Travel and the British country house: Cultures, critiques and consumption in the long eighteenth century 9781526110343

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S T O B A RT ( E D )

T R AV EL A ND THE BR ITISH COU N T RY HOUSE C U LT U R E S , C R I T I Q U E S A N D C O N S U M P T I O N I N THE LONG EIGHTEENTH CENTURY

The book begins by exploring the ways in which travel formed an inspiration to build or remodel houses and gardens. Attention has generally focused on the Grand Tour, but this volume also highlights the importance of empire and vicarious travel to China in shaping taste and acquiring goods. Subsequent essays examine the importance of country house visiting in influencing aesthetics through the published accounts of elite visitors, the growing number of guidebooks and the less familiar journals of foreign visitors to British houses. The final essays focus on some of the practical aspects of travel, including the expenditure involved and the logistics of moving people and goods around the country and across Europe and the globe. Suitable for a scholarly audience, including postgraduate and undergraduate students, but also accessible to the general reader, Travel and the British country house offers a series of fascinating studies of the country house that provide fresh insights and serve to animate the country house with flows of people, goods and ideas. Jon Stobart is Professor of History at Manchester Metropolitan University

Cover: W. Hollar, View of Windsor Castle, 1644. Courtesy of the Rijksmuseum

T R AV E L A N D T H E B R I T I S H C OU N T RY HOUS E

Travel and the British country house explores the ways in which travel by owners, visitors and material objects shaped country houses during the long eighteenth century. Bringing together essays on a wide variety of British houses, it provides a richer and more nuanced understanding of the impact of travel on the culture and perception of the British country house, and how this varied according to the identity of the traveller and the reasons for and geography of their journeys.

TR AV EL A ND THE BR ITISH COU N TRY HOUSE CULTURES, CRITIQUES AND CONSUMPTION IN THE LONG EIGHTEENTH CENTURY

www.manchesteruniversitypress.co.uk

EDITED BY JON STOBART

Travel and the British country house

Travel and the British country house Cultures, critiques and consumption in the long eighteenth century edited by

jon stobart

Manchester University Press

Copyright © Manchester University Press 2017 While copyright in the volume as a whole is vested in Manchester University Press, copyright in individual chapters belongs to their respective authors, and no chapter may be reproduced wholly or in part without the express permission in writing of both author and publisher. Published by Manchester University Press Altrincham Street, Manchester M1 7JA www.manchesteruniversitypress.co.uk British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library isbn  978 1 5261 1032 9  hardback First published 2017 The publisher has no responsibility for the persistence or accuracy of URLs for any external or third-party internet websites referred to in this book, and does not guarantee that any content on such websites is, or will remain, accurate or appropriate.

Typeset by Servis Filmsetting Ltd, Stockport, Cheshire

Contents



List of figures List of charts Notes on contributors

vii x xi

Introduction: travel and the British country house 1 Jon Stobart   1 ‘Antiquity mad’: the influence of continental travel on the Irish houses of Frederick Hervey, the Earl Bishop, 1730–1803 19 Rebecca Campion   2 From Rome to Stourhead and thence to Rome again: the phenomenon of the eighteenth-century English landscape garden 42 John Harrison   3 Virtual travel and virtuous objects: chinoiserie and the country house 63 Emile de Bruijn   4 Gentlemen tourists in the early eighteenth century: the travel journals of William Hanbury and John Scattergood 86 Rosie MacArthur   5 A foreign appreciation of English country houses and castles: Dutch travellers’ accounts of proto-museums visited en route, 1683–1855 106 Hanneke Ronnes and Renske Koster   6 ‘Worth viewing by travellers’: Arthur Young and country house picture collections in the late eighteenth century 127 Jocelyn Anderson

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Contents

  7 ‘Enjoying country life to the full – only the English know how to do that!’: appreciation of the British country house by Hungarian aristocratic travellers 145 Kristóf Fatsar   8 Magnificent and mundane: transporting people and goods to the country house, c.1730–1800168 Jon Stobart   9 On the road (and the Thames) with William Cavendish, 1st Earl of Devonshire, 1597–1623 188 Peter Edwards 10 ‘No Lady could do this’: navigating gender and collecting objects in India and Scotland, c.1810–50206 Ellen Filor Bibliography Index

225 242

Figures

1.1 Downhill Castle, County Derry, from George Sampson, Statistical Survey of Co. Londonderry (Dublin, 1802) 20 1.2 Ballyscullion House, County Derry, from George Sampson, Statistical Survey of Co. Londonderry (Dublin, 1802) 20 1.3  Ickworth House, Suffolk. Author’s photograph 21 1.4 John Soane, sketch of triclinium, 1778–79. Sir John Soane’s Museum, London, Italian sketchbook, SM vol. 164, pp. 6–7. Image © Sir John Soane’s Museum, London. Photograph: Hugh Kelly 26 1.5 John Soane, sketch of proposals for Downhill, 1780–81. Sir John Soane’s Museum, London, Italian sketchbook, SM vol. 39, pp. 86v–87r. Image © Sir John Soane’s Museum, London. Photograph: Hugh Kelly 27 1.6 Hugh Douglas Hamilton, Frederick Hervey, Bishop of Derry and 4th Earl of Bristol (1730–1803), with his Granddaughter Lady Caroline Crichton (1779–1856), in the Gardens of the Villa Borghese, Rome, c.1790. Oil on canvas, 223.5 × 199 cm. National Gallery of Ireland, NGI.4350. Image © National Gallery of Ireland, Dublin  32 2.1  Fredrik Magnus Piper’s 1779 plan of Stourhead 44 2.2 (A) Overton’s design No. 16; (B) the Englischer Gartensitz at Wörlitz; and (C) Piper’s sketch of the ‘Temple on the Terrace’ at Stourhead 47 2.3 Modern plan of the gardens at Wörlitz with photographs of features influenced by Stourhead gardens 48 2.4 Modern plan of the garden at Hagaparken with photographs of key items50 3.1 One of a pair of Delft glazed earthenware plaques showing a Chinese landscape with a pineapple plant and a banana plantain, late seventeenth century. Dyrham Park, Gloucestershire, NT 452247 and NT 452248. Image © National Trust photo library no. 1036101 66

viii Figures 3.2 One of two tapestries by John Vanderbank the elder, 1691, at Belton House, Lincolnshire, NT 436999. Image © National Trust Images/ Graham Challifour 70 3.3 The landscape garden at Shugborough, Staffordshire. NT 1271061, in a painting by Nicholas Dall. Image © National Trust Images 73 3.4 A Chinese painting on glass depicting figures in a garden on the banks of a lake, from the Hoare collection at Stourhead, Wiltshire, NT 452429, currently on display at Dyrham Park, Gloucestershire. Image © National Trust Collections/Seamus McKenna 75 3.5 English cabinet, c.1755–60, at Uppark, West Sussex, NT 137638. Image © National Trust Images/Nadia Mackenzie 76 3.6 A section of the mural paintings in the Music Room at the Royal Pavilion, Brighton, created in 1817–18 by Henry Lambelet. Image © Royal Pavilion & Museums, Brighton & Hove 81 4.1 Page of accounts from Hanbury’s travel journal. Image © King’s College London Archives 91 4.2 Letter from Scattergood recounting a visit to Chatsworth. Image © Northamptonshire Archives Services 95 5.1 W. Hollar, Whitehall in London, View from the Thames, 1647. Etching on paper, 14.7 × 33.2 cm. Collection Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam110 5.2 W. Hollar, View of Windsor Castle, 1644. Etching on paper, 9.3 × 17.1 cm. Collection Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam 112 5.3 D. Marot, Parterre of Hampton Court, between 1703 and 1800. Etching on paper, 28.7 × 19.5 cm. Collection Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam114 5.4 W. Hollar, View of Richmond Palace, 1638. Etching on paper, 11.5 × 33.8 cm. Collection Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam 115 5.5 Anon., The Tower of London, 1726. Etching on paper, 13.1 × 16.5 cm. Collection Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam 115 5.6 J. Kip, View of Hampton Court, 1709. Etching on paper, 34.7 × 47.5 cm. Collection Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam 120 7.1 The 1st Duke of Wellington’s country seat, Stratfield Saye House, ­probably by Prince Miklós Pál Esterházy, 1836. Image © Hungarian National Archives 155 7.2 Interior of Lady Jersey’s suite at Middleton Park, probably by Prince Miklós Pál Esterházy, 1836. Image © Hungarian National Archives156 7.3 Dome of the unrealised conservatory in the garden of the Károlyi Palace in Pest, designed by William Tierney Clark in 1833. Image © Architectural Collection of Kiscell Museum / Budapest History Museum161



Figures

  7.4 Front elevation of the gardener’s house, attached to the back of the conservatory in the garden of the Károlyi Palace in Pest, 1833. Image © Architectural Collection of Kiscell Museum / Budapest History Museum   7.5 Double sash window on the first floor of the Károlyi Palace in Pest, facing the courtyard, in the room used as a study by Count György Károlyi. Image © Kristóf Fatsar 10.1 ‘In the Dining-Room’ in Lawrence Weaver, ‘Brahan Castle, Ross-shire’, Country Life, 19 August 1916, p. 213. Image © Country Life

ix

162 163 216

Charts

5.1 The English houses and castles most visited by Dutch travellers, 1683–1855111 5.2 The English houses and castles most visited by Dutch travellers, 1683–1855 (by period) 117 7.1 Social background of Hungarian visitors to Britain and the number of aristocrats compared with the total number per year, 1837–49146 8.1 Spending on transport and travel by Sir Roger Newdigate, 1747–96 (£; five-year average as percentage) 170 8.2 Spending on transport and travel by Sir Roger Newdigate, 1747–96 (£) 171 9.1  Travel expenses of William Cavendish, 1599 189

Notes on contributors

Jocelyn Anderson completed her PhD at the Courtauld Institute of Art in May 2013; the title of her thesis was ‘Remaking the Country House: CountryHouse Guidebooks in the Late Eighteenth and Early Nineteenth Centuries’. In 2014, she held a postdoctoral fellowship at the Paul Mellon  Centre for  Studies in British Art, and during this time she worked on a book project on country-house tourism. Her current research is on architecture and the public sphere, and on depictions of the British Empire in the eighteenth century. Rebecca Campion holds an MA and a PGCE from Cambridge University and a PhD from Maynooth University. She specialises in eighteenth-century Irish material culture and has published ‘Consuming the Antique: Frederick Hervey and the Translation of Continental Style in the Irish Context’ in New Griffon (2012) and ‘Exploring Sources for Material Culture through the Example of the Earl Bishop of Derry’ in Austin Stewart (ed.), Maynooth History Forum Annual Conference 2012 (2014). Emile de Bruijn works for the National Trust. He was co-author (with Andrew Bush and Helen Clifford) of Chinese Wallpaper in National Trust Houses (2014). He helped to organise the conference ‘Chinese Wallpaper: Trade, Technique and Taste’, held at Coutts & Co. and the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, and the Royal Pavilion, Brighton, in April 2016. He is currently working on a major survey of Chinese wallpapers in the British Isles, to be published in 2017. Peter Edwards is Emeritus Professor of Early Modern British Social History at the University of Roehampton. He has written extensively on the multi-­ functional role of horses in pre-modern society. His publications include The Horse Trade of Tudor and Stuart England (1988), Horse and Man in Early

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Notes on contributors

Modern England (2007) and with Elspeth Graham (eds), The Horse as Cultural Icon: the Real and the Symbolic Horse in the Early Modern World (2011) and Authority, Authorship and Aristocratic Identity in Seventeenth-Century England: William Cavendish, 1st Duke of Newcastle, and his Political, Social and Cultural Connections (2012). Kristóf Fatsar is Senior Lecturer at Writtle University College, Essex, where he is Course Scheme Manager for the undergraduate Landscape Architecture and Garden Design provision. His current research focuses on transnational cultural tourism at the turn of the nineteenth century, with specific reference to perceptions of the English landscape garden on the Continent; it explores the changing ideological and cultural connotations of popular travel destinations in different chronological, geographical and social contexts. Ellen Filor is the Susan Manning Postdoctoral Fellow at the Institute of Advanced Studies of the Humanities, University of Edinburgh. She received her PhD in 2014 from University College London. Since then she has held a Fulbright award at the University of Michigan and a Junior Research Fellowship at University College London. John Harrison is a psychologist and classicist with a particular interest in the reception of Roman myth in Georgian Britain. He is an associate professor at the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, a visiting professor at King’s College London and a doctoral candidate with the Open University. Renske Koster MA studied heritages studies and art history at the University of Amsterdam. She is currently working at the exhibition department of the Frans Hals Museum in Haarlem. She has published on the travels of Dutch modern artists and on the influence of eighteenth-century aesthetic developments on country-house visiting. Rosie MacArthur is a historian with a particular interest in country houses and eighteenth-century material culture. She has carried out research into eighteenth-century art sales at the National Gallery, London, in association with the Getty Research Institute, and has published work on auction catalogues and the Hanbury family at Kelmarsh Hall, Northamptonshire. Hanneke Ronnes is an associate professor at the University of Amsterdam. She lectures in the Department of Cultural History and is director of the master’s programme in heritage studies. A historian, anthropologist and archaeologist, she specialises in castles and country houses. Jon Stobart is Professor of History at Manchester Metropolitan University. He has written extensively on various aspects of retailing and consumption in eighteenth-century England, with a particular focus on the country house. His



Notes on contributors

xiii

recent publications include Consumption and the Country House (2016), with Mark Rothery; The Country House: Material Culture and Consumption (2016), edited with Andrew Hann; and A Taste for Luxury in Early-Modern Europe (2017), edited with Johanna Ilmakunnas.

Introduction: travel and the British country house Jon Stobart

In the summer of 1748, Sophia Newdigate was touring southern England with her husband, Sir Roger Newdigate, and a small party of friends. In her journal of the tour, she noted that, after admiring Mr Hoare’s house and gardens at Stourton, they ‘got at night to a little miserable town called Bruton where, had we not been very hungry & much tired we should have found a difficulty to eat or sleep’. The following day, they ‘proceeded on to Wells ten miles from this Place a very rocky road’.1 Over twenty-five years later, her husband, by then aged fifty-five and on his second Grand Tour, wrote to his friend John Morduant describing the sights of Florence: ‘Our mornings are spent amongst the statues, paintings, intaglios & cameos, medals, antiquities Roman & Etruscan, of the immense collection call’d the Gallery. We have operas, comedies, balls, all mask’d …’ He also offered to shop on his friend’s behalf: ‘Can we do anything for you in this country – Books, Music, Perfumes, Sculpture, painting. Send your order we shall execute them with pleasure.’2 These two incidents from the archives of a single Warwickshire family tell us much about the relationship between travel and the country house. The houses of the elite were destinations for travellers, but also places to be furnished with the souvenirs of trips to Europe and further afield; travelling was something to be enjoyed or sometimes endured because of its privations and discomforts; it sharpened the critical eye by broadening geographical and cultural experience, and it marked out the elite as a group with the leisure and money to devote to travel for pleasure. For contemporaries, then, travel was something that placed the country house into social, spatial and cultural context; but it was also something that allowed owners to acquire a range of objects not easily accessed at home – most notably treasures from the Grand Tour or more exotic goods from India. This book explores these different aspects of the relationship between travel and the ­country house, and particularly the interlinking of the house as a destination of travellers and a product of travel. It builds on a vast

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Travel and the British country house

literature on country houses and their owners, but makes significant points of departure and thus offers new insights into how the country house was imagined, constructed and perceived, and how it was connected, both virtually and physically, with the wider world. The British country house has been the subject of increasing scholarly interest in recent years, much of it focusing on the long eighteenth century, the period in which its political, cultural and social significance were probably at their greatest. From an art-historical perspective, attention has focused on the architectural and aesthetic development of the country house, traditionally seen in terms of a progression of stylistic development from baroque through Palladian and neo-classical to gothic.3 While this approach has been questioned in recent years, in both its linear approach and its focus on ideal types, the importance of the country house as the embodiment of artistic endeavour and the owner as key patron of the arts and of skilled professionals and craftsmen remains largely intact.4 It formed a key component of the country house as powerhouse: an expression of elite patronage and influence or, in Girouard’s terms, ‘the headquarters from which land was administered and power organised. It was a show-case, in which to exhibit and entertain supporters and good connections … It was an image maker, which projected an aura of glamour, mystery or success around its owner. It was visible evidence of his wealth.’5 The country house brought not simply the prestige of a large and tasteful residence; it was also the embodiment of political power which derived from land ownership and control of people, including the electorate. Small wonder, then, that country houses were places that travellers wished to visit. A great house reflected cultural capital and political power, but also great wealth. This was derived from a range of sources, including political office, trade and finance, colonial investments or service and professional activities, most notably the law; but the most important was undoubtedly agriculture.6 While few great landowners farmed their land directly, effective estate management was central to building and maintaining high levels of rental income. An active land market allowed estate owners to increase and consolidate their holdings, despite the apparent restrictions imposed by practices of strict settlement and entail.7 These aspects of estate management have attracted considerable academic attention, but only recently has this interest in income begun to be matched by a corresponding interest in spending, as part of the recent emergence of consumption as a historical meta-narrative. Of course, the huge and sometimes ruinous sums laid out on building have long been recognised; what is new is an attempt to uncover more about the routine expenditure that underpinned household management and how consumption was related to identity, family relationships and systems of supply.8 The country house thus emerges as a nexus of consumption, but also a place that was constantly evolving as a result of the ongoing process of consumption.



Introduction

3

All these facets of the form and function of the country house place it into a variety of different frameworks and contexts, each with its own story to tell. We thus see the house set within worlds of collecting and connoisseurship, power and privilege, wealth and patronage; but also of goods, commerce and trade. There remains, however, a need to examine more closely the ways in which these various contexts were articulated and experienced through the geographical mobility of people: that is, their ability and readiness to travel between places in pursuit of business and pleasure. The relationship between travel and the country house was complex and contingent. It varied according to the means and motivations of individual landowners and their social and political ambitions, personal tastes and family circumstances; and, of course, it shifted over time. Cultures of travel: country house visiting The eighteenth-century country house was a well-established focus for travel and the destination for many journeys. This built on a long tradition of the country house as a site for hospitality: a place where travellers, at least those of a certain status, could expect to be welcomed even if they were unknown to the owner of the house. Yet this continuity was cut across by marked changes in the number, character and motivation of visitors. Country house visitors in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries were generally drawn from the elite; they came to view the cabinets of curiosities and increasingly the artistic collections to be found at the great houses.9 This was the age of the virtuosi, whose interests and tastes were wide-ranging and whose collections were similarly eclectic. Perhaps most famous was that found in Sir Walter Cope’s London house, where fine paintings were admired alongside a rhinoceros horn, a chain made from monkey’s teeth, an Indian canoe and clothes from China, Java and Arabia, among many other things.10 Collectors and visitors alike were driven by curiosity for things that were rare and unusual, opulent and costly. However, this approach to collecting was already being satirised in the 1670s, Thomas Shadwell’s The Virtuoso centring on the exploits of Sir Nicholas Gimcrack. From the early eighteenth century onwards, curiosity and eclecticism were increasingly replaced by taste and discernment, and collections were more narrowly focused on the arts – paintings, sculpture, medals, marbles and books – all framed in the grand and symbolic architecture of the house itself.11 Visiting country houses was much more about personal improvement and refining taste: learning and testing what comprised ‘good’ taste, not least by gazing at and critically assessing collections made on the Grand Tour (see Chapters 1 and 4). The twin attractions of great houses and great collections focused attention onto a particular canon of places, especially for overseas visitors. Tinniswood argues for a gradual expansion of geographical horizons, from a small number

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Travel and the British country house

of royal palaces and prodigy houses in and around London to a series of regional groupings, including Houghton, Holkham, Blickling and Raynham in Norfolk, and Longleat, Stourhead, Mount Edgecumbe and Saltram in the south-west – a transition also seen with overseas visitors (see Chapters 5 and 7).12 Within these, there were certain places that stood out, most notably Blenheim, Chatsworth, Wilton and Stowe. At these great houses and to a lesser extent elsewhere, guidebooks were increasingly available for the visitor, in part as a response to a growing thirst for accurate information about house interiors, particularly the collections of paintings. If the visitor was lucky and of high status, he or she might be shown round by the owner, but this task was often left to servants, usually the housekeeper, whose knowledge was increasingly found wanting. Guidebooks thus offered the visitor more reliable descriptions and attributions of paintings, a trend which, as Anderson demonstrates, Arthur Young both exploited and fed into (Chapter 6). Some guidebooks cost a few pence and were meant for use in situ, while others were expensive commemorative volumes, intended for gentlemen’s libraries, and could be well illustrated and expensive items.13 Guidebooks may have helped to supply more reliable information to discerning visitors, but the basic process of house visiting remained largely unchanged throughout the eighteenth century: the prospective visitor either sent a servant ahead or simply knocked on the door and asked to be admitted. Yet two important things had changed. First, there was a growing presumption that one would be allowed in; indeed, the irascible John Byng complained vociferously when he failed to gain entry to Shirburn Castle in Oxfordshire, arguing: ‘Let people proclaim that their great houses are not to be view’d, and then travellers will not ride out of their way with false hopes.’14 Second, the number of people seeking admission was growing and their social status was becoming more mixed – both trends that compromised the exclusivity of the country house. The private tours made by William Hanbury (Chapter 4) and Sophia Newdigate in the 1720s and 1740s were very different from the day trips undertaken later in the eighteenth century by urban middling sorts such as Abigail Gawthorn.15 Mandler has argued that the mid-eighteenth-century landowner needed to make his house ‘sufficiently permeable’ to allow visitors to ‘appreciate and, preferably, report on his achievements’; but the increasing press for admission in some places meant that restrictions, in terms of tickets or opening hours, were necessary. Moreover, the new set of visitors sometimes failed to behave themselves, resulting in complaints about vandalism and theft.16 Not everything was changing, however: polite social visits remained a central element of elite sociability throughout the eighteenth century.17 For those travelling, overnight stays with country house owners were common and signalled a deeper integration into country house culture and one that meant that sojourns at inns were only occasionally necessary.18 Receiving accommodation in this



Introduction

5

way, which William Hanbury enjoyed while his untitled travelling companion did not (see Chapter 4), signalled social standing and was predicated on a shared social identity (as titled landowners) and sometimes family connections with other country house owners. It was underpinned by the ownership of a carriage, which not only remained a defining characteristic of the elite and a very public demonstration of wealth and standing, but was also of immense practical value for travel, especially for women, because it allowed flexibility that stage coaches could not offer.19 The critical eye: travel and taste Closely linked to the importance of the house as a destination for travellers is the notion of travel as a point of critical comparison for ideas of taste, discernment and elite material culture. For the British, the key source of cultural inspiration is generally seen as the Grand Tour. Despite the shifting social and gender makeup of tourists and the varied and sometimes contradictory functions of the tour, it remained a central part of the social and cultural education of the elite through the eighteenth century and beyond.20 French and Dutch places were important places to call en route, but Italy was the key destination, where considerable attention focused on the ancient ruins (especially in Rome, Pompeii and Herculaneum) and also the architecture of the Italian Renaissance and especially the re-imagining of Roman villas by Palladio and others. These influences had begun to seep into the design of British houses from the sixteenth century, classical columns and motifs being found at Nonsuch, Burghley House, Hardwick Hall and many others;21 they reached their full flowering in eighteenth-century Palladianism and neo-classicism. These styles were inspired by the Grand Tour and by an envisioning of Britain as the inheritor of the values and authority of the Roman Empire, with landowners sometimes explicitly portraying themselves as Roman senators – a conceit seen most famously seen at Robert Walpole’s Houghton Hall.22 The classical influences on British architecture are often explored through the lives of key individuals or the construction of key houses. Among the former are patrons and gentleman-architects like Thomas Coke, 1st Earl of Leicester, and Richard Boyle, 3rd Earl of Burlington, both of whom made extensive continental tours, although the latter relied more on his reading of Palladio than on direct observation of classical ruins.23 The influence of Burlington in particular was immense, his trips to Italy being paired with travels between the houses of his numerous friends, whom he advised when designing their new houses. Just as important were the professional architects and designers who made their own tours of the Continent, sometimes in tandem with their patrons. William Kent travelled in Italy in the 1710s and 1720s, meeting up with Leicester and Burlington and gathering first-hand experience of both

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Travel and the British country house

ancient Rome and Palladio’s villas in the Veneto. A generation later, Robert Adam set off on a Grand Tour with the Earl of Hopetoun and, after falling out  with his patron, stayed on in Rome to study architecture, while James Stewart visited Naples and then Greece in the company of another budding architect, Matthew Brettingham the younger.24 These travels and the ideas and tastes that they inspired were embodied in some of the most iconic country houses of the eighteenth century. Burlington’s interpretation of Palladian villas is perhaps best seen in his own house at Chiswick, but Holkham Hall, built to house the Earl of Leicester’s vast collection of paintings and sculptures gathered on the Grand Tour, is the fullest realisation of Burlington-inspired neo-Palladianism. These formed models of fashionable good taste that were repeated and emulated up and down the country (see Chapter 1). Much the same was true of the Grand Tour’s influence on garden design. Although seen as perhaps the quintessential English contribution to design, country house gardens were profoundly influenced by landowners’ experiences of classicism in Italy, both through paintings of imagined classical landscapes by Claude Lorrain and more directly in the buildings that punctuated and structured English landscape gardens (see Chapter 2).25 In addition to this direct impact on the form and structure of the British house and garden, Roey Sweet argues that European travel also served to develop and hone the aesthetic criteria by which places were assessed.26 Her focus is primarily on the reaction of British tourists to the great Italian cities, but they deployed the same criteria of taste, virtue, erudition, sociability and domesticity, and engaged in similar cultural practices to those visiting English country houses. Importantly, they also deployed a common language of aesthetics, which runs through the journals and letters that were an essential accompaniment of any Grand Tour and which emphasised both rational and emotional or sentimental responses to the world, including ideas of the picturesque, sublime and beautiful.27 Seeing places and palaces elsewhere in Europe also enabled British travellers to define the distinctive qualities of their own houses. These increasingly centred on ideas of cleanliness, convenience and comfort, qualities that they often found missing in the places they visited. In Italy, for example, Rome was particularly vilified for its dirtiness, and both Venice and Naples were also found wanting; only Florentine streets were clean and free from bad smells.28 Critical appreciation and even direct inspiration for remodelling one’s own house could also be gained from visiting other houses in Britain, a practice that links to and reflects Colin Campbell’s attempts to valorise British architecture in his Vitruvius Britannicus.29 Seeing not just the great houses, but also the rapidly growing number of new and improved gentlemen’s seats, provided an opportunity to exercise and sharpen aesthetic judgement in a way that paralleled what was happening on European tours. Mrs Lybbe Powys is well known



Introduction

7

in this regard, but she was part of a much wider tradition that included women as well as men.30 Returning once more to Sophia Newdigate, we read her easy dismissal of Wooton Farm near Chertsey as ‘a mere box built of bricks’ and Goodwood as simply ‘indifferent’; yet we also see considered critiques: the garden buildings at Stowe were too numerous; the Duke of Queensbury’s garden at Amesbury was ‘in a stiff formal taste’, and its new Chinese house lost its authenticity and effect because it was made of flint, ‘no very proper material for the purpose’.31 Of particular significance are her observations and comments on gothic architecture, both domestic and ecclesiastical, which undoubtedly formed the context of Sir Roger Newdigate’s progressive gothicisation of their Warwickshire home, Arbury Hall, and underline the importance of learning from other houses, but also a wider set of buildings, including cathedrals and medieval guildhalls – the British equivalent of classical temples and villas.32 Travel also extended beyond Europe: the wider horizons of imperial travel offered another strand of influence on taste, attitudes and identities. Postcolonial perspectives have created a strong focus on the relationship between empire and nation; the ‘other’ encountered when travelling in India, North America and later Africa was an important influence on British identity.33 At the same time, however, it also focused the attention of travellers onto the everyday: domestic arrangements, social customs and material culture. The experience of travelling or residing in Britain’s colonies could have a profound impact on attitudes to domestic life and tastes in architecture and domestic decoration, most strikingly at Nabob houses such as Sezincote.34 Bringing it home: travel and consumption Travel was a means of bringing home goods as well as ideas; it was central to processes of collection and consumption, and to constructing the material culture of the country house. As with travel, the most famous and arguably important source of cultural treasures was the Grand Tour. One of the earliest and most influential collections was that assembled by the Earl of Arundel. He travelled on the Continent in the early 1600s and acquired a huge collection of paintings (including many Old Masters), drawings, sarcophagi, altars, coins, medals and manuscripts; but perhaps his most famous acquisitions were a series of classical statues, later donated to Oxford University.35 These feature in the background of Daniel Mytens’s famous portrait of Arundel, arranged in a long gallery, while some of his paintings appear behind the matching portrait of this wife, Lady Alethea. The collection was not just an integral part of the Arundel’s identity as a connoisseur and an influential courtier, but was also integral to the form and decoration of his house, because, as Girouard puts it: ‘collections, once formed, had to be put somewhere’.36 This link between travel, collecting and building is repeated in many other great houses. Holkham

8

Travel and the British country house

Hall can be seen, in part, as a gallery to house the collection of paintings, sculptures and so on amassed by the Earl of Leicester on his Grand Tour. A generation later, Henry Blundell had two galleries built at Ince Blundell Hall in Lancashire to house his collection of around 500 pieces of sculpture acquired on the Continent; the second was designed as a replica of the Pantheon in Rome, thus bringing together Roman architecture and artefacts. His desire to make his collection well known and an influence on taste led him to publish two illustrated folios; but, as Campion notes of Lord Hervey in Chapter 1, bringing people to these great collections was another way of sharing one’s taste and bolstering one’s cultural capital.37 Acquiring these objects required a deep purse. Some objects could be obtained from London auction houses, and copies were produced by men such as John Cheere, making trips to Italy unnecessary.38 Nonetheless, discerning collectors viewed the Grand Tour as an important opportunity to collect antiquities, original art and copies of both. Indeed, reproductions could be almost as exclusive as originals, in part because of the difficulties in obtaining permission from the owner to copy the original piece. While some aristocratic collectors were able to use their influence and knowledge to undertake negotiations with owners and suppliers themselves, most were reliant on intermediaries. Sir William Hamilton was especially useful to British visitors to Naples; the way in which Lord Hervey pressed him for help in acquiring permission to take copies of some of the king’s statues (Chapter 1) illustrates how influential he was thought to be. Similarly in Florence, Sir Horace Mann not only helped to ‘make the place agreeable to all his countrymen’, as Sir Roger Newdigate noted, but also assisted collectors in their acquisitions.39 Agents or antiquarians often operated as middlemen, linking the supply of excavated objects with eager collectors, but agency was also shown by tourists themselves: they were willing and able to be useful to their friends at home.40 This extended from the sweeping offer made by Sir Roger Newdigate to his friend John Morduant, which we saw earlier, to the commissioning of relatives to make purchases while travelling. Thus, the Marquess of Rockingham wrote to his son Lord Malton that ‘if when at Rome you chuse to lay out 4 or 500£ in Marble Tables, statues, as you Shall judge agreeable to you I will answer your Bills to that summ’.41 All this made the Grand Tour an important exercise in collecting as well as a cultural and social experience: one that could have an important influence on the materiality of the British country house. Of course, Europe was not the only place from which goods were brought back. Travel within Britain often meant returning with goods chosen and purchased whilst away from home. As with the spread of ideas, however, there was also a burgeoning flow of goods from the colonies, many of them sent or brought back by East Indiamen, planters and others. These included decorative pieces, such as painted screens, ivory cabinets and japanned furniture, which might also be acquired from the East India



Introduction

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Company sales in London, but also a wide array of more personal items, from shawls to paintings to hookah pipes.42 These had a profound impact on the material culture of certain houses, most notably the dwellings of the co-called nabobs. Richard Benyon, for example, returning home in 1744 from a spell as Governor of Madras, brought with him rosewood furniture inlaid with ebony and ivory, Chinese porcelain and Indian textiles, among many other things, and installed them all at Englefield House in Berkshire. More famously, Warren Hastings returned to Britain with significant quantities of ivory furniture and other Indian goods, which formed the centrepiece of the decorative scheme for his new house at Dayleford.43 In the eighteenth century especially, it was not simply the wealth, but also the cultural threat posed by the taste and material culture of nabobs that caused anxiety.44 And, of course, it was travel to and employment in India that allowed these men to bring home both Indian tastes and Indian goods.45 Key themes This collection engages with all these aspects of elite travel and its mutually constructive relationship with the country house. It includes new empirical research on houses across the British Isles, from Stourhead in Wiltshire to Brahan Castle in Ross, and from Downhill House in County Londonderry to Kelmarsh Hall in Northamptonshire. The focus is on the long eighteenth century, although the chapters by Edwards and Filor in particular stretch the boundaries at either end, and the range of subject matter is deliberately broad to emphasise and explore the variety and complexity of the relationship between travel and the country house: from the conceptual to the tangible, from artwork and antiquities to locks and windows, and from the objectification of foreign cultures to the intense practicality of spending on horses and hay. While each chapter presents its own arguments, three broad themes run through the book. The first theme concerns the contingency of motivations for and practices of travel relating to the country house. As discussed above, the relationship can appear clear and straightforward. At Stourhead, for example, John Harrison demonstrates in Chapter 2 that many of its classical buildings were closely modelled on key sites in ancient Rome, most notably the Pantheon and the Temple of the Sun at Balbec. This brought something of the classical civilisation to rural Wiltshire, yet the transfer was filtered through the lens of practicality and the aesthetics of an English garden. Dimensions and proportions were altered, classical allusions blended and arrangements shaped around the broader folds of the landscape. This borrowing and blending is no surprise, but it is easy to forget how these practices were often very particular to the spatial context. This comes out more clearly in Campion’s analysis of the travel and collecting of Lord Hervey (Chapter 1). In many ways, Hervey was the ultimate Grand

10

Travel and the British country house

Tourist, travelling to the Continent on several occasions, visiting many ancient sites (including some that were newly excavated) and collecting a wide range of original pieces and copies, the latter including his faux Apollo Belvedere, copied from the original with the Pope’s permission. However, what he did with these collections when they were brought back to Britain varied according to the character and function of his various houses. Helen Clifford has argued that Sir Lawrence Dundas used his various houses for different purposes, each one having a ‘role within the family’s personal, dynastic, political, social, cultural and economic situation’.46 In a similar manner, Hervey used his Grand Tour acquisitions to produce different effects and to make particular statements about himself and his status at Downhill, Ballyscullion and Ickworth. The importance of viewing country houses collectively, rather than in isolation, is apparent from the perspective of the visitor as well as the owner. For domestic tourists, but especially overseas visitors, this is most readily seen in the existence of a canon of favoured houses. Ronnes and Koster (Chapter 5) and Fatsar (Chapter 7) demonstrate that visitors from the Netherlands and Hungary largely went to the same places. They built personal assessments of these country houses around their intrinsic characteristics, but their merits were also measured against other places on the itinerary, Blenheim forming the usual touchstone, and to houses and gardens back home. A similar practice is seen in Arthur Young’s assessments of the paintings hung in the various country houses that he visited and wrote about in his travel books (Chapter 6), although his comparisons are less overt. Young’s focus on paintings underlines their importance in embodying taste and cultural capital, and his attempts to offer an informed critique form a fascinating exercise in the popularisation of aesthetics. At the same time, they were being assessed in relation to those hung in other houses in a way that reflected common practice among elite visitors to country houses but was unique in published form.47 Anderson’s analysis reminds us to look beyond the usual sources to gain fresh insights into the discerning traveller’s view of the country house. However, visiting houses was not all about refining taste either for oneself or for one’s readers. As MacArthur’s discussion of the tour undertaken by William Hanbury in the 1720s makes clear (Chapter 4), there could be a deeply practical side to observations and criticisms. Hanbury was, of course, quite capable of making aesthetic judgements, but even these sometimes had a practical dimension. He was aware of the cultural significance of the architect and the chosen style, but equally comfortable in offering a damning judgement of them. When shown the neo-Palladian Tottenham Park, designed by Burlington, he judged it to be ill suited to the English climate, its architectural form rendering it dark, damp and airless, a critique that reflected Walpole’s assessment of Chiswick House. Yet what are most striking in Hanbury’s writings are his observations on the seemingly mundane: the locks on doors and the quality and reliability of the



Introduction

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water supply. It seems that he had in mind his owns plans to build a new house at the family seat at Kelmarsh and was eager to collect ideas as well as to view the splendours of the houses that he visited. The second theme centres on the multi-directional movement of ideas, which were carried to and from country houses by travellers and visitors. The British elite travelled around Europe on the Grand Tour, but there was of course a flow of wealthy travellers moving in the opposite direction. Tinniswood notes their presence in the early modern period, but then they fade from view in his analysis.48 As Ronnes and Koster (Chapter 5) make clear, however, the Dutch elite continued to come to Britain in numbers, sometimes only to see the key sites in and around London, but often to visit a range of country houses and romantic ruins, such as Kenilworth Castle, made famous by Walter Scott’s novel of the same name, published in 1821. In contrast, the neo-Palladian palace at Whitehall, much lauded by British writers because of its links with Inigo Jones, was largely overlooked. Similarly, the Hungarian travellers discussed by Fatsar in Chapter 7 gradually shifted their attention from the iconic landscapes of places like Stowe and gazed admiringly on the more picturesque and romantic vistas of Warwick Castle and later Scotland. These foreign visitors were part of a cosmopolitan European elite, drawing on a common (literary) culture that shaped their tastes and attitudes. While sometimes critical, these foreign visitors also took inspiration from the English houses that they saw. Men like Count István Széchenyi and Count György Károlyi took home to their Hungarian estates ideas about the ideal country house, including architectural details like sash windows. Both they and their Dutch counterparts were also much struck by English landscape gardens, and were an important mechanism in their growing popularity across Europe. This process is explored in detail by Harrison (Chapter 2), who notes how German, Swedish and Italian visitors to Stourhead took home with them ideas about garden design and sought to recreate on their own estates a cultural landscape originally inspired by Roman antiquity. At the same time, influences and goods were also being brought back to British country houses by a range of people who had travelled to India, usually in service of the East India Company. We have already noted the spending power and cultural hybridity of some nabobs and the impact this had on places such as Sizencote and Englefield; but there is a danger of focusing too closely on the well-known examples of the super-rich. As Filor reminds us in her study of Mary Mackenzie (Chapter 10), the flow of Indian goods that came with returning colonial servants was far more widespread than this, especially by the early decades of the nineteenth century. Indian and Chinese goods were found in many houses and reflected strong personal ties with India;49 Mackenzie had direct experience of living and travelling in India, and these experiences influenced both her self-identity and the ways in which she constructed and used

12

Travel and the British country house

space in the family home in Scotland. This was manifest in a few larger items that were shipped home from India, but most of the things that came back with her were of a personal nature. Filor focuses in particular on Mackenzie’s drawings, which were a personal record of her time in and impressions of the country. Her experience of travel was real and highly influential on the material culture of the ancestral home in Scotland. However, as de Bruijn argues in Chapter 3, travel could have an equally profound impact when experienced vicariously. Travel to and in China was extremely difficult in the eighteenth century; most merchants were restricted to the European enclaves at Amoy, Chusan and later Canton, and only a few intrepid travellers penetrated further into the country.50 This gave a premium to information about China, adding an aura of mystique to the aesthetic and material attraction of Chinese goods. Travel accounts were thus an important part in the shifting form and perennial popularity of chinoiserie; they linked the armchair traveller with the mysteries of the Orient and reinforced chinoiserie as a form of ‘alternative’ taste to the conventions of neo-classicism. At a more local level, the importance of vicarious travel can also be seen in Arthur Young’s travel books (Chapter 6). Without having to visit any of the houses themselves, readers could know what paintings were hung there and also form (or borrow) an opinion about their merits as individual pieces and tasteful collections. The third theme is focused on the practicalities of travel, in particular the organisational challenges and costs incurred in moving about the country or from one continent to another. These practicalities were particularly important for elite households that spent just part of the year at their country residence and who were often engaged in moving between their own and their friends’ properties. Travel remained an important, if not defining, feature of elite lifestyle in eighteenth-century Britain,51 and yet journeys were major undertakings that required careful planning – an aspect of elite travel that has received scant attention in the past.52 Edwards demonstrates the complexities of such arrangements in his detailed analysis of the seasonal trips to and from London undertaken by William Cavendish and his household in the early seventeenth century (Chapter 9). The logistics were made still more complex by the fact that Cavendish and his wife often travelled separately, and so, in effect, the needs of two households were being addressed. As a result, horses were almost constantly on the move between London and Cavendish’s houses  in the Midlands and the Home Counties, all of which carried considerable costs in time and money. To step back from the specificities of particular journeys, there were considerable costs in travelling independently which ensured that it remained largely the domain of the wealthy. First and foremost, there was the cost of buying one or more coaches. The outlay was considerable, making them beyond the means of most people and a key marker of elite status.53 As Stobart notes in Chapter 8, there were also the costs of regular maintenance and the



Introduction

13

additional cost of harnesses, bridles, saddles and a huge variety of other tackle, which together could outweigh the cost of the carriage itself. Added to this were the costs of horses (generally with different animals for carriages and for riding) and provender, as well as an array of servants who needed paying and clothing, often in elaborate and expensive livery. Indeed, well-presented coachmen and grooms were an essential part of the equipage of a carriage.54 Once on the road, there were tolls to pay: bills at inns, both for the elite and their servants and for stabling for horses, incurred on journeys and in London, if that was the destination (see Chapter 9). Such costs are easily overlooked, as are the practical arrangements that underpinned each journey, yet they were central to the way in which travel related to the country house: it was a significant element of spending and a purposeful activity rather than simply an effortless flitting between destinations. It is self-evident that travelling meant moving people, but their belongings also had to be transported, a task which could be especially taxing if the journey involved moving between houses. This meant mobilising one’s own resources and also those of carriers. Edwards shows how William Cavendish regularly shifted huge quantities of household goods between his country houses and his London accommodation: his servants carried some, but most went on carriers’ wagons. Sir Roger Newdigate did much the same 150 years later when moving goods from his residence at Springfield Gardens (Chapters 8 and 9). The task of moving possessions over long distances extended beyond these periodic relocations and into the delivery of purchases made in London, Europe or the colonies. Studies of consumption focus on the moment of acquisition and the experience of ownership, but rarely consider the processes whereby goods were moved from the shop or craftsman to the purchaser’s home. As Helen Berry has remarked, ‘material goods transport themselves from shops into people’s homes … with little attention paid to the social interactions which were required to procure them’.55 Stobart’s analysis of the arrangements made by the Leigh and Purefoy families (Chapter 8) highlights the role of both London porters and regional carriers in moving purchases around the metropolis and carrying them to country residences, and the care with which goods were packed to avoid damage on the journey. The task of bringing home goods acquired overseas was much more complex. There were the issues of packing and shipping, but also the difficulties of the customs house, which were both administrative and financial. Travellers in Europe had to work through or get around the politics of acquiring permission to export antiquities, which in Rome meant dealing with papal officials as it was the Pope who controlled their export from the city. Permission could usually be obtained for lesser objects, but restrictions were more rigorously enforced where high-quality pieces were concerned, causing some collectors to smuggle out their treasures.56 Neither Lord Hervey nor Sir Roger Newdigate had to

14

Travel and the British country house

resort to such drastic measures, but both experienced the complexities and costs of moving their purchases of paintings, sculptures, books and marbles through customs (see Chapters 1 and 8). Bringing home goods from India could be even more difficult given the distances involved, the fragility of many of the objects and the East India Company’s often rigorous protection of its monopoly on importing Indian goods. Filor illustrates in Chapter 10 how safe passage often relied on complex maritime, imperial and familial networks; even then, goods could become stuck in the East India Company’s baggage warehouse, as Mary Mackenzie found to her cost. As in Italy, influential friends were useful in lubricating the process and extracting treasured objects from the limbo of the customs house. Only then could they make the final leg of their journey to the country house. The journeys taken by goods were no easier than those made by people. Together, these essays challenge and nuance our understanding of the relationship between travel and the country house, and thus offer fresh insights into the British country house: its social status, cultural influence and material culture. They serve to highlight the ways in which the country house was both a nexus and an object of consumption, linked through the practicalities and practices of travel. It was a treasure house of goods acquired when travelling and a destination for travellers often bent on viewing these objects. The process was iterative and spiralled outwards, travel to country houses inspiring more travel to acquire objects of desire or to further expand one’s cultural horizons: a search for fresh inspiration or the kudos of collectibles or access to particular houses, made more desirable by their scarcity.57 At the same time, travel itself is revealed as the object of consumption, in terms not only of equipage, tolls and the like, but also of time and space. Country houses and their elite owners, visitors and goods were all brought together in the real and imagined spaces of the travel: on the pages of guidebooks, journals and letters, and in the experiences and imaginations of tourists. Drawing together these different dimensions of travel serves to contextualise and animate the country house by setting it into a series of dynamic relationships between goods and ideas, people and places, opportunities and attitudes. Notes   1 Warwickshire Record Office, Warwick (hereafter WRO), DR1841/7, ‘Lady Newdigate’s Tour’, 1748, fol. 47.  2 WRO, CR1368/v/33, letter dated 6 December 1774.  3 J. Summerson, Architecture in Britain 1530–1830, 9th edn (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1993), esp. pp. 296, 384–409, 452–4.  4 D. Arnold, The Georgian Country House: Architecture, Landscape and Society, 2nd edn (Stroud: Sutton Publishing, 2003), p. 40; R. Wilson and A. Mackley, The



Introduction

15

Building of the English Country House, 1660–1880, 2nd edn (London: Hambledon Continuum, 2007), pp. 109–44.  5 M. Girouard, Life in the English Country House (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1978), p. 192.  6 C. Christie, British Country House in the Eighteenth Century (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2000), pp. 4–25; Wilson and Mackley, Building of the English Country House, pp. 11–46; S. Barczewski, Country Houses and the British Empire, 1700–1930 (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2014), pp. 19–121.  7 See G. E. Mingay, English Landed Society in the Eighteenth Century (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1963); J. Beckett, ‘The Pattern of Landownership in England and Wales, 1660–1800’, Economic History Review, 37 (1984), pp. 1–22; J.  Habakkuk, Marriage, Debt and the Estate System: English Landownership 1650–1950 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996).  8 See J. D. Williams, ‘The Noble Household as a Unit of Consumption: The Audley End Experience, 1765–1797’, Essex Archaeology and History, 23 (1992), pp. 67–78; J. Whittle and E. Griffiths, Consumption and Gender in the Early Seventeenth-Century Household: The World of Alice Le Strange (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012); J. Stobart and M. Rothery, Consumption and the Country House (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016).  9 A. Tinniswood, The Polite Tourist: Four Centuries of Country House Visiting (London: National Trust, 1998), pp. 41–60. 10 Girouard, Life in the English Country House, pp. 164–74; Tinniswood, Polite Tourist, p. 51. 11 F. Haskell. ‘The British as Collectors’, in G. Jackson-Stops (ed.), The Treasure Houses of Britain: Five Hundred Years of Private Patronage and Art Collecting (Washington, DC: National Gallery of Art, 1985), pp. 50–9; Girouard, Life in the English Country House, pp. 175–80. See also M. Swann, Curiosities and Texts: The Culture of Collecting in Early-Modern England (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2011). 12 Tinniswood, Polite Tourist, p. 91. See also Wilson and Mackley, Building of the English Country House, pp. 79–108. 13 A. McEvoy, ‘Following in the Footsteps of Eighteenth-Century Tourists’, in J. Stobart and A. Hann (eds), The Country House: Material Culture and Consumption (Swindon: Historic England, 2016), pp. 187–95; Tinniswood, Polite Tourist, pp. 99–100. 14 Quoted in Tinniswood, Polite Tourist, p. 94. 15 J. Stobart, ‘From Magnificent Houses to Disagreeable Country: Lady Sophia Newdigate’s Tour of Southern England and Derbyshire, 1748’, in A. Capern and B. McDonagh (eds), Women and the Land, 1500–1900 (forthcoming); A. Henstock (ed.), The Diary of Abigail Gawthern of Nottingham, 1751–1810 (Nottingham: Thoroton Society, 1980). On improving road transport, see Wilson and Mackley, Building of the English Country House, pp. 59–60; D. Gerhold, Carriers and Coachmasters: Trade and Travel before the Turnpikes (Chichester: Phillimore, 2005). 16 P. Mandler, The Fall and Rise of the Stately House (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1997), p. 8; Tinniswood, Polite Tourist, p. 94.

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17 S. Whyman, Sociability and Power in Late-Stuart England: The Cultural Worlds of the Verneys, 1660–1720 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999), pp. 87–109; A. Vickery, Behind Closed Doors: At Home in Georgian England (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2009), pp. 14–16, 274–6, 294–5. 18 Stobart, ‘From Magnificent Houses’. 19 Whyman, Sociability and Power, p. 105. See also Whittle and Griffiths, Consumption and Gender, pp. 191–6. 20 See J. Black, The British Abroad: The Grand Tour in the Eighteenth Century (Stroud: Alan Sutton Press, 1997); E. Chaney, The Evolution of the Grand Tour: AngloItalian Cultural Relations since the Renaissance (London: Routledge, 1998); R. Sweet, Cities and the Grand Tour: The British in Italy, c.1690–1820 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012). 21 Girouard, Life in the English Country House, pp. 81–118. 22 For a more general discussion, see Wilson and Mackley, Building of the English Country House, pp. 66–79; Arnold, Georgian Country House, pp. 100–16. 23 H. Colvin, A Biographical Dictionary of British Architects 1600–1840, 3rd edn (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1995); Wilson and Mackley, Building of the English Country House, pp. 70–4. 24 J. Cornforth, Early Georgian Interiors (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2004); G. Roderick, Arbiter of Elegance: A Biography of Robert Adam (Edinburgh: Birlinn, 2009); Colvin, Biographical Dictionary of British Architects. 25 T. Richardson, The Arcadian Friends: Inventing the English Landscape Garden (London: Bantam, 2007). 26 Sweet, Cities and the Grand Tour, pp. 23–38. See also C. Hancock, ‘Your City does not Speak my Language: Cross-Channel Views of Paris and London in the Early Nineteenth Century’, Planning Perspectives, 12:1 (1997), pp. 1–18. 27 See, for example, E. Bohls and I. Duncan, ‘Introduction’, in E. Bohls and I. Duncan (eds), Travel Writing, 1700–1830: An Anthology (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005), pp. xiii–xxvii; K. Turner, British Travel Writers in Europe, 1750–1800 (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2001); E. Bohls, Women Travel Writers and the Language of Aesthetics, 1716–1818 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995). 28 Sweet, Cities and the Grand Tour, esp. pp. 45–7, 75–6, 140–5. 29 C. Campbell, Vitruvius Britannicus (London, 1715). See also H. Stutchbury, Architecture of Colen Campbell (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1967). 30 E. Climenson (ed.), Passages from the Diaries of Mrs Philip Lybbe Powys, Oxon. A.D. 1756–1808 (London: Longman, Green & Co., 1899). 31 WRO, CR1841/7, ‘Lady Newdigate’s Tour’, fols 15, 5, 34. For fuller discussion, see Stobart, ‘From Magnificent Houses’. 32 G. Tyack, Warwickshire Country Houses (Chichester: Phillimore, 1994), pp. 9–15. 33 See M. Pratt, Imperial Eyes: Travel Writing and Transculturation (London: Routledge, 1992); L. Colley, Britons: Forging the Nation, 1707–1837 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1992). 34 Barczewski, Country Houses and the British Empire, pp. 136–52; M. Finn, ‘Swallowfield Park, Berkshire’, East India Company at Home (February 2013), http://blogs. ucl.ac.uk/eicah/case-studies-2/swallowfield-park-berkshire/ (accessed 16 March



Introduction

17

2017); K. Smith, ‘Warfield Park: Longing, Belonging and the Country House’, East India Company at Home (April 2013), http://blogs.ucl.ac.uk/eicah/warfield-park-berkshire/ (accessed 16 March 2017). 35 See D. Howarth, Lord Arundel and his Circle (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1985). 36 Girouard, Life in the English Country House, p. 173. 37 Christie, British Country House, pp. 184–5; J. Scott, The Pleasures of Antiquity: British Collections of Greece and Rome (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2003); R. Guilding, Owning the Past: Why the English Collected Antique Sculpture, 1640– 1840 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2014). 38 Scott, Pleasures of Antiquity. 39 WRO, CR1368/v/33, letter dated 6 December 1774. 40 On the networks bringing antiquities to collectors in early modern Rome, see B. Furlotti, ‘Constructing Antiquities as Luxury Goods In Early Modern Rome: A Preliminary Overview’, in N. Coquery and A. Bonnet (eds), Le commerce du luxe (Paris: Mare & Martin, 2015), pp. 93–100. 41 Quoted in Christie, British Country House, p. 182. 42 Barczewski, Country Houses and the British Empire, pp. 136–63; K. Smith, ‘Imperial Objects? Country House Interiors in 18th-Century Britain’, in J. Stobart and A.  Hann (eds), The Country House: Material Culture and Consumption (Swindon: Historic England, 2016), pp. 105–12; H. Clifford, ‘“Conquests from North to South”: The Dundas Property Empire. New Wealth, Constructing Status and the Role of “India” Goods in the British Country House’, in J. Stobart and A. Hann (eds), The Country House: Material Culture and Consumption (Swindon: Historic England, 2016), pp. 123–33; J. Eacott, Selling Empire: India in the Making of Britain and America, 1600–1830 (Williamsburg: University of North Carolina Press, 2016), pp. 291–8. 43 Smith, ‘Imperial Objects?’, pp. 108–9; Barczewski, Country Houses and the British Empire, pp. 143–7. 44 See T. W. Nechtman, Nabobs: Empire and Identity in Eighteenth-Century Britain (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010). 45 K. Smith, ‘Empire and the Country House in Early Nineteenth-Century Britain: The Amhersts of Montreal Park, Kent’, Journal of Colonialism and Colonial History, 16:3 (2015), https://muse.jhu.edu/article/602384 (accessed 28 March 2017). 46 Clifford, ‘Dundas Property Empire’, p. 132. 47 See, for example, Stobart, ‘From Magnificent Houses’; Climenson (ed.), Lybbe Powys. 48 Tinniswood, Polite Tourist, pp. 26–34. 49 Barczewski, Country Houses and the British Empire, pp. 140–8. See also the various case-studies of the East India Company at Home project, http://blogs.ucl.ac.uk/ eicah/case-studies-2/ (accessed 16 March 2017). 50 M. Ellis, R. Coulton and M. Mauger, Empire of Tea: The Asian Leaf that Conquered the World (London: Reaktion, 2015), pp. 53–72. 51 Whittle and Griffiths, Consumption and Gender, pp. 191–6; Whyman, Sociability and Power, pp. 87–109.

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52 P. Edwards, Horse and Man in Early Modern England (London: Bloomsbury, 2007) touches on some of these issues. 53 Vickery, Behind Closed Doors, p. 124; Whyman, Power and Sociability, pp. 100–7. 54 See Edwards, Horse and Man. 55 H. Berry, ‘Polite Consumption: Shopping in Eighteenth-Century England’, Trans­ actions of the Royal Historical Society, 12 (2002), pp. 376–7. 56 Furlotti, ‘Constructing Antiquities’, pp. 98–9. 57 On collectibles, see G. McCracken, Culture and Consumption: New Approaches to the Symbolic Character of Consumer Goods and Activities (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1988), p. 113.

The Irish houses of Frederick Hervey

1

‘Antiquity mad’: the influence of continental travel on the Irish houses of Frederick Hervey, the Earl Bishop, 1730–1803 Rebecca Campion

‘Antiquity mad – and bitt by the same Dog as you & I.’1 The Earl Bishop diagnosed himself and his friends to be rabid: mad about the classical world, salivating at the possibilities of acquiring antiquities. Frederick Hervey, 4th Earl of Bristol and Bishop of Derry, was the ultimate tourist, spending more than twenty years abroad over six Grand Tours.2 Undoubtedly an eccentric and mercurial character, he cut a figure on the Irish political and cultural scenes. Although a bishop of the Church of Ireland (Anglican), he was vociferous against the remaining anti-Catholic Penal Laws and in favour of Catholic emancipation. He spent prodigiously on art and statuary collections and undertook an unparalleled campaign of house building: Downhill Castle from 1776 and Ballyscullion House from 1787, both in his Irish diocese of Derry, and Ickworth House in England from 1791 on his inherited estate in Suffolk (Figures 1.1–1.3). This chapter will examine the relationship between travel and Hervey’s country houses. Hervey’s material legacy will be explored to trace how a wealthy and well-travelled figure acted as a conduit through which Grand Tour experiences were translated back at home. Investigation is hampered by the demolition of Ballyscullion in 1813 and by the fire at Downhill in 1851, followed by the removal of the roof in 1950. Ickworth was only partially built at Hervey’s death so that the completed house and furnishings owe much to his son. Very few artworks, furniture, plate items or books are traceable through waves of dispersals. However, an auction of over 500 lots held in Rome in 1804 (shortly after Hervey’s death) indicates the scale of his collecting.3 Hervey’s letters, receipts (most relating to Downhill), auction lists and commentaries by Irish visitors are the chief sources of evidence; they offer the advantage that text can reflect how objects were viewed or valued. The artefacts under scrutiny in this study of material culture (the great houses and art collections) are vast in scale and yet, like any artefacts, can be examined in terms of their derivation,

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Figure 1.1  Downhill Castle, County Derry

Figure 1.2  Ballyscullion House, County Derry

meaning to the owner, image projection and of how they functioned. The study of material culture in Ireland and in Britain should not be assumed to be the same. Toby Barnard, pioneer of the study of Irish material culture, notes the dearth of evidence in Ireland in comparison with Britain and considers the study of material culture in Ireland to be at the stage of recovery and recording, after which the ‘knotty riddles of interpretation’ will follow. For Ireland the ‘simple retrieval and assembling of the settings in which past peoples lived constitute formidable undertakings’.4 The widespread loss over time of buildings, artefacts and records (most famously the burning of the National Records Office in 1922) has been exacerbated by Ireland’s t­roubled political history and a negative association of the country house with British rule. Firstly, this chapter asks whether Hervey’s example challenges the tra-



The Irish houses of Frederick Hervey

21

Figure 1.3  Ickworth House, Suffolk

ditional definition of the Grand Tourist. Secondly, his unparalleled building campaign, involving a sequence of three country houses, is explored to consider their purpose. Where Downhill may support Mark Girouard’s ‘powerhouse’ model, Ballyscullion (only thirty-five miles away) does not, prompting questions about the impact of travel.5 When Hervey’s six tours are looked at in tandem with his house building, a two-way process is evident. Travel directly influenced his taste, which was played out in his houses and collections, and simultaneously his travels abroad were given direction and purpose once he became a house builder. Barnard contends that contemporary figures observed the cultural patronage of the elite to explain their dominance.6 Here, visitor accounts to the country house as a tourist destination are explored as a commentary on how Hervey’s display was received in Ireland. Lastly, travel offered rich opportunities for consumption. Unravelling some of Hervey’s commissions and purchases indicates the complexity behind the Grand Tour objects displayed in country houses. Hervey’s deep interest  in  all things ancient (in his own words ‘Antiquity mad’) lends support to Viccy Coltman’s proposal that neo-classicism was more a style of thought

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than a decorative form.7 The range and extent of Hervey’s activities add an interesting dimension to the dynamic interplay between travel and the country house. The Grand Tourist The example of Frederick Hervey, the Earl Bishop, who spent nearly a quarter of a century roaming Europe, challenges the definition of a Grand Tourist as a young British milord sent to Italy to finish his education. Secondary literature emphasises the centrality of education to the Grand Tour. For Giovanna  Ceserani the Grand Tour was ‘the ultimate educational rite of passage’.8 Francis Haskell argued that ‘the distinguishing and paradoxical feature of the golden age of the Tour … is that the more it became institutionalised the narrower it became in scope’.9 This view of the Grand Tour as an educational construct for young elite men has been challenged, notably by Jeremy Black, for whom, during the French Revolution, the educational tour ‘had fragmented as a consequence of the increasing variety in British tourism, a variety  in personnel, intentions, routes and activities’.10 Frank Salmon argued for a wider definition to include people travelling later in life, women, middle-class  professionals, artists and writers, especially from the late eighteenth  century  and into the nineteenth century.11 Roey Sweet emphasised the number of women and families visiting the key cities of Italy.12 Hervey’s example challenges these definitions and time-frames: he travelled for the first time when aged over thirty in the 1760s, and his motivations  were  surprisingly varied and  ever-shifting.  John Ingamells considered Hervey to be unusual, and his motives ‘difficult to define’ but including ‘relief of boredom, the exercise of patronage and the study of antiquity and vulcanology’.13 Behind the fascination with travel, particularly to Italy, was the classical education shared by the ruling class of Europe. At Westminster School, young Frederick Hervey experienced the typical classical education of his social class, which was based on Latin and Greek language and literature and on ancient history and culture. Coltman has argued that ‘the schoolboy rituals of parsing, translating, and imitating the classical authors patented styles of thought among the British elite’.14 As Montaigne claimed of his own education: ‘I was familiar with the affairs of Rome long before those of my own house. I knew the Capitol and its position before I knew the Louvre, and the Tiber before the Seine.’15 A rare letter from Hervey as a young man indicates that he was preparing himself for classical encounters a decade before he first had the opportunity to go abroad. As an armchair tourist, he was using ancient and modern maps to explore parallel virtual worlds:



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Will’s Geography … is a summary account of all parts of the world both what was known to the Ancients and what has since been discover’d by the moderns, and has this particular convenience, that it gives you the names of places us’d by both.16

Through their education, travellers were predicated to admire the classical world they would experience abroad. As a third son, Hervey had not been given the opportunity of a Grand Tour to finish his education, though a trip through Italy had been provided for his eldest brother George at the age of twenty. Hervey first went abroad in 1765–67, in his mid-thirties, accompanied by his wife and young family. On this first of his six tours, the family began with health tourism, visiting Spa, where their eldest son died aged nine. Their daughters aged twelve and seven were left at Geneva for a year at the school of Madame Chomel. After a visit to Voltaire at Ferney, the Herveys moved on to winter in Italy, enjoying Naples, Rome, Florence and Venice. Hervey took a detour to Corsica to indulge his political interests by spending eight days as the guest of General Paoli, leader of the fight for Corsican independence. Hervey’s travel companion described Paoli as ‘not inferior to the patriots and heros of antiquity’.17 Comparison with and admiration for the ancient world were constant themes in Hervey’s correspondence. Hervey took his son Jack Hervey and his future architect, Michael Shanahan of Cork, on his second Grand Tour in 1770–72. Unusually, they searched Languedoc and Dalmatia for volcanic landforms similar to the Giant’s Causeway near his diocese and viewed Alpine bridges looking for a prototype bridge to span the deep river Foyle at Derry. Later tours focused on architecture and then increasingly on art collecting, as will be explored in this chapter. Hervey’s sixth and final tour (from 1791 to his death in Italy in 1803) was spent traversing Europe, now torn by the Revolutionary Wars, at a time when tourism was all but suspended. In an unusual tourist mishap, he was imprisoned for nine months in Milan for spying in 1798. As Sir William Hamilton, British ambassador to Naples, observed laconically, ‘We all know that his Lordship’s freedom in conversation, particularly after dinner, is such as to make him liable to accidents of this nature.’18 Hervey’s travels were idiosyncratic in terms of length and the variety of his interests. The relationship between these experiences abroad and his life at home can most productively be explored through his country houses. Three great houses: Downhill Hervey was able to embark on building a country house in 1776 as a result of a bequest of £10,000 on the death in 1775 of his eldest brother, George (who

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had secured the bishopric which brought Hervey to Ireland a decade before).19 Hervey selected a stunningly beautiful but impractical site on the cliffs near Coleraine, County Londonderry. The house reflected his changing status. He had enjoyed some political success in the passing of the 1774 Test Act, which he had hoped would bring Catholics at last into the political fold.20 Hervey’s interest in the Catholic question is one example of transference between home and abroad. On his first tour, Hervey took the opportunity to carry out political enquiries in France, interviewing émigré Irish merchants and members of religious orders about relief for Catholics in Ireland, where the Penal Laws still prevented Catholics from taking office and restricted land ownership. On his second tour he had interviews with Pope Clement XIV, hoping to encourage a favourable response to an oath of allegiance to the British crown. In Ireland, Hervey lobbied for: a test or form of oath as would discriminate the dangerous members of that Communion from the harmless … A legal but decent exercise of their religion by registered priests … with a small stipend from government … [and] liberty to purchase such lands only as were forfeited in the great rebellion of forty-one [1641].21

The Penal Laws offended Hervey’s Enlightened ideals. He also feared that continued exclusion of Catholics would eventually result in rebellion in Ireland. The 1774 Test Act was a personal milestone and was commemorated in 1778 in a full-length portrait by Pompeo Batoni showing Hervey in bishop’s robes, standing in his study and holding the text of the Act in his hand. At this early stage in Hervey’s art-commissioning career, a professional image at a good price was prioritised over a Grand Tour portrait. In the 1780s Batoni charged only £50 for a full-length in Rome while Joshua Reynolds charged £200 in London.22 Hervey’s third tour abroad (1777–78) was different from the two preceding ones because now he had begun to build a country house for which architectural inspiration and artworks would be required. Hervey was involved in two potential architectural projects which, if carried out, would have been unique: he purchased the original Roman wall frescos from the Villa Negroni intending to install them at Downhill, and, with architect John Soane, he planned to copy a semi-circular Roman triclinium as a dining room at Downhill. In 1777 Hervey had arrived in Rome shortly after the discovery of a rare buried Roman house at the Villa Negroni near Rome. He purchased the interior frescos from Henry Tresham for £300 and wrote enthusiastically to his daughter Mary Erne: several ancient rooms have been unearthed since my arrival – the ptgs were in fresco & almost as perfect as at first – the secret was soon found of detaching the



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ptd stucco from the walls, & I have bought three complete rooms with wch I propose to adorne the Downhill et le rendre un morceau unique.23

British and Irish architecture largely took inspiration from the domes, porticos, pillars and proportions of the public buildings of ancient Rome. However, new discoveries at Pompeii, Herculaneum and the Villa Negroni were revealing that Roman domestic interiors were surprisingly colourful and playful. The artist Thomas Jones described the Villa Negroni frescos in his journal: ‘The painted Ornaments much in the Chinese taste – figures of Cupids bathing &c and painted in fresco on the Stucco of the Walls – The Reds, purples, Blues & Yellows very bright – but had a dark & heavy effect.’24 Jones was surprised by the colours and foreignness (‘Chinese taste’); it was difficult for contemporary observers to interpret the historical context of these images because they were so unfamiliar. How to treat the site was also problematic. For an agent like Tresham or for a collector like Hervey, the Villa Negroni was an opportunity for profit and plunder. Others viewed it differently. The young Philip Yorke wrote to his uncle regretting that this rare example of an ancient house was literally disappearing before his eyes (the bricks were being used for the Sacristy of St Peter’s).25 Before the site was destroyed, an ambitious cycle of engravings was made, unusual in its intention of recording the whole decorative scheme undisturbed instead of presenting dislocated images as in the Herculaneum and Pompeii publications. In his Manifesto (1778), Camillo Buti claimed: our rooms are drawn (before being removed from the walls) with the most scrupulous exactness and with the same colours, in order that it can be seen what was the effect that the parts made with the whole, and finally so that one can form an idea of the taste of the ancients in this type of mixed ornamental and figurative painting.26

Hervey must have supported this project (which stretched from 1778 to 1802), because the last four engravings were dedicated to him.27 There was a vogue for decoration inspired by archaeological excavation in British country houses between 1760 and 1790, led by architect-designers such as James ‘Athenian’ Stuart, Robert Adam and James Wyatt. These rooms were variously named ‘Pompeian’, ‘Etruscan’ and ‘Ancient’.28 However, it was the idea of the antique rather than the authentic Roman fresco that appealed. These rooms were named almost without recourse to their actual origins and were derived from images already dislocated by excavation and reinterpreted into book form. To give an example from Ireland, Lady Louisa (Lennox) Conolly personally selected images for her Long Gallery at Castletown, County Kildare, from Grand Tour folios: Montfaucon’s L’antiquité expliquée, the Loggie di Rafaele nel Vaticano, Sir William Hamilton’s Collection of Etruscan, Greek and Roman Antiquities and the Antichità di Ercolano esposte.29 Hervey’s

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intention to decorate Downhill with actual Roman frescos suggests that he was unusually interested in the authentic and archaeological aspects of neo-classicism and that travel afforded him opportunities to see and to buy. The frescos certainly would have made Downhill ‘un morceau unique’ within the British Isles. The fate of these plaster frescos is unknown but it seems probable that they deteriorated too far to be displayed.30 The second project which demonstrates Hervey’s interest in original ancient sites was his collaboration with John Soane over plans for a semi-circular dining room for Downhill, based on a Roman triclinium. In his memoirs, Soane recalled the Christmas picnic they shared in what Hervey was convinced was the Apollo triclinium of the Roman general Lucullus.31 Coltman’s proposal that travellers on the Grand Tour found ‘their classical education was both fleshed out once on classic ground and imaginatively played out before their eyes’ finds resonance with Hervey and Soane.32 In his on-site notebook, Soane sketched a plan of the triclinium, paced out and drawn that day. Another notebook outlines plans for a nearly identical semi-circular dining room for Downhill with indications of the decoration of pillars, dome and plasterwork (Figures 1.4 and 1.5). Du Prey considers that such deference to archaeology and strong link between function and form single Soane and Hervey out as pioneers in neo-classicism.33 Soane left Italy and went to Ireland to bring some order to the work going on at Downhill. However, Hervey’s constant interference turned the relationship sour, and after only a month Soane left Downhill: ‘Experience … taught me how much

Figure 1.4  John Soane, sketch of triclinium, 1778–79



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Figure 1.5  John Soane, sketch of proposals for Downhill, 1780–81

I had overrated the magnificent promises and splendid delusions of the Lord Bishop of Derry.’34 Ultimately, these unusually original plans for the Villa Negroni frescos and the semi-circular dining room were not carried out at Downhill. Exciting projects conceived abroad were not necessarily practical on reconsideration at home.

