THE LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA PRESENTED BY PROF. CHARLES A. KOFOID AND MRS. PRUDENCE W. KOFOID BY THE SAME AUTHOR, Dedicated by Special Permission to Her Most Gracious Majesty the Queen. THE HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT PALACE VOL.1. IN TUDOR TIMES (Pp. 376). Second Edition. VOL. II. IN STUART TIMES (Pp. 312). VOL. III. IN ORANGE AND GUELPH TIMES (Pp. 566). Price One Ctiinea each. Profusely illustrated with 220 Engravings^ Etchings, Maps and Plans. Small d^o. OPINIONS OF THE PRESS. • • Although Mr. Law's narrative is based upon patient archeeological investi- gations, he has succeeded in avoiding all dulness of detail, and has presented us with a succession of vivid pictures of courtly life in England under the rule of the magnificent Tudors." — The Times. " He possesses a rare faculty for unearthing from dusty piles of old manu- scripts and faded parchments, facts and fancies relating to Hampton Court, that under his magic touch form themselves into the shape and sequence of a con- tinuous story. ... He makes the very walls to speak and the stones to cry out, and he marshals his incidents and arranges his figures with consummate skilL Mr. Law's book occupies a position of unique importance." — Morning Post. " It is seldom that one comes across so satisfactory a combination of research and recital. . . . Mr. Law has spared no pains in the collection of facts, and shown no little skill in his treatment of them." — The Academy. " Mr. Law's work, by adding the charm of historical association to so many nooks and corners of the buildings, has greatly increased the pleasure of a visit." — Saturday Review. "A story which reads like the stately portions of ' Kenilworth' — a splendid record of royal banqueting and processions, of princely extravagances, of the romance that accompanies even the ceremony of Court life, of secret happen- ings and dark tragedies, true things stranger than fiction." — Literary World. " Tastefully got up, pleasantly written, and hberally illustrated." — Spectator. " Claims the particular gratitude of the antiquarian, the architect, and the historical reader." — Daily Telegraph. " Picturesque and stately as was the sketch of the Tudor Times, the second volume gives a no less imposing view of the Stuarts." — Daily Chronicle. " Mr. Law's pages seem to glow with purple and gold ; and if mere words would dazzle, this description of Wolsey's life at Hampton Court would throw the rest of the book into obscurity." — St. Javics's Gazette, " A model of all that a book of the sort should be. . . . Mr. Law has no small historical gift. ... He tells us facts, not tiresomely, but covering their dry bones with the clothing of pleasant gossip. " — Pall Mall Gazette. ' ' The charming manner in which the author avoids dulness and long-winded- ness ; the thorough mastery of the subjects, architectural and archaeological, discussed throughout, render it very readable. . . . The book may be regarded as a very model." — Vanity Fair. " It is scarcely possible to praise too highly the skill and industry which Mr. Law has given to his task. . . . The narrative has all the interest of a romance. . . . Well written, admirably illustrated, and excellently printed, the book is one which it is a pleasure to read and a pleasure to x>vii\se."— Graphic. "A work of great historic and artistic interest and importance." — The World. "No dull pages in the book." — The Scotsman. " A delightful hook."— Manchester Guardian. " Good and scholarly work." — The Guardian. " A carefully and brightly written narrative." — Illustrated London News. " The work is altogether one of absorbing interest." — The Queen. " Brimful of interest." — Court Journal. " Vastly more interesting than most good novels." — The Magazine of Art. *' A really delightful history." — The Bookseller. " Full of curious information and personal anecdote." — Surrey Comet. " A most interesting record of a most interesting building." — The Builder. " The work has been thoroughly well done. . . . Mr. Law has proved him- self admirably qualified for his important task. He has brought to the work all the industry and patience, the accurate habits and conscientious care necessaiy for a record of this kind. ... A vast amount of valuable material has thus been brought together, and, what is more, so well arranged and sifted as to form a vivid and picturesque narrative of Hampton Court from first to last. " — Church Quarterly. "To say that this history is interesting would be doing it less than justice. It is a work of high value as well, and will take rank amongst those which the historian of any reign, from Henry VIII. to Victoria, will naturally turn to for information, and from which he will seldom fail to derive material assistance in his own researches." — Glasgow Herald. "The interest of Mr. Law's volumes is historical, picturesque and anti- quarian. To all classes of readers it thus makes appeal. An animated panorama of history is laid before us, the details given being those precisely of which 'your orthodox historian ' is most chary." — Notes and Queries. LONDON : GEORGE BELL AND SONS, YORK HOUSE, PORTUGAL STREET, W.C. V- A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT HENRY VIII. AT THE AGE OF FORTY-FIVE. (After the Portrait at Hampton Court, probably by an Italian Artist.) From a p hotograph by Messrs. Wm. M. Spcotur and Co. A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT BY ERNEST LAW, B.A., F.S.A. BARRISTER-AT-LAW; AUTHOR OF "THE HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT PALACE;" **THE ROYAL GALLERY OF HAMPTON COURT;" ** HOLBEIN's AND VANDYCK's PICTURES AT WINDSOR CASTLE ;" "KENSINGTON PALACE, THE BIRTHPLACE OF QUEEN VICTORIA;" ETC. WITH NUMEROUS ILLUSTRATIONS SECOND EDITION LONDON: GEORGE BELL AND SONS IQ06 '7^r PREFACE. THIS volume has been compiled from the author's larger works with the view of affording a con- tinuous narrative of events, and a picture of life at Hampton Court, during the four centuries of its history, in such a compact and compendious form, and at so moderate a price, as to bring it within the range and means of the general reader. Consequently, while all that seemed essential to this object has been reproduced in the present book, much topographical detail and many discussions on questions of art and archaeology, which occupy a con- siderable space in "The History of Hampton Court Palace," in three quarto volumes, have necessarily been either greatly abbreviated, or altogether omitted. Likewise it has been thought superfluous to give hjifz^ n^ r^^ VI PREFACE. here any authorities or references, or to cumber the pages with notes and appendices, all of which, being furnished in ample detail in the larger works, can be easily consulted therein by anyone seeking fuller in- formation. The favourable reception accorded by the press and the public to the author's previous volumes, and the considerable demand which continues to be made for them, encourage the hope that this " Short History of Hampton Court," designed as it is for a more extended class of readers, may equally meet with public approval. CONTENTS. I. II. III. IV. V. VI. VII. VIII. IX. X. XI. XII. XIII. XIV. XV. XVI. XVII. XVIII. XIX. XX. XXI. XXII. XXIII. XXIV. XXV. XXVI. PAGE Cardinal Wolsey at Hampton Court ... i Decoration and Furniture of Wolsey's Palace 20 Cardinal Wolsey's Magnificence 35 Henry VIII. at Home 55 Anne Boleyn and Jane Seymour T] Anne of Cleves, Catherine Howard, and Catherine Parr 103 Edward VI. and the Protector Somerset . 