Stranica 40 [40]
THE VAA MESS RIVER (SP RANTA TION BELT
phoenix, the golden spur and Lady of Leeds in proper succession.
No one knows just who it was who planted the multi-great-grand¬
parents of this present wealth of jonguils which mantlé Bassett
Hall in a robe of gold in April as year follows year.
So profligate have they become in number, so far-spreading
have they-.gone, that the right has been given the Williamsburg
Civic League to take from them enough bulbs to naturalize on the
esplanade which extends along Duke of Gloucester Street.
Along the path which leads from the lane to the house, a chain
of cowslips links the present to the past, and fragrant lilies stand
together like angels in a dream. Bassett Hall is, in truth, the
envied possessor of what many of us dream of, but few fortunates
possess—'‘a lily avenue climbing to the doors.”’
Adjoining this lawn is the former home of Peyton Randolph,
Speaker of the House of Burgesses and President of the Con¬
tinental Congress. The acreage here has dwindled with the years
and the garden has given way to modern needs of a town, but the
same staunch bulbs return season after season. And in August,
when the grass is brown and the leaves are withering, masses of
tiny purple lilies hold up their crowns in loyalty to the first master
of the home.
Just across the street is the Gault house, built just when, and by
whom, no one knows, but rich in its historic lore and legend.
At the Thompson house, on Nicholson Street, Patrick Henry
lived when he practiced law in Williamsburg. One of its tiny
—attic windows, the outlook from which is now so restful, was once
the scene of frenzied watching against Indian depredations. There
is, perhaps, more of a formal garden at this particular place than
anywhere else in the little town. Box clumps are scattered here
and there among lilacs and snowballs and the early flowering shrub
yellow jessamine. Violets and narcissi; iris and ionquils; lilies—
the pure Madonna and the tigerish Jamestown lily. The yellow
Rose of Texas, known better as the Harrisonti, blooms above beds
of bloodroot and hepatica brought from the woodland beyond.
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