The palatial Hall of Trentham, farther to the north, is rather beyond our province, being in the main modern. One grieves that the fine old house represented in Dr. Plot's quaint history of the county has passed away; one grieves, indeed, that so many of these fine Staffordshire houses are no more. The irreparable loss of Ingestre Hall, Wrothesley Hall, Enville Hall, and of Severn End in the adjoining county, makes one shudder at the dangers of fire in these ancestral mansions. Coombe Abbey in Warwickshire was only quite recently saved from a like fate by Lord Craven's activity and presence of mind.
But the old gatehouse of Tixall to the east of Stafford, and Wootton Lodge to the north of Uttoxeter, fortunately still remain intact. The former presents much the same appearance as in Plot's drawing of 1686, but the curious gabled timber mansion beyond has long since disappeared, and the classic building that occupies its site looks hardly in keeping with so perfect an example of Elizabethan architecture. The romantic situation of Wootton Lodge is well described by Howitt. The majestic early-Jacobean mansion (the work of Inigo Jones) has a compactness and dignity quite its own, and there is nothing like it anywhere in England, though more classic, perhaps, than the majority of houses of its period. It has a battlemented roof surmounted by an array of massive chimneys, mullioned windows innumerable, and a graceful flight of steps leading to the ornamental porch. It was not at this stately house that the eccentric Jean Jacques came to bury himself for over a year, but at the Hall, a far less picturesque building. The philosopher and his companion Thérèsa le Vasseur were looked at askance by the country folk; and "old Ross Hall," as they called him, botanising in the secluded lanes in his strange striped robe and grotesque velvet cap with gold tassels and pendant, was a holy terror to the children. It was supposed he was in search of "lost spirits," as indeed was the case, for his melancholia at length led to his departure under the suspicion that there was a plot to poison him.
A bee-line drawn across Staffordshire, say from Bridgnorth in Salop to Haddon in Derbyshire, would intersect some of the most interesting spots. In addition to Wootton and Ingestre, we have Throwley Hall, Croxden and Calwich Abbeys, and Tissington (in Derbyshire) to the north-east (not to mention Alton and Ham), and Boscobel, Whiteladies, Tong, etc., to the south-east.
Of Boscobel and Whiteladies we have dealt with elsewhere too particularly to call for any fresh description here; but not so with the picturesque village of Tong, whose church is certainly the most interesting example of early-Perpendicular architecture in the county. Would that the interiors of our old churches were as carefully preserved as is the case here. There is nothing modern and out of harmony. The rich oak carvings of the screens and choir stalls; the monumental effigies of the Pembrugges, Pierrepoints, Vernons, and Stanleys; the Golden Chapel, or Vernon chantry—all recall nooks and corners in Westminster Abbey. It was Sir Edward Stanley, whose recumbent effigy in plate armour is conspicuous, who married Margaret Vernon, the sister of the runaway heiress of Haddon, and thus inherited Tong Castle, as his brother-in-law did the famous Derbyshire estate.
The early-Tudor castle was demolished in the eighteenth century, when the present Strawberry-Hill Gothic fortress of reddish-coloured stone was erected by a descendant of the Richard Durant whose initials may still be seen on the old house in the Corn Market at Worcester, where Charles II. lodged before the disastrous battle.[28] Unromantic as were Georgian squires, as a rule, the Eastern Gothic architecture of their houses and the fantastic and unnatural grottoes in their grounds show signs of sentimental hankering. At Tong they went one better, for there are traditions of Æolian harps set in the masonry of the farmyard of the castle. The mystic music must indeed have been thrown unto the winds!
But the Moorish-looking mansion, if architecturally somewhat a monstrosity, is nevertheless picturesque, with its domed roofs and pinnacles. A fine collection of pictures was dispersed in 1870, including an interesting portrait of Nell Gwyn, and of Charles I., which has been engraved.
In the older building (which somewhat resembled old Hendlip Hall) was born the famous seventeenth-century beauty, Lady Venetia Digby, née Stanley, of whom Vandyck has left us many portraits, notably the one at Windsor Castle,—an allegorical picture representing the triumph of innocence over calumny, for she certainly was a lady with "a past." The learned and eccentric Sir Kenelm Digby, her husband, endeavoured to preserve her charms by administering curious mixtures, such as viper wine; and this, though it was very well meant, probably ended her career before she was thirty-three. One can scarcely be surprised that at the post-mortem examination they discovered but very little brains; but this her husband attributed to his viper wine getting into her head!
BLACKLADIES.