APDL Eductation Resources/APDL Eductation Resources.iso/text/authors/poe/landorcott/LANDORCOTT

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                         Landor's Cottage

               A PENDANT TO 'THE DOMAIN OF ARNHEIM'

During a pedestrian tour last summer, through one or two of the river
counties of New York, I found myself, as the day declined, somewhat
embarrassed about the road I was pursuing.  The land undulated very
remarkably; and my path, for the last hour, had wound about and about so
confusedly, in its effort to keep in the valleys, that I no longer knew
in what direction lay the sweet village of B-----, where I had
determined to stop for the night.  The sun had scarcely shone--strictly
speaking--during the day, which, nevertheless, had been unpleasantly
warm.  A smoky mist, resembling that of the Indian summer, enveloped all
things, and, of course, added to my uncertainty.  Not that I cared much
about the matter.  If I did not hit upon the village before sunset, or
even before dark, it was more than possible that a little Dutch
farmhouse, or something of that kind, would soon make its
appearance--although, in fact, the neighbourhood (perhaps on account of
being more picturesque than fertile) was very sparsely inhabited.  At
all events, with my knapsack for a pillow, and my hound as a sentry, a
bivouac in the open air was just the thing which would have amused me.
I sauntered on, therefore, quite at ease--Ponto taking charge of my
gun--until at length, just as I had begun to consider whether the
numerous little glades that led hither and thither were intended to be
paths at all, I was conducted by one of the most promising of them into
an unquestionable carriage-track.  There could be no mistaking it.  The
traces of light wheels were evident; and although the tall shrubberies
and overgrown undergrowth met overhead, there was no obstruction
whatever below, even to the passage of a Virginian mountain wagon--the
most aspiring vehicle, I take it, of its kind.  The road, however,
except in being open through the wood--if wood be not too weighty a name
for such an assemblage of light trees--and except in the particulars of
evident wheel-tracks--bore no resemblance to any road I had before seen.
The tracks of which I speak were but faintly perceptible, having been
impressed upon the firm, yet pleasantly moist surface of--what looked
more like green Genoese velvet than anything else.  It was grass,
clearly--but grass such as we seldom see out of England--so short, so
thick, so even, and so vivid in colour.  Not a single impediment lay in
the wheel-route- -not even a chip or dead twig.  The stones that once
obstructed the way had been carefully placed--not thrown--along the
sides of the lane, so as to define its boundaries at bottom with a kind
of half-precise, half-negligent, and wholly picturesque definition.
Clumps of wild flowers grew everywhere, luxuriantly, in the interspaces.

What to make of all this, of course I knew not.  Here was art
undoubtedly--that did not surprise me--all roads, in the ordinary sense,
are works of art; nor can I say that there was much to wonder at in the
mere excess of art manifested; all that seemed to have been done, might
have been done here--with such natural 'capabilities' (as they have it
in the books on Landscape Gardening)--with very little labour and
expense.  No; it was not the amount but the character of the art which
caused me to take a seat on one of the blossomy stones and gaze up and
down this fairy-like avenue for half an hour or more in bewildered
admiration.  One thing became more and more evident the longer I gazed:
an artist, and one with a most scrupulous eye for form, had
superintended all these arrangements.  The greatest care had been taken
to preserve a due medium between the neat and graceful on the one hand,
and the pittoresco, in the true sense of the Italian term, on the other.
There were few straight, and no long uninterrupted lines.  The same
effect of curvature or of colour, appeared twice, usually, but not
oftener, at any one point of view.  Everywhere was variety in
uniformity.  It was a piece of 'composition', in which the most
fastidiously critical taste could scarcely have suggested an emendation.

I had turned to the right as I entered the road, and now, arising, I
continued in the same direction.  The path was so serpentine, that at no
moment could I trace its course for more than two or three paces in
advance.  Its character did not undergo any material change.

