called _King's Oak_: it was William the Conqueror's favorite tree. _Herne's Oak_ in Windsor Park, is said by some to be still standing, but it is described as a mere anatomy.

----An old oak whose boughs are mossed with age, And high top bald with dry antiquity.

_As You Like it_.

"It stretches out its bare and sapless branches," says Mr. Jesse, "like the skeleton arms of some enormous giant, and is almost fearful in its decay." _Herne's Oak_, as every one knows, is immortalised by Shakespeare, who has spread its fame over many lands.

There is an old tale goes that Herne the hunter, Sometime a keeper here in Windsor Forest, Doth all the winter time, at still midnight, Walk round about an oak, with great ragg'd horns, And there he blasts the trees, and takes the cattle; And makes milch cows yield blood, and shakes a chain In a most hideous and dreadful manner.

You have heard of such a spirit; and well you know, The superst.i.tious, idle-headed eld Received, and did deliver to our age, This tale of Herne the Hunter for a truth.

_Merry Wives of Windsor_.

"Herne, the hunter" is said to have hung himself upon one of the branches of this tree, and even,

----Yet there want not many that do fear, In deep of night to walk by this Herne's Oak.

_Merry Wives of Windsor_.

It was not long ago visited by the King of Prussia to whom Shakespeare had rendered it an object of great interest.

It is unpleasant to add that there is considerable doubt and dispute as to its ident.i.ty. Charles Knight and a Quarterly Reviewer both maintain that _Herne's Oak_ was cut down with a number of other old trees in obedience to an order from George the Third when he was not in his right mind, and that his Majesty deeply regretted the order he had given when he found that the most interesting tree in his Park had been destroyed.

Mr. Jesse, in his _Gleanings in Natural History_, says that after some pains to ascertain the truth, he is convinced that this story is not correct, and that the famous old tree is still standing. He adds that George the Fourth often alluded to the story and said that though one of the trees cut down was supposed to have been _Herne's Oak_, it was not so in reality. George the Third, it is said, once called the attention of Mr. Ingalt, the manager of Windsor Home Park to a particular tree, and said "I brought you here to point out this tree to you. I commit it to your especial charge; and take care that no damage is ever done to it. I had rather that every tree in the park should be cut down than that this tree should be hurt. _This is Hernes Oak_."

Sir Philip Sidney's Oak at Penshurst mentioned by Ben Jonson--

That taller tree, of which the nut was set At his great birth, where all the Muses met--

is still in existence. It is thirty feet in circ.u.mference. Waller also alludes to

Yonder tree which stands the sacred mark Of n.o.ble Sidney's birth.

Yardley Oak, immortalized by Cowper, is now in a state of decay.

Time made thee what thou wert--king of the woods!

And time hath made thee what thou art--a cave For owls to roost in.

_Cowper_.

The tree is said to be at least fifteen hundred years old. It cannot hold its present place much longer; but for many centuries to come it will

Live in description and look green in song.

It stands on the grounds of the Marquis of Northampton; and to prevent people from cutting off and carrying away pieces of it as relics, the following notice has been painted on a board and nailed to the tree:--"_Out of respect to the memory of the poet Cowper, the Marquis of Northampton is particularly desirous of preserving this Oak_."

Lord Byron, in early life, planted an oak in the garden at Newstead and indulged the fancy, that as that flourished so should he. The oak has survived the poet, but it will not outlive the memory of its planter or even the boyish verses which he addressed to it.

Pope observes, that "a tree is a n.o.bler object than a prince in his coronation robes." Yet probably the poet had never seen any tree larger than a British oak. What would he have thought of the Baobab tree in Abyssinia, which measures from 80 to 120 feet in girth, and sometimes reaches the age of five thousand years. We have no such sylvan patriarch in Europe. The oldest British tree I have heard of, is a yew tree of Fortingall in Scotland, of which the age is said to be two thousand five hundred years. If trees had long memories and could converse with man, what interesting chapters these survivors of centuries might add to the history of the world!

Pope was not always happy in his Twickenham Paradise. His rural delights were interrupted for a time by an unrequited pa.s.sion for the beautiful and highly-gifted but eccentric Lady Mary Wortley Montague.

Ah! friend, 'tis true--this truth you lovers know; In vain my structures rise, my gardens grow; In vain fair Thames reflects the double scenes Of hanging mountains and of sloping greens; Joy lives not here, to happier seats it flies, And only dwells where Wortley casts her eyes.

What are the gay parterre, the chequered shade, The morning bower, the evening colonnade, But soft recesses of uneasy minds, To sigh unheard in to the pa.s.sing winds?

So the struck deer, in some sequestered part, Lies down to die, the arrow at his heart; He, stretched unseen, in coverts hid from day, Bleeds drop by drop, and pants his life away.

These are exquisite lines, and have given delight to innumerable readers, but they gave no delight to Lady Mary. In writing to her sister, the Countess of Mar, then at Paris, she says in allusion to these "most musical, most melancholy" verses--"_I stifled them here; and I beg they may die the same death at Paris_." It is not, however, quite so easy a thing as Lady Mary seemed to think, to "stifle" such poetry as Pope's.

Pope's notions respecting the laying out of gardens are well expressed in the following extract from the fourth Epistle of his Moral Essays.[015] This fourth Epistle was addressed, as most readers will remember, to the accomplished Lord Burlington, who, as Walpole says, "had every quality of a genius and an artist, except envy. Though his own designs were more chaste and cla.s.sic than Kent's, he entertained him in his house till his death, and was more studious to extend his friend's fame than his own."

Something there is more needful than expense, And something previous e'en to taste--'tis sense; Good sense, which only is the gift of Heaven, And though no science fairly worth the seven; A light, which in yourself you must perceive; Jones and Le Notre have it not to give.

To build, or plant, whatever you intend, To rear the column or the arch to bend; To swell the terrace, or to sink the grot; In all let Nature never be forgot.

But treat the G.o.ddess like a modest fair, Nor over dress nor leave her wholly bare; Let not each beauty every where be spied, Where half the skill is decently to hide.

He gains all points, who pleasingly confounds, Surprizes, varies, and conceals the bounds.

_Consult the genius of the place in all_;[016]