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land, went to the youngest son, Richard Taylor, who sold it, and
for the first time the estate reverted to an outsider, Mr. Smith, who,
in turn, sold Fall Hill to Colonel Hellier.
In 1909, upon the death of Colonel Hellier, Fall Hill came into
the possession of the original family again, through Captain Mur¬
ray Taylor, eldest son of Dr. Taylor. At the present time, his
daughter, Mrs. Bessie Forbes Robinson, is chatelaine of the old
place, which descends by entail to her daughter, Butler Brayne
Thornton Robinson.
Though the garden, which suffered cruelly during the war, has
been replaced to a great extent by modern shrubs and vines, the
steep terraces. and the thousands of naturalized jonquils, which
make them glitter like gold in the spring, give a very good idea
of what the spot once was. The driveway around the grass circle
in front of the house is still lavishly bordered with jonquils, and
ends at an old-fashioned stone carriage block quarried at Fall Hill.
Mrs. Charles Selden, daughter of Dr. and Mrs. J. R. Taylor,
who once lived there, says of the old garden: “A broad gravel
walk once led from the carriage block to the house, and from
there followed the course of the lawn overlooking the Rappa¬
hannock River. ‘The terraces which fall from the front of the
house are bordered with jonquils of many varieties, and thousands
of dattodils grow in large beds under many of the trees on the lawn.
“On the first terrace, which begins at the brow of the hill, some
of the trees which once stood there are still left, though the trellises
and arbors, covered with roses and Virginia creeper, that were at
one time scattered over the lawn, have disappeared.
‘Extending through the original flower garden at the rear of
the house was a wide gravel path, bordered with masses of cow¬
slips and hyacinths which bloomed beneath spiraea, pyrus japonica
and magnolia conspicua. Microphyllae and damask roses were
also in these borders, and beyond them were large beds of hundred¬
leaf roses.”
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