The Mole justifies its name in seeming shyer than the Wey, keeping clearer of towns, and being not made familiar to wayfarers by a tow-path. Much of its stealthy course, indeed, is imprisoned in private grounds, whose owners may be jealous of angling rights; the Mole has even been chained and brought into law courts. In following it upwards, we must often be content to keep near its bed, sometimes only to be stuck to by ordeals upon muddy banks, in thorny gaps, over barbed wire fences, or in face of threatening notices to trespassers; and even the footpaths that lead from church to church, or cut off angles of high-roads, are seldom so far left to themselves as to follow the windings of this vagrant river.
If, like the author of “The Farmer’s Boy,” he would spend—
One dear delicious day
On thy wild banks, romantic Mole—
I do not advise my reader to track the river from its mouth through East Molesey, though the police station here stands near such an Arcadian feature as a ford across the eastern branch. But behind the Hurst Park racecourse, opposite Hampton, he may take a road by West Molesey Church, that, straggling off southwards, soon ends in a fairly straight footpath, a mile on touching the left bank of the Mole at its old paper-mills. So far the path may seem not very attractive unless to lovers or philosophers; but beyond the railway it is enlivened by a prospect of the grounds of Esher Place on the farther bank. The gateway of ivied brick, so conspicuous here, is known as “Wolsey’s Tower,” a sturdy remnant of the Episcopal residence to which that proud Cardinal retreated after his disgrace, but found himself so unwell, perhaps from the dampness of an abode near the river, where “he wanted even the most ordinary parts of household stuff,” that he got leave to remove to Richmond for a time before being sent northward by the unrelenting king. The modern mansion has been built higher up, out of the way of floods and footpath starers.
Behind Esher Place is Sandown racecourse, which also has memories of ecclesiastical state and of the transitoriness of worldly things that might serve as a text to its pleasure-seeking frequenters, if they cared for texts “worth following.” This was once the seat of a Priory and Hospital, whose brethren were all swept away by the Black Death, and every trace of its buildings has long disappeared. By its enclosure ascends the high-road, passing near Esher station, almost a mile away from Esher; but that seems close proximity in this part of the county, where some places lie twice as far from the stations deceivingly named after them for want of a nearer title.
From the river bank let us turn up into Esher, on the high ground above it. If this be styled a village, it is a village of much dignity, beset by mansions and villas, and looking conscious of courtly patronage, for at the farther end it has the park of Claremont, residence of more than one royal family, and now occupied by the widowed Duchess of Albany. Here died the lamented Princess Charlotte, whose husband afterwards became the first king of the Belgians. Here ended the eventful life of Louis Philippe. In the Church, that raises its graceful spire beside the cross-road leading up from the river, there is a monument to King Leopold, also a bust of the late Duke of Albany. The old church, by the main road, was disused more than half a century ago; and the graveyard of the new one has had time to gather a good show of memorials, among them the tomb with recumbent effigies erected for himself in his lifetime by Lord Esher, Master of the Rolls. Samuel Warren, author of Ten Thousand a Year, is also buried here, as may be seen by any cycling Tittlebat Titmouse. The sisters Jane and Maria Porter lived for a time at Esher, as did William and Mary Howitt.
But the literary fame of Esher should rest on its identification with the Highbury of Jane Austen’s Emma, a matter which I am prepared to prove against those inconsiderate and presumptuous theorists who vainly put forward Leatherhead for such honour. The only scrap of evidence they have is the occurrence of the name “Randalls Park” near Leatherhead. It is a note of this beloved author—caviare as she may be to the general—that she did not put herself out of the way in christening her characters and scenes. Some of the names in Emma seem to have been suggested to her by tombstones opposite her seat in Chawton Church. At Esher Weston Green may well have prompted her “Mr. Weston”; and Weylands would easily become “Hartlands.” It might be thought far-fetched to connect Sandown with “Donwell Abbey,” if one did not know that there is a well of old note beside the racecourse, and that Sandown was originally a priory. Now for more positive marks of identity. “Highbury” is in Surrey, and on a hill. The description of the Donwell grounds (chap, xlii.) exactly fits the banks of the Mole, which lies a Georgian lady’s “twenty minutes’ walk” below the place. This is introduced as being a large village, almost a small town. The market town (iv.) is Kingston; and Cobham is spoken of as within a walk. It is sixteen miles from London (passim), where Frank Churchill rode to get his hair cut; nine miles from Richmond (xxxvii.); and seven miles from Box Hill (xliii.). The only one of these distances that does not quite suit Esher is the last; but then the mileage would no doubt be minimised to soothe Mr. Woodhouse’s fidgety concern for his horses; and who can say that they were not to be put up at the “Running Horse” of Mickleham, a mile or two short of the scene which Mrs. Elton desired to explore? But Box Hill is only three miles from Leatherhead; and if Frank Churchill sojourned there, he could surely have had his hair cut at Dorking, where, for all we know, Mr. Stiggins’s grandfather carried on a barber’s business in the High Street. By this demonstration, I claim to have for ever settled a controversy that has vexed generations of painful students, and seems to me too lightly passed over in Mr. W. H. Pollock’s book on the “immortal Jane.”
Had Miss Burney been the author of Emma, she would no doubt have made loyal mention of Claremont. This is a house with a history, even before it became a royal demesne. It was originally built by Sir John Vanbrugh, that playwright and architect of Queen Anne’s reign, who had such an unkind epitaph—
Lie heavy on him, earth, for he
Laid many a heavy load on thee!
He sold the place to the Earl of Clare, from whom came the name Claremont. The improvements begun under this peer were carried out on a larger scale by the famous Lord Clive, who rebuilt the house and had the grounds laid out by “Capability Brown” at enormous expense. Macaulay tells us how Surrey peasants whispered that the wicked lord had the walls made so thick to keep himself from being carried away by the devil; and Clive’s unhappy death would not go to silence such rumours. After passing through the hands of successive owners, this classical mansion was bought by the Crown about a century ago, and has served, as we saw, to house royal and princely families.