Presently the murmur of water fell gently upon my ear--and in a few
moments afterwards, as I turned with the road somewhat more abruptly
than hitherto, I became aware that a building of some kind lay at the
foot of a gentle declivity just before me.  I could see nothing
distinctly on account of the mist which occupied all the little valley
below.  A gentle breeze, however, now arose, as the sun was about
descending; and while I remained standing on the brow of the slope, the
fog gradually became dissipated into wreaths, and so floated over the
scene.

As it came fully into view--thus gradually as I describe it- -piece by
piece, here a tree, there a glimpse of water, and here again the summit
of a chimney, I could scarcely help fancying that the whole was one of
the ingenious illusions sometimes exhibited under the name of 'vanishing
pictures'.

By the time, however, that the fog had thoroughly disappeared, the sun
had made its way down behind the gentle hills, and thence, as if with a
slight chassez to the south, had come again fully into sight; glaring
with a purplish lustre through a chasm that entered the valley from the
west.  Suddenly, therefore--and as if by the hand of magic--this whole
valley and everything in it became brilliantly visible.

The first coup d'oeil, as the sun slid into the position described,
impressed me very much as I have been impressed when a boy, by the
concluding scene of some well-arranged theatrical spectacle or
melodrama.  Not even the monstrosity of colour was wanting; for the
sunlight came out through the chasm, tinted all orange and purple; while
the vivid green of the grass in the valley was reflected more or less
upon all objects, from the curtain of vapour that still hung overhead,
as if loth to take its total departure from a scene so enchantingly
beautiful.

The little vale into which I thus peered down from under the fog-canopy,
could not have been more than four hundred yards long; while in breadth
it varied from fifty to one hundred and fifty, or perhaps two hundred.
It was most narrow at its northern extremity, opening out as it tended
southwardly, but with no very precise regularity.  The widest portion
was within eighty yards of the southern extreme.  The slopes which
encompassed the vale could not fairly be called hills, unless at their
northern face.  Here a precipitous ledge of granite arose to a height of
some ninety feet; and, as I have mentioned, the valley at this point was
not more than fifty feet wide; but as the visitor proceeded southwardly
from this cliff, he found on his right hand and on his left, declivities
at once less high, less precipitous, and less rocky.  All, in a word,
sloped and softened to the south; and yet the whole vale was engirdled
by eminences, more or less high, except at two points.  One of these I
have already spoken of.  It lay considerably to the north of west, and
was where the setting sun made its way, as I have before described, into
the amphitheatre, through a cleanly-cut natural cleft in the granite
embankment; this fissure might have been ten yards wide at its widest
point, so far as the eye could trace it.  It seemed to lead up, up like
a natural causeway, into the recesses of unexplored mountains and
forests.  The other opening was directly at the southern end of the
vale.  Here, generally, the slopes were nothing more than gentle
inclinations, extending from east to west about one hundred and fifty
yards.  In the middle of this extent was a depression, level with the
ordinary floor of the valley.  As regards vegetation, as well as in
respect to everything else, the scene softened and sloped to the south.
To the north--on the craggy precipice--a few paces from the
verge--upsprang the magnificent trunks of numerous hickories, black
walnuts, and chestnuts, interspersed with occasional oak; and the strong
lateral branches thrown out by the walnuts especially, spread far over
the edge of the cliff.  Proceeding southwardly, the explorer saw, at
first, the same class of trees, but less and less lofty and Salvatorish
in character; then he saw the gentler elm, succeeded by the sassafras
and locust--these again by the softer linden, red-bud, catalpa, and
maple--these yet again by still more graceful and modest varieties.  The
whole face of the southern declivity was covered with wild shrubbery
alone--an occasional silver willow or white poplar excepted.  In the
bottom of the valley itself--(for it must be borne in mind that the
vegetation hitherto mentioned grew only on the cliffs or
hill-sides)--were to be seen three insulated trees.  One was an elm of
fine size and exquisite form: it stood guard over the southern gate of
the vale.  Another was a hickory, much larger than the elm, and
altogether a much finer tree, although both were exceedingly beautiful:
it seemed to have taken charge of the north-western entrance, springing
from a group of rocks in the very jaws of the ravine, and throwing its
graceful body, at an angle of nearly forty-five degrees, far out into
the sunshine of the amphitheatre.  About thirty yards east of this tree
stood, however, the pride of the valley, and beyond all question the
most magnificent tree I have ever seen, unless, perhaps, among the
cypresses of the Itchiatuckanee.  It was a triple-stemmed tulip
tree--the Liriodendron Tulipiferum--one of the natural order of
magnolias.  Its three trunks separated from the parent at about three
feet from the soil, and diverging very slightly and gradually, were not
more than four feet apart at the point where the largest stem shot out
into foliage: this was at an elevation of about eighty feet.  The whole
height of the principal division was one hundred and twenty feet.
Nothing can surpass in beauty the form, or the glossy, vivid green of
the leaves of the tulip tree.  In the present instance they were fully
eight inches wide; but their glory was altogether eclipsed by the
gorgeous splendour of the profuse blossoms.  Conceive, closely
congregated, a million of the largest and most resplendent tulips!  Only
thus can the reader get any idea of the picture I would convey.  And
then the stately grace of the clean, delicately-granulated columnar
stems, the largest four feet in diameter, at twenty from the ground.
The innumerable blossoms, mingling with those of other trees scarcely
less beautiful, although infinitely less majestic, filled the valley
with more than Arabian perfumes.