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Travel developed the architectural eye and provided models and inspiration. Hervey took his Irish architectural protégé, Michael Shanahan of Cork, abroad in 1770–72 to make record drawings and act as drawing tutor to his son Jack Hervey. Shanahan went on to have constant architectural work from Hervey for the next twenty years. Surviving engravings drawn by Shanahan in Italy give an indication of what they viewed abroad, honing the neo-classical style that characterised their future collaborations. These Roman and Palladian buildings, carefully measured and recorded, directly provided the models for garden buildings at Downhill. The Roman Mausoleum at St Remy in Provence was adapted as the Downhill Mausoleum. The Roman Temple of Vesta at Tivoli inspired the beautiful Mussenden Temple, which still stands spectacularly on the cliff edge above Downhill strand. The neo-classical idiom was slower to take hold in Ireland than in England and was becoming established only from the 1760s through landmark buildings like William Chambers’s exquisite Casino at Marino, County Dublin, built for Lord Charlemont. Tracing the architectural evolution of Downhill also offers insight into Hervey’s changing interests and image. The original villa comprised a drawing room, library and dining room, with bedroom suites named after his wife and daughters; it was the only one of his three houses that acted as a family home and fits within Girouard’s model of the ‘powerhouse’.35 Early in the 1780s two extensions were added: a large gallery wing and a balancing wing consisting of ‘barracks’ or dormitories for male overnight guests. At Downhill, the Earl Bishop (who had succeeded as 4th Earl of Bristol on the death of his second brother in 1779) entertained his friends, diocesan clergy and Irish Volunteer officers: these were his spheres of influence. Receipts for large dinners for Volunteer officers, including blankets for overnight guests, hint at its role as a house for political hospitality.36 The extension wings of the early 1780s at Downhill should be read in tandem with Hervey’s new political enthusiasm, the Volunteers. The redeployment of British troops from Ireland to fight in the American War of Independence resulted in landowners raising local militia, the Irish Volunteers, as a safeguard against possible French invasion. Irish patriot politicians, notably Henry Grattan, recognised the power of the Volunteers as leverage to force the government in London to grant concessions, culminating in free trade in 1779, legislative independence and a parliament located in Dublin rather than London (known as Grattan’s Parliament) from 1782. Hervey was late to become involved in the Volunteer Movement (having been in England for two years following his inheritance of the earldom) but exploded onto the Irish political scene as an outspoken Irish patriot on his return in 1782, seeing the Volunteer Movement as an opportunity to further his goals of Catholic emancipation and parliamentary reform. The extensions to Downhill (particularly the ‘barracks’ wing of the early 1780s) indicate how the house functioned during this period.



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Hervey was typical among the Irish elite in his involvement with the Volunteers; however, his political aims (most controversially his support for Catholic emancipation) were more radical and led to his lampooning in the London press as a dangerous Irish nationalist.37 He attempted to gain the leadership of the Volunteer Movement in 1783 but was out-manoeuvred by his conservative rival, Lord Charlemont. Although the enlarging of Downhill indicates a long-term commitment to his political career, Hervey’s failure to become Commander-in-Chief, and the increasingly conservative nature of the Volunteers, led to his disenchantment and ultimately disengagement from the Irish political scene. He embarked on his fourth Grand Tour (1785–86), and on his return to Ireland put his energy into a new project. Three great houses: Ballyscullion and Ickworth Ballyscullion House, begun in 1787, was Hervey’s second great house, situated on picturesque Lough Neagh. Like Downhill, Ballyscullion illustrates how architectural influences from abroad found their way into County Londonderry through a well-travelled patron. Inspiration for the rotunda design came from both the Grand Tour and the Home Tour: the Pantheon of classical Rome, Palladio’s Villa Capra la Rotonda near Vicenza (1566) and Hervey’s favourite modern house, John Plaw’s Belle Isle (1774) on Lake Windermere. Hervey explained that Ballyscullion was to be ‘Oval like the Pantheon … The offices will be join’d to the House by a semicircular colonnade like That of St Peters only closed, because of the Climate.’38 The oval staircase was to be ‘like Ld. Bessborough’s at Roehampton and that of Marshall Saxe at Chambord in the Poitou’.39 The Belfast Newsletter in 1787 was quick to advertise this local novelty, which ‘is the only thing of its kind in the Kingdom’ and ‘presents a figure resembling a double corkscrew; a great stair surrounding a lesser one for servants, both so constructed that passengers in one can’t perceive those on the other’.40 Touring in the British Isles and on the Continent, Hervey was always alert to inspiration for his building. Within Ireland, the results were closely observed by visitors and the press. The building of Ballyscullion House from 1787 begs the question of why it was erected at all.41 Hervey already possessed four houses: an episcopal palace in Derry in which he had little interest; the ever-spreading mansion at Downhill on the coast; and, as Earl of Bristol, an inadequate country house at Ickworth, Suffolk, and a London house in St James’s Square. Perhaps he built again simply because he was a man who needed a project. Even so, viewing the shape of the houses suggests that Downhill and Ballyscullion may have been intended to fulfil differing functions (Figures 1.1 and 1.2). It has been argued here that Downhill operated along the lines of the ‘powerhouse model’: it was the centre for Hervey’s diocesan and political activities. Where Downhill had

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a ‘barracks’ wing added for male overnight guests, Ballyscullion was designed with a limited number of bedrooms (restricted by the size and shape of the central rotunda). Two flanking offices at Ballyscullion were intended as galleries for art, and the hall of the rotunda was for the display of sculpture, as will be explored in this chapter. By 1787, when Ballyscullion was begun, Hervey had tired of politics, and, with an income of up to £40,000 a year as both Bishop of Derry and Earl of Bristol, he became a serious collector of art. The inspiration and enjoyment of travel and the opportunities for buying art abroad may help to answer the question of why Hervey continued to build country houses: he required sophisticated display spaces for his collecting. The Earl Bishop’s last great project was Ickworth House, begun in 1792 on the Suffolk estate of the Hervey family (Figure 1.3).42 Again, Ickworth begs the question of why a third and even greater mansion was required. This period of Hervey’s life was spent in war-torn Europe, in the aftermath of the French Revolution. It may be that Hervey, the once radical Irish patriot, witnessed the experiences of his aristocratic friends in Europe and, like most of his class, became more conservative. Building on his ancestral lands may have represented both political retrenchment and the re-establishment of the Hervey family in England. It should also be noted that towards the end of his life, Hervey became increasingly eccentric, at one point justifying a new house at Ickworth as suitable for himself as a potential duke and father-in-law of royalty if his unwilling son was to marry the illegitimate daughter of the King of Prussia.43 Hervey’s will of 1791 divided his assets: his Irish houses were to be left to his cousin and agent in Ireland, the Revd Sir Henry Hervey Bruce, while his son Frederick Hervey would have the entailed inheritance of the English earldom.44 This separation of assets reflected a further change in his interests, with the focus shifting away from Ireland and towards building in England and travelling on the Continent (his sixth tour, from 1792 until his death in 1803). The scanty sources from the last ten years of his life do not reveal his position on the United Irishmen Rebellion of 1798 (he was imprisoned in Milan by the French at the time), for which as a younger and more radical man he might have had some sympathy. He voted by proxy in favour of Union in 1800; this event ended the Dublin parliament for which the patriot politicians, backed by the Volunteers, had worked so hard to achieve in 1782. A combination of unprecedented bribery by the government and fears after the 1798 Rebellion ensured a majority vote in favour of Union. Hervey’s motives for voting do not survive; however, both his disengagement from Ireland and William Pitt’s promise of emancipation for Catholics may have contributed. The design of Ickworth is remarkably similar to that of Ballyscullion, except in scale. Ickworth was to be twice the size of Ballyscullion, with superior ornamentation, based on architectural plans drawn up by a fashionable Italian architect and with a huge art collection waiting in warehouses in Rome and



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Leghorn. Unfortunately this collection never reached Ickworth: during the Revolutionary Wars it was confiscated twice, ransomed and auctioned in Rome after Hervey’s death.45 The difference in scale suggests that Hervey believed that more was needed to impress a hundred miles from London than in a quiet corner of County Londonderry. Hugh Douglas Hamilton’s full-length portrait Frederick Hervey, Bishop of Derry and 4th Earl of Bristol, 1730–1803, with his Granddaughter Lady Caroline Crichton, 1779–1856, in the Gardens of the Villa Borghese, Rome (c.1790) indicates the influence of the milieu within which Hervey moved abroad (Figure 1.6). The setting for the portrait is the English garden designed in 1786 by Hervey’s agent, the artist Jacob More, with the Temple of Aesculapius (1787) by Mario Asprucci the younger in the background (see also Chapter 2). As with all Hervey’s building projects, architectural responsibility is uncertain, but two plans by Asprucci of 1794 and 1795 have been located.46 Hervey brought Francis Sandys (for whom he had financed experience in Italy) and the Revd Joseph Sandys, Irish brothers who had overseen the building of Ballyscullion, to Ickworth to carry out the works. The friezes that were planned to circle the great rotunda at Ickworth also confirm that Hervey was drawing directly on his contacts abroad. He took advice from Antonio Canova (an Italian neo-classical sculptor) and asked Alexander Day (a British miniaturist and agent in Rome) to carry out experiments using casts from the Villa Borghese.47 Hervey imported two specialists from Italy, Casimiri and Donato Carabelli, who had worked on Milan cathedral, to model the frieze in terracotta on site at Ickworth. The scenes of the frieze were based upon John Flaxman’s illustrations of Homer’s Odyssey (1793) and Iliad (1805), an innovative experiment in replicating ancient images seen in ancient vase decoration. Hervey’s three country houses reveal how inspiration and expertise from abroad influenced building projects at home. Collecting and displaying art The Grand Tour provided an unsurpassable opportunity for buying souvenirs and artworks which, in turn, required suitable display space at home. On the Continent, Hervey moved in intellectual circles that advocated an innovative way of displaying art which may have influenced both the design and the purpose of Ballyscullion and Ickworth. Hervey became conscious of a didactic responsibility, claiming at Ballyscullion that ‘young Geniusses who can not afford to travel into Italy may come into my house & There copy the best masters’.48 He may have found some justification for his prodigious spending on architecture and artworks as the duty of the cultured and wealthy, especially during this period before either Britain or Ireland had a national gallery. At Ickworth, Hervey refined his display intentions further:

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Figure 1.6  Hugh Douglas Hamilton, Frederick Hervey, Bishop of Derry and 4th Earl of Bristol (1730–1803), with his Granddaughter Lady Caroline Crichton (1779–1856), in the Gardens of the Villa Borghese, Rome, c.1790 The idea I have struck out of showing the historical progress of the art of Painting in all the five different schools of Germany and Italy I deem both happy & ­instructive … classing the authors under the different schools, will show the characteristick Excellence of each, instruct the young mind & edify the old.49

Figgis has traced these ideas to the Florentine art historian Luigi Lanzi, who was instrumental in the chronological and regional arrangement of the Uffizi Gallery and published a historical survey of Italian painting.50 Figgis has also pointed out that the museum of the Belvedere Palace in Vienna was arranged in 1781 by periods and schools, with the seven rooms to the



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right of the entrance dedicated to Italian art and the mirroring rooms on the other side to Dutch art.51 Hervey’s plans for Ballyscullion and Ickworth, each with two flanking galleries (one for Italian art and one for Northern art), echoed  these  recent  continental developments. Travellers could be inspired by intellectual currents abroad and work them into their material display back at home. Viewing works of art was one way in which country houses (and townhouses) were both the result of travel and the object of tourism. Tourists on the Home Tour were motivated by curiosity and a desire to improve themselves; appreciation of art was important to those with cultural ambitions. Authorities on connoisseurship, for example Thomas Martyn’s English Connoisseur, had made readers aware of the usefulness of picture catalogues: It is well known at how few Houses into which … the Curious are admitted, any Catalogues of the Paintings … can be obtained, and it must be confessed little use can be made, by the yet uninformed Observer of these valuable Collections.52

Adrian Tinniswood estimates that only about fifteen or twenty of the greatest properties in England had individual guidebooks by 1800.53 Despite Hervey’s views on the educational possibilities of galleries, he appears to have done little to help visitors to his country houses. The Revd William Bisset visited Ballyscullion in 1799 and was irritated that there was no list of the pictures on display: ‘I am told there are no Originals, but the Person who shewed the house not having a Catalogue I could not make a memorandum of particulars.’54 In his Statistical Survey (1802), the Revd Sampson regretted that he had to list the chief works of Ballyscullion from memory, but included among the highlights original works by Titian, Claude Lorrain, Guido Reni, Albrecht Dürer, Philips Wouwermans and Salvator Rosa.55 The visits of Bisset and Sampson took place only three years apart, yet they reached very different conclusions on attribution, indicating that both the competency of the guide and the purpose of the writing (in Bisset’s case, his journal, and in Sampson’s, a published survey relying on subscriptions) influenced what the visitor recollected (see also Chapter 6). Written accounts by visitors to Downhill demonstrate critical awareness of attribution, indicating that Home Tourists educated themselves in preparation for encountering art in Irish country houses. Correggio’s Cupid Shaping his Bow (whereabouts now unknown) serves as an example: every visitor to Downhill commented on this picture, which hung in a prime position above the ­chimney-piece in the drawing room. Bisset (1799) gave it his fullest comment, felt certain it was a genuine Old Master and was annoyed that it could not be seen to better advantage. The Revd Daniel Beaufort and his daughter Louisa both noted the work in their journals in 1807, with Louisa concluding that it was a copy.56 In their published accounts, both Sampson (Statistical Survey, 1802)

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and Neale (Views of the Seats of Noblemen, 1823) believed it to be original.57 On the other hand, Anne Plumptre opined in 1814: ‘Among the pictures are two called original Correggios, but their being really so is very much doubted.’58 In admiring Correggio, these visitors concurred with the art market: Iain Pears has identified Correggio as the third most valuable artist at auction behind Raphael and Rubens (in the period 1731–59).59 Figgis comments that, in view of his wealth and interest in art, it is surprising that Hervey did not possess any really impressive original pictures. She attributes this to the vast number of walls to be covered in his three mansions and his reluctance to spend the sum required on a single special painting.60 Hervey also hung views of Grand Tour landscapes which had been commissioned from contemporary artists based in Rome, notably Thomas Jones, Jacob More and Claude Joseph Vernet. He displayed evocative Grand Tour views in other media too: a set of six pier tables were painted with scenes including Rome and her environs, Vesuvius in eruption and mythology. The production of these tables hints at a complex interplay between foreign inspiration and British technical innovation, the Grand Tour and the Home Tour, and the stages of planning and purchasing that went into a finished product. The workshop of Henry Clay, a Birmingham manufacturer who patented new techniques in japanning, was on the itinerary of tourists to England’s emerging industrial towns. Visiting Birmingham in 1791, Edward Daniel Clarke (a traveller and collector) saw ‘two pier tables’ made from papier mâché ‘for Lord Bristol, which were painted after some designs brought purposely from Rome. They were by far the most beautiful things of the kind I ever saw’.61 These  tables were the height of neo-classical decorative fashion: the gilt frieze corresponds to a pattern by Tischbein which at this date (1791) had not yet been published in A Collection of Engravings from Ancient Vases Discovered in the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies between 1789–1790 (Naples, 1793–1803).62 It is possible that Hervey, who had been staying in Naples in 1790 before returning home, may have purchased engravings or designs from Tischbein before publication and brought them to England for the next stage in the production process, thus fuelling developments in British neo-classical decoration. During his travels abroad, Hervey also collected statues and marble ­chimney-pieces for his houses, favouring the studios of Cardelli and Albacini in Rome. Perhaps because of their bulk, these are easier to trace than the picture collections. Malcolm Baker has explored how statuary, which was associated with public display, was integrated into the private domestic sphere. He argues that in the Georgian house, the distinction between public and private was not strongly demarcated: some rooms had a public dimension (particularly the hall, saloon and gallery) and were the rooms most likely to display statuary, as holds true for Hervey’s houses.63 Hervey’s display of statuary became more



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s­ ophisticated over time. At Downhill, sculpture was part of a mixed display, inspired by continental precedents like the Tribuna in Florence. Hervey took inspiration from the Pantheon for his rotunda houses at Ballyscullion and Ickworth: a Roman temple provided the perfect backdrop for statues and for expressing homage to the ancients. Christopher Christie views the eighteenth-century house as a temple to the arts, pointing to the use of Roman temple architecture for halls and galleries as a setting for statuary: Robert Adam drew upon the Pantheon for the saloon at Kedleston (1760s) and Ince Blundell Hall (1802–10) and upon Hadrian’s Villa at Tivoli and the catacombs for a sculpture gallery at Newby Hall (1760s).64 Visitor reactions to the house as temple varied. In 1778 Richard Sulivan felt that Kedleston was ‘designed for more than a mortal residence’.65 In 1797 the French traveller Latocnaye, who also saw Downhill, was less enamoured by the temple concept, finding Castle Coole, County Fermanagh, to be frigid: temples, he thought, should be left to the gods.66 In the hall of Ballyscullion, Sampson recognised ‘admirable statues of the Apollo Belvedere and the Vatican Mercury’ and also busts of Cicero, Demosthenes, Seneca and Pericles in niches.67 The effect was not perhaps as impressive as intended: Bisset considered that ‘The Hall appeared to me to be small, but I did not measure it, and as it is at present filled with Casts of the Laocoon, Centaurs, &c the dimensions may be more considerable than they now appear.’68 Hervey gathered copies of famous pieces on his travels. Copies allowed for an idealised collection, where scale could be manipulated, pairs matched for symmetry and mythological narratives explored. There was also considerable cachet in owning a copy of a statue that implied a relationship with the august owner; Hervey built up a network of contacts through frequent and extended travel. The Apollo Belvedere, copied with the Pope’s permission, took pride of place at the far end of the gallery at Downhill. Hervey had no inhibitions about charming or embarrassing owners of statues, who were sometimes unwilling to allow casts to be taken for fear that the original might itself be damaged or cheapened by frequent reproduction. He pressed Sir William Hamilton to exert his influence over the King and Queen of the Two Sicilies: But if you find him difficult – you may plea that Prince Borghese gave me a written leave under his hand to take casts of All the Statues found at Gabii & also of All his Statues in the Villa Borghese & surely Lord Bristol will not find the Q: of Naples less friendly than P: Borghese.69

For Ickworth in Suffolk, Hervey took a further step in his artistic development in 1790 by commissioning John Flaxman (then based in Rome) to sculpt a huge neo-classical centrepiece in marble, The Fury of Athamus. This sculpture had impeccable credentials: the subject matter was classical, literary (from Ovid’s Metamorphoses) and recommended by Antonio Canova. Typically, Hervey drove

36

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a hard bargain and, although initially delighted, Flaxman found the 600 guineas agreed upon left him out of pocket; in addition, Hervey insisted on paying only in instalments ‘to give his Genius every encouragement he desires’.70 Hervey also collected genuine ancient sculpture; however, with a limited supply of antiquities, rivalry was fierce and licences hard to procure. Since the last decade of Hervey’s life was spent on the Continent he had the opportunity to engage in activities beyond the typical tourist. He collaborated with Robert Fagan and Prince Augustus to finance an archaeological dig at Practica di Mare near Ostia (1794–1801), where ‘we have found a narcissus gazing in a well wch we sold to Ld Barwich for £350, a Lucius Verus fully equal to that of the Borghese’. Hervey also planned a further excavation, using his knowledge of ancient literature and previous excavations to guide him: ‘now I am going to dig at Antium where the Apollo Belvedere was found & where Strabo the geographer of August Cesar says all the rich Romans had rich Villas’.71 Conclusion What do the life and activities of Frederick Hervey, the Earl Bishop, tell us about the relationship between travel and the country house? This case-study indicates a symbiotic process. Not only was the country house shaped by what was seen and collected abroad, but also a building project at home gave direction to touring. Hervey undertook two tours before he began to build houses: these tours focused on educating his young family, viewing ancient sites and Palladian buildings, climbing Vesuvius and locating volcanic formations. Becoming a house builder altered his travelling. Hervey’s third tour took place while Downhill was being built and indicates that his focus abroad shifted towards pursuing architectural inspiration. He made contact with young architects like John Soane in Rome, viewed buildings abroad with an eye to his own house and took inspiration from ancient sites such as the semi-circular triclinium and the Villa Negroni frescos. Travel sharpened the critical eye. In Hervey’s case this may have led to dissatisfaction with his first house and the choice of a radically different architectural plan (the rotunda) for Ballyscullion and Ickworth, inspired by both the Grand Tour (Palladio’s Villa Capra la Rotunda and the Pantheon) and the Home Tour (John Plaw’s Belle Isle). Not only the design but also the purpose of his round houses may have been driven by what he experienced abroad: new ideas led to the two flanking galleries, one for Italian art and one for Northern art, with statuary in the central hall. Hervey’s unique building campaign of three country houses allows for an exploration of change over time. It appears that the houses may have been built for different purposes, reflecting his changing self-fashioning from bishop and politician (Downhill) to cultured Grand Tour collector (Ballyscullion and Ickworth).



The Irish houses of Frederick Hervey

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Travel brought not just inspiration but also opportunity. Hervey’s later tours prioritised collecting on an ever-increasing scale; in turn, these collections necessitated display space. Abroad, artworks were more abundant and cheaper than in the auction rooms of London or Dublin. Hervey could commission new works and copies, track hoped-for Old Masters, charm contacts and, latterly, avail himself of the break-up of foreign collections during the French Revolutionary Wars. The length of time spent abroad enabled him to engage in activities beyond most Grand Tourists, notably digging for antiquities at Practica di Mare. Unravelling some of Hervey’s commissions and purchases indicates the complexity behind the Grand Tour objects displayed in country houses. Hervey’s purchasing was highly varied: opportunistic buys facilitated by his physical presence abroad, dependence on a network of contacts in his absence, ‘typical’ Grand Tour commissions from artists in Rome and bringing neo-classical patterns home to avail of British innovation in manufacturing processes. The country house was itself a tourist destination. Hervey claimed to provide a Grand Tour experience for visiting Irish artists. However, like the majority of patrons, he allowed visitors in but provided no catalogue, and so viewers could not be sure what they were seeing. Visitors to Hervey’s Irish houses assessed his display with a critical eye, hazarding opinions on the authenticity of Old Masters and admiring the chimney-pieces and statuary which they recognised as being imported from Italy. Hervey’s building and collecting activities raised his cultural capital within Ireland; conversely, the longer his absences from his diocese were extended, the more critical visitor commentary on his display became. In 1802 (a year before Hervey’s death) Robert Slade censured him for ‘the hardship of absence … the whole of this enormous income having been expended in Italy and France for these last twenty years’. Slade was prescient when he viewed Hervey’s Irish country houses: ‘left in an unfinished state, [Downhill and Ballyscullion] may be considered as two monuments of modern ruins’.72 Notes  1 National Library of Ireland, Dublin, Hamilton Papers, MS 2262, Hervey to Sir William Hamilton, 14 July 1797. Hervey was writing to Hamilton, British Envoy Extraordinary in Naples, referring to the King of Prussia. Original spelling has been retained in all quotations.  2 In this article, Frederick Hervey is referred to as Hervey (pronounced ‘Harvey’) or the Earl Bishop. His titles were Bishop of Cloyne (1767), Bishop of Derry (1768) and Earl of Bristol (1779). The diocese and city are here referred to as Derry and the county as Londonderry.  3 N. Figgis, ‘The Roman Property of Frederick Augustus Hervey’, Volume of the Walpole Society, 55 (1989–90), pp. 77–104.

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 4 T. Barnard, A Guide to the Sources for the History of Material Culture in Ireland, 1500–2000 (Dublin: Four Courts Press, 2005), p. 11. See also T. Barnard, Making the Grand Figure: Lives and Possessions in Ireland 1641–1770 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2004).  5 M. Girouard, Life in the English Country House (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1978), p. 192.  6 T. Barnard, ‘The Languages of Politeness and Sociability in Eighteenth-Century Ireland’, in D. G. Boyce, R. Eccleshall and V. Geoghegan (eds), Political Discourse in Seventeenth- and Eighteenth-Century Ireland (Basingstoke: Macmillan, 2001), p. 209.  7 V. Coltman, Fabricating the Antique: Neoclassicism in Britain, 1760–1800 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2006), pp. 11–14.  8 G. Ceserani, ‘Mapping the Grand Tour’, www.stanford.edu/dept/classics/cgibin/web/projects/mapping-grand-tour (accessed 29 September 2012).  9 F. Haskell, ‘Preface’, in A. Wilton and I. Bignamini (eds), Grand Tour: The Lure of Italy in the Eighteenth Century (London: Tate Gallery, 1996), p. 10. 10 J. Black, The British Abroad: The Grand Tour in the Eighteenth Century (Stroud: Alan Sutton Press, 1997), p. 346. 11 F. Salmon, ‘The Impact of the Archaeology of Rome on British Architects and their Work c.1750–1840’, in C. Hornsby (ed.), Impact of Italy: The Grand Tour and Beyond (London: British School at Rome, 2000), p. 219. 12 R. Sweet, Cities and the Grand Tour: The British in Italy, c.1690–1820 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012), pp. 7–11. 13 J. Ingamells, ‘Discovering Italy: British Travellers in the Eighteenth Century’, in A. Wilton and I. Bignamini (eds), Grand Tour: The Lure of Italy in the Eighteenth Century (London: Tate Gallery, 1996), p. 26. 14 Coltman, Fabricating the Antique, p. 14. 15 Montaigne, Essay III, ‘De la vanité’, quoted in F. Haskell and N. Penny, Taste and the Antique: The Lure of Classical Sculpture, 1500–1900 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1981), p. 45. 16 Hervey to Constantine Phipps, 15 June 1753, quoted in W. S. Childe-Pemberton, The Earl Bishop: The Life of Frederick Hervey the Bishop of Derry and Earl of Bristol, 2 vols (London: Hurst & Blackett, 1924), vol. I, p. 31. 17 Revd Andrew Burnaby, quoted in Childe-Pemberton, The Earl Bishop, vol. I, p. 80. 18 British Library, London, Add. MS 41200, William Hamilton to Charles Greville, 29 May 1798. 19 George Hervey, 2nd Earl of Bristol, was briefly Lord Lieutenant of Ireland. 20 See J. Walsh, Frederick Augustus Hervey: ‘Le bienfaiteur des Catholiques’, Maynooth Historical Series, 1 (Maynooth: Department of Modern History, St Patrick’s College, 1972); N. Yates, The Religious Condition of Ireland 1770–1850 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006), chapter 2. 21 Public Record Office of Northern Ireland, Belfast, Hervey Bruce papers, D1514/9/79, F. Hervey, treatise ‘December 1770’. 22 M. Pointon, Hanging the Head: Portraiture and Social Formation in EighteenthCentury England (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1993), p. 50.



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23 Hervey to Mary Erne, 24 December 1777, quoted in Childe-Pemberton, The Earl Bishop, vol. I, p. 177. 24 National Library of Wales, Aberystwyth, MS 23812D, journal of Thomas Jones, 5 July 1777. 25 G. Darley, John Soane: An Accidental Romantic (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1999), p. 38. 26 Quoted in H. Joyce, ‘The Ancient Frescos of the Villa Negroni and their Influence in the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries’, Art Bulletin, 65:3 (September 1983), p. 266. 27 Joyce, ‘Villa Negroni’, p. 428. 28 J. Wilton-Ely, ‘Pompeian and Etruscan Tastes in the Neo-Classical Country-House Interior’, in G. Jackson-Stops (ed.), The Functioning and Fashioning of the British Country House (Washington, DC: National Gallery of Art, 1989), p. 51. 29 A. Keller, ‘“In Great Vogue”: The Long Gallery at Castletown’, in E. Mayes (ed.), Castletown: Decorative Arts (Trim: Office of Public Works, 2011), p. 58. 30 See R. Campion, ‘Consuming the Antique: Frederick Hervey and the Translation of Continental Style in an Irish Context’, New Griffon, 13 (July 2012), pp. 71–80. 31 P. du Prey, ‘Je n’oublieray jamais: John Soane and Downhill’, Quarterly Bulletin of the Irish Georgian Society, 21:3–4 (July–December 1978), p. 20. 32 Coltman, Fabricating the Antique, p. 15. 33 du Prey, ‘Soane and Downhill’, p. 23. 34 Ibid., p. 17. 35 Girouard, Life in the English Country House, p. 192. 36 Public Record Office of Northern Ireland, Hervey-Bruce papers, D1514/1/1/14, draft on Robert Alexander, 10 August 1784. 37 The Right Rev. Volunteer Bp. of D---y (printed and sold by R. Paye of Broad Street, London, 30 August 1784), British Museum, London, BMC 6653, 6654, 6662. 38 Hervey to Lady Mary Erne, November 1789, quoted in P. Rankin, Irish Building Ventures of the Earl Bishop of Derry (Belfast: Irish Architectural Heritage Society, 1972), p. 54. 39 Hervey to Lady Mary Erne, 8 March 1787, quoted in Childe-Pemberton, The Earl Bishop, vol. II, p. 400. 40 Belfast Newsletter, 14–18 September 1787. 41 Hervey’s cousin and heir in Ireland (the Revd Sir Henry Hervey Bruce) could not maintain two country houses, so Ballyscullion was demolished in 1813, only ten  years after Hervey’s death. The portico is the front of St George’s Church, Belfast. 42 The Jacobean Ickworth Hall had been demolished in 1702 and a farmhouse improved as a temporary measure. The Earl Bishop’s son completed Ickworth House in 1828. 43 Hervey to Lady Elizabeth Foster, August 1796, quoted in Childe-Pemberton, The Earl Bishop, vol. II, p. 510. 44 The National Archives, Kew, Probate 11/1403, will of Frederick Hervey, 4th Earl of Bristol and Bishop of Derry, 17 September 1791, and codicil, 27 February 1794.

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45 Figgis, ‘Roman Property’, p. 79–83. 46 P. Tudor-Craig, ‘The Evolution of Ickworth’, Country Life, 153 (1973), pp. 1362–5; Cooper Hewitt Museum, New York, 18550443, M. Asprucci, first design for Ickworth House, Suffolk, c.1800. 47 Suffolk Record Office, Bury St Edmunds, Hervey Papers, 941/30/1, Hervey to Alexander Day, 8 September 1795. 48 Sheffield City Archives, Wharncliffe Muniments, 552b/1, Hervey to Lady Mary Erne, 25 August 1794. 49 Suffolk Record Office, Hervey Papers, 941/51/4, Hervey to John Symonds, 9 October 1796. 50 Figgis, ‘Roman Property’, p. 87, n. 6. 51 N. Figgis, ‘Frederick Augustus Hervey, 4th Earl of Bristol and Bishop of Derry (1730–1803) as Patron of Art’ (unpublished MA thesis, University College Dublin, 1992), p. 23. 52 T. Martyn, The English Connoisseur, 2 vols (London: L. Davis and C. Reymers, 1766), preface, vol. I, pp. ii–iii. 53 A. Tinniswood, The Polite Tourist: Four Centuries of Country House Visiting (London: National Trust, 1998), p. 95. 54 G. Brown, ‘The Journal of William Bisset, August 1799’, Journal of the Glens of Antrim Historical Society, 33 (2005), pp. 86–90. 55 G. Sampson, Statistical Survey of the County of Londonderry (Dublin: Dublin Society, 1802), p. 414. 56 Trinity College Dublin, Beaufort MS 4033, journal of Daniel Beaufort, 27 October 1807; Beaufort MS 4034, journal of Louisa Beaufort, 27 October 1807. 57 G. Sampson, Statistical Survey, p. 414; J. Neale, Views of the Seats of Noblemen and Gentlemen in England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland, 6 vols (London: Jones & Co, 1823), vol VI. 58 A. Plumptre, Narrative of a Residence in Ireland during the Summer of 1814 and that of 1815 (London: Henry Colburn, 1817), p. 154. 59 I. Pears, The Discovery of Painting: The Growth of Interest in the Arts in England, 1680–1768 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1988), p. 226. 60 Figgis, ‘Hervey as Patron of Art’, p. 45. 61 Y. Jones, ‘A Recent Discovery of Two Papier Mâché Pier Tables by Henry Clay’, Furniture History Society Newsletter, 162 (May 2006), p. 1. 62 Christie’s auction, London, sale 7095, 24 November 2005. 63 M. Baker, ‘Public Images for Private Spaces? The Place of Sculpture in the Georgian Domestic Interior’, Journal of Design History, 20:4 (2007), pp. 309–23. 64 C. Christie, British Country House in the Eighteenth Century (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2000), pp. 181–5. 65 Tinniswood, Polite Tourist, p. 104. 66 Christie, British Country House, p. 179. 67 Sampson, Statistical Survey, p. 414. 68 Brown, ‘The Journal of William Bisset’, p. 86. 69 National Library of Ireland, Hamilton Papers, MS 2262, Hervey to Hamilton, 12 February 1797.



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70 Flaxman’s Fury of Athamas was purchased by Hervey’s son after his death and is on display at Ickworth. 71 Sheffield Archives, Wharncliffe Muniments, 552b/7, Hervey to Lady Mary Erne, 27 January 1798. 72 R. Slade, Narrative of a Journey to the North of Ireland in the Year 1802 (London: R. & H. Causton, 1803), p. 55.

The eighteenth-century English landscape garden

2

From Rome to Stourhead and thence to Rome again: the phenomenon of the eighteenth-century English landscape garden John Harrison

Ancient and contemporary Roman influences in Stourhead gardens The literature, architecture and culture of ancient Rome had a profound influence on eighteenth-century Britain. Richardson writes that the early eighteenth century vision for ‘a new Britain was something like the enlightened age of Augustus, the Roman emperor who reigned from 27 BCE to CE 14 – the time of Virgil, Horace and Ovid – and who brought political stability and just rule to the empire. With the great Maecenas encouraging artists, the Augustan age was seen (by writers, at least) as the zenith of the arts, which is why this period in eighteenth-century England came to be known as the second “Augustan Age”’.1 A similar view is offered by Mowl, who suggests that early eighteenth-century Britain was ‘a society determined to be Augustan and to reshape itself on the model of that Roman greatness before the martial simplicity of a senatorial aristocracy had been corrupted by emperors’.2 The influence of ancient Rome is also cited by Arnold, who writes that ‘Classical forms, whether in architecture, painting, sculpture, garden design or literature enabled the expression of the fundamental ideology of a culture which aligned itself with Augustan Rome. And the use of classicism as a primary expression of English culture helped to underpin the imperialist nature of early Eighteenth-century British society.’3 That these eighteenth-century ‘New Augustans’ viewed themselves in these terms is confirmed by contemporary commentators, including Count Carlo Gastone della Torre di Rezzonico, who comments in his tour diary on how ‘the English … so love to compare themselves to the Romans’.4 Richardson had famously earlier confirmed the association when in 1715 he wrote, ‘no nation under Heaven so nearly resembles the ancient Greeks and Romans than we’.5 This affinity with Rome was emphasised by the placing of antiquities purchased on the Grand Tour in the gardens at Wilton and Stourhead. Garden builders unable to obtain ancient



The eighteenth-century English landscape garden

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Roman statues filled the gap with copies bought from ‘Hyde Park Corner’ vendors such as John Cheere.6 Stourhead is one of the earliest examples of the English Garden and exhibits considerable Italian and Roman influence. There is considerable evidence from visitor accounts and eighteenth-century commentators that Stourhead was admired domestically for its content and its compliance with expectations of taste in garden design. For example, Warton wrote that ‘the best comments that have been given on these sensible and striking precepts, are, Painshill, Hagley, the Leasowes, Persefield, Woburn, Stourhead and Blenheim’.7 The garden contains both an original Roman statue and Cheere copies of notable Roman statues in lead and plaster, as well as garden buildings influenced by Roman temples and inscriptions drawn from Roman literature. This phenomenon was by no means restricted to Stourhead; Campion (Chapter 1) describes the incorporation of Roman and Italian influences at the Irish houses of Frederick Hervey (see Figure 1.6). The estate and original Stourton Hall were purchased in 1717 by the banker Henry Hoare, who had the hall demolished and replaced in 1725 with one of the first Palladian villas in England, an early example of Italian influence at Stourhead. In 1725 Henry’s son, also called Henry, inherited the estate. Henry Hoare II returned from Grand Tour in 1741, and after the death of his mother he began a programme of extensive garden building.8 Henry left little in the way of information regarding his design intentions for the garden at Stourhead. Fortunately, to aid us in recreating the content and evolution of the garden we have a number of visitor accounts from the late eighteenth century (see also Chapter 5).9 These accounts vary from just a few lines of general observation through to the detailed reports we have from Horace Walpole.10 Furthermore, much of the garden content listed in visitor  accounts is corroborated by extant financial details for Stourhead.11 Stourhead has often been cited as an influence on English Gardens in Europe, but very little specific evidence for this has so far been presented. In this chapter I will consider specific elements of Stourhead and critically evaluate the evidence for their influence on the gardens at Wörlitz in Germany and Hagaparken in Stockholm, and thus the link between elite travel and landscape gardens.12 Roman features in Stourhead gardens All four of the edifices in Stourhead gardens exhibit ancient Roman influence. The first structure built was the Temple of Ceres (E in Figure 2.1), almost certainly erected to house the Livia Augusta as Ceres statue purchased by Henry Hoare in Rome while on Grand Tour in 1740.13 This rectangular temple was built between 1744 and 1746 to a design provided by Henry Flitcroft. The external features include a portico of four Tuscan Doric columns.14 The

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Figure 2.1  Fredrik Magnus Piper’s 1779 plan of Stourhead Key to Piper’s ‘General plan of the Pleasure Garden at Stourton’ L Lawn or grassfield in front of Villa (A) which slopes and artificial basin or lake has been formed between the enlarges towards the road with a ‘ha-ha’ (C) between surrounding hills T Pantheon or Rotunda with a portico of six columns in the nearest pedestals Z Obelisk of the same dimensions as the one at Porta del the front, which together with four statues has cost Popolo in Rome £12,000 sterling X Statue of Apollo Belvedere on a mound at the end W Grotto built against the slope of the hill on the back of a lawm 120 feet wide and four times as long on that side consisting of many caverns and sections with side accompanying rigoles, minor cascades, bath-cisterns y–y Terrace: where two straight walks from Apollo’s statue and statues and the obelisk: and from which there is an extensive K Bridge-span of oak, 100 feet of opening, with steps from both abutments and a level plane on the top and from view over the lower arrangements and the Temple of which a path winds up to the tent (B) the Sun (N), the Hermitage (O) and other things on the D Chinese alcove opposite hillside P Vaulted steps over the road between artificial rocks to E Temple of Flora get to the hermitage F Orangery (a.k.a. Gothic Greenhouse) R Sousterrain or grotto which passes under the G Gardener’s building H Portico road S Dam which with its concave side retains a mass of water M Lower water 28 feet of depth and by means of which a triangular J Temple on the Terrace (a.k.a. Venetian Seat)



The eighteenth-century English landscape garden

45

temple originally contained pulvinaria and altars, and an account of the temple in The  London Chronicle indicates that these items were in place as early as 1757.15 In the niches are busts, possibly copies of the originals of Faustina the younger and elder in the Capitoline Museum.16 A reference to Roman literature here is the quotation ‘Procul o procul este profani’ (‘Away, away, all ye who are unhallowed’) from Virgil’s Aeneid (VI.258) above the entrance of the temple. The second construction was the Grotto (W), originally titled the ‘Temple of the Nymph’ and dating from about 1748. Here there is a further quotation from the Aeneid (I.167–8) above the original entrance (‘Intus acquae dulces, vivoque sedilia saxo, Nympharum domus’: ‘Within, fresh water and seats in the living rock, the home of the nymphs’). In the main chamber is a copy by John Cheere of the Belvedere Ariadne, in front of which is Alexander Pope’s translation of Cardinal Bembo’s lines referencing the nymph.17 In the next chamber is a lead river god statue, likely to represent the tutelary deity of the river Stour.18 Originally a wooden plaque listing lines from Ovid’s Metamorphoses tale of Daphne and Peneus hung above the river god statue.19 The third garden building (T), also designed by Henry Flitcroft, was built between 1753 and 1754. This is a rotunda based on the Pantheon in Rome and was originally titled the ‘Temple of Hercules’, presumably because it was intended to house the Hercules statue commissioned from Michael Rysbrack.20 Three of the four external niches were by 1787 occupied by copies of Venus Anadyomene, Bacchus and the Faun of Florence statues.21 The Hercules statue had by 1762 been joined by the Livia Augusta as Ceres from the Temple of Ceres, a Rysbrack copy of the Farnese Flora and a lead copy of the Versailles Diana.22 Pendant to the Diana was placed a plaster copy of the Meleager statue currently on display in the Sala degli Animali of the Vatican.23 Copies of the Capitoline Isis and Duquesnoy’s St Susanna complete the internal statuary.24 Bas-reliefs, from designs in Admiranda romanarum antiquitatum, are above the door and internal statue niches.25 These depict scenes of Roman celebrations and deities. Fry suggests that the Stourhead Pantheon was ‘a model of the Renaissance building by Sebastian Serlio’, and indeed the Pantheon drawings in Serlio’s Tutte l’opere d’architettura et prospetiva show similarities between the original Pantheon in Rome and the one at Stourhead.26 There are for example the same number of recessed niches. Further, the portico columns for both buildings are Corinthian, and the domes are both coffered and feature an oculus. However, there are clear differences. The Stourhead Pantheon has the additional feature of the square towers that were disparaged by Walpole after his visit in 1762.27 A further difference is in the proportions of the two buildings. The height to the oculus and the diameter of the interior circle in the Roman Pantheon are an equal 43.3 m. In contrast the height to the oculus in the Stourhead Pantheon

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is 13.5 m and the interior circle diameter is 9.7 m, yielding a ratio of 1.4 to 1. These differences indicate that the Stourhead Pantheon was not designed to be simply a reduced-size copy of the Roman Pantheon, but instead an original building, albeit one with clear Roman influences. The fourth garden building is Flitcroft’s Temple of Apollo (N), completed in 1765. A number of influences for the temple’s design have been identified, including the Temple of Venus at Balbec and the ‘Temple of Vesta’ at Tivoli.28 By 1801 the temple housed a copy of the Apollo Belvedere statue and a bench designed by Henry Flitcroft.29 The bench is decorated with a painting based on Guido Reni’s Aurora from the Casino of the Palazzo Pallavicini Rospigliosi.30 The exterior of the temple features twelve Corinthian columns forming eleven niches.31 The niches at either side of the door were originally occupied by two antique busts.32 The remaining niches were occupied by nine lead statues purchased from John Cheere.33 These statues have a decidedly Roman theme and include a Vestal Virgin and a statue of the Roman goddess Pomona.34 The juxtaposition of Bacchus, Venus and Ceres statues was possibly intended to illustrate the Roman proverb ‘Sine Cerere et Baccho friget Venus’ (‘Without Bacchus and Ceres, Venus freezes’).35 This brief outline of the four key garden buildings, with their statuary and quotations from Virgil and Ovid, indicates a clear Roman influence on the gardens. Additionally, many of the selected statues are copies of those that were on display in Roman palazzi in the early eighteenth century and illustrated in guides such as Antiquarum statuarum urbis Romae.36 It seems evident that much of the garden content was influenced by Henry Hoare’s Grand Tour experience. Further, the design of the garden buildings was influenced by structures that could be visited by Grand Tourists at locations in and around Rome. In addition to ancient features, the Stourhead garden buildings also contained then more recent Roman features, such as the St Susanna statue copy and the William Hoare version of Reni’s Aurora. Thus we see both the impact of the Grand Tour and the Roman influence on Lord Burlington and William Kent expressed through their protégé Henry Flitcroft.37 They were shaped by travel to the Continent. Prior to his Stourhead commissions Flitcroft had worked with Kent at Ditchley House, and as a colleague would have known about Kent’s work at Stowe and Holkham Hall.38 A further possible source of influence on Flitcroft is Kent’s designs for garden buildings.39 For example Kent produced a design to build a circular peripteral temple for the hillside at Chatsworth, the placement and design of which are very similar to those of the Stourhead Temple of Apollo.40 Throughout the eighteenth century Stourhead attracted numerous domestic visitors and tourists from continental Europe (see also Chapter 7).41 Some of these tourists, such as Prince Leopold III Anhalt-Dessau, were inspired to create English gardens in their homelands. In the next section I shall describe



The eighteenth-century English landscape garden

47

how Stourhead gardens influenced the prince in his design of the English Garden at Wörlitz. Stourhead influences at the English Gardens at Wörlitz and Hagaparken Stourhead garden absorbed many elements of the classical tradition, recasting them in a new context. Its unique vision of antiquity then went on to influence other gardens on the Continent. One good example of this is the garden at Wörlitz, just south of Berlin, begun in 1764 and thus one of the first ‘English Gardens’ built outside Britain.42 As with Henry Hoare at Stourhead, we have little in the way of extant information regarding Prince Anhalt-Dessau’s plans for his ‘Garden Kingdom’. Trauzettel informs us that this is because the Prince ‘had the records of his English Travels destroyed … so as not to reveal the cost of his projects to posterity’.43 We know that he made four visits to England, and it seems certain that he visited Stourhead on the first of these visits in about 1764, as work on the garden at Wörlitz began later that year.44 By the time of the prince’s visit many of the Stourhead Roman garden elements were in place, as well as at least one Chinese feature.45 Trauzettel states that Prince Leopold’s garden design at Wörlitz was influenced by ‘Henry Hoare iconography at Stourhead’.46 The most conspicuous example of this is the Englischer Gartensitz (Figure 2.2). In the Wörlitz garden this structure has a sight-line across the swan pond, a situation comparable to the Orangery shown at location F on F. M. Piper’s plan of Stourhead (see Figure 2.1).47 Piper’s sketch of the ‘Temple on the Terrace’ shows that it was very similar to the Wörlitz structure (see Figure 2.2). The Stourhead edifice is now lost, a casualty of Richard Colt Hoare’s 1790s neo-classical purge.48 Further Stourhead influence can be seen in the Grotte der Egeria (location 39 in Figure 2.3). This figure is very similar to the Stourhead nymph, though

Figure 2.2  (A) Overton’s design No. 16; (B) the Englischer Gartensitz at Wörlitz; and (C) Piper’s sketch of the ‘Temple on the Terrace’ at Stourhead

Figure 2.3  Modern plan of the gardens at Wörlitz with photographs of features influenced by Stourhead gardens



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the setting is more obviously influenced by the Ninfeo d’Egeria in Parco della Caffarella, Rome.Another point of similarity is the Versailles Diana at Stourhead, which originally stood isolated in a grove high on the north side of the valley, and the Dianenstatue (25) at Wörlitz, which also stands in isolation. Some of the Wörlitz garden elements share names with Stourhead features though are physically dissimilar. For example, the Temple of Flora at Wörlitz (19) is unlike the Stourhead temple of the same name and instead appears to have been modelled on the Casino at Wilton.49 Trauzettel suggests that ‘the pantheon at Stourhead may have been the pattern for the Wörlitz Pantheon’ (location 34 in Figure 2.3).50 However, the designs, sizes and building materials of the two structures are very different. Furthermore, the interior of the Wörlitz Pantheon features half-life-size statues of the Muses around a central figure of Urania. This contrasts with the Stourhead Pantheon, which contains an entirely different set of statues, most of which are larger than average human height. So there is good evidence of Stourhead influence at Wörlitz: some features were visually very similar to their Stourhead counterparts; others, such as the Temple of Flora and the Pantheon, were thematically linked, but visually quite different.51 Later in the eighteenth century further examples of the English Garden were built across Europe. For example, Catherine the Great commissioned an English Garden for her palace at Pavlovsk near St Petersburg.52 Similarly, the Stourhead visitor Princess Izabela Czartoryska built her English Garden at Wilanów Palace in Warsaw.53 An English Garden was even built at Versailles for Marie Antoinette.54 English Gardens were popular in Sweden, and especially with the monarch King Gustav III.55 Gustav decided that first-hand accounts of notable English Gardens were required for planning English Gardens in Stockholm and so a young architect, Fredrik Magnus Piper, was dispatched on a tour, with the specific remit of studying and recording details of English landscape gardens.56 Piper began in England and then toured through France to Italy. En route he visited and studied the garden designs of André Le Nôtre (1613–1700). While in Italy from 1776 to 1777 Piper visited and sketched a variety of Roman buildings, ranging from classical edifices, such as the Pantheon, through to country villas in the environs of Rome, including the Villa Aldobrandini and Villa Doria-Pamphili. In 1778 Piper returned to England and embarked on a tour of notable English Gardens, including Painshill and Kew. However, a major focus of his attention during this time was the garden at Stourhead.57 Garden buildings influenced by Stourhead were a feature of the gardens at Drottningholm and Hagaparken that Piper was commissioned to design by Gustav III on his return to Sweden in 1780. Piper produced a number of plans and designs for Hagaparken between 1781 and 1786, some of which were executed, such as the Turkish kiosk (see location 13 in Figure 2.4). One was partially completed (the

Figure 2.4  Modern plan of the garden at Hagaparken with photographs of key items



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Grotto – 10), and others, including a Casino and a Temple of Neptune, were never begun. These garden elements provide prima facie evidence that Piper was influenced by the garden at Stourhead, but more direct evidence can be found in Piper’s book Beskrifning ofwer Ideen och General-Plan till end Angelsk Lustpark (‘Description of the Idea and General-Plan for an English Park’).58 While at Stourhead Piper produced a substantial corpus of sketches and notes which, Karling writes, ‘bear witness to the important part which Stourhead was to play in the landscape design which he himself introduced in Sweden’.59 An examination of Piper’s book shows that he advocated the inclusion of many Stourhead garden elements in his English Garden design. In a single sentence Piper suggests the inclusion of a rotunda Pantheon, a hermitage, an obelisk, ‘an opening through the forest to the large Bassin’ and a cascade, all features that in 1779 were to be found in Stourhead gardens.60 Stourhead features are extensively referenced throughout the book as having inspired Piper’s plan and are often illustrated by sketches and descriptions. For example, Piper provides details of the location of Stourhead House (p. 127), an extensive description of the Hermitage (p. 133), a description of the dam and lake (p. 135) and a very thorough account of the Grotto (p. 145). The English garden in continental Europe: ‘Giardini Inglesi’ In the foregoing sections I have described the genesis and evolution of the English Garden at Stourhead and how Rome was often the inspiration for the phenomenon. I have also shown how visits to Stourhead by overseas visitors inspired and influenced them to create their own English Gardens, in particular the gardens at Wörlitz and Hagaparken. A key remaining issue is why the English Garden was so widely copied by garden makers across Europe, and especially in Italy, which had inspired many of the garden features at Stourhead. We know that the accounts of Stourhead visitors who had travelled in Italy commonly mentioned comparisons and contrasts with their experiences in Rome. For example, Rezzonico in his account of Stourhead references the Pantheon in Rome, the Belvedere Ariadne statue and several other Italian influences, such as the Faun of Florence statue.61 A further example of perceived similarities is William Hazlitt’s description of the road down from Stourhead House to the gardens as being like ‘a sort of rural Herculaneum’.62 This effect is also to be found in Walpole’s account where he describes the Stourhead Pantheon as being similar to the one at Rome.63 Similarly, Graves’s character Atticus in the novel Columella comments, ‘When I contemplate those objects [the Pantheon and Temple of Apollo], and one or two more in the Roman style, I could fancy myself upon a visit to Cicero, Lucullus, or some ancient Roman.’64 For these visitors, both real and fictional, Stourhead is cueing recall of memories from travel in Italy, or memories of writing on, and visual representations

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of, these Italian locations. The sight of statues, inscriptions and Roman-style buildings could also cue recall of historic figures, such as Cicero and Lucullus, as well as Roman deities and mythical stories. For example, the wooden plaque in the Grotto with the quotation from Ovid’s Metamorphoses could cue recall of the Daphne and Peneus story. Similarly, Pantheon statues could cue memories of the Judgement of Hercules and the story of the Calydonian boar. Extant visitor accounts show how the Roman features of Stourhead evoked memories of ancient Rome. I have so far considered the English Garden as realised in northern Europe, but the phenomenon extended to countries bordering the Mediterranean, including Italy. The poet, translator and essayist Ippolito Pindemonte (1753– 1828) marks out three ‘Giardini Inglesi’ as being of particular note: the garden in Caserta, one at Cremona ‘that belongs to the two well-educated and very kind Picenardi brother’ and ‘the third in Genoa designed by the Senator Lomellini’.65 By the early 1780s even the Borghese gardens in Rome featured an English Garden, complete with winding paths and a Temple of Aesclepius overlooking a small lake.66 Guidance on building ‘Giardini Inglesi’ was available in books such as the one published by Hercules Silva, creator of the English Garden at Villa Silva near Milan.67 Pietrogrande suggests that the popularity of the English Garden was partly due to the impact of the many English visitors to Italy in the late eighteenth century, who as well as absorbing Italian influences, may have influenced the taste of the indigenous population.68 For example, Sir William Chambers is often credited with dissemination of the English Garden throughout the Continent.69 A further example is the documented influence of Sir William Hamilton on the initiation and content of the English Garden at Caserta. In a letter to Sir Joseph Banks, Hamilton reveals that Queen Maria Carolina had invited Hamilton to supervise the creation of the garden and ‘to send for a British Gardiner & Nurseryman’.70 In the content of a further letter to Banks, dated January 1788, Hamilton indicates that his ambition was to produce ‘A specimen of English pleasure Garden’ but one free of ‘The serpentine walks, regular clumps and twisted rivers with bald banks broken here and there with a weeping willow and a Chinese bridge’.71 An explanation of why the English Garden became so popular in Italy can be found in the writing of Pindemonte. As well as authoring a poem entitled ‘Il Giardino Inglese’, he published a lecture entitled ‘I giardini inglesi e sul merito in cio dell’Italia’ (‘On English Gardens, and the Merit due to Italy in this Respect)’.72 In this account Pindemonte defends the premise that the lack of linearity and formality, as well as the placement of various garden edifices, are distinct features of the English Garden. He places a good deal of emphasis upon seasonal colour, as well as features such as ruined buildings, statues and the presence of large areas of lush turf, a feature also mentioned by Piper but often overlooked in England.73 This suggests that a key feature of the English Garden



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for overseas visitors, but one possibly taken for granted by domestic visitors, was the verdant, grassy expanses. The blending of gardens with wider estates through devices such as the ha-ha, as well as the ‘surprise reveals’ created by serpentine paths and careful planning, were as charming to continental garden visitors as they were to the English. Thus part of the appeal of the English Garden for continental Europeans was the very features of the style enjoyed by English Garden owners and visitors. A further possible reason for the popularity of the English Garden is that it represented not just a reaction against the more formal French style of gardening, but also against French expansionist aggression, absolutist monarchy and the later excesses of the French Revolution. As discussed earlier, Sir William Hamilton, the British ambassador to the court of Naples from 1764 to 1800, suggested the creation of an English Garden at Caserta to Queen Maria Carolina of Naples, the sister of Queen Marie Antoinette of France. Work on the garden began in 1787 and continued into the mid-1790s.74 This period was contemporary with the revolutionary disturbances in France that culminated with the abolition of the French monarchy and Marie Antoinette’s execution in 1793. Queen Maria Carolina was horrified at news of the events in France and of her sister’s execution, and thus promotion of the English Garden was perhaps a gesture of Neapolitan commitment to their British allies and a symbolic rejection of French culture.75 On this same theme, Umbach presents the view that alignment with British ideals of liberty, free trade and the Enlightenment was a key motivator for Prince Leopold’s creation of the English Garden at Wörlitz, which she suggests was an expression of his commitment to these ideals. This stood in contrast to French garden design, which ‘became a model of what France should be: a regulated, fortified and ‘square’ state’, that is, a garden metaphor for absolutist monarchy.76 The adoption of the English garden thus takes on a symbolic significance beyond simply one of fashion and into the political. In this context it is interesting to consider to what extent the Hoares were political in their ambitions. While through the bank’s activities they were supportive of Britain’s expansionist ambitions, successive generations of the Hoare family took an equivocal approach to politics.77 Henry Hoare II served as the Tory MP for Salisbury from 1734 to 1741, though he spent three of those years on Grand Tour, and in his seven years as MP he did not vote in any recorded division.78 It seems that any political convictions were secondary to ‘a deep and genuine interest in art’.79 The commitment to British imperial expansion was evident also in the endeavours of Richard Colt Hoare, Henry’s successor at Stourhead. A practical advantage of the English landscape garden was that rather than land being divided into garden, plantation and field, these elements could instead be incorporated into the landscape.80 Thus Colt Hoare was able to put the wider estate at Stourhead to tree plantation for profit, while keeping to a style of gardening that was consistent with prevailing

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ideas of good taste. In the eighteenth century wood was in heavy demand, the production of a single ship of the line requiring over two thousand trees. Thus tree plantations provided an income from timber and supported ship-building, an important element of British imperial expansion. The political overtones of the English landscape garden do not seem to have been a barrier to wider European adoption. As noted, an English garden was even a feature of the gardens in Versailles. A third possible reason for the popularity of the English Garden is the mnemonic element already discussed in the context of Stourhead, specifically that the English Garden cued remembrance. The following section from the writings of Melchiore Cesarotti (1730–1808) supports this idea.81 Cesarotti writes that ‘[The English Garden] has a perpetual succession of scenes in new and surprising ways [that] … speak to the eyes, to the imagination and to the heart of the viewer, and arouse pleasant memories, revived sensations of unexpected wonder, or carry them in a delicious and almost ecstatic escape.’82 The key element here is the reference to the arousal of pleasant memories, a theme also identified by Pietrogrande, who proposes that the English Garden ‘stimulates among educated Italians a more careful consideration of their ancient traditions’.83 These comments suggest that a valued aspect of the English Garden style to the Italian visitor was that the content, often drawn from Roman antiquity, elicited a reaction that was literally ‘romantic’ and which evoked atavistic memories of the achievements and legacies of ancient Rome. These are similar reactions to the memories elicited by Stourhead features in visitors such as Walpole, Rezzonico and Hazlitt, as well as the accounts of fictitious visitors such as Graves’s Atticus in Columella. Woodbridge refers to this idea in the specific context of Stourhead when he writes that ‘nostalgia was reinforced by travel; countless Englishmen saw for themselves the places they had read about, the Roman campagna strewn with antique remains’.84 From the many Stourhead visitor accounts it is evident that the content of the Roman-influenced English Garden had the power to prompt memories in the British visitor of visits to Italy, and especially Rome, or of writings and visual representations of Italian locations. These gardens could also cue recollection of stories from Roman mythology, poetry and political and historical events in those who recognised the significance of the iconography. These could be potent cues for English visitors, but also to continental European visitors, and especially Italians, from whose culture the English Garden content had largely been received. Conclusions In this chapter I have demonstrated the considerable Roman influence that was absorbed into the garden at Stourhead. I have then shown how it in turn



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influenced examples of the English Gardens at Wörlitz and Hagaparken. My account has helped to confirm Mowl’s proposition that ‘Stourhead was the epitome of the “English Garden” as imitated in France, Germany, Sweden and Russia’ (see also Chapter 7). In seeking to explain the general appeal of the English Garden in continental Europe, I have identified aesthetic, political and mnemonic characteristics of the English Garden. Key to this chapter’s place in a volume entitled Travel and the British Country House is that the Roman influences absorbed into the garden at Stourhead were garnered by Henry Hoare and others while on Grand Tour. These influences were later absorbed by overseas tourists visiting Stourhead, who took ideas of the English Garden and reproduced them at sites in Sweden, Germany, Italy and elsewhere in Europe. The written word was doubtless one medium through which ideas about the English Garden were disseminated, but the transmission of ideas about the English Garden has travel at its heart. The influence of Sir William Hamilton and Sir William Chambers is well documented, and to this list can be added the influence of gardeners and designers, such as Jacob More (the Borghese gardens), John Graeffer (Caserta) and Charles Cameron (Pavlovsk), who travelled to the continent to help create English Gardens. However, as Symes states, ‘the main avenue was in the form of visitors from the Continent to Britain’.85 Piper, visiting from Sweden, played a critical role in recording and transmitting details of Stourhead, as did visitors from the Netherlands (e.g. Baron Johan van Spaen van Biljoen), Italy (Count Carlo Gastone Rezzonico), Poland (Princess Izabela Czartoryska) and others who documented their visits.  We know also of overseas visitors to Stourhead who  may have left as yet undiscovered accounts of their visits. Duchess Yolande de Polignac’s party visiting in  1787 included the French ambassador Comte Jean-Balthazar d’Adhémar, and probably also included the Comte de Vaudreuil, as well as members of both families. Further research is likely to yield other domestic and overseas visitor accounts, with the potential to enrich our understanding of the evolution and content of English Gardens, as well as their reception and imitation. Notes  1 T. Richardson, The Arcadian Friends: Inventing the English Landscape Garden (London: Bantam, 2007), p. 135.  2 T. Mowl, Gentlemen & Players: Gardeners of the English Landscape (Stroud: Sutton Publishing, 2000), p. 93.  3 D. Arnold, The Georgian Country House: Architecture, Landscape and Society (Stroud: Sutton Publishing, 1998), p. 15.  4 ‘Che gl’Inglesi che tanto amano di paragonarsi a Romani’. B. Gamba, Viaggio in Inghilterra di Carlo Gastone della Torre di Rezzonico comasco (Venice, 1824), p. 22.  5 J. Richardson, An Essay on the Theory of Painting (London, 1715), pp. 222–3.

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 6 C. Timothy and T. Friedman (eds), The Man at Hyde Park Corner: Sculpture by John Cheere, 1709–1787, exhibition catalogue (Leeds: Temple Newsam, 1974).  7 J. Warton, An Essay on the Genius and Writings of Pope, vol. II (Dublin, 1782), p. 244.  8 The most complete account of Henry’s Grand Tour to date is that provided by S. S. Jervis and D. Dodd, Roman Splendour, English Arcadia: The English Taste for Pietre Dure and the Sixtus Cabinet at Stourhead (London: Philip Wilson Publishers, 2014), pp. 130–43. Henry’s mother was the sister of William Benson (1682–1754). Benson’s own Grand Tour included a lengthy stay in Hanover, where he ingratiated himself with the future George I, whom he would later serve as Surveyor of the King’s Works. In 1709 Benson designed and built Wilbury House near Amesbury, which he sold to Henry Hoare in 1734. The garden at Wilbury includes a grotto and a temple, and may have served as a prototype for the garden at Stourhead.  9 O. Cox, ‘A Mistaken Iconography? Eighteenth-Century Visitor Accounts of Stourhead’, Garden History, 40:1 (2012), pp. 98–116. 10 H. Walpole, Journals of Visits to Country Seats (July 1762), published in P. Toynbee (ed.), ‘Horace Walpole’s Journals of Visits to Country Seats, &c’, Volume of the Walpole Society, 16 (1927–28), pp. 41–4. 11 I have previously described in detail the content and evolution of the gardens, and so in this chapter I will provide only a brief, introductory account of the Roman influences. See J. E. Harrison, ‘The Development and Content of Stourhead Gardens: Recent Findings, Insights from an Eighteenth-Century Poem and the Visit of Carlo Gastone Della Torre di Rezzonico in 1787’, Garden History, 43:1 (2015), pp. 126–43. 12 Examples of the English Garden in other locations in Europe have recently been written about by Michael Symes in The English Landscape Garden in Europe (Swindon: Historic England, 2016). 13 British Museum, London, Add. MS 6767, fol. 37; unknown, Livia Augusta as Ceres, second century CE, marble, 1930 mm (height), Pantheon, Stourhead, National Trust inventory no. (hereafter NT) 562913.1. 14 This order had previously been employed by Inigo Jones (1633) in the design and building of St Paul’s Church in Covent Garden, London. It is possible that this influenced Flitcroft’s selection when he designed the four-columned Temple of Flora. 15 Anon., ‘Journey through Wiltshire’, London Chronicle, 16–18 June 1757, p. 578. A description of these items has been published in D. Dodd, ‘Fit for the Gods: Furniture in Stourhead’s Temples’, in The National Trust Historic Houses & Collections Annual (London: National Trust, 2007), pp. 14–22. 16 Unknown, Portrait of Young Faustina Minor, sculpture, marble, 60 cm, 147–48 CE, Capitoline Museum, Rome, inv. no. MC0449; unknown, Portrait of Faustina Major, sculpture, marble, 63 cm, 138–61 CE, Capitoline Museum, inv. no. MC0447. This identification is suggested in S. Gordon,‘The Iconography and Mythology of the 18th Century English Garden’ (unpublished doctoral thesis, University of Bristol, 1999) p. 113.