112 Queen Mary, King Philip, and the Princess Elizabeth 122 Reconciliation of Mary and Elizabeth . . 128 Queen Elizabeth at Home 137 Queen Elizabeth's Conferences and Enter- tainments 147 James I.'s Christmas Entertainments ... 160 James I.'s Amusements 181 Charles I.'s Quarrel with his Queen ... 201 Charles I. as King and Captive 212 Charles I.'s Escape from Hampton Court . 227 The Commonwealth. Hampton Court for Sale 237 Oliver Cromwell's Private Life at Hampton Court 243 The Restoration. Honeymoon of Charles II. AND his Wife 258 Charles II. 's Disagreement with his Wife . 270 Hampton Court under Charles II. and James II 285 William and Mary at Hampton Court . . 289 Queen Mary at Home in her new Palace . 300 King William's Works and Improvements . 322 William HI. in his new Palace — Further Works 333 William III. 's Declining Health and Death . 339 Vlll CONTENTS. CHAP. PAGE XXVII. Queen Anne at Hampton Court. " The Rape OF the Lock" 351 XXVIII. George I. at Hampton Court 359 XXIX. Court Life under George II 373 XXX. Hampton Court during the Reign of George III. — THE Palace divided into Private Apartments 380 XXXI. Hampton Court during the Reigns of George IV. and William IV 388 XXXII. Queen Victoria— Hampton Court as a Popular Resort 393 Index 411 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. PAGE Henry VIII. at the Age of Forty-five Frontispiece Great Elm Tree in the Home Park known as the ** Two Sisters," or " King Charles's Swing 3 Bird's-Eye View of Hampton Court, showing the extent of Wolsey's Palace 7 West Front of Wolsey's Palace 9 Gable. From Wolsey's West Front 11 Entrance to Katharine of Arragon's Rooms 13 The Master Carpenter's Court on the North Side of the First Court of Wolsey's Palace 15 Entrance to the North Wing of the Palace, leading to the Offices . 17 The First Green Court, with the Cupolas restored 21 Arms of Cardinal Wolsey 23 Cardinal Wolsey's Closet 24 One of Cardinal Wolsey's Rooms 25 Decorative Frieze in Cardinal Wolsey's Closet 26 Oriel Window in Wolsey's P'irst Green Court 27 Wolsey's oak-panelled Room in the Clock Court 31 Cardinal Wolsey in Bed 32 Cardinal Wolsey's Arms as Archbishop of York 33 Cardinal Wolsey 39 Wolsey's Low Gallery, on the Ground Floor of the South Range, in the First Court 41 Cardinal Wolsey in Progress 43 Seizure of the Cardinal's Goods 51 Henry VIII. and Anne Boleyn, sending tokens of Goodwill to the sick Cardinal 53 Lead Water-spout, put up by Henry VIII 57 Back Court, by the Great Kitchen 65 View of one of the old Offices in Henry VIII. 's Palace .... 67 The Great Kitchen 71 Entrance to Henry VIII. 's Cellars under the Hall and Great Watching Chamber 73 Old Lattice Window, with Ventilators of perforated Lead ... 75 Anne Boleyn's Gateway • .... 78 Anne Boleyn 79 Exterior of the Great Hall. From the Clock Court 81 Great Bay Window on the Dais in the Great Hall 83 The Great Hall. From the Dais 85 Jane Seymour 87 View of the old East Front of Hampton Court Palace, as finished by Henry Vm. Zc) X LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. PAGE The Chapel. 91 Carrying of Prince Edward to the Font 92 The Chapel Doorway 93 The Clock Court, as it appeared in the reign of Henry VIII. . . 95 The Ghost of Mrs. Penn, Edward VI. 's Nurse 99 The Chapel Court, as seen from Prince Edward's (Edward VI.) Lodgings loi View from the River Thames of the old Palace of Hampton Court, as finished by Henry VII I . 102 Henry VIII. and his Council 105 The Haunted Gallery 109 Henry VIII. 's Private Stairs in the Clock Court, leading to his Privy Chamber no Henry VIII. playing on the Lute ; with his jester, Will Somers, singing Ill Edward VI 113 The Duke of Somerset 115 Doorway of the Great Gate-house 116 The Great Gate-house, restored 117 Edward VI. and his Council 119 The Prison, so-called, in the Round Kitchen Court 121 Philip II. of Spain 123 View of the Chimneys of the Great Kitchen, Tennis Court Lane . 125 View of Hampton Court Palace from the Thames in the reign of Queen Mary 129 Queen Mary 131 " My Lord Robert Dudley's Picture " 141 Round Kitchen Court 145 Carved Stone on Queen Elizabeth's Window 148 Foot of the Great Hall Stairs 149 Old Leaden Water-spouts on Queen Elizabeth's Stables . . . 151 The Fish Court 155 The Dungeon 159 Bay Window in the Great Watching Chamber 165 The Screens in the Great Hall 167 Entrance to the Buttery under the Pantry and Great Hall . . . 171 James I. out Hunting, " Taking the Assay " 189 King James 1 197 Charles I. . . . 205 Family of George Villiers, 1st Duke of Buckingham 213 Charles I. and his Queen dining in Public 215 View of the North of the Palace in Tennis Court Lane .... 223 The Old Pond Garden 229 Parapet of the Great Hall as seen from the Roof 241 Mrs. Cromwell, ** the Lady Protectress " 247 Old East Front of Hampton Court in the time of Charles II. . 269 Back Stairs to the Great Hall 279 Bird's-Eye View of Hampton Court in the reign of William III. . 297 The Old Greenhouse, with an American Agave in flower, and Queen Mary's Orange Trees 303 Queen Mary's Bower 30$ LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. XI PAGE East Front and Great Fountain Garden 307 The South Front of William III.'s New Palace 309 The Colonnade 311 The Fountain Court 313 Pediment of a Window in the South Front, surmounted by William and Mary's Coat-of-Arms 317 Screen and Gate of Wrought Iron formerly in the Gardens at Hampton Court 319 The King's Great Staircase 325 The Flower- Pot Gate 327 The Maze 329 The King's Guard Chamber 331 King William III.'s State Bedchamber 335 " The Rape of the Lock " 357 The Queen's State Bedchamber, showing the Ceiling painted by Sir James Thornhill in 1716 361 The Pavilions belonging to the Bowling Green at the end of the Terrace Walk at Hampton Court 365 View, looking eastward, of the Diagonal Walks in the Great Fountain Garden in the time of George II 377 The Pavilion, Hampton Court Park, the Seat of H.R.I I. the Duke of Kent 386 North-East Angle of the old Palace, with the Gateway into Lady Mornington's harden 389 ** Purr Corner " 391 " The Push " 401 The House or Home Park and Long Canal 40J The Privy Garden 405 View, looking east, of the Long Canal and Great Avenue in the House or Home Park 407 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT, CHAPTER I. CARDINAL WOLSEY AT HAMPTON COURT. AMONG the many places of interest that lie within easy reach of London, there is none, if we except Windsor Castle, that can be held to vie in historic and artistic charms with the Queen's magnificent palace at Hampton Court. Nowhere else do we meet with attractions so uncommon, and yet so varied, as those which are to be found within its precincts. There we may behold a building, which still remains, altered and restored though it has been, an almost perfect specimen of Tudor palatial architecture, side by side with the best example existing in England of the debased classic Louis XIV., namely. Wren's State Apartments. There, too, we may feel, in a more than ordinary degree, amid its red-brick courts, solemn cloisters, picturesque gables, towers, turrets, embattled parapets, and mullioned and latticed windows, that indescribable charm which invests all ancient and historic places. While walking through Wolsey's courts we may recall the splendour and wealth of the mighty Cardinal; and while standing in Henry VHL's chapel, or his gorgeous Gothic hall, ponder on the many thrilling events enacted within the palace in the days of the Tudors and Stuarts — the birth of Edward VI. and the death of Jane Seymour ; the marriages of Catherine Howard and Catherine Parr; the honeymoons of Philip of