Vauxhall Gardens in their glory days, mid 18th century
By Cheryl Bolen
On my recent sojourn in England I came across a small 1909
book titled London’s Lure: An Anthology in Prose & Verse compiled by Helen and Lewis Melville. Some of
that country’s greatest authors are represented in these pages, and I shall be
blogging about their observations about their nation’s capital.
Today I present “Lien Chi Altagi at Vauxhall Gardens”
written by Oliver Goldsmith:
The people of London are as fond of walking as our friends at Pekin of riding; one of the principal entertainments of the citizens here in Summer is to repair about nightfall to a garden not far from town, where they walk about, show their best clothes and best faces, and listen to a concert provided for the occasion. . .
Musicians entertain at Vauxhall Gardens
The illuminations
began before we arrived, and I must confess, that upon entering the Gardens, I
found every sense overpaid with more than expected pleasure; the lights
everywhere glimmering through the scarcely moving trees, the full-bodied
concert bursting on the stillness of the night, the natural concert of the
birds in the more retired part of the grove, vying with that which was formed
by art; the company gaily dressed, looking satisfaction, and the tables spread
with various delicacies, all conspired to fill my imagination with visionary
happiness of the Arabian lawgiver, and lifted me into an ecstasy of admiration.
“Head of Confucious,”
cried I to my friend, “this is fine! This unites rural beauty with courtly
magnificence! If we except the virgins of immortality that hang on every tree,
and may be plucked at every desire, I do not see this falls short of Mahomet’s
paradise!”
"As for virgins,” cries my friend,
“it is true they are a fruit that do not much abound in our Gardens here; but
if ladies, as plenty as apples in autumn, and as complying as any houri of them all, can content you, I fancy we have
no need to go to heaven for paradise.” (Goldsmith died in 1774 at the age of 44.)
Cheryl Bolen is the award-winning author of 23 books, most
of them set in Regency England. Her lighter books have been compared to
Georgette Heyer, and her emotional ones (where the heroine overcomes almost insurmountable
obstacles on the way to her happy ending) have been likened to Mary Balogh. Her
three latest releases (Christmas Brides,
Marriage of Inconvenience, and her Regent Mystery A Most Discreet Inquiry) are classified as "sweet" while
some of her earlier works are moderately steamy.
Posts
1 comment:
This is fun! I had been researching Vauxhall Gardens and had yet to have come across this book. Thanks for sharing those fun passages that so beautifully captures not only the gardens, but the verbose writing of the time.
Post a Comment