When the ladies had retired to dress, Sir Gore and Lord Strangford told us many anecdotes of the East—a theme of which I never tire. Both these gentlemen are great partisans of the Turks, and Lord Strangford spoke of the Sultan as a very enlightened man. He was probably, he said, the first ambassador from any Christian power who had had several private conferences with the Grand Signior. At these a singular etiquette was observed: the Sultan received him in the garden of the Seraglio, in the dress of an officer of his body-guard, and in that character always addressed Lord Strangford with the greatest deference in the third person; Lord Strangford did not venture to let it appear that he recognized him. He declared that the Sultan was better informed about Russia than a great many European politicians, and knew perfectly well what he was undertaking.[72]
After dinner, at which we had some Oriental dishes, and I drank genuine Schiraz for the first time in my life, (no very pleasant wine, by the by, for it tastes of the goat-skins,) we had music again, and ‘des petits jeux.’ As these latter were not remarkably successful, the whole party went to bed in good time.
December 12th.
I have bought a coal-black horse, a thing as wild as a roe, of my host’s Arab breed; and to give him a longer trial, we rode over to pay a visit to Lady Cowper, who lives in the neighbourhood. The park and house of Pansanger are well worth seeing, especially the picture-gallery, which contains two of Raphael’s early Madonnas; and a singularly fine portrait of Marshal Turenne on horseback, by Rembrandt. Lady Cowper received us in her boudoir, which led immediately into a beautiful garden, even now gay with flowers, on the other side of which are green-houses, and a dairy in the form of a temple.
Pansanger is celebrated for the largest oak in England. It is nineteen feet and a half in circumference six feet from the ground, and is at the same time very straight and lofty, though its branches reach to a great extent on all sides. We have larger oaks than this in Germany.
To reconnoitre the country still more fully, we afterwards made a second visit to Hatfield, which I viewed more accurately.
The whole house, including kitchen and wash-house, is heated by one steam-engine. The Dowager Marchioness, the most active woman in England of her age, did the honours herself, and led us about into every hole and corner. The chapel contains some admirable old painted glass,—buried in Cromwell’s time, to which it is indebted for its escape when the frantic iconoclasts destroyed all the church windows. In one of the rooms was a fine portrait of Charles the Twelfth,—that ‘Don Quixote en grand,’ who, but for Pultawa, would perhaps have become a second Alexander. In the present stables (formerly the house,) Elizabeth lived a captive during the reign of her sister Mary. The Queen ordered a very lofty pointed chimney, surmounted with an iron rod, to be built on a gable opposite to her sister’s window, and caused it to be insinuated to her that this rod was destined to receive her head. So the Marchioness told us. The chimney is still standing, and is thickly overgrown with ivy; but Elizabeth, to feast on the delightful contrast in after years, when she could contemplate the threatening pinnacle with more agreeable feelings, built the new palace close to it. The house is poor in works of art, and the park rich only in large avenues of oaks and in rocks; otherwise dreary, and without water, except a nasty green standing pool near the house.
December 13th.
In my host’s house is a singular picture gallery,—a Persian one, which contains some very curious things. The portraits of the present Shah, and of his son Abbas, are the most interesting. The yellow dress of the former, covered with precious stones of every kind, and his enormous black beard, form a very characteristic picture of this Son of the Sky and of the Sun. His son, however excels him in beauty of feature; but he is almost too simply dressed, and the pointed sheepskin cap is not becoming. The late Persian ambassador to England completes the trio. He was a very handsome man, and fell into European manners and customs with such ease, that the English speak of him as a perfect Lovelace. On his return home he proved himself nowise ‘discret,’ but compromised several English ladies of rank in a shameful manner.
Some large dressed dolls gave a faithful idea of the fair sex in Persia, with long hair painted red or blue, arched and painted eyebrows, large languishing eyes of fire, pretty gauze pantaloons, and gold rings round the ankles.