2-982-612 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

Swift's Cottage, Moor Park, Surrey - from a photograph by Mr. Liddiard, of Farnham, 1858. 'In the neighbourhood of Waverley Abbey is Moor Park, amongst the prominent objects of interest of which is the cottage where Swift used to sleep when he resided here with Sir William Temple. It is on the roadside, at the extremity of the park, near the Waverley gate, with a little garden before it, and bears an inscription over the door suitable to its one great literary memory; the said inscription struggling for notice with an announcement in the window which informs the thirsty passer-by that he may procure lemonade or ginger-beer within. It was in this place Swift first saw Stella, the daughter of Sir William Temple's steward, Johnson. Temple died at Moor Park in 1698; and near the east end of the house is the sun-dial under which, according to his own request, his heart was buried in a silver box, "in the garden where he used to contemplate and admire the works of nature with his beloved sister, the Lady Giffard...Sir William's secretary was Jonathan Swift. Lady Giffard's waiting-maid was poor Stella".' From "Illustrated London News", 1858.