Spain and Mary Tudor, and of Charles 11. and Catherine of Braganza ; James I.'s conference with the Puritans; and Cromwell's sojourn here in almost regal splendour. And while passing through William III.'s splendid suite of rooms, with their 2 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. painted ceilings, carved cornices, tapestried and oak-panelled walls, we may mentally people them again with the king's and queens, and statesmen and courtiers, who thronged them in the last century. Moreover, by the aid of an unbroken series of historical pictures and portraits, illus- trative of three centuries of English history, we may recall the past with a vividness that no books can ever excite. And then, when satiated with art and archaeology, we can relax the mind by wandering beneath the shade of William III.'s stately avenues of chestnut and lime ; strolling in the ever-delightful gardens where Wolsey paced in anxious meditation a few weeks before his fall ; where Henry VIII. made love to Anne Boleyn and to Catherine Howard ; along the paths where Queen Elizabeth took her daily morning walk ; past the tennis court where Charles I. played his last game on the day he escaped from the palace ; beneath the bower where Queen Mary sat at needlework with her maids of honour ; along the terrace to the bowling green and pavilion where George II. made love to Mrs. Howard and Mary Bellenden ; under the lime groves which sheltered from the sun Pope and Hervey, Swift and Addison, Walpole and Bolingbroke. Hampton Court is pleasantly situated on the left or north bank of the river Thames, in the hundred of Spelthorne, in the county of Middlesex, about one mile distant from the villages of Hampton and Hampton Wick, about a mile and a half from the town of Kingston-on-Thames, and thirteen miles or so from London, reckoning in a westerly direction from Charing Cross. It longitude is o° 20' west of Greenwich, and its latitude 51° 24' north. The boundaries of the ancient parish of Hampton appear to have been coterminous with those of the manor, which consists of about 3,000 acres and of which Hampton Court forms a part. The natural features of the country in which Hampton Court is situated are not particularly striking. The ground is flat, with scarcely an undulation rising more than twenty feet above the dead level, and the soil, though light and gravelly, supports very little indigenous timber. Indeed, in primaeval times, the whole district of Hampton appears to have been an open tract, forming part of the famous Hounslow Heath, to which it immediately adjoins; and the INTRODUCTORY. thorns in Bushey Park, with a few ancient gigantic elms and oaks in the Home Park, are still surviving remnants or traces of its original state. One of the oaks, which is believed to be the largest in England, is as much as 37 feet in girth at the waist. Nevertheless, the surrounding prospect must, from the earliest times, have been not unpleasing. The stretch of SS^^V ^s^^^^^^^ GREAT ELM TREE IN THE HOME PARK KNOWN AS THE SISTERS," OR "KING CHARLES's SWING." TWO the river opposite Hampton Court — studded with eyots, and bordered with luxuriant meadows fringed with willows — is one of the prettiest in the lower Thames ; and the stream, which is particularly clear and swift at this point, is always lively with boats and barges. When we add, that the view from the palace extends, across the river, over a wide expanse of "Meads for ever crowned with flowers," 4 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. clusters of trees, flowery hedgerows, and broad undulating heath-clad commons, — **To Claremont's terraced height, and Esher's groves, By the soft windings of the silent Mole,—" and that in the distance can be traced the dim blue outline of the Surrey hills; while on another side appear the crowded gables and the picturesque old church-tower oi Kingston, we have enumerated all the natural and local amenities of Hampton Court. Of the annals of the place in the days of the ancient Britons, Romans, and Saxons, »we can record nothing but a complete blank ; nor have there been found here many traces or remains of those periods of history. To Saxon times we owe, of course, the name Hampton^ a compound of the words Hame^ meaning home or place of shelter, and Ton^ signifying an aggregate of houses environed and fortified with a hedge and ditch. The first mention of Hampton in any records is to be found in Domesday Book, compiled in 1086, where the manor of Hamntone in the county of Middlesex, and the hundred of Spelthorne, which in Saxon times had belonged to Earl Algar, is entered as held by Walter de St. Valerie or Valeric, and valued, including arable land, pasture for the cattle of the manor, and 3^. arising from the fisheries in the Thames, at ;£^39, a very high value for Domesday. In the time of Edward the Confessor it was valued at £^^0^ of which the King received ;£2o. For a century and a half after this, the manor remained in the possession of the family of De Valery or De St. Valery. From their hands it passed into those of Henry de St. Albans, who about the year 1 2 1 7 gave it, lent it, or leased it to the Knights Hospitallers of St. John of Jerusalem, who appear to have had here, as early as the end of the twelfth century, a preceptory of some sisters of their Order; and who were, at any rate, by the middle of the thirteenth century in possession of the whole manor of Hampton. The Order was at this time in the heyday of its prosperity and power, and possessed enormous property in every country in Europe, and not least in England, where their lands were farmed, and money amassed, to be paid into the LEASE OF THE MANOR TO WOLSEY. 5 exchequer for the general purposes of the ruling body. The estabHshment at Hampton, however, though a typical one, must have been on a small scale, and maintained for little more than managing the property and collecting the rents. For 1 60 years or so, we hear little of the manor of Hampton Court. But the house was still inhabited by the Order in the year 1503, when Elizabeth of York went there from Richmond Palace, as we gather from her privy purse expenses, to make a retreat, and pray for a happy delivery, just a month before she died in childbed. We may observe here that long before the manor was acquired by Wolsey it was known by the name of " Hampton Court," and that it is incorrect to suppose that the word "Court" has anything to do with the palace, which he built. It has, in fact, the same origin and meaning as in the names Ember Court, Sayes Court, etc., and signifies, in distinction to the whole manor, that portion of it which was retained by the Lord for his own use, and called the demesne lands, and in which was situated the manor-house, or capital mansion of the manor. The next date in the history of Hampton Court is 15 14, on the 20th of March of which year Henry visited the manor in company with Katharine of Arragon. A little later, in the same year, 15 14, namely, on Mid- summer day, by an indenture executed on the nth of January of the following year, the manor of Hampton Court, with all its appurtenances, was leased by the prior. Sir Thomas Docwra, and his brethren Knights of the Hospital of St. John to "the most Rev. Father in God Thomas Wolsey, Archbishop of York," for a term of ninety-nine years, at a rent of ;^5o per annum. A contemporary copy of the lease is still extant in the chartulary of the priory in the British Museum, and confirms our surmise that there was a manor-house on the site of the present palace previous to its acquisition by