The general floor of the amphitheatre was grass of the same character as
that I had found in the road: if anything, more deliciously soft, thick,
velvety, and miraculously green.  It was hard to conceive how all this
beauty had been attained.

I have spoken of the two openings into the vale.  From the one to the
north-west issued a rivulet, which came, gently murmuring and slightly
foaming, down the ravine, until it dashed against the group of rocks out
of which sprang the insulated hickory.  Here, after encircling the tree,
it passed on a little to the north of east, leaving the tulip tree some
twenty feet to the south, and making no decided alteration in its course
until it came near the midway between the eastern and western boundaries
of the valley.  At this point, after a series of sweeps, it turned off
at right angles and pursued a generally southern direction--meandering
as it went--until it became lost in a small lake of irregular figure
(although roughly oval), that lay gleaming near the lower extremity of
the vale.  This lakelet was, perhaps, a hundred yards in diameter at its
widest part.  No crystal could be clearer than its water.  Its bottom,
which could be distinctly seen, consisted altogether of pebbles
brilliantly white.  Its banks, of the emerald grass already described,
rounded, rather than sloped, off into the clear heaven below; and so
clear was this heaven, so perfectly, at times, did it reflect all
objects above it, that where the true bank ended and where the mimic one
commenced, it was a point of no little difficulty to determine.  The
trout, and some other varieties of fish, with which this pond seemed to
be almost inconveniently crowded, had all the appearance of veritably
flying-fish.  It was almost impossible to believe that they were not
absolutely suspended in the air.  A light birch canoe that lay placidly
on the water, was reflected in its minutest fibres with a fidelity
unsurpassed by the most exquisitely polished mirror.  A small island,
fairly laughing with flowers in full bloom, and affording little more
space than just enough for a picturesque little building, seemingly a
fowl-house--arose from the lake not far from its northern shore--to
which it was connected by means of an inconceivably light-looking and
yet very primitive bridge.  It was formed of a single, broad and thick
plank of the tulip wood.  This was forty feet long, and spanned the
interval between shore and shore with a slight but very perceptible
arch, preventing all oscillation.  From the southern extreme of the lake
issued a continuation of the rivulet, which, after meandering for,
perhaps, thirty yards, finally passed through the 'depression' (already
described) in the middle of the southern declivity, and tumbling down a
sheer precipice of a hundred feet, made its devious and unnoticed way to
the Hudson.

The lake was deep--at some points thirty feet--but the rivulet seldom
exceeded three, while its greatest width was about eight.  Its bottom
and banks were as those of the pond--if a defect could have been
attributed to them, in point of picturesqueness, it was that of
excessive neatness.