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17 J. Cheere, Nymph, c.1745, lead, 865 mm (height) × 1700 mm (length), Grotto, Stourhead, NT 562876. 18 J. Cheere, River God, 1751, lead, 1980 mm (height), Grotto, Stourhead, NT 562877. 19 Warner states that ‘Over the arch in front of this recess hangs a wooden tablet, with some lines allusive to this aquatic deity.’ The presence of this plaque is confirmed by Colt Hoare who writes in 1822 that ‘in front of this cavern are the following lines: Haec domus …’. R. Warner, Excursions from Bath (Bath: R. Cruttwell, 1801), p.  108; R. C. Hoare, The History of Modern Wiltshire, vol. I: Hundred of Mere (London, 1822), p. 66. 20 J. M. Rysbrack, Hercules, 1756, marble, 1855 mm (height), Pantheon, Stourhead, NT562911.1. 21 Gamba, Viaggio in Inghilterra, p. 40. The faun statue was still in place as late as 1867 (Proceedings of the Bath Natural History and Antiquarian Field Club (Bath: Bleeck and Leach, 1867–79), 1, p. 78). 22 J. M. Rysbrack, Flora, 1760–62, marble, 1790 mm (height), Pantheon, Stourhead, NT 562912.1; J. Cheere, Diana of Versailles, 1744, lead, 2080 mm (height), Pantheon, Stourhead, NT 562880.1. 23 J. Cheere, Meleager, 1762, plaster, 2080 mm (height), Pantheon, Stourhead, NT 562914.1. 24 J. Cheere, St Susanna, 1762, plaster, 2035 mm (height), Pantheon, Stourhead, NT 562915.1; J. Cheere, Priestess of Isis/Isis, 1762, plaster, 1880 mm (height), Pantheon, Stourhead, NT 562916.1. Duquesnoy’s original St Susanna has been on display in the church of Santa Maria di Loreto in Rome since the statue’s completion in 1633. 25 P. S. Bartoli, Admiranda romanarum antiquitatum (Rome: Joanne Iacobo de Rubeis, 1693). 26 S. Serlio, Tutte l’opere d’architettura et prospetiva (Venice, 1619), pp. 52–4; C. Fry, ‘Spanning the Political Divide: Neo-Palladianism and the Early EighteenthCentury’, Garden History, 31:2 (2003), pp. 180–92. 27 ‘Taken from the Pantheon, except that each end of the Portico is stopped up, and I think not judiciously, with a square tower, with niches and statues’. Walpole, Journals of Visits to Country Seats, p. 44. 28 A further possible influence was William Chambers’s Temple of the Sun at Kew, built in 1761. The presence of a zodiacal frieze at the Kew temple might account for the comments from Stourhead visitors such as Rezzonico, who expected to see signs of the zodiac at the Temple of Apollo (J. E. Harrison, The Development and Content of Stourhead Gardens: Recent Findings, Insights from an EighteenthCentury Poem and the Visit of Carlo Gastone Della Torre di Rezzonico in 1787’, Garden History, 43:1 (2015), p. 133). Both buildings also incorporated a representation of the sun in their ceilings. 29 H. Flitcroft, Curved Bench Seat, 1765, pine, grained, oil on panel, 1320 × 2225 × 675 mm, Temple of Apollo, Stourhead, NT 562873.1. 30 Inspection of the Reni version reveals that the William Hoare version is only very loosely based on the original. See L. Calabrese, Il casino dell’Aurora Pallavicini: percorsi, immagini, riflessioni (Milan: Skira Editore, 2007), pp. 114–15.

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31 The temples at Balbec and Tivoli feature are circular, peripteral temples decorated with Corinthian column and so both remain possible sources of inspiration. 32 G. A. Ward (ed.), Journal and Letters of the Late Samuel Curwen, Judge of Admiralty: An American Refugee in England, from 1775–1784 (New York: C. S. Francis & Co., 1842), p. 231. 33 Wiltshire and Swindon History Centre, Chippenham, record 383, box 4, ‘Henry Hoare Esq. from Mr. Cheere, to five drapery statues of a Vesta, Ceres, Pomona …’, 1766. 34 J. Cheere, Vesta/Vestal Virgin, 1765–66, lead, 1600 mm (height), West Front, Stourhead House, NT 562884. 35 J. E. Harrison, ‘More than Just Squabby Cupids? History and Myth in Stourhead’s Famous Landscape Garden’, ABC Bulletin (spring 2015), pp. 6–8. 36 During the eighteenth century the Farnese Hercules and Farnese Flora were both on show in the courtyard of the Farnese Palace (A. Aymonino and A. V. Lauder, Drawn from the Antique: Artists & the Classical Ideal (London: Sir John Soane’s Museum, 2015), p. 176). G. B. Cavalieri, Antiquarum statuarum urbis Romae (Rome, 1585–94). 37 Flitcroft’s architectural skills had been spotted while he was working as a carpenter at Burlington House. 38 R. White, ‘Kent and the Gothic Revival’, in S. Weber (ed.), William Kent: Designing Georgian Britain (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2015), pp. 247–69. 39 Grant has provided circumstantial evidence to suggest that the Stourhead Pantheon was based on a set design by Filippo Juvarra for Iphigenia in Tauris, a production that Kent was likely to have seen while in Rome (K. Grant, ‘Planting Italian Gusto in a “Gothick Country”: The Influence of Filippo Juvarra on William Kent’, in D.  Marshall, S. Russell and K. Wolfe (eds), Roma Britannica (London: British School at Rome, 2011), p. 227). 40 J. Harris, ‘Garden Buildings’, in S. Weber (ed.), William Kent: Designing Georgian Britain (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2013), p. 408. Richard Wheeler has recently pointed out that the same arrangement of a circular temple on a hillside is depicted in Carlo Maratta’s, Marchese Niccolò Maria Pallavicini (1650–1714) Guided to the Temple of Virtù by Apollo with a Self-Portrait of the Artist, which hangs in the main house at Stourhead, suggesting a consistent theme (1705, oil on canvas, 2997 × 2120 mm, Stourhead, NT 732098). R. Wheeler, ‘Stourhead: Procul O Procul Este Profanis. A Classical Landscape in a Picturesque Setting’, lecture given at ‘Classical Influences on Georgian Stourhead’, Stourton Memorial Hall, 11–12 November 2015. 41 Records show that Marie Antoinette’s close circle were among those visitors: ‘Our correspondent at Frome informs us, that on Friday last their Excellencies the French and Spanish ambassadors, with the Duchess of Polignac, and their suite passed thro’ that town in their way to Stourton, the seat of H. C. Hoare Esq.’ Bath Journal, 44:2266 (13 June 1787), p. 4. 42 L. Trauzettel, ‘Wörlitz: England in Germany’, Garden History, 24:2 (1996), pp. 221–36. 43 Ibid., p. 222.



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44 Trauzettel records the other visit dates as 1768–69, 1775 and 1785, which with the 1763–64 tour totals some two and a half years spent in England. Ibid., p. 221. 45 There is evidence for a single item of Chinoiserie in the garden from as early as 1749 (see Harrison, ‘Stourhead Gardens’, p. 128). 46 Trauzettel, ‘England in Germany’, p. 224. 47 A reference point for the ‘Temple on the Terrace’ was not included on Kenneth Woodbridge’s annotated version of Piper’s 1779 plan of Stourhead (K. Woodbridge, The Stourhead Landscape (London: National Trust, 1982), p. 44). Piper’s key is incomplete with respect to this item, but the legend to Piper’s sketch of this structure (‘Loge wid Terrassen y.y.– se foreguinde Plans Lit. J’) indicates that the structure shown to the right of the ‘y.y.’ location on Piper’s plan is labelled ‘J’. I have therefore added ‘J’ to the plan to indicate its position (see Figure 2.1). Piper sketched many of the Stourhead garden elements, including an urn on a pedestal on the approach to the grotto (‘Passage genom skogen, innan man kommer till gråttan, Stourhead’) and a ‘Chinese Umbrella’, shown in his picture titled ‘Wue af Solens Tempel, Pantheon m.m. uti f.f Banquiren Hoares Lustpark wid Stourton’ (‘View of the Temple of the Sun, the Pantheon, etc. at the Banker Hoare’s garden at Stourton’). Though sketched, neither of these two garden elements is indicated on his plan. F. M. Piper, Beskrifning ofwer Ideen och General-Plan till end Angelsk Lustpark (Stockholm: Byggforlaget, 2004), pp. 17, 9. 48 A very similar design was included in T. Overton, The Temple Builder’s Most Useful Companion (London, 1766), design 16 (see Figure 2.2). Henry Hoare, Esq. is listed as a subscriber. 49 The Wilton Casino was itself influenced by the Temple of Clitumnus at Spoleto. It has been suggested that the Temple of Flora at Stourhead was also inspired by Clitumnus, but other than its proximity to water, the similarities are not at all obvious. Woodbridge writes that the originator of this suggestion was Georgina Masson (K. Woodbridge, Landscape and Antiquity: Aspects of English Culture at Stourhead 1718 to 1838 (Oxford University Press: Oxford, 1970), p. 31). However, Masson writes on this topic that ‘Byron’s evocation of Clitumnus … could have applied equally well to an English landscape garden of his day’ (G. Masson, Italian Gardens (London: Thames & Hudson, 1961), p. 38). This suggests that her comment was made in general, and was not specific to the Temple of Flora at Stourhead. 50 Trauzettel, ‘England in Germany’, p. 225. 51 Trauzettel takes a strong position on Stourhead influence. However, M. Symes (personal communication, 28 May 2016) has pointed out that William Chambers’s Kew ‘would probably have been the principal influence’. 52 Pavlovsk was built by Catherine the Great for her son Pavel and his second wife, Maria Feodorovna. The palace grounds featured various structures consistent with the design of an English Garden, including a Chinese kiosk, Chinese bridges and classical temples. Catherine’s architect, the Scot Charles Cameron (1745–1812), designed both the domed circular temple and a colonnade containing a copy of the Apollo Belvedere, as well as the Palladian-influenced palace (S. Massie, Pavlovsk: The Life of a Russian Palace (Blue Hill, ME: Heart Tree Press, 1990)). On 25 June

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1772 Catherine wrote to Voltaire of her affection for the English Garden: ‘I now love to distraction gardens in the English style, the curving lines, the gentle slopes, the ponds in the forms of lakes, the archipelagos on dry land, and I scorn straight lines and twin allées. I hate fountains, which torture water in order to make it follow a course contrary to its nature; statues are relegated to galleries, halls etc. In a word, anglomania rules my plantmania’ (M. Piotrovsky, M. Dedinkin and D. Jacques, The Hampton Court Albums of Catherine the Great (London: Fontanka, 2016), p. 14). Michael Symes has suggested to me that extant designs by James Meader (ibid., pp. 16–17) indicate that the gardens at Peterhof were more consistent with the traditional precepts of the English Garden. 53 I am grateful to Agnieszka Whelan and Zdzisław Żygulski jnr for providing me with the following translation of the princess’s visit of 19 June (1790): ‘We went to Stourhead, the estate of Mr. Hoare, twenty-five miles away, superbly placed and brilliantly designed. We saw the temple, the grotto and a public walk on top of the rocks. The house is sad but beautiful.’ 54 The competition between Marie Antoinette and her favourite sister Maria Carolina, the Queen of Naples, may have influenced the building of the Giardino Inglese at Caserta. 55 A detailed account of the English Garden in Sweden has been provided by J. Phibbs, ‘Pleasure Grounds in Sweden and their English Models’, Garden History, 21:1 (1993), pp. 60–90. 56 Piper, born in Uppsala in 1746, read mathematics and hydrostatics at university and later studied with Carl Fredrik Adelcrantz (1716–1796). 57 Henry Hoare provides an account of Piper’s activities at Stourhead in a letter to Charles Hamilton dated 30 August 1779: ‘Mr Hoare of Bath presents his best respects to Mr Hamilton, and begs to be permitted, in favour of a young artist who is sent by the King of Sweden to study the culture of lands for Gardening in England, to request leave for him to see the disposition of Mr Hamilton’s Grounds at Bath, which he is more desirous of, having been to study at Painshill.’ Quoted in J. Harris, ‘F. M. Piper, his English Studies’, in Fredrik Magnus Piper: Texter och kommentarer (Stockholm: Byggforlaget, 2004), p. 117. 58 F. M. Piper, Beskrifning ofwer Ideen och General-Plan till end Angelsk Lustpark (Stockholm: Byggforlaget, 2004), p. 133. 59 S. Karling, ‘From Tessin to Piper: A Century of Swedish Landscape Gardening’, in Fredrik Magnus Piper and the Landscape Garden, exhibition catalogue (Stockholm: Royal Academy of Fine Arts, 1981), pp. 8–38. 60 F. M. Piper, ‘Description of the Idea and General-Plan for an English Park’, in Fredrik Magnus Piper: Texter och kommentarer (Stockholm: Byggforlaget, 2004), p. 130. 61 Gamba, Viaggio in Inghilterra, p. 40. 62 H. Hazlitt, Sketches of the Principal Picture Galleries in England (London, 1824), p. 137. 63 Walpole, Journals of Visits to Country Seats, p. 44. 64 R. Graves, Columella, or the Distressed Anchoret: A Colloquial Tale (Toulouse: Presses Universitaires du Mirail, 1989), p. 74.



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65 I. Pindemonte, Le prose e poesie campestri d’Ippolito Pindemonte con l’aggiunta d’una  dissertazione su i giardini inglesi e sul merito in cio dell’Italia (Verona, 1833), pp. 166–7. 66 The English Garden was partly designed by Jacob More (c.1740–1793). The Temple was added in 1786. Symes, English Landscape Garden, p. 107. 67 E. Silva, Dell’arte dei giardini inglesi (Milan: Genio Tipografico, 1801). 68 Pietrogrande writes that ‘During the eighteenth century, contacts with Britain are not lacking in the Veneto, rather we are seeing an increase of Anglomania, fuelled by numerous trips during the course of the century by British visitors to Venice.’ A. Pietrogrande, ‘Un’interpretazione veneta del nuovo giardino europeo: Selvaggiano, il ritiro campestre di Cesarotti’, in F. Finotti (ed.), Melchiorre Cesarotti e le trasformazioni del paesaggio europeo (Trieste: EUT Edizioni Università di Trieste, 2010), p. 62. For a further view on the impact and influence of the English in Italy see L. Collison-Morley, ‘The Georgian Englishman in Contemporary Italian eyes’, Modern Language Review, 12:3 (1917), pp. 310–18. 69 Symes, English Landscape Garden, p. 14. 70 ‘The Queen of Naples has adopted my project.’ British Library, Add. MS 34048, fol. 22, Sir William Hamilton to Sir Joseph Banks, 20 February 1785. 71 British Library, Add. MS 34038, fol. 81, Sir William Hamilton to Sir Joseph Banks, January 1788. 72 This article was first presented in 1792 to the Padua Academy of Science, Letters and Art, a short time after his return from a tour including time in Paris, London, Berlin and Vienna. Pindemonte was in London from late August 1789 until the spring of 1790. We have no extant evidence of trips to English Gardens during this time. A commentary on the Paduan English Garden debate has been published by A. Pietrogrande, ‘Il dibattito padovano sui giardini all’Inglese all’Accademia di Scienze, Lettere e Arti di Padova: 1782–98’, in Atti e memorie dell’Accademia patavina di Scienze, Lettere ed Arti, 108 (1994–95), part III: Memorie della Classe di Scienzi Morali, Lettere e Arti, pp. 19–38. 73 Carlo Gastone della Torre di Rezzonico also highlights this point when he writes that the gardener imported from Britain, John Andrew Graeffer, utilised ‘the clemency of the climate, and the fertility of the soil’ to create ‘long lush plantations’. Rezzonico visited Caserta in 1789, two years after his visit to Stourhead, in the company of Abbott Zarillo and Sir William Hamilton. His comments on the characteristics of the English garden are a key feature of his commentary, including the sudden changes of perspective and the variety of garden ornamentation. However, his account of the garden at Caserta contains no mention of his observations at Stourhead. F. Mocchetti, Opere del Cavaliere Carlo Gastone (Como, 1819), p. 259. 74 C. Knight, I giardino inglese di Caserta: un’avventura settecentesca (Naples: Sergio Civita Editore, 1986). 75 Constantine writes that she had the words ‘Je poursuivrai ma vengeance jusqu’au tombeau’ inscribed under a portrait of Marie Antoinette and ‘to that end she directed Neapolitan foreign policy thenceforth’. D. Constantine, Fields of Fire: A Life of Sir William Hamilton (London: Weidenfield & Nicolson, 2001), p. 192.

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76 M. Umbach, Federalism and Enlightenment in Germany, 1740–1806 (London: Hambledon Press, 2000), p. 62. 77 Hoare & Co.’s profit of £28,000 from the South Sea Bubble had afforded the bank an opportunity to expand operations, with the new estate at Stourhead providing excellent security. V. Hutchings, A History of the Hoare Banking Dynasty (London: Constable, 2005), p. 47. 78 Ibid., p. 50. 79 Richardson, Arcadian Friends, p. 407. 80 C. Hussey, English Gardens and Landscapes, 1700–1750 (London: Country Life, 1967), p. 33. 81 Cesarotti (1730–1808) was professor of Greek and Latin language and literature at the University of Padua. 82 ‘Presenta una successione perpetua di scene nuove e mirabili … parlano successivamente agli occhi, alla fantasia ed al cuor dello spettatore, e ora gli destano reminiscenze piacevoli, sensazioni ravvivate, ora li colpiscono d’inaspettata meraviglia, or lo trasportano in un delizioso e quasi estatico rapimento.’ Melchiore Cesarotti, Relazioni accademiche dell’abate, vol. II (Pisa: Dalla tipografia della società Lett, 1803, p. 280. 83 Pietrogrande, ‘Un’interpretazione veneta’, p. 64. By including the caveat ‘educated’ Pietrogrande is suggesting that these induced reflections require a familiarity with ancient Roman literature, architecture and culture. However, less well-educated visitors could still be expected to enjoy the aesthetics of the garden. I have previously suggested that a useful distinction can be made between Stourhead visitors, such as Walpole and Rezzonico, who in their writing employ the ‘trope of digression’, and those who employ the ‘trope of hyperbole’ (see Harrison, ‘Stourhead Gardens’, p. 138). Pietrogrande implies a similar distinction. 84 Woodbridge, The Stourhead Landscape, p. 9. 85 Symes, English Landscape Garden, p. 18.

Chinoiserie and the country house

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Virtual travel and virtuous objects: chinoiserie and the country house Emile de Bruijn

The Grand Tour – the practice among the British aristocracy and gentry of travelling to the Continent, and Italy in particular, in order to sample its history, culture and landscape – reached its peak in the eighteenth century.1 This period also saw a burgeoning of the British interest in things Chinese, subsequently called chinoiserie.2 On a purely economic level, both these phenomena were made possible by Britain’s increasing wealth and its growing role  in world trade, providing the financial means and the transport infrastructure by which objects from Italy and China could be acquired  and  brought back.  However,  chinoiserie and the Grand Tour are also related on a  deeper  level, through  their  causes  and effects. Both were imbued with a sense of intellectual and sensual curiosity; both equated physical travel and exploration with  the widening of mental and cultural horizons. This chapter will describe the key role of illustrated books on China, written by European travellers, in creating and sustaining the image of China in the British consciousness. These books played a role similar to the guidebooks, travel accounts and catalogues inspired by the Grand Tour, in that they not only informed the British public but also stimulated discourse and influenced taste. Books such as Johan Nieuhof’s An Embassy from the East-India Company of the United Provinces to the Grand Tartar Cham Emperor of China (Dutch edition 1665, English edition 1669), Jean-Baptiste du Halde’s A Description of the Empire of China (French edition 1735, English editions 1736 and 1738– 41), Sir William Chambers’s Designs of Chinese Buildings (1757) and William Alexander’s The Costume of China (1805) and Picturesque Representations of the Dress and Manners of the Chinese (1814) succeeded in both popularising the Chinese style and providing it with intellectual gravitas. All of these books paired text with images, widening their appeal and making the experience of armchair travel more vivid.

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I will begin by describing how books about China influenced the way Chinese objects were regarded and used in English interiors from the late seventeenth century onwards, citing examples at Ham House, Surrey, and Petworth, West Sussex. I will then analyse how both the Chinese and the Italo-classical styles were deliberately and meaningfully combined in the interiors of Uppark in West Sussex, Felbrigg Hall in Norfolk and Nostell Priory in West Yorkshire. I will also discuss how the ‘Chinese’ elements in the landscape gardens at Shugborough in Staffordshire, Stourhead in Wiltshire and Kew in Richmond upon Thames happily coexisted with their Greek and Roman counterparts. Finally, I will show how the aforementioned books by Chambers and Alexander continued the tradition of providing illustrated first-hand-accounts of China, but that their claims of authenticity mirrored the new emphasis on art-­historical accuracy in late eighteenth-century Grand Tour literature. Before exploring further the similarities between chinoiserie and Grand Tour taste, it is worth noting some of the obvious differences. Travelling from Britain to China was significantly more expensive, time-consuming and risky than travelling to Italy. The effort required to reach China made it seem more distant in a psychological sense. Whereas travel to Italy was mainly for edification and pleasure, travel to China was generally a commercial undertaking. The same families who spent considerable sums on going to the Continent and bringing back works of art would engage with the China trade only at arm’s length, as investors in the British East India Company and as consumers of the goods brought to London by the company. Moreover, Italy was regarded as one of the cradles of European civilisation,3 whereas China was seen as a fundamentally ‘other’ place, fascinating and admirable, but also mysterious and strange. In spite of these differences, however, chinoiserie and the Grand Tour were similar in their causes, their mechanics and their effects. Both phenomena were deeply selective, emphasising certain aspects of Italian and Chinese material culture that were agreeable and interesting to the British and filtering out others.4 The European conception of China, for instance, was heavily influenced by the accounts of the Jesuit missionaries, who had been active there since the sixteenth century and were keen to present the Chinese as virtuous and proto-Christian.5 Likewise the British, especially in the eighteenth century, tended to see Italy as a museum of the antique and to ignore or deprecate contemporary Italian culture.6 Just as many of the objects exported from China to Europe were influenced by European tastes and fashions, so the British conception of Italian art – and indeed Italian scenery – relied heavily on the works of certain artists, such as Claude Lorrain (1604–1682), Nicolas Poussin (1594–1665) and Salvator Rosa (1615–1673) in the seventeenth century and Pompeo Batoni (1708–1787), Antonio Canaletto (1697–1768) and Giovanni Battista Piranesi (1720–1778) in the eighteenth century.7



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Although Italy was seen as the ‘centre’ and China as the ‘periphery’, both were regarded as interconnected parts of the known world. Indeed, during the seventeenth century several scholars tried to investigate how the history of China was connected to that of Europe. Theories were advanced about how the Chinese language was a remnant of a lost universal language and how the Chinese people might be a lost Old Testament tribe.8 China was admired for its long history and for its apparent ability to preserve its ‘ancient virtue’.9 There were certainly many contradictions in the way Chinese society was perceived, from quite early on, as both virtuous and cruel, enlightened and static. But once again this is reminiscent of the conflicting British views about Italy as being both beautiful and squalid, debauched and edifying.10 On a fundamental level, both Italy and China acted as points of reference for British cultural identity as it developed in the eighteenth century.11 Chineseness as an attractive paradox Books about China and all things Chinese began to be published in Britain in increasing numbers from the mid-seventeenth century onwards. Translations of works by the Jesuits, such as Martino Martini’s Bellum Tartaricum, or the Conquest of the Great and Most Renowned Empire of China, by the Invasion of the Tartars, published in London in 1654,12 and Alvarez Semedo’s The History of that Great and Renowned Monarchy of China, published in London in 1655,13 answered the need for information about China and helped to disseminate a positive view of the Chinese as civilised and virtuous. A less ideologically motivated but nevertheless positive perspective was provided by the translation of Johan Nieuhof’s travel journal An Embassy … to the Grand Tartar Cham Emperour of China, first published in Amsterdam in 1665 and quickly translated into several other languages, including an English edition in 1669.14 Nieuhof’s Embassy documented a trade mission of the Dutch East India Company that visited the Chinese imperial court in 1656, describing the sights and points of interest along the route taken by the Dutch party from the coast to the capital. The success of this book prompted its British publisher, John Ogilby, to bring out further publications on East Asia: Atlas Japannensis, an English translation of the book by Arnoldus Montanus documenting a trade mission of the Dutch East India Company to the Japanese court, published in 1670;15 and Atlas Chinensis, an English translation of Olfert Dapper’s account of other Dutch missions to China combined with parts of Semedo’s History, published in 1671.16 The numerous illustrations in these books were an important factor in their success, heightening the readers’ sense of vicarious travel. Ironically, the imagery itself had ‘travelled’ a considerable distance, from the original perception of the Chinese sites and scenes by the European visitors, via the

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sketches they then made either in situ or subsequently from memory, to the reinterpretations of those sketches by the artists and engravers working for the publishers. It is striking, for instance, to see Chinese figures depicted with European baroque body language. In spite of, or indeed because of these ‘translations’, the images had a significant impact on chinoiserie taste. Motifs from these books found their way onto Delft glazed earthenware, such as the pair of plaques preserved at Dyrham Park, Gloucestershire, depicting a banana plantain and a pineapple from Nieuhof’s Embassy (see Figure 3.1).17 The English silver pieces of the 1680s chased with baroque-style Chinese figures, such as the monteith or punch bowl at Erddig, Wrexham, were also inspired by this publishing phenomenon.18 All these books included admiring references to China’s long history, stable system of government and high standards of private and public virtue.

Figure 3.1  One of a pair of Delft glazed earthenware plaques showing a Chinese landscape with a pineapple plant and a banana plantain, late seventeenth century, copied from a plate in Johan Nieuhof, Embassy … to the … Emperor of China, at Dyrham Park, Gloucestershire, an example of the influence of this book on the decorative arts



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As  David  Porter has demonstrated, this made China appear as an exemplar to European scholars looking for continuity and legitimacy in a fast-changing world.19 One example of this projection of European intellectual concerns onto China was John Webb’s Historical Essay Endeavouring a Probability that the Language of the Empire of China is the Primitive Language, published in 1669. Webb claimed that Chinese was a version of the original language of the Biblical Adam and Eve, preserved because the Chinese had escaped the subsequent confusion of tongues at Babel. One of the aims of Webb’s book was to persuade King Charles II to emulate the virtuous philosopher-emperors of China:20 clearly a tall order, in view of the king’s ingrained habits of public evasiveness and private hedonism. When the king’s powerful secretary of state for Scotland, John Maitland, 1st Duke of Lauderdale, and his wife Elizabeth Murray remodelled their suburban seat Ham House in Richmond upon Thames in the 1670s, they chose an opulent mixture of Asian, continental and British furniture and furnishings. The whole gamut of orientalism was deployed, from Asian objects, via AsianEuropean hybrids, to European objects in Asian styles. The hybridising was radical: Chinese porcelain was ‘captured’ with European silver-gilt mounts,21 incised Chinese lacquer was cut and rearranged to fit cabinets22 and mirror frames,23 and a Javanese or Tonkinese lacquer table, deemed too low for contemporary custom, was raised on a European base.24 The glamour of Asian objects was clearly very desirable, even as their physical and cultural integrity was completely disregarded. Among the European items imitating Asian lacquer at Ham is an apparently unique set of side chairs sporting inwardly curved legs and backs and displaying aprons, splats and toprails with serpentine, curling silhouettes.25 Like the illustrations in Nieuhof and in other contemporary books about China, these chairs convey Chineseness in a baroque language. In 1675 the playwright Elkanah Settle (1648–1724) produced the heroic tragedy The Conquest of China by the Tartars, inspired by the accounts of the fall of the Ming dynasty and the accession of the Manchu (or ‘Tartar’) Qing dynasty in 1644 by Martini and Nieuhof. Chi-ming Yang has demonstrated how this play provides useful insights into contemporary perceptions of China.26 Settle presents the Chinese in a negative as well as a positive light, as both feminine and effeminate: while the dissolute Ming dynasty is succumbing to the vigorous Manchu invaders, the courageous Chinese female warrior Amavanga comes forward to fight a duel with the Tartar prince Zungteus. Amavanga is killed, but then she miraculously returns from the dead and marries Zungteus. This marriage literally represents the best of both worlds, and mirrors the view widely held at the time (and promulgated by the Western books on China) that although the barbarian Manchus had conquered China, they were being civilised and ‘sinicised’ by their virtuous and cultured subjects.27 On the one hand, The Conquest of China transported the audience to a recent episode in China’s

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history, just as the various published travel journals and compendia had done; on the other hand, Settle presented Chinese figures as exemplars of universal vices and virtues, on a par with figures from classical mythology, history and literature. The diplomat and man of letters Sir William Temple (1628–1699) echoed this fascination with China as an exemplary nation in his essay Of Heroic Virtue, published in 1690, where he records that ‘Honour and respect is nowhere paid to nobility and riches so much as it is here to virtue and learning’.28 He also notes that ‘under the present Tartar kings, the government continues still the same and in the hands of the Chinese learned’.29 In another essay published in the same volume, Upon the Gardens of Epicurus, Temple praises the enticing yet artful naturalness of Chinese gardens, stating that ‘their greatest reach of imagination is employed in contriving figures, where the beauty shall be great, and strike the eye, but without any order or disposition of parts that shall be commonly or easily observed … And whoever observes the work upon the best India gowns, or the painting upon their best screens or porcelains, will find their beauty is all of this kind without order.’30 Here Temple was defining China as an attractive paradox: a civilisation that combined revolution with continuity, femininity with masculinity, power with wisdom, and moral virtues with beautiful objects. The rhetoric of lacquer and porcelain The material attractions of China were highlighted in a 1692 opera produced by Elkanah Settle entitled The Fairy Queen, celebrating the fifteenth wedding anniversary of King William III and Queen Mary II.31 It was based on William Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream, but was interspersed with masques or symbolic theatrical entertainments set to music by Henry Purcell. The final masque featured ‘a transparent prospect of a Chinese garden; the architecture, the trees, the plants, the fruit, the birds, the beasts quite different from what we have in this part of the world’. Then ‘six pedestals of China-work rise from under the stage, they support six large vases of porcelain, in which are six China-orange trees’, a reference to William III’s lineage as Prince of Orange. There was also a ‘grand dance’ of ‘twenty-four Chineses’. The splendour of China, in the form of its gardens, its architecture and its porcelain, was being used to glamorise the British monarchy. The vases that played a starring role in The Fairy Queen were probably painted wooden props, but they were indicative of the strong taste for East Asian porcelain in Britain at this time. The technology for producing hard-paste porcelain was not yet available in Europe, and the lustrous beauty of this material reinforced the reputation of China as an advanced civilisation. Moreover, the images of Chinese people and landscapes depicted on the ­porcelain echoed



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and validated the illustrations in the European books on China. Groups of large Chinese blue and white vases dating from the late seventeenth century can still be found in the collections of various British palaces and country houses. Sometimes these vases still have the pedestals specially made for them – again reminiscent of those in Settle’s opera – as for instance at Petworth, West Sussex. The Petworth vases were probably acquired by Lady Elizabeth Percy, Duchess of Somerset (1667–1722), and are thought to have originally been in the duchess’s apartment, which included a China closet containing forty-five pieces of porcelain. Two ‘India Cabinets’ – probably referring to Asian lacquer cabinets – in the King of Spain’s Drawing Room at Petworth were each surmounted by twenty-two pieces of china.32 The juxtaposition of lacquer and porcelain was both visually and metaphorically powerful: both materials shimmered glamorously in the candlelight and firelight, they were both redolent of the virtue and history of China, and used en masse they conveyed a sense of abundance and wealth. The duchess shared her enthusiasm for lacquer and porcelain with Queen Mary II, who in turn may have been influenced by the tradition in her husband’s family – the house of Orange – of collecting Asian objects. It seems to have been around this time that porcelain and the collecting of it became associated with women: both positively, as a type of splendour appropriate to a lady’s apartment, and negatively, as a frivolous extravagance. The playwright William Burnaby (1676–1706) satirised the fashionable taste for things Chinese in his 1701 comedy The Ladies Visiting-Day, in which it is said of the protagonist, Lady Lovetoy, that ‘All her delight is in foreign Impertinencies, Her Rooms are Japan, and her dress Indian’. Daniel Defoe, writing in the early 1720s, pointedly attributed this ‘injurious’ female taste for porcelain to Mary II.33 In 1688 John Stalker and George Parker published A Treatise of Japanning and Varnishing, a practical manual on how to decorate objects in imitation of Asian lacquers using European paints and varnishes. The text makes it clear that this book was aimed at both the professional ‘japanner’ and the gentleman or lady amateur. The authors provide recipes for black, white, blue, red, ‘chestnut colour’ and ‘olive colour’ japanning, as well as instructions on how to imitate ‘Bantam-work’ or incised lacquer. The book includes plates with examples of the kinds of motif that were considered appropriate for ‘oriental’ decoration, including birds, insects, flowers, human figures and architecture. Some of the pictures are vaguely in the style of Nieuhof and similar illustrated books, while others appear to have been copied from the type of Asian ceramics seen at Petworth. In this way both genuine Asian objects and European books about Asia were influencing the taste that would later be called chinoiserie. Although it is difficult to know how much this book was actually used as a practical manual, its very existence seems to suggest that the market for imitation lacquer products was well developed at this time. The authors ­breezily

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assert that well-made imitation lacquer objects are almost indistinguishable from the real thing.34 This appears to jar with the careless sketchiness of the illustrations, which have very little pretence of verisimilitude. But authenticity was not really a priority: Asia – including ‘China’, ‘India’ and ‘Japan’ – was being defined by the commercial rhetoric of the market and the social rhetoric of fashion. The buildings and fences seen on some of the Petworth jars also appear on a smaller jar at Belton House, Lincolnshire, which was combined with several other Asian vessels to form a towering composite vase.35 This is another instance of the baroque tendency to appropriate and amalgamate Asian objects, and was probably created in the 1680s or 1690s as Sir John Brownlow, 3rd Baronet (1659–1697), and his wife, Alice Sherard (1659–1721), were remodelling and redecorating Belton. Among the new furnishings was a pair of tapestries depicting ‘Indian figures’, commissioned from the London weaver John Vanderbank the elder in 1691 (see Figure 3.2).36 Sir John and Lady Brownlow

Figure 3.2  One of two tapestries by John Vanderbank the elder, 1691, at Belton House, Lincolnshire. The imagery in these tapestries was inspired by the plates in Arnoldus Montanus, Atlas Japannensis (1670)



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stipulated that the tapestries had to be identical in design to those recently supplied to the queen at Kensington Palace – another example of the influence of Mary II’s taste. The ‘Indian’ motifs were inspired by some of the illustrations in Montanus’s Atlas Japannensis, and their arrangement on a dark background was clearly meant to evoke the appearance of Asian lacquer. Indeed, the emergence of these tapestries in the 1690s appears to have been inspired by the practice, pioneered by William III’s grandmother Amalia van Solms (1602–1675), of using genuine Asian lacquer to decorate the walls of small rooms. Mary created such a cabinet room, panelled with incised Chinese lacquer, at Huis Honselaarsdijk, near The Hague, in 1687, a year before she and her husband William acceded to the British throne, and she subsequently had another one assembled at Hampton Court. Similar lacquer rooms were constructed at Chatsworth, Derbyshire, in 1692, by William and Mary’s political ally William Cavendish, the 4th Earl (and subsequently 1st Duke) of Devonshire (1640–1707), and at Burghley House, Lincolnshire, in 1697, for the Duke of Devonshire’s sister Lady Anne Cavendish (c.1648–1703) and her husband John Cecil, 5th Earl of Exeter (1648–1700). 37 In cases like this a taste for oriental objects or orientalist decoration seems to have signified a family connection or a political allegiance. China and Italy in the English landscape garden Just as Asian porcelain and lacquer were being reshaped and reinterpreted by the taste, commerce and politics of baroque Europe, so Chinese philosophy was being repackaged by the Jesuit order in accordance with its specific beliefs and requirements. As Lionel M. Jensen has shown, the Jesuits effectively ‘manufactured’ Confucianism as a Chinese spiritual doctrine that was sufficiently close to their own and through which they could communicate their Christian message to the Chinese. They chose the philosophy of Kong Fuzi, a thinker and teacher who lived in the sixth and fifth centuries BCE, and presented themselves to the Chinese as modern-day followers of this ‘Master Kong’.38 For the benefit of their European audiences the Jesuits presented the Chinese as civilised, virtuous and latently Christian. In translating certain philosophical classics into European languages, moreover, they effectively created a new hybrid Sino-Christian canon.39 ‘Confucius’, the Latinised name of Kong Fuzi, became the symbol of this Sino-Christian school of thought.40 The book Confucius Sinarum philosophus (‘Confucius, Philosopher of the Chinese’), edited by the Jesuit Philippe Couplet and published in Paris in 1687, played an important role in making ‘Confucianism’ synonymous with China. This scholarly compendium was widely read, and its frontispiece fixed the figure of Confucius in the Western imagination as the quintessential benign sage.41 In carrying out their mission, the Jesuits were literally and figuratively travelling back and forth

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between two cultures, bringing a sinicised version of Christianity to China and a Confucianised version of China to Europe. The Jesuits’ religious and philosophical perspective on China was combined with the more material focus of the mercantile accounts in the book Description … de la Chine, edited by Jean-Baptiste du Halde, which was originally published in Paris in 1735 and translated into English the following year as The General Description of China.42 This was a compilation of the writings on China by seventeen Jesuit missionaries, together with translations of Chinese texts and a number of detailed maps. As with Nieuhof’s Embassy, the illustrations seem to have been key to making The General Description popular with a wide readership. The images, based on Chinese sources but reinterpreted by French artist Antoine Humblot (d. 1758), present China as an elegant and playful early rococo paradise. Moreover, the publication of the English translation in 1736 seems to have sparked the sudden popularity of Chinese-style pavilions in English gardens, the earliest of which were built at Grove House, Old Windsor (mid-1730s), Stowe, Buckinghamshire (by 1738), Woburn Abbey, Bedfordshire (about 1738), and Wroxton Abbey, Oxfordshire (c.1740).43 By 1749 this taste had  reached the royal family, as a two-storey ‘House of Confucius’ was constructed for Frederick, Prince of Wales (1707–1751), at his garden at Kew, Richmond upon Thames.44 The fact that an English royal garden pavilion should be named after a Chinese philosopher indicates the degree to which ideas and images from and about China were permeating British culture. A prime surviving example of this early phase of chinoiserie in English gardens is Shugborough, Staffordshire, where the cultivated bachelor Thomas Anson (1695–1773) created a remarkable landscape garden between the 1740s and the 1760s (see Figure 3.3). Anson’s great-grandfather had purchased the core of the Shugborough estate, but Thomas Anson consolidated and expanded the holdings and unified them into a designed landscape. He travelled to Italy in 1724–25 and collected Old Master paintings, antique sculpture and medals. The first of the garden pavilions he constructed at Shugborough, in about 1747, was a ‘Chinese House’, a small masonry pavilion in the Chinese style.45 It was said to be inspired by the buildings seen by his brother, Admiral George Anson (1697–1762), who visited China on two occasions during an extended naval expedition between 1741 and 1744. However, the small rectangular garden pavilion with its neatly upturned eaves, fretwork windows and rococo plasterwork is very similar to the pavilions at Stowe and Wroxton, and it seems more likely that, like them, it is inspired by the Europeanised Chinese imagery in Du Halde and Nieuhof. Thomas Anson is known to have read books about China, as two works by Jesuits bearing his bookplate are still in the library at Shugborough.46 The Chinese House was soon joined by two Chinese-style bridges, a Chinese boat and boathouse, and a small pagoda.47 At the same time Thomas Anson also constructed an artificial ruin nearby, allegedly constructed



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Figure 3.3  The landscape garden at Shugborough, Staffordshire, in a painting by Nicholas Dall. This garden, created by Thomas Anson between the 1740s and the 1760s, included a Chinese pagoda and other Chinese-style structures as well as classical garden pavilions and monuments

from the remains of an ancient episcopal manor house. At Shugborough ancient Britain was situated adjacent to distant China, literally and figuratively. In 1762 Thomas Anson inherited his brother George’s fortune, which enabled him to commission the architect James ‘Athenian’ Stuart to build several Grecian-style monuments at Shugborough. These comprised an Arch of Hadrian, a Tower of the Winds and a Choragic Monument of Lysicrates, all copies of buildings illustrated in James Stuart and Nicholas Revett’s The Antiquities of Athens, which had been published in 1762.48 But although the neo-classical element at Shugborough became stronger as time went on, the landscape garden remained a heterogenous ensemble. The paintings commissioned from Nicholas Dall (active 1748–76) represent the estate as a kind of visual discourse on the comparable merits of the ancient Greeks, Romans and Britons and the distant Chinese, framed by an agriculturally productive and picturesquely beautiful English landscape. The garden at Stourhead, now regarded as one of the quintessential English landscape gardens, was being developed at about the same time as the one at Shugborough, between the 1740s and the 1770s (see Chapter 2). Its creator was Henry Hoare II (1705–1785), the wealthy scion of a banking dynasty. Hoare went on the Grand Tour between 1738 and 1741,49 and collected paintings by artists such as Nicolas Poussin (1594–1665), Claude Lorrain (1604–1682), Carlo Maratta (1625–1713) and Gaspard Dughet (1615–1675), some of which directly influenced his plans for the Stourhead landscape.50 He also read widely

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in the classics, and much of the thematic structure for the garden, laid out as an allegorical journey around a lake, was inspired by Virgil’s Aeneid.51 As John Harrison describes in Chapter 2 above, the most prominent buildings and structures in the garden at Stourhead, mostly designed by the architect Henry Flitcroft (1697–1769), were Palladian or neo-classical, such as the Temple of Flora (1744–46), the Pantheon (1753–54), the stone three-arch Palladian Bridge (c.1762) and the Temple of Apollo (1765). But others were gothic or rustic, such as the small thatched Convent (probably 1760s) and Alfred’s Tower (completed 1772), which celebrated the ninth-century Saxon King Alfred, seen as one of the founders of the British nation. There were also some Chinese elements in this most classical of English gardens: a Chinese Alcove was situated halfway up the wooded slope on the eastern side of the lake,52 and a circular covered seat called the Chinese Umbrella was built in an elevated location near the entrance to the garden, with views of the Temple of Apollo, the stone Palladian Bridge and the Pantheon.53 A single-arch wooden bridge constructed across the northern arm of the lake was also called Chinese in some of the contemporary descriptions.54 Like the stone bridge, it was actually based on the designs of Palladio, but the very fact that this confusion could arise shows how pervasive the awareness of China was at the time. Once again the English landscape was seen as being p ­ resided over not just by Virgil, Claude and Palladio, but also by King Alfred and Confucius. There is a Chinese painting on glass in the Hoare collection depicting figures in a garden with a lake behind (see Figure 3.4),55 apparently of mid-eighteenth-century date, which is curiously reminiscent of the works of the above-mentioned European painters, and even of the lake-centred layout of the Stourhead garden itself. Pictures like this one, as well as books like Du Halde’s General Description – of which there is an eighteenth-century copy in the house’s library56 – may have suggested the Chinese elements in the garden at Stourhead. China and Italy in the English interior The motif of the Chinese pavilion or pagoda, emblematic of everything China stood for, also migrated to furniture design, where it became a component of the decorative repertoire of the rococo style. A cabinet at Uppark, West Sussex, has several miniature carved wooden Chinese pavilions arranged on its top, a place where previous generations might have displayed a group of Asian porcelains (see Figure 3.5).57 The maker of the cabinet is unknown, but parts of it are reminiscent of designs in Thomas Chippendale’s Gentleman and Cabinetmaker’s Director (1754) and John Mayhew and William Ince’s Universal System of Household Furniture (1762),58 books which were contributing to the increasing domestication of the Chinese style in Britain. But this cabinet is



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Figure 3.4  A Chinese painting on glass depicting figures in a garden on the banks of a lake, from the Hoare collection at Stourhead, Wiltshire, currently on display at Dyrham Park, Gloucestershire. In the mid-eighteenth century such Chinese images intermingled with Grand Tour paintings in English interiors. Similarly, the landscape garden at Stourhead combined classical, gothic and Chinese structures

relatively unusual in that it incorporates not only panels of imitation Chinese lacquer, but also ivory portrait medallions after the antique and Florentine pietra dura panels, a striking conflation in a single object of Grand Tour and chinoiserie taste. The owners of Uppark, Sir Matthew Fetherstonhaugh, 1st Baronet (1714– 1774), and his wife Sarah Lethieullier (1722–1788), embodied both the contrasts and the parallels between chinoiserie and the Grand Tour. Sir Matthew, whose inherited wealth came from the trade in coal and wine, held shares in the East India Company and invested in ships plying the East India trade. When he and his wife travelled to Italy between 1749 and 1751, however, it was on a typical Grand Tour, for the purpose of pleasure and edification. They purchased portraits by Pompeo Batoni (1708–1787), seascapes and landscapes by Claude-Joseph Vernet (1714–1789), copies after Venetian vedute by Canaletto (1697–1768) and scagliola table-tops by Don Pietro Belloni (active in the mid-eighteenth century). On their return these and other acquisitions were incorporated into the interiors of Uppark and of Fetherstonhaugh House, Whitehall, which were both being remodelled in rococo style by the architect James Paine the elder (1717–1789).59 But as the hybrid Sino-Italian cabinet

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Figure 3.5  English cabinet, c.1755–60, at Uppark, West Sussex. This object epitomises the meeting of Grand Tour and chinoiserie taste in that it includes miniature pagodas and imitation Chinese lacquer panels as well as portrait medallions after the antique and pietra dura panels

shows, Grand Tour taste was perfectly compatible with rococo chinoiserie. Indeed, the room in which it is displayed today, and for which it may have been originally commissioned, the Little Parlour, was also decorated with a Chinese bird-and-flower wallpaper between about 1750 and about 1770.60 This was Lady Fetherstonhaugh’s personal sitting room, indicative of the increasing association of female areas of a house with the Chinese style.



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It may well have been James Paine who supplied the Chinese wallpaper to the Fetherstonhaughs at Uppark, because he is known to have provided exactly the same Chinese wallpaper to William Windham II (1717–1761), squire of Felbrigg Hall, Norfolk, in 1751.61 Windham inherited the Felbrigg estate in 1749 and immediately started to update and remodel the house, with Paine as his architect. He had been on an extended Grand Tour between 1738 and 1742, and that experience clearly informed the look of the new interiors at Felbrigg. The sitting room called the Cabinet has been described as the epitome of an English Grand Tour interior. It survives today virtually as Windham composed it, the walls dominated by a collection of pictures by Giovanni Battista Busiri (1698–1757) of Rome and the Campagna, in gilded rococo frames.62 The Library, created to house the books Windham had inherited as well as those he had bought on the Continent, was fitted with bookcases in the gothic style, supplied by Paine and finished by the joiner George Church.63 As was already seen in the discussion of the gardens at Shugborough and Stourhead, the classical and the gothic styles were regarded as entirely complementary. The Chinese wallpaper supplied by Paine was hung in what was then called the Bow Window Dressing Room, similar to the Little Parlour at Uppark in being a private sitting room. Windham expressed considerable annoyance at having to pay for the travelling expenses of a London paper hanger, John Scruton,64 but the surviving wallpaper shows the extensive and delicate work required to integrate the separate sheets of bird-and-flower imagery and to make the paper fit the dimensions of the walls, something which presumably only certain specialists were able to do. While slightly less brutal than the breaking up of lacquer screens and coffers in the seventeenth century, this ‘cutting and pasting’ of the wallpaper still constitutes a fairly radical adaptation of Chinese material culture to an English setting. In a 1771 inventory of Felbrigg Hall the contents of the Bow Window Dressing Room included six mahogany ‘Chinese’ armchairs with fretwork backs and armrests, some of which are still in this room. There was also a firescreen decorated with ‘India paper’, probably referring to a Chinese painting or print.65 This does not survive, but examples of pole-screens with Chinese pictures are known from other historic houses of the period and from illustrations in Chippendale’s Gentleman and Cabinetmaker’s Director.66 The inventory further lists a ‘very fine India cabinet, brown and gilt’, which appears to refer to the late seventeenth-century Japanese lacquer cabinet decorated with herons against a background of transparent lacquer now in the Cabinet.67 It may have come to Felbrigg in the time of Windham’s grandfather, William Windham I (1647–1689), who built the west front of the house in the 1680s. By now some Chinese objects had become heirlooms, connected not just to the ancient civilisation of China, but also to specific British places and family histories.

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Italy and China came even closer at Nostell Priory, West Yorkshire, when Sir Rowland Winn, 5th Baronet (1739–1785), employed the architect Robert Adam (1728–1792), the painter Antonio Zucchi (1726–1796) and the ­cabinet-maker Thomas Chippendale (1718–1779) to remodel the interiors from the mid-1760s to the mid-1780s. Adam deployed the neo-classical style which he had developed following his sojourn studying architecture in Rome during the second half of the 1750s. He also invited Zucchi, whom he had met in Italy, to come to England, and the artist produced numerous decorative works for the state rooms at Nostell. Thomas Chippendale, in turn, supplied Winn with furniture, textiles and wallpapers for Nostell.68 Between 1769 and 1771 Chippendale’s workshop created a large suite of chinoiserie furniture, decorated in green and gold imitation lacquer and combining Chinese, rococo and neo-classical elements, for the State Bedroom and State Dressing Room.69 The Chinese painted bird-andflower wallpaper in these rooms, also provided by Chippendale, has somewhat darkened over time, but originally its cream background and green foliage would have been in complete harmony with the painted and gilded furniture and the Chinese cotton upholstery painted with floral designs. This kind of imitation lacquer furniture was part of the decorative tradition going back to the 1670s chairs at Ham discussed above, but Chippendale achieved a particularly imaginative and subtle integration of the Chinese and Western elements, and of the individual pieces of furniture and the room as a whole. At times the neo-classical and Chinese elements in the furniture are virtually indistinguishable, representing the complete absorption of the Chinese style into a cosmopolitan British style. Moreover, as Stacey Sloboda has pointed out, the chinoiserie furniture and the Chinese wallpaper in these rooms were deliberately combined with rococo and neo-classical fireplaces and with an overmantel painting by Joseph Nicholls (active 1738–51) depicting a quintessential Grand Tour subject, the Canale di Cannaregio in Venice.70 Authenticity and picturesqueness in the representation of China The appropriation of Chineseness into Britishness took a more scholarly, art-historical turn with the publication of Sir William Chambers’s Designs of Chinese Buildings in 1757. Chambers explicitly stated that the aim of the book was to document genuine Chinese architecture and to correct the wilder excesses of pseudo-Chinese decoration in the West.71 The author had the advantage of having travelled to China himself, in the employment of the Swedish East India Company, before training as an architect. But Designs of Chinese Buildings also derives its serious tone and scope from the works on classical archaeology and architecture being published in the middle of the eighteenth century, such as Giovanni Battista Piranesi’s Antichità romane (1748), the



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Comte de Caylus’s Recueil d’antiquités égyptiennes, étrusques, grecques et romaines (from 1752), Johann Joachim Winckelmann’s Gedanken über die Nachamung der griechischen Werke in der Malerey und Bildhauerkunst (1755) and Robert Wood’s The Ruins of Palmyra (1753) and The Ruins of Balbec (1757).72 It is no coincidence that Chambers’s representation of authentic Chinese architecture was contemporary with Robert Adam’s first attempts to define a more historically correct classical architectural and decorative style. Significantly, plate 12 of Designs of Chinese Buildings depicts Chinese pillars and roof bracketing structures, complete with measurements, echoing the rigorous methodology of the above-mentioned books and implying an equivalence between Chinese architecture and the established European classical orders. The illustrations also include elevations and plans of various Chinese buildings and interiors as well as images of Chinese furniture. Although Designs of Chinese Buildings was published too late to have any traceable influence on the Chinese structures at Shugborough and Stourhead, it did become the default style guide for chinoiserie garden pavilions and interiors during the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries.73 In retrospect it is clear that Designs of Chinese Buildings is not entirely free from chinoiserie fantasy. Like Adam’s neo-­classicism, Chambers’s Chinese style is still a kind of rhetoric, meant to persuade and please the British public. Chambers was commissioned by Augusta, Dowager Princess of Wales (1719–1772), to remodel the landscape garden of her estate at Kew, Surrey. The result was documented in Plans, Elevations, Sections and Perspective Views of the Gardens and Buildings at Kew, published in 1763.74 The pavilions were arranged around a central meadow, in full or partial view of each other, like a landscape-sized collector’s cabinet or encyclopaedia. A masonry pagoda, a modified version of the one illustrated in Designs of Chinese Buildings, dominated (and still dominates) the garden by its size and central position, but it was joined by classical, gothic, Moorish and Mughal structures. Rather than expressing an imperialist ideology, as has been proposed,75 I would suggest that Kew reflects the cosmopolitan outlook also seen at Shugborough and Stourhead, welcoming foreign styles as potential additions to Britishness. The artist William Alexander (1767–1816) produced a large and influential body of pictures about China at the end of the eighteenth century and the beginning of the nineteenth. Like William Chambers, Alexander travelled to China himself, as an official artist attached to the diplomatic mission led by George, Earl Macartney (1737–1806), which visited the Qianlong Emperor in 1793. Although the main aim of the embassy – to persuade the emperor to lessen the restrictions on British merchants and to further open the country to British trade – was not achieved, it did provide the British public with more information and imagery about China. During the journey Alexander produced a large number of sketches of scenery, buildings, people and artefacts. Some of those

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were subsequently worked up and reproduced in Sir George Staunton’s official record of the mission, Authentic Account of an Embassy from the King of Great Britain to the Emperor of China, published in 1797, and in two books by Sir John Barrow, Travels in China (1804) and Voyage to Cochin China (1806). Alexander then brought out two illustrated books of his own, The Costume of China (1805) and Picturesque Representations of the Dress and Manners of the Chinese (1814).76 The word ‘picturesque’ in the title of Alexander’s second book is telling, as much of the popularity of his images must have been due to their appealing combination of vivid detail and dramatic composition. Frances Wood has demonstrated how Alexander created his finished works by combining different motifs from separate sketches, thereby sometimes changing the significance of the scene.77 The images are realistic to a degree, but are also aestheticised and exoticised. In this way Alexander was bringing China closer to the British public by presenting it in a familiar pictorial language, while also rendering it more distant by emphasising its strangeness. However, this paradoxical quality was not limited to Alexander, or indeed to chinoiserie: much of the iconography of the Grand Tour conveys a similar mixture of realistic documentation and idealised beauty. The designer Frederick Crace (1779–1859) exploited the picturesqueness of Alexander’s images to the full at the Royal Pavilion, the private retreat of George, Prince of Wales (later King George IV, 1762–1830), in Brighton. The prince worked closely with the architect John Nash and the Crace firm to create a series of opulent and vivid chinoiserie interiors. When a large Music Room was added in 1817–18 its walls were decorated with scenes from Alexander’s Costume of China by the artist Henry Lambelet (1781–1860).78 In being transferred to the walls of the Music Room, Alexander’s images were even further amalgamated and their colours simplified to a rich but other-worldly scheme of gold on red (see Figure 3.6). Revealingly, the prince regent was using the most up-to-date visual sources on China to create a fantasy vision of China that looked back to the imitation lacquer of the rococo or even the baroque. Conclusion As Eugenia Zuroski Jenkins has asserted, both the British importation of Asian goods and their appreciation were ways of objectifying the world, assessing the products of widely different cultures by using certain universal principles of morality and taste.79 In the cosmopolitan world-view of the eighteenth century a European object could be Chinese simply by conforming to the accepted visual language of Chineseness. Conversely, things Chinese could coexist with things British and things classical, as they all shared the same objectified rhetoric. In this sense chinoiserie and the Grand Tour were parallel systems of knowledge, allowing the British to understand the world through its objects.



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Figure 3.6  A section of the mural paintings in the Music Room at the Royal Pavilion, Brighton, created in 1817–18 by Henry Lambelet. This particular vignette is derived from William Alexander’s print of the south gate of the city of Ting-Hai, first published in 1798, but Lambelet has re-exoticised it by using a red and gold colour scheme reminiscent of lacquer

As I have endeavoured to show, illustrated books on China played a vital role in creating an objective image that could be consumed and reproduced in Britain, as did books on Italy and ancient Rome and Greece. Images of China and objects from China both enabled virtual modes of travel, transporting the British reader to a distant realm that was both sensuously enticing and culturally sophisticated. The taste for things Chinese, like that for the Grand Tour, included an element of perceived virtue that made it attractive to the British public over and above the obvious material and visual qualities of the objects themselves. This conception of ‘China’ as a system of knowledge, pleasure and aspiration was expressed, rehearsed and refined in British country house interiors and gardens. I would argue that it was precisely because of the multi-­referential and at times paradoxical nature of both the Grand Tour and ­chinoiserie that they were able to coexist and thrive in Britain, contributing to a cosmopolitan conception of Britishness. Notes

I am grateful to Dr Helen Clifford, Katie Knowles, Dr Alexandra Loske, Dr Gabriella de la Rosa and Professor Jon Stobart for commenting on drafts of the text.

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 1 For a brief but incisive survey of the phenomenon of the Grand Tour, see J. Ingamells, ‘Discovering Italy: British Travellers in the Eighteenth Century’, in A. Wilton and I. Bignamini (eds), Grand Tour: The Lure of Italy in the Eighteenth Century (London: Tate Gallery, 1996), pp. 21–30.  2 D. Porter, Ideographia: The Chinese Cipher in Early Modern Europe (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2001); Y. Liu, Seeds of a Different Eden: Chinese Gardening Ideas and a New English Aesthetic Ideal (Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 2008); C. Yang, Performing China: Virtue, Commerce and Orientalism in Eighteenth-Century England, 1660–1760 (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2011); E. Zuroski Jenkins, A Taste for China: English Subjectivity and the Prehistory of Orientalism (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2013); and S. Sloboda, Chinoiserie: Commerce and Critical Ornament in Eighteenth-Century Britain (Manchester and New York: Manchester University Press, 2014).  3 I. Bignamini, ‘Grand Tour: Open Issues’, in Wilton and Bignamini (eds), Grand Tour, pp. 31–6, at p. 32.  4 For a discussion on how the scope of the Grand Tour narrowed as it developed over time, see F. Haskell, ‘Introduction’, in Wilton and Bignamini (eds), Grand Tour, pp. 10–12.  5 L. M. Jensen, Manufacturing Confucianism: Chinese Traditions and Universal Civilization (Durham, NC, and London: Duke University Press, 1997), especially chapter 2, pp. 77–133.  6 E. Chaney, ‘The Grand Tour and the Evolution of the Travel Book’, in Wilton and Bignamini (eds), Grand Tour, pp. 95–7, at p. 96.  7 A. Wilton, ‘Dreaming of Italy’, in Wilton and Bignamini (eds), Grand Tour, pp. 39–40.  8 Porter, Ideographia, chapters 1 (pp. 15–77) and 2 (pp. 78–132) respectively.  9 Yang, Performing China, p. 25. 10 C. de Seta, ‘Grand Tour: The Lure of Italy in the Eighteenth Century’, in Wilton and Bignamini (eds), Grand Tour, pp. 13–19, at pp. 15–16. 11 Zuroski Jenkins, A Taste for China, p. 22. 12 Originally published in Antwerp earlier in the same year. 13 First published in Portuguese in 1641. 14 M. Reed and P. Demattè, China on Paper: European and Chinese Works from the Late Sixteenth to the Early Nineteenth Century (Los Angeles: Getty Research Institute, 2007), cat. no. 2, p. 142. 15 Originally published in Dutch in 1669. 16 Originally published in Dutch in 1670; Reed and Demattè, China on Paper, cat. no. 4, p. 146. On the influence of Semedo on Dapper, see D. Carr, ‘Chinoiserie in the Colonial Americas’, in D. Carr (ed.), Made in the Americas: the New World Discovers Asia (Boston: Museum of Fine Arts, 2015), pp. 111–31, at p. 113. 17 National Trust inv. nos (hereafter NT) 452247 and NT 452248. 18 The monteith (NT 1151486) has a maker’s mark ‘IA’, for John Austin, London, 1689, and was decorated by Andrew Raven. For the use on silver of images from Nieuhof’s Embassy and Dapper’s Atlas Chinensis see J. Lomax, ‘Chinoiserie Silver in Britain’, in D. Beevers (ed.), Chinese Whispers: Chinoiserie in Britain 1650–1930 (Brighton: Royal Pavilion and Museums, 2008), pp. 39–54, at pp. 40–3.



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19 Porter, Ideographia, pp. 15–77. 20 W. W. Davis, ‘China, the Confucian Ideal, and the European Age of Enlightenment’, Journal of the History of Ideas, 44:4 (October–December 1983), pp. 523–48, at p. 537. 21 As in the white Zhangzhou teapot with European silver-gilt mounts in the Duchess’s Private Closet at Ham, NT 1139006. 22 As in the cabinet in the Queen’s Anteroom at Ham, veneered with sections of an incised lacquer panel, NT 1140111. 23 As in the cushion-framed mirror in the Withdrawing Room at Ham, veneered with fragments of incised lacquer, NT 1139863. 24 In the Duchess’s Private Closet at Ham, NT 1139863. 25 In the Duchess’s Private Closet and the Queen’s Antechamber at Ham, NT 1139867.1–8. 26 Yang, Performing China, pp. 32–74. 27 Ibid., pp. 50–1. 28 S. H. Monk (ed.), Five Miscellaneous Essays by Sir William Temple (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1963), p. 121. 29 Ibid., p. 123. 30 Ibid., p. 30. 31 For a discussion of the staging and symbolism of this opera see F. Muller and J.  Muller, ‘Completing the Picture: The Importance of Reconstructing Early Opera’, Early Music, 33:4 (November 2005), pp. 667–82. 32 C. Rowell, Petworth: The People and the Place (Swindon: National Trust, 2012), p. 43. 33 D. Defoe, A Tour through the Whole Island of Great Britain first published 1724–27), abridged and ed. P. N. Furbank, W. R. Owens and A. J. Coulson (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1991), p. 65; quoted in Yang, Performing China, p. 3. 34 ‘… if done by able Hands, it may come so near the true Japan, in fineness of Black, and neatness of Draught, that no one but an Artist should be able to distinguish ’em.’ J. Stalker and G. Parker, A Treatise of Japanning and Varnishing (Oxford, 1688; republished Reading: Alec Tiranti, 1998), p. xii (‘The Epistle to the Reader and Practitioner’). 35 NT 433562. 36 NT 436999 (catalogue note by Helen Wyld). 37 D. O. Kisluk-Grosheide, ‘The (Ab)Use of Export Lacquer in Europe’, in M.  Kühlenthal (ed.), Ostasiatische und europäische Lacktechniken, Arbeitshefte des Bayerischen Landesamtes für Denkmalpflege, 112 (Munich: Bayerisches Landesamt and Edition Lipp, 2000), pp. 27–42, at p. 29 and p. 33. 38 Jensen, Manufacturing Confucianism, pp. 48–59. 39 Ibid., pp. 59–63. 40 Ibid., pp. 79–96. 41 Reed and Demattè, China on Paper, cat. no. 17, pp. 172–3. 42 Ibid., cat. no. 8, p. 154. 43 E. de Bruijn, ‘Found in Translation: The Chinese House at Stowe’, Apollo, 165:544 (June 2007), pp. 52–9, at p. 53. 44 R. Desmond, Kew: The History of the Royal Botanic Gardens (London: Harvill Press, 1995), p. 28.

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45 J. M. Robinson, Shugborough (London: National Trust, 1996), pp. 18–21. 46 N. Trigault, Regni Chinensis descriptio (Leiden: Elzevier, 1639), NT 3201326; and L. le Comte, Memoirs … of China (London, 1697), NT 3215571. 47 Of these structures only the Chinese House survives today. 48 Robinson, Shugborough, pp. 22–7. 49 K. Woodbridge, The Stourhead Landscape (London: National Trust, 1982, reprinted 2002), p. 12. 50 A. Laing, Stourhead: Illustrated List of Pictures and Sculpture (Swindon: National Trust, 2010), www.nationaltrust.org.uk/documents/stourhead---illustrated-listof-paintings-and-sculptures.pdf (accessed 13 May 2016), p. 1. 51 Woodbridge, The Stourhead Landscape, p. 19. 52 Ibid., pp. 44–5, marked as ‘D’ on the 1779 map by F. M. Piper. 53 Ibid., p. 23 (illustrated in a sketch by F. M. Piper, 1779). 54 Ibid., pp. 44–5, marked as ‘K’ on the 1779 map by F. M. Piper; see also p. 55–8. 55 NT 452429, currently on display at Dyrham Park, Gloucestershire. 56 NT 3083432. 57 NT 137638. 58 C. Rowell, Uppark (London: National Trust, 1995, reprinted 2004), p. 57. 59 Ibid., pp. 17–24. 60 Ibid., pp. 55–7. 61 J. Maddison, Felbrigg Hall (London: National Trust, 1995, reprinted 2003), p. 75. 62 Ibid., p. 57. 63 Ibid., pp. 66–9. 64 Ibid., p. 75. 65 Ibid., p. 74. 66 For instance a pole-screen at Osterley Park, west London, decorated with painted Chinese silk, NT 771815; a pole-screen at Peckover House, Wisbech, decorated with a Chinese painting on paper, NT 782302; see also plates 124 and 125 in the 1754 edition of Chippendale’s Gentleman and Cabinetmaker’s Director, showing various fire-screens decorated with Chinese pictures. 67 NT 1398387. 68 T. Knox and S. Raikes, Nostell Priory (Swindon: National Trust, 2001, reprinted 2012), pp. 54–6. 69 Ibid., pp. 18–20. 70 NT 960072. Sloboda, Chinoiserie, pp. 82–4. 71 Reed and Demattè, China on Paper, cat. no. 33, p. 210. 72 J. Summerson, The Architecture of the Eighteenth Century (London and New York: Thames and Hudson, 1986, reprinted 1996), pp. 76–7. 73 Sir Matthew Fetherstonhaugh is mentioned in the list of subscribers, but there is no evidence of any garden features at Uppark having been influenced by the book. 74 Reed and Demattè, China on Paper, cat. no. 34, pp. 212–13. 75 Sloboda, Chinoiserie, pp. 185–7. 76 Reed and Demattè, China on Paper, p. 22–3; cat. no. 9, pp. 156–7; cat. no. 10, pp. 158–9; cat. nos 12 and 13, pp. 162–3.



