The Anatomy of Melancholy

Our gentry in England live mainly in the country—apart from a few castles—always building in hollows, Jovius says, or near woods, “a crown of green trees.” You may recognize a village by a clump of trees in or around it, planted to shelter it from the strong winds that afflict the island and from cold winter blasts.

Some condemn moated houses as unhealthy. Camden says of Ewelme that it was little frequented for this reason, “because of the vapours from the neighbouring pool”; the same objection applies to all places near lakes or rivers. But I think these disadvantages can be reduced or easily corrected by good fires. As one writer reports of Venice, the “foul smell” and fog of the marshes are sufficiently tempered by its innumerable plumes of smoke. Indeed, the eminent physician Thomas Philologus of Ravenna maintains that Venetians generally live longer than the inhabitants of any city in Europe, many reaching 120 years.

But it is not water itself that does so much harm as the slime and offensive smells that accompany flooded places. These occur only at certain times after a flood, and are amply compensated by sweet smells and lovely views in summer. “Spring will paint the meadows, studded with flowers, in varied colours,” with many other advantages of pleasure and profit.

Or the difficulty may be corrected by the site, if it lies some distance from the water, as at Lindley, Orton-on-the-Hill, and Drayton; or a little higher, though nearer to it, as at Caldecote, Amington, Polesworth, and Weddington—to dwell on places best known to me, on the River Anker in Warwickshire—and Swarkestone and Drakelow on the Trent. However unsuitable they may be in winter or at certain times, they serve well in summer.

If their means are too limited to allow such variety, and they must decide once for all and make one house serve every season, I know no writers who have given better rules on this subject than those who write on husbandry. Cato and Columella advise that a good house should stand beside a navigable river and good roads, near a city and on good soil; but that serves convenience more than health.

The best soil commonly produces the worst air. A dry, sandy plot is best for building, preferably hilly rather than level, full of downs—a Cotswold landscape—since it offers the greatest advantages for hawking, hunting, woods, waters, and every kind of pleasure.

Périgord in France is barren, yet because of its excellent air and the pleasures it offers, many of the nobility live there, as at Nuremberg in Germany and Toledo in Spain. Our countryman Tusser will tell us as much: open-field country is for profit, woodland for pleasure and health. The former commonly has deep clay, and is therefore unhealthy in winter and liable to bad roads; the latter is dry land.