Note 174:B — Chapter VI
Reading edition
"The last May-pole in London was taken down in 1717, and conveyed to Wanstead in Essex, where it was fixed in the Park for the support of an immensely large telescope. Its original height was upwards of one hundred feet above the surface of the ground, and its station on the East side of Somerset-House, where the new church now stands.—Pope thus perpetuates its remembrance:
Amidst the area wide they took their stand, Where the tall May-pole once o'erlook'd the Strand."
Clavis Calendaria, vol. i. p. 318.