APPENDIX TO CHAPTER VI
My brother and I have here added a few recollections of our old home.
A. R.
Pembroke Lodge, an old-fashioned house, long and low, surrounded by thickly wooded grounds, stood on the ridge of the hill in Richmond Park overlooking the Thames Valley and a wide plain beyond. It was approached by a drive between ancient oaks, limes, and evergreens, and at the entrance was a two-roomed thatched cottage, long occupied by a hearty old couple employed on the place, so careful and watchful that an amusing incident occurred one day when our father and mother were away from home. A lady and gentleman who were walking in the Park called at the Lodge, and asked for permission to walk through the grounds. The old lodge-keeper refused, saying she could not give access to strangers during the absence of the family. The lady then told her they were friends of Lord and Lady John, but still the old guardian of the place remained suspicious and obdurate; till, to her surprise and discomfiture, it came out that the visitors to whom she had so sturdily refused admission were no other than Queen Victoria and Prince Albert walking incognito in the Park.
Just outside the Lodge the Crystal Palace on the height of Sydenham could be seen glittering in the rays of the setting sun. In front of the house, eastward, were two magnificent poplars, one 100 feet, the other about 96 feet high, rich and ample in foliage, and most delicately expressive of every kind of wind and weather. They could be seen with a telescope from Hindhead, about thirty miles south-west. Grand old oaks, of seven hundred to a thousand years, grew near the house and made plentiful shade; southwards the grass under them was scarcely visible in May for the glorious carpet of wild hyacinths, all blue and purple in the chequered sunlight. Nearly every oak had its name and place in the affection of young minds. There were also many fine beech-trees in the grounds. On the western slopes were masses of primroses and violets, also wild strawberries. West and south, down the hill, was a wilderness, the delight of children, untended and unspoiled, where birds of many kinds built their nests, where squirrels, rabbits, hedgehogs, weasels, snakes, wood-pigeons, turtle-doves, owls, and other life of the woods had never been driven out, and where visitors hardly ever cared to penetrate. Outside, in Petersham Park, was a picturesque thatched byre where the cows were milked. Petersham Park was then quiet and secluded, before the time came for its invasion by London school treats.
East of the house was a long lawn, secluded from the open Park by a beautiful, wildly growing hedge of gorse, berberis, bramble, hawthorn, and wild roses. Further north was a bowling-green, surrounded by hollies, laburnums, lilacs, rhododendrons, and forest trees; at one end was a rose-trellis and a raised flower garden. The effect of this bright flower garden with its setting of green foliage and flowering shrubs, and majestic old trees surrounding the whole, was very beautiful. At one end, shaded by two cryptomereas, planted by our father--said by Sir Joseph Hooker to be among the finest in England--was a long verandah where our mother often sat in summer with her basket of books, and in winter spread oatmeal for the birds, which grew very tame and would eat out of her hand. Close by was a picturesque old thatched summer-house, covered with roses; on each side were glades of chestnut, hornbeam, and lime trees, and looking westward Windsor Castle could be seen on the far horizon.
Near the house was a noble cedar, with one particularly fine bough under the shade of which the Petersham School children and the "Old Scholars" had their tea on festive occasions, followed by merry games in the grounds. The view from the house and the West walk, and also from King Henry's Mount, was most beautiful, especially in the spring and autumn, with the varied and harmonious tints of the wooded foreground fading away into the soft blue distance.
It was a glorious Park to live in. The great oaks, the hawthorns, the tall dense bracken, the wide expanses of grass, the herds of red and fallow deer, not always undisturbed, made it a paradise for young people. The boys delighted in the large ponds, full of old carp and tench, with dace and roach, perch, gudgeons, eels, tadpoles, sticklebacks, and curious creatures of the weedy bottom. There was the best of riding over the smooth grass in the open sunny expanses or among the quiet and shady glades. Combe Wood, a little south of the Park, was then an island of pure country, quite unfrequented, and an occasional day there was a treat for all.