7. He that in Winter should behold some of our highest hills in Surrey, clad with whole woods of these two last sort of trees, for divers miles in circuit (as in those delicious groves of them, belonging to the Honourable, my noble friend, the late Sir Adam Brown of Bech-worth-Castle, from Box-hill) might without the least violence to his imagination, easily fancy himself transported into some new or enchanted country; for, if any spot of England,
........’Tis here Eternal Spring, and Summer all the year.{ 300:1}
Of which I have already spoken in the former section.
8. But, above all the natural greens which inrich our home-born store, there is none certainly to be compar’d to the _agrifolium_, (or _acuifolium_ rather) our holly so spontaneously growing here in this part of Surrey, that the large vale near my own dwelling, was anciently call’d Holmes-Dale; famous for the flight of the Danes: The inhabitants of great antiquity (in their manners, habits, speech) have a proverb, Holmes-Dale never won; he never shall. It had once a fort, call’d Homes-Dale Castle: I know not whether it might not be that of Rygate; but leaving this uncertain, and return to the plant, I have often wonder’d at our curiosity after foreign plants, and expensive difficulties, to the neglect of the culture of this vulgar, but incomparable tree; whether we will propagate it for use and defence, or for sight and ornament.
A hedge of holly, thieves that would invade, Repulses like a growing palizade; Whose numerous leaves such orient greens invest, As in deep Winter do the Spring arrest.{ 301:1}
Which makes me wonder why it should be reckon’d among the unfortunate trees, by Macrobius, _Sat._ lib. III. cap. 20. others among the lucky; for so it seems they us’d to send branches of it, as well as of oak (the most fortunate, according to the Gentile theology) with their _strenae_ (new-year’s gifts) begun (as Symachus tells us) by K. Tatius, almost as old as Rome her self.
But to say no more of these superstitious fopperies, which are many other about this tree, we still dress up both our churches and houses, on Christmas and other festival days, with this cheerful green and rutilant berries.
9. Is there under heaven a more glorious and refreshing object of the kind, than an impregnable hedge of about four hundred foot in length, nine foot high, and five in diameter; which I can shew in my now ruin’d gardens at Say’s-Court, (thanks to the Czar of Moscovy) at any time of the year, glitt’ring with its arm’d and varnish’d leaves? The taller standards at orderly distances, blushing with their natural coral: It mocks at the rudest assaults of the weather, beasts, or hedge-breakers,