It would be impossible to find two houses more dissimilar than Chatsworth and Haddon. Chatsworth is—although the building was begun as far back as 1687—comparatively modern of aspect; none would guess its age as more than fifty years. The stone is lightly coloured, the window frames are gilded, and in certain lights the Palace of the Peak suggests a well-preserved matron who intends always to guard carefully against any signs of the oncoming of age. It is tranquil and perhaps somnolent, a house where one cannot believe that anything of real note has ever happened. Somewhere there is a picture, dim and faded, of the house built by Sir William Cavendish, second husband of Bess of Hardwick; this is stern, forbidding, and one is glad that it stands no longer in this happy valley.

Old Chatsworth, however, was not without its admirers. Charles Cotton wrote:—

There dwelt Thomas Hobbes, as favoured by my lord the earl and my lady the countess as was Samuel Johnson by the brewer Thrale and his vivacious Hester. Probably the Leviathan was written there, stimulated by the ten or twelve pipes of tobacco that Doctor Kennet tells about.

Bess of Hardwick had more magnificent taste than Sir William. Hardwick Hall, the Duke of Devonshire’s seat near the Nottinghamshire border, is one of the finest Elizabethan mansions in the country, a place of great bays with latticed panes that turn into gold when the sun creeps westward. Her ladyship must have loved the daylight—there is still extant a distich:

“Hardwick Hall, more glass than wall”.

Some biographers of this remarkable woman—perhaps the most striking female genius ever born in Derbyshire—express surprise that the daughter of a simple country squire should have attained such a lofty position; but all who have seen the old house in which Bess was born will understand that her sire must have been a person of considerable importance. The ruins still stand not far from the stately palace she commanded, and in some respects the old house is more interesting than the inhabited one. One wonders why her ambition prompted her to raise another so near; possibly it was because of the prophecy that she would live as long as she continued to build.

Her first spouse was one Robert Barley, of Barlow, a little hamlet about six miles from Chatsworth. Both were of tender years, and he died very soon, leaving her mistress of his estates. After him she wedded Sir William Cavendish, by whom she had several children. Her third husband was Sir William St. Lo, a south-country knight; and her fourth George, Earl of Shrewsbury, the unhappy jailer of Mary Queen of Scots. Before accepting the offer of the last, she stipulated for the marriage of two of her Cavendish children with two of his young Talbots.

At first Lord Shrewsbury doted on his shrewd and comely wife, but as the years passed honey turned to gall, and finally both agreed to part. The countess was no mate for a peace-loving old man, and, moreover, she boasted a bitter tongue and a cruel pen. She was coarse and vulgar—as probably were all the great ladies of her time—she professed to be jealous of the royal captive, she well-nigh lost her husband the favour of Elizabeth by arranging the marriage of Darnley’s brother with her step-daughter, from which union resulted Arabella Stuart. None the less she was a woman with a heart, and in her letters may be found one or two profoundly touching expressions. She won her way through life; she trampled on the weak, and possibly her only real happiness proceeded from the knowledge of realized ambition. She lived to a great age, and only died because a frost interfered with her building operations. Several dukes now living claim her as ancestress, and owe much to her splendid business ability. Somehow one associates her more closely with the Cavendish family, since she had no offspring save by the master of Chatsworth.

QUEEN MARY’S BOWER, CHATSWORTH

In the park the two most interesting features are the “Stand”, a tower on the hilltop whence in Elizabethan days the ladies of the family were wont to watch their squires hunting; and the moated flowerless garden which to-day bears the name of “Queen Mary’s Bower”. The ceilings of some of the rooms in the “Stand” are quaintly pargeted, and from the highest windows there is a magnificent view of Longstone Edge and Eyam Moor. At the back stretches a peacock-haunted woodland where lie the lakes that feed the fountains of the great house. To descend the hill there is a narrow path with many stone steps, beside which rushes a merry little stream.

“Queen Mary’s Bower”, which is said to have been used as an airing place by the unfortunate prisoner, rises from a moat near Derwent bank. It resembles a dwarfish heavy-balustraded keep, filled with rich soil in which grow ancient trees. A broad staircase crosses the moat, rising to a locked wicket gate, through which may be seen the melancholy little enclosure. According to local tradition a secret passage descended from here to the old house. One may easily imagine the captive sitting here amidst her ladies and working with her everlasting needle.

