MONKSWOOD.
Monkswood was the original family place of the Fairfaxes. It was from
Monkswood that a Fairfax sallied forth, booted and spurred, to ride
with Prince Rupert; and owing to having espoused that side, many a fair
acre was shorn away from him and his descendants. Nothing, in fact, was
left to the next generation but the house and demesne.
A succession of lucky speculations and prudent marriages had restocked
the Fairfax purse, and Sir Reginald’s grand-father, instead of
gambling and squandering at Arthur’s, Crockford’s, Boodle’s, or
White’s, as was the fashion in his day--being, on the contrary, of a
thrifty turn of mind--purchased Looton, which a card-playing owner
had brought to the hammer, and it became the family seat. Still all
Fairfaxes were at least _buried_ at Monkswood, and during the season it
was generally visited for woodcock-shooting, for which its thick woods
were famous.
Monkswood was a good-sized red-brick house, hideous and rambling
and inconvenient to the last degree. It was a rare collection of
architecture on a small scale, as a room had been added here, a window
knocked out there, according to the sweet will of the reigning Fairfax.
It was approached by a long drive, skirted on one side by a thick
laurel cover, and on the other by a broad open demesne, dotted about
with some splendid timber, oak and copper beech in particular.
The house was entered by a shallow flight of steps and heavy portico,
leading into a lofty oak-panelled hall, opening on one side into the
drawing-room and tea-room, and on the other into the dining-room and
library.
The drawing-room side looked out on a grand old-fashioned
pleasure-ground; the dining-room “gave”--oh horror!--on the
yard--a yard large enough for a barrack square, with a long range
of loose-boxes and deserted stalls and coach-houses. A couple of
saddle-horses, and Miss Saville’s fat ponies, Tweedle Dum and Tweedle
Dee, revelled at least in plenty of room. Upstairs the house was
still more old-fashioned than below; fireplaces in corners abounded;
cupboards broke out in the strangest places; and there were various
passages leading everywhere in general and nowhere in particular, as
you angrily discover when, having followed one down to its source as
you flatter yourself, you open a fine promising-looking door, and
find a set of empty shelves staring you in the face! On the other
hand, you are disagreeably surprised when, on bursting open the door
of what you take to be a cupboard, you find yourself precipitated
headlong down three steps into a large room. Huge four-post beds and
furniture to correspond were _de rigueur_, and there was an old-world
feeling about the place altogether, as if it had gone to sleep one
hundred years ago, and awoke, greatly surprised to find itself in the
present century. Everything was antiquated, with the exception of new
carpets and curtains in the sitting-room, a few fashionable chairs and
tea-tables, Alice’s piano, and the furniture of her bedroom, where a
modern brass construction relieved the time-honoured four-poster, and
a writing-table, wardrobe, and lounge took the place of furniture that
would have been the _ne plus ultra_ of luxury in the reign of Queen
Elizabeth.
Need I here mention that the maiden monarch slept a night at Monkswood?
According to the number of places which boast of this honour, her
majesty can have rarely passed a night at home.
The house was overrun with old china, and there were a good many
family portraits, simpering and scowling, about the walls. The
best--the beauties and the handsome cavaliers--were all at Looton;
but frosty-faced old divines and plain elderly matrons had been left
undisturbed. There was some Chippendale furniture too, and all kinds
of queer old ornaments, odds and ends, and even _clothes_, stowed away
carefully among the venerable wardrobes; in fact, enough unappreciated
_bric-à-brac_ to turn a collector’s head.
The pleasure-grounds opened through a rustic gate into the plantations,
which skirted the whole demesne inside a high wall. Through the
plantations ran a walk just wide enough for two. A dense growth of
underwood gave cover to thousands of rabbits, and where the ground was
visible it was one mass of blue-bells and primroses in the season.
Opening also out of the pleasure-grounds was a large old-fashioned
garden, chiefly devoted to fruit and vegetables, though the broad
gravel walks that intersected it were lined with wallflowers,
carnations, lavender, and hollyhocks. Its four gray walls did not look
down upon a “wealth of flowers,” but they were covered with very
excellent fruit trees, and they overlooked the best beds of asparagus
within a radius of ten miles.