The expanse of the green turf was relieved, here and there, by an
occasional showy shrub, such as the hydrangea, or the common snow-ball,
or the aromatic seringa; or, more frequently, by a clump of geraniums
blossoming gorgeously in great varieties.  These latter grew in pots
which were carefully buried in the soil, so as to give the plants the
appearance of being indigenous.  Besides all this, the lawn's velvet was
exquisitely spotted with sheep--a considerable flock of which roamed
about the vale, in company with three tamed deer, and a vast number of
brilliantly-plumed ducks.  A very large mastiff seemed to be in vigilant
attendance upon these animals, each and all.

Along the eastern and western cliffs--where, towards the upper portion
of the amphitheatre, the boundaries were more or less precipitous--grew
ivy in great profusion--so that only here and there could even a glimpse
of the naked rock be obtained.  The northern precipice, in like manner,
was almost entirely clothed by grape-vines of rare luxuriance; some
springing from the soil at the base of the cliff, and others from ledges
on its face.

The slight elevation which formed the lower boundary of this little
domain, was crowned by a neat stone wall, of sufficient height to
prevent the escape of the deer.  Nothing of the fence kind was
observable elsewhere; for nowhere else was an artificial enclosure
needed:--any stray sheep, for example, which should attempt to make its
way out of the vale by means of the ravine, would find its progress
arrested, after a few yards' advance, by the precipitous ledge of rock
over which tumbled the cascade that had arrested my attention as I first
drew near the domain.  In short, the only ingress or egress was through
a grate occupying a rocky pass in the road, a few paces below the point
at which I stopped to reconnoitre the scene.

I have described the brook as meandering very irregularly through the
whole of its course.  Its two general directions, as I have said, were
first from west to east, and then from north to south.  At the turn, the
stream, sweeping backwards, made an almost circular loop, so as to form
a peninsula which was very nearly an island, and which included about
the sixteenth of an acre.  On this peninsula stood a dwelling-house--and
when I say that this house, like the infernal terrace seen by Vathek,
'etait d'une architecture inconnue dans les annales de la terre', I
mean, merely, that its tout ensemble struck me with the keenest sense of
combined novelty and propriety--in a word, of poetry-- (for, than in the
words just employed, I could scarcely give, of poetry in the abstract, a
more rigorous definition)--and I do not mean that the merely outre was
perceptible in any respect.

In fact, nothing could well be more simple--more utterly unpretending
than this cottage.  Its marvellous effect lay altogether in its artistic
arrangement as a picture.  I could have fancied, while I looked at it,
that some eminent landscape- painter had built it with his brush.

The point of view from which I first saw the valley, was not altogether,
although it was nearly, the best point from which to survey the house.
I will therefore describe it as I afterwards saw it--from a position on
the stone wall at the southern extreme of the amphitheatre.

The main building was about twenty-four feet long and sixteen
broad--certainly not more.  Its total height, from the ground to the
apex of the roof, could not have exceeded eighteen feet.  To the west
end of this structure was attached one about a third smaller in all its
proportions:--the line of its front standing back about two yards from
that of the larger house; and the line of its roof, of course, being
considerably depressed below that of the roof adjoining.  At right
angles to these buildings, and from the rear of the main one--not
exactly in the middle--extended a third compartment, very small--being,
in general, one third less than the western wing.  The roofs of the two
larger were very steep--sweeping down from the ridge-beam with a long
concave curve, and extending at least four feet beyond the walls in
front, so as to form the roofs of two piazzas.  These latter roofs, of
course, needed no support; but as they had the air of needing it, slight
and perfectly plain pillars were inserted at the corners alone.  The
roof of the northern wing was merely an extension of a portion of the
main roof.  Between the chief building and western wing arose a very
tall and rather slender square chimney of hard Dutch bricks, alternately
black and red:--a slight cornice of projecting bricks at the top.  Over
the gables, the roofs also projected very much:--in the main building
about four feet to the east and two to the west.  The principal door was
not exactly in the main division, being a little to the east--while the
two windows were to the west.  These latter did not extend to the floor,
but were much longer and narrower than usual--they had single shutters
like doors--the panes were of lozenge form, but quite large.  The door
itself had its upper half of glass, also in lozenge panes--a moveable
shutter secured it at night.  The door to the west wing was in its
gable, and quite simple--a single window looked out to the south.  There
was no external door to the north wing, and it, also, had only one
window to the east.