Wolsey, though it was evidently of small dimensions, and very rudely furnished. Several motives probably weighed with Wolsey in fixing on Hampton Court as a residence. In the first place, he was in need of a secluded country place, within easy access of London, whither he could withdraw occasionally for rest 6 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. and quiet without being too far from the centre of affairs — as he would certainly have been, had he retired to his diocesan palaces of York, Lincoln, or Durham. At the same time he was anxious to select a place where his health, which suffered much from the fogs and smoke of London, might be recruited in fresh and pure air. We may presume, too, that he was not regardless of the advantage attaching to a site on the banks of the Thames, in days when, on account of the badness and danger of the roads, no route was so safe, convenient, and expeditious as the "silent highway" of a river. With these objects in view, he is declared by the legend of the parish to have " employed the most eminent physicians in England, and even called in the aid of doctors from Padua, to select the most healthy spot within twenty miles of London." The decision of the faculty was emphatically in favour of Hampton Court, on account of its " extraordinary salubrity"; and Wolsey, in accordance with their advice, forthwith proceeded to treat for a lease of the manor. Whether this tradition be founded on fact or not, it would be impossible now to decide ; but certainly the healthiness of Hampton Court at the present is an unquestioned fact, nor has anything ever happened, during the last 370 years, to belie the favourable opinion of Wolsey's doctors. The building, though the ground floor is scarcely 10 feet above the average level of the river, is wonderfully free from damp, while the air, though sometimes foggy, is never unwholesome. Much of this is doubtless due to the gravelly nature of the soil, the absence of moist vegetation, and the proximity of the running stream of the river, which acts as a drain to carry off all surface water and impurites. Wolsey had no sooner entered into possession of Hampton Court, than he began with characteristic energy to plan the erection of a vast and sumptuous edifice commensurate with the dignity and wealth he had just attained to. He was then on the threshold of his career of greatness, and already receiving enormous revenues. Besides his office of Grand Almoner, he had been appointed within a year to three several bishoprics — that of Lincoln, that of Tournay in France, and the archbishopric of York ; and in quick sue- CARDINAL WOLSEYS EARLY DAYS. 7 cession followed the Abbey of St. Albans in commendam and the bishopric of Durham (though he surrendered Durham soon after into the King's hand to take the bishopric of Winchester instead), and the bishoprics of Bath, Worcester, and flereford, in farm. To these and many minor dignities were added those of Cardinal on the 20th of September, bird's-eye view of HAMPTON COURT, SHOWING THE EXTENT OF WOLSEY's PALACE. 15 15, of the Lord Chancellorship of England on the 2 and of December in the same year, and of a Legate a latere in 1 5 18. And yet amid the multifarious labours that these offices entailed upon him, he found time to supervise everything relating to his buildings and his household. No matter was too insignificant, no detail too trivial, to come within the grasp of his all-reaching intellect. 8 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. Though engaged till midday in the administration of justice in Westminster Hall, and occupied the rest of the day in carrying on the whole government of the kingdom, receiving foreign ambassadors, reading despatches, writing instructions to his agents abroad, and retaining in his mind the whole complex thread of continental politics, we find him superintending the most minute details in regard to the works at Hampton Court, besides doing the same for his school at Ipswich, his college at Oxford, and his other place at Whitehall. He was resolved to have a country residence, befitting the dignity of his high station as a prince of the Church, and he spared no effort for this object. Hundreds of artificers, of all sorts, were daily engaged on " my Lord Cardinal's works" in the parks, gardens, and buildings, which were pushed on with the greatest speed possible. The old manor-house already stood in the midst of an extensive domain of pasture land, consisting of some 2,000 acres. All this he proceeded to convert into two parks, fencing them partly with paling, and partly inclosing them with a stout red-brick buttressed wall, a great part of which remains to this day, and may be identified by its deep crimson colour, toned here and there with chequered lines of black burnt bricks. There may be found, too, inserted in this wall of Wolsey's on the Kingston Road, near the Paddock, a curious device of these black bricks, disposed in the form of a cross, evidently an allusion to his ecclesiastical character. At the same time he surrounded the house and gardens with a great moat — a precaution which is noticeable, as the mediaeval custom of so defending dwelling places had generally died out, since the Wars of the Roses, and Wolsey's moat here must have been one of the last made. It remained as a prominent feature in front of the palace till the time of William III., and traces of it still exist on the north side of the palace. His gardens, also, were to be an appanage in every way worthy of the princely residence he was projecting. Many curious entries for wages of gardeners, and for spades, shovels, barrows, seeds, plants, "for the use of my Lorde's garthinges at Hampton Courte," occur in the original bills, which are still preserved in the Record Office. WOLSEY'S EXTENSIVE BUILDING SCHEMES. 9 Nor did the Cardinal neglect the sanitary arrangements of his house. Every part of the building was carefully drained, and the rain-water and other refuse was carried off by great brick sewers, 3 feet wide and 5 feet high, into the Thames. So excellent, in truth, was his system of drainage, that it was not found necessary to interfere with or supersede it till the year 1871. Another aim of the Cardinal's was to secure, for the use of himself and his household, the purest water that was to be had anywhere in the vicinity, for though people in these enlightened days are content to drink the " diluted sewage " of the Thames Wolsey, living in the benighted times of the WEST FRONT OF WOLSEY S PALACE. Tudors, would by no means tolerate its then comparatively innocuous waters. With the object, accordingly, of procur- ing the best possible supply, the springs at Coombe Hill, a spot about three miles distant from Hampton Court, were collected in several conduits or water-houses, whence the water was conveyed, in a double set of strong leaden pipes, from Coombe to Surbiton, under the Hogsmill River (a small tributary of the Thames), and then under the Thames above Kingston Bridge, and so through the Home Park to the palace. The leaden pipes as originally laid down were moulds in lengths of 25 feet each. The diameter of each pipe is about 2i inches, the thickness is half an inch, and the amount of lead used must have been about 250 lO A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. tons, which, with the labour in laying them down, would give a cost of something Hke ;^5o,ooo. We find, also, that there were in several parts of the palace baths and other conveniences — facts which go to modify the too common notion that cleanliness is entirely