Playford Hall is considered, I think, the oldest of the fortified
houses in England, and is, I am told, the only one that has water in
the moat. The water which is seen girdling the wall, in the picture,
is the moat: it surrounds the place entirely, leaving no access except
across the bridge, which is here represented.
After crossing this bridge, you come into a green court yard filled
with choice plants and flowering shrubs, and carpeted with that thick,
soft, velvet-like grass which is to be found nowhere else in so
perfect a state as in England.
The water is fed by a perpetual spring, whose current is so sluggish
as scarcely to be perceptible, but which yet has the vitality of a
running stream.
It has a dark and glassy stillness of surface, only broken by the
forms of the water plants, whose leaves float thickly over it.
The walls of the moat are green with ancient moss, and from the
crevices springs an abundant flowering vine, whose delicate leaves and
bright yellow flowers in some places entirely mantle the stones with
their graceful drapery.
[Illustration: _of Playford Hall._]
The picture I have given you represents only one side of the moat.
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