Wider, but equally steep steps lead between drunken mounds of lavender and arrive close to the thickly clothed pillars and roofbeams of the Peto-esque pergola. Wisteria, vines and clematis fill the air with mad curls.Either route will eventually lead you to the centrepiece of this part of the garden. Down below, is Mapperton’s great surprise: a superb formal garden with terraces, pool, pergola and yew topiary.It’s completely hidden until you get to the lip of the lawn and must once have been part of the original 17th-century garden. Less is more…” It hasn’t worked yet, but I’m still hoping.On the lawn, you are at the same level as the cattle and the sheep grazing in the rough pasture that rises steeply on the other side of the valley. Restraint is one of the most difficult skills to acquire as a gardener and every time I see this tree, I mutter the mantra, “Less is more.

Wisteria, magnolia, garrya and ceanothus all benefit from their shelter, but the thing you most notice here is the magnificent multi- stemmed Acer griseum, planted in the corner made by a projecting wing of the house. Sometimes, the whole enclosed square swims with the smell of tobacco flowers thickly planted in the beds.A path leads off to the left to bring you round the house and out on to a massive lawn, surrounded by tall walls. Six drums of clipped bay lead through the entrance court to the front door of the house. To the right, a medieval church, All Saints, shuts off the courtyard to the south.

But sitting on the edge of the great lawn to the north of the house, gazing over the garden hidden in the valley below, you want the world to stop, there and then.It reveals its delights slowly and elegantly. The drive leads you down past a handsome stable range of the mid-17th century, set at right-angles to the house. Opposite this is the entrance to the garden, dominated by lead eagles perched on top of the gate piers. You won’t find here the blazing herbaceous borders considered de rigueur in old country houses. Mapperton doesn’t try to show off with collections of rare or stylish plants.

Tranquillity.
In May, the place I go to find that is Mapperton, near Beaminster in Dorset. It starred recently as the setting for the BBC’s remake of Tom Jones, but, at heart, it’s a quiet garden, with none of the great set- pieces that star gardens usually have. As a Hindu leaves his shoes at the entrance to the temple, you temporarily cast off life’s grubbier aspects and float. The gardens I most value are those where you feel, quite palpably, that by passing through the garden gate, you step into a different world, one that has nothing to do with anger, frustration or sorrow. She was thinking of the subject from an owner’s point of view, but her definition fits what some garden visitors look for, too.