Mrs A of Rothbury and Mr A of Durham (no relation) are fixed to the idea that everything the master gardener Lancelot ‘Capability’ Brown learnt that was worth learning he learnt at his birthplace, Kirkharle.
Tag: Kirkharle
Dr R of Herefordshire, himself a dedicated archaeologist of the shorts, long socks and sandals school, is anxious first to categorise earthworks by the use for which they were intended (saw-pits, charcoaling sites, hill-forts etc.) and second to distinguish constructed earthworks from natural eruptions in the soil that happen to suit some purpose of man.
The good Captain Ken and I hardly know where to put ourselves. At one moment we have Mrs L, apparently English-born, suggesting that Capability Brown was Irish (note 158), and now, out of an unusually weighty in-box, has slipped a question from Ms M.
Dr G writes from York to ask what evidence there is for Capability Brown’s having started life as a gardener.
Mrs C has written from an address close to the bed of the Solent. Her envelope is a little damp and smeared, but she assures me that hers is a marine villa, being only submarine on the highest of tides.
Mrs L of Harrogate has asked me to remind her about the portrait of Capability Brown said to have been painted by Gainsborough.
A wave of correspondence has broken across the desk of the Brown Advisor on the related subjects of Brown’s social position, flies, tea and cake.