Hampton Court ... Illustrated with forty-three drawings by Herbert ...

ITS FUTURE PICTURED 237
new, some old," he sees as he rows up from the new
London that is so far off from the London of to-day,
all " dominated by the long walls and sharp gables of
a great red-brick pile of building, partly of the latest
Gothic,partly of the court style of Dutch William,
but so blended together by the bright sun and beautiful
surroundings, including the bright blue river which it
looked down upon, that even amidst the beautiful
buildings of that new happy time it had a strange
charm about it." 1
SinceIwrote down these words of his,he has passed
from the earth that was so beautiful to him; and he
knows now the realities that were sometime dim in
his eyes. He has left us many visions that we shall
not forget; chiefest, perhaps, those that belong to
the banks of the silver Thames.
Those who go to Hampton Court on a bright
summer day may well think, even now, that it does
not fall very far below the poet's picture of its
future.
1 WilliamMorris, " News from Nowhere," p. 162,