Avington Park
Avington Park, Itchen Valleycounty:
coords:
Hampshire
SU5332
Period - 19th century, early
... Descending from this hill [Magdalen Hill], you cross the turnpike-road (about two miles from Winchester), leading from Winchester to London through Alresford and Farnham. As soon as you cross the road, you enter the estate of the descendant of Rollo, Duke of Buckingham, which estate is in the parish of Avington. In this place the Duke has a farm, not very good land. It is in his own hands. The corn is indifferent, except the barely [sic], which is every where good. You come a full mile from the roadside down through this farm to the Duke's mansion-house at Avington and to the little village of that name, both of them beautifully situated, amidst fine and lofty trees, fine meadows, and streams of clear water. On this farm of the Duke I saw (in a little close by the farm-house), several hens in coops with broods of pheasants instead of chickens. It seems that a gamekeeper lives in the farm-house, and I dare say the Duke thinks much more of the pheasant than of the corn. ... I here saw, at this gamekeeping farm-house, what I had not seen since my departure from the Wen; namely, A WHEAT RICK! Hard, indeed would it have been if a Plantagenet, turned farmer, had not a wheat-rick in his hands. This rick contains, I should think, what they call in Hampshire ten loads of wheat, that is to say fifty quarters, or four hundred bushels. And this is the only rick, not only of wheat, but of any corn whatever that I have seen since I left London. The turnips, upon this farm, are by no means good; but, I was in some measure compensated for the bad turnips by the sight of the Duke's turnip-hoers, about a dozen females, amongst whom there were several very pretty girls, and they were as merry as larks. ...
... A very pretty park. The house is quite in the bottom; it can be seen in no direction from a distance greater than that of four or five hundred yards. ... The Duke's house stands not far from the river [Itchen] itself. A stream of water is brought from the river to feed a pond before the house. There are several avenues of trees which are very beautiful, and some of which give complete shelter to the kitchen garden, which has, besides, extraordinarily high walls. ...
...
... We started, therefore, this morning, coming through the Duke of Buckingham's Park, at AVINGTON, which is close by EASTON, and on the same side of the Itchen. This is very beautiful place. The house is close down at the edge of the meadow land; there is a lawn before it, and a pond, supplied by the Itchen, at the end of the lawn, and bounded by the park on the other side. The high road, through the park, goes very near to this water; and we saw thousands of wild-ducks in the pond, or sitting around on the green edges of it, while, on one side of the pond, the hares and pheasants were moving about upon a gravel-walk, on the side of a very fine plantation. We looked down upon all this from a rising ground, and the water like a looking glass, showed us the trees, and even the animals. This is certainly one of the very prettiest spots in the world. The wild water-fowl seem to take particular delight in this place. ... Here, at AVINGTON, every thing is in such beautiful order; the lawn, before the house, is of the finest green, and most neatly kept; and, the edge of the pond (which is of several acres) is as smooth as if it formed part of a bowling-green. To see so many wild-fowl, in a situation where every thing is in the parterre-order, has a most pleasant effect on the mind; and Richard and I, like POPE'S cock in the farm-yard, could not help thanking the DUKE and DUCHESS for having generously made such ample provision for our pleasure, and that, too, merely to please us as we were passing along. Now, this is the advantage of going about on horseback. On foot, the fatigue is too great, and you go too slowly. In any sort of carriage, you cannot get into the real country places. ...
- park - Hampshire
