Stranica 49 [49]
HISTORIC GARDENS OF VIRGINIA
garden, however, centers about the tree-box, which in quantity and
quality, ranks with the finest in the south.
When the grounds for the Jamestown Exposition were being
laid off, in 1906, the owner of Tedington was offered four thousand
dollars for the boxwood, but the trees had fastened their hold on
their latter-day master, and the offer was declined. “Today these
trees and lines of boxwood rear their heads as proudly as of yore.
The widow of William Howell Lightfoot married John Minge,
Esquire, and their daughter, Sarah Melville, married Robert
Bolling, of Petersburg, Virginia.
An interesting description of a Christmas at Tedington, by
Charles Campbell, the Virginia historian, presents to the reader
of today a vivid picture of the season of gifts on an old James
River plantation in ante-bellum days. Ihe letter is dated Ieding¬
ton, Christmas, 1841, and reads, in part, as follows:
‘Rainy Sunday. In the drawing-room at Iledington, three
sisters, descendants of Pocahontas [evidently the Misses Bolling],
Alice, Virginia and Rosalina; Miranda from an Italian city famous
for its pictures and palaces. Five darkies put off in a rowboat to
meet the river boat. en more ladies ie the party, afterwards
breakfast.
“Breakfast: Buttermilk rolls, Sally eel hominy. Prenala
and Miranda ride with two gentlemen, Farrel and Racket. Ground
half frozen. The cows stand close together in cowpen, stoically
chewing their cuds; several little mules are huddled up in their
shed eating their fodder; flocks of wild geese are flying over the
broad wheat fields, reiterating their ‘cohonk,’ ‘cohonk,’ as they
disappear from sight. Later, the ladies are firing ‘poppees,’ in the
dining-room. | |
— “Dinner: Ham of bacon—in Virginia, sine qua non. With¬
out it we cannot organize or take any parliamentary action. Ham
of mutton (Napoleon’s favorite), a venison with jelly, oysters
(Back River), stewed and baked, a huge round of beef, potatoes,
Hibernians and sweet, salsify, hominy, celery, .and cauliflower.
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