Contributor: Mandy

Reverend William Gilpin 1724 to 1804

Reverend William Gilpin was an artist, a headmaster and an author. He developed and wrote about his ideas on the ‘picturesque’ in relation to landscapes in a popular 1768 Essay on Prints as “that kind of beauty which is agreeable in a picture”. He travelled extensively drawing and creating watercolours and writing notes about the landscapes he visited which were subsequently made into etchings by his nephew and which were printed alongside his written observations.

He moved to the New Forest and became the vicar of Boldre c.1777. In 1791 the following book was published, there are several copies at the Christopher Tower reference library in the New Forest Heritage Centre, Lyndhurst.

Remarks On Forest Scenery, And Other Woodland Views : (Relative Chiefly To Picturesque Beauty) Illustrated By The Scenes Of New-Forest In Hampshire; In Three Books. Vol. 2

The following is an extract on his observations of Lepe and nearby area from the book:

To an injudicious person, or one who delights in temples, and Chinese bridges, very little would appear executed in the scenes I have described at Exbury. There is scarce a gravel-walk made: no pavilion raised; nor even a white-seat fixed. And yet in fact, Page  188 more is done, than if all these decorations, and a hundred others, had been added, unaccompanied with what has been done. The greatest difficulty of all is surmounted—that of laying out a judicious plan. The rest, tho the most ostensible, because the most expensive, is only a little mechanical fi∣nishing.

From these pleasing scenes we pursued our journey through part of the beautiful ride we have just described to Leap, along lanes close on the left, but opening to the right in various places, to the river, which assumes a magnificent form. Needsore-point makes here an appearance very different from what it made when we navigated the mouth of Beaulieu-river*. It appears now from the higher grounds, when the tide is low, to run at least a league into the sea; flat, unadorned, and skirted with drifted sand; making a singular feature in all these views; and the more so, as every part of the ground in it’s Page  189 neighbourhood is woody, bold, and prominent. This peninsula, of which Needsore point is the termination, belongs to the manor of Beaulieu. It contains some good land; consisting chiefly of pasturage; and the whole of it is let out in a single farm.

In this remote part, it is supposed, somewhere near Exbury, the Dauphin, after his fruitless expedition to England, embarked privately on the death of king John, for France; burning the country behind him as he fled. His embarkation, from so obscure a place, shews, in a strong light, how much his hopes were humbled.

At Leap we met the sea, where the coast of the isle of Wight, as far as to Spithead on the left, makes nearly the same unpicturesque appearance, which it does from the other shores of the forest. It extends into length, and exhibits neither grandeur, nor variety. When it is seen, as we saw it from Mr. Mitford’s, broken into parts, as it should Page  190 always be, when seen to picturesque advantage*, it afforded several beautiful distances. But here, when the whole coast was displayed at once, it lost it’s picturesque form.— Near Leap however we had one very beautiful coast-view. A rising copse on the left, adorned with a road winding through it, makes a good fore-ground. From thence a promontory, in the second distance, with an easy, sweeping shore, shoots into the sea; and is opposed, on the opposite side, by a point of the island, leaving a proper proportion of water to occupy the middle space.

Leap is one of the port-towns of the forest: and as it lies opposite to Cowes, it is the common place of embarkation, in these parts, to the island. It consists of about half a dozen houses: and shelters perhaps as many fishing-boats. All the coast indeed from St. Helen’s to the Needles, and around the island is in peaceable times, a scene of fishing. In the whiting-season especially, fleets of twenty or thirty boats are often seen lying at anchor on the banks; or a little out at sea.

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Page  191Fowling too is practised, on this coast, as much as fishing. Numerous flocks of wild-fowl frequent it, in the winter; widgeons, geese, and ducks: and in the beginning of the season especially, as they bear a price in the country, they of course attract the notice of the fowler. As the coast between Hampshire and the isle of Wight is a peculiar species of coast, consisting, when the tide ebbs, of vast muddy flats, covered with green sea-weed, it gives the fowler an opportunity of practising arts perhaps practised no where else.

Fowling and fishing, indeed on this coast, are commonly the employments of the same person. He who in summer, with his line, or his net, plies the shores, when they are overflowed by the tide; in winter, with his gun, as evening draws on, runs up, in his boat, among the little creeks, and crannies, which the tide leaves in the mud-lands; and there lies in patient expectation of his prey.

