Paul Hentzner writes of the sixteenth century garden of Theobalds, the seat of Lord Treasurer Burleigh—“There was a summer house, in the lower part of which, built semicircularly, are the twelve Roman emperors in white marble and a table of touchstone (alabaster) the upper part is set around with cisterns of lead into which the water is conveyed by pipes so that fish may be kept in them, and in summer time they are very convenient for bathing.”
At St. Fagan’s, near Cardiff, in front of the house is a remarkable lead tank; it is octagonal, ten feet across and nearly four feet high; it is ornamented round the sides with flowers, and shields in panels, and is dated 1620.
At Syon House there is a fountain in which a lead figure forms the jet d’eau.
At Wooton in Staffordshire there is a fountain basin with a lead duck so suspended as to float on the water spouting water from its bill. The Swan which seemed to float on the water described by Borrow in Lavengro must have been of lead. At Sprotborough in Yorkshire are some lead toads about nine inches long, which also seem to have belonged to a fountain.
Some of the figures mentioned before stand in the centre of basins, and occasionally simple groups, as of Neptune in a two-horsed chariot, may be found, but we have nothing in England to compare to the great fountain compositions of the Versailles Gardens or to the fountain called Le Buffet in the Trianon Park, designed by Mansard, and profusely decorated by the gilt lead sculptures of Van Clève and other artists.
In Germany some of the earlier town fountains are of lead.
§ XVI. OF VASES AND GATE PIERS.
The [vases] at Hampton Court mentioned above are particularly fine in design and well modelled; their height is about 2.3 and the little sitting [figures], slight as they are, are charming in their pose; the folded arms and prettily arranged hair give us a suggestion of life which most of these things supposed to be in the classic taste lack. The inventory taken by the Commission at Hampton Court mentions “Fower large flower potts of lead.” Similar vases are in the gardens at Windsor, also larger and later examples with figure plaques in Flaxman’s manner. At Castle Hill, North Devon, there are ten [vases], some with mouldings and gadroons formed in repoussé, others cast.
At Melbourne in Derbyshire there is an enormous vase some seven or eight feet high in a very rococo style.[29] There is one at Penshurst, which comes from Old Leicester House in London; and at Sprotborough are others of similar design. These vases will not bear comparison with the beautiful lead Gothic fonts before given.