The blank wall of the eastern gable was relieved by stairs (with a
balustrade) running diagonally across it--the ascent being from the
south.  Under cover of the widely-projecting eave these steps gave
access to a door leading into the garret, or rather loft--for it was
lighted only by a single window to the north, and seemed to have been
intended as a store-room.

The piazzas of the main building and western wing had no floors, as is
usual; but at the doors and at each window, large, flat, irregular slabs
of granite lay imbedded in the delicious turf, affording comfortable
footing in all weather.  Excellent paths of the same material--not
nicely adapted, but with the velvety sod filling frequent intervals
between the stones, led hither and thither from the house, to a crystal
spring about five paces off, to the road, or to one or two outhouses
that lay to the north, beyond the brook, and were thoroughly concealed
by a few locusts and catalpas.

Not more than six steps from the main door of the cottage stood the dead
trunk of a fantastic pear-tree, so clothed from head to foot in the
gorgeous bignonia blossoms that one required no little scrutiny to
determine what manner of sweet thing it could be.  From various arms of
this tree hung cages of different kinds.  In one, a large wicker
cylinder with a ring at top, revelled a mocking bird; in another, an
oriole; in a third, the impudent bobolink--while three or four more
delicate prisons were loudly vocal with canaries.

The pillars of the piazza were enwreathed in jasmine and sweet
honeysuckle; while from the angle formed by the main structure and its
west wing, in front, sprang a grape-vine of unexampled luxuriance.
Scorning all restraint, it had clambered first to the lower roof--then
to the higher; and along the ridge of this latter it continued to writhe
on, throwing out tendrils to the right and left, until at length it
fairly attained the east gable, and fell trailing over the stairs.

The whole house, with its wings, was constructed of the old- fashioned
Dutch shingles--broad, and with unrounded corners.  It is a peculiarity
of this material to give houses built of it the appearance of being
wider at bottom than at top--after the manner of Egyptian architecture;
and in the present instance, this exceedingly picturesque effect was
aided by numerous pots of gorgeous flowers that almost encompassed the
base of the buildings.

The shingles were painted a dull grey; and the happiness with which this
neutral tint melted into the vivid green of the tulip tree leaves that
partially overshadowed the cottage, can readily be conceived by an
artist.

From the position near the stone wall, as described, the buildings were
seen at great advantage--for the south-eastern angle was thrown
forward--so that the eye took in at once the whole of the two fronts,
with the picturesque eastern gable, and at the same time obtained just a
sufficient glimpse of the northern wing, with parts of a pretty roof to
the spring-house, and nearly half of a light bridge that spanned the
brook in the near vicinity of the main buildings.

I did not remain very long on the brow of the hill, although long enough
to make a thorough survey of the scene at my feet.  It was clear that I
had wandered from the road to the village, and I had thus good
traveller's excuse to open the gate before me, and inquire my way, at
all events; so, without more ado, I proceeded.

The road, after passing the gate, seemed to lie upon a natural ledge,
sloping gradually down along the face of the north-eastern cliffs.  It
led me on to the foot of the northern precipice, and thence over the
bridge, round by the eastern gable to the front door.  In this progress,
I took notice that no sight of the out-houses could be obtained.

As I turned the corner of the gable, the mastiff bounded towards me in
stern silence, but with the eye and the whole air of a tiger.  I held
him out my hand, however, in token of amity-- and I never yet knew the
dog who was proof against such an appeal to his courtesy.  He not only
shut his mouth and wagged his tail, but absolutely offered me his
paw--afterwards extending his civilities to Ponto.