Sea-fowl commonly feed by night, when in all their multitudes they come down to graze on the savannahs of the shore. As the sonorous cloud advances, (for their noise in the air resembles a pack of hounds in full cry) the attentive fowler listens, which way they bend Page  192 their course. Perhaps he has the mortification to hear them alight at too great a distance for his gun (tho of the longest barrel) to reach them. And if he cannot edge his boat a little round some winding creek, which it is not always in his power to do, he despairs of success that night.—Perhaps however he is more fortunate, and has the satisfaction to hear the airy noise approach nearer; till at length, the host settles on some plain, on the edge of which his little boat lies moored. He now, as silently as possible, primes both his pieces anew, (for he is generally double-armed) and listens with all his attention. It is so dark that he can take no aim: for if he could see the birds, they also could see him; and being shy, and timorous in a great degree, would seek some other pasture. Though they march with music, they feed in silence. Some indistinct noises however, if the night be still, issue from so large a host. He directs his piece therefore, as well as he can, towards the sound; gives his fire at a venture; and instantly catching up his other gun, gives a second discharge, where he supposes the flock to rise on the wing.—His gains for the night are now decided; and he has only to gather his harvest. Page  193 He immediately puts on his mud-pattens, ignorant yet of his success, and goes groping about in the dark, happy if he have a little star-light, in quest of his booty, picking up perhaps a dozen, and perhaps not one.—So hardly does the poor fowler earn a few shillings; exposed, in an open boat, during a solitary winter-night, to the weather as it comes, rain, hail, or snow, on a bleak coast, a league perhaps from the beach, and often in danger, without great care, of being fixed in the mud; where he would become an inevitable prey to the returning tide. I have heard one of these poor fellows say, he never takes a dog with him on these expeditions, because no dog could bear the cold, which he is obliged to suffer.—After all, perhaps others enjoy more from his labours, than he himself does; for it often happens, that the tide, next day, throws, on different parts of the shore, many of the birds, which he had killed, but could not find in the night.

I have heard of an unhappy fowler, whom this hazardous occupation led into a case of Page  194 still greater distress. In the day time too it happened, which shews the double danger of such expeditions in the night.—Mounted on his mud-pattens, he was traversing one of these mudland-plains in quest of ducks; and being intent only on his game, he suddenly found the waters, which had been brought forward with uncommon rapidity by some peculiar circumstance of tide, and current, had made an alarming progress around him. Incumbered as his feet were, he could not exert much expedition; but to whatever part he ran, he found himself compleatly invested by the tide. In this uncomfortable situation, a thought struck him, as the only hope of safety. He retired to that part of the plain, which seemed the highest from it’s being yet uncovered by water; and striking the barrel of his gun, (which for the purpose of shooting wild-fowl was very long) deep into the mud, he resolved to hold fast by it, as a support, as well as a security against the waves; and to wait the ebbing of the tide. A common tide, he had reason to believe, would not, in that place, ave reached above his middle: but as this was a spring-tide, and brought in with so strong a current, he durst hardly expect so Page  195 favourable a conclusion.—In the mean time, the water making a rapid advance, had now reached him. It covered the ground, on which he stood—it rippled over his feet—it gained his knees—his waist—button after button was swallowed up—till at length it advanced over his very shoulders. With a palpitating heart, he gave himself up for lost. Still however he held fast by his anchor. His eye was eagerly in search of some boat, which might accidentally take it’s course that way: but none appeared. A solitary head, floating on the water, and that sometimes covered by a wave, was no object to be descried from the shore, at the distance of half a league: nor could he exert any sounds of distress, that could be heard so far.—While he was thus making up his mind, as the exigence would allow, to the terrors of sudden destruction, his attention was called to a new object. He thought he saw the uppermost button of his coat begin to appear. No mariner, floating on a wreck, could behold a cape at sea, with greater transport, than he did the uppermost button of his coat. But the fluctuation of the water was such, and the turn of the tide so slow, that it was yet some time before he durst venture to Page  196 assure himself, that the button was fairly above the level of the flood. At length however a second button appearing at intervals, his sensations may rather be conceived, than described; and his joy gave him spirits and resolution, to support his uneasy situation four or five hours longer, till the waters had fully retired.

A little beyond Leap we were interrupted by a creek, which, when the tide flows high, runs considerably into the land, and forms a large piece of water. At all times it is an extensive marsh. It’s borders are edged with rushes, and sedges, which grow profusely also on various, little rough islands on it’s surface. Here the wild-duck, and the widgeon find many a delightful cover; amidst which they breed, and rear their young, in great abundance.