a modern virtue, and was little thought of in mediaeval times. To these wise precautions, as much, perhaps, as to the natural salubrity of the locahty, we may ascribe the immunity from any serious epidemic which Hampton Court has enjoyed during the last 370 years, when the sweating sickness, the plague, small-pox, and scarlet fever have been fiercely raging around. All this, however, was only subsidiary to the main concern of the building of the palace itself, which was planned on a most extensive scale. As to who was Wolsey's architect we can arrive at no certain determination. Whoever he was, there can be no question as to the skill and taste with which the building was carried out. The general plan and scope of the building were, no doubt, determined by the Cardinal himself. The material selected was red brick, stone being employed for the windows, the doorways, the copings of the parapets and turrets, the string-courses, and the various ornamental details, — such as pinnacles, gargoyles, and heraldic beasts, on gables and elsewhere. The first portion taken in hand was, doubtless, the great west front of the building, which extends, with its two wings, from north to south 400 feet. The fagade, though only two storeys in height, has considerable beauty about it, and the picturesque turrets at the angles of the building, the embrasured parapet, the chimneys of carved and twisted brick, the graceful gables with their gargoyles and pinnacles, and the varied muUioned windows, form an admirable specimen of Tudor domestic architecture. An especially striking feature in Wolsey's west front, as in other parts of the Tudor building, is the delicately moulded forms of the chimney shafts, which rise in variously grouped clusters, like slender turrets, above the battlements and gables. They are all of red brick, constructed on many varieties of plan, and wrought and rubbed, with the greatest nicety, into different decorative patterns. Some are circular, BUILDING OF THE PALACE. II some square (but set diagonally), and some octagonal ; and they are grouped together in twos or fours, with their shafts sometimes carried up solid, and sometimes separate. Another charm is the deep crimson of the bricks, approxi- mating often to a rich purple, which contrasts favourably with the staring scarlet of modern red brickwork. As to the use to which this part of Wolsey's palace was GABLE. FROM WOLSEY S WEST FRONT. put, it appears to have been intended entirely for the suites of guest chambers, which were always in readiness to receive friends and strangers. By the month of May, 1516, the building had so far advanced that Wolsey was able to receive the King and Queen at dinner in his new abode. This was a time when Henry delighted to honour with his company his "awne goode Cardinall," as he termed him, at pleasant little enter- 12 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. tainnients, when he could throw off the restraints of royalty, and join in unconventional intercourse with his personal friends. During dinner or supper the minstrels usually played music, and afterwards the King and a few intimate friends took part in a masquerade or an impromptu dance. Some- times he "would oblige the company with a song," accompany- ing himself on the harpsichord or lute. At other times, the King would visit the Cardinal in state accompanied by his whole Court. " And when it pleased the King's majesty," says Cavendish, " for his recreation, to repair unto the Cardinal's house, as he did divers times in the year, there wanted no preparation or goodly furniture with viands of the finest sort, that could be gotten for money or friendship. Such pleasures were then devised for the King's comfort and consolation as might be invented or imagined. Banquets were set forth, masques, and mummeries in so gorgeous a sort, and costly manner, that it was a heaven to behold. There wanted no dames, nor damoselles, meet or apt to dance with the masquers, or to garnish the place for that time, with other goodly disports. Then was there all kinds of music and harmony set forth, with excellent voices both of men and children. I have seen the King come suddenly thither in a masque with a dozen masquers all in garments like shepherds, made of fine cloth of gold, and fine satin paned and caps of the same, with visors of good proportion and physiognomy ; their hairs and beards either of fine gold wire or of silver, or else of black silk, having sixteen torch- bearers besides three drums, and other persons attending them, with visors, clothed all in satin, of the same colour." And he goes on to tell how they startled, with the noise of guns, the Cardinal and his guests, "who mused what it should mean coming so suddenly, they sitting quiet at a solemn banquet," and how he sent his attendants with torches and drums and fifes to receive them ; and how he entertained them as strangers, and they played at dice with the ladies ; and how Wolsey mistook which was the King, and went up to one of the gentlemen of the Court, hat in hand. On which, "the King hearing and perceiving the Cardinal so deceived in his estimation and choice could not forbear laughing, but pulled down his visor, and dashed out such a pleasant countenance and cheer, that all the WOLSEY ENTERTAINS HENRY VIII. 13 noble estates there assembled, perceiving the King among them, rejoiced very much." These were the earlier days of Henry's reign, when he conceived nothing but implicit trust and respect for his faithful Wolsey, and regarded Katharine with nothing but tender love, before the bright black eyes of Mistress Anne Boleyn had come to fling discord and suspicion between them. No one, who was acquainted with the " vie intime " i I I ENTRANCE TO KATHARINE OF ARRAGON's ROOMS. of Henry at this time, could have imagined, for a moment, that unbridled passion and despotic power could effect so great a change, as that wrought in him in his later years. Besides Wolsey's more private entertainments, he fre- quently gave splendid banquets to the foreign ambas- sadors, and now and then to any royal guest who might be in England. On these occasions, and at the King's own banquets, he was always seated in the centre of the high table among the most distinguished guests, with a lady on 14 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. each side of him. Giustinian, the Venetian ambassador, who was invited to one of them, declares that, "the Hke of it was never given either by Cleopatra or Caligula ; the whole banqueting hall being decorated with huge vases of gold and silver, that I fancied myself in the tower of Chosroes, where that monarch caused divine honours to be paid to him." After dinner came the masquerades and mummeries, which were nowhere more splendid than at the Cardinal's palaces. The general company awaited the masquers in the Withdrawing Chamber, into which the procession advanced, headed by the minstrels, and followed by the ladies and gentlemen, among whom was sure to be the King, all attired in rich fantastic costumes, and attended by knights bearing torches. At one of the Cardinal's banquets there were as many as " thirty-six masquers disguised, all in one suite of fine green satin, all over covered with cloth of gold, undertied together with laces of gold, and masking hoods on their heads : the ladies had tyers made of braids of damask gold, with long hairs of white gold. All these masquers danced at one time, and after they had danced they put off their visors, and then they were all known." Then they were served with a supper of "countless dishes of confections and other delicacies. Having gratified their palates, they then regaled their eyes and hands ; large bowls, filled with ducats and dice, being placed on the table for such as liked to gamble: shortly after which, the supper tables being removed, dancing commenced," and lasted till midnight, and often many hours later. Wolsey's avocations in London, and his business with the King, and especially the negotiations that followed on the death of the Emperor, for which dignity Henry VHI. had been a candidate, did not permit of his often visiting Hampton Court between the years 1517 and 1520. But he occasionally went down there to spend a few days of rest and quiet in the country air, and would give orders that he was not to be troubled with business till he came back to town. Nevertheless, on these occasions he was frequently annoyed by importunate questioners and suitors, who pur- sued him into his country retreat, and then complained that they were received with impatient curtness. Even the WOLSEY ENTERTAINS THE AMBASSADORS. 