' And the loved toil which formed the quincunx, which perforated
and extended the grotto until it extended across the road to a garden on
the opposite side--the toil which showed the gentler parts of Pope's
better nature--has been respected, and its effects preserved. The
enamelled lawn, green as no other grass save that by the Thames side is
green, was swept until late years by the light boughs of the famed
willow. Every memorial of the bard was treasured by the gracious hands
into which, after 1744, the classic spot fell--those of Sir William
Stanhope.
In the subterranean passage this verse appears; adulatory it must be
confessed:--
'The humble roof, the garden's scanty line,
Ill suit the genius of the bard divine;
But fancy now assumes a fairer scope,
And Stanhope's plans unfold the soul of Pope.'
It should have been Stanhope's 'gold,'--a metal which was not so
abundant, nor indeed so much wanted in Pope's time as in our own. Let us
picture to ourselves the poet as a host.
As the barge is moored close to the low steps which lead up from the
river to the villa, a diminutive figure, then in its prime, (if prime it
_ever_ had), is seen moving impatiently forward.
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