The gardens[333] occupied about twelve acres and were laid out in gravel walks flanked by a number of fine trees. On passing through the principal entrance, that connected with the manager’s house[334] at the western end of the gardens, the visitor beheld the Grand (or Great) Walk, planted on each side with elms and extending about nine hundred feet, the whole length of the garden, to the eastern boundary fence, beyond which could be seen pleasant meadows with the hay-makers at their task. At the eastern end of this walk there was a gilded statue of Aurora, afterwards (before 1762) replaced by a Grand Gothic Obelisk bearing the inscription Spectator fastidiosus sibi molestus. This latter erection would hardly have borne inspection by daylight, for, like much of the ‘architecture’ of Vauxhall, it consisted merely of a number of boards covered with painted canvas.
Parallel to the Grand Walk was the South Walk with its three triumphal arches through which could be seen a painting of the ruins of Palmyra.
A third avenue, the Grand Cross Walk, also containing a painted representation of ruins, passed through the garden from side to side, intersecting the Grand Walk at right angles. This cross walk was terminated on the right by the Lovers’ (or Druid’s) Walk, and to the left were the Wildernesses and the Rural Downs.
The lofty trees of the Lovers’ Walk formed a verdant canopy in which the nightingales of Spring Gardens, the blackbirds, and the thrushes were wont to build. This was the principal of the Dark Walks so often mentioned in the annals of Vauxhall. In 1759 complaints were made of the loose characters who frequented these walks, and in 1763 Tyers was compelled to rail them off. When Vauxhall opened for the season in 1764 some young fellows, about fifty in number, tore up the railings in order to lay the walks open.
The Rural Downs, at least in the earlier days of Vauxhall, were covered with turf and interspersed with firs, cypresses and cedars. On one of the little eminences was a leaden statue of Milton[335] seated, listening to music, and at night-time the great Bard was illuminated by lamps. Here were also the Musical Bushes where a subterraneous band used to play fairy music till about the middle of the eighteenth century when this romantic entertainment ceased, “the natural damp of the earth being found prejudicial to the instruments.”
The Wildernesses were formed by lofty trees and were (about 1753) the verdant abode of various “feathered minstrels, who in the most delightful season of the year ravish the ears of the company with their harmony.”
The orchestra, open in the front, stood, facing the west, in the centre of what was called The Grove, a quadrangle of about five acres formed by the Grand, Cross, and South Walks and by the remaining side of the garden.
On each side of this quadrangle were the supper-boxes and pavilions, placed in long rows or arranged in a semi-circular sweep. These were decorated, about 1742, with paintings chiefly by Francis Hayman. Hogarth allowed his “Four Times of the Day” to be copied by Hayman for the boxes, and is said to have given Tyers the idea of brightening Vauxhall with paintings. It is doubtful if any of the pictures in the boxes can be traced directly to his hand, though an undoubted Hogarth, “Henry VIII. and Anne Boleyn” was presented by the artist to Tyers and hung in the Rotunda. The pictures in the boxes chiefly represented scenes in popular comedies and a number of common sports and pastimes such as the play of seesaw, the play of cricket, the humorous diversion of sliding on the ice, leap-frog, and the country dance round the maypole. Some of the larger boxes, denominated temples and pavilions, were more elaborately designed and decorated. Such were the Temple of Comus (in the semi-circle of boxes on the left of the garden) and the Turkish Tent behind the orchestra.
The Inside of the Elegant Music Room in Vaux Hall Gardens.