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77 F. Wood, ‘Closely Observed China: From William Alexander’s Sketches to his Published Work’, British Library Journal, 24 (1998), pp. 98–121. 78 The murals appear to have been designed in December 1817 and painted in January 1818: see Royal Pavilion archives, Brighton, Grace Ledger, entries for 1818. I am grateful to Dr Alexandra Loske for this reference. See also J. Morley, The Making of the Royal Pavilion, Brighton: Designs and Drawings (London: Philip Wilson Publishers, 1984, reprinted 2003), pp. 202–5. 79 Zuroski Jenkins, A Taste for China, p. 30.

Gentlemen tourists: Hanbury and Scattergood

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Gentlemen tourists in the early eighteenth century: the travel journals of William Hanbury and John Scattergood Rosie MacArthur

On Thursday 15 October 1724 William Hanbury set out from Oxford, ‘intending to view ye whole county of wilts & whatsoever therein could excite ye curiosity of an inquisitive traveller’.1 Over approximately six weeks Hanbury travelled through Wiltshire and then on to Somerset, through Wales, up to Cheshire and back through Staffordshire. At twenty years old, this was not Hanbury’s first tour, but was his best documented, with observations and accounts recorded in a journal titled ‘Britannia’. This is largely in note form, perhaps written on the spot or at inns in the evenings. Hanbury later wrote up this journal and other tours into a series of letters to another traveller, an acquaintance named John Scattergood. He was the son of the clergyman and scholar Anthony Scattergood from the village of Winwick, approximately twelve miles from Hanbury’s family seat in Northamptonshire.2 These letters are contained in a bound volume alongside copies of letters sent to Hanbury by Scattergood. Scattergood’s letters tell us that he had been travelling with Hanbury’s father Thomas in the Septembers of 1718 and 1719, through Nottingham and York and to Scotland and Wales. On these travels the men would stay in historic market and spa towns, visit medieval cathedrals, examine ancient monuments and explore natural wonders of the landscape. They would also spend a great deal of time as knowledgeable and curious visitors to country houses across Britain. Hanbury was a wealthy man and, as an eldest son, had inherited the Kelmarsh estate in Northamptonshire when his father died in January 1722. By then the estate had been in the Hanbury family for over a hundred years, having been bought by William’s great-great-grandfather Sir John Hanbury, who had made his money in the wool trade in London after moving there as an apprentice from Worcestershire. Hanbury’s father, a successful barrister, Baron of the Exchequer, King’s Sergeant and assize court judge, had vastly increased the family’s fortunes. William Hanbury had begun travelling in 1720 aged sixteen



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(probably accompanied by his father), and had matriculated at Trinity College, Oxford, in 1721. He would later attempt to enter politics, standing (unsuccessfully) as the Whig candidate for Northamptonshire in 1730 and 1748.3 His letters reveal that Hanbury was primarily an antiquarian and used his travels combined with his reading to piece together the past and situate events in their geographical locations. However, he was also fascinated, like Defoe, to observe new manufacturing works and technological processes that he encountered. Hanbury would go on to join both the Royal Society in 1727 and the Society of Antiquities in 1740. In the 1720s there were many Britons in Rome and Paris on the Grand Tour, which would become hugely popular among gentlemen towards the end of the century. Hanbury, however, was never to undertake a European tour (unlike his son who travelled to Italy in the 1770s). James Brome had also travelled in England, Scotland and Wales and published his journal of the tours in 1700. On the virtues of the nation’s wonders he wrote: as Italy has Virgil’s Grotto, and the Sybil’s Cave by Puteoli, so England hath Ochy Hole by Wells, and Pool’s by Buxton: We have Baiae at the Bath, the Alps in Wales, the Spaw in Yorkshire … the Pyramids at Stonehenge, Pearls of Persia in Cornwall, and Diamonds of India at St Vincent’s Rock.4

The tradition of travel writing in Briton had long been associated with antiquarian studies and local histories, from Antonius’s Itinerary in the third century CE to the topographical surveys of Camden and Leland in the mid-sixteenth century.5 Stevens had published his Magna Britannia in 1720, and Camden’s Britannia was being revised often, most recently in 1722. Like Hanbury, the antiquarian William Stukeley did not travel abroad, but published his observations from his summer tours of England in 1724 as Itinerarium curiosum, written as letters to friends.6 Increasingly in this period, travel writers were also becoming concerned with how the modern world looked and worked. Chamberlayne’s The Present State of England, an account of the social and political condition of the country, first appeared in 1669 and had been published in thirty-six editions by 1755.7 John Macky had published a work entitled A Journey through England, in Familiar Letters from a Gentleman Here, to his Friend Abroad in 1722, and in the early 1720s Defoe was writing up his tour which was to be published between 1724 and 1727.8 Celia Fiennes made notes on her travels through every county in England in the 1690s, observing the ‘good buildings, different produces and manufactures of each place, with the variety of sports and recreations they are adapt to’.9 These writers detail visits to country houses and the development of trade and industry in the country and were interested in the present state of Britain and its transition into the modern world.10 Some of the above works can be found in an inventory of Hanbury’s library at Kelmarsh in 1740 and

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may have inspired or assisted Hanbury in planning his travels. These included a 1636 volume of Camden’s Britannia, a copy of Chamberlayne from 1716 and also ‘Directions for English Travellers (n.d)’.11 More practical books on travelling, as well as road maps, began to emerge as journeys became more common, most famously Ogilby’s cartographic road book of 1675.12 Further into the eighteenth century, as travel became quicker and more comfortable, ‘genteel tourism’ increased in popularity and guidebooks and directories of towns and guides to country houses and their collections started to be produced for visitors.13 Published accounts of journeys became popular only later in the century, but unpublished journals and letters such as Hanbury’s and Scattergood’s can be found in the archives of many landed families.14 There is no indication that Hanbury intended to publish his journal or to share it more widely, and no evidence of a particular cultural or social agenda. The writings can best be described as chorographic. As Haycock explains, this was ‘not a form of travel writing as we would probably understand it today’ but combined ‘the traveller’s observation and remarks on things of both human and natural origin, including history, topography, natural and civic history, antiquities and genealogy.’15 Hanbury stated his intentions in a letter to Scattergood: you must not expect such an exact methodical narration of every town city county &c as is required in most chorographical writings but only a mear description of Wt things in each place seemed to me most extraordinary & memorable and some particular facts in History which did naturally Occur to mee on the sight of those places which were the scens of them.16

Hanbury used Camden’s Britannia to plot many of the points along his tours and appears to have carried a copy with him.17 He made notes to remind himself to transcribe passages from the Latin, for example, ‘Transcribe Cambden for Ogmore & Barry ye story of Justin’ (this would appear to contradict the claim in his letter to Scattergood that the historical facts he recorded ‘occurred naturally’ to him).18 He also recorded practical details of and anecdotes from his travels, something not found in topographic works. Hanbury had the natural curiosity and the leisure and means to travel (albeit only within Britain), but he may also have had more practical motivations. In 1728 he commissioned the architect James Gibbs to design a new house on the Kelmarsh estate to replace a crumbling Jacobean mansion. He also carried out some work to the surrounding parkland. Hanbury and Scattergood had visited a large number of country houses on their travels, both ‘old’ and newly built; these included Chatsworth, Blickling, Wilton, Tottenham Park, Longleat and Houghton. In observing such an array of houses, collections, furnishings and landscapes, Hanbury could observe fashions and form his own tastes. But as we shall see, it was often the functional and even mundane



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features of the houses that warranted the most attention from a man envisioning a newly built family seat. These letters and accounts also reveal some of the practicalities of country house tourism, including costs of food and board at inns and prices paid for entrance to houses or to guides. This chapter will use Hanbury’s and Scattergood’s journals to examine the varied dimensions of country house visiting in the early eighteenth century and the different lenses through which the gentleman could gaze on the creations of his peers. It will emphasise the importance of travel to these men’s, and our, understanding of the country house in this period, and will highlight the experiences that were possible only when somebody got onto a horse (or into a carriage) and went somewhere new. ‘As humble a Hostel as I think I ever enter’d’: the practicalities of travelling In John Scattergood’s first recorded letter to Hanbury we learn how keen Hanbury had been to receive a written account of his travels: Dear Sir, You are pleased, in two or three letters that I have (I thank you) had from you of late, to require me to send you an Account of my Journey into Scotland: though, I confess, I would much rather have chosen to have entertain’d you with ye relation of it, when you and I should possibly have met next in the country, and when we might have Discoursed it over together, with a map before us, and might more conveniently, than now we may, have either ask’d or answered questions, besides, I doubt not but that Serjt Hanbury, who travelled that journay with me, hath long since given you an account of it, and hath already anticipated whatsoever I can reasonably thought to be able to say in the matter; However, Sr, since you are pleased to require it to me, I shall once more travail this Scotch Journey.19

This letter was (somewhat grudgingly) written from Winwick on 27 December 1718 and recounted a journey which began the previous September. As copied into Hanbury’s volume, Scattergood’s letters do not describe the tour of Scotland itself but recount tours through the Midlands to Yorkshire (en route to Scotland), and, in September 1719, to the west Midlands including Staffordshire, Shrewsbury, Gloucestershire, Worcestershire and Warwickshire. It seems that Hanbury used Scattergood’s letters as a model for his own writings, which began in the summer of the following year when he was just sixteen years old. In August 1720 he wrote to Scattergood from Bath: having received from you several chorographical letters and being desirous to have so delightfull and instructive a correspondence continued I make bold to send you some of my observations & beg you would look upon them not as pieces wrought wth labour and accuracy but only ye product of a fond hand dedicated to your service.20

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From Bath he travelled through Bristol and Chepstow and around the west Midlands. In July 1721 he explored more locally, visiting Leicester, Warwick, Birmingham, Coventry, Oxford and a number of Northamptonshire towns and country houses. After his father’s death but before 1724, probably in the summers of 1722 and 1723, he travelled through Tunbridge Wells down to Sussex, and around East Anglia. Then in October 1724 he set off again on the journey described above through Wales and the western English counties.21 Hanbury’s journal of 1724 can be divided into three sections: a record of costs incurred for lodgings, food and given for entrance or to guides at sites of interest (Figure 4.1), the account of the places seen and, at the end, a list of locations arranged by county and marked as to whether Hanbury had visited them or not. He noted, ‘N.B. ye counties wth this mark / have been seen by me, as to those places wch Camden recommends, in those marked thus X I have seen all places yt there were or are worth seeing.’22 He marked twenty-three out of forty counties as seen. However, as a number of the counties not marked are described in his writings, it is clear that this list was not kept updated. Under each county he also marked with a cross a number of towns and country seats, presumably those he had seen. If this was indeed the case then Hanbury, like Celia Fiennes thirty years earlier, visited every county in England as identified by Camden, as well as parts of Wales. Despite a certain amount of planning, revealed in his lists of places to visit, Hanbury gives the impression in a letter to Scattergood that his travels were more fortuitous: ‘I shall begin wth bath where I now am and wheresoever blind fortune and my inclinations lead me you may expect to hear from me and to receive an impartial account of what seems remarkable in my way.’23 Hanbury’s record of expenses in his journal demonstrates that he was travelling up to twenty miles a day between destinations (although he was not constantly on the move, and stayed three days in Salisbury for example, and four in Bath). When discussing his trip to Scotland Scattergood wrote: ‘for our Journey being very long, at least 300 northern miles, and the time allowed us to perform it in base eleven days, we had no time to spare; but were obliged to make the best of our way, and to slave hard at it every day, not scrupuling to travil upon Sunday whilst we were in England though when in Scotland where it is not so usual to do so we pretended to more conscience’.24 This reveals that roughly thirty miles a day on difficult terrain was considered a testing ride (compare with William Cavendish’s travels, described in Chapter 8 below). In 1724 Hanbury was riding on horseback, accompanied by two servants who appear in the accounts; he usually paid for hay for three horses when he stopped at an inn. Horses could be hired from inns, and if on a long journey and wanting to make a reasonable pace, it was common for travellers to change their horses along the way.25 The total cost of horse hire and expenses for Hanbury’s entire journey was £1 7s 8½d, with an additional payment of one shilling to hire a



Gentlemen tourists: Hanbury and Scattergood

Figure 4.1  Page of accounts from Hanbury’s travel journal

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coach, although we do not know when he used this.26 Total expenses for the whole journey are listed as £36 19s 9½d, although this also included a number of purchases: £19 for books and prints, 14s for cutlery ware, 3s 4d for gloves and £1 9s for a coracle (which included a rowing lesson and ‘carriage’ back to Kelmarsh from Pitchford, Shropshire).27 Journeying for pleasure was still quite unusual at this time, and it should not be forgotten that this tour would have been quite a serious undertaking; Pat Rogers writes that ‘in 1700 the roads had scarcely been less dirty, dangerous, and unreliable than they were in the Middle Ages’.28 Even later in the century Arthur Young found the roads in many parts of the country to be of terrible quality, writing of one in Lancashire, ‘I know not, in the whole range of language, terms sufficiently expressive to describe this infernal road.’ Another between Preston and Wigan was ‘most execrably vile with ruts four feet deep’.29 Hanbury rarely complained about the roads, noting only that the terrain was very difficult in places. Of Somerset he wrote, ‘This county is … very uneven & has some bogs that are Inaccessible in winter.’30 It is more common to find both Hanbury and Scattergood praising the state of certain roads as, supposedly, good ones were rare and therefore noteworthy. At Yarmouth Hanbury wrote, ‘but before I leave this town I must commend ye inhabitants for their roads especially ye causeway that is 2 miles in length & ye best I ever saw.31 And in Derbyshire, Scattergood noted a resourceful method for fixing potholes: ‘I passed by Ticknell, a town much noted for earthenware, and where I found the roads, which are here very bad in the winter, mended a great way together with broken potts.’32 Some roads appear to have been a pleasure to travel; ‘We had not gone far from Nottingham’, Scattergood wrote, ‘before we entered into Sherwood forest, where Robin hood and his outlaws are used, they say, to rendevous and keep their residence, this forest was theretofore famous for wood, the roads through which were wont, upon that account, to be wondrous pleasant & entertaining to a travailler.’33 There is also detail on river crossings, which could be particularly treacherous if the water level was high. Scattergood noted that ‘about a mile from Loughborough we again crossed the soar which was yet at that time so very low that it would hardly take our horses to the fetlock’.34 He also remarked upon the bogs on Beeley Moor, ‘that are not only troublesome but oftentimes very dangerous to a traveler as I myself have experienced more than once. It is at the foot of this dismal moor that Chattesworth stands.’35 Hanbury’s accounts also record the names of the inns stayed at on his travels, such as ‘Ye Angel’ at Salisbury, ‘Ye Black Bull’ at Coventry and ‘Ye Green Dragon’ at Welchpool.36 There would have been a choice of many inns in the towns Hanbury visited, but they would have been of varying quality. Grander establishments such as posting houses would have entertained those who arrived in their own carriages or in post-chaises, but these inns might also



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accommodate gentlemen on horseback if accompanied by servants, and we can assume that many of the establishments in which Hanbury stayed were of this nature. Travellers would often have had a choice of hiring a private sitting room or having their meals with the landlord and his family in the parlour or kitchen. In the higher-class inns, the food could be very good.37 Hanbury’s accounts reveal that he ate well on his travels, dining on ‘rabbets’, ‘trouts’, salmon, mutton and broth and ‘a wild duck roasted’. We also find cheese and breakfast for his servants and plenty of ‘cyder’, ale and beer.38 In a description of his journey through Kettering to Peterborough we get an insight into the trials of finding suitable accommodation: the day was not so far spent but we could discern a very handsome publick house wch wth great pleasure we enter’d but to our no small mortification was informed the house was full & by a nimble footed tapster was conducted to as humble a Hostel as I think I ever enter’d, the outward appearance was but an ill omen & I had surely not alighted had not a spruce old land lady wth a muslin nightrail & hood illuminated wth a couple of candles … bid me welcome. She was a great housewife but as to my sorrow I afterwards experienced not a little too long tongued, however ye first dispute wch was managed wth equal ardour on both sides procured one civil usage and pretty tolerable lodging afterwards during my whole stay wch was 2 days.39

Where no payment for lodging is listed it can be assumed that Hanbury stayed with family, friends or acquaintances (see also Chapter 8). From Scattergood’s letters we learn that he and Hanbury’s father Thomas had stayed with a Mr Pierce at Alveston near Bristol, who was formerly curate of Kelmarsh … it was very late before we could get thither that night which made our visit very unseasonable and for 4 Horsemen to come without warning so late at night, and to one who had but one spare bed and stable room only for 2 horses, was not so civil as I could have wish’d however he entertained us all very cheerfully, and made a shift to quarter both us and our horses very well.40

These practical details enable the reader today to relate to these travellers across the three centuries that divide us. They remind us that these gentlemen tourists also needed to watch their expenses, find beds for the night and perhaps dry their clothes. When visiting Stonehenge, Buxton or Blickling Hall, for example, they may have been tired, saddle sore or feeling the effects of the previous night’s drinking, all of which might affect their impressions of a place or what they chose to record. But there was no substitute for first-hand experience of a place, as Defoe explained in the preface to his published tours: ‘in travelling through England, a luxuriance of objects presents itself to our view. Where-ever we come and which way soever we look, we see something new, something significant, something well worth the traveller’s stay, and the writers

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care.’41 These letters are therefore a valuable record of the physical and cultural ­landscape of this period as witnessed by Hanbury and Scattergood, and of the jewels in that landscape: its country houses. ‘I am got so into an enchanted castle that I know not how to get out’: country house visiting Before the eighteenth century the medieval tradition of hospitality to travellers visiting country houses remained, and a respectable gentleman or gentlewoman could arrive unannounced at a seat and expect to be granted a tour by the housekeeper or high-ranking domestic servant (for a small fee). In some cases the owner might be an acquaintance of the visitor or a friend of a friend, but this did not necessarily have to be the case. When Celia Fiennes arrived at the Earl of Chesterfield’s Bretby Hall in Derbyshire in 1698 she was allowed to explore the house, despite the fact that a wedding was taking place, and was offered a glass of wine.42 However, travel was still largely the preserve of a privileged few and, as Scattergood discovered to his cost when his party visited Chatsworth in 1719, a visitor’s birth, education and wealth could influence her or his experience.43 When the men had returned to their inn ‘The duke of Devonshire (who had been abroad that morning to take the air) being returned home & understanding that Serjt Hanbury and Mr Isted had been to see the house sent a servant to the inn to invite them to dinner’ (Figure 4.2).44 Scattergood, who was not a successful lawyer or wealthy landowner, was not invited, but did return to the house that evening to wander in the grounds: ‘when they were gone and after I had eaten a bit I likewise took another walk to chattesworth to feast myself with a second view of it’. While walking among the ponds and groves he came across a battlemented tower: ‘I could by no means apprehend the design and use of this tower. I therefore went up the stairs to that door which I found lock’d: but peeping through the keyhole it seems to me (for I could see but a very little of it, and only straight forward) to have been a delicate flower garden with curious Knots, statues, and the like.’45 Further into the century country house visiting became more formalised and was an important genteel leisure activity (see Chapters 5 and 7). The reasons for this increase in tourism may have been that a great number of houses had been built in this period, especially thanks to the new power and wealth of the Whig aristocracy. In the first edition of Defoe’s tour he wrote that ‘even while the sheets are in the press, new beauties appear in several places, and almost to every part we are obliged to add supplemental accounts of fine houses, new undertakings, buildings etc.’.46 Hanbury witnessed one such new undertaking, noting that near Marlborough ‘stood a new fair built house of Lady Winchelsea wch I was told cost 25000 lb but I cannot believe it’.47 Not wanting to miss out on any new seats worth viewing, Hanbury used Chamberlayne’s The Present



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Figure 4.2  Letter from Scattergood recounting a visit to Chatsworth

State of Great-Britain and Nichols’s British, Scottish and Irish Compendium, the fourth edition of which was published in 1721: ‘and from them’ he noted ‘has been taken very regularly the seats of all ye nobility.’48 Additional fuel for growth in country house visiting was the fact that within houses both new and old, larger and finer collections were being accumulated. Whether these were of art, sculpture or books, there was more to see, not just in the grandest houses of the wealthiest nobility but also at smaller family seats.

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The same was true of landscaped gardens as more families spent money on their parks. Furthermore, an acquaintance with and understanding of art and architecture had become an important aspect of upper-class social behaviour.49 Guidebooks to gardens and collections began to appear at larger seats such as Stowe and Wilton in the 1740s and 1750s, and by 1760 Chatsworth had opened to the public on two days a week.50 Scattergood gives us a glimpse into the popularity of Chatsworth as early as 1719: ‘We pass’d the Derwent over a fine stone bridge near Chattesworth and set up our horses at a pretty fair inn where we lay that night. Our Inn is seldom without guests some one or other coming thither almost every day to see Chattesworth, Although it is commonly reckoned among the wonders of the peak.’51 Scattergood wrote at length of his visit to Chatsworth and was clearly enthralled by this ‘princely palace’, which ‘is far the finest house in my opinion that I have any where yet seen’.52 He greatly admired the large and lofty rooms ‘adorned with a great variety of rich and curious furniture, exquisite painting, marble chimney pieces, windows all of ground glass like coach glasses’. He noted that ‘the figures in the hangings’ were ‘so very lively as though they had been done by a delicate pencil’.53 He also recounted some of the information given by his guide: ‘the walls and roof are curiously painted with great variety of gospel stories by the famous Vario [Verrio] as I think they told us, all the fine paintings about the house and there is abundance, was done by his hand’.54 But rather than being a mere description of Chatsworth’s treasures, Scattergood’s account highlights the pleasures of the visitor experience: On the east side there is a long spacious and noble gallery … this gallery is so exceedingly lightsome that they who are within may see anything with out through the windows as well as in the open air, yet they who are without can see nothing within no more than through a stone wall, the windows reflecting your own figure and all outwards objects back again upon you like a looking glass … I am got so into an enchanted castle that I know not how to get out.55

At some of the seats he visited William Hanbury seems to have had little trouble in gaining access and, like Fiennes, was entertained by the owners. On his tour into Norfolk he visited Earlham near Norwich, a seat of Mr Bacons Representative in Parliament for that city where wee were very kindly entertained & frequently enjoyed ye conversation of yt very learned Divine Dean Prideaux. wee were likewise very much obliged to ye reverend  & learned Dr Tanner … who received us very favourably not to omit Sr Jno Huebart who was so obliging to invite us to his seat at Blickling where wee one day dined. He showed us the examination of ye famous Guido Faux before ye Privy Council signed by Himself. At this house was born Anna Bullen mother of Queen Elizabeth … and having spent several days very agreeably in ye company of these gentlemen we proceeded on our journey.56



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Hanbury noted that ‘[Blickling] is a noble old brick house’ with ‘one very pretty stoco hall’ (presumably referring to the famous long gallery with its plasterwork ceiling). John Hobart, 5th Baronet (still a young man in his late twenties), was Whig MP for St Ives, Cornwall, between 1715 and 1727 and would have been a favourable contact for Hanbury.57 Country houses and their libraries were hotbeds of learned discussion and many valuable documents were contained in their archives.58 Hanbury was clearly able to hold his own in such discussions and was aware of developments within these antiquarian networks. When visiting Avebury he noted that ‘Dr Steukly has, as I am informed, met wth a manuscript at Wilton wch gives so ample an acct of this surprising structure and yt at Stoneheng yt he not only knows ye occasion of erecting them but also the use they were of.’59 Hanbury visited Wilton House in October 1724, not as an invited guest but as a paying visitor (demonstrating that it was not only the status of the tourist but also the attitude – and indeed whereabouts – of the owner which determined the form of visit experienced). Hanbury’s accounts show that he gave 2s 6d to the housekeeper for entrance and a tour. He wrote: ‘Ld Pembrokes house is the design of Inigo Jones, the front likewise of this building is very fine. In ye house where ye rooms are very proportionable and hansome is a very curious collection of stones, pictures, statues & horns whereof ye largest were dug out of ye bogs in Ireland.’60 Hanbury paid a shilling to be shown around ‘a pretty mount of Ld Harfords’ near Avebury, writing: ‘in his house he has ye pictures Of all ye present European kings but nothing else remarkable’.61 Other than these entries, Hanbury showed little concern for works of art or curiosities on display in the houses he visited, being more interested in furnishings and domestic arrangements. Of Longleat Hanbury wrote that ‘ye outside of it is very noble the rooms within proportionable but not answerably furnished’, and at Narford (a seat of Sir Andrew Fountains in Norfolk) he noted that ‘tho small [it] is very neat & well furnished ye inside is prettely adorned & there can be nothing more neat than his library & Breakfast room’.62 Fountains was a fellow antiquarian and had built up a collection of paintings, medals and antiquities on his recent travels on the Continent. At Chapelfield house, near Norwich, Hanbury had more convivial concerns in mind and noted that there were ‘spacious rooms for dancing &c’.63 Scattergood too remarked on the comfort of the arrangements at Nottingham Castle, ‘which is wonderfully improved since I was there last, the present Duke of Newcastle having been at a great charge in making of it and all about it exceeding neat and trim. The rooms, which were very large and too cold and airy, are parted now some of them into four or perhaps 6 and are still large enough and very warm.’64 Hanbury’s journal is unusual in that the most functional attributes of houses seem to have been of the most interest to him (but see also Chapter 7), and his desire for modernity reveals itself in an interest in technology more

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than taste. This may be explained by the likelihood that he was considering the practicalities of his future building project. At Lord Charlton’s in Wiltshire, Hanbury paid a shilling to the housemaid and noted, ‘Ld Charlton’s house is well disposed I like his method of fixing his locks in ye doors & colour for  his door & his 2 stoco rooms.’65 His writing is at its most animated, however, when he does not like something, and this is demonstrated in his account of Tottenham Park in Wiltshire, newly built in the fashionable, strictly Palladian style. Hanbury paid 2s 6d to be shown around and wrote: ‘Ld Bruces house in Savernack forest a seat lately built (Ld Burlington being ye architect) who has mistaken ye english for ye Italian climate he has made ye windows small & ye walls thick consequently ye house is dark and damp it is also cumbred wth entries [passages] & dark rooms wch ye air having but little vent from are stinking holes.’ He added, however, that ‘hee has 2 very pretty stoco halls’. Lord Burlington had indeed based the plan of Tottenham Park on Palladio’s  Villa Serego in Verona, which comprised four wings attached by short corridors.66 Hanbury’s complaint was not over: ‘add to this’, he continued, ‘ye distance of water wch is brought in leaden pipes a full mile to ye house’.67 Hanbury’s concerns with water supply feature often in his letters, and when it came to gardens, he again seemed to have concerns for the practical rather than the picturesque. Of Longleat he wrote, ‘Here is a great command of water a swift river running through ye garden wch affords many cascades & amongst others one fountain of ¾ of an inch diameter wch plays 70 foot High, ye gardens are disposed according to ye old way.’68 Here Hanbury was referring to the recent trend away from formal gardens and towards more natural-looking landscapes around the country house. Scattergood described how the river Derwent was worked into the surrounding parkland at Chatsworth, where ‘the water seems almost to stagnate and to stand still before the house’.69 He was also impressed by the Duke of Devonshire’s ‘delicate’ marble-floored bath house with ‘two curious cocks one to let in hot water and the other cold as occasion should require’.70 At Wilton Hanbury wrote: ‘the gardens I do not like unless a grotto in them where ye voice of a nightingale is admirably well imitated by ye admission of air into water. … [the Earl of Pembroke] hath a very great command of water but lies in a bourn about 2 miles from Salisbury’.71 The gardener at Wilton was thanked with a shilling, which seems to have been the going rate as the same amount was paid to a gardener at Tottenham Park. Hanbury noted that by the gardens there runs a pretty trout river wheron is a engine for supplying the house wth water, this water engine ye design of Mr Holland an eminent enginear is a very useful one but ye old gentleman would not let me in to ye mechanism of a couple of wheels the work being closed in wood but I think one might have been made to serve ye end as well for less than 1400 lb wch I was told it cost.72



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It was much easier to access water if a house was situated in a vale or ‘bottom’, and this would also provide shelter. However, halls were often placed on rising ground to provide views of and from the house.73 Clearly Hanbury believed that the positioning of a house was hugely important, and a balance needed to be struck between a ‘good’ or ‘bold’ situation and having a ‘good command’ of water. Of Ampthill, another house of Lord Bruce’s, Hanbury wrote that ‘the situation is very bold Affording a very large prospect it is well watered for so high & it was one of king James ye 1sts hunting seats’.74 He remarked at Longleat that the seat was ‘scituated in a bottom where ye soil is cold spewy clay but there is a Pretty grove above [the gardens] tho this house stands in a bottom yet the hills rise so gradually one above another from it that it affords as pleasant a prospect as a man can well have in so bad a country’.75 In contrast to these somewhat practical appraisals is Scattergood’s rather more poetic description of the positioning of Nottingham Castle: ‘When the rock underneath is covered and concealed from sight by a thick dale mist, as it is often (especially in a summer’s morning before a very hot day) then the castle above, to one at a distance, looks like a castle in the air.’76 The productivity of the land – a vital consideration for a landowner – was another pragmatic concern that Hanbury often referred to in his journal, noting which counties were fertile and fruitful with ‘rich arable soil’ and which were barren. In Norfolk he visited Walpole’s Houghton, which was then being built. He remarked that the Stables are noble his gardens very fine and tis probable his house will not be inferior to them but it is but just began. he hath no water near him & if he had the soil would not retain it he is scituated in a bad country & destitute of gentry having no neighbour of any note except Ld Townshend at Raynham, whose situation is bold his house hansom but his soil not retentive of water.77

At Euston, near Thetford, ‘an old seat … now belonging to the D of Grafton’, Hanbury admired the technology in use: ‘ye house is not extraordinary but ye gardens are pretty good. his grace finds great improvement of his land by rolling for wch purpose his watering carts are fixed on rollers’.78 On his travels and during his visits to so many houses, Hanbury must have been considering improvements he could make at his own estate. It seems that the old Kelmarsh hall had become dilapidated, perhaps beyond repair, and Hanbury wanted a complete rebuild. The result was the house which stands today, a seven-bay, red brick mansion in a Palladian style with two office pavilions connected by quadrant corridors. The architect James Gibbs published his design for the new hall in A Book of Architecture in 1728 and provided drawings for the decoration of the interiors. Trained in Rome, Gibbs was not famed as a country house architect at this time but had recently designed Ditchley in Oxfordshire, built in 1720–21. Although Ditchley is listed in the

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back of Hanbury’s journal it is not marked as seen. Gibbs is also thought to have been involved at Houghton, although we have no record that Hanbury saw the completed hall.79 The only architects mentioned in the letters are Inigo Jones at Wilton and Burlington at Tottenham Park. Both of these architects were  inspired by Palladio, as was Gibbs, although Gibbs’s designs did not adhere so strictly to the Italian’s conventions as Burlington’s, perhaps rendering his designs more practical for the English climate. Hanbury may not have liked the strict Palladian design of Tottenham Park but he did like Burlington’s stucco halls, and the plans for the hall at Kelmarsh display delicate but prominent stucco relief patterns. Hanbury was a great admirer of proportional rooms and Palladian dimensions such as the famous cube and double cube rooms at Wilton, and this is reflected at Kelmarsh, where the double-height Great Hall is almost a perfect cube. The Saloon, also decorated with stucco designs, would have provided ‘space for dancing,’ with views out across the estate. Although the location of the old hall at Kelmarsh has not come to light, an undated document from the mid-eighteenth century reveals that the ‘situation’ of the house was changed. This contains instructions from William Hanbury to a Mr Yeomans to ‘calculate … how many yds [of earth] will be required to level where the old house stood’. It can be assumed that the change in location facilitated a better ‘command’ of water (so admired at Longleat and Wilton when Hanbury visited these houses), as the document also contains instructions for surveying and improving the water supply, bringing the river Ise close by the west front of the new hall. Yeomans was instructed To make a plan of the designed pond to put down ye calculations on it, calculate how many yds of earth will be required to fill up the old course of the brook … to give directions about feigning the spring above the church only to secure the water and convey it through a brick drain (secured by day) into ye reservoir. To look at the engine but not to touch ye spring for fear of loosing it, to set out ye serpentine water in the close by the house.80

We learn that Hanbury had himself secured a water engine, which perhaps used the mechanism he witnessed at Tottenham Park, and manipulated the flow of the river past the house, as observed by Scattergood at Chatsworth. In terms of the view of and from Kelmarsh Hall, the site of the centre of the estate is on fairly low ground, but the hall itself is situated on a slight eminence with a westward view over the vale of the Ise. This has been enhanced by the clearing of the woodland down to the river and beyond, ensuring a good ‘prospect’ of the surrounding countryside, so notable at Ampthill Park and Raynham Hall. Hanbury wrote to Yeomans: In the first place tomorrow morning go to the oak at sunrise and with ye large telescope and take your view and give Ringrose directions how to make the seat there, get up the tall ash and take a view round then go to mount sion and shew the



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hedges to be cut to open a view to desborough steeple, this may be done by cutting one of Mr Roleby’s hedges.81

This reveals Hanbury’s concern with the more picturesque qualities of the landscape of his estate, although it has not been discovered what Mr Roleby made of his plans. Conclusion Hanbury’s travels and letters enable us to place the developments at Kelmarsh Hall and estate within the wider material culture of the eighteenth-century country house. This could be in ways quite unanticipated; for example, instead of providing detailed accounts of picture collections or gardens, he admired doors, locks and water engines. Hanbury’s observations largely concerned utility rather than display, and he seemed to envision the subsequent Hall not as a statement of taste and wealth, but as a comfortable and functional home. As Wilson and Mackley point out, ‘Building was not simply the cerebral realisation of landowners’ aims and dreams, expressed in a set of architect’s plans, it was also practically linked to their pockets and the careful management of their projects.’82 Hanbury’s and Scattergood’s letters also demonstrate that although highly educated, they were not concerned with the labels that we use today to describe the architecture of the eighteenth century. Rather than being defined as baroque, classical or gothic in style, buildings would simply be described as old or new. For example Castle Ashby, Blickling Hall and Audley End, very different sixteenth-century and early seventeenth-century piles, were simply ‘noble old’ seats. If a house was old, the interest might lie in its contents or historical associations; if new, it often deserved some comment, ‘if only a criticism of the builder’s lamentable want of taste’ as Tinniswood writes, ‘since criticism denoted discrimination, and the ability to discriminate was becoming a decided social asset’.83 Common adjectives used throughout these sources include ‘grand’, ‘noble’, ‘stately’, ‘fine’, ‘delicate’, ‘rich’, ‘goodly’, ‘curious’ and ‘pretty’. There are nuances here, however, that may not be fully appreciated by the modern reader. Scattergood continued his description of Chatsworth: on the north side lie the offices, as the kitchen &c. but though we saw not these neither were we in the cellars, nor upon the top of the house; yet these and hundreds of things that we saw not (neither indeed had we time to see them) are all, no doubt, like those we did see, very grand and noble; for I saw nothing mean about the house; or that would admit of so low an epithete as pretty.84

William Hanbury spent at least four summers travelling as a young man in the early 1720s but his country house visiting was not simply as a tourist. He was

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keen to educate himself on the favourable and functional design and workings of a country estate and certainly put a number of his discoveries and preferences into practice. He may also have used his tour as a vehicle for networking, visiting the seats of a number of prominent Whigs including Shobdon Hall in Herefordshire, ‘a fine seat of Mr Bateman’s’ (MP for Leominster from 1721 to 1722 – into whose family he would later marry), the aforementioned John Hobart’s Blickling and, of course, Walpole’s Houghton. He also visited Milden Hall to see Sir Thomas Hanmers (who had been the Speaker of the House of Commons in 1714–15), ‘of wch we had heard much but it no ways answered our expectations nor rewarded us for our journey in such a miserable country’.85 The processes of travelling and visiting were important forms of education and knowledge exchange in this period, linking these houses to each other and to the wider world. Country houses were a prime attraction for sightseers in the eighteenth century (as they still are for tourists today), where the finest specimens of architecture and art, the newest technological processes and the most important antiquarian collections could be found. Whether received warmly by the owners, guided by the housekeeper or forced to peek through keyholes, our travellers witnessed these houses in a way largely lost to today’s visitors, as they were then alive with resident families and servants, busy kitchens and working estates. Thankfully they chose to broaden their geographical and cultural horizons and share their experiences and opinions with each other, and in doing so shared them with us too. Notes  1 King’s College London (hereafter KCL), GB 0100 KCLCA, journal of William Hanbury, ‘Britannia’, 1720s.  2 Aside from his place of residence, little is known of Scattergood. In his letters he reveals that Nottingham Castle was built ‘in my time’, so he must have been at least forty years old by 1718 as it was built inn 1674–79. Northamptonshire Record Office, Northampton (hereafter NRO), Hanbury (Kelmarsh) (hereafter H (K)) 183, p. 9.  3 He was unsuccessful but the election was closely contested. See E. G. Forrester, Northamptonshire County Elections and Electioneering, 1695–1832 (Oxford and London: Humphrey Milford, 1941).  4 D. Haycock, William Stukeley: Science, Religion and Archaeology in EighteenthCentury England (Woodbridge: Boydell Press, 2002), pp. 6, 7.  5 See R. Sweet, The Writing of Urban Histories in Eighteenth-Century England (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997), pp. 100–1.  6 W. Stukeley, Itinerarium curiosum, or, an Account of the Antiquitys and Remarkable Curiositys in Nature or Art, Observ’d in Travels thro’ Great Britain (London, 1724).  7 Dictionary of National Biography, 1st edn, vol. X (London: Elibron Classics, 2006), p. 8.



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 8 D. Defoe, A Tour through the Whole Island of Great Britain, ed. P. Rogers (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1971), pp. 111–16.  9 C. Fiennes, Through England on a Side Saddle in the Time of William and Mary (London: Leadenhall Press, 1888). Fiennes’s writings were not published until the late nineteenth century. 10 See Rogers in Defoe, A Tour, pp. 12, 20; A. Tinniswood, The Polite Tourist: Four Centuries of Country House Visiting (London: National Trust, 1998), p. 61. 11 KCL, Hanbury, ‘Britannia’, p. 59; Herefordshire Record Office, Hereford, R79, inventory of Kelmarsh Hall, c.1740, p. 133. 12 Sweet, Urban Histories, p. 102. 13 See ibid., chapter 3, ‘Tourism and Travel Literature’. 14 See for example J. Stobart, ‘From Magnificent Houses to Disagreeable Country: Lady Sophia Newdigate’s Tour of Southern England and Derbyshire, 1748’, in A. Capern and B. McDonagh (eds), Women and the Land, 1500–1900 (forthcoming). 15 Haycock, William Stukeley, p. 4. 16 NRO, H (K) 183, p. 100. 17 Herefordshire Record Office, R79, p. 133. 18 KCL, Hanbury, Britannia, pp. 37, 53. 19 NRO, H (K) 183, p. 1. 20 Ibid., p. 81. 21 Ibid., pp. 100, 117. 22 KCL, Hanbury, ‘Britannia’, p. 61. 23 NRO, H (K) 183, p. 81. 24 Ibid., p. 2. In the early days of the century there was little Sunday travelling: coaches very rarely ran, and the hire cost of horses was doubled. R. Bayne-Powell, Travellers in Eighteenth Century England (New York: Ayer Publishing, 1972), pp. 33–4. 25 J. Martin, Wives and Daughters: Women and Children in the Georgian Country House (London and New York: Hambledon and London, 2004), p. 304. 26 KCL, Hanbury, ‘Britannia’, p. 13. This seems a particularly low cost; see Chapter 8 below for comparison. 27 KCL, Hanbury, ‘Britannia’, p. 13. 28 Defoe, A Tour, pp. 39, 40; Martin, Wives and Daughters, p. 315. 29 Bayne-Powell, Travellers, pp. 26–8. This was mainly due to the fact that before many roads had established turnpikes, roads were maintained by unpaid parishioners. 30 NRO, H (K) 183, pp. 133–4. 31 Ibid., p. 108. 32 Ibid., p. 63. 33 Ibid., p. 12. 34 Ibid., p. 5. 35 NRO, H (K) 183 b), p. 3. 36 KCL, Hanbury, ‘Britannia’, pp. 1–13. 37 Bayne-Powell, Travellers, pp. 42, 44, 45. 38 KCL, Hanbury, ‘Britannia’, pp. 1–13. 39 NRO, H (K) 183 c), p. 1.

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40 NRO, H (K) 183, p. 78. 41 Defoe, A Tour, p. 43. 42 Martin, Wives and Daughters, pp. 315–16. However, Tinniswood records that visitors were turned away on occasion, and owners may have pretended to be out so that they did not have to meet the guests. Tinniswood, Polite Tourist, pp. 61–3, 94. 43 Sweet, R., Cities and the Grand Tour: The British in Italy, c.1690–1820 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012), p. 280. 44 NRO, H (K) 183, p. 48. It is noted that a Mr Isted of Ecton was travelling with Scattergood and Thomas Hanbury. Ecton is a village approximately sixteen miles from Kelmarsh, and this reveals a local Northamptonshire network of early travellers of the generation before William Hanbury. 45 Ibid., pp. 50–1. 46 Defoe, A Tour, p. 46. 47 NRO, H (K) 183, p. 118. 48 KCL, Hanbury, ‘Britannia’, p. 59; Herefordshire Record Office, R79, p. 133. 49 Tinniswood, Polite Tourist, p. 63. 50 Ibid., pp. 91, 99–100. 51 NRO, H (K) 183 b), p. 2. 52 NRO, H (K) 183, pp. 46–7. 53 NRO, H (K) 183 b), pp. 6–7. 54 Ibid., p. 5. 55 Ibid., pp. 5–6. 56 NRO, H (K) 183, pp. 109–10. 57 John Hobart (1693–1756), later 1st Baron of Blickling (1728) and MP for Norfolk (1727–28). G. E. Cokayne et al. (eds), The Complete Peerage of England, Scotland, Ireland, Great Britain and the United Kingdom, Extant, Extinct or Dormant, new edn, vol. II (Gloucester: Alan Sutton Publishing, 2000), p. 401. 58 See M. Dimmock, A. Hadfield and M. Healy (eds), The Intellectual Culture of the English Country House, 1500–1700 (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2015). 59 NRO, H (K) 183, pp. 119–20. William Stukeley was one of the founders of the Society of Antiquities and pioneered the archaeological investigation of Avebury and Stonehenge. His published accounts appeared in the 1740s. 60 NRO, H (K) 183, p. 125. 61 Ibid., pp. 118–19. 62 Ibid., pp. 129, 104–5. 63 Ibid., p. 107. 64 Ibid., p. 22. 65 KCL, Hanbury, ‘Britannia’, p. 17. 66 J. Summerson, Architecture in Britain 1530–1830, 9th edn (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1993), pp. 310–11. 67 NRO, H (K) 183, p. 122. 68 Ibid., pp. 128–9. 69 NRO, H (K) 183 b), p. 3. 70 Ibid., p. 5.



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71 NRO, H (K) 183, p. 125; KCL, Hanbury, ‘Britannia’, p. 20. 72 KCL, Hanbury, ‘Britannia’, p. 19; NRO, H (K) 183, p. 123. 73 W. G. Hoskins, The Making of the English Landscape (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1970), pp. 167–9. 74 NRO, H (K) 183, pp. 115–16. 75 Ibid., pp. 128–9. 76 Ibid., pp. 9–10. 77 Ibid., p. 105. 78 Ibid., pp. 110–11. 79 Summerson, Architecture in Britain, pp. 302–3. He may however have seen the designs. 80 NRO, H (K) 84. 81 Ibid. 82 R. Wilson and A. Mackley, The Building of the English Country House, 1660–1880, 2nd edn (London: Hambledon Continuum, 2007), p. 49. 83 Tinniswood, Polite Tourist, p. 81; Sweet, Cities and the Grand Tour, p. 46. 84 NRO, H (K) 183, pp. 33–4. 85 Ibid., p. 111.

Dutch travellers’ accounts of proto-museums

5

A foreign appreciation of English country houses and castles: Dutch travellers’ accounts of proto-museums visited en route, 1683–1855 Hanneke Ronnes and Renske Koster Leisure trips to England were popular with Dutch men and women from at least the late seventeenth century onwards. The route from the Netherlands to England was familiar given the proximity, the cultural, scientific and financial exchange between the two countries, and the shared history on account of the joint stadholder and king, William III. In this chapter, tours from the Netherlands to England in the period between the late seventeenth to mid-­ nineteenth centuries take centre stage, and more specifically those involving visits to country houses and castles. The main question concerns the ways in which these country houses and castles were presented or ‘staged’ and especially how they were ‘consumed’. The argument is made that we are dealing here with ‘proto-musealisation’. The castles and houses visited were predominantly still lived in, yet visitors were in most cases not acquainted with or related to the owners, and often not even of the same social status. Visits to these castles and country houses were aimed at satisfying the visitor’s curiosity about the residence, collection and garden in a time when these places were not yet musealised. Little attention has been given to this subject so far. Firstly, it is generally the Grand Tour rather than smaller trips that is studied, even though these smaller tours became very popular throughout the eighteenth century. Secondly, when attention is paid to smaller trips, the focus is usually on capital cities such as London, and on describing urban phenomena instead of country houses and castles.1 Thirdly, there is considerable interest in present-day museological presentations of country houses and, especially in England, a healthy dialogue exists about best practices as regards museological presentations: that is, the (political) dialogue with audiences, inclusion of minorities or other classes and so on.2 However, the historical musealisation of country houses is generally associated with the twentieth century or at best the late nineteenth century, too late for the sites that will feature here. Fourthly, in exceptional cases when early



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forms of the presentation and consumption of houses and collections do receive attention, individual houses are studied in isolation or in the context of a set of houses belonging to one (royal) family.3 This study aims to present a Dutch gaze on the English elite landscape and will compare this with what we know about the English interpretation of these same castles and country houses.4 Country house visiting and the Dutch elite While country houses have been largely overlooked in studies of historical travelling in Europe as a whole, it could be argued that domestic tours in England are an exception. Both now and in the past, the country house has encapsulated much of what has been believed to be English and represent Englishness.5 Much harks back to Tinniswood’s The Polite Tourist, which details the history of visiting English castles and country houses from the sixteenth century to the twentieth, relating the changing motivations for these tours, modes of visiting and frameworks for appraising these places.6 Since then, various new issues have been raised: identity formation (regarding national, social and female identities), travel writing, country house guidebooks, consumerism and the way in which country house visits often provided inspiration for visitors’ own building projects.7 The present chapter engages with this debate but does so from a different angle by putting forward an outsider’s perspective. Identity building was undoubtedly also at stake for Dutch visitors to English castles and country houses, but the fact that the houses were not situated within their own country meant that this was concerned much less with a national identity, although many of the Dutch visitors did remark on the Dutch paintings in the country house collections and some on the presence in English palaces of portraits of the stadholder and king, William III, and the stadholder William V. It is equally true that only rarely were English houses visited with an eye to refurbishing the family home; most of the English houses that the Dutch went to see were of a very different character and size from their own houses. The matter of taste and the language of aesthetics, however, does seem to have been a universal preoccupation and formed, as we will see, one of the key parameters within which the trips were undertaken or ‘performed’. In the Netherlands and Belgium scholars studying historical travel literature, such as Anna Frank-van Westrienen and Gerrit Verhoeven, have paid indirect attention to visits to castles and country houses.8 Westrienen, writing about the seventeenth century, argues that Dutch travellers to England usually started their tour in London, where all the palaces and castles were visited, and then went to Oxford and Cambridge, followed by Windsor Castle and Hampton Court.9 Some travelled further, for instance to Bristol, but this was not common.10 The travellers went to England before going to France and Italy, perhaps as a way to practise for the Grand Tour to the south of Europe.11

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The period under discussion marks a time when traditional conceptions of the Grand Tour were giving way to the ‘pleasure trip’.12 The two differed in various ways. The Grand Tour, lasting anything between six months and three years, was undertaken by men and more occasionally women of various ages. It involved immersing oneself in culture as well as pleasure and often functioned as a rite de passage for young men: a special stage in their education – marking the end of their schooling – and in their personal lives.13 The art and history of cities like Venice, Florence and especially Rome dovetailed with the humanist curriculum of these young men and with the general idea that the exposure to both was indispensable for any gentleman. World-wise, older and with an extra, foreign university degree and a broad network, at the end of the tour they were believed to be ready for the responsibilities of a working life – as a lawyer, functionary, or statesman – or the running of a country estate. Gerrit Verhoeven believes that, for Dutch tourists, the coming to power of Louis XIV and the growing importance of Versailles and the Louvre as centres of power and culture resulted in a shift in focus from Rome to Paris.14 Given the proximity of Paris to the Netherlands, it became possible for more people to make the trip. When Louis XIV died, Paris lost some of its attraction, and it was London that benefited from this, becoming one of the most popular destinations in the eighteenth century.15 Verhoeven links this change of cynosure, from Rome to Paris and then to London, to Fernand Braudel’s idea of the translatio imperii from south to north-west.16 Not only in terms of trade and economy but also with regard to travel destinations, the nucleus shifted from the Mediterranean to the north-west of Europe. The differences between the archetypical Grand Tour and the pleasure trip extended beyond the destinations (which for the pleasure trip were closer), the distances (shorter) and the durations of the journeys, which also were shorter, not only as a result of the shorter travel distance, but also because of better roads and eventually the invention of the train and the steamer. With time, the motivations for travelling also changed. The purpose of the Grand Tour undertaken by the Dutch had largely been educational, including a moral undertone.17 Men on tour often spent some time at a foreign university, submerged themselves in art, culture and history and took lessons in elocution, dancing and fencing. The pleasure trip was not devoid of educational lessons but, nomen est omen, was geared more towards pleasure, cultural interest and Bildung.18 On the basis of our sample, a process of democratisation as regards the background of the travellers cannot be discerned: only the highest echelons of society – the most affluent and high-ranking members – took part in these trips. However, a considerable number of our travel accounts were written by another segment of society: scholars, authors, doctors and lawyers.19 It was not only young men who went on pleasure trips; a growing number of Dutch men in their forties and fifties enjoyed these tours. The number of women travelling



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steadily increased as well in the years between 1600 and 1750, but they make up a very small percentage of all travellers. Some of them went on Grand Tours, but it was not until the rise of the pleasure trip that it became more common for Dutch women to travel abroad.20 For this study, twenty-eight Dutch travel accounts were researched, written between 1683 and 1855 by twenty-seven different authors, who were mostly in their thirties and forties.21 Four travellers were of noble birth, including the three women included in our sample, who travelled in the company of relatives or other chaperones. One travel account was written by the valet of a baron and his wife; six of the travellers were members of the ruling class; four came from rich trading families; four were scholars; two were judges; and the earliest account was written by a minister of a Calvinist church. These different groups of travellers were quite equally spread over the research period. It is only in the accounts written well into the nineteenth century that a clearer process of democratisation can be witnessed: in the period 1847–54 two poets, both sons of pharmacists, travelled to England. The sole artist in our sample was able to travel through Europe after he won the Prix de Rome in 1831. Canon of destinations In the eighteenth century, according to Verhoeven, the canonisation of ‘destinations’ in London was well developed: 22 more than was the case in other capital cities, people all went to see the same sites, including castles and palaces.23 However, both the royal collections and the famous collection of the Earl of Arundel had become dispersed over the years, and Verhoeven argues that tourists were keenly aware of the fact that, given the power of Parliament, English monarchs were not able, like the absolutist monarchs in France, to venture into massive building projects.24 When London’s star rose in the eighteenth century it owed its fame not to its architectural heritage and art collections, but rather to its status as a place for consumption.25 The eighteenth century in England saw the rise of the ‘consumer society’ which, McCracken argues, heralded the ‘eclipse’ of patina, the physical signs of the historicity of artefacts.26 Even though this is overstated – old castles and country houses were still appreciated as (family) heritage – the eighteenth century can be characterised as a time when the new was valued over the old. Accordingly, the new and luxurious country houses of the English were seen as proof of the wealth of England in this period. Dutch visitors were frequently astonished by the riches and especially the size of the country houses and estates, even if they made little comment on the wealth and power of England in general. The fact that the palaces of London were not the most highly regarded sites of the city does not mean that people did not go to see them. When we take only visits to houses and castles into account, the canon of ‘must-see’ places in

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Figure 5.1  W. Hollar, Whitehall in London, View from the Thames, 1647

London that loom up from our research, consists first and foremost of St James’s Palace and the Tower of London.27 Before the fire of 1689, Whitehall Palace was also relatively well visited, although our protagonists did not appreciate its merits (Figure 5.1). The minister Balthasar Bekker (1634–1698) wrote in 1683 that the building was badly constructed and did not seem congruent in style.28 The remaining Banqueting House also did not appeal to the visitors, who hardly mentioned it in their travel accounts. Only the Tower with its priceless jewels, exotic animals and imposing armoury really impressed.29 The palaces around London could count on more positive reactions and extensive descriptions. Windsor Castle, Richmond Palace, Hampton Court and Kensington Palace were among the favourites of Dutch travellers.30 It is possible that the Dutch had a greater interest in the last two given that they were extended or largely rebuilt by William of Orange, although not many words were devoted to the history of the former king in travellers’ accounts. It was mainly Hampton Court which caused the Dutch travellers to write about their own history and rulers, especially after William V had stayed there for a few years during his exile (1795–1806). Dirk Jacob Alewijn (1787–1863), treasurer of urban taxes and duties, wrote in 1825 that for a Dutchman the palace was ‘doubly interesting because it was inhabited by our royal family before the Revolution, and had previously been inhabited by William III’.31 From the second half of the eighteenth century onwards, the Dutch took long walks in the gardens of Kew, Richmond and Kensington, the first two being especially admired. The delights of English landscape gardens and the many ornaments, like the Moorish Alhambra, Chinese pagoda and Roman ruins in Kew, filled many pages in the travel journals.32 Not all Dutch travellers stayed in the London area; indeed, the majority also visited houses and castles in other parts of England. Southsea Castle in Portsmouth, Gregories near Beaconsfield, Hornby Castle and Castle Howard



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Colchester Castle

Castle Howard

Dover Castle

Warwick Castle

Kenilworth Castle

Carisbrooke Castle

Wilton House

Somerset House

Northumberland House

Buckingham House

Palace of Whitehall

Westminster Palace

St James's Palace

Kew Palace

Blenheim Palace

Kensington Palace

Hampton Court

Richmond Palace

Windsor Palace

Tower of London

100% 90% 80% 70% 60% 50% 40% 30% 20% 10% 0%

Chart 5.1  The English houses and castles most visited by Dutch travellers, 1683–1855

in Yorkshire, and Wilton House were regularly visited in the eighteenth century, as they were by Hungarian visitors in the early nineteenth century (see Chapter 7). At Wilton, the outstanding art collection of the Earl of Pembroke was especially admired.33 Of all the country houses outside London one house stood out: Blenheim (see Chart 5.1). This trend started with Allard de la Court (1688–1755), who saw Blenheim in 1710 when it was still under construction, and noted that it was one of the most considerable houses he had ever seen.34 Those who saw Blenheim when it was finished shared his opinion, and almost every traveller upgraded the house to the status of a palace. They all admired the baroque architecture, the size of the building, the beautiful paintings of the great Italian and Dutch masters and the luxurious furniture. What is more, Blenheim seems to have been, for a long time, the benchmark for the ideal country house, its overwhelming importance lessening only in the course of the nineteenth century.35 Although this is seemingly self-evident, it is important to stress that, whereas castles functioned as clear reminders of the past, country houses, in contrast to our experience when we visit them as tourists today, formed part of the contemporary world of most of the eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century visitors. To complicate things further, there was also a category in between the two: houses that were perceived as neither new nor old. This latter category seems to have been appreciated the least. As outlined above, newness was a major factor in the appreciation of country houses and palaces, and

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Figure 5.2  W. Hollar, View of Windsor Castle, 1644

for ­country house owners too, the eighteenth century was a time of consumerism.36 Old furniture was seemingly replaced with new pieces sooner than formerly; objects which used to be valued for relating the long history of the family or its genealogy were now at risk of being discarded. Dutch hawk eyes often spotted outdated furniture, especially when a house was empty. Adriaan van der Willigen (1766–1841), for example, commented in 1823 on Windsor Castle (Figure 5.2): ‘The old-fashioned and graceless manner in which these rooms were furnished, showed that they had not been inhabited by the court for several years.’37 As the eighteenth century progressed, there was a growing appreciation for the ‘old’ house among the English, and therefore most of the English visitors commented positively on older interiors in historic buildings. For the Dutch, however, these buildings had no national value and an authentic setting was consequently not desirable. Tinniswood has argued that in this period Palladian architecture was favoured over baroque architecture, but that dilettantes appreciated both.38 In the accounts of the Dutch travellers it is evident that this was also true for practically all the Dutch: they valued both the baroque and Palladian styles and considered them suitable for the high status of their owners. Significantly, the older parts of Hampton Court were often said to be old-fashioned, but the baroque parts were considered magnificent.39 Some of the Dutch men and women travelling to England owned country houses themselves or at least circulated in networks of country house owners. The authors of travel accounts were intimately familiar with the phenomenon of the country house and as a consequence were critical of what they saw. Each house was carefully studied in order to determine whether it was up to the latest standards, out of date, above someone’s status (in other words, pretentious)



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or too sober. About Blenheim it was often noted (so often that one wonders whether it is a phrase copied from a guidebook) that it was ‘more a palace than a house’, and Northumberland House was called ‘more proud than beautiful’. Variations on the theme were common.40 Distinctions were frequently made between judgements of the house, the garden, the furniture and the collection. Generally, it was the park and the painting collection that was valued most. Until the second half of the eighteenth century, the Dutch had a preference for formal gardens; straight ­avenues, clipped plants and classical statues and fountains. This changed with the development of the English landscape gardens, when almost immediately the Dutch began to compliment these gardens and parks with picturesque views and landscape. At Hampton Court, the formal gardens, once highly valued, were now deemed outdated (Figure 5.3). Increasingly, there was a preference for gardens containing wilderness, which provided an opportunity for visitors to ‘relax’. Such ‘natural’ gardens were now signs of the good taste of the owner of the country house or palace. In 1772 the scholar Hendrik Albert Schultens (1749–1793) was impressed with the parks of Richmond (Figure 5.4) and showed a clear preference for the more natural parks: Here, all exceeded the highest expectation I ever had. And never have I seen anything which delighted me more; all here is purely natural, or rather: the nature is by art preserved and improved in such a way that on every moment you will be surprised by the most pleasant change, of water, of hills, of construction or paths.41

Whereas the taste of the Dutch in gardens changed over the course of the eighteenth century, their taste in architecture did not: only the classical rules of order remained suitable for palaces and country houses. This seems to be in contrast with British taste, where the gothic and later neo-Jacobean styles came into fashion for country houses. Like their Hungarian counterparts (discussed by Fatsar in Chapter 7), the Dutch were inspired by the English landscape gardens that they saw and often hired landscape architects to create ‘English Gardens’ for their homes. For the architecture and the interiors of their own country houses, however, they were more likely to use elements of French fashion and taste.42 In contrast with other European countries, ‘Anglomania’ had a patchy impact on the cultural landscape. Castles For castles – here defined as buildings that were clearly historical for our ­ rotagonists – entirely different criteria of taste applied. Whereas country p houses were initially judged on their architectural quality, and their age only mattered in so far as it could devalue a place, the exact opposite was true for

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Figure 5.3  D. Marot, Parterre of Hampton Court, between 1703 and 1800



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Figure 5.4  W. Hollar, View of Richmond Palace, 1638

Figure 5.5  Anon., The Tower of London, 1726

c­ astles. It was because of the history that they represented that castles were valued. This was especially true for the royal castles, descriptions of which were almost without exception accompanied by a list of kings and queens who had been born or had lived there. Castles prompted visitors to relate the story of the building ‘from the beginning’: they were not infrequently ascribed to what we now know to be fictive Roman or even Greek origins. Constantine the Great was believed to have been born in Colchester Castle, and Caesar was invariably indicated as the creator or the first owner of the Tower of London (Figure 5.5), a

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familiar attribution since Shakespeare famously mentioned Caesar as the builder of the Tower in Richard II and Richard III.43 Various stories occur in Dutch travel accounts: the Tower was erected by Caesar himself or was believed to date back to this period. Only one traveller correctly named William the Conqueror as the builder.44 It is notable that, at the beginning of the nineteenth century, a castle was liked less when its history was bloody, as was the case with the Tower of London. Some travellers were very explicit about their dislike of the place, given the horrible things that had happened there. Van der Willigen believed that on account of its bloody history, the Tower could not be ranked among London’s jewels. Even so, the Tower remained the most frequented destination of the Dutch travellers, and most of them simply ignored its history in their travel accounts.45 Around the same time, the high status of the castles was increasingly linked not just to political history, but also to ‘history’ known through prose and poetry. This was, for instance, true for Kenilworth, which was popular with Dutch travellers and was inextricably linked to the era of Elizabeth and the Earl of Leicester, and to the works of Sir Walter Scott. In the early travel accounts, it is evident that old castles, as remnants of the past, formed part of another, impenetrable world. Under the influence of the Romantic era, the distance between past and present was increasingly bridged and a process of identification instead of ‘othering’ can be identified. In Romantic prose, authors described how they tried to imagine while walking around the castle what it must have been like in the past. When the doctor and poet George Groshans (1814–1874), who wrote under his pseudonym of E. Troosting, visited the ruins of Kenilworth one Sunday afternoon, he remarked: ‘Undistracted, our imagination ran wild and the memory of the eternal poem of the great author [Sir Walter] was so vivid that I saw the persons whose vicissitudes he described so inimitably right before my eyes.’46 At the end of the eighteenth century the Dutch developed a pre-Romantic appreciation for historical buildings. The gothic elements in the English gardens were already appreciated, but the Romantic rapprochement was responsible for an aesthetic appreciation of historical houses. The cult of the picturesque became enhanced by the Romantic. Picturesque views of and from castles were  actively sought out more than before, not only in England, but everywhere the Dutch went. Indeed, picturesque views were also sought out at home. Different components in the landscape could enrich the Romantic views: ivy was seen as a striking demonstration of the transience of earthly greatness and could therefore instantly transform a building into a Romantic feature, and the light at the scene similarly had a great impact on the way a castle was perceived.47 A lack of other people on the site, whether tourists or owners, equally contributed to the Romantic experience. It is also clear from the Dutch travel



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accounts that the castles were now, for the first time, experienced as authentic. The English were presented as a people who valued their history and, as such, were worthy guardians of antiquities. Under the influence of the cult of the picturesque and the later Romantic movement, various houses were added to the canon of houses deemed to be worth a visit. Very old castles or ruins were also appreciated more over time. Some houses disappeared from the canon or were less frequently visited, often because of changed routes. The cult of the picturesque, in which ‘elegant relics of ancient architecture’ were valued, encouraged people to look for more variation in the landscape, and this remained the case throughout the Romantic period.48 In our sample, places such as Kenilworth, and also Carisbrooke Castle and Warwick Castle, were increasingly visited (Chart 5.2). Museological practices In the period studied, country houses, castles and palaces were visited by both native and foreign travellers by invitation or on production of a letter of recommendation, or in some cases as public places, or (proto-)museums. When people went on a formal visit where they were welcomed by the owners, they were shown the house and collection almost without exception; a stroll in the garden was even more common. Somewhere between visiting a house whose owner one was acquainted with and visiting as a tourist was the situation in which the visitor carried a letter of recommendation. Such letters ensured that only elites could visit these houses. In the third situation, either 100% 90% 80% 70% 60% 50% 40% 30% 20% 10% 0%

1683–1775

Colchester Castle

Dover Castle

Castle Howard

Warwick Castle

Kenilworth Castle

Wilton House

Carisbrooke Castle

Somerset House

Buckingham House

Northumberland House

Palace of Whitehall

St James's Palace

Westminster Palace

Kew Palace

Blenheim Palace

Kensington Palace

Hampton Court

Richmond Palace

Windsor Palace

Tower of London

1776–1855

Chart 5.2  The English houses and castles most visited by Dutch travellers, 1683–1855 (by period)

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the traveller did not know the owner or the house was not lived in. This is the situation which is closest to the museological experience of visitors to castles and houses today. When the house was lived in and the owners were at home, visitors seldom met them, although they were sometimes spotted from a window, an experience especially remarked on when the owners happened to be royalty.49 The way in which tours of a large house were organised went back, according to Tinniswood, to the medieval system of hospitality.50 On the basis of our research it seems that visits to palaces and castles in our period also owed something to the late sixteenth-century and seventeenth-century system that existed in court circles in which the enfilade determined the visit. According to one’s status, one might enter the house as far as the antechamber, the bedroom or the cabinet or some room in between. This also explains the lack of opening hours: much as in the seventeenth century, there would always be someone at the house to at least welcome visitors into a waiting room such as the antechamber, and most of the visitors had sufficient standing to be deemed worthy of a tour through the house.51 Groshans observed that the English system of opening the house to visitors was arranged by servants who received free board; the only money they saw consisted of the fees that people paid to see the house. Whether this was indeed common practice is not certain, but it is clear that tips paid by those visiting the house were very welcome contributions to the little money that servants possessed. To see Warwick Castle, for example, the visitor had to pay a generous tip to the housekeeper, having already paid other servants and the porter. The greed of the servants was a well-known topos in the late eighteenth century and the first half of the nineteenth. The story was told that visitors to Blenheim were overtaken by a swarm of servants as soon as they arrived.52 As early as 1748 the doctor Petrus Camper (1722–1789) had to pay a servant 2s 6d to see Blenheim, after he had already paid one shilling at the gate. He again had to pay one shilling at the entrance of the park.53 The different rooms in the houses sometimes had different guides. The more private apartments were often closed to ‘commoners’ and were accessible only with a letter of recommendation and under the guidance of a high-ranking servant. Baron Willem van Westreenen (1783–1848) mentioned that he was guided through the public rooms at Windsor Castle by a male servant, but that the private apartments, for which he received a ‘private order that is seldom granted’, were shown to him by a ‘decently dressed young girl’.54 Like housekeepers, gardeners often functioned as cicerones through the gardens and parks, and were often more highly regarded as tour guides. The pharmacist and poet Samuel van den Bergh (1814–1868) was pleasantly surprised by the knowledge and manners of the gardener of the estate of Sir George Staunton (1781–1859) at Portsmouth who, after taking a look at his letter of recommendation, offered himself as a cicerone.



