CHAPTER XIX.
THE DECEIT OF DESCRIPTIONS OF SCENERY.—THE SOUL OF A LANDSCAPE.—THE ISLE OF WIGHT, ITS CHARACTERISTICS.—APPROPRIATE DOMESTIC ARCHITECTURE.—GENIAL CLIMATE.—TROPICAL VERDURE.—THE CLIFFS OF ALBION.—OSBORNE.—THE ROYAL VILLA.—COUNTRY LIFE OF THE ROYAL FAMILY.—AGRICULTURAL INCLINATION AND RURAL TASTES.—THE ROYAL TENANTRY.—A RURAL FETE AT OSBORNE.
There is always a strong temptation upon the traveller to endeavour to so describe fine scenery, and the feelings which it has occasioned him, that they may be reproduced to the imagination of his friends. Judging from my own experience, this purpose always fails. I have never yet seen any thing celebrated in scenery, of which I had previously obtained a correct conception. Certain striking, prominent points, that the power of language has been most directed to the painting of, almost invariably disappoint, and seem little and commonplace, after the exaggerated forms which have been brought before the mind’s eye. Beauty, grandeur, impressiveness in any way, from scenery, is not often to be found in a few prominent, distinguishable features, but in the manner and the unobserved materials with which these are connected and combined. Clouds, lights, states of the atmosphere, and circumstances that we cannot always detect, affect all landscapes, and especially landscapes in which the vicinity of a body of water is an element, much more than we are often aware. So it is that the impatient first glance of the young traveller, or the impertinent critical stare of the old tourist, is almost never satisfied, if the honest truth be admitted, in what it has been led to previously imagine. I have heard “Niagara is a mill-dam,” “Rome is a humbug.”
The deep sentiments of Nature that we sometimes seem to have been made the confidant of, when among the mountains, or on the moors or the ocean,—even those of man wrought out in architecture and sculpture and painting, or of man working in unison with Nature, as sometimes in the English parks, on the Rhine, and here on the Isle of Wight,—such revealings are beyond words; they never could be transcribed into note-books and diaries, and so descriptions of them become caricatures, and when we see them, we at first say we are disappointed that we find not the monsters we were told of.
Dame Nature is a gentlewoman. No guide’s fee will obtain you her favour, no abrupt demand; hardly will she bear questioning, or direct, curious gazing at her beauty; least of all, will she reveal it truly to the hurried glance of the passing traveller, while he waits for his dinner, or fresh horses, or fuel and water; always we must quietly and unimpatiently wait upon it. Gradually and silently the charm comes over us; the beauty has entered our souls; we know not exactly when or how, but going away we remember it with a tender, subdued, filial-like joy.
Does this seem nonsense to you? Very likely, for I am talking of what I don’t understand. Nature treats me so strangely; it’s past my speaking sensibly of, and yet, as a part of my travelling experience, I would speak of it. At times I seem myself to be her favourite, and she brings me to my knees in deep feeling, such as she blesses no other with; oftener I see others in ecstasies, while I am left to sentimentalize and mourn, or to be critical, and sneering, and infidel. Nonsense still; but tell me, do you think it is only for greed of trouts that your great and sensitive man lingers long, intently stooping over dark pools in the spray of the mountain torrents, or stealing softly a way through the bending rushes, or kneeling lowly on the darkest verdure of the shaded meadow? What else? I know not what he thinks, but of this I am assured: while his mind is most intent upon his trivial sport, his heart and soul will be far more absorbent of the rugged strength, the diffuse, impetuous brilliance, the indefinite gliding grace, or the peaceful twilight loveliness, of the scenes around him, than if he went out searching, labouring directly for it as for bread and fame.
The greater part of the Isle of Wight is more dreary, desolate, bare, and monotonous, than any equal extent of land you probably ever saw in America—would be, rather, if it were not that you are rarely out of sight of the sea; and no landscape, of which that is a part, ever can be without variety and ever-changing interest. It is, in fact, down-land in the interior, exactly like that I described in Wiltshire, and sometimes breaking down into such bright dells as I there told of. But on the south shore it is rocky, craggy; and after you have walked through a rather dull country, though pleasing on the whole, for hours after landing, you come gradually to where the majesty of vastness, peculiar to the downs and the ocean, alternates or mingles with dark, picturesque, rugged ravines, chasms, and water-gaps, sublime rock-masses, and soft, warm, smiling, inviting dells and dingles; and, withal, there is a strange and fascinating enrichment of half-tropical foliage, so deep, graceful, and luxuriant, as I never saw before any where in the world. All this district is thickly inhabited, and yet so well covered with verdure, or often so tastefully appropriate—quiet, cosy, ungenteel, yet elegant—are the cottages, that they often add to, rather than insult and destroy, the natural charm of their neighbourhood. I am sorry to say, that among the later erections there are a number of very strong exceptions to this remark.
In this paradise the climate, by favour of its shelter of hills on the north, and the equalising influence of the ocean on the south, is, perhaps, the most equable and genial in the northern temperate zone. The mercury does not fall as low in winter as at Rome; deciduous trees lose their verdure but for a brief interval; greensward is evergreen; tender-roses, fuschias, and the dark, glossy shrubs of Canaan and of Florida, feel themselves at home, and flourish through the winter.
Where the chalky downs reach the shore without an intervening barrier of rock, or a gradual sloping descent, they are broken off abruptly and precipitously; and thus are formed the “white cliffs of Albion,” and a coast scenery with which, for grandeur, there is nothing on our Atlantic shore that will in the least compare: notwithstanding which, and although they really are often higher than our church-steeples and monuments—the familiar standards with which we compare their number of feet—they have not the stupendous effect upon the mind that I had always imagined that they must have.
We were rambling for the greater part of two days upon the island, spending a night near Black-gang-Chine. Returning, we passed near Osborne, a private estate purchased some years since by the Queen, upon which she has had erected a villa, said to be an adaptation of the Grecian style to modern tastes and habits, but of which nothing is to be seen from without the grounds but the top of a lofty campanile, from which is now displayed the banner with the royal arms, which always indicates the presence of the reigning sovereign of Great Britain. It is the custom of the royal family, when here, to live in as retired and unstately a way as they can ever be permitted to. The Prince himself turns farmer, and engages with much ardour in improving the agricultural capabilities of the soil, much of which was not originally of a fertile character, but by thorough drainage, and judicious tillage and manuring, is now producing greatly enlarged crops. The Prince is well known as a successful breeder and stockfarmer, having taken several prizes for fat cattle, &c., at the great annual shows. Her Majesty personally interests herself in the embellishment of the grounds and the extensive oak plantations which are being made, and is in the habit of driving herself a pair of ponies, unattended, through the estate, studying the comfort of her little cottage tenantry, and in every way she can trying to seem to herself the good-wife of a respectable country gentleman.
On the last birth-day of Prince Albert, a dinner was given to the labourers on the estate, with the seamen, boys, and marines of the Royal Yacht, and the coast-guard and soldiers stationed in the neighbourhood, (altogether about four hundred persons.) The dinner was provided in a large tent which was pitched on the lawn in front of the house, and consisted of a plentiful supply of beef, mutton, and plum-pudding, with strong ale. After grace had been said by the bailiff, (overseer,) and the company were seated, the Queen and Prince walked through the tent, and at the conclusion, after the usual loyal toasts, all adjourned to the greensward without, and in the presence of all the royal family engaged in a country dance, and afterwards in foot-races and in games of cricket and football, and other old-fashioned rural sports, the Queen remaining with them for several hours.