15 Venetian ambassador could not depend on being received by him. " I have been severaltimes," relates Giustinian, " to the right reverend Cardinal, but could never obtain audience; true is it that he was always occupied either with the ambas- sadors aforesaid (of Spain) or with those of France, so that there was no room for me." "No one," he declares else- THE MASTER CARPENTER's COURT ON THE NORTH SIDE OF THE FIRST COURT OF WOLSEY'S PALACE. where, " obtains audience of him, unless at the third or fourth attempt. As he adopts this fashion with the Lords and Barons of England I made light of it." In truth, however, to those who sought him on business of real and national importance, Wolsey was generally accessible enough, though he doubtless found it sometimes convenient l6 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. to refuse to answer importunate questioners. But, by the world in general, his demeanour was looked upon as the arrogance of an upstart. As such it did not escape his implacable satirist, John Skelton, who, in his satire, " Why come ye not to Courte," touches on it in the following lines : '* His countenance like a Cayser, (Kaiser) My lord is not a layser ; {leisure) Sir, you must tarry a stound, Till better layser be found : Sir, we must dance attendaunce And take patient sufiferaunce; For my lorde's grace Has now no time nor place, To speak with you as yet. And so they may sit or flit. Sit or walk or ride, And his layser abide, Perchaunce, half a yere And yet be never the nere." So many concurrent testimonies compel us to admit that in his dealings with other men there was frequently an abruptness and imperiousness which they could not fail to resent. Sometimes, when his plans were thwarted, he became transported with anger. On one occasion he is reported to have sent for the Papal Nuncio, taken him into his private chamber, and, regardless of his sacred character and his immunity as an ambassador, to have violently seized him, fiercely demanding what had been the nature of his communications with France, adding that if he did not reveal them he should be put on the rack. Still we cannot ascribe such irritability to badness of dis- position, for we have it from several sources that he was by nature a kindly and considerate man, " Lofty and sour, to them that loved him not, But to those men that sought him sweet as summer." We ought, perhaps, to attribute it, with Mr. Brewer, " to the impatience of a man of great genius and penetration, at the interruptions, follies and contradictions to which he was exposed by conceited mediocrity or pertinacious self- interest." From whatever cause it sprune;, it naturally excited the resentment of many with whom he had to transact business and to raise against him a host of enemies. WOLSEY'S ABSORPTION IN AFFAIRS 17 In the Star Chamber and the Privy Council he reigned supreme, the other lords scarce daring to question his ENTRANCE TO THE NORTH WINO OF THE PALACE, LEADING TO THE OFFICES. proposals, much less to prevent or impede the execution of his plans. His peremptoriness is thus reflected on by Skelton : " He is set so high In his hierarchy Of frantic phrenesy And foolish fantasy That in the Chamber of Stars All matters there he mars. Clapping his rod on the Board, No man dare speak a word, For he hath all the saying Without any renaying He rolleth iii 1 is rcc ^rds, 1 8 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. And saith, ' How say ye my Lords ? Is not my reason good ? ' * Good even, good Robin Hood 1 * Some say ' yes ' and some Sit still as they were dumb. Thus thwarting over them He ruleth all the roast, With bragging and with boast, Borne up on every side With pomp and with pride." Outbursts, such as these, were undoubtedly greatly due to the excessive, and rarely relaxed, mental strain of the whole internal and foreign affairs, both political and ecclesiastical, which were entirely directed by him, and not less to the state of his health. His constitution appears to have never been robust ; and when he first selected Hampton Court as a residence, he is said to have been influenced by the qualities of the springs in the vicinity, which are alleged to be beneficial for the stone — a disease from which he suffered. He was a victim, besides, to dropsy, and was several times, also, attacked by the sweating sickness — that strange and dreadful plague which for two centuries ravaged the homes of England, — and he was constantly suffering from ague, quinsy, and colic. His condition in the summer of 15 17 was such as to cause the gravest anxiety ; and the King wrote affectionately to him, urging him to take air and exercise, and correct the weakness of his stomach. Recommendations like these were easier to give than to follow, for Wolsey had no time for recreation ; and, as he wrote to Henry, his digestion was so impaired that he could eat only tender food, and on this account he had been compelled to procure a dispensation from the Pope for the Lenten observances. This also was adroitly seized on by the venomous Skelton to point the arrows of his invective : *' To drynke and for to eate Swete ypogras and swete meate To kepe his flesshe chast In Lent for a repast He eateth capons stewed Fesaunt and partriche mewed Hames, checkynges and pygges." WOLSEY'S PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION. 1 9 and again that he : ** May ete pigges in Lent for pikys After the sectes of heretickys For in Lent he will eat All manner of fleshe meate That he can anywhere get." The King, however, fully understood the difficulties of Wolsey's position, and appreciated the trials to which his ill-health subjected him, and the sacrifices which he made in his master's service. All his letters, indeed, at this period show the same easily familiarity, and cordial sympathy and affection for his " own good Cardinal." And good cause had he to be grateful for Wolsey's devo- tion. While everyone else about the Court was thinking only of his own personal safety, Wolsey alone remained at his post, and through danger, infection, and sickness kept in view only his duty to his King and the State. In addition to his office as Chief Minister, which combined all the departments that modern usage distributes among a cabinet of thirteen or fourteen ministers, he was now Lord Chancellor; and, as Mr. Brewer observes, " his administration of that great legal office was characterised by the same energy and fearlessness as distinguished his conduct in all other departments. For his zeal and ability as a judge we have the best testimony that could be had — the testimony of Sir Thomas More. His regularity, decision, and despatch can- not be questioned ; his impartiality to all classes was never disputed. These formed the topics of satire and complaint. The lawyers hated him for his strict adherence to justice, his discouragement of petty legal artifices, endless forms, and interminable verbosity; the nobles hated him still more, because riches and nobility were no recommendation to partiality or favour, as they had been in the days of his predecessors." In confirmation of this estimate can be cited the view of the Venetian ambassador, who, though no friend of his, is found stating that " he favours the people exceedingly, and especially the poor, hearing their suits and seeking to despatch them instantly. He also makes the lawyers plead gratis for all paupers." 