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This well-educated gardener, however, did receive a considerable salary and accommodation in a spacious cottage.55 Around 1750 the Dutch tourists mentioned a written guide for the first time: the guidebook of the Tower of London.56 At the end of the eighteenth century one of the travellers mentioned a catalogue of the Egyptian artefacts on show at Wilton House. Of course, the immensely popular Blenheim could not lag behind, and it too offered visitors a precise description of the house and its collection.57 By then the current museological distinction between guided tours and free flow through the house had already existed for a long time. The latter practice was apparently customary at Hampton Court and caused one traveller to complain that no one showed him Wolsey’s hall; it was only when he consulted the catalogue once back in London that he realised he had missed it.58 The travel accounts also provide information about the ways in which the houses were staged and which museological programme was followed. This process of staging was not as professional and conscious as is the case nowadays; even so, it is a mistake to believe that owners left everything to chance when their reputation was at stake. One visitor related how Warwick Castle contained ‘several rooms that were furnished in such a way that their original function was still visible’.59 Apart from these period rooms, a museological programme may be suspected where visitors mention how it seemed at one country house that the owners had just left the room, while other houses contained cabinets of curiosities, showed ex situ historical objects or functioned as art museums. In some ways, this reflects the different purposes and functions of rooms within a country house, whether it was being visited or not. In others it had much more to do with the owners’ careful preparations for the critical visitors who they knew would step over their thresholds. In a situation in which professional, public country house museums were not yet fully established, it seems to have been a popular activity to penetrate the building as deeply as possible, and it was considered prestigious to view the most private rooms in houses and palaces. Van Westreenen, as noted above, is a good example of a traveller who was privileged enough to look, more than once, into the more exclusive rooms of the palaces and country houses. Most of the visitors, however, had to join the queues at Hampton Court, Windsor and the Tower before they could enter in large groups. While these places were exceptional in terms of their fame and attraction to visitors, it is clear from our research that more obscure places also dealt with ever-increasing crowds of visitors. Only those who were cunning were able to avoid the long waiting times. When Lady Florentine Rethaan Macaré-Ontijd (1812–1887) visited the Tower, she did not want to wait until her group number was called and sneaked in with an earlier group.60 Tinniswood sees the first signs of a process of musealisation in the second half

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Figure 5.6  J. Kip, View of Hampton Court, 1709

of the eighteenth century. Yet even at the turn of the nineteenth ­century, no more than fifteen to twenty houses contained catalogues of their collections. It was only around the second quarter of the nineteenth century that c­ astles and country houses became truly musealised. Tinniswood presents the case of Hampton Court as one of the pivotal examples in this process because from 1838 it no longer functioned as a living space but solely as a museum (Figure 5.6). It opened to the general public, a new initiative which meant that the masses were also welcomed. The fact that the opening hours extended to Sunday, when the working classes had a day off, meant that the controlling social factors which had always played such an important role in the admission of visitors no longer existed. Encounters in the museum with men and women who were previously excluded from visits to elite houses raised a lot of eyebrows, and worse. It was said that the presence of the working classes must be bad for the building, since they would no doubt molest and steal, despite the safety measures (including the erection of balustrades) that were taken to protect the furniture and paintings.61 Others defended the new visitors and realised, correctly, that a new era had started. Tinniswood links this development to William Gilpin’s novel idea that castles and country houses belonged to ‘the nation’ at large rather than to the noble families.62 In agreement with Tinniswood, our research confirms that, while various



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initial museological measures were taken in the second half of the eighteenth century, it was only in the first half of the nineteenth century that our protagonists started to frequently discuss tickets, opening hours, brochures and tour guides (‘walking vademecums’) for the castles, palaces and country houses they visited. At Windsor Castle, tourists could buy their tickets in London, as Lady Rethaan Macaré-Ontijd mentioned in 1851. A museological infrastructure for these institutions now seems to have emerged, and immediately travellers seem to have been influenced by what has been called the wave of ‘anti-tourism’.63 As more and more people travelled, and increasingly to the same places as a result of the professionalisation of travel guides such as Baedeker’s, tourists developed a wish to distinguish themselves from other tourists, claiming to have seen more authentic sites or, in the case of visits to country houses, to have seen more of the house than was usual.64 Visitors now compared castles and country houses with the professional museums they had become familiar with. Tour guides who showed them disappointingly little of the sites were commonly disliked. They were believed to be greedy, to move too fast from one room to the next and to be impolite and inflexible, relating the same story over and over again.65 At Hampton Court around 1850, Dutch visitors complained that they did not get enough time to see the paintings, and one traveller had to wait three hours before he could see the cartoons: when he arrived at 11 am, a sign at the gate indicated that the palace was not accessible until 2 pm. When he visited the Tower he had to rush through the various rooms, with his tour guide rattling his lines for the ‘millionth time’.66 Conclusion A visit to a castle, country house or palace in the heyday of the Grand Tour was usually exactly that: a visit to a nobleman’s home on the way to the highlights of the tour. The sites did not count as principal attractions of the tour, even though Grand Tourists sought, and were pleased to gain access to, the grand palaces in Italian cities and elsewhere. This changed with the advent of the short pleasure trip. In England some of the most canonical lieux de mémoire were castles and country houses, as they were for the Hungarian visitors studied by Fatsar (Chapter 7). Country house owners who travelled were keen to compare their own houses, parks and collections with those of their English counterparts; others were curious to see how those a little higher on the social ladder lived and, by peeping into house and garden, satisfied their curiosity. Moreover, the English landscape gardens and the positioning of the houses in the gardens offered the visitors Romantic views that they could not yet find at home. How did these English houses compare with the Dutch equivalents more familiar to visitors from the Netherlands? The Dutch valued English country

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houses and palaces according to four criteria: beauty, architectural style, size and cost, which together resulted in an assessment of good or bad taste. NeoPalladian and baroque architecture was seen as fit for palaces and houses while, for a long time, Tudor styles and more gothic elements were said to be old-­ fashioned. The luxury of many of the palaces astounded almost every Dutch visitor. This was especially true for the paintings and tapestries that adorned the walls of these houses. Equally, the gardens and parks surprised the Dutch: their size, their design, the number of deer seen in the parks and the level of care that went into the gardens. Classical architecture in combination with gardens and parks laid out in the latest fashion testified to the good taste of the country house owners.67 Generally speaking, English taste was thought to be exquisite, Groshans writing: ‘The country houses of the English nobility surpass all that one can imagine.’68 The size and cost of many English houses made the Dutch gasp for air, but both aspects had little effect on the issue of good or bad taste. As the son of a burgomaster, Rutger Metelerkamp (1772–1836), noted that ‘one must recognise that the taste of the English in the construction of country houses, certainly the simplest, deserves imitation’.69 Such imitation can be found especially in the English Gardens that were laid out at Dutch country houses, as in the rest of Europe (see Chapters 2 and 7). The architecture and interior styles of the English country houses had less impact on the design of the Dutch country houses: some elements were used, but French styles and fashion were still the most influential. Even though official country house and castle museums did not exist in England before approximately 1825, it is appropriate to discuss museological practices with regard to country houses and castles, given the fact that visits to these places became widespread, even in the case of the smaller sites. Moreover, country houses and castles were visited long before they might be regarded as museums; as yet we understand too little of the nature of these visits. This chapter has therefore attempted to show that one way to enable a better understanding of the phenomenon is through an analysis of travel accounts. The fact that these trips to country houses touch on some of the major themes in early modern history, such as the Romantic movement, tourism, nationalism and heritage awareness, means that the phenomenon warrants a thorough study. Notes  1 G. Verhoeven, ‘Foreshadowing Tourism: Looking for Modern and Obsolete Features – or Some Missing Link – in Early Modern Travel Behavior (1675–1750)’, Annals of Tourism Research, 42 (2013), pp. 275–6.  2 S. West, ‘Heritage and Class’, in R. Harrison (ed.), Understanding the Politics of Heritage (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2010), pp. 270–303.



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 3 See for instance C. zum Kolk, J. Boutier, B. Klesmann and F. Moureau (eds), Voyageurs étrangers à la cour de France (1589–1789) (Rennes: Presses Universitaires de Rennes, 2014) and G. de Beer and A. M. Rousseau, Voltaire’s British Visitors (Geneva: Institut et Musée Voltaire, 1967).  4 J. Urry, The Tourist Gaze, 2nd edn (London: SAGE Publications, 2005), pp. 1, 2–5; M. Foucault, Surveiller et punir: naissance de la prison (Paris: Gallimard, 1975).  5 See for instance A. Aughey, The Politics of Englishness (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2007).  6 A. Tinniswood, The Polite Tourist: Four Centuries of Country House Visiting (London: National Trust, 1998).  7 See for instance R. Wilson and A. Mackley, The Building of the English Country House, 1660–1880, 2nd edn (London: Hambledon Continuum, 2007); J. Anderson, ‘Remaking the Space: The Plan and the Route in Country-House Guidebooks from 1770 to 1815’, Architectural History, 54 (2011), pp. 195, 212; J. Stobart and M. Rothery, Consumption and the Country House (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016).  8 Anna Frank-van Westrienen has written about the Dutch Grand Tour in De groote tour: tekening van de educatiereis der Nederlanders in de zeventiende eeuw (Amsterdam: Noord-Hollandse Uitgeversmaatschappij, 1983); Gerrit Verhoeven has researched the Dutch Grand Tour and pleasure trips in Anders reizen? Evoluties in vroegmoderne reiservaringen van Hollandse en Brabantse elites (1600–1750) (Hilversum: Uitgeverij Verloren, 2009).  9 Frank-van Westrienen, De groote tour, p. 247. 10 Ibid., p. 248. 11 Ibid., p. 243. 12 Verhoeven, Anders reizen?, pp. 48, 150; Verhoeven, ‘Foreshadowing Tourism’, pp. 265, 267–8. 13 Frank-van Westrienen, De Groote Tour, pp. 1–2, 8–9; J. Towner, ‘The Grand Tour: A Key Phrase in the History of Tourism’, Annals of Tourism, 12 (1985), pp. 298– 301, 310, 313. 14 Verhoeven, Anders reizen?, p. 304. 15 Ibid., p. 306. 16 Ibid., p. 279. 17 Ibid., p. 99. 18 W. Siebers, ‘Bildung auf Reisen: Bemerkungen zur Peregrinatio academica, Gelehrten- und Gebildetenreise’, in M. Maurer (ed.), Neue Impulse der Reiseforschung (Berlin: Akademie Verlag, 1999), pp. 177–88; Verhoeven, Anders reizen?, p. 105; Verhoeven, ‘Foreshadowing Tourism’, pp. 275–7. 19 R. Dekker, ‘Van Grand Tour tot treur- en sukkelreis’, Opossum, 13 (1994), p. 17; H. Ronnes and B. van Toor, ‘Op bezoek bij de adel: de buitenplaats als “proto museum” vanaf de late zeventiende tot de late achttiende eeuw’, Virtus, 21 (2014), pp. 90–1. 20 B. Dolan, Ladies of the Grand Tour (London: Flamingo, 2002), pp. 5, 7–8, 12; Verhoeven, ‘Foreshadowing Tourism’, pp. 271–5. 21 One of them, Hendrik Fagel the elder (1706–1790), travelled to England twice, in 1727 and 1770. As a member of a ruling family he was rich enough to travel to England several times.

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22 B. Kirshenblatt-Gimblett, Destination Culture: Tourism, Museums and Heritage (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998), p. 21. 23 Verhoeven, Anders reizen?, p. 352. 24 Ibid., p. 190. 25 Ibid., pp. 269, 272. 26 G. McCracken, Culture and Consumption: New Approaches to the Symbolic Character of Consumer Goods and Activities (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1988). 27 R. Koster, ‘De invloed van esthetische ontwikkelingen op de reisbeleving: de waardering van Engelse en Duitse adellijke residenties door Nederlandse reizigers in de achttiende eeuw’, Virtus, 22 (2015), p. 72. 28 B. Bekker, Beschrijving van de reis door de Verenigde Nederlanden, Engeland en Frankrijk in het jaar 1683 (Ljouwert: Fryske Akademy, 1998), p. 43. 29 This confirms the findings of Frank-van Westrienen and Verhoeven that castles and palaces did not rank among the most popular sites in London in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries; only the Tower of London was appreciated, and not Whitehall, St James’s Palace, Westminster and Kensington Palace (Frank-van Westrienen, De groote tour, p. 245; Verhoeven, Anders reizen?, p. 307). 30 Koster, ‘De invloed’, pp. 72–4. 31 ‘Dubbel interessant voor de wijl het vóór de revolutie door onse Koininglijke famille bewoond is geworden, en vroeger reeds door Willem d derden was bewoond geweets’. Stadsarchief Amsterdam, Amsterdam (hereafter SA), Archive Familie Backer, 172:665, journal of D. J. Alewijn, ‘Journaal van Dirk Jacob Alewijn van een reis naar Londen’, 1825, p. 23. 32 Koster, ‘De invloed’, p. 77. 33 P. de la Court, De reizen der De la Courts: 1641, 1700, 1710 (Leiden, 1928), pp. 97, 100, 101, 108; C. Huygens, Journaal van Constantijn Huygens, den zoon, van 21 ­october 1688 tot 2 sept. 1696, vol. I (Utrecht: Kemink & Zoon, 1876), p. 35; Nationaal Archief, The Hague (hereafter NA), 2.21.070, 75, journal of M. de Leeuw, ‘Reis naar Engeland en Duitsland’, 1799, p. 24v; J. Meerman, Eenige berichten omtrent Groot-Brittannië en Ierland (The Hague, 1787), pp. 189–91. 34 Court, De reizen, p. 97. 35 NA, 1.10.29, 53, journal of H. Fagel the elder, ‘Eigenhandig journaal door Henrik Fagel van zijn reis naar Engeland’, 1727, pp. 15, 28; M. Girouard, Life in the English Country House (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1978), p. 154; P. Camper and B. Nuijens, Petri Camperi itinera in Angliam, 1748–1785 (Amsterdam: Amstelodami, 1939), p. 76; Koninklijke Bibliotheek, The Hague (hereafter KB), 133 G 13, part 1, journal of J. Meerman, ‘Reijze door Engeland vertrokken Hellevoetsluis’, 1774–76, pp. 50, 51; NA, 2.21.070, 75, Leeuw, ‘Reis naar Engeland en Duitsland’, p. 33v; SA, Archive Familie Luden en aanverwante Families, 922, journal of J. Luden, ‘Reis naar Engeland’, 1823, p. 13. 36 Stobart and Rothery, Consumption and the Country House. 37 A. van der Willigen, Aantekeningen op een togtje door een gedeelte van Engeland in het jaar 1823 (Haarlem, 1824). pp. 309, 326. 38 Tinniswood, Polite Tourist, p. 80. 39 Koster, ‘De invloed’, p. 73.



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40 See for example Camper and Nuijens, Petri Camperi itinera, p. 76; KB, 133 G 13, Meerman, ‘Reijze door Engeland’, p. 50; NA, 2.21.070, 75, Leeuw, ‘Reis naar Engeland en Duitsland’, p. 33v; Willigen, Aantekeningen, p. 87. 41 ‘Hier overtrof alles de grootste verwagting die ik er ooit van kon hebben. En nooit heb ik iets van die natuur gezien waarover ik meer verrukt was, zijnde hier alles zuiver natuurlijk, of liever de natuur door de kunst zodanig geconserveerd en verbeeterd, dat men ieder ogenblik door de aangenaamste verandering dan van water, dan van heuveltjes, dan van bouw of wegland gesurpreneerd word.’ H. Schultens, Een alleraangenaamste reys: eigenhandige dagelijksche aanteekeningen van Hendrik Albert Schultens nopens zijn verblijf in Engeland in de Jaren 1772 en 1773: met oorspronkelijke bijlagen, introduction by C. van Eekeren and E. Kwant (Leiden: Lugdunum Batavorum, 1991), p. 27. 42 Koster, ‘De invloed’, pp. 67, 72–3, 77–9; D. Watkin, The English Vision: The Picturesque in Architecture, Landscape and Garden Design (London: Harper & Row, 1982), pp. 1–3, 31, 45, 52–3; J. van den Bergh, Mijn uitstapjen naar Engeland in de lente van 1854 (Arnhem, 1855), p. 81. Further research is required to see whether  this Dutch preference for classical architecture in this period was exceptional. 43 Court, De reizen, p. 108. 44 H. Cramer, Kunstreis door Frankrijk, Zwitserland, Italië en Engeland, vol. IV (Amsterdam: J. Cramer, 1835), p. 231; KB, 73 F 17, journal of R. Metelerkamp, ‘Verslag van reis door Duitsland, Oostenrijk, Denemarken, Zweden, Engeland, Schotland, Frankrijk en België’, 1798–1802; Bekker, Beschrijving, p. 69. 45 Willigen, Aantekeningen, p. 88; Koster, ‘De invloed’, p. 74. 46 E. Troosting, Veertien dagen in Engeland in 1849 (Dordrecht: H. Lagerweij, 1851), pp. 80–1. 47 Ibid., p. 80; SA, Archive Familie Van Lennep en Aanverwante Families, 238:64, Briefwisseling tussen Hendrik Aarnoud van Lennep en Anna Louisa bij zijn reis naar Engeland, letter of A. van Lennep, 9 June 1834. 48 W. Gilpin, Three Essays: On Picturesque Beauty, on Picturesque Travel and on Sketching Landscape (London: R. Blamire, 1794), pp. 44–5. 49 Bekker, Beschrijving, p. 43; Court, De reizen, p. 104; NA, 1.10.29, 53, of H. Fagel the elder, ‘Eigenhandig journaal’, p. 35. 50 Tinniswood, Polite Tourist, p. 63. 51 Ronnes and Toor, ‘Op bezoek’, p. 94. 52 D. van Velden, Journaal van W. H. J. Baron van Westreenen van zijn reizen naar Londen, Cambridge en Oxford in de jaren 1834 en 1835 (The Hague: Rijksmuseum Meermanno-Westreenianum, 1972), p. 19; Troosting, Veertien dagen, p. 96; Ronnes and Toor, ‘Op bezoek’, p. 104. 53 Camper and Nuijens, Petri Camperi itinera, p. 76. 54 van Velden, Journaal, pp. 41–2. 55 Bergh, Mijn uitstapjen, pp. 59, 60, 63; Ronnes and Toor, ‘Op bezoek’, p. 102. 56 Camper and Nuijens, Petri Camperi itinera, p. 82; KB, 133 G 13, Meerman, ‘Reijze door Engeland’, p. 21. 57 NA, 2.21.070, 75, Leeuw, ‘Reis naar Engeland en Duitsland’, pp. 24v, 33v.

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58 Bergh, Mijn uitstapjen, p. 91. 59 Troosting, Veertien dagen, p. 90. 60 F. Rethaan Macaré, Londen en de wereldtentoonstelling of veertien dagen in de hoofdstad van Groot-Brittannië in den jahre 1851 (Houten, 1852), pp. 50, 64, 79; Bergh, Mijn uitstapjen, p. 111. 61 J. Crook and M. Port, The History of the King’s Works, vol. VI: 1782–1851 (London: HM Stationery Office, 1973), pp. 329, 330, 333; Tinniswood, Polite Tourist, pp. 139–45. 62 Tinniswood, Polite Tourist, p. 121. 63 J. Buzard, The Beaten Track: European Tourism, Literature, and the Ways to Culture, 1800–1918 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1993), pp. 4, 80–3. 64 Velden, Journaal, pp. 28, 41, 78. 65 SA, Archive Familie Van Lennep en Aanverwante Families 238, letter of A.  van Lennep, 30 May 1834; SA, Archive P. G. Holthuyzen, 387:2, journal of P. Holthuyzen, ‘Reis naar Engeland’, 1837, pp. 32–3; Rethaan Macaré, Londen en de wereldtentoonstelling), p. 79; Bergh, Mijn uitstapjen, pp. 184, 193. 66 Bergh, Mijn uitstapjen, pp. 81–90, 111–12. 67 Koster, ‘De invloed’, pp. 70–3, 78–9. 68 ‘De buitenverblijven van den Engelschen adel overtreffen alles, wat men zich daarvan voorstellen kan.’ Troosting, Veertien dagen, p. 89. 69 ‘Men moet herkennen dat de smaak der Engelsche in het aanleggen van buitenplaatsen, zeker van de eenvoudigste[,] navolging verdient’ (author’s emphasis). KB, 73 F 17, Metelerkamp, ‘Verslag van reis door Duitsland’.

Arthur Young and picture collections

6

‘Worth viewing by travellers’: Arthur Young and country house picture collections in the late eighteenth century Jocelyn Anderson

This collection … will afford any spectator the greatest entertainment; for here are pictures that must kindle raptures in those who remark nature alone; and others sufficient to afford the most noble enjoyment to the most learned eye. Britannica curiosa, describing the picture collection at Burghley1

When Britannica curiosa was published, country house tourism was in the process of establishing itself as a popular pastime. From the 1770s onwards, the number of people touring Britain each summer grew to unprecedented levels: while nothing like visitor numbers today, hundreds of people were now making trips, and a nascent tourism industry, including inns, guides and guidebooks, emerged to accommodate them.2 Among the most important types of destination for these tourists were country houses, and in particular country houses with art collections. Many country houses were open to genteel travellers, and offered them the opportunity to view Old Master paintings, large collections of portraits and collections of antiquities. The identities of these collections as tourist attractions and the subsequent perception of them as being of national importance depended not only on their accessibility to tourists, but also on their publicity. Because they were widely written about and celebrated by travel writers, they became prestigious for the public, and integral to contemporary perceptions of British culture. In order to appreciate how their fame developed, it is essential to examine how early British travel writers represented these collections. Tourists and travellers’ descriptions of country house art collections appear in manuscript journals much earlier than they do in publications, a distinction which is crucial to histories of tourism. Jeremiah Milles, for example, toured England in the late 1730s and viewed picture collections at several houses, including Easton Neston, Althorp, Burghley and Knole.3 Horace Walpole had begun touring country houses by 1751, and in his journals he made long lists

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of the pictures on display, noting their subjects, the artists who had created them and his views of their quality, giving verdicts such as ‘fine’, ‘very fine’ and ‘poorly painted’.4 These tourists were from the highest levels of society, however, and some historians have seen tourism of this period as a strictly elite practice, confined to ‘a minority within a minority’.5 Though it is true that many early tourists were aristocrats, by the 1760s interest in country houses and their art collections was increasingly part of public discourse: in The English Connoisseur in 1766, Thomas Martyn called on collectors ‘to make their cabinets and collections as accessible to the curious as is consistent with their safety’.6 There was also growing attention to the specific artistic merits of pictures: William Gilpin, for instance, made a distinction between the ­‘furniture-picture’, which needed to please viewers from the moment they first saw it, and the ‘cabinet-picture’, which required an examination of its parts to recognise its value; highlighting the difference between a picture’s decorative potential and its ability to withstand close examination encouraged visitors to country houses to reflect on whether or not paintings truly deserved their attention.7 Publications like Martyn’s and Gilpin’s were a critical element of how the viewing of country house picture collections increasingly moved beyond elite circles. One of the earliest travel writers to exploit this burgeoning interest in country house art collections was Arthur Young (1741–1820). Today, Young is primarily known as eighteenth-century Britain’s most prolific writer on agricultural reform.8 In his writings, he discussed all manner of topics associated with agriculture, including crops, livestock, soils, farming implements, labour costs and land improvements, and he has long been a significant figure for historians of agriculture and the economy: Liam Brunt has argued that the ‘quality, quantity, and scope’ of the agricultural data in Young’s writings make them ‘far superior to any other data source’ from that period.9 Among his earliest works are a series of books with a significantly broader scope: A Six Weeks Tour, through the Southern Counties of England and Wales (1768), A Six Months Tour through the North of England (1769/70)10 and The Farmer’s Tour through the East of England (1771) record Young’s observations from his travels through England, primarily on agriculture, but also on country houses, their art collections and their gardens. The ‘Descriptions of the Seats of the Nobility and Gentry’ (a subtitle of A Six Months Tour through the North of England) were a substantial element of all three books, and they represent a significant contribution to eighteenth-­century tourist literature on country houses. In the years following the publication of Young’s Tour books, numerous domestic travel narratives were published: in 1798, when William Mavor published an anthology of tours of Britain, he observed that he had done so because ‘The various tours … which have been published within the last thirty years, amount to many volumes’; his starting



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point, 1768, is the year in which Young published his first Tour.11 His works were sufficiently popular to spark new editions soon after publication, and for future travel writers his books were invaluable resources; John Brewer has argued that because Young’s Tour books were saturated with descriptions rich in aestheticizing language, they became ‘a seminal influence’.12 Young’s approach to describing country houses was generally consistent: he normally began with the house’s situation and its façade(s), then described the interior, often providing considerable information about the paintings on display, and finally discussed the gardens; often, he devoted most of his attention to the interior and the gardens. Historians of landscape have examined the latter descriptions: most notably, John Barrell has described Young as a ‘connoisseur of landscape’ and has examined how his texts addressed agricultural land and picturesque and sublime views.13 Passages about the interiors, however, and their extensive commentary about the art collections displayed within them, have received comparatively little attention. Written at a moment when travel writers were just beginning to publish detailed descriptions of country house art collections, Young’s books represent a relatively early attempt to place elite practices of tourism and criticism before the public. His approach indicates that while his primary purpose was to publish his research on agriculture, his writings about houses and picture collections were intended to be read as popular art criticism which would be useful to anyone making a tour of their own, or merely imagining one. ‘Take particular notice of this picture’: embedding descriptions of country houses within an agricultural tour Although there were tourists writing privately about country house art collections in the mid-eighteenth century, to publish accounts of them was still relatively unusual, and Young positioned his descriptions of houses carefully. His decision to include these descriptions was questioned by his contemporaries and continues to be questioned by historians: his books were always primarily presented as works on agriculture, and the connection between livestock and seed and portraits and history paintings is not immediately apparent. Young’s own explanations and those offered by later commentators stress that the descriptions of country houses were distinct from the agricultural content, and might be appreciated by readers who were not especially interested in farming. Touring country houses was increasingly being perceived as an activity appropriate for anyone with polite taste, and it was for this audience that Young published the descriptions, encouraging his readers to admire country houses as cultural tourist attractions. In writing the Tour books and in electing to incorporate descriptions of country houses and their art collections into them, Young was probably attempting

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to advance his position in society as well as his income. He was in the process of trying to establish himself: he had become interested in farming while in search of a profession, and in 1763 he accepted the tenancy of a farm at Bradfield, Suffolk, which belonged to his mother. While farming there, he began collecting books on agriculture, and he published The Farmer’s Letters to the People of England in 1767; that year, he and his family left Bradfield, and over the summer he began making trips to visit possible new farms.14 It was these journeys which formed the basis of his Tour, through the Southern Counties, and the success of that publication led to the subsequent (considerably longer) tours. Writing became integral to his professional identity, at a time when his financial difficulties were significant; historians have argued that his social position was also a precarious one. Beth Fowkes Tobin has described it as ‘ambiguous’, noting that he was ‘Neither of the lesser gentry nor of the servant class’ but instead positioned himself as a well-educated, expert professional man, albeit one whose expertise was in farming.15 Similarly, Stephen Bending has argued that as a man from ‘a minor gentry family with no money’, he was ‘on the edge of propertied gentility’ and has suggested that ‘The tours, in establishing a gentlemanly vision of agriculture, were to secure also Young’s own gentlemanly status.’16 Young’s ambitions in this respect may have contributed to his decision to include extensive commentary on the art, architecture and landscapes associated with country houses, all topics more closely associated with the gentleman than the farmer. As a writer whose previous publications had dealt mainly with agriculture, Young did not have an authoritative position from which to write his descriptions of houses and their art collections, and in introducing them he emphasised that he was not a connoisseur. How he acquired his confidence in this area is unclear, though there were various books that he might have consulted for general guidance on art criticism.17 Young was very clear about the role of the descriptions within his work, and in introducing each of his Tour books, he outlined his reasons for including them. He was conscious of the tension between the purported goal of the books – to examine the science of agriculture – and the amount of content about country houses. In Tour, through the Southern Counties, he noted: The professed design of my sketches is husbandry; but it would have been great stupidity to pass very near a celebrated house without viewing it; and when seen, there are so many things worthy of mentioning, that I thought they would serve to vary the tenor of my letters in general, and render them somewhat more entertaining.18

In this account, the inclusion of country houses is a matter of convenience, a vague awareness that some houses were already well known as tourist attractions and an intention of making the writing about agriculture somewhat more pleasurable by introducing variety. When Young published his Tour through



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the North, not only did he return to this issue, but he presented a more sophisticated justification: I should apologise for introducing so many descriptions of houses, paintings, ornamented parks, lakes, &c. I am sensible they have little to do with agriculture, but there is, nevertheless, an utility in their being known. They are a proof, and a very important one, of the riches and the happiness of this kingdom: No traveller can here move far, without something to attract his notice, – art or nature will perpetually catch his eye. – An agriculture that even reaches perfection.  – Architecture, painting, sculpture, and the art of adorning grounds, every where exhibit productions that speak a wealth, a refinement – a taste, which only great and luxurious nations can know.19

The contrast between these explanations is telling: whereas in the first book Young presented the house descriptions as something he had included simply because of opportunity and potential interest, in the second he argued that both country houses and agriculture ultimately represent Britain’s wealth and happiness. The rationale had shifted from an issue of practicality to one of politics and economics, and to comment on the houses was not just to take an interest in sights which happen to be celebrated but to reflect on national culture, a reasoning which was shared by a number of other writers in this period.20 The political angle is particularly interesting: Young was not alone in suggesting that country houses were proof of the strength of the British economy and, by extension, of its government, but at the same time he would have been aware that much of the wealth spent on houses did not necessarily come from agriculture, so the connection between successful farming and magnificent houses was by no means a simple causal relationship. In his third Tour, Young suggested that the two topics were entwined in his approach to writing, claiming that ‘descriptions of houses or gardens’ rendered ‘the papers more general, and of course more useful’ and that they had ‘introduced me to some of my most valuable husbandry articles; much intelligence in agriculture in this work … would not have been there had I rejected all matters foreign to agriculture’.21 Bending has suggested that the connections between farming and art and architecture were critical to what Young hoped to achieve, arguing that he was trying to cultivate a reputation as a polite gentleman by ‘offering husbandry as agricultural technology and agriculture as scientific experimentation for the national good, divorced from personal profit and therefore a happy companion to gardening, architecture, painting, and popular aesthetics’.22 In this reading, the inclusion of information about country houses shapes how the entire project is read. The house descriptions should not be seen as mere supplementary passages, however: the Tour books make clear that Young anticipated readers for whom these passages would be their primary interests. He knew that his readers were not solely reading for farming data: his papers include letters from his readers,

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and some emphasise the pleasure (as opposed to merely the information) they received from reading.23 The most revealing letter is one from Walter Harte, dated 9 July 1768: in it, he notes the ‘great pleasure’ he had in reading Tour, through the Southern Counties, expresses interest in Young’s intention to tour the north, offers to write to the Marquess of Rockingham on Young’s behalf and finally asks Young to ‘do all the justice you can to my Lord Rockingham’s Seat, house, & agriculture’.24 Harte described himself as a cultivator, but his reference to the house clearly indicates a wider interest. Young even acknowledged that there might be readers who ‘quickly turn over every leaf that concerns husbandry, and dwell alone on the description of houses and gardens’.25 Passages about houses were suitable for any reader, but they would have been particularly useful for potential tourists, for whom he offered specific tips: at Wilton, for example, while discussing a Descent from the Cross which he believed to be by Durer, he wrote, ‘I beg you will take particular notice of this picture, if ever you see Wilton; for it is by far the greatest work I have seen of this master’s.’26 When he published the Tour through the East (and the second edition of Tour through the North), he elected to separate the descriptions of the houses from the agricultural information altogether, explaining that he had ‘thrown all such descriptions into notes, that they may not the least interrupt the mere farming reader’.27 In doing this, he simultaneously made them easier to find for the non-farming reader; because of their sheer length, the footnotes filled large sections of the pages, such that in some descriptions, it is the agricultural information which appears to be supplementary. That he chose to continue to incorporate all this material suggests that he was determined to continue to contribute to the literature of domestic tourism. Young’s discussions of the art and architecture of country houses were of great interest to reviewers commenting on his books. While not all of them admired the descriptions – one specifically recommended that Young ‘keep out of picture galleries, and direct his observations altogether to the open fields’ – many directed their readers’ attention to these passages.28 A literary journal discussing his Tour, through the Southern Counties declared Young to be ‘a man of Wit and Taste: and the Descriptions which he gives of many fine Seats in the Country, shew that he has a great Knowledge of the fine Arts’; for this reviewer, Young’s acknowledgement that he was not an expert apparently did not matter.29 In analysing this book, The Critical Review noted that while it expected anyone interested in agriculture to master the information Young provided, ‘There is, however, another division of this excellent publication, which recommends itself to readers of every denomination; we mean the author’s descriptions of, and observations upon, the beauties of art and nature which fall in with his Tour.’30 The following year, a reviewer of Tour through the North commented, ‘though agriculture is this gentleman’s profession, and the chief subject of his publication … he talks in a far more decisive tone as a connoisseur



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in painting and architecture, than as a farmer’.31 Similarly, in its review, The Monthly Review observed that ‘the Reader who seeks only the exercise of taste or amusement’ would not be disappointed because ‘the Author has not omitted to introduce a particular account of such works of art and elegance as adorn the several provinces through which he passed’.32 Ultimately, these reviews were encouraging the public to consider Young’s work on two distinct levels. All this suggests that while house descriptions may indeed have helped Young socially, they would certainly have made his books appeal to a wider readership. The domestic tour was already a popular genre in its own right, though it would become much more so in the following decades. First published in 1724, Daniel Defoe’s Tour through the Whole Island of Great Britain had remained a well-known text long after his death in 1731; new editions were published in 1738, 1742, 1748, 1753, 1762, 1769, 1778 and 1779, and each one incorporated revised and new material.33 Less prominently, Philip Luckombe had published The Beauties of England in 1757, new editions of which appeared in 1764 and 1767, and William Toldervy had published England and Wales Described in 1762. While all of these writers occasionally commented on country houses, none of them offered the type of rich descriptions of art collections that Young provided. In his accounts, Young provided readers with both practical guidance to viewing the collections and a critical position they could adopt during their visits. For those readers who could not or did not wish to visit the house in question, Young’s descriptions may have saved them the ­trouble  – facilitating the kind of vicarious tourism also seen in Chapter 4 above. He treated the picture collections that he visited as collections of public interest: while hardly any collections had been formed with tourists’ interests in mind, Young encouraged his readers to judge them in this way. Young and art collections Young began formally touring country houses in 1767, by which time many houses had begun to display art collections which were not only large in number but increasingly grand in the status they aspired to. Until the mid-eighteenth century, many families kept their best Old Master paintings in London and hung mostly portraits in country houses. That began to change in the 1730s, however, and by the time Young began touring, several houses had substantial collections on display.34 The publicity that Young offered these collections made them more accessible and better known beyond elite circles. In writing about houses’ interiors, Young usually gave much more attention to the art collection than to the decorations or furniture, often providing a formal list of the paintings (and sometimes sculptures) on display. Providing readers with the titles (or subjects) of the works and, wherever possible, the names of the artists who had painted them, these lists encompassed dozens of paintings

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and/or sculptures; at Castle Howard alone, for example, the list includes over 180 paintings.35 This type of project was not entirely without precedent: Carlo Gambarini had published A Description of the Earl of Pembroke’s Pictures, which examined the collections at Wilton, in 1731, and Horace Walpole had published Ædes Walpolianæ, a catalogue of the paintings at Houghton, in 1747; simple lists of the pictures at Blenheim and Ditchley appeared in A Pocket Companion for Oxford (1759).36 Most importantly, Martyn’s The English Connoisseur, presented as an anthology of catalogues of paintings intended for ‘the young student in the polite arts’, was largely concerned with private collections in England and examined the pictures at thirteen country houses.37 By this time, there was significant interest in country houses’ paintings: in reviewing Martyn’s book, one reviewer declared, ‘We have long wished to see a work of this kind executed by the hand of a master.’38 Young was by no means a master, but for the majority of the estates he visited, he would have been one of the earliest writers, if not the first, to publish any type of record of the pictures. His lists vary in scope: at some houses he named only a few paintings, while at others he listed dozens; some lists he presented as comprehensive catalogues, and others, he explained, merely recorded works which ‘struck me most’.39 In total, in Tour, through the Southern Counties he listed paintings at seven houses; in Tour through the North, twenty-two; and in Tour through the East, twenty; while this is not a large group, it is a diverse one in that Young included both grand houses which routinely attracted tourists and much smaller houses which rarely appear in other travel books of this period. In the face of increasing public curiosity about country house art collections, these lists became a significant resource for anyone interested in touring or imagining a tour of these spaces. In creating the lists of artworks, Young would often have been forced to rely on the owner of the house for information. Commenting on his visit to Kedleston, for example, Young thanked Lord Scarsdale for ‘favouring me with a catalogue of the paintings’ (in fact, this catalogue had already been printed as a pamphlet guide for visitors).40 He expressed frustration when information was not available: in his description of Hovingham, a footnote reports that ‘The person who shewed the house, knew none, either of the pictures or drawings.’41 In his account of his visit to Temple Newsham (i.e. Temple Newsam), he complained: Lord Irwin’s collection of pictures is not only capital, but very numerous. The following are those which struck me the most. I cannot add the masters, as the person who shews the house, knows neither the subject, or painter of scarce any; a circumstance to be regretted, when a catalogue is so easily written for the information of the curious traveller.42

Young was by no means alone in experiencing this frustration (see Chapter 2): whether or not there was a catalogue available to tourists was purely a matter



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of chance, and even when one was provided, there was no guarantee as to its quality; for example, while commenting on the catalogue at Holkham, Craven Ord noted that ‘There is a house catalogue of the paintings &c which they will let you have – but it is written in a confused incorrect manner, and not of much service.’43 In listing the pictures at Temple Newsam, Young identified paintings by their subject matter and sometimes linked them to artists, such that the nature of the collection is at least suggested even if it is not captured by a catalogue. As texts, the lists functioned as the foundations of extensive commentary on the paintings and their significance as artworks. Many of these comments were quite brief, such as ‘Guido. Daughter of Herodias. Very fine’ or ‘Dominichino. Conversion of St. Paul. Legs, arms, and lights!’, remarks Young made in response to pictures at Duncombe Park.44 There were, however, paintings which Young deemed particularly special. For these works, such as the ‘very famous … wonderfully fine’ Raphael at Okeover, he would write a full paragraph: there is such a diffusion, grace, ease and elegance over the whole piece that it strikes the spectator the moment he enters the room. The grouping of the Virgin and the two children is as happy, as imagination can conceive: the attitudes surprizingly caught. The turn of the Virgin’s head grace itself. The expression of the boys, particularly Christ, is full of animation; and tho’ not natural to the age, yet is it consistent with the idea of the artist, and uncommonly pleasing. The warmth and tenderness of the colouring cannot be exceeded; the mellow tints of the flesh are an animated representation of life; and the general harmony of the whole piece, admirable.45

Within the torrent of praise in this passage, Young repeatedly comments on the form of the painting. In doing so, he was effectively deploying a traditional language of art criticism, adopting it as his own despite his minimal experience. His frequent interest in very specific details in the paintings is typical of the precise methods of the connoisseur, a role normally conceived of as being reserved for aristocrats and other elite collectors. He distinguished between the total effect of the painting and excellence in its parts; at Houghton, for example, he described a Van Dyck portrait of Rubens’s wife as ‘A most celebrated picture: but not an agreeable one: what strikes me most are the hands and arms, which are finer than any I ever beheld.’46 Sometimes, he confidently linked the form of the painting on display to the artist’s oeuvre: at Duncombe Park, discussing a Venus and Adonis by Titian, he praised it for its colours and noted that few of Titian’s ‘works in his fine brilliant glowing manner, are to be met with in England’ and that most of the Titians he had seen ‘are of weak faded colouring, with none of that happy delicacy and pleasing expression, for which he is so famous’.47 The types of detail he singles out in these

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­ assages and in many others – the representation of specific parts of figures, p the d ­ rawing, the  colouring, the expression, the finishing of the painting – were  ­precisely those which critics accused connoisseurs of being too much invested in.48 Young’s position in relation to connoisseurship, however, is a complex one: he was not simply attempting to insert himself and his readers into an aristocratic domain. He was repeatedly self-deprecating about his critical abilities. In discussing Holkham, the first house visited on the southern tour, for example, he explained he intended to ‘express to you nothing but my feelings; I had rather praise what the critics would call an execrable piece, than be guided merely by the dictates of common fame: Many a Vernet may please me as well as a Claud’.49 Similarly, at Wanstead, he claimed, ‘I am no connoisseur in paintings, and may be so gothic as to praise a piece by a modern artist, when an antient one hangs by it.’50 By simultaneously adopting and rejecting connoisseurship, Young was placing his writings in a liminal and increasingly popular area of art criticism, one which would become crucial for later travel writers commenting on art collections at country houses. The connoisseur’s position was a contested one during this period, and it was no longer seen as exclusively elite. In his writings on connoisseurship, Jonathan Richardson had ‘asserted that knowing who painted a picture and how good it was could be deduced empirically by any clear-thinking person’ who spent time studying art.51 At the time Young was writing, the discourse of connoisseurship was increasingly being adopted for the newspaper reports of art exhibitions held in London. These reviews were aimed at a wide audience: Mark Hallett has argued that for an urban bourgeois public, they offered models of responses to artworks, a working vocabulary of art criticism which they could use ‘to fashion their own identities as informed spectators’ and vicarious involvement in exhibitions which would be entertaining whether or not they visited them.52 The public, popular criticism of newspapers and pamphlets is comparable to the confident and bold attitude which bubbles under the surface of the Tour books and occasionally erupts into strong judgements. On seeing a Luca Giordano painting of the death of Seneca at Blenheim, for instance, Young dismissed it as ‘without any expression of character, or the least trace of imagination’.53 Describing a visit to Burghley, a house celebrated for its pictures, he declared that one Correggio had colouring which ‘does not equal the idea one has formed of this great master’s genius’, and another was ‘unpleasing … the faces very ugly’.54 At Kiveton, he commented that in Rubens’s The Four Parts of the World, ‘The figures are those of Rubens, a pure fleshy female, but the beasts surprizingly fine; the panther equal to any thing ever painted, and the crocodile admirably done. The groupe vile.’55 In a particularly dramatic comment in North, in response to a painting at Hagley, he wrote, ‘The lady is a Rubens figure with a vengeance, and her attitude disgusting’.56 Clearly, Young



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was prepared to be completely frank about his judgements, regardless of the fact that he was visiting private collections. Young’s willingness to adopt such a forthright and critical approach to these collections is noteworthy for its lack of deference, an attitude which would have been striking in a publication of this period. He was writing at a time when it was still relatively unusual to publish negative comments about a gentleman’s private property, particularly if you were not a gentleman yourself. Matthew Craske has argued that before James Ralph published A Critical Review of the Publick Buildings, Statues and Ornaments in and around London and Westminster in 1734, a gentleman could build whatever he wished ‘without there being any published public comment as to whether that building constituted an improvement to the public realm’.57 Ralph, however, criticised the architectural patronage of his social superiors publicly, and in language that is at times extremely harsh. Young was writing thirty years later, but his willingness to criticise estates would still have been noticeably candid: when Uvedale Price published his An Essay on the Picturesque in 1794, he noted, ‘As Blenheim is the only place I have criticised by name, an apology is due to the noble possessor of it (to whom, on many accounts, I should be particularly sorry to give offence) for the freedom I have taken.’58 In this context, Young’s blunt analyses of paintings are a powerful demonstration of a sense of entitlement: just as he had no compunction about criticising a lack of catalogues or guides for visitors, he indicated that, gentlemen’s property or not, he and his readers had every right to judge paintings as they saw fit. This confidence and conviction sometimes attracted criticism. Following the publication of North, one article queried whether or not Young actually understood who had painted certain works; referring to his description of Kiveton, it notes: Speaking of a picture of the four evangelists by Titian, he tells us, they are ‘heavy and inexpressive, but the diffusion of light good, the air of the heads is fine, and the hands appear to me very well executed. – Paul Veronese’s Marriage of Cana, a strange groupe; the drapery very bad; nor is there any propriety of action: the expression is, however, strong.’ – Does not this description of those two paintings create a strong suspicion, that they are bad copies of excellent originals?59

In general, it was not uncommon for a country house art collection to display copies and for those copies to be recognised as such (see Chapter 2); it did not necessarily matter to tourists, and some country house guidebooks even indicated which collections the original pictures were in.60 For this reviewer, the issue was not the possibility of the copy but rather Young’s attitude to widely admired artists: ‘Though we highly applaud free-thinking in painting, and a disregard to the authority of all names where merit is wanting, yet this free-thinking sometimes grows into infidelity, and a too temerarious contempt

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of great masters.’61 The reviewer was effectively defending an art-historical canon by suggesting it was Young that was at fault, since he was unable to distinguish ‘bad copies’ of the great masters of whom he was not suitably respectful. The implication that Young needed more experience and better knowledge to accurately assess the collections he was touring was a tacit criticism of his position, but the success of Young’s writings about houses and the frequency with which they were referred to by other authors suggests that it was not a damning one. Young did note where he believed a picture to be a copy, or a work merely in the style of a well-known artist: whatever his background may have been, he was confident in his ability to be discerning about the paintings he saw, and his extensive travels in Britain had given him great familiarity with many artists’ works. At Narford, he introduced his account of the paintings as follows: as to the masters’ names I minute them as they pass at Narford, and without answering for their originality. I hint this, because the most pleasing picture in the house, the Virgin and Child, said to be by Guido, is precisely the same figures, attitude, airs, &c. as Mr. Butler’s Correggio, as appears by a print … whether it is a copy or an original, the colouring is fine, and the air of the head and attitude admirably graceful.62

This passage seems to suggest that rather than a painting’s status as the work of a prestigious artist, what mattered to Young was the technical skill displayed in it, an approach which would be particularly ideal for any tourist or reader whose experience in studying paintings was limited. Commenting on Young’s perceived ambivalence about artist’s names, John Barrell has argued that although Young might ‘question the authorship of copies and forgeries … he does not consider it important: the names are trade marks for him’.63 Young’s expressed frustration with the lack of information about artists’ names at some houses would suggest that they did in fact concern him, but he was certainly prepared to overlook them if necessary, an attitude which is markedly different from that espoused by collectors. Not only was Young distancing himself from the traditional position of the connoisseur; he was attentive to the emotional experience of a painting. His praise for the immediate, powerful impact that the Okeover Raphael had on the spectator was an experience he had with other paintings as well. Admiring Guido Reni’s Consultation of the Elders at Houghton, he claimed that it was the finest picture in the collection, ‘so wonderfully fine, that one cannot quickly leave off viewing it’, as if it had the power to capture the viewer’s gaze.64 At Temple Newsam, on seeing a portrait of the Duchess of Grafton, he reported that ‘The very first sight of this picture will extort from you, “Grace was in all her steps, heaven in her eye: In every gesture, dignity and love”.’65 Reflecting on the entire collection at Duncombe Park, he declared the greatest pictures



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on display would ‘awaken in the beholder the most rapturous delight’.66 This type of superlative language encourages Young’s readers to anticipate or envision the experience of viewing paintings while touring the country house as an ­emotional one: it resonates with a sense of awe, spectacle and sentiment rather than the close examination of the connoisseur. The vicarious thrill of the collection was also conveyed through attention to setting. Far from treating paintings as isolated objects, Young was deeply conscious of their positions within rooms, and he often framed his discussion of the paintings by commenting on the interior decorations. In a description of Ditchley, for instance, he offered the following description of the White Dining Room, a room he introduced as ‘highly ornamented’: The cieling is in compartments of white and gold; the cornice and frieze richly executed in the same; the pannels, window frames, and picture ones of the same: The glasses very elegant, and fine slabs of Siena marble. Here are Lely. Charles II. Dutchess of Cleveland. Kneller. The present Duke of Grafton’s great grand-father, and Lady Charlotte Fitzroy.67

Published accounts of country houses which incorporated observations on their interior decorations and furnishings as well as the artworks on display in a given room were unusual in the 1760s, though tourists sometimes adopted this mode of description in manuscript journals. At the time, rich descriptions of rooms were comparatively rare in general: in an examination of interiors in early eighteenth-century novels, Cynthia Wall has determined that while domestic interior spaces are made vivid for readers, this vividness is frequently achieved through implication rather than description; it was only later in the eighteenth century that explicit descriptions of rooms became more widespread.68 In presenting his accounts of paintings in this context, then, Young was offering his readers something unique, drawing attention to the paintings’ significance as elements of the broader display of the country house, a display that readers were tacitly invited to picture. Conclusions Young’s writings about country houses and their art collections were popular, and whatever reservations critics may have had about Young and his expertise, his work circulated widely and through multiple types of texts. Initially, when the Tour through the Southern Counties was published, The London Magazine reprinted several extracts, including descriptions of Houghton, Narford and Blenheim.69 Travel books combined acknowledged and unacknowledged quotations, if they did not resort to outright plagiarism: The Norfolk Tour (1773), for example, reprinted Young’s reactions to paintings at Rainham

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and Holkham.70 The most extreme version of this type of ‘quotation’ was using Young’s work as the basis for a new book, or pamphlet: A Description of Duncombe Park (1812) notes that it was ‘taken chiefly from Mr. Young’s Northern Tour … but varied and adapted to present circumstances’.71 This book presented Young’s readings of paintings alongside comments ‘by that respectable artist and connisseur [sic] the late Mr. Edward Dayes’, as if to stress that these men’s judgements could be treated as authoritative.72 As a group, these books are indicative of how the Tour books continued to be consulted and mined for material decades after they had first been published. They were not alone in receiving this type of treatment: in an analysis of contemporary travel literature, Charles L. Batten notes that ‘many an eighteenth-century hack eked out a few pounds for writing a bogus tour made up of materials stolen from authentic travel and geography books’.73 There is even a slight possibility that Young himself copied passages, but if he did it is unlikely that his copying was extensive: although his acknowledgement sections are extensive, he does not mention anyone actively contributing to the descriptions of houses, and in 1791, in reflecting on his career, he claimed that his Tour books were ‘often plundered rather than quoted, without a mark or atom of acknowledgement’.74 While this seems to have been a source of frustration to him, it is clear that he had a profound impact on how country houses were described in print in the late eighteenth century. In the years following the publication and success of his Tour books, Young went on to publish books describing travels in Ireland (1780) and in France (1793), two works which led him to further develop his work on the connections between agriculture, the arts and economic and political stability, a crucial issue in the years following the French Revolution. In Britain, many travel writers increasingly turned their attention to country house art collections. William Bray’s Sketch of a Tour into Derbyshire and Yorkshire (1778), for instance, commented on the pictures he encountered at Kedleston, Kiveton, Althorp and Woburn Abbey.75 When he published his Tour, Richard Joseph Sulivan not only commented on picture collections, he included brief biographies of ‘the celebrated painters, whose works we shall have such abundant cause to admire in the course of our journey’.76 Perhaps most revealingly, the decades following 1770 saw a rapid increase in the publication of country house guidebooks, many of which discussed art collections in great detail.77 All these publications played an important role in shaping the public perceptions of country house art collections: these were collections which had not been created for tourists’ benefit and were rarely arranged with tourists in mind, yet were popular tourist attractions nonetheless. That they became so was not a result of their owners’ choices, but rather of the achievements of a wide range of travel writers and art critics who publicised these collections. Arthur Young’s Tour books made a critical contribution to this field: whatever he hoped the descriptions of coun-



Arthur Young and picture collections

141

try houses might achieve for the Tour books, there can be no question of their s­ uitability for tourists interested in art and culture. He emphasised the importance of making picture collections legible, of judging them critically and of enjoying them regardless of their art-historical pedigree. In doing so, he helped establish collections created for private residences as critical cultural sites in the public sphere. Notes  1 Britannica curiosa, 6 vols (London: R. Snagg, 1776), vol. III, p. 323.  2 A. Tinniswood, The Polite Tourist: Four Centuries of Country House Visiting (London: National Trust, 1998), p. 88.  3 British Library, London, Add. MS 15776, Journals of the Rev. Jeremiah Milles, 1735–43.  4 Horace Walpole, Journals of Visits to Country Seats, published in P. Toynbee (ed.), ‘Horace Walpole’s Journals of Visits to Country Seats, &c’, Volume of the Walpole Society, 16 (1927–28), pp. 9–80, at pp. 18–19.  5 P. Mandler, The Fall and Rise of the Stately Home (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1997), p. 10.  6 T. Martyn, The English Connoisseur, 2 vols (London: L. Davis and C. Reymers, 1766), vol. I, p. vii.  7 W. Gilpin, Observations, Relative Chiefly to Picturesque Beauty, Made in the Year 1772, on Several Part of England, 2nd edn, 2 vols (London: R. Blamire, 1788), vol. I, p. 24.  8 For a list of his publications, see J. G. Gazley, The Life of Arthur Young, 1741–1820 (Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society, 1973), pp. 704–7.  9 L. Brunt, ‘Rehabilitating Arthur Young’, Economic History Review, 56 (2003), pp. 265–99, at pp. 294–5. 10 The book was actually published in December 1769; see n. 31 below. The quotation in the title of this chapter comes from the second edition, published in 1771. 11 W. Mavor, The British Tourists, 6 vols (London: E. Newbery, 1798–1800), vol. I, p. viii. 12 New editions of Tour through the Southern Counties appeared in 1769 and 1772 in London and in 1768 and 1771 in Dublin; new editions of Tour through the North were published in London in 1771 and in Dublin in 1770. J. Brewer, The Pleasures of the Imagination: English Culture in the Eighteenth Century (London: HarperCollins, 1997), p. 634. 13 J. Barrell, The Idea of Landscape and the Sense of Place, 1730–1840 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1972), pp. 77, 82–3. 14 Gazley, Arthur Young, p. 14. 15 B. F. Tobin, ‘Arthur Young, Agriculture, and the Construction of the New Economic Man’, in B. F. Tobin (ed.), History, Gender & Eighteenth-Century Literature (Athens and London: University of Georgia Press, 1994), pp. 179–97, at p. 180. 16 S. Bending, ‘The Improvement of Arthur Young: Agricultural Technology and the Production of Landscape in Eighteenth-Century England’, in D. E. Nye (ed.),

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Technologies of Landscape: From Reaping to Recycling (Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 1999), pp. 241–53, at p. 244. 17 See, for example, Jonathan Richardson’s Two Discourses (London: W. Churchill, 1719). 18 A. Young, A Six Weeks Tour, through the Southern Counties of England and Wales (London: W. Nicoll, 1768), p. 2. 19 A. Young, A Six Months Tour through the North of England, 4 vols (London: W. Strahan, 1770), vol. I, p. xi. 20 See, for example, Adam Smith’s comments about Stowe and Wilton: A. Smith, An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations, 2 vols (London: W. Strahan and T. Cadell, 1776), vol. I, p. 423. 21 A. Young, The Farmer’s Tour through the East of England, 4 vols (London: W. Strahan, 1771), vol. I, p. xxi. 22 Bending, ‘The Improvement of Arthur Young’, p. 244. 23 British Library, Add. MS 35126, Original Letters Addressed to Arthur Young, fol. 48, letter from Chr. Baldwin, 15 July 1768, fol. 66, letter from the Earl of Holdernesse, 8 December 1769, and fol. 76, letter from James Frampton, 28 March 1770. 24 British Library, Add. MS 35126, Original Letters Addressed to Arthur Young, fol. 47, letter from W. Harte, 9 July 1768. 25 Young, Tour through the North, vol. I, pp. xi–xii. 26 Young, Tour through the Southern Counties, p. 162. 27 Young, Tour through the East, vol. I, p. xxi. 28 ‘Art. 18 [review of] A Six Weeks Tour, through the Southern Counties of England and Wales … Second Edition’, Monthly Review, 40 (1769), p. 429. 29 From ‘a foreign Literary Journal’, quoted in an advertisement for the book’s second edition, bound at the end of Young, Tour through the North, vol. I, n.p. 30 ‘VII. [Review of] A Six Weeks Tour, through the Southern Counties of England and Wales’, Critical Review, 25 (1768), pp. 201–6, quote from p. 201. 31 ‘Article I. [Review of] A Six Months Tour through the North of England’, Critical Review, 28 (1769), pp. 401–14, at p. 405. 32 ‘Art. I. A Six Months Tour through the North of England’, Monthly Review, 42 (1770), pp. 81–91, at p. 83. 33 D. Defoe, A Tour through the Whole Island of Great Britain, ed. P. N. Furbank, W. R. Owens and A. J. Coulson (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1991), p. xiii. 34 F. Haskell, ‘The British as Collectors’, in G. Jackson-Stops (ed.), The Treasure Houses of Britain (Washington, DC: National Gallery of Art, 1985), pp. 50–9, at p. 51. 35 Young, Tour through the North, vol. II, pp. 42–54. 36 Anon., A Pocket Companion for Oxford (Daniel Prince: Oxford, 1759), pp. 109–21. 37 Martyn, The English Connoisseur, vol. I, pp. ii–iii. 38 ‘II. [Review of] The English Connoisseur’, Critical Review, 21 (1766), pp. 407–9, at. p. 407. 39 Young, Tour through the Southern Counties, p. 33. 40 Young, Tour through the East, vol. I, p. xixx.



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41 Young, Tour through the North, vol. II, p. 97. 42 Ibid., vol. I, pp. 389–90. 43 British Library, Add. MS 14823, ‘Journal of Tours by Craven Ord in the Counties of Norfolk and Suffolk’, 1781–97. 44 Young, Tour through the North, vol. II, pp. 79, 80. 45 Young, Tour through the East, vol. I, p. 189. 46 Young, Tour through the Southern Counties, p. 36. 47 Young, Tour through the North, vol. II, p. 77. 48 H. Mount, ‘The Monkey with the Magnifying Glass: Constructions of the Connoisseur in Eighteenth-Century Britain’, Oxford Art Journal, 29:2 (2006), pp. 167–84, at pp. 173–6. Brewer, Pleasures of the Imagination, p. 258. For more on the figure of the connoisseur, see I. Pears, The Discovery of Painting: The Growth of Interest in the Arts in England, 1680–1768 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1988), pp. 181–206. 49 Young, Tour through the Southern Counties, p. 15. 50 Ibid., p. 197. 51 C. Gibson-Wood, ‘Jonathan Richardson and the Rationalization of Connoisseurship’, Art History, 7:1 (1984), pp. 38–56, at p. 41. 52 M. Hallett, ‘“The Business of Criticism”: The Press and the Royal Academy Exhibition in Eighteenth-Century London’, in D. Solkin (ed.), Art on the Line: The Royal Academy Exhibitions at Somerset House, 1780–1836 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2001), pp. 65–75, at pp. 68, 71, and p. 259; M. Munsterberg, ‘The Beginnings of British Art Criticism in the 1760s’, British Art Journal, 15:1 (2014), pp. 82–94. 53 Young, Tour through the Southern Counties, p. 95. 54 Young, Tour through the North, vol. I, pp. 66, 70. 55 Ibid., p. 356. 56 Ibid., vol. III, p. 348. 57 M. Craske, ‘From Burlington Gate to Billingsgate: James Ralph’s Attempt to Impose Burlingtonian Classicism as a Canon of Public Taste’, in B. Arciszewska et al. (eds), Articulating British Classicism: New Approaches to Eighteenth-Century Architecture (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2004), pp. 97–118, at p. 100. 58 U. Price, An Essay on the Picturesque (London: J. Robson, 1794), p. 265. 59 ‘Article I. [Review of] A Six Months Tour through the North of England’, p. 408. 60 See, for instance, R. C. Hoare, A Description of the House and Gardens at Stourhead (Salisbury: J. Easton, 1800), pp. 9–10. 61 ‘Article I. [Review of] A Six Months Tour through the North of England’, p. 412. 62 Young, Tour through the Southern Counties, p. 43. 63 Barrell, Idea of Landscape, p. 6. 64 Young, Tour through the Southern Counties, p. 38. 65 Young, Tour through the North, vol. I, p. 390. 66 Ibid., vol. II, p. 82. 67 Ibid., vol. III, p. 409. 68 C. Wall, The Prose of Things: Transformation of Description in the Eighteenth Century (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2006), p. 124.

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69 ‘Further Extracts from A Six Weeks Tour through the Southern Counties of England and Wales’, London Magazine, 37 (1768), pp. 69–72; ‘Description of Blenheim House, from the Six Weeks Tour, &c.’, London Magazine, 37 (1768), pp. 193–5. 70 R. Beatniffe (ed.), The Norfolk Tour (Norwich: R. Beatniffe, 1773), pp. 28, 14–26. 71 Anon., A Description of Duncombe Park and Rivalx Abbey &c. Attempted (Harrison and Cooper: Kirbymoorside, 1812), p. 3. 72 Ibid., pp. 8, 11. 73 C. L. Batten, Pleasurable Instruction: Form and Convention in Eighteenth-Century Travel Literature (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1978), p. 60. 74 England Displayed (1769) includes some very similar descriptions of houses; Michael Cousins has suggested that Young may have been engaged to provide some descriptions for this project. (M. Cousins, ‘Hagley Park, Worcestershire’, supplement to Garden History, 35 (2007), pp. iii–iv, vi–xii, and 1–152, at p. 3). A. Young, ‘By the Editor’, Annals of Agriculture, and Other Useful Arts, 15 (1791), pp. 152–82, at p. 157. 75 W. Bray, Sketch of a Tour into Derbyshire and Yorkshire (London: B. White, 1778), pp. 68–70, 196–7, 222, 228. 76 R. J. Sulivan, A Tour through Parts of England, Scotland, and Wales, in 1778, 2 vols (London: T. Becket, 1785), vol. I, p. 95. 77 J. Anderson, ‘Remaking the Country House: Country-House Guidebooks in the Late Eighteenth and Early Nineteenth Centuries’ (unpublished PhD thesis, Courtauld Institute of Art, 2013).

Hungarian aristocratic travellers in Britain

7

‘Enjoying country life to the full – only the English know how to do that!’: appreciation of the British country house by Hungarian aristocratic travellers Kristóf Fatsar

Introduction Britain was the most attractive new travel destination for Hungarian aristocrats towards the end of the eighteenth century and during the first half of the nineteenth.1 This phenomenon followed continental fashion, as the achievements of the British agricultural and industrial revolutions attracted nobility and professionals from all over the Continent, and from Hungary too, to study the new methods at first hand.2 Naturally, different levels of Hungarian society had different agenda when travelling. Country house tourism was an activity pursued with various interests based on differences in wealth, upbringing, cultural involvement and so on. Among those who followed it were intellectuals, who were more likely than others to share their experiences with the wider public in written form. These experiences are better recorded than those of others who travelled to Britain for commercial or other more down-to-earth purposes. Regrettably, there is no reliable data from the early period of visits to Britain to judge the percentage of noblemen or intellectuals at this time. Since more frequent travel started only in the 1780s, when obtaining a passport, along with crossing the Continent and travel in general, was still very difficult, we can assume that these early travellers were almost exclusively from the higher classes. Records of foreign arrivals to Britain are available only from 1836 onwards, when such journeys were already widespread, and they give a much clearer picture of the number of Hungarian aristocrats travelling there. Even then, the problem with identifying Hungarian aristocrats, or Hungarian tourists in general, in the records from the period before the 1848 Revolution is that tourists often did not identify themselves as Hungarians, or the British customs houses refused to recognise them as such. Many Hungarian magnates actually resided in Vienna for a large part of the year, and this probably made their national background even more obscure. A random search on family names

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shows that a substantial number of the Hungarian nobility were recorded as Austrians. Interestingly, and probably reflecting the increase in patriotic feeling during the first half of the nineteenth century, in some cases a particular individual was recorded first as Austrian and at a later visit as Hungarian.3 Leaving aside the obvious shortcomings of such research, the records still provide a valuable dataset to explain the extent of Hungarian tourism to Britain in the 1830s and 1840s. According to this, Hungarian tourists to Britain numbered around fifty per annum between 1837 and 1844, with the exception of 1839, when more than sixty people arrived (Chart 7.1). A sharp rise in visits 1837 1838

17

1839

5

1840

4

8

11

31 10

10

31 9

10

24

4 2 11

20

1841

26 9

1842

6

6

1844

25

15 3

1845

15

1

1847

5

11

1848

2

1849

7 53

6

6 50

10

6 9

7 5 6

44 9

47 10 7

58 12

67

2

15

20

16

11

11

100

65 82

13

52 20

0

51

17 43 9

24

61

53

10 3 7

37

1

13

12

6

27 9

1846

8

49

11

5

2 12

18 6

1843

5 45

213 9

25 10

40

60

80

100

14

120

140

12

160

aristocrats, gentlemen and their entourages

arsts (performing arts, fine arts, applied arts)

military officers, soldiers

intellectuals (lawyers, doctors, professors, clergy etc.)

cra smen

tradesmen etc.

