There are no less than four of these rivers, which meet all
together at or near the city of Salisbury; especially the waters of
three of them run through the streets of the city--the Nadder and
the Willy and the Avon--and the course of these three lead us
through the whole mountainous part of the county. The two first
join their waters at Wilton, the shiretown, though a place of no
great notice now; and these are the waters which run through the
canal and the gardens of Wilton House, the seat of that ornament of
nobility and learning, the Earl of Pembroke.
One cannot be said to have seen anything that a man of curiosity
would think worth seeing in this county, and not have been at
Wilton House; but not the beautiful building, not the ancient
trophy of a great family, not the noble situation, not all the
pleasures of the gardens, parks, fountains, hare-warren, or of
whatever is rare either in art or nature, are equal to that yet
more glorious sight of a noble princely palace constantly filled
with its noble and proper inhabitants. The lord and proprietor,
who is indeed a true patriarchal monarch, reigns here with an
authority agreeable to all his subjects (family); and his reign is
made agreeable, by his first practising the most exquisite
government of himself, and then guiding all under him by the rules
of honour and virtue, being also himself perfectly master of all
the needful arts of family government--I mean, needful to make that
government both easy and pleasant to those who are under it, and
who therefore willingly, and by choice, conform to it.
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