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HiIsToRiIcC GARDENS OF VIRGINIA
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ried Judith, the daughter of William Shakespeare. He left his
share of the property to his great-nephew, Robert Richardson, who
sold it, in 1720, to Nathaniel Harrison (1677-1727), of Wake¬
held, Surry County.
Brandon was next inherited by Nathaniel Harrison II, and
the present house, or its original part, was built by him in 1735,
and subsequently grew, with its various generations and needs, until
it spread its wings almost across the lawn. Some of the most
distinguished Virginians were born within its walls, and many more
have been sheltered under its hospitable roof.
A wide space of open green is left just in front of the door,
and from the steps of the porch there stretches a double line of box
across the front of the house on both sides. The double line con¬
tinues down each side of the front grounds for about four hundred
feet, where it joins enormous bowers and hedges of lilac which
lead out from the main grounds to more secluded arbors and
garden houses. I[hese ancient box-hedges have grown far past all
expectations of the original planter, and have assumed queer shapes,
gnarled and twisted, each more beautiful than the other, and they
have furnished days of endless pleasure for the many little children
who have played “house”’ on the velvety brown carpet under their
soft green boughs. The grass walk, about fifteen feet in width,
leads down to the river, the vista of which is one of the most beau¬
tiful on the James.
It is wild and wide, and takes one back to the days when the
Indians fled in their canoes from the white settlers. Though
Jamestown was a thriving settlement, with a House of Burgesses
in session in 1619, the Indians still held for themselves the kingdom
of James River. We feel this historic fact at Brandon today.
On either side of the garden walk from the open green to the
river, a distance of some two hundred yards, there is a continuation
of fine old specimens of spiraea, syringa, weigela, calycanthus, crepe
myrtle, forsythia, japonica, lilac, corchrous, or rock rose, and snow¬
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