18

191

180

aristocrats only

Chart 7.1  Social background of Hungarian visitors to Britain and the number of aristocrats compared with the total number per year, 1837–49

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started in 1845, culminating in more than a hundred people by 1847, followed by a steep decline during the revolutionary year of 1848. The number of aristocrats did not follow any pattern, the norm being between five and ten, with a record low of only one recorded visitor in 1846. If we extend the privileged class to include the lower nobility, and for the sake of simplicity add the entourages of the aristocrats as well, the numbers are more steady, making up between a third and half of all visitors to Britain. It is interesting to see that proportionally large numbers of people of more humble origin visited the British Isles towards the middle of the nineteenth century, despite the great geographical distance, although their movement was helped by increasingly easy transport. Perhaps less surprisingly, intellectuals from non-aristocratic families like medical doctors, university professors, lawyers or members of the clergy numbered between ten and fifteen per annum, with a similar number of merchants and tradesmen. Craftsmen, including gardeners on study tours to British country houses, numbered between five and ten in most years, and a handful of artists, including the celebrated pianist Franz Liszt, add to the overall picture of visitors. Although many of these tourists visited country houses while in Britain, they focused on different things. Aristocrats like Count Ferenc Széchényi (1754–1820) or Baron Miklós Wesselényi (1796–1850) were most interested in country houses and their gardens as a way of living. The British country house was the object of envy, for it represented the ultimate estate residence, even for rather wealthy Hungarian landlords like Wesselényi, author of the remark quoted in the title of this chapter, who also believed that ‘it is not possible to imagine anything more tasteful than an English country house in the middle of the flourishing green velvet lawn of a park’.4 Others with more social concern and less estate property paid greater attention to public buildings and parks. Impoverished and untitled noblemen with university education in the law like Bertalan Szemere (1812–1869), the Prime Minister of Hungary in 1849, István Gorove (1819–1881), minister in the first Hungarian government after the Compromise with Austria in 1867, or Lőrinc Tóth (1814–1903), future Member of the House of Magnates in the Hungarian parliament, were all very influential members of Hungarian society during the so-called Reform Era that preceded the 1848 Revolution, and consequently were all sentenced to death in absentia following its defeat. Their influence was not limited to their sparkling public speeches during the turbulent years that ultimately led to the Revolution: they also published their travel notes in order to educate the Hungarian public about fairer political systems, law enforcement, public finance or social institutions. They visited other advanced countries in north-west Europe, but in most matters they regarded Britain as an example of best practice. They also visited a few country houses and parks to experience and introduce the lifestyle of the wealthiest aristocrats of Britain and to see d ­ omestic architecture, ­landscape

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design and art collections of the highest quality. Their descriptions of the houses and parks they visited were written in a tone of praise. Aristocrats, on the other hand, were occasionally critical of some of their country house experiences in their own very private travel journals; they were probably more educated in the subject, but they also did not have to conceal their views, as their journals were not intended to be published. In contrast with the less wealthy and less privileged, aristocrats often visited a string of British country houses, not as places for discovery of the arts but to visit friends or even relatives with whom they maintained amicable relationships, just as with other continental counterparts. The key to this phenomenon was access to the British nobility and their houses, which was facilitated by a number of factors that this chapter aims to identify. The chapter also aims to demonstrate that the changing travel destinations of the aristocracy between the end of the eighteenth century and the middle of the nineteenth century were determined not only by a change of taste and other external drivers, but again by personal circumstances, or in other words by access. It attempts to do so in the context of international country house tourism in the decades around the turn of the nineteenth century, also bringing in views of non-aristocratic yet educated and influential Hungarian travel writers, and drawing on the background of country house experiences of Hungarian aristocrats and the broader polite society in general. It will re-affirm the notion that the British country house did indeed enjoy special attention, but will also help to explain the reasons behind such favoured views of them. Periods of Hungarian tourism to Britain and their sources There were two distinct periods of travel from Hungary to Britain in the late eighteenth century and the first half of the nineteenth century, separated by an intermediate period: the Napoleonic Wars, during which the number of travellers was very low. The early period can practically be reduced to roughly fifteen years between the late 1770s and early 1790s. We are aware of only very occasional journeys in the preceding decades, or even centuries, but the industrial and the agricultural revolutions as well as the taste for the naturalistic garden that was simply called the ‘English Garden’ in the German-speaking realm, to which Hungarian intellectual circles practically belonged, attracted a growing number of Hungarian tourists on the eve of the French Revolution.5 There were several notable travellers, among them aristocrats. Unfortunately, this early period is not characterised by a wealth of sources. The only published account of a journey to Britain was written by a widely travelled member of the lower gentry, István Sándor (1750–1815), who visited England in 1786 and anonymously published his observations on Western Europe in a series of fictional letters to his friend in 1793.6 Because he had neither the necessary



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connections nor the financial background to visit famous country houses in Britain, which was already infamously expensive, his journey did not extend much beyond London. Travel writings on Britain by aristocrats, as opposed to those reform-minded gentlemen mentioned above, did not exert any influence on Hungarian society as none were published during the lifetimes of their authors. Some of them, written by the most important historical figures of the country, were published much later, typically between the two world wars. As far as the early aristocratic travellers are concerned, only one deserved such attention. Count Ferenc Széchényi, who founded the Hungarian National Museum by giving his collections to the nation in 1802, wrote not only a travel journal but also lengthy observations and even analyses of the things he saw while travelling in Western Europe. An abridged version of his travel journal came out in the inter-war period,7 and his travels have continued to attract scholarly attention, although an article on his visits to English country house gardens omitted some of his garden destinations and descriptions.8 The other aristocratic traveller from this period who left a detailed travel journal was Baron Miklós Vay (1756–1824), whose notes are not yet published, and the otherwise excellent study on him focuses on things other than his country house visits.9 It has been long recognised that for eighteenth-century continental visitors one of the main attractions of the British country house was its park and pleasure grounds; these were often considered just as noteworthy as the house and its collections (see Chapter 5 in this volume). This was also the case for Hungarian tourists, who had the first real chance to experience ‘proper’ English Gardens while travelling to Britain. István Sándor was an advocate of the new landscape style, although, because of his modest circumstances, he did not have a chance to see internationally known examples of the English landscape garden other than public parks of London.10 He did not see private residences in England, but on the Continent he visited royal and princely gardens open to the public such as Versailles in France and Nymphenburg in Bavaria.11 There was a long pause in Hungarian tourism after the French Revolution and during the Napoleonic Wars. The borders of the Habsburg Monarchy remained more or less closed for a quarter of a century. We know of only a few travellers to Britain during this period, mainly from the early nineteenth century, which saw a few years of peace. Prince Miklós Esterházy (1765–1833) travelled to England with a small company of family members on an excursion from Paris in the summer of 1803; the tour lasted for more than two months, but frustratingly, the writer of the journal, probably one of the two sisters of the prince who accompanied him, wrote almost nothing about it.12 Just a few years later another Esterházy family member, again supposedly a princess, namely Leopoldine Esterházy (1788–1846), daughter of Prince Miklós, kept a journal of a tour across Western Europe in 1806 and 1807, listing several country

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houses of England (which are discussed below) and showing a principal interest in parks and gardens, on which the journal records lengthy notes.13 A second wave of Hungarian tourists to Britain came following the end of the Napoleonic Wars and the Congress of Vienna in 1815. The Hungarian aristocrats’ interest in Britain was fuelled not only by their ever-increasing admiration for British commerce, industry and social and public institutions, but by their desire to engage with British trade. The Hungarian aristocracy benefited from the high demand for food during the war years and hoped to make their estates even more profitable by studying the wool industry, agricultural machinery and the like. As far as the British country house is concerned, a clear change of interests can be observed between these two periods. Instead of being drawn to great examples of the landscape garden, nineteenth-century Hungarian aristocratic tourists were attracted by the comfort of the English country house. These interests were in line with those of other high-ranking continental visitors, among them Archduke John of Austria, who travelled in Britain during 1815 and 1816. His main purpose was to study and learn, and he therefore visited many industrial facilities, including coal mines and quarries, salt mines and porcelain factories, whisky distilleries and glass manufacturers, paper mills and steel factories. Architecture as such was not his main interest but, as he was often a guest in great houses, he occasionally recorded impressions of the comfort of English country houses. However, he also noted how draughty many houses were.14 This change of interest regarding the British country house has already been identified and explored by József Sisa, who has also given plenty of examples of the influence that British country houses exerted on their Hungarian equivalents.15 No doubt, Hungarian country house owners possessed architectural treatises on the latest fashions and relied on the services of able architects, but  their first-hand experiences must have shaped their taste and expectations  for their own houses and gardens. The identification of their travel ­destinations is therefore of no little significance. Drawing up a list of country house destinations presents a familiar challenge: the sources are limited. Nevertheless, there are more aristocratic travel journals available from the first half of the century than from the previous period. Again, some of them were not published until the twentieth century: the entire diary of Count István Széchenyi (1791–1860), son of the above-­mentioned Count Ferenc and leader of the Hungarian reform movement from the 1820s until the 1848 Revolution, came out between the two world wars,16 as did the travel journal of his friend and travelling companion on his 1822 tour, Baron Miklós Wesselényi.17 Almost all other sources remained in manuscript form until the twentieth century (the only aristocratic travel journal published in its own time is about a tour to Italy18); but even these are not too numerous. Probably more existed but were lost during the wars and revolutions of the twentieth century;



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and many travellers’ experiences were never written down. In this respect it is particularly unfortunate that we are not aware of any journals by Prince Pál Antal Esterházy (1786–1866), who was ambassador of the Austrian Empire to the Court of St James’s between 1815 and 1842. During his very long tenure he visited many country houses in Britain, and also received many British travellers in his principal country seat in Hungary, Kismarton (now Eisenstadt in Austria). He was also responsible for introducing many Hungarians, mainly aristocrats of course, to British nobles and even royalty, and in consequence they were kindly received in many country houses across the British Isles. Consequently, he was the key person who could provide  access to British country houses for Hungarian aristocrats, and this resulted in a very different pattern of travel destinations from those of the gentleman tourists who followed the usual recommendations of travel guides. Early Hungarian aristocratic travellers to Britain and their country house visits By the time Hungarian aristocrats started visiting Britain in any number, country house owners were feeling the need to protect their property from ‘mass tourism’ and its inconvenient consequences, including theft and vandalism.19 Given the apparently small number of Hungarian tourists, they did not have much impact, although the two early aristocratic visitors I have already introduced largely followed the usual travel routes of ‘ordinary’ tourists. Neither Baron Miklós Vay nor Count Ferenc Széchényi had many connections with their British counterparts, so it is not surprising that they were seldom received by country house owners. They also had limited knowledge of Britain, which may explain why they expressed awe at most things they saw. Although their background and circumstances were quite different, their journeys show some remarkable overlap, particularly in terms of the country houses they visited. Baron Miklós Vay started his journey in 1786 and stayed in Britain for a year and a half. He was of Protestant background and modest means, and for this reason he was not close to the inner circles of the imperial court and the Viennese society of Hungarian magnates. He was determined to pursue a military career and eventually became General of the Military Engineers. Nevertheless, his long journey was partly financed by the state because of the useful information he provided; in other words, he was spying on British military and industrial establishments. He sent lengthy reports to Vienna and also kept a diary for himself. Being an engineer, he was most interested in both military and civil constructions, and he also very much appreciated their creators, engineers, architects and landscape designers, mentioning the names of Sir John Vanbrugh, Sir William Chambers and Lancelot ‘Capability’ Brown when describing country houses. He was a real entrepreneur, and upon his return he

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initiated several businesses in Hungary, most of which failed. After building up debts on his travels he had to trade his stone house with his brother’s wooden house to overcome his financial difficulties. This also meant that he could not really utilise the experience he gained in Britain as far as his own home was concerned. Count Ferenc Széchényi, on the other hand, was wealthy, and his estates lay much closer to Vienna; at the end of his life he was created a Knight of the Golden Fleece, the highest possible distinction for a subject in the Habsburg Empire. He travelled with his wife, née Countess Julianna Festetics, and his personal assistant. They spent only four months in Britain. Széchényi was just as interested in technology as Baron Vay: he took notes on and even drew the machines he saw, but he was also interested in architecture and garden design, transforming his formal garden in Nagycenk into the naturalistic style upon his return. Like many of his contemporaries, he was a true Anglomaniac, although he was very much aware of shortcomings in British society, which he analysed in his notes. He was astonished by the freedom that the British Parliament and citizens enjoyed, which were unimaginable for Hungarian subjects. According to Széchényi, a British gentleman was ready to show his country house and park to a foreigner, and although all foreigners were believed to be French and were looked down on for this reason (just as the Romans considered everybody barbarian if they were not Roman), British gentlemen were very courteous towards them. Comparing the sites visited by Vay and Széchényi, one notices some remarkable similarities. Although they both visited around a dozen country houses, as many as five of these were seen by both: Wanstead House, Painshill Park, Blenheim, Stowe and Kedleston Hall (see Chapter 5 for comparisons with the places visited by Dutch travellers, a list which is broadly similar).20 Blenheim Palace was an all-time favourite, being visited by most Hungarian aristocrats and by nearly all other gentlemen travellers. Its popularity was partly due to the fact that it is very close to Oxford, which a few decades later was recommended as one of the two places to visit in England outside London if one was to stay in the country for more than a month (the other one being Canterbury).21 The same is true of Wanstead House, as it is conveniently close to London for visiting on a one-day excursion, although it was more popular in the eighteenth than in the nineteenth century. Stowe and particularly Painshill, on the other hand, were the archetypical garden tourism destinations of the eighteenth century. They were made widely known by C. C. L. Hirschfeld’s most influential work, Theorie der Gartenkunst (‘Theory of Garden Art’), published in five volumes between 1779 and 1785, a title that was known to practically all great garden patrons of Hungary.22 Kedleston Hall was another popular destination, not least because of the welcoming reception that the tourist could enjoy.23 It was visited by both Vay and Széchényi, but they noticed different things.



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While the former praised the beautiful layout of the park, the latter admired mainly the house, describing and even judging many architectural details of both appearance and arrangement, and noting that ‘Mr. Adam was the architect of this beautiful country house … Otherwise much cleanliness rules all over the house, although not much splendour.’24 Széchényi also took notes on paintings in the houses he visited. The two men’s views diverged even more in the case of Blenheim and Stowe. Széchényi preferred Blenheim and wrote in his journal that ‘the Duke is a garden connoisseur with taste … and constantly makes changes in the garden’, while at Stowe ‘the views in this park I did not like as much as the ones in Blenheim. The objects are too densely placed, the temples and statues are of ordinary materials and are not artistic.’25 Vay, on the other hand, who also visited Blenheim first and Stowe on the following day, wrote that ‘Stowe is in many respects more beautiful than Blenheim … The park is full with the most beautiful buildings that are well arranged.’26 Széchényi, as the owner of several country houses, was probably more educated in landscape design and more aware of current tastes, yet voiced an older critique of Stowe; Vay’s attitude to gardens was perhaps less well informed, and he may have relied on his personal impressions; his preference for the gardens at Stowe was perhaps old-fashioned, but he reflected more recent re-appraisals of the buildings, as voiced by Mrs Lybbe Powys.27 The remaining sites were partly chosen through chance meetings with their owners. Count Széchényi arranged visits to Boughton House and Boughton Park; he was shown around in the house and gardens by the owner at Wollaton Hall, and was invited to Rokeby Park. He probably met the owners in London before he started his country journey. Baron Vay, on the other hand, did not perhaps have many friends in the highest circles, although as a Fellow of the Royal Society he must have known important people. Doors opened for him, however, when Archduke Ferdinand of Austria made a visit to England and Vay found himself in his entourage. He visited Nuneham Courtney and other estates in the company of the archduke and thus had access to notable country estates. The travels of Princess Leopoldine Esterházy with her new husband Prince Moritz von Liechtenstein in 1806 still belonged to the early period as far as country house destinations were concerned. The couple did not visit Painshill or the Leasowes, but their itinerary still listed iconic sites of the English landscape gardening movement like Stowe or, even more surprisingly, Alexander Pope’s almost forgotten house and grotto in Twickenham. Their impressions of the British country house are very positive, with only a few and minor critical remarks.28 Széchényi, on the other hand, was not impressed by contemporary British domestic architecture, which in his opinion generally lacked taste and durability, although he very much approved of the country houses (as opposed to urban buildings), which he considered to be beautiful and made to last. He

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was interested in garden features and many aspects of both pleasure grounds and kitchen gardens, but although he improved his own gardens, he did not intend to change his country house. The desire for changing the layout, spatial arrangement and details of the Hungarian country house waited for the next generation of Hungarian aristocratic travellers to Britain. Country house tourism by Hungarian aristocrats in the first half of the nineteenth century A party of illustrious participants in the Congress of Vienna left the imperial capital in November 1814 for two days’ shooting at the Hungarian country seat of the Esterházy princes in Kismarton.29 Among them were the British Foreign Secretary Lord Castlereagh, the Duke of Saxon-Weimar-Eisenach, Eugene de Beauharnais and Prince Leopold of Bourbon-Two Sicilies; their host was Prince Pál Antal Esterházy, heir to the reigning Prince Miklós, who became ambassador of the Austrian Empire to London in the following year, a role he was to keep until 1842. Both this event and subsequent shooting parties in Eisenstadt had far-reaching consequences. Prince Pál Antal Esterházy had started his diplomatic career in England eight years before, aged twenty-eight, as secretary at the London embassy for a short period of time, and he was now ready to take up more prestigious and permanent positions. He eventually became Foreign Minister (the ‘Minister beside the King’, as it was called at that time) in the first independent Hungarian government during the 1848 Revolution. His rank and wealth made him not only a natural choice for high diplomatic positions but also a bridgehead for other Hungarians travelling to Britain during his tenure as ambassador. The guests at the Eisenstadt shooting parties included not only foreigners but also Hungarian magnates. The social network resulting from these events during the Reform Era helped Hungarian aristocrats to mix with foreign nobility, enabling the rapidly developing country to import muchneeded Western ideas and expertise to improve agriculture, industry and social and cultural institutions. The guests at Eisenstadt were mainly diplomats and high-ranking politicians from all over Europe. Some of them were appointed to the Austrian court, while others were visiting Vienna during or after the Congress. Many were British, thanks to the personal connections that originated from the diplomatic missions to London by both Prince Miklós and his son Prince Pál Antal. The full extent of the Eisenstadt hunting parties can be appreciated from a letter sent by the politician Edward John Littleton (1791–1863), later 1st Baron Hatherton, to his friend and relative Colonel Wellesley in 1819. He wrote, ‘You perhaps know that Hungary is considered one of the best sporting Countries in the world’, and after describing the prince’s immense wealth with what he must have thought were scarcely credible but probably reliable figures, he continued:

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‘You will easily conceive from all this that the Chasse at Eisenstadt was worth going to.’30 No wonder that more than fifty British aristocrats visited Eisenstadt in the following decades: members of the British mission in Vienna were regular guests, and the royal Dukes of Cambridge and Cumberland also enjoyed the Esterházys’ hospitality in 1820 and 1822 respectively. The Hungarian Counts and Countesses Zichy were also regular guests, and they were present in Eisenstadt in 1816 when Lady Shelley wrote in her diary that ‘six ugly women of the family of Zichy, two frightful men of the same family’ completed the party.31 One of them was Count Ferenc Zichy (1777–1839), who assumed the name Zichy-Ferraris upon marrying a Countess Ferraris and who travelled to Britain a number of times. In 1837 his son Count Emmanuel (1808–1877) married Charlotte Strachan (1815–1851), daughter of Admiral Sir Richard Strachan, 6th Baronet, and an heiress of the 3rd Marquess of Hertford. Such connections had a deep impact on Hungarian cultural life: Count Emmanuel transformed his chateau in a style recognised as that of Windsor Castle to please his wife, who eventually left him for another Hungarian count. Prince Miklós Pál (1817–1894), the only son and heir of Prince Pál Antal Esterházy, also married a British lady, the daughter of the 5th Earl of Jersey. Although there is no trace of his travel notes, he may have been responsible for a sketchbook that recorded a few views of British country houses, among them the Duke of Wellington’s Stratfield Saye House (Figure 7.1) and a suite of Lady Jersey at Middleton Park (Figure 7.2).32

Figure 7.1 The 1st Duke of Wellington’s country seat, Stratfield Saye House, probably by Prince Miklós Pál Esterházy, 1836

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Figure 7.2 Interior of Lady Jersey’s suite at Middleton Park, probably by Prince Miklós Pál Esterházy, 1836

These very strong personal connections explain the travel destinations of Hungarian aristocrats in the British Isles, and the evolving Anglomania, which had an enormous effect on Hungarian public and particularly political thinking during the first half of the nineteenth century, and both of which set Hungarian visitors apart from their Dutch contemporaries (see Chapter 5). One of the greatest of all Anglomaniacs was Count István Széchenyi (1791– 1860), son of the above-mentioned Count Ferenc and a driving force of the reform movement in Hungary from 1825 until the Revolution in 1848, when he sat in the first Hungarian government together with Prince Pál Antal Esterházy. He travelled to Britain several times, his first journey taking place in 1815 as a kind of a Grand Tour.33 He was a very young man then and only partly independent of his father’s finances, and so he did not travel extensively. Outside London, he went only to Newmarket, a place that, as a keen sportsman and horse-breeder, he visited every time he went to England. He was introduced to the highest circles by the new ambassador, Prince Pál Antal Esterházy, who was a family friend, and it was also in his company that he was able to visit the Duke of Bedford at Woburn Abbey or the regent’s house in London. Count István Széchenyi and the Duke of Bedford met again in Eisenstadt in 1819 when Széchenyi started to be a regular guest there, but on that occasion Széchenyi also met the above-mentioned Lord Hatherton; later, in 1832, he visited Lord Hatherton’s country seat at Teddesley Hallon a journey used to study bridges for the Hungarian capital’s first permanent connection over

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the Danube between Pest and Buda, which is named after him today. The bridge was designed and constructed by the British, and the designer, William Tierney Clark (1783–1852), was also a guest in Eisenstadt while in Hungary. The younger Széchenyi was much better connected to British society than his father, and this is clearly reflected in the differences in their country house visits. The younger count went to many places as an invited guest, and it is quite telling that he visited Blenheim only on his third tour to England, in 1832. He knew the English language well, and his wealth also helped him to access and experience more than many of his countrymen could. On his second journey in 1822 he was already his own master (as his father had died two years before), and this can be seen in his itinerary. He was travelling with his friend Baron Miklós Wesselényi, but the two men sometimes undertook separate tours, partly because Széchenyi was invited to more places and did not always take Wesselényi with him. Széchenyi was quite laconic in his journal about his admiration of the country houses he saw, but Wesselényi, as a first-time traveller to England, was very enthusiastic. The greenery and the tranquil setting of the houses particularly impressed him, as we have already seen in his exclamation of delight upon seeing Bildeston House. Wesselényi had a romantic soul and preferred the very naturalistic and plain scenery. When he visited the Duke of Rutland’s Cheveley Park, close to Newmarket, his architectural taste was again clearly visible: ‘The house is in the middle of the park – big, handsome. Nothing is artificial, no roads or walks are here, only unharmed and sound nature. Quiet calmness and fearlessness rules here … .’34 But he could also be very critical. When he visited Blenheim he was, like many other visitors by this date, far from satisfied with everything he saw, arguing that Vanbrugh’s ‘large pompous bridge is very much scandalous’. He also disliked the house itself, declaring that it ‘is magnificent and grand, but without taste; … The interior is much nicer’, and then went on to describe the rooms and galleries. The park, on the other hand, he very much approved, noting that it ‘is indeed beautiful. Mighty giant trees spread their dark shadow over the most beautiful lawn. The most magnificent sights are opened to the chateau and the great lake from tiny valleys and hilltops. The colour scheme of the various trees are composed with the best taste.’35 He also visited Nuneham Courtney, which he found ‘neither magnificent, nor beautiful’, but his overall experience of the British country house was more than favourable. When the two men travelled back to London from their Yorkshire tour, they visited Welbeck Abbey and Wesselényi became very enthusiastic; ‘Great place’, he wrote, and continued: The beautiful castle was built in the middle of a large green lawn, next to a lightcoloured lake that appears like a mirror. The beautiful wide walk leads among flowering shrubs and giant trees, sometimes in the cool shade, sometimes openly, with the most magnificent views to the castle and the lake. Real country houses

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are only in England, and enjoying country life to the full – only the English know how to do that!36

Széchenyi was very much aware architecturally and a tireless observer of the British country house. He promoted many new architectural ideas in his native Hungary, from gas lighting to the more comfortable spatial arrangement of country residences. Less than two months after his last visit to England in 1834, he started to write a treatise on architecture with the title ‘Dust and Mud of Pest’, which remained unpublished during his lifetime. Contrary what the title suggests, it was less about town planning than about domestic architecture. Széchenyi drew ground plans of country houses and architectural details in his journal while travelling, and he used his experiences to embellish his country house in Nagycenk and make it more comfortable (see also Chapter 5). Indeed, it was while planning alterations to his own house in the 1830s that his interest in British architecture became most evident. At Blenheim Palace, which he visited in 1832, he was most struck by the planting of the park, and summarised his excitement by exclaiming: ‘Magnificent Decadence’.37 His mind must have been occupied with his plan to educate the Hungarian public about domestic architecture when in October 1832 he wrote praising Soho House near Birmingham and condemning Hungarian country houses in comparison: ‘the most pleasant that man can see. No country house in Hungary, and not even in the Austrian Empire, can be compared to it.’38 He went even further just a week later upon visiting Ingestre Hall and summarising his architectural impressions of his recent trip: ‘What magnificent country houses! How stupidly live we on the Continent! And particularly in Hungary.’39 In contrast, the advancing romantic movement did not find favour with Széchenyi – or at least there is hardly any sign of his appreciation of ruinous castles or wild landscapes. He did not even visit Windsor Castle, an easy destination for many foreign visitors keen on apparent ‘medievalism’, and the only ruin he visited was Helmsley Castle in 1822. Even his father seems to have been more romantic, for he had ventured on a hike in the Peak District in 1787. Others, though, were more interested in romantic scenery. Count József Esterházy (1791–1847), just a year after having lost his twenty-three-year-old wife, visited the British Isles and mostly remained in the company of his distant cousin, Prince Pál Antal Esterházy, accompanying him also on a tour to Ireland as part of King George IV’s historic visit there in 1821. He was the first known Hungarian to visit Kenilworth (increasingly popular with Dutch visitors: see Chapter 5), just a few months after the publication of Sir Walter Scott’s eponymous novel.40 Not surprisingly, perhaps, he also visited Windsor Castle and Warwick Castle, and travelled to the Scottish Highlands to experience some of the picturesque qualities of the landscape there.41



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Such visits became increasingly popular. As noted earlier, the p ­ olitical-minded intellectuals, who eventually became leaders of the country in the later phase of the Revolution and War of Independence of 1848–49 or during the second half of the nineteenth century, visited very few country houses and were more interested in romantic sites. Bertalan Szemere’s only country house experience was at Blenheim, although he walked in the park of Burghley House and visited the romantic scenes of Windsor Castle and Alnwick Castle in 1837.42 István Gorove and Lőrinc Tóth travelled together in 1842, visiting the industrialist Edmund Ashworth’s house, Egerton Hall, but their only real country house visit was to Castle Howard. Naturally, they visited romantic sites, too, making excursions to the Scottish Highlands and to Penrhyn Castle in Wales, and strolling in the park of Windsor Castle. They were among the few who travelled to Ireland and saw Hillsborough Castle.43 In contrast with other gentleman travellers who published their travel notes, the archaeologists and antiquarians Ferenc Pulszky (1814–1897) and his uncle Gábor Fejérváry (1780–1851) were genuine country house tourists.44 Pulszky inherited the great archaeological collection accumulated by Fejérváry and was a collector himself. More importantly, he utilised his expertise decades later in the service of his nation as director of the Hungarian National Museum and in helping to form such significant collections as the Museum of Fine Arts. The two men went on their Western European journey in 1836 and visited many country houses, Pulszky also giving an account of their art collections and designed landscapes. As true antiquarians, they walked to many historically important places and saw Kenilworth, Fountains Abbey and other popular sites that were considered to have picturesque qualities.45 As is evident by now, Hungarian aristocrats were increasingly involved in seeking out the romantic experience. By the 1830s their travel routes resembled those of the less privileged, but with the key difference that they could access houses which were not open to the general public. Prince Pál Antal Esterházy was very helpful in arranging such visits. The young Protestant Transylvanian Count Ferenc Béldi and his mentor, Sándor Bölöni Farkas, were very far from Esterházy’s circles, but he gave them tickets to social events, arranged entry permissions to sensitive military sites and probably gave them letters of recommendation to country houses.46 They could visit places in the owner’s absence and see every room they desired. They sought out the more romantic sites, which became the usual tourist destinations, but they also visited places that were not recorded by other Hungarian tourists like Belvoir Castle, Lumley Castle and Scone Palace.47 Another Anglomaniac, a friend of Széchenyi’s and a generous supporter of his causes, Count György Károlyi (1802–1877), had his own strong personal connections to British aristocrats. How these came about is not known, but they almost certainly derived from other aristocrats’ earlier links. By the 1830s he

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was a personal friend of the 6th Duke of Devonshire (1790–1858) and a cherished guest at Chatsworth, where he spent nearly two weeks in October 1832, at one evening sitting next to the future Queen Victoria at supper. Although the records of his 1832 journey are incomplete, the surviving documents indicate that he was also visiting the Scottish Highlands and especially the country houses, looking for the more romantic types like Stirling Castle.48 Károlyi was fascinated by English architectural design and commissioned William Tierney Clark to design a conservatory for his house, Károlyi Palace, in the capital city of Pest (Figures 7.3 and 7.4). The conservatory was never built, but one peculiar detail can still be seen in the palace that recalls his Anglomania: a series of sash window all along the upper floor of the garden façade in the main wing. These are the only known surviving examples of this window type in Hungary (Figure 7.5).49 Naturally, the climate demanded double glazing, which was executed with the usual continental fashion with the sheets of glass around six inches apart, meaning that two sashes were needed for every opening. Conclusion Hungarian aristocrats’ journeys to Britain demonstrate an interest in and appreciation of the British country house during the decades around the turn of the nineteenth century. Their notes on details such as heated hollow walls of gardens, which were unknown in the eastern parts of Europe, are extraordinary sources for an understanding of the perception of cultural differences in general and of British country residences in particular. Some of the architectural details never became popular because of their inappropriateness for the Hungarian circumstances; those which survived, however, are c­ aptivating proof of ­widespread Anglomania and the strong influence that the British country house exerted in far-flung parts of Europe. British influence became widespread, although not dominant, in Hungarian country house architecture by the middle of the nineteenth century. Hungarian aristocrats were very well connected to their British counterparts by the 1830s: in the twenty or so years before 1848, Hungarian aristocrats (along with Russians) formed the most numerous group of foreign dinner guests at the Duke of Devonshire’s Chiswick House.50 They were guests, quite unlike the many visitors to Chatsworth House who were merely tourists, although the visitors’ books there record several European aristocrats, Hungarians included.51 Chatsworth was accessible for tourists; other houses could be visited only by appointment or were not open at all to the public. A contemporary German travel guide warns that it took several extra months to visit the houses of the richest, owing to limited access.52 This chapter has shown that personal contacts helped Hungarian aristocrats to gain access to many British country houses and that country house tourism remained a favourite pursuit among them,



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Figure 7.3  Dome of the unrealised conservatory in the garden of the Károlyi Palace in Pest, designed by William Tierney Clark in 1833

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Figure 7.4  Front elevation of the gardener’s house, attached to the back of the conservatory in the garden of the Károlyi Palace in Pest, 1833

c­ arried out as a long excursion from London. Around 1840 a member of Prince Esterházy’s family, perhaps Princess Marie Leopoldine again, travelled to as many as thirty houses, recording only the names of the country residences and architectural landmarks she visited.53 Following the defeat of the Revolution and War of Independence of 1848–49, there were many a­ ristocrats among those



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Figure 7.5  Double sash window on the first floor of the Károlyi Palace in Pest, facing the courtyard, in the room used as a study by Count György Károlyi

who fled Hungary, finding refuge in Britain (see Chart 7.1). Meanwhile in a mental asylum, after a breakdown triggered by the lost national cause, Count István Széchenyi wrote a second preface for his book on town planning and domestic architecture, which was published years after his death, in 1865.54 It was reprinted a year later, and he continued to influence his nation with his

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architectural observations based on his travels to Britain and experiences with the British country house. Notes

I would like to express my thanks to Mark Rothery and especially Peter Edwards, whose helpful comments have refined and strengthened the arguments.

 1 Hungarian aristocrats were the equivalent of British peers. The Hungarian nobility traditionally included untitled members of the lower nobility, from whom aristocrats were often distinguished by being called ‘magnates’. A princely title was usually held by only one male member of a family, and all other family members were styled counts (like the Batthyánys). There was only one family, namely the ducal branch of the Esterházys, whose members were all styled princes or princesses by the end of the eighteenth century. (The other family lines of the Esterházys were all in the rank of counts.) All members of other Hungarian aristocratic families were styled barons or baronesses, or counts or countesses, according to their sexes.  2 See G. Kurucz, ‘Tanulmányúton Nyugat-Európában: Gerics Pál georgikoni tanár angliai levelei gróf Festetics Lászlóhoz’, Agrártörténeti Szemle, 39:4 (1997), pp. 655– 724; K. Fatsar, ‘Bless’d Isle Admired: The English Countryside as a Reflection of Economic Power in the First Half of the 19th Century’, in I. Dymitryszyn, M. Kaczyńska and G. Maksymiuk (eds), Proceedings of ECLAS 2012 Conference ‘The Power of Landscape’ (Warsaw: Warsaw University of Life Sciences–SGGW, 2012), pp. 154–8; L. Országh, ‘“Anglomania” in Hungary, 1780–1900’, New Hungarian Quarterly, 22:82 (1981), pp. 168–79.  3 This part of the research was carried out by an electronic search engine provided by The National Archives at Kew. It searched digitised records, the originals having been transcribed. As both the original and the transcribed records suffered some miswriting, I have searched for the words ‘Ungarn’, ‘Hongrie’ and ‘Transylvania’ besides ‘Hungary’, but I also found records with entries like ‘Hungaria’, ‘Hongarn’ and ‘Hungrie’, the most peculiar transcription probably being ‘Angara’. The bulk of the data come from two sections of the Public Record Office at The National Archives, namely the Foreign Office’s lists of aliens arriving at English ports and Home Office: Aliens Act 1836: Certificates of Arrival of Aliens.  4 Wesselényi was inspired to write this remark upon visiting Richard Wilson’s Bildeston House in Suffolk; see M. Wesselényi, Báró Wesselényi Miklós útinaplója 1821–1822 (Cluj-Kolozsvár: Concordia, 1925).  5 A study of Hungarian garden tourism during this period with particular attention to the appreciation of the landscapes created by Lancelot ‘Capability’ Brown (1716– 1783) is K. Fatsar, ‘Hungarian Garden Tourists in Search of Lancelot Brown’s Legacy’, Garden History, 44, Supplement 1 (2016), pp. 114–24.  6 [I. Sándor], Egy külföldön utazó magyarnak jó barátjához küldetett levelei (Győr: Streibig, 1793).  7 H. Marczali, ‘Gróf Széchenyi [sic] Ferenc utazásai Angliában’ (1787), Budapesti



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Szemle, 220:638 (1931), pp. 26–50, and 220:639 (1931), pp. 224–48; H. Marczali, ‘Gróf Széchenyi [sic] Ferenc utazásai’, Budapesti Szemle, 240:699 (1936), pp. 129– 51, and 220:700 (1936), pp. 291–323.  8 J. Sisa, ‘Count Ferenc Széchényi’s Visit to English Parks and Gardens in 1787’, Garden History, 22:1 (1994), pp. 64–71.  9 O. Szakály, Egy vállalkozó főnemes: Vay Miklós báró (1756–1824) (Budapest: ELTE Eötvös Kiadó, 2003). 10 On the perception of the landscape garden movement in Hungary and its consequences on adapting new garden fashions see K. Fatsar, ‘European Travelers and the Transformation of Garden Art in Hungary at the Turn of the 19th Century’, Studies in the History and of Gardens and Designed Landscapes, 36:3 (2016), pp. 166–84. 11 J. Papp, Művészeti ismeretek gróf [sic] Sándor István (1750–1815) írásaiban (Budapest: Akadémiai Kiadó, 1992), pp. 30–7. 12 Hungarian National Archives, Budapest (hereafter HNA), P 115–III.–a–9. See also S. Körner, Nikolaus II Esterhazy (1765–1833) und die Kunst: Biografie eines manischen Sammlers (Vienna: Böhlau, 2012), pp. 126, 135–44. 13 HNA, P 115-III.-a-7. 14 E. Hammer-Luza, ‘“Stündlich erwarte ich meinen Aufbruch …”: Reisen im Leben von Erzherzog Johann’, in A. Ableitinger and M. Brunner (eds), Erzherzog Johann von Österreich, ‘Ein Land, wo ich viel gesehen’: Auf dem Tagebuch der England-Reise 1815/16 (Graz: Historische Landeskomission für Steiermark, 2009), pp. 45–61, at pp. 59–60. 15 J. Sisa, ‘The “English Garden” and the Comfortable House: British Influences in Nineteenth-Century Hungary, in G. Ernyey (ed.), Britain and Hungary: Contacts in Architecture and Design during the Nineteenth and Twentieth Century (Budapest: Hungarian University of Craft and Design, 1999), pp. 71–94; J. Sisa, ‘Mansions under the Spell of the “Oden Times”: Country House Building in the English Style’, Ars, 42:2 (2009), pp. 206–15. 16 G. Viszota (ed.), Gróf Széchenyi István naplói, 6 vols, Gróf Széchenyi István összes munkái, 10–15 (Budapest: Magyar Történelmi Társulat, 1925–39). 17 Wesselényi, Báró Wesselényi Miklós útinaplója 1821–1822. 18 Countess Antalné Csáky, née Baroness Anna Vécsey, Utazási vázlatok Olaszországról (Pest: Geibel, 1843). 19 A. Tinniswood, The Polite Tourist: Four Centuries of Country House Visiting (London: National Trust, 1998), pp. 88–94, gives a vivid overview of the frustration of country house owners and the measures taken to channel tourism during this period. Wilton was visited by thousands per year in the middle of the 1770s, while around 900 people per year saw Horace Walpole’s Strawberry Hill between May and September each year in the 1780s and 1790s. 20 Vay also visited Windsor Castle, Wilton House, Mount Edgecumbe House, Nuneham Courtney, the Leasowes, Chatsworth House and Knowsley Hall in England and Marino Villa and Powerscourt House when he travelled to Dublin. Széchényi also went to the London royal gardens of Kensington and Kew, Boughton Park, Boughton House, Wollaton Hall and Rokeby Park. In addition, he mentioned several others that he either missed or saw only from a distance while en route, like

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Chatsworth, Harewood House, Aske Hall, Acorn Bank, Netherby Hall, Bank House and Alkrington Hall. 21 J. F. Neigebauer, Handbuch für Reisende in England (Leipzig: Brockhaus, 1829), p. 17. 22 On Painshill: C. C. L. Hirschfeld, Theorie der Gartenkunst, vol. II (Leipzig: M. G. Weidmanns Erben und Reich, 1780), pp. 178–82; on the temples of Stowe: Hirschfeld, Theorie der Gartenkunst, vol. III (Leipzig: M. G. Weidmanns Erben und Reich, 1780), pp. 61–7. 23 Tinniswood, Polite Tourist, pp. 102–5. 24 HNA, P 623, vol. I, no. 12/9, fol. 276v. 25 Ibid., fols 232r, 232v. 26 Vay’s landscape and garden descriptions were kindly provided by his biographer, Orsolya Szakály. The original manuscript is in the care of the Reformed College of Sárospatak, Hungary. 27 Mrs Lybbe Powys recorded in 1775 that by that time the garden buildings had been thought to be too numerous; however, she observed that the plantations were now mature enough to mean that not all the buildings would be seen at once, diminishing the problem of perceived overcrowding. See E. Climenson (ed.), Passages from the Diaries of Mrs. Philip Lybbe Powys of Hardwick House, Oxon, A.D. 1756 to 1808 (London: Longmans, Green and Co., 1899), pp. 154–5. 28 They visited Burghley House, Castle Howard, Harewood House, Kings Weston House, York House in Twickenham, Blenheim Palace and Stowe House. 29 National Széchényi Library, Budapest, Manuscript Collection, Quart. Germ. 1023, fols 7v–8r. 30 Staffordshire Record Office, Stafford, D260/M/F/5/38. 31 R. Edgcumbe (ed.), The Diary of Frances Lady Shelley 1787–1817 (London: John Murray, 1912), p. 289. 32 HNA, P 115-III.-a-10. 33 Count István Széchenyi’s only recorded visit to a country house during his 1815 tour was to Woburn Abbey, but in 1822 he went to Audley End House, Bildeston House, Eaton Hall, Halkyn Hall, Bramham Park, Duncombe Park, Parlington Hall, Tickhill Castle House, Sandbeck Hall, Welbeck Abbey, Sherwood Hall, Chippenham Park, Euston Hall and Riddlesworth Hall. He had other interests during his 1832 tour but found time to visit Middleton Park, Blenheim Palace, Soho House, Teddesley Hall, Beaudesert Hall and Ingestre Hall. In 1834 he mostly stayed in London and visited Shernfold Park and Aston Hall only. 34 Wesselényi, Báró Wesselényi Miklós útinaplója, p. 109. 35 Ibid., p. 114. 36 Ibid., p. 130. This 1822 tour was Wesselényi’s only visit to England, and he saw the following country houses: Cheveley Park, Bildeston House, Blenheim Palace, Nuneham Courtney, Windsor Castle, Enville Hall, Bramham Park, Parlington Hall, Tickhill Castle House, Sandbeck Hall, Welbeck Abbey, Chippenham Park, Euston Hall and Rissledworth Hall. 37 Viszota (ed.), Gróf Széchenyi István naplói, vol. IV: 1830–1836 (Budapest: Magyar Történelmi Társulat, 1934), p. 306.



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38 Ibid., p. 326. 39 Ibid., p. 336. 40 The change in taste for country house destinations like Hardwick Hall and Kenilworth, and later Walter Scott’s influence in the early nineteenth century, are examined by Tinniswood, Polite Tourist, pp. 121–9. 41 He also visited Wollet Hall (now Loring Hall), Windsor Castle, Blenheim Palace, Warwick Castle, Bellevue House in Ireland, Buchanan Castle and Balloch Castle in Scotland, Burghley House, Cassiobury House and Bentley Priory. 42 B. Szemere, Utazás külföldön, vol. II: Nagy Britannia s Irland, Németalföld, Belgium, Rajnavidék, Helvétzia (Buda: Magyar Királyi Egyetem, 1840). 43 I. Gorove, Nyugot: Utazás külföldön, vol. II (Pest: Heckenast, 1844); L. Tóth, Uti tárcza: Ötödik füzet: Brittföld (Pest: Landerer & Heckenast, 1844). 44 [F. Pulszky], Aus dem Tagebuche eines in Grossbritannien reisenden Ungarn (Pest: Heckenast, 1837). 45 They visited Windsor Castle, Blenheim Palace, Wilton House, Leigh Court, Piercefield Park, Warwick Castle, Powerscourt in Ireland, Newby Hall, Studley Royal, Duncombe Park and Castle Howard. 46 S. Bölöni Farkas, Nyugateurópai utazás (Kolozsvár: Minerva, 1943). 47 Besides these they also saw Burghley Park, Lambton Castle, Alnwick Castle, Dunsinane House and Dunkeld Castle. 48 After Stirling Castle he visited Blair Castle, Tulloch Castle, Dunkeld Castle, Doune Castle and Rosslyn Castle before returning to England, where he went to Chillingham Castle and then Chatsworth. 49 According to historical records, there were sash windows in the Széchenyi chateau of Nagycenk as well, but they were removed long time ago. 50 Chatsworth House, Devonshire Collection, CH16/2/7, guest lists, Chiswick and Kemp Town, 1812–55. 51 Károlyi’s 1832 visit is not recorded, which implies that the duke’s personal guests were treated differently. 52 Neigebauer, Handbuch, p. 18. 53 These were Hatfield House, Woburn Abbey, Wrest Park, Ashridge House, Chiswick House, the Royal Pavilion in Brighton, Windsor Castle, Hampton Court, Cassiobury House, Syon House, Kew Palace, Buccleuch House (Montagu Villa) in Richmond, Gunnersbury Park, Chatsworth House, Alnwick Castle, Dalkeith Palace, Abbotsford House, Hopetoun House, Kinfauns Castle, Taymouth Castle, Blair Castle, Finlarig Castle, Stirling Castle, Hamilton Palace, Eaton Hall, Warwick Castle and Blenheim Palace (HNA, P 115-III.-a-7, fols 71–2). 54 I. Széchenyi, ‘Pesti por és sár’, in Töredékek gróf Széchenyi István fennmaradt kézirataiból, 2nd edn, ed. J. Török (Pest: Heckenast, 1866), pp. 1–138.

8

Magnificent and mundane: transporting people and goods to the country house, c.1730–1800 Jon Stobart

In recent years, there has been growing interest in animating the country house, a practice which has a number of overlapping elements. One builds on a much older interest in the social life of the country house, given particular momentum by the work of Mark Girouard in the 1970s which emphasised the relationship between its architecture, contents and use.1 What particularly caught his attention were the public lives and consequently the lavish spending of the elite, but this has since been complemented by a plethora of studies which examine the motivations, decision-making processes and changes of mind that lay behind particular decorative schemes or purchases of furniture.2 A second element of this animation is a focus on the house as the centrepiece for practices of polite visiting and increasingly of tourism, activities which encompassed both the country and metropolitan residences of the elite.3 And a third has explored the more mundane processes of household management, including both the strategies and accounting procedures followed by owners’ wives and the daily drudgery of servants as they cleaned, cooked and washed – duties which are now recreated in sanitised form by live interpreters working in a variety of country houses.4 All of these activities involved the movement of goods and people, making the country house a nexus for consumption. A huge variety of objects came in from London and other towns – everything from paintings and books to sugar and candles – while supplies of fruit, vegetables and game were taken from the country estate to houses in the metropolis (see also Chapter 9).5 Visitors arrived and left, as did many owners; tradesmen came with goods and craftsmen to carry out work, and servants were dispatched on errands. This constant ebb and flow has attracted increasing attention as historians have sought to count the number and map the geographical spread of suppliers. Others have highlighted the status that accrued from travel and the symbolism and cost of elite transport including coaches, horses and livery.6 However, rather less attention



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has been given to the ways in which these costs fitted in with broader patterns of elite expenditure, and especially to the more mundane aspects of travel and transport: that is, the mechanisms by which these things moved to and from the country house. This chapter forms an attempt to fill this lacuna, at least partly, and thus give a more rounded picture of the priorities and practices that characterised elite transport and travel. Its purpose is twofold. Firstly, it aims to highlight the magnificent: the ways in which money was lavished on coaches, horses and liveried servants in order to display wealth and rank, and the processes of supply that brought these manifestations of conspicuous consumption to the country house. And secondly, it aims to examine the day-to-day costs of feeding horses and maintaining vehicles, and of hiring coaches, paying tolls and transporting goods to and from the house. The relative importances of these various outgoings, and the rhythms of spending over the life course of an individual, are set within the context of overall spending on the country house, thus situating transport and travel in the broader framework of elite lives. The analysis focuses on three Midlands families: the Leighs of Stoneleigh Abbey in Warwickshire, the Newdigates of Arbury Hall in Warwickshire and the Purefoys of Shalstone House, Buckinghamshire. The Leighs were among the wealthiest landowners in Warwickshire, with estates worth £6,795 in 1749, rising to £13,643 by 1786 and £19,000 by the early nineteenth century.7 They were raised to the peerage in 1643, but suffered a series of demographic misfortunes in the eighteenth century: Thomas, 4th Lord Leigh, died young (in 1749), and his son, Edward, did not reach his majority until some fourteen years later; Edward died unmarried in 1786, following a long period of mental illness, and the estate then passed to his unmarried sister, the Honourable Mary Leigh, who split her time between Stoneleigh Abbey and her Kensington residence, Grove House. None of the eighteenth-century Leighs were active in political life. In stark contrast, Sir Roger Newdigate inherited Arbury Hall in 1734 and ran the estate for the whole of his long life, dying in 1806, the same year as Mary Leigh. He was MP for Middlesex (1741–47) and then for Oxford University (1750–80), attending Parliament on a regular basis and actively defending the ancient privileges of the university. He was also a captain in the Warwickshire militia, a renowned man of letters, a pioneer of the gothic revival and active in developing coal mines on his estate, the production of which helped to raise estate income to a peak of about £15,000 per annum in 1789. The Purefoys were of more modest means. Elizabeth was widowed in 1704, but continued to live at Shalstone House for the remainder of her long life (she died aged ninety-three in 1765) along with her son Henry. The family were not titled and lived rather unassuming lives, occasionally visiting London or Bath, but otherwise contenting themselves with county society and fairly modest pursuits.

170

Travel and the British country house Anatomy of spending on transport and travel

Spending on travel and transport formed a significant proportion of Sir Roger Newdigate’s outgoings. In the period 1747–96, his account books record a total of £21,906 of spending in his categories of stables, journeys and carriage of goods and letters: more than twice the amount he spent on silverware, furniture and books combined, and about 15 per cent of his overall expenditure.8 This impressive sum reflected the continued importance of travel as a marker of elite status; it was an outlay of time and money beyond the means of most people and thus signalled both wealth and leisure. It also reminds us of the level of mobility necessary for life in a country house, especially when it was combined with a career as an MP.9 There was a broad balance between four main categories of spending: the hardware of coaches and tack, feed for horses, wages and livery, and the cost of journeys (tolls, hiring coaches and horses, and overnight accommodation); see Chart 8.1. Perhaps surprisingly, the purchase 100% 90% 80% 70% 60% 50% 40% 30% 20% 10% 0% 1747–51 1752–56 1757–61 1762–66 1767–71 1772–76 1777–81 1782–86 1787–91 1792–96

carriage & le ers

journeys

physic & shoeing

horses bought

wages & livery

provender

tack, etc.

Chart 8.1  Spending on transport and travel by Sir Roger Newdigate, 1747–96 (£; five-year average as percentage)



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of horses accounted for less than 5 per cent of this spending – a modest outlay that is only partly explained by Newdigate breeding his own horses, the costs of which rarely amounted to more than £2 per annum according to his accounts. Overall spending rose over the years, from an average of £400 per annum in the 1750s and 1760s to £480 per annum in the 1780s and 1790s, an increase that appears to have been largely driven by greater spending on wages, livery and feed. These certainly grew as a proportion of expenditure, while spending on journeys declined – a reflection of Newdigate’s retirement as an MP in 1780 and his increasing age, which made him less inclined to travel long distances. In this respect, his second Grand Tour in 1774–75 appears to have formed something of a watershed; the eighteen months spent away from home explain the very different pattern of expenditure during this time and generated a huge spike in his spending on journeys and the carriage of goods (Chart 8.2). 1200

1000

800

600

400

200

55 17 57 17 59 17 61 17 63 17 65 17 67 17 69 17 71 17 73 17 75 17 77 17 79 17 81 17 83 17 85 17 87 17 89 17 91 17 93 17 95

53

17

51

17

49

17

17

17

47

0

provender

wages & livery

travel & carriage

total

coach & horses

Chart 8.2  Spending on transport and travel by Sir Roger Newdigate, 1747–96 (£)

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Indeed, what is most striking about Newdigate’s spending on travel and transport is its volatility. Peaks in spending often coincided with large journeys, including tours of the southern counties in 1748 (costing £98 9s), Yorkshire in 1766 (£165 12s), East Anglia in 1768 (£68 13s) and Lincolnshire in 1773 (£44 18s 9d). However, there were also other large periodic outlays: the carriage of five loads of goods from his London house in Spring Gardens following the loss of his Middlesex seat in 1747 (£84 11s 11d), and the purchase of new carriages in 1747, 1755, 1758, 1765, 1786 and 1787, for a combined total of about £644. This conspicuous spending on coaches and travel was, to some extent, discretionary; less easily controlled was the outlay on feed: oats, hay and straw. Overall spending on these rose from an average of around £100 per annum in the 1750s and 1760s to around £150 per annum by the 1780s and 1790s, but this pattern masks considerable variations from year to year: from as little as £55 in 1790, up to £247 in 1794 and down again to £152 in 1795. It is hard to know exactly what caused these vicissitudes, but they appear to have been linked to changes in quantity rather than price, although the latter did vary slightly year by year. Newdigate’s shifting need to buy in feed probably reflected variable harvests because there is no indication that the number or quality of horses fluctuated this dramatically over the years, at least when judged from the prices he paid for horses. Another unavoidable and growing outlay associated with his stables was the rising tax burden. The £6 that he was paying on two carriages in 1747 had risen to £13 14s 4d by 1783, when he was also paying £4 4s on his coachman and postilions and £3 10s in horse tax; ten years later, he was paying £28 on his carriages, £6 10s on his horses and £4 4s on his servants, a total of £38 14s or the equivalent of two coach horses. The magnificent: coaches, horses and livery These taxes were targeted on luxuries and reflect the role of transport and travel as a prop to elite status. Coaches, horses and liveried grooms spoke volumes of the wealth and taste, but also the rank and title, of the landowner; indeed, the coach was the pars pro toto of an elite lifestyle and emblematic of the economic and social standing of the landed classes.10 As a very public statement of status, its presence on the streets of London and the spa resorts was more telling than appearances in lanes around the house itself. There was thus a need for carriages to be both fashionable and well presented, an imperative which required regular and substantial spending and which, for the very wealthy like the Verneys, involved owning different vehicles for town and country or for different seasons. Sir Roger Newdigate does not appear to have made this distinction, but he invariably owned both a coach and a post chaise (generally a lighter vehicle). As Edwards shows for William Cavendish (see Chapter 9), carriages were replaced regularly over the years, and, continuing an earlier trend noted



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by Whyman, the costs rose steadily from £54 10s (in 1747) to £109 (1786) for a post chaise, and from £85 5s (1755) to £188 10s (1787) for a coach.11 Unfortunately, we know little about the appearance and decoration of these vehicles, although Newdigate complained bitterly during a dispute about an overdue bill from a London coachmaker called Leader that it was an ‘enormous charge for a very plain chaise & harness’.12 This probably represents the jaundiced eye of an unhappy customer rather than a completely accurate depiction of the carriage. Certainly, the detailed descriptions contained in coachmakers’ bills indicate that the Leigh family’s coaches were ornately and fashionably decorated in a manner befitting their rank and station. In 1757, Thomas and James Cope, of Long Acre in London, presented a bill for a post chaise supplied to the Honourable Mary Leigh, sister of the future 5th Lord Leigh. She was twenty­-one years old, and it seems likely that the coach was part of her coming out onto the social scene. It was described as ‘stone colour with ornaments on the Pannels of China figures, coats of Arms and Cyphers; lined with light colour Cloth’.13 Seven years later, her brother was supplied with a new crane-necked chariot by the same makers, perhaps in connection with his inheritance of the family estate and, again, his coming of age. They described the coach as having ‘neat ornamentl mouldings, painted with a glaz’d ruby colour, and the arms and dignity in very large mantles, and all the framework gilt, and the roof, back and sides japan’d’.14 As Whyman notes, the family coat of arms was an essential part of the decoration as it made clear the rank as well as the wealth of the family;15 but these descriptions also hint at gender differences in decorative style: Mary’s Chinese figures contrasted with her brother’s more obviously showy combination of japanned and gilt work. Such important symbolic capital required considerable and regular outlay to maintain its condition and thus its ability to communicate the right status messages, a need compounded by the considerable wear and tear that was inevitably experienced as these vehicles carried their owners around the country on roads that were frequently rutted and uneven.16 This brought two imperatives: first, the coach needed to be sturdy and practical as well as looking good, especially if was to be used for travelling rather than simply making social calls in London, and second, it required regular maintenance work. The cost of particular pieces of work could be quite modest, Mary Leigh paying John Hatchett 5s for cleaning and a total of £3 1s 6d for japanning, varnishing and polishing the coach in 1793. But new harnesses were more costly, the same bill recording a charge of £30 for ‘4 New harnesses & bridles made of the best Neat Leather & strong Silver plated Furniture’ along with other pieces of polished ironwork, including bits and cribs. Cumulatively, these kinds of bills added considerably to the cost of owning a coach. Between the purchase of his new post chaise in 1747 and his new coach in 1755, Sir Roger Newdigate paid his coachmaker just over £171 for repairs, new glass and the like. 17

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Outlay at this level makes any disappointment felt in the end product more understandable: when fault was found, it was the cost that irked as well as the way that perceived shoddiness undermined the coach as a status symbol. Newdigate may have bemoaned the plainness of his coach, but Elizabeth Purefoy centred her complaints on the poor quality of the glass in her carriage, which ‘broke & flew in severall pieces’ when she tried to open the window, and of some harnesses, the brass buckles of which were ‘of such small substance as will break like Glasse’.18 These sentiments were brought together in the complaints made by the wealthy industrialist Michael Hughes about his new carriage. It was not only ‘plain, mean and paltry and this much inferior to any Gentleman’s Carriage’, but also poorly made, ‘for the Springs, altho’ the Carriage since I had it has not run more than 30 Miles … have already given way and must be replaced’.19 Another consequence of the expense of carriages was to encourage attempts to defray costs. Like others, the Leighs did not settle their account with Thomas and James Cope in in full, but rather paid it down in instalments, a practice which they followed with many of their principal suppliers.20 Sir Roger Newdigate, like John Verney, traded in the carriages that he was replacing, receiving £6 18s for his old landau in 1755 and £10 for his old coach ten years later (this was roughly 10 per cent of the cost of his new carriages – the price of fashion, but also of wear and tear).21 Henry Purefoy went a stage further, dipping his toe into the extensive market for second-hand carriages that developed in both London and the provinces, perhaps because he lacked the means to buy new.22 In early 1745, he wrote to his coachmaker, Henry Lake, that his mother was looking to exchange her current large coach for a smaller lighter model. Unsurprisingly, he expressed a desire to ‘have the Doors & coach pretty near the fashion they make them now’: after all, a second-hand coach was a false economy if it failed to measure up to the required standards of taste or fashion. At the same time, though, practical issues were paramount. Purefoy described the old coach as being ‘little ye worse for wearing’ – reflecting the imperatives found in newspaper advertisements for second-hand carriages – and rejected one offered by Lake as too heavy, noting that ‘Wee must have a very light one to travel in, otherwise wee need not change our own.’23 The precise saving that Purefoy might have made by purchasing second-hand is unclear, but would certainly have run to tens of pounds – enough to pay his coachmen and grooms for a year, or to purchase two or three good coach horses. Both men and animals formed considerable additional costs, especially when they had to be clothed and fed (see also Chapter 9). A post chaise usually required two horses, while the bigger and heavier coaches needed four or more often six.24 Given that each of the families considered here was running two or more carriages at any one time, they must have owned at least five coach horses and more likely seven; the Leighs certainly had more, especially when Mary



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and Edward Leigh were running separate carriages in the 1760s. In addition, there would have been horses for riding as well as others for drawing wagons and carts, most owners preferring to have different animals for each of these tasks, not least because different physical and behavioural characteristics were required for each. Coach horses needed to be large, strong and of a good gait, and needed to match in terms of colour, action, size and conformation, giving the full ensemble of coach and horses an elegant appearance.25 Riding horses too were intended to create an imposing and authoritative image, but each one also needed to be matched to its rider’s needs and abilities: not everyone wanted a fine, mettlesome stallion. Henry Purefoy, for example, wrote to a local grazier, offering ‘a very pretty Gelding I bought for my own riding, hee being too airy for mee’ and later complained, after having been thrown from his horse, that ‘mares when they go to horse are Resty and gamesome, & not fit for mee’.26 The need for economy sometimes forced dual use of horses, an imperative which again shaped Henry Purefoy’s behaviour. He enquired about a saddle horse that might also be used occasionally to pull carts and made reference to ‘the coach horse I ride’,27 but the elite kept designated coach and saddle horses if they could. While his accounts do not tell us about the intended purpose of the horses that he bred, Sir Roger Newdigate distinguished coach, saddle and general-purpose horses in his purchases. The price difference was considerable: broken-in coach horses cost him between £15 4s and £19 (a price which remained fairly stable over time), whereas the price of saddle horses was more variable and could be as little as £5 10 for a modest mount, again reminding us that not all members of the elite strove for costly thoroughbreds. Over a fifty-year period, Newdigate spent a total of £720, sometimes acquiring colts and foals that required breaking (costing up to £5 apiece) and sometimes breeding from his own mares, although the latter was never a major source of livestock and the Arbury Hall stables were a far cry from the large-scale and hugely costly stud that had been run by his grandfather Sir Richard Newdigate.28 The accounts make occasional reference to purchases of horses at the fairs in Rugby and especially Northampton, a renowned source for powerful draught animals. More generally, however, no location is given, making it difficult to judge the balance between fairs and private transactions as a source of animals, although Edwards argues that coach horses were usually acquired at the former and saddle horses from the latter.29 Purefoy, with less disposable income, was still keen to acquire good horses. In the summer of 1736, he wrote to his friend the Revd Richard Dalby asking him to buy a coach horse belonging to Mr Buzwell, ‘if hee may be had for 12 guineas or 13 pounds as you was mentioning’, adding that ‘upon consideration wee think hee will match Ruby well enough’.30 The imperatives of economy were being balanced with the desire to have matching horses for the carriage; importantly, they were being fulfilled via a private transaction, Purefoy being

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cautious about buying at fairs. That said, he was sometimes unlucky when reaching private bargains, writing to a neighbour and complaining that he had been misled about the quality of a horse bought at Banbury which ‘I mistrusted & questioned … but you & Pratt [a local farrier] & the owner of the mare said she was not surfeited but entirely sound’.31 This incident throws up two important aspects of horse buying. The first is that not all gentlemen were experts in horseflesh: while Purefoy could be disparaging about the judgement of others, he appears to have been uncertain of his abilities in assessing the  qualities of particular animals – hence his reliance on his neighbour and the local farrier. This was not unusual, of course: some landowners engaged a specialist stable master to assess potential horses and haggle over prices as well as managing their stables. Purefoy was probably unable to afford such a luxury, but there is no evidence that Sir Roger Newdigate had such a servant either, so he may have been confident of his own skills or looked to friends or perhaps his coachman for advice. The second point is the need to exercise care: it was all too easy to end up with poor or sickly animals, especially when buying from an unknown source, as Purefoy again found to his cost in 1748 when acquiring a coach mare for his mother.32 Of course, buying the horse was only the start of the expenditure. Feed was an ongoing expense and one that, for Sir Roger Newdigate, outweighed the recorded outlay in purchasing horses by a ratio of nearly 9:1 (around £6,106 over the fifty-year period, compared with £720 on horses: see Chart 8.1). If the landowner had pretensions to large-scale stud breeding, the cost could be crippling unless sufficient hay and oats could be produced on the estate, and there was, of course, the opportunity cost of tying up land that might be put to more profitable use.33 In addition, there was a need for tack, especially when riding was a particular passion or a significant element of the owner’s identity. This does not appear to have been the case for Newdigate, Purefoy or Edward Leigh; but it was for true of Edward’s father, Thomas, 4th Lord Leigh. In 1739, he purchased for his wife a ‘Leopard Skin Side Sadle & Housing Trimed with Gold fringe & Lace’ and ‘Fine Leopard Housing & bags, Trimm’d with Gold fringe & Lace, very Rich’.34 These were exotic luxuries that cost Thomas a total of £49 7s: almost as much as Newdigate spent on his 1747 post chaise and just as potent as a symbol of wealth, status and taste, especially when combined with the ‘Four Sett of Housing & bags with yr Lordships Crest & Coronet’. The conspicuous consumption of coach, horses and saddlery was made complete by the addition of liveried servants. John Styles has argued that servants had a variable and ambivalent attitude to livery, but for their masters it was a key component in public expressions of rank and title.35 Sir Roger Newdigate spent almost as much on livery as he did on clothing for himself and his wives across the period of the account books.36 Much of this outlay was for dressing his coachman and postilions, spending on whom often ran into double figures.



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In 1755, for instance, he purchased leather breeches, a frock suit, a hat and a box-greatcoat for his coachman and groom, at a combined cost of over £20. Sixteen years later, a new set of livery for his coachman, groom and two postilions cost £45 3s, and in 1790, ten years after he had retired from public life as an MP, he was still spending handsomely, the tailor’s account for livery coming to £62 17s 6d.37 This level of spending was at least matched by Mary Leigh, who was laying out around £25 per head to clothe her coachman, grooms and postilion in the 1790s.38 Significantly, she went to the same London tailors, Fell & Son of St Martin’s Lane, that her brother had used for his own clothing in the 1760s, while the hats came from Davies and Lees of Conduit Street, ‘Hatters to her Majesty’. Like all livery, the clothing provided by Sir Roger Newdigate and Mary Leigh was showy. Colours were often used to mark out the family by which the servant was employed, and trimmings made for an ostentatious rather than fashionable display. These were not clothes that spoke of sartorial elegance or gentlemanly good taste; rather they communicated rank, wealth and service. The detail contained in Newdigate’s account books is limited, but the frock suits and jackets bought in 1750 were scarlet and laced. Bills presented to Mary Leigh by the Fells give more detail. In 1795, the firm supplied four dress livery laced suits, three claret frock suits, two scarlet laced jackets and waistcoats and six striped waistcoats. Rather less showy but no less expensive were three duffle jackets, seven drab colour surtout coats, a drab coach box-coat, six drab frock suits and seven Russia drab frock coats and waistcoats. The total bill came to £141 12s, with a further £84 8s of livery for the Stoneleigh servants, to which was added £9 2s 6d for the livery hats and velvet postilions’ caps supplied by Davies and Lees.39 And yet this spending was not unthinking extravagance; rather, it was tempered with economy and prudence. The Fells’ bill included 9s 6d for ‘Ripping to pieces a Claret colour frock Suit & Greatly altered for a new Postilion & made to his size’, and there were similar charges for altering another suit, two jackets and three waistcoats. Although some servants retained their livery, it is clear that employers could extend the useful life of clothing beyond the employment of a particular servant. More importantly, perhaps, liveried servants formed a vital component of the magnificence of travel for the titled elite. Coaches, horses and livery comprised what de Vries refers to as a ‘consumption bundle’: that is, a set of objects which, when deployed and displayed collectively, carried additional meaning.40 As an ensemble, they were central to elite status, both as a highly visible display of rank and status and as the key mechanism for a level of personal mobility that marked them out from other social groups. Yet travel and transport were also fundamental to elite lifestyles and elite spending at a more mundane level: moving people relied on everyday costs as well as expenditure on ‘big ticket’ items, while most goods went to and from the country house by other means.