Near this part of the coast stands Lutterel’s tower; built as the station of a view: but as it is intended for a habitable house likewise, the offices, which it could not contain, Page  197 are constructed of canvas around it. It is finished in the highest stile of expence; and if it were not for the oddness, and singularity of the conception, and contrivance, it is not intirely destitute of some kind of taste. But the building is so whimsical, and the end so inadequate to the expence, that we considered it, on the whole, as a glaring contrast to those pleasing scenes, we had just examined at Exbury; in which true taste had furnished us with a delightful entertainment at a trifling expence^*.

The view, which this tower commands over the circumjacent country, is very extensive; but it’s sea-view is most admired, stretching from the bay of Southampton to Portsmouth—form thence to St. Helen’s— and on the other side, all along the range of the isle of Wight, and beyond the Needles to the ocean. The whole together forms the appearance of a magnificent bay; of which Spithead, and St. Helen’s, (where there is commonly a fleet at anchor) make the central part.

Page  198But this view, like the other extensive views we have seen, is by no means picturesque. It might have been supposed, that the isle of Wight (on surveying it’s appearance in a map) would have made such an angle at Cowes-point, which is nearly opposite to this tower, as would have thrown the eastern part of the island into better perspective, than the western assumes from any part of the Hampshire coast. And so indeed in some degree it does. But the eye is at too great a distance to get much advantage from this circumstance. If the spectator were carried nearer Cowes, the coast towards St. Helen’s might then fall away in good perspective. But at this distance all is sea; the coast is a mere thread; and the whole view together is without proportion.

And yet it is not merely the disproportion between land and water, which disqualifies a view of this kind in a picturesque light. A picturesque view may consist intirely of water.—Nor is it distance, which disqualifies it. The most remote distances are happily introduced on canvas. But what chiefly disqualifies it, is the want of fore-ground to balance this vast expanse of distance. Page  199 Unless distances and fore-grounds are in some degree, balanced, no composition can be good. Fore-grounds are essential to landscape: distances are not.

A picturesque view, as was observed, may consist chiefly, indeed intirely, of water: but then, it is supposed, that, as there cannot be a natural fore-ground, an artificial one must be obtained—a group of ships—a few boats with figures—a light-house—or something, that will make a balance between near and distant objects. Such were the sea-pieces of Vandervelt; in which vessels of some kind were always introduced to make an artificial fore-ground. We sometimes indeed meet with amusing views, such as that celebrated one at Hack-fall in Yorkshire^*, where there is a gradual proportion among the different parts of the retiring landscape: we can scarce distinguish where the fore-grounds end, and where the distance begins: yet still there are objects nearer the eye, which, in a degree set off the retiring parts, tho they may not be fully proportioned to them. But the most Page  200 advanced parts of water cannot form a fore-ground, if I may so speak. It wants, on it’s nearest parts, that variety of objects, which receiving strong impressions of light, and shade, are necessary to give it consequence, and strength. It turns all into distance. Such is the view before us over the channel, and along the shores of the isle of Wight. To the imagination it is the simple idea of grandeur: to the eye, a mere exhibition of distance.

Besides, there is not only a want of natural proportion and balance between the fore-ground, and the offskip; but a fore-ground here could not even artificially be obtained, because of the loftiness of the point. Take the same view from a lower stand; from the level of the sea for instance, or a little higher, where you may sta

tion a group of ships, the masts and sails of which rise above the horizon; and by thus giving the view a proper, and proportioned fore-ground, you may turn it into one of Vandervelt’s compositions, and give it picturesque beauty.

But tho the view before us is not picturesque; it is certainly, as we observed of Page  [unnumbered]

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Page  201those other views over the island^*, in a great degree, amusing. The whole area, constantly overspread with vessels of various kinds, is a perpetual moving scene: while the naked eye discovers, in the distance, a thousand objects; and through a telescope a thousand more. Tho the telescopic pleasures of the eye are very little allied to the pleasures of the painter, they still assist the amusement.— The cliff, on which this tower stands, is about forty or fifty feet high; and is formed into a terrace, which runs a considerable way along the beach.

About a mile from this whimsical building stands Calshot-castle; situated like the castle of Hurst, on a tongue of land shooting into the sea. Calshot is another of those ancient coast-castles, which Henry VIII built, out of the spoils of the abbeys. It was originally intended as a safeguard to the bay of Southampton.—The views here are of the same nature as those at Lutterel’s tower.