With the World's Great Travellers, Volume 3

by Unknown

Whatever the age possessed of skill and merit in every branch of art was employed for the beautification of the new Chatsworth. Caius Gabriel Cibber, the Laureate’s father, with Geeraerslius, Augustine Harris, Nost, Davis, Lanseroon, Nadauld, and others, carved the friezes, adorned with rich foliage the door-cases, worked upon many vases and other objects in and about the mansion, and peopled the gardens with nymphs and goddesses. Cibber himself has left notes of some of the sums he received, and it appears that he executed two statues in the pediments, others, both in the round and in relief, heads of Roman emperors, figures of dogs, sphinxes, and such-like. “For two statues as big as life, I had 35l. apiece, and all charges borne, and at this rate I shall endeavor to serve a nobleman in freestone.”

[Many others might be named who helped to give Chatsworth its wealth of carvings, but we shall omit the catalogue of their names.]

So completed, as a noble Palladian quadrangle, divided externally into sections by fluted Ionic pilasters, crested by a balustrade which is adorned with decorative vases, and having on its principal front a fine compartment with a sculptured pediment, Chatsworth remained, even then one of the noblest mansions of its kind in the kingdom, until the sixth Duke of Devonshire (ob. 1858) added to it the great northern wing, containing the magnificent dining-room, the sculpture-gallery, the orangery, and many other chambers, as well as a whole range of offices in the basement. Of this wing, which is three hundred and eighty-five feet in length, Sir Jeffrey Wyattville was the architect, and it will be observed that he has adopted a more broken style, and a somewhat more picturesque method, than that of Talmari, but there are many who think that his addition detracts from the classic character and fitting symmetry of the whole, to which, nevertheless, it must be admitted it gives a greater aspect of grandeur and magnificence.

We shall not here dwell at any very great length upon the many treasures of which Chatsworth is the storehouse, for they are described after the manner of a catalogue in several guide-books. Passing from the Porter’s lodge, the visitor, having traversed the whole length of the new wing, arrives at the quadrangle, which is entered through the sub-hall, where the ceiling is painted with a copy of Guido’s Aurora.

A corridor leads thence to the Great Hall, on the eastern side of the court-yard, which is a very impressive apartment, with its floor of black and white marble, laid down by the son of Watson, the wood-carver, the fine staircase at its farther end, its walls painted by Verrio and Laguerre with scenes from the life of Julius Cæsar,—among others the crossing of the Rubicon, the passage of the Adriatic, and the assassination by Brutus,—and the great scene of Cæsar’s apotheosis on the ceiling, where he goes to join the Immortals. One very noteworthy object in it is the immense slab of Derbyshire encrinitic marble that forms the top of its table. It also contains a great Turkish canoe which the sultan gave to the sixth Duke.

The south corridor, hung with pictures, leads from this hall to the Chapel, one of the most interesting chambers in Chatsworth. Here everything that art could do to lend enchantment to the classic interior has been done. The lower walls are richly panelled with fragrant cedar; above, Verrio and Laguerre have depicted the miracles of our Lord; and on the ceiling is the “Ascension;” over the altar Verrio’s “Incredulity of St. Thomas” is regarded as his masterpiece, though the work has been attributed to Laguerre; the baldacchino at the east end is of the choicest marbles and spars of Derbyshire, with figures of Faith and Hope by Gibber; and there are marvellous wood-carvings, probably by Samuel Watson and Thomas Young, but perhaps from the designs or with the assistance of Grinling Gibbons. Passing onward, the Gallery of Sketches is a place where not hours only, but days, might be spent with equal pleasure and profit, a treasure-chamber in which, as it were, the great masters of every school may be seen at their very work....

Entering the state apartments by the dressing-room, with its painted ceiling of the “Mission of Mercury to Paris,” its carved marble door-cases, and its tours de force in wood, by Gibbons or Watson, as the case may be, we notice the great vista through the open doors of the suite and pass on into the state bedroom. Here Aurora chases Night on the ceiling; we notice the fine embossed leather on the walls, the canopy embroidered, it is said, by “Bess of Hardwick,” the coronation chairs of George III. and Queen Charlotte, with their footstools, the wardrobe of Louis XVI., and much else. Next we come to the state music-room, which has similar decorations, and a strangely deceptive painting, attributed to Verrio, of a violin on its door. From this we enter the state drawing-room, where Phaeton drives the horses of the sun above us, where the walls are hung with Gobelin tapestry after the cartoons of Raffaelle, and where, in the malachite table and other fittings, there is much to attract the attention. In the state dining-room, which is the last of the suite, Verrio has depicted upon the ceiling, in his best manner, the “Fates cutting the Thread of Life.” In this luxurious chamber it is hard to think the wood-carving can be by any other than Gibbons, if we regard his characteristic manner; but whoever he may have been, the skilful craftsman has surpassed himself in giving the very touch of nature to these marvellous representations of flowers, fruit, birds, and shells....

Passing into the new wing through the dining-room (rarely shown), which is a grand chamber, simple in its style, but having a coved ceiling of white and gold, and adorned with rare marbles and splendid furniture, including tables of hornblende, porphyritic syenite, and Siberian jasper, hung with family portraits, and having sculptures by Westmacott, and others, we enter the sculpture-gallery, which is so well known that we need in this article only say that it contains works by Canova, Thorwaldsen, Schadow, Gibson, Wyatt, Westmacott, and several foreign artists. Attention is here drawn to a magnificent vase of the Blue John spar, which is said to be the largest in existence. Having then passed through the orangery, which is filled with sweet-scented blossoms or rich in ripening fruit, we leave the house and enter the gardens.

These stand high among the attractions of Chatsworth, and with their varied character of the natural and the artificial, their terraces and walks, their gay parterres, their fine trees, their fountains and rocks, their great conservatory, and their many other houses stored with choicest exotics, they are certainly among the finest gardens in England.

Few things can be more pleasant, having passed through the luxurious chambers, than to linger in these sweet-scented pathways, which are bordered by rich clusterings of flowers, to listen to the music of the waterfalls, and to see the dark-green trees, and the white-limbed nymphs, reflected in the pellucid basins. We pass down a short flight of steps, between dancing-girls after Canova, and vases of Elfdalen porphyry, and then proceeding through the French gardens, where the pathways are separated from the bright flower-beds by delicate creepers turning about lofty pedestals supporting busts and vases, we reach the great cascade, which pours from a stone water-temple, and rolls foaming down its long flight of formal descents below, to where, amid the rugged rocks at the bottom, it disappears underground.