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Travel and the British country house The mundane: transporting people and delivering goods

In addition to the costs of coach, horses and servants, Sir Roger Newdigate spent an average of just over £100 per annum on journeys. Even if we remove the exceptional costs of his 1774–75 Grand Tour, the figure was a hefty £90 per annum, reflecting the cumulative cost of turnpike tolls, hiring horses, overnight accommodation and the like (see also Chapter 9). These costs were incurred on at least three different types of travel, all of which fed into and facilitated his elite lifestyle. First, there were extended leisure trips, comprising not just his Grand Tour but also a number of journeys within England, both of which were well beyond the means of most people and served to mark elite status. For example, his 1748 tour of southern England lasted for about two months and involved over 600 miles of travel. Some nights were sent with friends or acquaintances, but there were numerous overnight stays at inns.41 Quite apart from the ability to devote so much time to leisure travel, the total cost recorded for the journey (£98 9s) accounted for nearly one quarter of his spending on transport and travel that year. Second, there were regular excursions made to spa resorts and to a variety of towns for the races. The journey to Bath in the 1770s and 1780s cost around £12 10s; trips to Buxton in the early 1780s accumulated bills of between £3 4s and £10 10s, depending on the length of stay, and visits to Warwick and Rugby races in the 1750s involved laying out anything from £2 13 6d to £7 19s. Thus, even a modest leisure trip to a neighbouring town could easily cost more than a maid’s annual wages. Third, there were the journeys necessary for Newdigate’s role as magistrate and an MP. These sometimes took him to Warwick for the quarter sessions or to Oxford, but mostly he went to London, sometimes meeting the Vice Chancellor of Oxford University while there. The recorded cost of these journeys varied hugely, depending mostly on the duration of the visit and on whether accommodation as well as travel was included. Other cost factors included the time of year and thus the time taken for the journey, and the number of people travelling. Details are not always recorded, but in January 1767, for instance, the accounts show £12 for Newdigate’s own travel, plus a further £2 15s 6d for transporting his cook and three maids down to London.42 In addition to these longer trips, there were numerous shorter journeys and costs for sending servants on errands. For Newdigate, these were mostly incurred in Warwickshire. In London, he appears to have walked a great deal from his house in Spring Gardens: for the short journey to and from Parliament, but also around the city streets and to a variety of retailers and craftsmen. While walking was not unusual, the distances he covered were exceptional, his diaries indicating some round trips of several miles.43 Of course, he also used his carriages, and for most elites in London a coach was necessary both to achieve this level of mobility and to signal their status to the metropolis. Judith Baker,



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visiting London in the 1770s and 1780s, appears to have been geographically constrained by her reluctance to hire a coach. As a consequence, her shopping trips remaining focused on the streets close to her lodgings.44 In contrast, the Purefoys’ 1749 trip was undertaken in their own coach, which was lodged at an inn near to the Wood Street house of their friend and agent Peter Moulson.45 From this base, they spent several days visiting shops in St Paul’s Churchyard, Cheapside, Fleet Street, Long Acre, Holborn, Piccadilly and elsewhere. The following day they went sightseeing, beginning in the City with visits to St Stephen’s, the Bank, Southsea House and the Guildhall, and then travelling north to Moorfields and on to Westminster Abbey. Some of these shops and landmarks might be reached on foot, but Henry was not the most athletic of men and his mother was seventy-six years old, so they must have hired coaches (or used their own) for many journeys. They would certainly have needed to do so when visiting friends in Pall Mall and when travelling to Ranelagh House, the Tower and Greenwich in the following two days. Such practices were well established in the early seventeenth century, with horses often being returned to the country residence rather than expensively stabled in London (see Chapter 9). By the middle decades of the eighteenth century, even longer-term residents appear to have mixed ownership and hiring. Mary Leigh incurred significant bills as a young woman, paying George Wright a total of £495 over the period 1759–72 for hiring coaches, horses and coachmen.46 The destinations to which she travelled on these occasions are not recorded, but other bills note trips as far afield as Cheltenham, though most journeys were in and around London.47 As an older woman and by then living in Kensington, she was still hiring carriages as well as using her own coach: an account for £169 4s 6d with a London hackney man, Richard Smith, was settled in July 1804.48 Some of these costs are recorded in the account book for Grove House, payments for coaches appearing on average once a week during the months when she was in residence. The sums involved were generally very modest, either one or sometimes shillings, although it is unclear whether these were the tolls charged on journeys into London or the cost of hiring a coach. Some were undoubtedly the latter, as the accounts occasionally record ‘coach for the cook’, but trips to see her man of business, Joseph Hill, in Temple Bar or Queen Street and those to visit family and friends were more likely to be made in her own coach. Visiting was an important part of Mary Leigh’s social life – her accounts also record payments for packs of small visiting cards – and, as Whyman notes of the Verneys, arriving by coach would have made this an important and symbolic occasion.49 Given the wider importance of coach ownership in London society, these visits would have provided the ideal opportunity for Mary to use her coach and show off her expensively clothed servants. The regular and substantial nature of her bills for equipage and tack indicate that Mary Leigh made good use of her coach. She paid thirty-two such bills

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over the course of her life, covering repairs, renovations and cleaning of her coach and a wide range of new harnesses, collars, bars and the like. But there were also whips, saddles, reins and bridles; cruppers, martingales, nick straps, curbs and body rollers; and combs, sponges and brushes.50 The significance of these is twofold. First, they question the extent to which saddlery was an entirely masculine domain as Vickery suggests.51 Men may have engaged more enthusiastically with the equipage of coach and horses, but it was necessary for any wealthy landowner to devote time and money to these items. While it is unlikely that Mary spent much time in the saddler’s workshop, she was clearly linked into this world through her demand for its products. Second, and more important for the present discussion, this spending confirms that Mary was using her own coach and horses on a regular basis, and sufficiently to necessitate repairs and renewal. Viewed in this way, these bills equate to those for cleaning and maintaining the house; they speak less of a fetish for leather than of the prudent spending of a responsible owner. Whether owned or hired, a coach and horses made members of the elite geographically mobile. Thanks to the network of carriers that enmeshed the country with an increasingly dense web of interconnections, goods were equally footloose.52 Carriage was a significant enough area of spending to merit a separate entry in Sir Roger Newdigate’s account books, an average of about £34 being laid out each year. Unfortunately, it is mostly impossible to know how this broke down into payments for particular journeys or consignments. Bringing his artistic and bibliographic treasures back from Italy was exceptional in terms of complexity and cost: his accounts indicate a total bill of a shade over £331 for freight, duties and brokerage, to which was added a further £89 for ‘package, embarkage &c’.53 More generally, however, his payments for carriage reflected dozens of separate transactions each year, with arrangements for delivery being made for each consignment of goods and personal belongings. These arrangements come into much sharper focus in the letters written by Elizabeth and Henry Purefoy to their various suppliers, each of which ends with careful instructions about how the goods being ordered should be delivered. For goods coming from London, they generally used the Buckingham carrier Mr Webster and his successors William Eagles and Mr Jones, who each in turn operated out of the Oxford Arms on Warwick Lane off Ludgate Hill. From there, they transported a remarkable range of goods for them – anything from groceries and textiles to books and lottery tickets. However, the Purefoys also drew on the services of Eagles’s father, the Brackley carrier; Mr Palmer, the Oxford carrier who called at Northampton; and Zachary Meads, whose route is not specified. On rare occasions, they even had goods dispatched by stage coach, Elizabeth requesting that a pound of bohea tea be sent from her London grocer via the Bath coach as she was staying in the resort for her health.54 Given the complexity of London’s retail and transport networks, the Purefoys were



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understandably careful in giving precise instructions about where their chosen carrier could be found and the days on which they would depart. The wine merchant Peter Moulson, with whom the Purefoys developed a very close relationship, was thus informed that Meads ‘sets out from George inne Smithfield on Mondays and ffriday mornings’, while Eagles departed at four o’clock each Tuesday morning.55 The retailer was clearly expected to assemble the goods, but responsibility for their safe delivery to the carrier’s London base is less easily apportioned. The arrangements and costs are not explicit in the Purefoy’s correspondence, although Henry exhorted his stationer when ordering a range of paper to ‘charge the carrier they don’t come to any Wett’, suggesting that the retailer was expected to deal directly with the carrier.56 More systematic evidence can be drawn from the account book for Grove House, Mary Leigh’s Kensington home, which records regular payments for the carriage of hampers of groceries, at the rate of 1s 6d per hamper.57 The supplier of these is not noted, but her chief source of groceries at this time was Francis Field, whose shop was on Holborn, some three and a half miles distant. It may have been Field who organised the delivery of these hampers, but the actual work of moving them across town was probably in the hands of porters. These arrangements reveal something of the complex nature of what might seem to be relatively straightforward transactions with London suppliers; placing an order was really only the start of a complex series of relationships that brought goods to the country house. Moreover, there were significant flows in the opposite direction. The Purefoys used the same carriers who brought goods from London to return items that they found wanting, Henry, for instance, sending back quilting ‘carriage paid’, via Webster, the Buckingham carrier. More frequent were the gifts that they sent to their agents in London, especially Thomas Robotham and Peter Moulson, with whom they stayed when visiting London in 1749. These were usually fresh foods: hares from the estate, pigeons, hog puddings, cheese, a chine, turkey or goose. They helped to cement friendships, and the letters announcing their dispatch invariably noted that they came ‘carriage paid’.58 Mary Leigh was engaged in similar practices, although her largesse stretched to venison, which was especially important in denoting favour and was given most often to Joseph Hill, thus signalling and reinforcing their professional and personal relationship.59 This came to Kensington as part of regular consignments of vegetables and fruits from Stoneleigh Abbey and was sent on via local carriers at a cost of between 8d and 1s per delivery.60 More generally, the Grove House account books record a plethora of payments for goods being carried from London inns to Kensington. In 1790, for example, three hampers were brought from the Bell Inn, Wood Street, in January; two hampers and three deal boxes were sent from the same address in February; a case followed in March; five boxes and a trunk, then three boxes and a hamper,

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and finally a box, hamper and package came in July.61 The overall cost of these journeys was 17s 6d – insignificant in Mary’s annual expenditure, which ran into the thousands – but they reflect both the enormous flows of goods that criss-crossed London on a daily basis and the huge, but often neglected, importance of carriers in allowing both trade and daily living to function effectively. The geographical mobility of carriers meant that they were in London more regularly than some provincial landowners, especially those without a London house. They were called on to undertake a variety of roles beyond simply transporting goods; they carried valuables, chased up enquiries with tradesmen and paid shopkeepers’ accounts. A single example will serve to illustrate the way in which these various duties were to be executed. In April 1750, Henry Purefoy wrote to the carrier William Eagles asking him to enquire after ‘my Ring that I gave you in a little box to deliver to Mr Chabbert a Goldsmith over against Brownlow Street’; there had clearly been some delay, and Purefoy was anxious for news concerning its whereabouts.62 In addition, Eagles was to call at Richard Budd, a stationer in Chancery Lane, and settle an account for £14s 9d on his behalf. He was instructed to get a receipt, on production of which Eagles would be paid when he returned to Buckingham. For his trouble, Eagles was allowed to ‘drink sixpence’, which seems scant reward for effectively advancing money to Purefoy in this way. Budd’s account was relatively small, but the carrier paid others that were considerably larger, meaning that he could be tens of pounds out of pocket. Carriers were thus trusted to carry goods and undertake financial transactions safely and honestly, but shopkeepers were equally careful to ensure that the items that they dispatched were safely packaged. We have already seen something of this in the hampers of groceries being carried to Grove House. These containers were often itemised on bills and their cost explicitly passed on to the customer: North, Hoare, Nanson and Simpson, for instance, charged Mary Leigh 7s 6d for three hampers to contain £38 14s 10d of groceries, while Field and Lewis added 3s 2d for a hamper and a stone bottle (the latter being a substantial item containing nine quarts of finest salad oil.63 Such packaging contained and protected the goods within; this was necessary for all manner of objects but especially important for fragile items such as china. Wedgwood’s concerns about the safe movement of his wares is generally seen in terms of transportation from the factory to his London showrooms, which was most famously manifest in his support of the Trent and Mersey Canal. However, the need for similar care when dispatching goods to his customers is seen in the charge for crates inevitably contained in his bills and those of provincial china dealers like M. Backhouse of Coventry.64 Despite this, mishaps were quite common, Henry Purefoy writing in 1749 that a box of china had arrived safely, except for one plate which ‘was put up under the cover of the Dish, & no straw being upon it, it was broke’.65



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In many ways, packing and transporting small items like these was relatively straightforward. Something of the complexity and costs of moving furniture from London makers to provincial country houses is apparent from the lengthy bill presented by William Gomm.66 This contains a total of £21 18s 6d on packaging: a modest sum in relation to the £818 19s of the overall account, but still a substantial figure, equivalent to the cost of twenty-four chairs or two of the best large chests of drawers. Chairs and presses were protected by matting and deal boards across their backs, while strong packing cases were used for dressing tables, commodes and the like. Particular trouble was taken over the communion table, costing £31 10s, which was covered in a blanket and placed in a large packing case. The benefit of this care is apparent from the safe arrival of most of the furniture, although it is telling that Gomm allowed £1 6s for ‘2 Mahogany Chairs in the room of two broke in the Carriage & allowing for the Wood that could be used’.67 Suitably protected and in the safe hands of a reliable carrier, goods were thus highly mobile, at least for wealthy landowners who could afford the costs of packaging and transport and the time to organise safe transit from shop or workshop to the country house. If the work was sometimes put onto the shoulders of others – carriers being asked to settle accounts or stewards and housekeepers charged with dealing with suppliers – this did nothing to diminish the huge logistical effort required to make goods and people geographically mobile in a way that made the country house such an important nexus of consumption. Conclusions The magnificence and symbolism of the coach and horses often dominate analyses of elite transport. It was such a costly undertaking, such a showy piece of conspicuous consumption and such an important public statement of rank and title that it too easily blinds us to other, more everyday, aspects of travel: horse feed and vehicle maintenance, turnpike tolls and accommodation, carriage hire and carriers’ bills. And yet, as with the country house itself, the magnificent and mundane were two sides of the same coin; they were mutually inter-­ dependent. A coach was useless without well-fed horses to pull it and would have lost much of its cultural impact were it to appear in public in a dilapidated condition. Moreover, coach ownership implied journeys, the cost of which – as Sir Roger Newdigate’s accounts make clear – could easily exceed those of the vehicle and equipage. Whyman has suggested that the coach was both useful and symbolic because it conferred freedom on its owner; freedom from the constraints of space which allowed the elite to conceive and operate on a geographically broader stage.68 A corresponding freedom from the tyranny of space derived from the ability to order goods over long distances and secure their safe delivery to the house. This

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was vital to the geographical reach of the elite and thus to their status as tasteful and discerning consumers. The motivations for buying goods in London were complex and varied, but undoubtedly served to extend choice and underpin status; but choosing and buying the right things from the right places was of little value if they could not be carried home. Cost was an important factor here; another was the level of organisation required to order and deliver goods over great distances. Together, they helped to differentiate the supply patterns of country house owners from the middling sorts who relied much more on shops in their local towns.69 When we think about the country house as a nexus of consumption, we should therefore recall that not only was a significant proportion of that consumption concerned with transport and travel (in the forms of bills from coachmakers, saddlers, tailors, farriers and innkeepers), but also it was underpinned by a dependence on transport services in the form of carriers. Their importance was out of all proportion to the size of the bills they presented because without them, the country house quite simply could not have functioned. Notes

I would like to express my thanks to Mark Rothery and especially Peter Edwards, whose helpful comments have refined and strengthened the arguments.

 1 M. Girouard, Life in the English Country House (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1978).  2 See, for example, R. Wilson and A. Mackley, The Building of the English Country House, 1660–1880, 2nd edn (London: Hambledon Continuum, 2007); A. Vickery, Behind Closed Doors: At Home in Georgian England (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2009); J. Whittle and E. Griffiths, Consumption and Gender in the Early Seventeenth-Century Household: The World of Alice Le Strange (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012); J. Stobart and M. Rothery, Consumption and the Country House (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016).  3 A. Tinniswood, The Polite Tourist: Four Centuries of Country House Visiting (London: National Trust, 1989); S. Whyman, Sociability and Power in Late-Stuart England: The Cultural Worlds of the Verneys, 1660–1720 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999), pp. 91–9.  4 Whittle and Griffiths, Consumption and Gender, pp. 26–48, 212–21; P. Sambrook, Keeping their Places: Domestic Service in the Country House (Stroud: Alan Sutton Publishing, 2009).  5 Stobart and Rothery, Consumption and the Country House, chapter 8.  6 Wilson and Mackley, Building of the English Country House; J. D. Williams, ‘The Noble Household as a Unit of Consumption: The Audley End Experience, 1765– 1797’, Essex Archaeology and History, 23 (1992), pp. 67–78; J. Stobart, ‘Gentlemen and Shopkeepers: Supplying the Country House in Eighteenth-Century England’, Economic History Review, 64 (2011), pp. 885–904; Whyman, Sociability and



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Power, pp. 100–7; P. Edwards, Horse and Man in Early Modern England (London: Bloomsbury, 2007), chapters 4 and 9; P. Edwards, ‘The Decline of an Aristocratic Stud: The Stud of Edward, Lord Harley, 2nd Earl of Oxford and Mortimer, at Welbeck (Oxfordshire), 1721–29’, Economic History Review, 69 (2016), pp. 870–92; J. Styles, Dress of the People. Everyday Fashion in Eighteenth-Century England (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2007), pp. 295–301.  7 M. MacDonald, ‘“Not unmarked by some eccentricities”: The Leigh Family of Stoneleigh Abbey’, in R. Bearman (ed.), Stoneleigh Abbey: The House, its Owners, its Lands (Stratford upon Avon: Shakespeare Birthplace Trust, 2004), pp. 149, 151, 153; Stratford Central Library and Archives (hereafter SCLA), DR18/31/16–37, Rentals of Real and Devised Estates 1762–1806.  8 Warwickshire Record Office, Warwick (hereafter WRO), CR136/v/156, Accounts 1747–62; CR136/v/136, Accounts 1763–96. These are the headings used in the accounts, which do not distinguish between personal and estate costs in relation to journeys and carriage.  9 Whittle and Griffiths, Consumption and Gender, pp. 191–6; Edwards, Horse and Man. For comparisons with everyday spending at Audley End, see Williams, ‘Noble Household’. 10 F. M. L. Thompson, English Landed Society in the Nineteenth Century (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1963), p. 1; P. Burke, The Historical Anthropology of Early Modern Italy (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987), p. 139. More generally, see Edwards, Horse and Man, chapter 9. 11 WRO, CR136/v/156, Accounts 1747–62; CR136/v/136, Accounts 1763–96; Whyman, Sociability and Power, pp. 100–3. 12 WRO, CR136/B/2627[1], letter, 20 May 1799. See also CR136/B2627[2], letter, 10 June 1799. Newdigate bought all his carriages from London makers. 13 SCLA, DR18/5/3738. 14 SCLA, DR18/5/4350. 15 Whyman, Sociability and Power, p. 101. 16 D. Gerhold, Carriers and Coachmasters: Trade and Travel before the Turnpikes (Chichester: Phillimore, 2005). 17 SCLA, DR18/5/6054; WRO, CR136/v/156, Accounts 1747–62. 18 Eland, G. (ed.), Purefoy Letters, 1735–1753 (London: Sidgwick and Jackson Ltd, 1931), no. 292, 13 September 1743; no. 300, 19 July 1750. 19 Letter to Messrs Chamberlayne & Co., 23 October 1809, quoted in T. C. Barker and J. R. Harris, A Merseyside Town in the Industrial Revolution: St Helens 1750– 1900 (Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 1954), p. 155. 20 Stobart and Rothery, Consumption and the Country House, chapter 7. 21 WRO, CR136/v/156, Accounts 1747–62; CR136/v/136, Accounts 1763–96; Whyman, Sociability and Power, p. 104. 22 Whyman, Sociability and Power, 104; J. Stobart, ‘Clothes, Cabinets and Carriages: Second-Hand Dealing in Eighteenth-Century England’, in B. Blondé, P. Stabel, J. Stobart and I. Van Damme (eds), Buyers and Sellers: Retail Circuits and Practices in Medieval and Early Modern Europe (Turnhout: Brepols, 2006), pp. 225–44. 23 Eland (ed.), Purefoy Letters, no. 293, 23 February 1745; no. 294, 9 March 1745.

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24 Edwards, Horse and Man, pp. 220–5; Gerhold, Carriers and Coachmasters. 25 Edwards, Horse and Man. 26 Eland (ed.), Purefoy Letters, no. 286, 30 April 1740; no. 289, 13 December 1749. 27 Ibid., no. 284, 8 July 1739; no. 287, 11 June 1740. 28 P. Edwards, ‘Horses and Elite Identity in Early Modern England: The Case of Sir  Richard Newdigate II of Arbury Hall, Warwickshire (1644–1710)’, in Pia Cuneo  (ed.), Animals and Early Modern Identity (Farnham: Ashgate, 2014), pp. 131–49. 29 P. Edwards, The Horse Trade of Tudor and Stuart England (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988), pp. 73–6. 30 Eland (ed.), Purefoy Letters, no. 273, 4 June 1736. 31 Ibid., no. 283, 20 June 1739. 32 Ibid., no. 290, 22 February 1748. On the hazards of horse buying, see Edwards, The Horse Trade. 33 Edwards, ‘The Decline of an Aristocratic Stud’. As Edwards makes clear, it was possible to make large profits if the stud was successful, but it was an extremely risky business. 34 SCLA, DR18/5/2331. 35 Styles, Dress of the People, pp. 295–301. 36 The actual figures were £3,629 for personal clothing and £3,047 for livery. 37 WRO, CR136/v/156, Accounts 1747–62; CR136/v/136, Accounts 1763–96. 38 SCLA, DR18/5/6051, 6098, 6099. 39 SCLA, 18/5/6098, 6097. 40 J. de Vries, The Industrious Revolution: Consumer Behaviour and the Household Economy, 1650 to the Present (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008), p. 31. 41 WRO, CR1841/7, ‘Lady Newdigate’s Tour’, gives a detailed account of the trip, but does not always record details of where the travellers stayed overnight. See J. Stobart, ‘From Magnificent Houses to Disagreeable Country: Lady Sophia Newdigate’s Tour of Southern England and Derbyshire, 1748’, in A. Capern and B. McDonagh (eds), Women and the Land, 1500–1900 (forthcoming). 42 WRO, CR136/v/136, Accounts 1763–96. Similar patterns and costs are seen for William Chatsworth: see Edwards, ‘The Decline of an Aristocratic Stud’. 43 See Stobart and Rothery, Consumption and the Country House, chapter 8. 44 H. Berry, ‘Prudent Luxury: The Metropolitan Tastes of Judith Baker, Durham Gentlewoman’, in P. Lane and R. Sweet (eds), Women and Urban Life in Eighteenth Century Britain (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2005), pp. 130–54. 45 Details of the trip are contained in Henry Purefoy’s diary. See Eland (ed.), Purefoy Letters, pp. 359–60. 46 SCLA, DR18/5/3857, 3908, 4253a, 4215, 4336, 4512, 4964, 5017. 47 For example, see SCLA, DR18/5/4663, 4712. 48 SCLA, DR18/5/6816. 49 SCLA, DR18/31/656, day book for Grove House, 1793–98; Whyman, Sociability and Power, p. 100. 50 SCLA, DR18/5/5941, 6027, 6054.



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51 Vickery, Behind Closed Doors, p. 124. 52 On the development of the carrier trade, see D. Gerhold, Road Transport before the Railways: Russell’s London Flying Waggons (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993). 53 WRO, CR1236/v/136, Accounts 1763–96; CR136/b/2638b, ‘Books, marbles, medals, casts &c purchased from Italy’, July 1774 to January 1776. 54 Eland (ed.), Purefoy Letters, no. 534, 19 August 1742. 55 Ibid., no. 124, 11 January 1743; no. 119, 3 February 1739. 56 Ibid., no. 423, 12 October 1751. 57 SCLA, DR18/31/656, day book for Grove House, 1793–98; see entries for 14 January and 21 June 1792. 58 Eland (ed.), Purefoy Letters, no. 162, 1 February 1735; no. 189, 8 April 1739; no. 119, 3 February 1739. 59 On the significance of gifting venison, see Whyman, Sociability and Power, pp. 23–33. 60 SCLA, DR18/31/655, account of sundries from Stoneleigh Abbey, 1793–98; DR18/31/656, day book for Grove House, 1793–98. 61 SCLA, DR18/31/656, day book for Grove House, 1793–98. 62 Eland (ed.), Purefoy Letters, no. 192, 5 April 1740. 63 SCLA, DR18/5/6093, 6058, 6046. 64 SCLA, DR18/5/5684, 5961. 65 Eland (ed.), Purefoy Letters, no. 138, 18 June 1749. 66 SCLA, DR18/5/4808. 67 Ibid. 68 Whyman, Sociability and Power, p. 105. 69 J. Stobart, A. Hann and V. Morgan, Spaces of Consumption: Leisure and Shopping in the English Town, c.1680–1830 (London: Routledge, 2007), pp. 49–55.

On the road with William Cavendish

9

On the road (and the Thames) with William Cavendish, 1st Earl of Devonshire, 1597–1623 Peter Edwards

This chapter is primarily concerned with the practicalities of travel, but it touches on the cultural and social significance of aristocratic houses and the tradition among the elite of visiting each other’s homes. As this account deals with William Cavendish’s journeys to London, most of the houses he visited were urban rather than rural, but their form and contents were no less influenced by travel, either directly through the owners who built or remodelled them or on the visitors who viewed them.1 Indeed, as many of cultural developments outlined in this volume filtered through the country via London and the experiences of elite visitors like Cavendish, this case-study provides evidence of the means whereby these ideas and concepts were disseminated. Cavendish, like so many of his peers, was attracted to the capital because the existence there of the court, the Houses of Parliament and the central law courts made it the centre of the political, social and cultural life of the country. Economically, it was equally dominant, not only in terms of its industrial output and commercial activity but also as a centre of consumption, which in relation to this volume means conspicuous consumption.2 To coincide with the law terms, William Cavendish, created Lord Cavendish in 1605 and 1st Earl of Devonshire in 1618, usually stayed there between May and July and then returned in October for another lengthy visit often incorporating Christmas. If he did go home to Hardwick Hall, he generally returned to the capital before the end of January.3 While he resided there, Cavendish attended the court and Parliament, conducted business and socialised with his peers. Like the exemplars of upper-class travel discussed by Stobart in Chapter 8, Cavendish spent a considerable amount of money on travel and associated costs. Whereas Sir Roger Newdigate’s annual outlay on transport and travel in the years 1747–96 averaged £438, Cavendish spent £473 in the sampled year 1599, a considerably larger sum in real terms.4 Even so, the latter sum represents only 4.3 per cent of Cavendish’s total expenditure that year, a much



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Carrying & leers Tack & coaches Provender & stabling Journeys Horses Physic & shoeing Wages & liveries

Chart 9.1  The travel expenses of William Cavendish, 1599

smaller proportion than for Newdigate, but he was spending heavily on land purchases.5 If one focuses on his ‘everyday’ running costs, which amounted to £1,214 4s 4¼d in 1599, travel expenses accounted for nearly two fifths of the total, over half of which (£290 12s 10½d) was spent on trips to London. These trips form the focus of this chapter; where applicable, I make comparisons between Cavendish’s expenditure (Chart 9.1) and that of Sir Roger Newdigate, but my main focus is on the day-to-day details that lie behind the more quantitative approach taken by Stobart. Indeed, my approach complements his by providing a deeper understanding of the contingent and complex nature of travel, even for elites. Travel to and from London The introduction of coaches into the country in the mid-sixteenth century made it easier for a member of the landed elite like Cavendish to travel with his family and servants. In 1599 Cavendish bought two coaches from Banks, a London coachmaker, for £39 10s 2d and three Flemish coach horses, probably in the Smithfield, the capital’s great livestock market.6 However, when Cavendish travelled without his family (although with his servants), he may have ridden to the capital and back rather than travelling by coach. Many men of his age and status would have done so, considering it effeminate to cower from the elements in a covered vehicle. If he did, he intended to display his horsemanship: in early 1599 he spent £15 15s on a ‘great’ horse, that is, a powerful, imposing steed bought from Mr Alexander, a courtier and an expert in the tilt.7 He continued

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to ride, but by 1613 the sixty-three-year-old was seated astride an easy-paced saddle nag rather than a great horse.8 In July George Wilson, his stable master, paid Mr Eyre of Alfreton (Derbyshire) the relatively modest sum of £5 for a black nag ‘for my lords saddle’.9 Richard Cholmeley of Brandsby (North Riding) certainly made a distinction in his mode of transport, travelling by coach with his wife in April 1620 and on horseback later that year. He set off on his bay mare on 21 October and arrived in the capital five days later.10 When the elite travelled, whether heads of household alone or en famille, they were accompanied by companions and various household and estate servants, some sitting in coaches and others acting as outriders. Footmen often ran alongside the coach, while leaders of sumpters and drivers of carts and wagons were in charge of any baggage that went with them. When Lady Anne Clifford and her husband, Richard Sackville, 3rd Earl of Dorset, left London on 21 February 1616 the company travelled in two coaches, each drawn by four horses, and was accompanied by about twenty-six horsemen.11 Cavendish travelled with fewer servants. When, as a widower, he returned to Hardwick in December 1599 his party included five servants, a Frenchman, a baker and a waiting maid for his mother, the dowager Countess of Shrewsbury. Perhaps the servants wore the liveries made out of the mallard-coloured cloth that he had paid £21 13s 3d for in February.12 In August 1604, newly married, he and his second wife were accompanied by nine servants and fourteen horses.13 Although the network of stage coach services had yet to be developed, elite travellers at the turn of the sixteenth century could utilise established roadside facilities which had grown up to cater for the needs of the wayfaring community. Thoroughfare towns like Northampton and Stamford, sited on the main arterial roads that radiated out of London and spaced a day’s journey apart, prospered, and proprietors of the larger inns acquired local status and influence.14 Cavendish’s party normally stopped overnight at Nottingham, Leicester, Northampton and Dunstable, taking refreshment and perhaps hiring horses (as in March 1599) at a mid-point between stages, generally at Welford or Market Harborough and Stony Stratford on the middle two stages and at either Loughborough or Mountsorrel and then Barnet on the outer two.15 As Hardwick lay about 160 miles from London, Cavendish must have covered over thirty miles a day in summer and winter, a distance similar to that travelled by later stage coaches in winter but less than their daily mileage in summer.16 The inns of thoroughfare towns catered for the wayfaring community in general – carriers, suppliers of agricultural and industrial goods and people riding post, for instance – but the arrival of an elite party brought credit to the establishment, income from the lavish provision of food and drink and generous tips to the staff. When Cavendish travelled to London in April 1604 with nine servants and fourteen horses the bill amounted to £10 1s 9d, with supper and breakfast costing between £2 11s 6d and £2 18s 9d and stabling between



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16s 1d and 18s 11d. Ancillary expenses included payments of a shilling to the town waits at Nottingham and small sums to the poor at the stops or on the way. Expenditure on the return journey with a larger party and more horses came to £15 3s 11d. This time, musicians entertained the party on three of the four evenings.17 The inherent danger of road travel at the time is indicated in the purchase of gunpowder and shot for pistols (8d) at Leicester in March 1599.18 At the beginning of Michaelmas Term 1600 the 5th Earl of Rutland’s London receiver allowed £45 for his master’s journey from Belvoir to London via Coventry.19 Because the wives of the elite had their own engagements and were not bound by the dictates of the law terms, parliamentary sessions or business meetings, they did not always travel to London and back with their husbands. Naturally, the cost of travel increased on occasions when they did. In June 1612 Cavendish’s journey expenses totalled £23 3s 10d and his wife’s £10.20 At times, wives did not accompany their husabnds at all. When Sir Thomas Hoby set off for London with Mr Rhodes and Mr Nettleton on 13 March 1604, his wife, Lady Margaret, did not go with them.21 When Cavendish’s wife travelled separately from her husband she might use a litter, that is, a bed or couch supported on a frame and carried on the backs of two or four horses. At the time this provided a smoother ride than was possible in the poorly sprung coaches.22 The couple might also make separate arrangements while resident in the southeast. In May 1616 Lady Cavendish travelled alone to Redbourn and in preparation for the journey servants brought four horses from their grazing ground to the Bell, conveniently situated near Cavendish’s Aldersgate Street house, where they were stabled overnight.23 Members of the family travelled between Hardwick and one of their Home Counties seats on occasion. In August 1610 Lady Cavendish returned alone to Hardwick from the newly acquired Sopwell Priory, while the following July her husband accompanied her home from there.24 In July 1616, Lady Cavendish – and probably her son, John – travelled to Hardwick from Redbourn.25 Two months later a carter was hired to transport baggage weighing 1 ton 6 cwt 46 lb from Hardwick to Latimers.26 Once an entourage had arrived in London, it was common practice to send many of the horses back home, thereby avoiding the cost of stabling and feeding them in London. Of the eleven horses which accompanied Cavendish and his six servants to London in October 1601, nine were immediately driven back to Derbyshire by Dobb and Haynes, staying overnight at St Albans, Northampton and Mountsorrel.27 Similarly, in November 1604 Sir Thomas Hoby’s servants promptly returned the horses to north Yorkshire, setting out two days after the company had arrived in London.28 Cavendish regularly repeated the process for the return journey to Hardwick. At the end of Cavendish’s stay in Michaelmas Term 1601 Haynes and Haslam brought nine horses from Derbyshire, perhaps the same ones which had made the journey there and back in October. They

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stopped at Mountsorrel, Northampton and Dunstable en route.29 Often, the horses were returned to London just before the party set off home. However, Cavendish and presumably others might not recall the horses for  the return journey, instead obtaining the extra horses they needed from London hackneymen.30 Cavendish patronised one Barnes in particular, hiring horses from him over a number of years: at least from 1609 to 1613 and probably for longer than that. When Cavendish returned home at the end of Trinity Term 1609 Henry Travice, his London receiver, hired twenty-two horses from Barnes at £1 3s each.31 As implied above, Cavendish might ease the load on his own horses by hiring coach horses for the journey between Hardwick and London. On his way home in March 1599 he hired a horse at Dunstable and separate pairs at Stony Stratford and Welford for the half-day stages to  Northampton and Leicester. At Leicester he hired another horse to help to pull the coach to Hardwick. The boy who rode the horse back to Leicester earned 18d.32 Some of the servants required in London made their own way there, usually on horseback. In April 1600 Thomas Scriven travelled ahead of his master, the 5th Earl of Rutland, to prepare for the latter’s visit. He spent 10s on the journey down from Bevoir and a further £1 for his horse’s fodder while in the capital.33 Five months later Scriven’s counterpart Henry Travice rode down to the capital a month before his master set off, his journey also costing 10s.34 Female servants tended not to travel unaccompanied and might ride double with a male servant in front. In July 1611 Katherine, Cavendish’s laundry maid, rode back to Hardwick with William Bowen, one of her master’s officials. In June 1619, on the other hand, Margery Parker and Mary rode in the wagon between London and Leicester, as did Peg Littlewood a month later.35 Some servants made journeys for a specific purpose – delivering letters, relaying information of events back home or carrying goods, for instance – and others made brief visits before returning north. In November 1601, Cavendish’s servants Launt and Rogers stayed in London for five days, spending £2 8s on the journeys there and back and £1 13s 6d while in the capital. Roger Fretwell did not often go to London, being needed at Hardwick to help to manage the estate, but on occasion he travelled to the capital too. In May 1605 he made a visit lasting nine and a half days.36 Many servants had their own horses, supplied and maintained by their master, but they might hire a mount as well. Travice often shuttled between Hardwick and London on his own horse but on occasion he hired one. In December 1602, for instance, he travelled down on a hackney, spending 10s on himself, his horse’s stabling and fodder, and 14s for the hire.37 For greater speed, at a price, servants also made use of the posting network,established in 1512 when Henry VIII appointed Sir Brian Tuke Master of the Posts to create and manage a network of staging posts along which governmental messages could be speedily transmitted. By the end of the sixteenth



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century several arterial roads possessed a series of post stations, each with a post master and a stable of horses; as early as Mary I’s reign the government was encouraging private traffic as a means of helping to pay for the service, and the elite regularly made use of it. 38 When Sir Timothy Hutton, son of the Archbishop of York, posted down to London from his home in York in 1605 (a distance of about 210 miles) he exchanged his horses at fourteen different staging posts en route.39 Cavendish’s servants used the service on a number of occasions. In March 1604 Cuthbert Atkinson made two return trips to London within the month, shuttling between London and Hardwick. Then, having ridden to London again for a twenty-two days’ stay, he returned home with three horses. The total cost amounted to £10 17s 6d. Later that year Edmonds spent £2 8s 1d on posting down to London.40 For their sojourn in London the elite brought with them a huge amount of luggage: not merely changes of clothes but also furniture, soft furnishings, tableware and bedding. They might use their own servants to transport the baggage, either on the backs of sumpters, in two-wheeled wains and carts or in the heavier four-wheeled wagons that had been introduced into the country from the Low Countries in the mid-sixteenth century.41 In March 1598 the Earl of Rutland paid £8 to move his goods from London to Chester and a further £2 to his servants William Bonnet and Jarvis Thompson for their pains.42 Cavendish similarly deployed his servants, especially to take his luggage to London. So when he moved to his recently bought house in Aldersgate Street in 1608 and furnished it with many items brought from Hardwick, he paid £18 to hire wains to transport the 6⅓ tons of stuff and a further £18 5s for Mr Timothy and twelve other servants to escort them on horseback.43 More frequently, however, the elite hired common carriers, who by 1600 were operating along well-established routes between London and the provinces.44 Brayshay considers that they provided the cheapest means of transporting goods around the country, offering a professional service with compensation for damage caused in transit.45 John Lord Petre of Thorndon and Ingatestone Halls (Essex) regularly hired them. On 16 January 1590, for instance, he sent three trunks and a box to London by his local carrier, John Payne of Ingatestone, who also brought back two of the trunks and a chest to Ingatestone Hall.46 Cavendish, too, often used carriers to transport his luggage, mainly those based at Chesterfield.47 In July 1614 a carrier earned £5 19s 10d for moving Cavendish’s trunks, weighing almost 13 cwt, from London. Five years later the load exceeded two tons.48 As London was a centre of conspicuous consumption, a place ‘where men expended the revenues which they had acquired elsewhere’, the Cavendishes naturally went shopping for items not readily available at home. Undoubtedly, they patronised the Royal Exchange, with its imported ware on display in two floors or shops, and the new Exchange, which opened in 1609 on the Strand.49 If the purchases were not taken back with them, carriers transported them north.

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In 1608 a carrier brought back wine and black cloth, in October 1613 a box of books weighing 43 lb and in July 1619 a trunkful of oranges and lemons.50 The Cavendishes in London Elite sojourners like Cavendish congregated in the West End, which afforded them easy access to the court, Westminster Hall and the central law courts. Enterprising owners with property in the West End – in St Martin’s Lane in the 1620s, for instance – provided superior accommodation to let. Others leased rooms in their house. Farringdon Without Ward, located to the west of the city wall, was particularly popular with these temporary residents because of the number of lodgings in private houses it contained and because of the presence of the law courts there.51 The number of inns, tavern and ordinaries multiplied. Many, like Sir John Wynn of Gwydir, who stayed for a time with a barber near the White Hart in Holborn, had to live in cramped conditions.52 The Earl of Rutland, on the other hand, lodged far more comfortably in a house at Ivy Bridge. According to Stow’s 1603 edition of A Survey of London the area was becoming gentrified, the entire stretch of the Strand from Temple Bar to Ivy Bridge being lined with ‘diuerse faire buildings, Hosteries and houses for Gentlemen’.53 Cavendish, a widower between 1598 and 1604, lodged for several years in rented accommodation comprising only one or two chambers.54 In Easter Term 1602, however, he leased premises in Holborn from a Mr Bacon, to whom he paid an entry fine of £200.55 Then in May 1608 he gave Sir Francis Popham £850 for a house near the Charterhouse in Aldersgate Street, a street which Stowe stated was full of fine houses.56 While retaining this pied à terre in the capital, he also looked for country seats in the south-east, firstly acquiring a fifteen-year lease of Sopwell Manor near St Albans (Hertfordshire) in July 1610. In February 1615 he bought nearby Redbourn Priory, and the following year the Latimers and Chesham estate in Buckinghamshire.57 Until Cavendish rented the Holborn apartment in 1602, he could accommodate only one or two body servants in his chambers.58 Henry Travice, for instance, boarded out.59 In 1599 he stayed in lodgings for thirty-five weeks and four days at a cost of £5 6s for his chamber and £16 11s 7d for his ordinary. That year Cavendish spent £46 12s 3d to board his servants in London. Thereafter, the situation eased a little. Travice was one of the servants who moved into his Holborn apartment, the accounts merely recording the cost of his ordinary.60 Although Cavendish brought in other servants too, temporary visitors still had to board out.61 Following Cavendish’s purchase of the house in Aldersgate Street, he could accommodate all of his senior staff and essential servants, including Travice, Mistress Flood (the housekeeper) and the coachman, at his home.62 Even so, when Cavendish and his peers were staying elsewhere – on visits to the court or to each other’s the homes, for



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instance – alternative accommodation had to be found for their servants too. In summer 1599 the queen held court at Nonsuch and, as a result, the Earl of Rutland stayed in nearby lodgings between 30 July and 22 August while putting up his servants in two chambers. His horses were stabled at Ewell.63 When Cavendish attended the court at Greenwich Palace in May 1605 he remained there for four weeks, paying 16s a week for his chambers.64 For such a lengthy stay, Cavendish’s servants packed his personal effects, which a carrier took from Billingsgate to Lion Quay near the Tower; there Hallam had the baggage loaded onto a barge for transport to the palace. Servants who went with him bustled to and fro, making full use of the transport facilities on the Thames. Nonetheless, six of them spent eighteen and a half days at Greenwich between return trips to London.65 While the elite enjoyed the burgeoning social season in the capital, many of them primarily travelled with a more serious purpose in mind, whether the search for political or social advancement or pursuit of a legal action. Warren has noted that the Hobys did socialise, shop and attend court when resident in London between October 1600 and March 1601, but the main reason for the journey was to prosecute a lawsuit against the Eures, a rival North Riding family.66 Hoby was a politician whereas Cavendish was not, even if he had probably sat briefly in the House of Commons as MP for Liverpool in 1586 and for Newport (Cornwall) in 1588 and, after his elevation to the peerage in 1605, regularly attended sessions in the Upper House.67 He also appeared at court, normally at Whitehall or Greenwich, although on occasion he waited on the king at St James’s Palace, Hampton Court and Nonsuch.68 However, he did not compete for high office. and his committee work in the Lords remained low-key. According to Riden and Fowkes, he left politics to his son, William, who was an active member of the House of Commons.69 What seemed to concern him more were his commercial interests and legal business, mainly those related to his acquisition of land. He invested heavily in overseas enterprises, notably in the East India, Muscovy and Virginia Companies, while at the same time spending large sums of money to extend his estate, as his 1599 accounts indicate.70 Of course, the elite socialised, meeting at court or in each other’s homes, as the diaries of Lady Anne Clifford make clear. On 14 February 1616 the company at Dorset House, the residence of her husband, comprised the Archbishop of Canterbury, Lord William Howard, Lord Roos, her cousin (Francis Russell, 4th Earl of Bedford), her brother-in-law (Sir Edward Sackville) ‘and a great Company of men of note’. Another gathering, held at Dorset House on 19 January 1619, included Cavendish, his wife and Lord Kinloss (the brother of Cavendish’s daughter-in-law), as well as Lady Verulam (the wife of Francis Bacon, the Lord Chancellor) and ‘much other Company’.71 During his visits  Cavendish met the great officers of state, including Robert Cecil and

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Sir Thomas Lake, the Secretaries of State, and Sir John Fortescue, Sir Thomas Egerton and Sir Francis Bacon, Chancellors of the Exchequer.72 Significantly, one of his closest associates at the court was Sir Walter Cope, who, like him, sat on the council of the Virginia Company.73 As much of the business in London involved securing his title to land that he was acquiring, a useful contact was Edward Lord Kinloss, the Master of the Rolls.74 Kinloss’s daughter Christiana married Cavendish’s son William on 10 April 1609, illustrating the overlap between the personal and public relationships of members of the elite. Similarly, Cavendish made a marriage alliance with his close political associate Sir Henry Maynard of Little Easton (Essex), who had served as Lord Burghley’s chief secretary. The Cavendishes and Maynards regularly exchanged visits, and in June 1608 Cavendish’s daughter Frances married Maynard’s son William.75 On his visits Cavendish would be aware of his surroundings, noting the construction, rebuilding or remodelling of grand houses in the West End (see also Chapter 5). Surely, he also saw the erection of the Banqueting Hall in Whitehall and the Queen’s House at Greenwich, designed in the innovative Palladian style by Inigo Jones. As a guest, he could wander around and examine the contents of these houses – probably taking a guided tour of the house at first – running his eye over the furniture, admiring the paintings, statuary and other artefacts, many of them acquired on the Grand Tour, and reading the books in the library. Jacobean aristocrats were particularly interested in acquiring Italian works of art.76 Cavendish collected artworks himself, dispatching six paintings back to Hardwick in summer 1599 and five later in the year. In December 1609 he sent a painting of Mary, Queen of Scots, to the noted collector of antiquaries and objets d’art, Thomas, Earl of Arundel.77 As the patron of Thomas Hobbes, who tutored his son and heir, William, he would have been aware of ideas on politics and philosophy current at the time and would have discussed them with his peers at social and political gatherings. Among his books and pamphlets on politics and current affairs were a collection of Sir Francis Bacon’s essays, a book on the Earl of Essex’s treason and pamphlets on the murder of Henri IV of France and a sea-battle between the Dutch and Spanish fleets.78 His interest in overseas exploration and colonisation is also reflected in books that he purchased such as William Lithgow’s Travels and Voyages through Europe, Asia and Africa for Nineteen Years (10d), The New Founde Worlde (1s) and a Description of Virginia (6d), as well as a map of the world with two globes (£1).79 Apart from doing their normal chores, Cavendish’s servants were also heavily involved in administering their master’s affairs. Of particular importance was the work they carried out in the law courts. Some of Cavendish’s cases comprised criminal proceedings, such as his Star Chamber action in 1608– 09 against Sir Percival Willoughby and others who had hunted illegally in Langwith Park.80 Mostly, however, they dealt with the transmission of property and the securing of a legal title to it. To find the legal evidence that



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Cavendish required, his agents searched the assorted records generated by the various legal bodies, including the equity courts. They were constantly boating up and down the Thames, often to government offices in Westminster or to the Tower, a major repository of material. In July 1622, for instance, Travice spent 10s when he went to the Tower by barge to look for information on Scropton.81 Travel in London Sending most of the horses back home reduced the workload of hard-pressed servants as well as saving on stabling and fodder. There was less need for horses in London, too, because staff could use water transport. Until 1606 the accounts of the Earl of Rutland regularly record the trips he made along the Thames, mainly to the court, to the homes of his peers and, apparently, to playhouses on the south bank of the river. For a number of years, he visited Barn Elms House, the home of his kinswoman Ursula St Barbe, the widow of Sir Francis Walsingham, the queen’s spymaster.82 On 1 October 1598 Thomas Scriven accounted for 8s, the cost of a barge to take the earl and his men to Lambeth to see a play.83 Until 1606 Cavendish also travelled by barge when he attended the court or the House of Lords or made social visits. Thereafter, he virtually forsook the barge for the coach, generally using one only to cross the river or for his servants to ferry over his coach and horses. Cavendish’s switch to coaches as his main mode of travel around London reflects a general change in attitudes towards them in the opening of the seventeenth century. Even men of Cavendish’s age were beginning to appreciate their value as a mobile status symbol (see also Chapter 8). The future 5th Earl of Rutland, a younger man, certainly valued them. 1n 1587–88 he commissioned a coach, seemingly in anticipation of succeeding to the earldom (the 4th Earl died on 24 February 1588), paying the London coachmaker £38 13s 2d for it. In 1597 he spent £40 on a coach he bought from William Wright, another London coachmaker. Two years later furnishings for a new coach cost him £64, including the expense of embroidering his coat of arms on three crimson sumpter cloths.84 Of course, coaches not only proclaimed their owner’s wealth and status, they also kept the occupants dry. And, unlike barges, they could transport their occupants around the capital in all weathers. As Lady Margaret Hoby wrote on 24 November 1600, ‘In the morning I went to wesminster, and after Cam home and diner: and so kept in all that day, it being so stormy I Could not goe by water to the friers.’85 But coach travel on London’s narrow and congested streets also required patience, equanimity and fortitude. When Parliament met in February 1621 the Privy Council complained that the streets around Westminster were so clogged by carts and brewers’ drays that ‘there is no free passage left for the nobility and others to the Parliament House, but their coaches are commonly stayed and their passengers much endangered’.

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Not surprisingly, Cavendish sometimes arrived late for a day’s session.86 Mostly, Cavendish’s coachmen took him to Parliament, to government offices or to the court, but they also drove him to the town houses, suburban villas and country seats of his peers.87 When travelling to one of their master’s Home Counties seats or to those of his peers, servants could readily hire hackney horses. When the Earl of Rutland attended the queen at Nonsuch Palace in Surrey in August 1599, for instance, Sexton hired two horses for servants to ride to London.88 Similarly, Cavendish’s servants regularly hired horses when they travelled out of town. Travice did so in January 1609 when he rode with Mr Lee to Sawtry, paying 10s 4d for a hackney and half a peck of provender and a further 15s for the charges of their two nights on the road. In the same year he hired horses to travel to Edmonton and Ludgrave House, while Mr Redhill rode to Sir Roger Aston’s house at Eltham on a hackney.89 For Cavendish’s trip to Latimers in March 1619 Travice paid 15s to hire three hackneys for himself and two other servants and gave 4d in earnest for a fourth.90 To complement an ornate coach, displaying the coat of arms of the occupant, the horses not only had to be physically imposing but also had to match in terms of conformation, action, colour and even breed (see also Chapter 8). On December 1612 Francis Manners, the new Earl of Rutland, bought a pair of grey geldings for the coach from Sir John Danvers for £35, a price which was a little over the going rate at the time. Although the earl kept his own coach and horses in London, on occasion he had to hire others. In September 1599, for instance, Thomas Brewer hired a coach as well as three horses when his master travelled to the court, which was then at Nonsuch Palace in Surrey.91 Before 1597 Cavendish possessed only two coach horses, the old and young coach mares. However, as he acquired coaches, he gradually built up the numbers, starting in May that year with a pair of grey coach mares bought for him at nearby Mansfield.92 Thereafter, apart from three private transactions, including the purchase of four coach mares from his nephew Sir William Cavendish at Bolsover in 1614, he obtained his horses in London, the centre of the horse trade. In May 1599 he went to view Dutch mares in the Smithfield but seemingly did not buy any.93 He dealt mostly with foreign dealers, perhaps in the market, but as he did repeat business with Levin and the Corneliuses, he had probably established a private arrangement with them.94 Like the Earl of Rutland, Cavendish maintained at least a pair of coach horses in London but on occasion he too hired others. In March 1619, for instance, Travice hired two coach horses for two horses at 5s a horse per day for a trip to Latimers.95 On 7 June 1622 he paid for a pair to help drive the new Venetian ambassador to Greenwich and for another two to take the old one there four days later.96 Cavendish employed two coachmen, paying each of them £4 per annum. The assistant of Richard, the coachman hired in 1619, received £2.97 As ­coachmen



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were exposed to the weather when they drove the coach and team, their livery included protective outer garments.98 While in London the coachmen were constantly employed, getting the coach horses ready whenever Cavendish and his wife, either separately or together, set out on a visit. Thus in December 1611 it cost 4s 6d for Lamb to set up the horses at Whitehall and Greenwich and for dinner for him and the two accompanying footmen.99 After all, the job entailed a good deal of hanging around. Footmen ran alongside the coach whenever Lady Cavendish travelled alone. On 10 February 1619 she gave 4s to her husband’s coachman and footman when they attended to her at Mr Levison’s wedding. They also accompanied her on out-of-town visits, as on a visit to Latimers in June 1618. The two footmen earned 1s each for the two days.100 As noted above, Cavendish’s servants kept as few horses as possible in London. Even the horse on which Travice rode down might promptly return to Hardwick: in 1599, for instance, Travice lodged in town from 30 March to 26 August 1599 but his horse left after seven days. During Michaelmas Term the following year he resided in London from 19 September until beyond Christmas, but within a few days James Painter had taken the horse back to Derbyshire.101 Even so, Cavendish and his staff clearly could not dispense with horses completely, whether for the coach or the saddle. Indeed, Travice often kept his horse with him. In summer 1598 he agisted his horse for nine and a half weeks (1 May to 6 July), while in 1604 he stabled him in town for seven and a half weeks.102 Mainly because of the movement in and out of servants, numbers did fluctuate. In Hilary Term 1599 four horses were kept at livery for two nights, three more for twenty-two days and two coach mares for three weeks at a cost of £5 15s 6d.103 When Roger Fretwell spent nine and a half days in London in April 1605 his personal expenditure amounted to 12s 8d, with a further 7s 4d for his horse in stabling (4s 6d), provender (2s 6d) and a tip to the ostler (4d).104 In May the following year Redfern and Parker stayed for a fortnight before returning to Derbyshire. Livery for their horses for thirteen nights cost 8s 8d, and four bushels of provender a further 8s.105 Total numbers increased again when preparations were being made for the journey home. In July 1614, for instance, Cavendish’s agents gathered together eighteen horses, paying £5 8s for keeping them five nights at livery.106 Given the number of genteel sojourners resident in London for months on end, stabling was a problem. The Earls of Rutland, who rented spacious accommodation in a house, may have been able to accommodate some of them in stables but they also had to pay for livery at inns. In Michaelmas Term 1598 the 5th Earl was using the Bull in Southwark, and in 1612 his successor was keeping horses at the Bell in the Strand and the Cock in Aldersgate Street.107 Cavendish also had to find stabling for all his horses, at least until he had bought the property in Aldersgate Street. Thereafter, a reference to the ‘Coachman’s

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Chamber’ suggests that the site contained a coach house. As Cavendish could not keep all his horses there, he also had to use nearby inns.108 The Cock and the Red Lion lay in Aldersgate Street, while the White Horse, the Boar’s Head and Mr Chamberlain’s stables in the Barbican and the Bell in the Smithfield were also conveniently situated. The Swan was located at the Fleet Bridge in Holborn. Even the Antelope in King Street, Westminster, was not that far away. Although inns like the Red Lion and the Bell could usually put up all of Cavendish’s horses at peak times, he occasionally ran out of space. As he was preparing to return to Hardwick on 22 August 1616, Purslow, one of his chief agents, noted that he had to pay 10s for two horses ‘more than your honors stables wold hold’ on Thursday night and for two more the following night.109 Some of the horses were grazed on pastures outside London, perhaps because of pressure on stabling in the town or, equally likely, as a means of keeping costs down. In summer 1600 eight horses were grazing in Kentish Town, while in 1604 some were being kept on the Earl of Northumberland’s estate at Syon.110 Conclusion To sum up, this detailed analysis of William Cavendish’s journeys to and in London provides a rich and nuanced understanding of the complexities and contingencies of elite travel at the turn of the sixteenth century. For Cavendish, like so many of his peers, the London season was an extensive one and involved more than one visit. As befitted a member of the ruling elite, much of Cavendish’s time was spent either at court, in Parliament (especially after his elevation to the upper house) or managing his commercial and legal affairs. Because of the overlapping personnel there was no clear distinction between his public and private lives, although trips to his out-of-town residences offered some respite. Although the growing use of coaches made it possible for the elite to travel to London en famille, his ‘public’ activities meant that Cavendish and his wife did not always travel together, whether to London, a country seat or a social engagement. Of course, he visited his kin, friends and associates when in residence in Derbyshire, but the presence of so many of his peers in London made socialising there much more intense. At least he brought some of his ‘home comforts’ with him in the form of furniture, soft furnishings and all manner of glassware, plate and utensils. The logistics involved in moving the family, their staff and their belongings from Hardwick to London and back, as well as to and from their various seats and other places in between, required careful planning. They were further complicated by the need to find accommodation for the family and their staff once in town. Horses had to be stabled and fed and coaches housed. For several years Cavendish himself lived in rented rooms, even though his mother possessed a suburban seat at Chelsea. Once he had obtained a lease on property in



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Holborn in 1602 he was able to house some of his staff on site but others continued to board elsewhere. Moreover, he still had to rent stabling for most of his horses. The purchase of the house in Aldersgate Street improved the situation in relation to his staff but not markedly for his horses. Wherever possible, he kept his horses, especially the coach team, at conveniently sited inns, although he had to make use of suburban grazing grounds as well. Then there was the problem of moving all his accoutrements, the weight of which amounted to many hundredweight, even tons. Some of them travelled with the party but most were transported separately by carriers or wainmen. One solution to the problem of stabling was to dispatch horses back home as soon as they had arrived, bringing them back, if necessary, for the return trip. Otherwise horses could be hired from hackneymen. Cavendish kept a coach team, perhaps only a pair for the short journeys, in London but some of the coach horses, all of the carthorses and most of his servants’ nags returned north. In this way he saved money on stabling and fodder. For the return journey he might recall the horses, but on occasion he hired others from hackneymen. Of course, while in London many of the servants had to do without their horses, but movement around the capital was facilitated by the ease of travel up and down the Thames. If they required a horse – and they did whenever they had to go out of town, notably to accompany their master and mistress on a visit – they were able to hire one. Indeed, Cavendish’s servants often rode hackneys between Hardwick and London. When in a hurry, they posted up and down. At the turn of the sixteenth century Cavendish also made use of the Thames. However, within years he had succumbed to the fashion of riding in a coach, perhaps being talked into it by his wife. If the narrow streets and lanes of London made coach travel an arduous and uncomfortable experience, at least the occupants kept dry and displayed their status in the quality of the vehicle and equipage, as well as in the heraldic devices on show. Exposure to the fashion of riding in coaches during their sojourn in London probably accounted for the weakening of the resolve of members of the elite of Cavendish’s age to eschew it as an effeminate practice. And, in London, Cavendish and his peers had the widest choice of conveyance: over the course of the quarter-century he bought a number of coaches and caroches in London. Lady Cavendish had her own vehicles too, which she rode in whenever she attended an engagement on her own or whenever she and her husband travelled separately. She even acquired new litters, an older form of female conveyance. As the centre of country’s horse trade was based at the Smithfield market, the elite could buy teams of matching coach horses of a quality which further enhanced the impact of travelling in such a status-defining form of transport. Indeed, the reputation of the market attracted to it dealers from the continent as well as from all parts of the country. However, as in Cavendish’s case, the elite did not necessarily have to do business with them there because they could

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make private arrangements with them: a more civilised and effective process than was possible in the hurly-burly of the market place. Notes 1 William Cavendish received a peerage in 1605 and became Earl of Devonshire in 1618. For a more detailed discussion, see my forthcoming book, Horses and the Aristocratic Lifestyle in Early Modern England. 2 R. Porter, London: A Social History (London: Penguin, 1994), p. 76; F. Heal and C. Holmes, The Gentry in England and Wales 1500–1700 (Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1994), pp. 204–5. 3 Chatsworth Archives Office (hereafter CA), H10A/40r, 49r, 53r, 141v, 142v, 147r–v, 196r, 210r, 216r, 217r. References in this format denote disbursement book and folio page. 4 CA, H10A, passim. 5 The debts totalled £5,162 and legal fees, mainly for property transactions, of £116. 6 CA, H10A/123r, 124r. 7 CA, H10A/123r–v. 8 P. Edwards, Horse and Man in Early Modern England (London: Bloomsbury, 2007), p. 71. 9 See CA, H29/333 for the sale. For other references to Cavendish’s personal nags see CA, H29/508, 516, 544, 567, 589. 10 The Memorandum Book of Richard Cholmeley of Brandsby 1602–1623, North Yorkshire County Record Office Publications, 44 (Northallerton: North Yorkshire County Council, 1988), pp. 205, 207, 208, 217. 11 D. J. H. Clifford (ed.), The Diaries of Lady Anne Clifford (Far Thrupp, Stroud: Alan Sutton, 1990), p. 30. 12 CA, H10A/63r. 13 CA, H10A/51r; H23/127r. 14 A. Everitt, ‘The English Urban IInn 1560–1760’, in A. Everitt (ed.), Perspectives in English Urban History (London and Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1973), pp. 91–137. 15 CA, H23/8v. For horse hire see H10A/40v. 16 D. Gerhold, Carriers and Coachmaster: Trade and Travel before the Turnpikes (Chichester: Phillimore, 2005), pp. 141–50. 17 CA, H23/127r. 18 CA, H10A/40v. 19 Historical Manuscripts Commission, The Manuscripts of his Grace, the Duke of Rutland, vol. IV (London: HMSO, 1905), p. 427. 20 CA, H29/126, 133, 161, 168, 188, 206, 229, 342, 527, 640, 742. H29/229 refers to the costs of the trips in June 1612. 21 J. Moody (ed.), The Private Life of an Elizabethan Lady: The Diary of Lady Margaret Hoby (Thrupp, Stroud: Sutton Publishing, 2001), p. 201. 22 Edwards, Horse and Man, p. 211; CA, H23/152r; H29/11–12, 133, 180, 241, 393, 398, 418, 570, 596, 695, 739.



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23 CA, H29/469–70. 24 CA, H29/135, 138. 25 CA, H29/468, 474. 26 CA, H29/493. 27 CA, H10A/213r, 215r. 28 Moody (ed.), Diary of Lady Margaret Hoby, p. 205. 29 CA, H23/67r. 30 CA, H23/127v, 150r, 165r; H29/99, 147, 163, 229, 323, 566, 590, 592, 692. 31 CA, H29/99. For other references see H23/127v, 150r, 165r; H29/147, 163, 229, 323, 566, 590, 592, 692. 32 CA, H23/8v. 33 Historical Manuscripts Commission, Duke of Rutland, vol. IV, p. 427. 34 CA, H10A/147r–v. 35 CA, H29/200, 203, 534, 592; For women riding see Edwards, Horse and Man, pp. 76–7. 36 CA, H23/66r, 151v. 37 CA, H23/108r. 38 Edwards, Horse and Man, pp. 78–81; M. Brayshay, Land Travel and Communications in Tudor and Stuart England (Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 2014), pp. 267–8. 39 J. Raine (ed.), The Correspondence of Dr Matthew Hutton, Archbishop of York, Surtees Society, 17 (London: J. B. Nichols and Son, 1843), pp. 197–9. John Ellow, who wrote the account, considerably underestimated the distance of the journey. 40 CA, H23/121r, 132r. 41 Edwards, Horse and Man, p. 195. 42 Historical Manuscripts Commission, Duke of Rutland, vol. IV, p. 422. 43 CA, H29/45. 44 The first recorded London carrier was noted at Oxford in 1398, and in the fifteenth century carriers were operating between the capital and a number of towns in southern England: Gerhold, Carriers and Coachmaster, p. 3. 45 Brayshay, Land Travel and Communications, p. 131. 46 A. C. Edwards, John Petre: Essays on the Life and Background of John, 1st Lord Petre, 1549–1613 (London: Regency Press, 1975), p. 121. 47 CA, H10A, H23, H29, passim. 48 CA, H29/386, 592. 49 L. L. Peck, Consuming Splendor (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005), pp. 2–3, 14–16, 19, 33–46. 50 CA, H29/44, 386, 340, 592–3. 51 I. Warren, ‘The Gentry, the Nobility and London Residence’ (unpublished DPhil thesis, University of Oxford, 2007), p. 61. 52 Calendar of Wynn (of Gwydir) Papers 1515–1690 (Aberystwyth: National Library of Wales, 1926), p. 96. 53 ‘Historical Manuscripts Commission, Duke of Rutland, vol. IV, pp. 390, 410, 424; C. L. Kingsford (ed.), John Stow: A Survey of London, 2 vols, vol. II (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1971), pp. 97–8.

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54 CA, H10A/32v, 40r, 52v, 141v, 142v, 147r, 196r, 217r, 235r. 55 H10A/241r. 56 CA, H29/28; Kingsford (ed.), John Stow, vol. I, p. 309. 57 CA, H29/163, 416, 419–20, 457, 460. 58 As he was a widower –his first wife had died in February 1598 – perhaps it did not matter so much. He remarried in July 1604. 59 CA, H10A/32v, 35v, 40r, 48v, 52v, 53r, 136r, 147v, 196r, 210r, 217r, 243v; H23/116r, 142v, 150r, 167v, 180v, 199r–v. 60 CA, H23/88v. An ordinary was a place where one obtained set meals at fixed prices. 61 CA, H23/151v, 152v. 62 CA, MS 26. 63 ‘Historical Manuscripts Commission, Duke of Rutland, vol. IV, p. 421. 64 CA, H23/152r. 65 CA, H23/151r–152v. 66 Warren, ‘The Gentry, the Nobility and London Residence’, pp. 1–2; Moody (ed.), Diary of Lady Margaret Hoby, pp. xlvi–1, 116 n. 197, 126, 128, 137, 139; Memorandum Book of Richard Cholmeley, pp. 195, 207–17. 67 ‘William Cavendish, 1st Earl of Devonshire’, www.historyofparliamentonline. org/volume1558-1603/member/cavendish (accessed 22 June 2015); House of Lords Journal, 2, passim, British History Online, www.british-history.ac.uk/ lords-jml/vol2 (accessed 2 April 2017). 68 For St James’s Palace see CA, H23/182v; H29/468, 662; for Hampton Court, H29/578; and for Nonsuch, H23/151r. 69 P. Riden and D. Fowkes, Hardwick: A Great House and its Estate (Chichester: Phillimore, 2009), p. 39. 70 The account books, especially H29, include numerous references to Cavendish’s investment in overseas enterprises. For land purchases see Riden and Fowkes, Hardwick, pp. 37–8. 71 Clifford (ed.), Diaries, pp. 29, 66. 72 For the Secretaries of State see H10A/40r, 141v, 146v, 208v; H29/359. For the Chancellors of the Exchequer see H10A/39v, 141v; H23/130r–v, 146v, 149r, 236r; H29/363, 375, 532. 73 ‘Sir Walter Cope’, historyofparliamentonline.org/volume/1604-1629/cope-sirwalter-1553-1614 (accessed 5 April 2017). 74 CA, H10A/47v, October 1599; H29/135, 148, 150, 218. 75 CA, H10A/143r; H23/129v, 130r, 131r, 150r, 151v, 152r; H29/17, 30, 147, 221, 224. 76 L. L. Peck, ‘Building, Buying and Collecting in London, 1600–1625’, in L. C. Orlin (ed.), Material London ca. 1600 (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2000), pp. 280–3. 77 CA, H10A/32r, 44r, 46v, 48r, 50v; H29/149. 78 CA, H10A/208v, H29/160–1, 316, 356. 79 CA, H29/93, 153, 220, 365. 80 CA, H29/15, 22, 25, 35, 41, 57–8, 62, 64, 103, 107.