20 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. CHAPTER 11. DECORATION AND FURNITURE OF WOLSEY'S PALACE. After Wolsey's return from the meeting at the " Field of the Cloth of Gold," in 1520, he appears to have made more prolonged stays than heretofore at Hampton Court, which had now nearly arrired at that stage of completion in which he left it. We are not able exactly to define the limits of the Cardinal's palace, for after his death Henry VIH. carried out many alterations and additions, which in their turn have been subsequently modified ; but we can form a rough idea of its extent. We have already noticed the West Front as being entirely Wolsey's ; the same may be said of the First Green Court, which is the largest courtyard in the palace, being 167 feet from north to south, and 142 feet from east to west. It gives us no mean idea of Tudor palatial archi- tecture ; and now that the green turf which originally covered the area has been restored, we see it much as it appeared to the great Cardinal when riding through it on his mule. It has a look of warmth and comfort and repose, and an air of picturesque gloom which is in pleasing contrast with the staring vulgarities of the "cheerful" cockney buildings of the present day. The internal arrangements, to judge from the old plans and records, must have been of great comfort and convenience, and do not at all confirm the current notion of the discomfort of old Gothic houses. The Clock Court, access to which is had from the First Court through the archway of the Clock Tower, formed the inner and principal part of Wolsey's original palace ; but the alterations that it has undergone since his time cause it to present a very different appearance now, chiefly in that the present Great Hall, which occupies the whole of its north side, though often called Wolsey's hall, was not erected^, by him, but, after his death, by Henry VIII., though it perhaps stands on the site of the smaller and older hall of the DECORATION OF WOLSEY'S PALACE. 21 Cardinal's building ; while the original south range is almost entirely obscured from view by the Ionic colonnade of Sir Christopher Wren. Here, however, we are in one of the most interesting corners of Hampton Court ; for behind this colonnade are situated the very rooms occupied by Cardinal Wolsey himself. Attached to this corner was one of the Cardinal's galleries in which he used to pace, meditating on his political plans, THE FIRST GREEN COURT WITH THE CUPOLAS RESTORED. on his chances for the popedom, and on the failing favour of the King. To this, which must have been demolished by William III., and to the other long galleries in the First Court, Cavendish makes reference in his metrical life of his master : •*My galleries were fayer, both large and long To walk in them when that it lyked me best. On the north side of the last two mentioned courts is a long intricate range of building, inclosing various smaller courts, and containing kitchens and other offices, and bed- rooms for the numerous members of his household. Much of this part of the building, together with the cloisters and 22 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. courts to the north-east, called the Round Kitchen and Chapel Courts, seem also to have been the work of the great Cardinal. The Chapel, however, was remodelled, if not entirely rebuilt, by Henry VIII., though we may assume that it occupies the same site as that of Wolsey and the ancient one of the Knights Hospitallers, whose tombs perhaps lie beneath the kitchens and other offices contiguous to the Chapel Court. When, therefore, we take into consideration William III.'s demolitions, which included some of the Cardinal's original structure as well as Henry VIII.'s additions, we may con- clude that Wolsey's palace cannot have been very much smaller than the existing one, which covers eight acres, and has a thousand rooms. For the execution of the ornamental work about the build- ing, and for the internal decoration of the rooms, he em- ployed the best carvers, painters, and gilders in London, many of them being Italians who had come over to this country attracted by his liberal patronage of the arts. Sometimes he sent to Italy direct for decorative work. The terra-cotta medallion busts of the Roman Emperors, sur- rounded with rich arabesque borders, which are affixed to the turrets on each side of the gateways of the courts, were ordered by him of Joannes Maiano. Another specimen of Italian work is to be seen over the inner side of the gateway under the Clock Tower. It displays the arms of Wolsey, affixed to an archiepiscopal cross, supported by two cherubim and surmounted by a cardinal's hat. Above is his monogram T. W., entwined with a cordon, between the date mdxxv ; and below is his motto : DOMINVS michi adivtor. The prominence given to Wolsey's arms, which were often on public occasions placed side by side the King's, was another source of exasperation to his enemies. Roy, another satirist who lashed the proud Cardinal, in his satire, " Rede me and be not wrothe," gives a coarsely-drawn coat-of-arms, representing a sort of burlesque or caricature of his real arms, and showing quarterly three bulls' heads, three butchers' hatchets dripping with blood, and, instead of the lion, a mastiff passant with a royal crown in his mouth. The shield is supported by two devils ; while at the back, in place of CARDINAL WOLSEY'S ARMS. 23 the cross, is a thick club, and the whole is surmounted by a W^ i-!!E^.4L'gi^'^J^W»vi^^ss ;4^ W4i«iii/4t.^y/^W»sS DOMINYS-MICHI ARMS OF CARDINAL WOLSEY. (In terra-cotta.) cardinal's red hat. Accompanying this heraldic satire arc the verses : " Of the prowde Cardinall this is the shelde Borne up between two angels of Sathan, The six blouddy axes in a bare field Sheweth the cruelty of the red man, 24 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT, Carter of Yorcke, the vile butcher's son. ***** The ban-dog in the middes doth expresse The mastiff curre bred in Ipswich towne, Gnawinge with his teth a kynges crowne." CARDINAL WOLSEY's CLOSET. " The mastiff cur " and " the butcher's dog " are appella- tions, which became nicknames as it were, applied to him in allusion to his being supposed to be the son of a butcher of Ipswich, and which abound in the abusive publications of the time. Of the internal decoration of the rooms of Wolsey's palace I^i ^HSS^m=Q 1^1 i '0^^ 1 % ^ri^- E^^s^EP- -..-.^.