As no bell was discernible, I rapped with my stick against the door,
which stood half open.  Instantly a figure advanced to the
threshold--that of a young woman about twenty-eight years of
age--slender, or rather slight, and somewhat above the medium height.
As she approached, with a certain modest decision of step altogether
indescribable, I said to myself, 'Surely here I have found the
perfection of natural, in contra-distinction from artificial grace.'
The second impression which she made on me, but by far the more vivid of
the two, was that of enthusiasm.  So intense an expression of romance,
perhaps I should call it, or of unworldliness, as that which gleamed
from her deep-set eyes, had never so sunk into my heart of hearts
before.  I know not how it is, but this peculiar expression of the eye,
wreathing itself occasionally into the lips, is the most powerful, if
not absolutely the sole spell, which rivets my interest in woman.
'Romance', provided my readers fully comprehend what I would here imply
by the word--'romance' and 'womanliness' seem to me convertible terms;
and, after all, what man truly loves in woman is, simply, her womanhood.
The eyes of Annie (I heard some one from the interior call her 'Annie,
darling!') were 'spiritual grey'; her hair, a light chestnut: this is
all I had time to observe of her.

At her most courteous of invitations, I entered--passing first into a
tolerably wide vestibule.  Having come mainly to observe, I took notice
that to my right as I stepped in, was a window, such as those in front
of the house; to the left, a door leading into the principal room;
while, opposite me, an open door enabled me to see a small apartment,
just the size of the vestibule, arranged as a study, and having a large
bow window looking out to the north.

Passing into the parlour, I found myself with Mr Landor--for this, I
afterwards found, was his name.  He was civil, even cordial in his
manner; but just then, I was more intent on observing the arrangements
of the dwelling which had so much interested me, than the personal
appearance of the tenant.

The north wing, I now saw, was a bed-chamber: its door opened into the
parlour.  West of this door was a single window, looking towards the
brook.  At the west end of the parlour, were a fire-place, and a door
leading into the west wing--probably a kitchen.

Nothing could be more rigorously simple than the furniture of the
parlour.  On the floor was an ingrain carpet, of excellent texture--a
white ground, spotted with small circular green figures.  At the windows
were curtains of snowy white jaconet muslin: they were tolerably full,
and hung decisively, perhaps rather formally, in sharp, parallel plaits
to the floor--just to the floor.  The walls were papered with a French
paper of great delicacy--a silver ground, with a faint green cord
running zig- zag throughout.  Its expanse was relieved merely by three
of Julien's exquisite lithographs a trois crayons, fastened to the wall
without frames.  One of these drawings was a scene of Oriental luxury,
or rather voluptuousness; another was a 'carnival piece', spirited
beyond compare; the third was a Greek female head--a face so divinely
beautiful, and yet of an expression so provokingly indeterminate, never
before arrested my attention.

The more substantial furniture consisted of a round table, a few chairs
(including a large rocking-chair), and a sofa, or rather 'settee': its
material was plain maple painted a creamy white, slightly interstriped
with green--the seat of cane.  The chairs and table were 'to match'; but
the forms of all had evidently been designed by the same brain which
planned 'the grounds': it is impossible to conceive anything more
graceful.

On the table were a few books; a large, square, crystal bottle of some
novel perfume; a plain, ground-glass astral (not solar) lamp, with an
Italian shade; and a large vase of resplendently-blooming flowers.
Flowers indeed of gorgeous colours and delicate odour, formed the sole
mere decoration of the apartment.  The fire-place was nearly filled with
a vase of brilliant geranium.  On a triangular shelf in each angle of
the room stood also a similar vase, varied only as to its lovely
contents.  One or two smaller bouquets adorned the mantel; and late
violets clustered about the open windows.

It is not the purpose of this work to do more than give, in detail, a
picture of Mr Landor's residence--as I found it.