The Conservative. (M'connelsville, Ohio) 1866-1871, 1870-08-12
A london "Garden Party

-f From the New York Evening Post
Our London correspondent sends the fol-
lowing account of what is called, in Eng
lish society, a garden party" recently
given at Holland House:
Garden parties are all the rage in Lon
don Just now. The Prince of Wales has
taken the beautiful villa formerly the prop
erty of the late Duke of Devonshire, at
Chiswick, and has been giving a series of
entertainments of this description. Lady
Holland has also begun similar festivities
at her famous mansion at Kensington,
which has for nearly two centuries been
the scene of some of the most brilliant So
cial reunions in Europe.
The first of a series of four took place on
the 9TH instant, when seven hundred
guests, including the cream of intellectual,
political, and fashionable London assem-
bled to enjoy a perfect summer afternoon
beneath the cecars where Addison and
Macaulay loved to hold forth.
There is really nothing in the London
season better worth the seeing Than 'a
breakfast, F." as some old-fashioned folks still
term such a party, at Holland House. Sud-
denly turning out of an ugly street lined
with grimy houses you find yourself driv-
ing up a noble avenue of elms, and pres
emily ''the mansion ITSELF" which is IN
qu~estionably ''vast and venerable" stands
out before you, a monument of a stately
age.
Entering a spacious courtyard, the guest
presently passes into a stately vestibule,
and finds himself in the presence of the
mistress of the mansion, who receives with
an ease and grace rarely attained by Eng
fish ladies, unless they have had the bene-
At of being in continental society. Pro-
ceeding onward, to make way for ther re-
ception of some new arrival, the visitor
finds himself at the great garden entrance,
where he is delighted with an expanse of
velvet lawn, such as we seldom see out of
the British Isles, adorned with majestic ce-
dars.
This, in the earlier part of the afternoon
is the rendezvous, and here, seated or stand
ing Ia brilliant groups, are to be seen the
finest ladies and gentlemen in London in
their bravest attire-for every n is Sin
full feather" on these occasions.
After the first hour the visitors begin to
saunter through the flower garden, gay
with the exquisitely kept parterres, toward
anotherlawn beside a great orangery. Here
are hundreds of seats, while in the orange
nv You find ices and confectionery, upon
which all the skill and science of an italian
confectioner has been exhausted. If we
take a glance around we shall see many
men and women whose names are familiar
to u. The short, keen-looking man, who
is Just slipping a diminutive glassful of
champagne, is Mr.. Hayward, of the Quar-
terly Review, who wrote The Art of Din
ing" and is as critical about matters gas
tTonomic as about matters literary present
" you will see him talking to Lady Clan
- II Al ILL., -, -, o,I,,,
only daughter of the celebrated George
Canning.
A brilliantly attired young lady, whose
appearance strikes you as ''out of COM
mon" is Lady Diana Beauclerk, who has
Nell Gwynne's blood in her veins, for she
is sister OF the Duke of st. Adams. Just
beside her is Lady Mayo, wife of the popu-
lar Viceroy of India. who is spending her
summer in England instead of undergoing
the sweltering heat of Bengal.
"How do you do, Nh. Lowe" says some
body by us, and the Right Hon. Chancel-
lor of the E~xchecquer winks and bushes,
for his eyes do not take kindly to the rays
of the sun, as he turns to reply to his &C
coster. -.
That is Mr.. Delane, the editor of the
Times, who is talking so confidentially to a
Duchess, and that little man with so ami
mated a name is Count StrZelecki, who
has had an extraordinary experience of life
from Australia to Ireland, for he was one of
the pioneers in Australian gold-inding,
and a foremost relief distributor amid the
horrors of the Irish famine in 1S47. He is
a famous diner-out, and has the entree in
numberless good houses. Yet the Counts
early antecedents are much of a mystery.
There is a grand muster of the Corps Di-
plomatique; yonder is Madame d'Apponzi,
the wife of the Austrian Minister, who,
true to the traditions of the Uici cour of
Vienna, gives the selectest of select
balls. Mr.. Motley is talking to a
~savant, and his daughter, Mrs.
Ives, whom Enelishmen admire so much,
is chatting with a German diplomatist in
his own language, which she speaks very
well.
What is the future fate of this grand old
place, whose associations are perhaps rich
er than any mansion in the county of Mid
dlesex? Lord Macaulay wrote of it thirty
years ago:
''The wonderful city which, ancient and
gigantic as it is, still continues to grow as
fast as a young town of lOgwood by a water
privilege in Michigan. May iron displace
those turrets and gardens which are asso-
ciated with so much that is interesting and
noble, with the courtly magnifcence of
Rich; with the loves of Ormond; with the
councils of Cromwell; with the death of
Addison. The time is coming when, per-
haps, a few old men, the last survivors of
our generation, and in vain seek amidst
new streets and squares and railway sta
tons for the site of that dwelling which
was in their youth the favorite resort of
wits and beauties. of painters and poets, of
scholars. philosophers, and statesmen"
Happily there seems at present no cause
to apprehend its destruction. Lady Hol-
land, widow of the last Lord-the title is
extinct-who bequeathed it to her absolute
ly, has a thorough appreciation of the
charge entrusted to her, and is in every
way qualified to sustain the social reputa-
ton of her famous house. Rumor and
speculation are rife about who shall inherit
it from her; but report favors a young
Wing Marquis OF high character, who
bears a name Intimately connected for the
last half century with Holland House, and
whose grandfather was almost as notable
for his graceful Inequalities as the late
Lord Holland-the Marquis of Lansdowne.
$1,000 "---z- D