Montacute in Somersetshire, built towards the end of the sixteenth
century by Sir Edward Phelips, is another of that surprising number of
important houses built on a symmetrical plan that arose during the reign
of Queen Elizabeth.
As the house was then, so we see it now; unaltered, and only mellowed by
time. The gardens, too, are of the original design, including a
considerable amount of architectural stonework.
The large entrance forecourt is inclosed by a high balustraded wall,
with important and finely-designed garden houses on its outer angles.
The length of the side walls is broken midway on each side by a small
circular pillared pavilion with a boldly projecting entablature, crowned
with an openwork canopy and a topmost ornament of two opposite and
joining rings of stone.
The piers of the balustrade are surmounted by stone obelisks, and the
large paved landing, forming a shallow court at the top of the flight of
steps a hundred feet wide, that gives access to the house on this side
has tall pillars that now carry lamps, though they appear to have been
designed merely as a stately form of ornament.
The forecourt has a wide expanse of gravel with a large fountain basin
in the middle. Next the wall there are flower-borders; then the wide
gravelled path, and, following this, a broad strip of turf with Irish
yews at regular intervals. The general severity of the planning is
pleasantly relieved by the bright flower-border, the subject of the
picture. To right and left are openings in the wall leading to other
garden spaces. The one of these to the left, just behind the spectator
as in the picture, leads by an upward flight of steps to one side of a
wide terrace walk, that encompasses on all four sides a large sunk
garden of formal design. This garden runs the whole length of the
forecourt and depth of the house, and has a width equal to some
two-thirds of its length. A large middle fountain-basin, with shaped
outline of angles and segments of circles, has a balustraded kerb with a
stone obelisk on every pier. In the centre is a handsome tazza in which
the water plays. Wide paths lead down flights of balustraded steps from
all four sides to the gravelled area within which the fountain stands.
The spaces between, and the banks rising to the level of the upper
terraces, are of turf. Rows of Irish yews stand ranged on both levels.
It is all extremely correct, stately--dare one say a trifle dull?
Opposite the forecourt the garden is bounded by a good yew hedge
protecting it from wind from the valley below. Midway in the length is
an opening where a low wall and seats give a welcome outlook. The same
yew hedge returns eastward to the south-east angle of the house; the
garden’s opposite boundary being a low wall with a sunk fence outside,
giving a view into the park.
There is an entrance from the garden to the house on its southern side
by a flight of balustraded steps, and niches with seats are on either
side of the door.
Wonderful are these great stone houses of the early English
Renaissance--wonderful in their bold grasp and sudden assertion of the
new possibilities of domestic architecture! For it may be repeated that
it was only of late that a man’s house had ceased to be a place of
defence, and that he might venture to have windows looking abroad all
round, and yet feel perfectly safe without even an inclosing moat.
In the present day it is somewhat difficult to account for the
designer’s attitude of mind when deciding on such a lavish employment of
the obelisk-shaped finials. One can only regard it as the outcome of the
taste or fashion of the day, when he borrowed straight from the Italians
everything except their marvellous discernment. One accepts the many
obelisks at Montacute as showing the reflection of Italian influence on
the Tudor mind; to-day and new, they would be inadmissible. The modern
mind, with the vast quantity of material at hand, and the easy access to
all that has been said and done on the subject, should
[Illustration: MONTACUTE: SUNFLOWERS