Tuesday 25th August 2026

Like all high-level Socialists, Herbert Morrison enjoys access to the best houses. Egalitarian instincts dissolve instantly if the Quality are at hand.

Our first visit was to a large house and grounds outside a town. Not quite Rosings… more like Hartfield. Money purred quietly in the background, its source and quantity unproclaimed. There was an exhibition of ceramics in the ground floor rooms. As you know, I don’t like anything modern but these were exquisite – ghostly impressions of specialist Japanese rope work, strange flora rendered in ceramic and so on.

We toured the grounds. Repton thought to have had a hand. Grand lake and trees. The lake had an island. ‘Is that where you’ll be buried?’ I inquired of the lady owner. Royston King later condemned this approach to conversation. But I was well-pleased. The intention was to recall the opening episode of Coronation Street, the soap opera in which Ena Sharples says to the shop-keeper, ‘Where you bein’ buried?’ The reply: ‘I hadn’t rightly thought…’ ‘Well, you should… ‘

We went on privately to Wolterton Hall, a mansion built for Horatio Walpole, Sir Robert Walpole’s brother. Purely by coincidence I was later to meet the couple who restored this house from 2016 at Abraham Rosings’ spectacular Bordeaux chateau for August. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: it’s a small world when you’re at the top.

For some reason, members of the public were at the Hall.. but we’ll overlook that. I was dripping with excitement on arrival because I realised I’d seen this Hall on Instagram looking superb as to contents and restored interior. But it was disappointing: dead. A display of horrible modern sculpture installed. The couple from 2016 sold up in 2023 to a local businessman. Something has gone wrong.

The Glory was the outside: by Thomas Ripley, of the early 18th century. What a mansion. What a block. Squares, rectangles and triangles: that’s all it takes. And four urns. Only the Coat of Arms in the pediment swirls. The stone arcade at the lower level was added later. Probably it shouldn’t have been.

The setting is one of those as-far-as-the-eye-can-see sweeping all before sweeping statements of ownership – with a lake.