The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. Volume 19, No. 533, February 11, 1832

This has been described as perhaps the most striking imitation we have of the great works of nature: at all events, it has less of the mimicry of art than similar works on a smaller scale.
Virginia Water will be recollected as the largest sheet of artificial water in the kingdom, with the exception of that at Blenheim. Near the high Southampton road it forms the above cascade, descending into a glen romantically shaded with plantations of birch, willow, and acacia:
Hollowly here the gushing water sounds
With a mysterious voice; one might pause
Upon its echoes till it seemeth a noise
Of fathomless wilds where man had never walked.
Or it may be described in the graphic words of Thomson:
With woods o'erhung, and shagg'd with mossy rocks,
Whence on each side the gushing waters play,
And down the rough cascade white dashing fall,