DEER-PARKS.
There is nothing in England at the present day much more distinctly an institution of that country than its deer-parks. Although it seems probable that the Saxons had some sort of enclosed or partially enclosed chases where deer were hunted or taken in the toils, the regular and systematic enclosure of parks would appear to have come in with the Normans. According to the old Norman law, no subject could form a park without a grant from the Crown, or immemorial prescription, which was held presumptive evidence of such a grant.
On the Continent there would appear to have been much more strictness in this respect than in England. "In April, 1656," says Reresby in his travels, "I returned to Saumur, where I stayed two months: then I went to Thouars in Brittany, where the duke of Trémouille hath his best house. Thouars is looked upon as one of the best manors in all France, not so much for profit (a great extent of land there sometimes affording not much rent), but for greatness of tenure; five hundred gentlemen, it is said, holding their lands from it. Going to wait on the duke, I found him very kind when I told him my country, the late earl of Derby having married his sister.[1] He commanded me to dine with him, and the next time mounted me upon one of his horses to wait on him a-hunting in his park, which, not being two miles about, I thought of little compass to belong to so great a person, till I found that few are allowed to have any there save the princes of the blood. So true is it that there are more parks in England than in all Europe besides."
A large park would appear to have been among the many luxuries of the princely Medici, for Reresby says: "Ten miles from Florence the duke hath another country-house, nothing so considerable in itself as in its situation, standing betwixt several hills on one side, covered with vines and olive trees, and a valley divided into many walks by rows of trees leading different ways: one leads to a park where the great duke hath made a paddock course by the direction of Signior Bernard Gascoigne, an Italian, who, having served our late king in his wars, carried the pattern from England. Near to this house, Poggio-Achaiano, is another park, the largest in Italy, or rather chase, said to be thirty miles in compass."
Foremost amongst English parks is Windsor. The immense tracts by which Windsor was formerly surrounded consisted of park and forest. Windsor Forest has gradually diminished in size. In the time of Charles I. it contained twelve parishes, and probably covered not less than 100,000 acres. According to a survey in 1789-92, it amounted to 59,600 acres, of which the enclosed property of the Crown amounted to 5454. Like all the other forests in England, it has been much encroached on, and now consists of only some 1450 acres adjoining Windsor Great Park. The rest of the land formerly composing it has been sold or leased. Enough of the forest remains, in conjunction with the park, to enable the visitor to make many delightful excursions. The most agreeable way of seeing this sylvan country is on horseback. Perhaps nowhere in the world can one get a more delicious canter. By a little management it is easy to take a ride of twenty-five miles without more than a couple of miles off the turf. In 1607 the Great Park was stated at 3650 acres: it consists now of about one thousand acres less.
The principal royal park in modern days, next to Windsor, is Richmond. This covers more than two thousand acres, and, thanks to the railway, may almost be regarded as a lung of London, being only eight miles distant from the city. Richmond Park is as replete as Windsor with historical association, and came into especial importance in the reign of Charles I. That king, who was excessively addicted to the sports of the field, had a strong desire to make a great park, for red as well as fallow deer, between Richmond and Hampton Court, where he had large wastes of his own, and great parcels of wood, which made it very fit for the use he designed it for; but as some parishes had rights of commonage in the wastes, and many gentlemen and farmers had good houses and farms intermingled with them which they had inherited or held on lease, and as, without including all these, the park would not be large enough for Charles's satisfaction, the king, who was willing to pay a very high price, expected people to gratify him by parting with their property. Many did so, but—like the blacksmith of Brighton who utterly refused to be bought out when George IV. was building his hideous pavilion, and the famous miller of Potsdam, that Mordecai at the gate of Sans Souci—"a gentleman who had the best estate, with a convenient house and gardens, would by no means part with it, and made a great noise as if the king would take away men's estates at his own pleasure." The case of this gentleman and his many minor adherents soon caused a regular row. The lord treasurer, Juxon, bishop of London, who accompanied Charles to the scaffold, and other ministers were very averse to the scheme, not only on account of the hostile feeling it had evoked, but because the purchase of the land and making a brick wall of ten miles around it, which was what the king wanted, was a great deal too costly for his depleted exchequer. However, Charles, with his usual fatal obstinacy, would not hear of abandoning the scheme, and told Lord Cottington, who did his utmost to dissuade him from it, "he was resolved to go through with it, and had already caused brick to be burned and much of the wall to be built." This beginning of the wall before people consented to part with their land or common rights, increased the public feeling on the subject, and, happening at a time when public opinion was growing strongly against arbitrary rule, was no doubt one of the circumstances which contributed to Charles's fall.
George II. and Queen Caroline lived much at Richmond, and the interview between Jeanie Deans and Her Majesty took place here. Jeanie, it will be remembered, told her ducal friend that she thought the park would be "a braw place for the cows"—a sentiment similar to that of Mr. Black's Highland heroine, Sheila, who pronounced it "a beautiful ground for sheep."
The practice of hunting deer in a park, now quite a thing of the past, appears to have been very prevalent at Richmond during this reign, and apparently was attended with considerable risk. In a chronicle of 1731 we read:
"August 13, 1731. The royal family hunted a stag in Richmond new park: in the midst of the sport, Sir Robert Walpole's horse fell with him just before the queen's chaise, but he was soon remounted, and Her Majesty ordered him to bleed by way of precaution.