The bridge near by, crossing the river which for the nonce is deep and sullen, was copied from one of Michael Angelo’s designs, and the uncouth figures in the niches were wrought by Theophilus Cibber, the Georgian poet-laureate’s father. On the farther bank roam herds of red and fallow deer—the former descendants of those that ran wild in the forgotten Forest of the Peak. On a misty day, when house, and bridge, and bower are all veiled, these magnificent animals have a most impressive appearance—they move slowly then—there are no wild flights—they scorn man and are lords of the whole park.

Notwithstanding its great natural beauty the park somehow conveys an impression of monotony. There are few of those sudden tantalizing glimpses that one expects in such a place, and the neatness is perhaps too apparent. Some of the trees are of great age, but none are comparable with the giants of Sherwood Forest, twenty miles away. The atmosphere is too tranquil—it is hard to believe that this pleasaunce is haunted with the memories of noted folk. Mary the Queen and Bess the Countess might never have wrangled and made friends in this beautiful valley.

Chatsworth is filled with wonderful treasures. There may be seen the rosary used by Henry the Eighth before he became Defender of the Faith, masterpieces by the greatest painters, priceless tapestries from the French looms, books of almost incredible value. It is a house of cedar and rock amethyst and variegated alabaster and gilding is everywhere lavishly displayed. The most ancient piece of furniture appears as well preserved as though it had been fashioned in our own time. There must be some charm about Chatsworth—naught there can ever fade or decay.

Many marvellously delicate carvings, attributed to Grinling Gibbons, but more probably the work of a local genius called Watson, adorn the walls, notably a delicate cravat in lime-wood, which might have been wrought by some old Chinese craftsman.

Verrio, and Laguerre, and Thornhill painted the frescoes. In one, Verrio, who had quarrelled with the housekeeper, immortalized the luckless woman as the ugliest of the Fates. Verrio had a somewhat childish wit—on one door he painted a violin, with the intention of deceiving a fellow painter. To-day one would not attempt to remove it from the hook.

It cannot be denied that the present house has something of the aspect of a museum. It contains so many rich treasures that one’s sense of proportion becomes mazed, and one is almost relieved to pass out-of-doors again by way of the Sculpture Gallery, where the masterpieces date chiefly from the earlier half of the nineteenth century.

The Gardens are as stiffly beautiful and as artificial as the house. One is reminded of the Roi Soleil when one sees the little temple with its long flight of stairs down which on state occasions water flows, or the canals and basins with their slender fountains, the chief of which, known as the “Emperor”, rises to a height of 267 feet. In one place is to be seen a weeping-willow tree—of copper—and much mirth is excited when visitors, passing to the recess behind, are playfully drenched by a too-willing gardener.

In late spring the rhododendrons glow splendidly here—perhaps the best view may be obtained from the steep road on the farther bank of the river.

The Great Conservatory, designed by Sir Joseph Paxton, before the Great Exhibition, is enjoyable for such as wish to be transported to the tropics, and to breathe an oppressively perfumed air.

The road over the bridge leads to the model village of Edensor, in whose church may be seen the tomb of two of Bess of Hardwick’s sons, who died in James the First’s days. It is gaudily coloured and morbidly suggestive. On one side is the carved suit of armour of Henry Cavendish, on the other the coronet and robes of William, first Earl of Devonshire. Between, under an altar slab, are the figures of a corpse in winding sheet and a skeleton. It is all very ugly and grotesque, but none the less interesting as an instance of the decorations beloved by mourning Jacobeans.

A more important memorial of the past is the brass to John Beton, Comptroller of the captive Queen’s household, who died at Chatsworth in 1570. The Latin inscription tells how, with others, he bravely liberated his mistress from Loch Leven Castle. He died young, and was probably deeply regretted by the mimic Court.

The graveyard contains the resting places of the more recent members of the Cavendish family, simple and with no affectation of pomp. Perhaps the one that excites most interest to-day is that of Lord Frederick, whose assassination in Phoenix Park filled the whole country with dismay.