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81 CA, H29/692. 82 Historical Manuscripts Commission, Duke ofRutland, vol. IV, pp. 417–18, 428, 431. 83 Ibid. p. 419. 84 Ibid., pp. 393, 413, 421. 85 Moody (ed.), Diary of Lady Margaret Hoby, p. 125. 86 CA, H23/178v, 180v; J. V. Lyle (ed.), Acts of the Privy Council, 1619–21 (London: HMSO, 1930), p. 351. My thanks to Dr Andrew Thrush for this reference. 87 CA, H29, passim. 88 Historical Manuscripts Commission, Duke of Rutland, vol. IV, p. 421. 89 CA, H29/84, 95, 98, 99. 90 CA, H29/581. 91 Historical Manuscripts Commission, Duke of Rutland, vol. IV, pp. 493, 421. 92 CA, H10A/11r. 93 CA, H10A/39v. 94 CA, H29/31–2, 89, 97, 224, 265, 511, 632, 634. 95 CA, H29/581. 96 CA, H29/687. 97 CA, H29/657, 684. 98 CA, H29/436, 443, 661. 99 CA, H29/264. 100 CA, H29/579, 540. 101 CA, H10A/48v, 146r, 147v. This practice partially explains why Cavendish’s fodder bill in 1599 was proportionally lower than Sir Roger Newdigate’s, but it was also due to the failure of the accounts regularly to distinguish between the charges of the horse and rider. 102 CA, H10A/32v; H23/133r. 103 CA, H10A/40r. 104 CA, H23/151v. 105 CA, H23/183r. 106 CA, H29/375. 107 Historical Manuscripts Commission, Duke of Rutland, vol. IV, pp. 420, 493. 108 CA, H23/42v, 43r, 49r, 88r, 129v, 167r, 185v; H29/225, 269, 418, 419, 427, 453, 457, 464, 468, 469, 474, 591, 679, 681. 109 CA, H29/565. 110 CA, H23/43r, 129v, 131r.

Collecting objects in India and Scotland

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‘No Lady could do this’: navigating gender and collecting objects in India and Scotland, c.1810–50 Ellen Filor

‘I think of nothing but the joys of landing at Cromarty Bay’, Mary Mackenzie wrote to her father from Madras in 1814, ‘how very delightful it will be’1 The geographical reference to her childhood Scottish home, Brahan Castle in Ross-shire, creates a kind of imaginary cartography within Mackenzie’s imperial correspondence, highlighting the importance of the country house in the homesick imaginings of travellers in empire. This chapter examines the role of travel in the life of Mary Mackenzie (1783–1862), a hitherto overlooked landowner and collector. Using the letters she wrote and received while in India allows access to the delight of and difficulties with using the colonies to sustain and furnish the country house during the Georgian period. Thus this chapter engages with the furnishing of an imperial country house through the luxury and quotidian objects that Mackenzie circulated between metropole and colony, London and the Scottish Highlands, Madras and the mofussil. Centred on the space of Brahan Castle and the material routes that connected it to the globe, this chapter opens up gendered narratives of how travel helped and hindered the development of the country house. The Mackenzie family had a long and vibrant history of using travel to decorate its ancestral home during the Georgian period. How Mary fitted herself into this lineage of travel is of importance. Her great-uncle Kenneth Mackenzie (1744–1781) was a member of the Society of Dilettanti, a group dedicated to the study and collection of Greek and Roman art. While undertaking a Grand Tour in the 1770s, Kenneth commissioned a pair of conversation pieces by Pietro Fabris. The pictures show the interiors of Kenneth’s apartment in Naples and his collecting interests: the walls are decorated with oil paintings, prints, books and Roman vases.2 Kenneth’s journey on the Grand Tour and the collection he accrued in Italy to decorate a British country house are a story familiar to historians.3 Mackenzie’s father, Francis Humberston Mackenzie (1754–1815), who inherited the indebted Seaforth estates in 1783, had a less conventional



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collecting history. Despite this debt, he patronised many of the great artists of the day, and in 1796 he paid Thomas Lawrence £1,000 for three portraits, two of himself and one of his daughter Mary.4 By the early 1800s, however, his debt forced him to go to the West Indies in order to improve the family’s economic fortunes. Simultaneously, his time in Barbados allowed him to collect natural history and ornithology specimens. In 1808 he wrote from Pilgrim, Barbados, to a friend that his wife was returning to Scotland with the head and claws of a ‘magnificent’ vulture.5 It was in this continental, colonial and cultural milieu that Mary Mackenzie learnt to collect for and furnish the country house. She accompanied her father to Barbados in 1801. There she married Vice-Admiral Samuel Hood in 1804, and she soon afterwards returned with him to Britain. In 1811, Hood was appointed commander-in-chief in the East Indies, and his wife accompanied him there. There were manifold differences between the intentions behind embarking on a tour of Europe and travel to India under the employ of the East India Company. While the Grand Tour was undertaken by young elite men in order to immerse themselves in and collect classical culture,6 a career in India was most immediately about generating enough money to sustain a genteel life in Britain and, it was hoped, buy a country house.7 Nor was this return always a simple one: Britons who returned from India were often accused of ‘nabobry’ and tarred with the luxurious excess associated with the East. Divisions within the country house were used to reveal or hide certain aspects of their imperial career. As Tillman W. Nechtman has argued, the Georgian façade of classical country houses could conceal the ‘accoutrements of life in South Asia’.8 Exploring these divisions in the country house, therefore, allows analysis of the boundaries between public and private, cultural and financial, home and abroad. Thus Brahan Castle bore the marks of engagements with travel to several countries (Scotland, other parts of Britain, Italy and the West and East Indies) over the course of the Georgian period. The links Brahan had with empire have, however, largely been forgotten. Linda Colley situates the renovation of Brahan Castle within a narrative of increasing homogeneity between the Scottish and English upper classes: ‘a case of all British men of substantial property now taking certain patterns of consumerism for granted’.9 Ian Gow, when writing of the pictures taken for Country Life in the 1920s, makes no reference to the imperial collections at Brahan. Instead, he declares Francis Humberston Mackenzie ‘a remarkable Highland patron of the arts’.10 Both Colley and Gow, therefore, situate the furnishing of Brahan in a narrow national or sub-national (whether British or Highland) framework at the expense of the role of travel and, as a result, overlook Mary Mackenzie’s role in furnishing Brahan. This neglect has led John Batchelor, for example, to state that Mackenzie ‘knew little beyond the conventional world of the grander Scottish gentry’.11 The

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disregard for and misrepresentation of Mackenzie and her travels is all the more surprising as references to her wind in and out of the letters and poetry of her contemporaries. The Calcutta Gazette, for example, reported breathlessly in 1814 that Mackenzie had been hunting at Saharanpur, ‘sadly’ having killed only a lion and a tiger.12 This contemporary excitement at the novelty of an upper-class Scottish woman roaming widely in India suggests the innovative possibilities that Mackenzie’s life offers for looking at colonial travel and disrupting the tendency of scholars to situate the country house within a narrow national or local framework. The problem, therefore, concerns how to get away from rooting Brahan Castle within a narrowly national setting and integrate travel fully into its history. Here, James Clifford’s conception of ‘traveling cultures’ offers an effective means to conceptualise how the culture of the country house was not ‘rooted’ in place but rather produced and reproduced by the ‘routes’ of travel. For Clifford, it is important that the ‘challenge is seen to be the portrayal and understanding of local/global historical encounters, co-productions, dominations, and resistances’, and ‘one needs to focus on hybrid, cosmopolitan experiences as much as on rooted, native ones’.13 His work stresses the way in which such routes were integral to managing concepts of ‘home’ and ‘abroad’, allowing an examination of how Mackenzie situated herself and her country house in relation to global travel. By focusing the materiality of these routes, from the landing at Cromarty Bay imagined by Mackenzie quoted at the beginning of this chapter to the many goods she had shipped from India to Brahan, I demonstrate the complex ways in which global travel made and remade this country house. As Brahan Castle was demolished in 1951 and few of its furnishings can be traced, this chapter relies mainly on written sources to recreate Mackenzie’s travels and the country house she furnished. The main source consists of the letters Mackenzie wrote and received, which are held in the National Archives of Scotland. Following scholars who have argued that closer attention needs to be paid to the materiality of such epistles, it is important to highlight how these letters not only describe the commissioning and exchange of objects intended for the country house but also become objects in and of themselves.14 Analysing the letters sent by British women from India in the Georgian period, Kate Smith has emphasised the ‘home building’ aspect of these epistolary exchanges. Smith demonstrates how these women used the memories of family estates to mitigate the longing and homesickness that going to empire engendered.15 Under this analysis, Mackenzie’s lack of physical property led her to appropriate a form of control (or ownership) over Brahan through her letters and contacts in empire. Yet for Mackenzie, unlike those women studied by Smith, this metaphysical ownership became physical when she inherited Brahan in 1815. Ownership brought with it the pressures of debt, land management and repairs. Her inheritance allows the angst of homesickness to be compared with



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the stresses of home ownership. This chapter, therefore, uses letters to engage with ‘home’ as both a metaphysical space in India and the physical one of Brahan in Scotland. Containing four main sections, this chapter takes its structure from the routes that Mackenzie and her objects followed during their travels. The first examines the newly-wed Mackenzie in India, tracing her increasing exasperation with the frail connection that letters gave her to Scotland. Instead, she sought relief in collecting and commissioning objects intended for the country house. The second examines how she moved these objects from India to Scotland, outlining the difficulties she faced when shipping them from India via the baggage warehouse to Brahan. Where the objects were placed in the house informs a substantial part of the third main section, which, through visitor accounts, interrogates how Mackenzie memorialised her own and her wider family’s imperial travel. The fourth main section explores how the indebted nature of the estate led Mackenzie to turn again to travel to protect Brahan in the 1830s and 1840s. By examining the deaths of Mackenzies in empire, it is possible to show the darker side of travel and the sacrifices needed to maintain an indebted country house. By following these routes of objects and people from India to Scotland and back again, I will ultimately reconstruct the gendered narratives of travel that Mackenzie sought to immortalise in Brahan Castle. Recreating Scotland in India Mackenzie was deeply ambivalent about empire and travel. She wrote to the poet and novelist Walter Scott before she sailed to India in 1811: ‘[I] shall probably never see dear England or the dearer Land of cakes [Scotland] more so.’16 While in India, she believed letters to be the primary means of overcoming her homesickness and maintaining connections to her family at Brahan. Mackenzie wrote in 1813 to her mother that the letters she received ‘makes my heart sick’ and allowed her to ‘think my person connected with Rosshire’.17 This connection to Brahan, however, was a fragile one as many of her family were poor correspondents. She chastised her sister Caroline in 1812 for not writing enough, threatening, ‘if you don’t write by every ship you wicked animals I will endeavour if possible to let a Ship sail from here without a line to any of you & then I will have my revenge on you & myself too’.18 That correspondence from and about Scotland offered Mackenzie only a sporadic and frail connection to Brahan, often undone by unreliable correspondents and an irregular postal system, led her to seek other means to maintain her links to Scotland, first by connecting with the large numbers of Scottish men on the subcontinent and second through the commissioning of objects. The friendly letters she received from high-ranking East India Company men such as David Anderson, Colin MacKenzie and Archibald Seton demonstrate,

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in part, how the Scottish patronage networks, long detailed by historians, expanded to include women as well.19 Nor was Mackenzie passive in maintaining these networks. She informed her father, head of the clan Mackenzie, that she had aided one ‘Mr Mackenzie’ while in Madras: ‘So you see my dear Dad that I don’t forget our clan & kin whatever some geniuses may say to the contrary.’20 Tapping into this network of Scottish men facilitated and supported Mackenzie’s multiple tours through much of Madras, Ceylon, Mysore and the North-West Frontier. Seton, for example, invited himself for a ‘hifra [bowl] of porridge’ and suggested bypassing Cawnpore in favour of Teyzabad.21 On this trip, Mackenzie also relied on the infrastructure of the colonial state. She used roads mapped and built by the Indian army, acquired bearers for palanquins and access to daks through civil servants and sheltered in tents and bungalows belonging to the Company.22 Even if there was active encouragement for the project from civil servants in India, Mackenzie harboured some anxiety about what her family at home would think of the project. Her sister wrote to reassure her: ‘I must say that all of us, & every body I have heard on the subject, are quite delighted with your manner of spending your time, laying up such a store of information & amusement as must not only be delightful at present, but a perpetual recourse tho’ you should live to the age of 100.’23 This wish for the approval from her family, even when they were so far away, was a means for Mackenzie to maintain her responsibilities as a member of the Mackenzie clan as well as to adhere to acceptable notions of womanhood in the colonies. Throughout her time in the east, this connection to her family was intrinsically tied to their ancestral home. In 1813, for example, she shipped a vase to Brahan, stating that she intended it for the main bedchamber.24 Simultaneously, she explicitly sought to recreate Scotland in India, often using goods that had been sent to her from Brahan. She wrote in 1813 of a ‘Scotch dinner’ where she ate haggis, sheep’s head and cheese that her mother had sent from Brahan.25 In 1814, she wrote to her father: ‘Colonel M’Leod of the Royals is to lend me his piper to take up to Delhi with me, & I hope Cousin Colin Curios & his Dutch wife will go with my party so that my native land will not seem to be so far distant.’26 As well as on goods sent from her family estate in Scotland, Mackenzie relied on Indian craftsmen to feed her consumption of Scotland. She described to her father how she had commissioned tartan from Tanjore: ‘I have just recd some pieces of Tanjour Mackenzie Plaid a muster (Indian word for pattern) I enclose you, I have sattin [sic] of the same making in China & Silk in loads in Bengal.’27 For Mackenzie, her sense of ‘home’ was bound up in the sound, taste and touch of the bagpipes, haggis and tartan of her ‘far distant’ Scotland. Here, Mackenzie’s practical tactics can be perceived as recreating her previous life at Brahan Castle, allowing her to overcome her physical distance from the country house of her birth.



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If these goods suggest a nostalgia, to the point of stereotype, for Scotland, then her commissioning of drawings signalled an evolution of her collecting practices. From the men she stayed with in India she gained not only access to a network that helped her travel round India but access to a patronage network that allowed her to commission artists. Robert Melville Grindlay, then aidede-camp to General Sir Even Nepean, was permitted to accompany Mackenzie on her tour. Grindlay’s main task on this four-month excursion was to make sketches of the sights they visited. He recalled in 1865 that he spent his afternoons ‘busy working up sketches I had made for Lady Hood, at her side & under her advice – one of them the “Kylas” of the Ellora group took me six days to outline: the original drawing is I think still at Brahan Castle.’28 The close watch that Mackenzie kept over Grindlay as he drew not only highlights how she commissioned but was integral to the creative process of etchings intended for the country house. She gained access to painters not only through military contacts but also through more potentially disloyal subjects. At Vellore Fort she saw that ‘a Native artist has made some excellent drawings of the different parts of it, but having unfortunately exercised his skill in drawing the fort itself, the commander was allarmed [sic] and banished him, Major M[arriott] promised however to endeavour to procure me a set of his drawings of the Pagoda and Choultry’.29 These different drawings from military and professional, British and Indian artists suggest how Mackenzie’s collecting practices were developing. Instead of trying to recreate her childhood home, she sought to catalogue and comprehend India through such drawings. Travel, therefore, forced Mackenzie out of her narrow interest in Scotland alone when collecting for the country house. While economics and employment lay behind the decision of Mackenzie and her husband to go India, the structure of the fiscal-military state which allowed the East India Company to rule over the subcontinent also allowed Mary to travel, collect and commission throughout India. Her husband’s death in December 1814, however, less than three years after arriving in India, cut short her expected time on the subcontinent, leaving many of her commissions unfinished. To determine the full extent of her collecting ambition, therefore, it is necessary to follow the fate of these unfinished commissions left behind in India and the way in which Mackenzie negotiated their safe passage to Scotland. Purgatory in the baggage warehouse Samuel Hood’s death meant that Mackenzie had to leave her unfulfilled commissions in the hands of her agent and banker, Palmer & Co. Some of them were small objects intended as gifts while others were substantial pieces of furniture intended for Brahan. In a series of letters and accounts written in 1816 and 1817, V. Palmer stated that he had got ‘all your old commissions’,

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i­ ncluding ‘the Hooka of Hookas’ from Pedang, and a plume of feathers set with precious stones and a shawl from Kashmir.30 Such commissioning at a distance was often fraught with difficulty. Palmer apologised for the late arrival of a pair of shawls from Madras as the first order had been dirty and had been torn by ‘the vile Washerman’. He promised to send two more and assured Mackenzie that she would not be charged for the two damaged shawls.31 Particularly troublesome was the procuring of an ivory cabinet. In January 1816 Palmer wrote: ‘I grieve to say that a new & surly Correspondent at Canton declined executing my Commission for your Ivory Cabinet, but sent me two Boxes, so infinitely inferior to the Duchess of Angoulemes [sic], that I gave them away.’ He had some hope of buying a filigree cabinet from General Gillespie but it had been shipped into the Indian interior, leading him to claim that it would be in the ‘clutches of the Vizer’. Palmer reassured Mackenzie: ‘I have renewed the Order to a Friend on whom I have more reliance; & yet hope to accomplish It in a manner worthy of your Ladyship.’32 In the spring of 1816, Palmer wrote that he had Gillespie’s cabinet in storage for her but that it did ‘not deserve its reputation, but cost only Rs 120’.33 The machinations of ordering a cabinet demonstrate the difficulties of commissioning from a distance, both for Palmer in India and for Mackenzie in Scotland, and especially in the case of items ‘worthy’ of Mackenzie and the country house for which they were intended. Ships and shipping were, unsurprisingly, key to the importing of objects back to Brahan Castle. The Seaforth papers speak to the imperial, international and national maritime network in which the Mackenzie family and the Scottish economy more widely were ensconced.34 Their papers concern the Atlantic slave trade, the export of kelp from the Isle of Lewis and and the shipping of Thomas Lawrence portraits from London. It was this imperial and national shipping network that Mackenzie co-opted to move her objects. However, such transportation was not without risks. As explored above, written materials first introduced Mackenzie to the dangers of shipping objects and the frailty of the connections that relied on the sea. After she sent her diary recounting her Indian travels to Scotland in 1813, Henry Russell warned her to make a copy, ‘for Accidents sometimes happen to Ships and neither notes nor Memory would enable you to make a Second equal to the first’.35 Even if the objects reached Britain safely, they were still not out of danger. Mackenzie’s letters also show a less studied aspect of the difficulties of shipping objects from India: moving the said objects out of the baggage warehouse of the East India Company. The types of goods that might be detained in the warehouse were listed in the customs regulations as ‘baggage, books, earthenware, emeralds, and jewels, feathers, fossils, japanned and lacquered wares, lapis of all sorts, mangoes, maps and charts, medals, orange water, otto of roses, paper hangings, pictures, paintings, plants and shrubs; plate as baggage, all kinds of seeds as presents, skins as presents, specimens of minerals,



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fossils, and ores, succades, tortoise-shell, vermicelli, and all other goods, not considered as merchandize’.36 This mess of furnishing, paintings, food and plants rotting in the baggage warehouse was a potent one. As James Peller Malcolm described it in 1803: ‘From this purgatory there is no redemption for the articles seized, unless the owner or his friends attend for the purpose of getting them as they can.’37 While living in the Scottish Highlands, Mackenzie utilised her networks of genteel women in London to traverse the intricacies and the mess of the warehouse. In 1818, Lady Anne Hamilton wrote to Brahan of her difficulties in retrieving many of the Indian objects. She enquired: ‘but I must ask you if you know a Man of the name of Evans in the India House As he is Master of the Baggage Ware House Is over all the others (I think he has 200 under him) & he is the only man who can get any think [sic] out of the India H[ouse]’.38 Hamilton realised that patronage was key to succeeding and boasted: ‘Well I have got at his bosom friend & I mentioned to him our curious Persian shawls – India China & large jars – this latter he said could be got out easily – but that the former must be Sold bought in – & (I believe) Exported & Smuggled in again that no Lady could do this but that he could do it – of course I did not name you.’.39 Hamilton’s complicated and confused directions point to the near-­illegality of the actions necessary to extricate Indian objects from the warehouse. Moreover, Hamilton’s assessment that ‘no Lady could do this’ emphasises Mackenzie’s reliance on men to convey objects safely to Brahan. William Evans was in charge of the baggage warehouse between 1815 and 1825. Ten letters written to him survive in the British Library, six of them concerning the retrieval of objects from the warehouse. They speak to the machinations of patronage that oiled the swift release of objects. One letter, which may or may not have been written by the ‘bosom friend’ of Evans mentioned by Hamilton, discusses Mackenzie’s objects. In it, C. Grantham states: ‘A letter has gone to the Customs respecting Lady Hood’s things – In the mean time I hope you will have the goodness, as you have said, to keep them in safety.’40 That Grantham mentions Mackenzie’s name directly contradicts Hamilton’s earlier assertion that ‘of course I did not name you’. Here, Elaine Chalus’s work on eighteenth-century political patronage system and her insight that it was ‘eminently suited to women’ is important for understanding why Mackenzie was named.41 Chalus’s description of elite women’s ability to operate ‘in the grey areas between formal and informal political involvement, public and private life, and the political and social arenas’ works just as well in relation to the ‘grey area’ of the baggage warehouse as in relation to that of parliamentary politics.42 While Mackenzie could not actually enter the baggage warehouse, her name (signifying an aristocratic background and connections to high-ranking East India Company men) and the benefit her patronage could afford Evans’s career allowed the quasi-legal release of her objects. The insistence on keeping Mackenzie’s goods safe was a necessary and practical step, as objects were often

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stolen from or damaged in the baggage warehouse. As Grantham wrote: ‘I beg to mention to you, that, in the list you were kind enough to send, there is not note of a small tooth pick case, wh Lady Hood thinks was with the rest.’43 The limbo of the baggage warehouse stands as an example in miniature of the purgatory of empire. The dislocation (often verging on hatred) that Mackenzie experienced during her long stints in empire and the deaths with which these sojourns often ended found their mirror in the loss and destruction in the baggage warehouse. At length, however, this tactic of using Evans’s friend and naming Mackenzie secured the release of at least some of her Indian objects. These items wound their way to Brahan Castle in all likelihood by sea to Dingwall, like any number of the more mundane goods like tea or cheese Mackenzie had sent from London.44 These sea trade routes were the ones that Mary had intended to take to the castle on her return from India, as the quotation which opens this chapter demonstrates. Just as Viccy Coltman has shown of the collectors on the Grand Tour who used the burgeoning English road system of the eighteenth century to send Roman statues from London to their rural country houses,45 Mackenzie co-opted a shipping network that had connected the east coast of Scotland to the world since the sixteenth century to transport her Indian objects to remote Brahan. The next section follows these objects from their arrival at Cromarty Bay to their resting places inside the castle. Inheriting, furnishing and visiting Brahan Mackenzie inherited Brahan Castle in 1815 after the death of her father. This inheritance had been unexpected as she had four brothers, but all predeceased her, the last of them dying in India in 1814. By inheriting Brahan, she joined a small number of women in Scotland who were major landowners and who benefited from much stronger property rights than their English counterparts.46 Thus when she married James Alexander Stewart-Mackenzie in 1817 her ancestral land did not become her second husband’s property and then fall to a male heir, but rather she retained ownership of it until her death. The letters she wrote during the 1820s demonstrate the active role she took in renovating and furnishing the house. A series of improvements to the dining room, billiard room, kitchen and great hall were undertaken throughout the 1820s and early 1830s. The paintings in Brahan often informed these renovations. In 1820, she wrote to Thomas Lawrence informing him that she and her husband were building a large room to hold a vast painting by Benjamin West that her father had commissioned.47 This canvas was eventually physically embedded in the wall of this newly built room.48 To explore fully Mackenzie’s Brahan and how she celebrated (or did not celebrate) her travels, I utilise the narratives of contemporary visitors who recorded their movements through the house. As Peter Mandler has argued, the owners



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of country houses wanted an audience for their collections and therefore had to ‘ensure that [their] impregnable fortifications were just sufficiently permeable to admit any visitors able to assess, appreciate and, preferably, report on [their] achievements’.49 Mackenzie encouraged many of the Scotsmen she had met in India to visit Brahan Castle. In 1816, Sir David Ochterlony sent shawls and white heron feathers from Danapur and ended his letter by assuring her that ‘If I had my Intention of revisiting the Land of my Fathers I should ask you if Lewis contains a Cottage that would suit an old invalid Soldier & beg to add one to the number of your numerous Tenants.’50 While the reference to the cottage was almost certainly a joke on Ochterlony’s part, his imaginary home took on a certain earnestness in the final sentence of his letter: ‘You would listen with Kindness to my old indian Tales & in the Society of Lady Hood I should derive more Happiness than I dare acknowledge for even at this Distance it is not allowing me to say how.’51 Although Ochterlony died at Meerut in 1825 and so never fulfilled his desire to visit Mackenzie, his potent descriptions of Brahan while still on the subcontinent echo those that Mackenzie herself had written while in Madras and demonstrate how central the country house was to such sojourners’ imaginings of Scotland. Despite its remote location, a number of visitors, ranging from Georgian tourists to Edwardian journalists, recorded their trips to Brahan. Among these sources, the dining room was the most frequently mentioned room, and the objects most referred to within it were the portraits. Catherine Sinclair, on a tour of the Scottish Highlands in the 1830s, mentioned very little of Brahan’s interiors apart from giving detailed descriptions of the portraits. She wrote of Lawrence’s portrait of Francis Humberston Mackenzie in the military dress of his Highland regiment: ‘Here, in full Highland garb, we saw a fine spirited ­portrait … of the late Lord Seaforth, the last chief of that ancient line.’52 In 1916, when Lawrence Weaver wrote a feature on Brahan Castle for Country Life, the portrait was in the same position and led Weaver to opine that ‘Lord Seaforth was a gallant figure in a kilt and bonnet.’53 The photograph accompanying Weaver’s article (Figure 10.1) shows Lawrence’s martial portrait positioned so that Francis Humberston Mackenzie’s gaze surveys the four worn flags that the Seaforth regiment carried in battle, which hang over a fireplace engraved with the Seaforth crest. Under Mary Mackenzie’s stewardship, therefore, the dining hall memorialised the portraits commissioned by her father and his martial loyalty to the imperial British state. These public rooms accessible to the visitor, with their military portraits and relics of warfare, relate only one part of Mary Mackenzie’s furnishing of Brahan. Using the inventory of Brahan Castle from 1837 allows access to rooms that visitors did not see and presents a different, hidden narrative of travel from that projected by the public dining room. Most notable was the exotically named Botany Bay Room. This was a boudoir, opening directly off the master bedroom, and

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Figure 10.1  ‘In the Dining-Room’ in Lawrence Weaver, ‘Brahan Castle, Ross-shire’, Country Life, 19 August 1916, p. 213

contained many of the foreign objects that Mackenzie collected in India. The accuracy of the inventory in describing these exotic goods is somewhat doubtful: for example, a listing of a ‘6 feet Persian hearth rug’ has been crossed out and corrected to ‘an indian hearth rug’.54 Even so, by combining the inventory with letters sent from India, several of the objects can be traced with some certainty as those that Mackenzie commissioned or was given in India. The two Indian cabinets, one ‘beautifully inlaid’ and the other ‘japanned’, were almost certainly those that Palmer had sent from India in the 1810s.55 Other objects receive a tantalising description that only allows their actuality to be guessed at. In this category is ‘a 2ft6 stuffed with small leopard’, an animal that, it is tempting to think, Mackenzie herself shot.56 In direct ­contrast to the public celebration of



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martial and imperial masculinity in the dining room, the contents and private nature of her boudoir suggest how Mackenzie used the room as a personal monument to her own travels in empire. The visitor to Brahan, therefore, was privy to only certain acceptable forms of travel on a tour of the castle. Death, debt and return to empire Mackenzie’s inheritance of Brahan did not signal the end of her need to travel abroad. By the mid-1830s, the financial mismanagement of the Seaforth estates had caught up with the family. In 1833, Mackenzie’s husband explored the possibility of renting Brahan Castle and was close to reaching an agreement with one John FitzPatrick. Mary viewed this lease far less favourably than her husband and complained that she and her family were to be turned out of Brahan ‘to starve in a shabby genteel manner in Regents Park or to wander on the continent’.57 Here, travel of a different sort from the imperial travel of her early life was considered: a move either to a more modest townhouse in London or one to Europe, a step often undertaken by debtors as living on the Continent was cheaper than in Britain.58 Chief among her objections to the renting of the castle was ‘giving up our house furniture plans &c’.59 When discussing terms, the Mackenzies stated that certain rooms were to be shut up. The FitzPatricks countered that they wanted, among others, the Botany Bay Room opened up. Mary vehemently resisted this request: ‘there are such quantities of things laid aside the pictures & tapestry occupy three besides all your papers, my curiosities &c &c &c’.60 The areas of the castle that she prohibited prospective renters from entering underline again the importance Mackenzie placed on her private celebration of empire, even at the expense of potential income. Instead of roaming Europe in genteel poverty, the Mackenzie family turned to a now familiar form of travel to maintain Brahan: going to empire. Mary’s husband was appointed Governor of Ceylon in 1837 and she accompanied him to the island. This move posed more potential difficulties than her previous one to Madras as Mackenzie now had six children. She took her daughters with her, boarding her three sons at Rugby School. While they were in Ceylon, few of the epistolary exchanges between the members of Mackenzie family in Britain and those abroad were concerned with exotic sights and scenes that had defined their letters from and to Madras some twenty years earlier. Rather, the family was consumed by worry over the potential careers of the two youngest sons, Frank and George. Despite Mackenzie’s previous connections to and patronage of Scots in India, she struggled to gain positions for her sons in the East India Company. The Company director William Adam was applied to for a post in the Indian civil service but wrote a non-committal reply, citing the claims of the offspring of the Loch of Drylaws.61 There was discussion of buying land in Ceylon so that one of the sons could become a coffee planter.62 Another family

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member suggested that George might become a merchant if his handwriting could be improved.63 In 1840, Frank himself wrote that he wanted a cadetship in the Indian army.64 That none of these peripatetic careers were realised by her two sons suggests a waning of Mackenzie’s influence. Instead of making lucrative careers in the Indian army or Indian civil service, her sons had to settle for the British army: Frank entered the 71st Highland Infantry and George the 72nd Highlanders. The 72nd was the regiment her father had raised in 1778, suggesting that Mackenzie had to fall back on the clan-based patronage system when her attempts at gaining imperial careers failed. Whereas in the 1810s Mackenzie’s patronage could forward a man’s career in India, now she struggled to gain a position for either of her two sons. Thus the forays Mackenzie made into empire cannot be considered entirely successful. This is especially evident when measured in terms of loss of life. Mackenzie outlived two husbands and two sons, all of whom died in empire or shortly after their return. Her first husband’s death at Madras was described in Royal Naval Biography (1830) as due to his being ‘literally worn out in the service of his country’.65 Mackenzie commissioned the sculptor Francis Chantrey to design a sarcophagus in his memory that was placed in Fort St George, Madras.66 Her second husband died in 1843, shortly after the family returned from abroad, having been injured on board ship. Only a year later, Frank died of yellow fever in Granada aged twenty-four. His commemoration plaque in a church at Grenada read that it was ‘erected by his sorrowing mother’.67 A decade later, the youngest son, George, died in Britain aged twenty-eight, having recently served in the West Indies,. Mackenzie’s memorials to these dead spouses and sons span colonies and continents, from forts in the East and West Indies to catacombs in Southampton and the family tomb in Fortrose. As a form of commissioning, they stand as a far more sorrowful memorial to imperial travel than the more celebratory form that Mackenzie enacted at Brahan. Worse, this sacrifice of the Mackenzies to empire did not stabilise the precarious economic state of the Seaforth estates. In 1844, a year after the death of her second husband, Mackenzie was forced to sell the Hebridean island of Lewis for some £190,000.68 The promise of empire, therefore, was a mixed blessing: desire for imperial wealth imperilled rather than saved the Seaforth estates. Mary died at Brahan in 1862; of her legacy for the Seaforth estates, the historian Alexander Mackenzie concluded in 1878: One section after another of the estates had to be sold. The remaining portion of Kintail, the sunny braes of Ross, the church lands of Chanonry, the barony of Pluscarden, and the Island of Lews – a principality itself – were disposed of one after the other, till now nothing remains of the vast estates of this illustrious house except Brahan Castle, and a mere remnant of their ancient patrimony (and that in the hands of trustees), which the non-resident, nominal owner has just been prevented from alienating. Sic transit.69



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The loss of Seaforth lands and the indebted Brahan Castle demonstrate the damage that travel to empire could do to the country house. Yet this assessment of a failed landowner is not the (now forgotten) narrative that Mackenzie crafted during her lifetime, and that I have sought to unpick here. Instead, it was Brahan Castle and the travel its interiors celebrated that Mackenzie sought to preserve most fervently. Mackenzie’s will grants a final insight into her own narrative and legacy. The will provided for her three daughters. Economically, this was done through leaving a 250-acre plantation in Ceylon to her widowed daughter Mary Frances Anstruther.70 Smaller sums were distributed among her other children and her grandchildren. Such property and monetary legacies were not all that Mackenzie disposed of, however. Not surprisingly in view of their importance throughout her life, objects formed a detailed part of her will. One of the major categories consisted of portraits. Louisa Caroline inherited a portrait of herself by James Rannie Swinton, a portrait of her maternal grandfather (probably by Thomas Lawrence) that hung in her mother’s bedroom and sundry drawings which had her name written on the back.71 Mackenzie also bequeathed her the ‘Indian Camphorwood chests’, some Indian muslins and the books within the Botany Bay Room.72 By passing these ancestral portraits and imperial objects down to her daughter, Mackenzie was continuing a female lineage of collecting. Such hopes were realised, as Louisa Stewart-Mackenzie would become a far more renowned collector than her mother, housing her vast art collection in a specially built house in Devon that, in a nod to the estates where she had spent her childhood and learnt from the earlier furnishing patterns of her mother, she named Seaforth Lodge.73 Finally, the will conveyed Mackenzie’s wishes for her funeral. She wanted it conducted in the ‘plainest manner’ and asked that ‘no other persons than my nearest relations be invited to attend it’.74 Of where she wished her body to be interred, she wrote: ‘if I shall die at Brahan my body may be conveyed by Sea to London, whence I desire it may be sent by Railway to Southampton, and wherever I may die, that it may be placed in the Colonnade under the Church of all Saints in that Town, where I have purchased a niche adjoining that of my late Husband are laid’.75 Her demands for a ‘plain’ funeral and to be buried by her second husband in Southampton show the importance of travel in Mackenzie’s narrative even after death. The detailed instructions for the shipping of her own corpse to Southampton mirror her earlier commissioning of Indian objects; her funerary wishes can be read as her last commission. Her children, however, failed to accede to Mackenzie’s final wishes. Instead, three thousand people attended her funeral, including representatives from the Mackenzie clan and soldiers from local regiments. Her body was accompanied from Brahan by bagpipes and followed by a procession of two hundred carriages to Fortrose Cathedral, where she was buried in the Seaforth tomb.76 This martial Highland procession, exhibiting all the trappings of Highland Scotland

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that she had found so alluring fifty years before in India, was no longer the funeral nor the imperial legacy that Mackenzie wanted. Conclusion Following Mackenzie and her objects from Scotland to India and back again demonstrates the unique rewards and difficulties of travelling to and in India. Mackenzie’s increasing disillusionment with the ability of letters from family and friends to maintain her connection to Scotland led her to turn to more tangible links in India. Her four-year stint on the subcontinent allowed her collecting practices to mature from a nostalgic recreation of Scotland to the patronage of a wide variety of artists and craftsmen. Offering a valuable counterpoint to the histories of the Grand Tour, this chapter has examined the complex and gendered networks that Mackenzie integrated herself into on the subcontinent. The examples of the Scottish soldiers who guarded her, the Indian artists she employed, the semi-legal means that enabled her goods to escape from the baggage warehouse and the patronage that was used (sometimes unsuccessfully) to generate careers for her husbands and sons all demonstrate how the functioning of the British Empire enabled her to furnish a country house. Such travel to empire was also far more dangerous than that to the Continent. By emphasising the large large proportion of the family who died in empire while simultaneously demonstrating that the financial reward of India was insufficient to save the indebted Seaforth estates, I have shown how travel could undermine as well as sustain the country house. This chapter has outlined some of the many global stories contained within the Seaforth archive: from haggis dinners to tiger hunting in Madras, from the martial Highland dining hall to the Indian boudoir at Brahan and in the Mackenzie tombs (and corpses) that spanned from Fortrose to Grenada. Using the lens of travel and stressing the routes that connected Brahan to the globe dismantles the narratives of ‘national’ space within which Linda Colley has previously isolated this Highland country house.77 Indeed, the outward Highland and martial decorations described by visitors to Brahan were different from the hidden interiors of the Botany Bay Room. Such divisions show that only certain forms of travel were acceptable for the visitor’s view, complicating Nechtman’s vision of British exterior and imperial interior.78 However, the relatively private, familial nature of the rooms that contained Mackenzie’s Indian curiosities has meant that scholars have hitherto overlooked these quieter and gendered narratives of travel. That Mackenzie’s funerary wishes were ignored was just the beginning of the effacement of the imperial narrative that she had crafted within the walls of Brahan during her lifetime and that this chapter has recreated. Thus this chapter asserts the need for the historian to not only to take seriously the ways in which global travel impacted the country house but



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also to look for the hidden, often gendered narratives that narrow national or local histories erase. Notes

This chapter was started while I was funded by a Scottish Studies Fulbright award at the University of Michigan and was finished at the Institute of Advanced Studies at University College London. Thanks to the editor for his astute comments.

 1 National Archives of Scotland, Edinburgh (hereafter NAS), GD46/17/9/350–7, Mary Hood to Francis Stewart Mackenzie, 24 September 1814. A note on names: twice married, Mary Mackenzie used several second names and titles during her lifetime: Mackenzie (1783–1804), Hood (1804–17), Lady Seaforth (1815–62) and Stewart-Mackenzie (1817–62). For consistency, I have used her maiden name, Mackenzie, in the main body of the text and retained her contemporary names in the manuscripts referenced in the endnotes.  2 National Gallery of Scotland, Edinburgh, Pietro Fabris, At Home in Naples: Concert Party, 1771, PG 2611, and At Home in Naples: Fencing Scene, 1771, PG 2610.  3 B. Redford, Dilettanti: The Antic and the Antique in Eighteenth-Century England (Los Angeles: Getty Publications, 2008), pp. 143–72; V. Coltman, Classical Sculpture and the Culture of Collecting in Britain since 1760 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009), pp. 49–83; D. Arnold, ‘The Illusion of Grandeur? Antiquity, Grand Tourism and the Country House’, in D. Arnold, The Georgian Country House (Stroud: Sutton Publishing, 1998), pp. 100–16.  4 R. Carruthers, ‘The Seaforth Papers: Letters from 1796 to 1843’, North British Review, 39 (1863), p. 319.  5 Library of the Linnean Society, London, GB-110/JES/COR/9/1, Francis Humberston Mackenzie to James Edward Smith, 22 March 1806.  6 J. Black, The British Abroad: The Grand Tour in the Eighteenth Century (Stroud: Alan Sutton Press, 1997); R. Sweet, Cities and the Grand Tour: The British in Italy, c.1690–1820 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012).  7 P. J. Marshall, East Indian Fortunes: The British in Bengal in the Eighteenth Century (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1976); G. McGilvary, East India Patronage and the British State (London: I. B. Tauris, 2008), pp. 184–202.  8 T. W. Nechtman, Nabobs: Empire and Identity in Eighteenth-Century Britain (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010), p. 169.  9 L. Colley, Britons: Forging the Nation, 1707–1837, 2nd edn (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2005), pp. 158–9. 10 I. Gow, Scotland’s Lost Houses (London: Aurum, 2006), p. 63. 11 J. Batchelor, Lady Trevelyan and the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood (London: Chatto & Windus, 2006), p. 172. 12 ‘Letters from Saharanpore’, Calcutta Gazette, 14 April 1814. 13 J. Clifford, Routes: Travel and Translation in the Late Twentieth Century (London: Harvard University Press, 1997), p. 24. 14 See, for example, E. Rappaport, ‘“The Bombay Debt”: Letter Writing, Domestic

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Economies and Family Conflict in Colonial India’, Gender and History, 16 (2004), pp. 233–60; B. Elliott, D. Gerber and S. Sinke (eds), Letters across Borders: The Epistolary Practices of International Migrants (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2006). 15 K. Smith, ‘Imperial Families: Women Writing Home in Georgian Britain’, Women’s History Review, 24 (2015), pp. 843–60. 16 National Library of Scotland, Edinburgh, MS 3881/13–14, Mary Hood to Walter Scott, 14 April 1811. 17 NAS, GD46/17/9/348, Mary Hood to Mary Mackenzie, 25 August 1813. 18 NAS, GD46/15/2/15, Mary Hood to Caroline Mackenzie, 21 October 1812. 19 See, for example, McGilvary, East India Patronage. 20 NAS, GD46/17/9/350–7, Mary Hood to Francis Stewart, 24 September 1814. 21 NAS, GD46/15/2, Archibald Seton to Samuel Hood, n.d. (c.1811). 22 NAS, GD46/15/4/8, anon., ‘Journey to Hyderabad in 1813 (with Lady Hood)’, February 1813. 23 NAS, GD46/15/4/15–16, Frances Mackenzie to Mary Hood, 9 June 1814. 24 NAS, GD46/17/9/334–7, Mary Hood to Mary Mackenzie, 15 May 1813. 25 NAS, GD46/17/9/348, Mary Hood to Mary Mackenzie, 25 August 1813. 26 NAS, GD46/17/9/350–7, Mary Hood to Francis Stewart, 24 September 1814. 27 Ibid. 28 British Library, London, Add. Or. 4670–9, fol. 1d, Robert Melville Grindlay to Miss Dempster, 10 April 1865. 29 NAS, GD46/17/40, Mary Hood, ‘Sketch of a Journey’, July 1812, pp. 4–5. 30 NAS, GD46/15/151/10, V. Palmer to Mary Hood, 18 May 1816; GD46/601, V.  Palmer to Mary Hood, 3 December 1817; GD46/601, Mary Hood’s account with Palmer & Co., 17 April 1817. 31 NAS, GD46/15/6/32, V. Palmer to Mary Hood, 5 September 1816. 32 NAS, GD/46/15/6/1, V. Palmer to Mary Hood, 7 January 1816. 33 NAS, GD46/15/151/10, V. Palmer to Mary Hood, 18 May 1816. 34 For Scottish seafaring culture and its importance to the economy, see T. C. Smout (ed.), Scotland and the Sea (Edinburgh: John Donald, 1992). 35 NAS, GD46/15/3/14–16, Henry Russell to Mary Hood, 21 August 1813. 36 R. Ellis, The Laws of the Customs and Excise (London: G. B. Whittaker, 1826), p. 554. 37 J. P. Malcolm, Londinium Redivivum; or an Ancient History and Modern Description of London (London: John Nicholas & Son, 1803), vol. III, pp. 565–6. 38 NAS, GD46/15/15/2–4, Anne Hamilton to Mary Stewart Mackenzie, 3 August 1818. 39 Ibid. 40 British Library, IOR MSS EUR C 621, fol. 9, C. Grantham to William Evans, 19 June [1818]. 41 E. Chalus, Elite Women in English Political Life c.1754–1790 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007), pp. 106–56. 42 Ibid., pp. 111–12. 43 British Library, IOR MSS EUR C 621, fol. 9, C. Grantham to William Evans, 19 June [1818].



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44 NAS, GD46/15/242/23, William Davy and Co. to Mary Stewart Mackenzie, 4 September 1840. 45 Coltman, Classical Sculpture, pp. 156–7. 46 R. A. Houston, ‘Women in the Economy and Society of Scotland, 1500–1800’, in R. A. Houston and I. D. Whyte (eds), Scottish Society, 1500–1800 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989), pp. 129–31. 47 Royal Academy of Arts, London, LAW/3/196, Mary Stewart-Mackenzie to Thomas Lawrence, 14 August 1820. 48 NAS, GD46/15/40/18, J. A. S. Mackenzie to Mary Stewart-Mackenzie, 13 October [1831]. 49 P. Mandler, The Fall and Rise of the Stately House (London: Yale University Press, 1997), p. 8. 50 NAS, GD46/15/6/13, David Ochterlony to Mary Hood, 16 March 1816. 51 Ibid. 52 C. Sinclair, Scotland and the Scotch: or, the Western Circuit (Edinburgh: William Whyte & Co., 1840), p. 310. 53 L. Weaver, ‘Brahan Castle, Ross-shire’, Country Life, 19 August 1916, p. 213. 54 NAS, GD46/22/2, inventory of furniture and effects at Brahan Castle, 28 April 1837. 55 Ibid. 56 Ibid. 57 NAS, GD46/15/54/31–3, Mary Stewart-Mackenzie to J. A. S. Mackenzie, 15 April 1833. 58 M. Finn, The Character of Credit: Personal Debt in English Culture, 1740–1914 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003), pp. 55–6, 115–16. 59 NAS, GD46/15/54/13–15, Mary Stewart-Mackenzie to J. A. S. Mackenzie, 21 April [1833]. 60 NAS, GD46/1/247, Mary Mackenzie to J. A. S. Mackenzie, 3 April 1833. 61 NAS, GD46/15/92/7, William Adam to Augusta Mackenzie, 29 July 1838. 62 NAS, GD46/15/99/1, George Mackenzie to Mary Stewart Mackenzie, 29 January 1843. 63 NAS, GD46/15/94/21–2, J. H. Mackenzie and Helen Anne Mackenzie to Mary Stewart Mackenzie, postmarked 27 June 1839. 64 NAS, GD46/15/95/44–5, Frank Stewart-Mackenzie to Mary Stewart-Mackenzie, 23 September 1840. 65 J. Marshall, Royal Naval Biography (London: Longman, Rees, Orme, Brown and Green, 1830), p. 390. 66 A. Yarrington et al., ‘An Edition of the Ledger of Sir Francis Chantrey R.A., at the Royal Academy, 1809–1841’, Volume of the Walpole Society, 56 (1991–92), p. 50. 67 V. L. Oliver, More Monumental Inscriptions: Tombstones of the British West Indies (Dorchester: Friary Press, 1927), p. 203. 68 K. Mackenzie, History of the Outer Hebrides (Paisley: Alexander Gardener, 1903), p. 494. 69 A. Mackenzie, The Prophecies of the Brahan Seer (Inverness: A. & W. Alexander, 1878), p. 93.

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70 NAS, SC25/44/7, will of Mary Mackenzie, Dingwall Sheriff Court fols. 655–6. 71 Ibid., fol. 662. 72 Ibid. 73 V. Surtees, The Ludovisi Goddess: The Life of Louisa Lady Ashburton (London: Michael Russell, 1984); Batchelor, Lady Trevelyan, pp. 172–85. 74 NAS, SC25/44/7, will of Mary Mackenzie, Dingwall Sheriff Court, fol. 673. 75 Ibid., fols 673–4. 76 ‘Funeral of the Hon. Mrs Stewart Mackenzie of Seaforth’, Inverness Courier, 11 December 1862. 77 Colley, Britons, pp. 158–9. 78 Nechtman, Nabobs, p. 169.

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Index

account books 170, 179, 180, 181, 183 Adam, Robert 6, 25, 35, 78, 79, 153 aesthetics 6, 9, 10, 80, 107, 116, 129, 131 agriculture 2, 128, 129–32, 140 Alexander, William 63, 79, 80 Althorp 127, 140 Ampthill Park 99, 100 anglomania 113, 152, 156, 159–60 Anson, George, Admiral 72, 73 Anson, Thomas 72, 73 anti-tourism 121 antiquities 1, 13, 19, 25–6, 36, 37, 42, 97, 117, 127 Apollo Belvedere 10, 35, 36, 46 Arbury Hall 7, 169, 175 archaeological excavations 25, 26, 36 architecture critiques 130–3, 137, 153, 157–8 plans/designs 30–1, 101 styles 5, 7, 8, 25, 28, 35, 68, 79, 100, 111, 112, 113, 122 see also baroque; classical and neoclassical; gothic; Palladian/ Palladianism Augustan age 42–3 Ballyscullion House, Ireland 19–21, 29–31, 33, 35, 36–7 baroque 2, 66, 67, 70, 71, 101, 111, 112, 122

Batoni, Pompeo 24, 64, 75 Belvoir Castle 159, 191 bills and vouchers 8, 173, 177–80, 182, 183, 184 Birmingham 34, 90, 158 Blenheim Palace 4, 10, 43, 111, 113, 118–19, 134, 136, 137, 139, 152–3, 157–9 Blickling Hall 4, 88, 93, 96–7, 101, 102 Borghese Gardens 31, 32, 35, 36, 52, 55 Boyle, Richard see Burlington Brahan Castle, Scotland 206–24 Bruce, Lord 98, 99 Burghley House 5, 71, 127, 136, 159 Burlington, 3rd Earl of, Richard Boyle 5–6, 10, 46, 98, 100 Camden, William 87, 88, 90 Canaletto, Antonio 64, 75 canon of country houses 3, 10, 109–13, 117, 121 Canova, Antonio 31, 35 Canton 12, 212 Carisbrooke Castle 111, 117 carriages see coaches and carriages carriers 13, 180–2, 183, 193–4, 195, 201 carts 175, 190, 193, 197 Caserta 52, 53, 55 Castle Howard 110–11, 134, 159 Cavendish, Lady 191, 199



Index

Cavendish, William, 1st Earl of Devonshire 12–13, 188–205 Cavendish, William, 2nd Duke of Devonshire 94, 98 Chamberlayne, John 87–8, 94–5 Chambers, Sir William 28, 52, 55, 63, 78, 79, 151 Charles II, King 67, 139 Chatsworth House 4, 46, 71, 88, 94, 96, 98, 100, 101, 160 Cheere, John 8, 43, 45, 46 Child Villiers, Sarah, Countess of Jersey 155–6 chinoiserie 7, 9, 11–12, 25, 47, 52, 63–85, 110, 173 Chippendale, Thomas 74, 77, 78–85 Chiswick House 6, 10, 160 Clark, William Tierney 157, 160, 161 classical and neo-classical architecture 2, 5, 6, 9, 22, 26, 28, 74, 122 artefacts 31, 37 decoration 34, 35 Chinese/gothic in combination with 75, 77, 78–80, 101 influences 23, 26, 29, 35, 42, 47, 49, 73, 207 see also antiquities; Grand Tour; Rome Clifford, Lady Anne 190, 195 coaches and carriages benefits of ownership 5, 168, 178, 190, 200–1 post chaise 92, 173, 174, 176 purchasing and hiring 170–4, 179, 180, 189, 192, 197–8 quality and complaints 173, 174, 191 see also horses; saddles and harnesses coachman 172, 176, 177, 194, 198, 199 Coke, Thomas, 1st Earl of Leicester 5–6, 8 Colchester Castle 111, 115–16, 117 collections and collecting 3–4, 7 –8, 9, 19, 37, 88, 219, 220 antiquities 1, 8, 10, 35–6, 159, 206

243

art 6, 10, 23, 30, 72, 73, 77, 113, 133–9, 148, 159 chinoiserie 69, 74–5 galleries and catalogues 30, 33, 77, 96, 119–20, 129 Indian objects 211, 215–17 visitors and 97, 106, 109, 111, 113, 117, 128, 139–41, 149, 159, see also connoisseurship; Grand Tour; guidebooks and travel guides; taste comfort 6, 97, 101, 150, 158, 200 Confucius 71, 74 Congress of Vienna 150, 154 connoisseurship 3, 7, 33, 128, 129, 130, 132, 135–6, 138–9, 153 consumption 2, 14, 21, 109, 168, 177, 210 conspicuous consumption 169, 172, 176, 183, 193 consumerism 107, 109, 112, 207 Cope, Sir Walter 3, 196 Correggio 33, 34, 136, 138 cosmopolitan 11, 78, 79, 80, 208 Coventry 90, 92, 182, 191 cultural capital 2, 8, 10, 37 customs house 13, 14, 145, 212–14 Defoe, Daniel 69, 87, 93, 94, 133 Devonshire, Duke of see Cavendish, William, 1st Earl of Devonshire Ditchley 46, 99, 134, 139 Downhill Castle, Ireland 19–21, 23–9, 33, 35, 36–7 Dublin 30, 37, 165 Duncombe Park 135, 138, 140 Dutch visitors 106–26 Dyrham Park 66, 75 East India Company Dutch 65 English 8–9, 11, 14, 64, 75, 207, 209–10, 212, 217 Swedish 78 Eisenstadt, Austria 151, 154–5, 156–7 engravings 25, 28, 34 Esterházy, Prince Miklós 149, 154

244

Travel and the British country house

Esterházy, Prince Miklós Pál 155–7 Esterházy, Prince Pál Antal 151, 154, 155–6, 158, 159 Esterházy, Princess Leopoldine 149, 153, 162 expenditure on travel and transport 90–4, 170–83, 188–9, 191, 199 Felbrigg Hall 64, 77 Fetherstonhaugh, Sir Mathew and Lady Sarah 75, 76, 77 Fiennes, Celia 87, 90, 94, 96 Flaxman, John 31, 35–6 Flitcroft, Henry 43, 45, 46, 74 Florence 1, 8, 23, 35, 46, 51, 108 fodder see provender/fodder food 89, 90, 93, 181–2, 190 French Revolution 22, 23, 31, 37, 53, 140, 149 furniture 9, 19, 67, 74, 78, 79, 96, 111, 112, 113, 133, 217 moving between houses 183, 193, 200, 211 galleries (for display) 8, 30, 33, 35, 36, 132, 157 gardens buildings 43–6, 71–4, 79 English gardens 9, 11, 31, 42–62, 71–4, 110, 113, 116, 148, 149, 153 fountains 98, 113 temples 9, 28, 31, 35, 43–6, 47, 49, 51, 52, 74, 153 gendered practices 68, 173, 180, 206–24 Gibbs, James 88, 99, 100 gifts 181, 211 Gilpin, William 120, 128 Gorove, István 147, 159 gothic 2, 7, 44, 74, 75, 77, 79, 101, 113, 116, 122 Grand Tour British travellers 1, 6, 19, 22–6, 43, 63, 171, 178, 207 collecting on 1, 3, 6, 7, 8, 10, 23, 31–6, 37, 73, 77, 206

overseas travellers 10, 11, 106–26, 145–67 taste and 5, 24, 26, 29, 46, 55, 64, 75–6, 80, 81, 108, 117–21, 150, 153, 157, 160–3 Greenwich Palace 179, 195, 196, 198–9 grooms 13, 172, 174, 177 Grove House, Kensington 169, 179, 181, 182 guidebooks and travel guides 4, 33, 36, 38, 46, 63, 79, 88, 96, 107, 113, 118, 119, 121, 127–44, 151, 160 hackneymen 179, 192, 198, 201 Hagaparken, Stockholm 47–51 Hagley 43, 136, Halde, Jean Baptiste du 63, 72, 74 Ham House 64, 67, 78 Hamilton, Sir William 8, 23, 25, 35, 52, 53, 55 Hampton Court 71, 107, 110, 113, 119–20, 121, 195 Hanbury, William 4, 5, 10, 86–105 Hardwick Hall 5, 188, 190, 191, 191–3, 196, 199, 200 Hercules 45, 52 Hervey, Frederick, Earl of Bristol 8, 9–10, 13, 19–41, 43 Hoare, Henry II 1, 43, 46, 47, 53, 55, 73, 75 Hobart, Sir John 97, 102 Holkam Hall 4, 6, 7–8, 46, 135, 136, 140 Hood, Admiral Samuel (husband of Mary Mackenzie) 207 horses 12, 13, 89, 180, 190, 193, 197, 201 buying 169, 171–2, 175, 176 coach horses 174–5, 192, 198–9 hiring 90–2, 179, 190, 192, 198 horsemanship 175, 189 riding horses 175, 190 see also coaches and carriages; provender/fodder; saddles and harnesses Houghton Hall 4, 5, 88, 99, 100, 102, 134, 135, 138, 139



245

Index

house building 19, 23–31, 101, 109 Hungary Reform Movement 150, 156 Revolution (1848) 147, 150, 154, 156, 162 tourism to Britain 145–67 hunting 154, 208, 220 Ickworth House 21, 29–31, 33, 35, 36 identity national 29, 65, 107, 122, 131 social 11, 107, 130 India goods 9, 11, 14, 64, 68–9, 70, 71, 77, 87, 208–9, 211–14, 216, 219–20 travel to and from 11, 207–11, 215, 217–18 see also East India Company inns 13, 72, 89–94, 178, 181–2, 190, 194, 199, 200, 201 see also private lodgings Ireland 19–41, 97, 140, 158, 159 Irish Volunteers 28, 29, 30 Italy architectural influence 26, 28, 51–4, 64–5 artists and goods 31, 32, 37, 72, 75, 78, 180, 206 destination for tourists 5, 6, 22–3, 49, 55, 63–4, 75, 87, 107 see also Florence; Milan; Naples; Rome; Venice japanned furniture 8, 173, 212, 216 Jesuit order 64, 71 Jones, Inigo 11, 97, 100, 196 Jones, Thomas 25, 34 journals published 65, 68, 87, 149–50 travel 25, 86–91, 110, 127, 139, 148, 150, 157, 158 journeys practicalities 12–13, 88, 92, 93, 171–2, 178, 179, 183, 189–94

as tours 79, 89, 90, 102, 140, 145, 148–9, 151, 156, 157, 159 Károlyi, Count György 11, 159–60, 163 Kedleston Hall 35, 134, 140, 152 Kelmarsh Hall 11, 86, 87–8, 99–100 Kenilworth Castle 11, 111, 116, 117, 158, 159 Kensington Palace 71, 110–11, 117 Kent, William 5, 46 Kew Palace and gardens 49, 64, 72, 79, 110–11, 117 Kiveton 136, 137, 140 Kong Fuzi see Confucius Lambelet, Henry 80, 81 landscape garden see English gardens paintings 6, 34, 66 Lawrence, Thomas 207, 212, 214, 219 Leasowes 43, 143 Leicester 90, 190, 191, 192 Leigh, Edward (5th Baron) 169, 173, 174–5 Leigh, Hon. Mary 169, 173, 174–5, 177, 178–9, 181–2 Leigh, Thomas (4th Baron) 169, 176 letters consumers writing 180–1 from readers of guides 131–2, 159 of recommendation 117–18 from travellers 14, 19, 22, 52, 86–7, 88, 90, 93, 98, 100, 101–2, 154, 206, 208–9, 211, 212, 213, 214, 216, 217, 220 Littleton, Edward, Lord Hatherton 154, 156 livery (for servants) 13, 170–1, 176–7, 199 lodgings see inns London agents in 181, 197, 199, 200 houses/palaces 3, 11, 107, 109–11, 115–17, 119, 133, 149, 152, 156, 172 newspapers and journals 136, 137, 139 river barge 195, 197

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London (cont.) shops, auctions and craftsmen 13, 37, 64, 77, 168, 173, 174, 177, 180–2, 183, 195, 212, 214 transport within 179, 181–2, 197–200 travel to and from 189–94 Longleat 4, 88, 97, 98, 99 Lorrain, Claude 6, 64, 73, 74, 136 Louvre 22, 108 Lybbe Powys, Mrs Philip 6–7, 153 Mackenzie, Mary, Lady Hood 12, 14, 206–24 Madras 9, 206, 210, 212, 215, 217, 218, 220 Maratta, Carlo 73 Martini, Martino 65, 67 Mary II, Queen 68, 69, 71 Middleton Park 155–6 Milan 23, 30, 31, 52 mobility 3, 170, 177–8, 182 Montanus, Arnoldus 65, 71 More, Jacob 31, 34, 55 museolisation 106, 117–21, 122 nabob 7, 9, 11, 207 Nagycenk, Hungary 152, 158 Naples 6, 8, 23, 34, 35, 53, 206 Napoleonic Wars 148, 149, 150 Narford Hall 97, 138, 139 neoclassical see classical and neo-classical Netherlands 55, 106, 108 Newdigate, Sir Roger 1, 7, 8, 13, 169, 170–8, 180 Newdigate, Sophia 1, 4, 7 Newmarket 156, 157 Nieuhof, Johan 63, 65, 66, 67, 69, 72 Nonsuch 5, 195, 198 Nostell Priory 64, 78 Nottingham 86, 92, 97, 190, 191 Nuneham Courtney 153, 157 Ogilby, John 65, 68 Okeover 145, 138 Ovid 35, 36, 45, 46, 52 Oxford 86, 90, 178, 180

packaging of goods 180, 182–3 hampers for 181–2 Paine, James, the elder 75, 77 Painshill 43, 49, 152, 153 paintings catalogues of 32, 33 see also portraits collections of 1, 3, 4, 6, 7, 8, 34, 72, 74, 96, 97, 111, 121, 127, 206, 214 critical assessment of 10, 128, 129–39 purchasing 14, 34, 196 see also portraits Palladian/Palladianism 5, 6, 10, 11, 28, 36, 43, 74, 99, 100, 112, 122, 196 Palladio, Andrea 5, 6, 29, 36, 74, 98, 100 Pantheon, Rome 8, 9, 29, 35, 36, 44, 45–6, 49, 51–2, 74 Paris 87, 108, 149 patriotism 28, 30, 146 Pavlovsk, Russia 49, 55 Petworth 64, 69, 70 pictures see paintings picturesque 6, 11, 73, 78–80, 113, 116–17, 129, 137, 158, 159 Piranesi, Giovanni Battista 64, 78 pleasure trip 92, 108–9, 121 politics 19, 20, 23, 24, 28–9, 30, 53, 54, 71, 131, 147, 156, 169, 195–6, 213 Pope, Alexander 45, 153 Pope Clement XIV 24, 35 porters 181 portraits 75, 107, 127, 133, 207, 212, 215, 219 see also paintings postilions 172, 176, 177 Poussin, Nicolas 64, 73 private lodgings 4, 93, 181 provender/fodder 170, 171, 189, 192, 197–8, 199, 201 hay 90, 176 oats 172, 176 Purefoy, Elizabeth 174, 179, 180–1 Purefoy, Henry 174, 175–6, 180–1, 182

Raynham Hall 4, 99, 100, 139 Rezzonico, Count Carlo Gastone della Torre di 42, 51, 54, 55 Richmond Palace 110, 111, 115, 117 roads 1, 88, 92, 190 Roman frescos 24, 25, 26, 27, 36 romanticism 11, 54, 116–17, 121, 122, 158–60 Rome 6, 8, 9, 13, 19, 22, 23, 24–5, 29, 30–1, 34, 35–7, 42–6, 51–2, 54, 78, 81, 87, 108 rotunda 29, 30, 36, 44, 45, 46 Royal Pavilion, Brighton 80 Rutland, 5th Earl of 192, 193, 194, 195, 197, 198 saddles and harnesses 13, 173, 174–5, 180, 190 Sándor, István 148, 149 sash window 11, 160, 163 Scattergood, John 86–105 Scotland 12, 89, 90, 206–24 Highlands 159, 160 Scott, Sir Walter 116, 158 sculpture 1, 8, 35–6, 42, 72, 131, 133–4 servants house guides 4, 94, 118 on journeys 13, 90, 92–3, 168, 176, 177, 189–99, 201 see also coachman; grooms; postilions Settle, Elkanah 67, 68, 69 Shakespeare, William 68, 116 Shanahan, Michael 23, 28 Shugborough 64, 72, 73, 77, 79 Soane, John 24, 26, 27, 36 social visiting 4, 179 Solms, Amalia van 71 Southsea Castle 110, 179 spying 23, 151 Sri Lanka [Ceylon] 210, 217, 219 St James’s Palace 110, 111, 117, 195 stabling 13, 191, 193, 195, 199–200

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statues in gardens 43–6, 49, 51, 52, 94, 113, 153 in houses 7, 8, 34, 35, 94, 214 Stoneleigh Abbey 169, 177, 181 Stourhead 4, 11, 42–63, 64, 73, 74, 77, 79 Stourton 1, 43, 44 Stowe House 4, 7, 11, 72, 96, 152–3 Stuart, James ‘Athenian’ 25, 73 Széchényi, Count Ferenc 147, 149, 151, 152–3 Széchenyi, Count István 11, 150, 156–8, 159, 163–4 Szemere, Bertalan 147, 159 taste critiques and alternatives 8, 9, 12, 25, 64, 68–9, 71, 75–6, 131, 133, 153 travel 3, 5, 6, 7, 11, 21, 52, 63, 88, 113, 122, 150, 157 tax 172 technology 97, 99, 152 Temple Newsam 134–5, 138 Thames (river) 195, 197, 201 Tivoli 28, 35, 46 tolls 13, 169, 170, 178, 179, 183 Tóth, Lőrinc 147, 159 Tottenham Park 10, 88, 98, 100 tours, domestic 1, 29, 49, 86–105, 127–33, 172, 178, 215, 217 see also Grand Tour; journeys Tower of London 110, 111, 115–16, 117, 119, 121 transport goods 170, 171–2, 180–3, 193–4 groceries 181–2, 183 people 178–80, 194–5 shipping 13, 212, 214 travel guide see guidebooks; journals Triclinium 24, 26, 36 Uppark 64, 74, 75, 77 Vanbrugh, Sir John 151, 157 Vay, Baron Miklós 149, 151

248

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Venice 6, 23, 78, 108 Vernet, Claude-Joseph 75, 136 Versailles 45, 49, 54, 108, 149 Versailles Diana 45, 49 villas Capra la Rotunda 29, 36 Lucullus 26, 51, 52 Negroni 24, 25, 27, 36 Virgil 42, 45, 46, 74, 87 wages 170–1, 178, 189 Walpole, Horace 10, 43, 45, 51, 54, 127–8, 134 Walpole, Robert 5, 99, 102 Wanstead House 136, 152 Warwick Castle 11, 111, 117, 118, 119, 158 water engines 98, 100, 101

in gardens 44–5 supply 11, 44, 98–9, 100 Wellesley, Arthur, 1st Duke of Wellington 154, 155 Wesselényi, Baron Miklós 147, 150–1, 157 Westminster Hall 111, 117, 194 Whitehall Banqueting House 110, 196 Palace 11, 110, 111, 117, 195 William III, King 68, 71, 106, 107, 110 Wilton House 4, 42, 49, 88, 96, 97, 98, 100, 111, 117, 119, 132, 134 Windsor Castle 107, 110, 111, 112, 117, 118, 119, 121, 155, 158–9 Woburn Abbey 43, 72, 140, 156 Wollaton Hall 153, 165 Wörlitz, Germany 47–51, 53 Young, Arthur 6, 10, 127–44