^-^..Ammms (Mr ---'■'' 26 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. we have but few surviving remains. There is one little room, however, on the east side of the Clock Court, called " the Cardinal's Closet," which, though much reduced in size and injured by time, preserves in many essentials its pristine state. It is now open to public inspection, and is described in the author's New Guide to the Palace, p. 150. The ceiling is the chief point of interest, and is very beautiful, being of pure cinque-cento design in octagonal panels, with decorative scroll-work and other ornaments in relief. The ribs are of moulded wood, with balls and leaden leaves at their inter- sections : these, and the ornamental work within the panels, are gilt, the ground being of light blue. It is observable DECORATIVE FRIEZE IN CARDINAL WOLSEY'S CLOSET. that Cavendish, in the poem already quoted, makes particular reference to the " roofs with gold and byse," byse being a rich light blue paint : ** My buildings sumptuous, the roofs with gold and byse, Shone like the sun in mid day sphere Craftily entailed, as cunning could devise, With images embossed, most lively did appear ; Expertest artificers that were both far and near, To beautify my houses, I had them at my will. Thus I wanted nought my pleasures to fulfil." Round the upper portion of the walls, on two sides, is a finely wrought cornice or frieze, in the same style as the ceiling, recalling the lines : "Nor did there want Cornice or frieze with bossy sculpture graven ; The roof was fretted gold." The whole decoration of this room, faded though it is by time, gives us that idea of splendour and richness, without SPLENDID DECORATION OF WOLSEY'S ROOMS. 2J gaudiness, which was characteristic of the artistic taste of the great Cardinal. Some further traces of the decoration of Wolsey's rooms are also to be found in the suite already referred to, behind ORIEL WINDOW IN WOLSEY's FIRST GREEN COURT. the colonnade in the Clock Court. The finest is a large and lofty chamber with a deep-bayed oriel window, abutting on the court, and with a beautiful ceiling. An adjoining room has a ceiling of like nature, exhibiting the Cardinal's hat, his crosses, and his pole-axes crossed, with other devices. The walls were of course originally hung with tapestries of silk and gold, and the windows ablaze with coloured glass. Two other rooms of this apartment have their walls covered with oak panelling of two different varieties of the linenfold pattern. 28 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. All his other chambers were equally resplendent. " One has to traverse eight rooms," says the Venetian ambassador, who frequently visited him at his country residence, " before one reaches his audience chamber, and they are all hung with tapestry, which is changed once a week." Du Bellay, also, who came over to England on a diplomatic mission with Anne de Montmorency, and was entertained with the rest of his suite with great magnificence at Hampton Court, bears similar testimony to its gorgeousness. "The very bed-chambers had hangings of wonderful value, and every place did glitter with innumerable vessels of gold and silver. There were two hundred and four score beds, the furniture to most of them being silk, and all for the enter- tainment of strangers only." The whole furniture of Wolsey's palace was on the same scale of splendour as its decoration. It threw the King's quite into the shade. Foreigners just arrived from the Courts of France, Germany, Spain, and Italy, were filled with amazement at his magnificence. Nothing like it had ever been seen before out of Rome. For tapestry he seems to have had a perfect passion. His agents ransacked the Continent for the choicest products of the looms of Flanders ; and in the year of the meeting of Henry and Francis at the Field of the Cloth of Gold, we find him in correspondence with Sir Richard Gresham, the father of the more famous Sir Thomas, the founder of the Royal Exchange, with regard to the purchase of arras wholesale. Such profane and worldly luxury on the part of an ecclesiastic could not fail to fall under the puritanic lash of the malignant Skelton, who comments severely on his " building royally " such " mansions curiously " : ** With turrets and with towers With halls and with bowers, Stretching to the stars With glass windows and bars ; Hanging about the walls Cloth of gold and palls, Arras of rich array, Fresh as flowers of May, With Dame Diana naked, How lusty Venus quaked. And how Cupide shak^d WOLSEY'S MAGNIFICENT TAPESTRIES. 29 His dart, and bent his bow, For to shoot a crow." From the allusions in these verses, it would seem that Skelton had actually seen some of the tapestries that de- corated Wolsey's palaces. That he was thoroughly familiar, at any rate, with one set belonging to Wolsey, three pieces of which still hang on the walls of Hampton Court, is certain. We refer to the " Six Triumphs," entered in the Cardinal's Inventory of which we can at once identify three, those of Renown, Time, and Death, as being those now hung in Henry Vin.'s Great Watching or Guard Chamber. Duplicates of the Triumphs of Death and Fame are in the South Ken- sington Museum, where may be also seen the Triumph of Chastity. When we consider that ;!^3,ooo was given a few years ago for the three pieces in the Museum, and that Wolsey's set of six formed but an insignificant portion of his whole collection, we can arrive at some idea of the value and richness of the hundreds of hangings that "shone on the walls of his palace. We need not describe in detail here these beautiful " triumphs." It will be sufficient to observe that, belonging to the finest period of Flemish art, before the influence of the Italian Renaissance had made itself felt, they are as in- teresting for the cleverness of the design, as for the harmony of colour and the delicacy of workmanship. Every piece contains two distinct aspects of the triumph, represented under a mystical or allegorical form ; and over each part is worked a scroll, with quaint old French verses or legends, in black letter, indicating the moral of the allegory beneath. One of these — that above the Triumph of Fate over Chastity — may be cited as a specimen : Combtenqiue . romme . eoit « chaste . tout . putrtque lies . scurs . fatalles . par. leur . loj? . autenti(iue. €vantfitnt ♦ les . nnfs . ft . fillet j . lie . la . hit. a . cela . la . mort . tons . leg . bibans . amobie. In each piece a female, emblematic of the influence of which the triumph is celebrated, is shown enthroned on a gor- geously magnificent car, drawn by elephants, or unicorns, or bulls, richly caparisoned and decorated ; while around them throng a host of attendants and historical personages typical of 30 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. the triumph portrayed. Thus, in the Triumph of Fame or Renown, we have figures representing JuHus Caesar and Pompey ; and in the first aspect of the Triumph of Chastity we see Venus, driven by naked cupids, and surrounded by heroines of amorous renown attacked by Chastity. The reader will now recognize how pointed is the reference to these tapestries in the following lines of Skelton's satire : •* With Triumphs of C^sar And of Pompeius' war Of Renown and Fame By them to get a name. Now all the world stares How they ride in goodly chairs Conveyed by elephants "With laureat garlants And by unicorns With their seemly horns ; Upon these beasts riding, Naked boys striding, With wanton wenches winking. Now, truly, to my thinking That is a speculation And a meet meditation For prelates of estate, Their courage to abate." Rich tapestries, such as are here described, were the hang- ings used for the decoration of the 280 guest bedrooms, and the various great parlours, and presence and other chambers of the Cardinal's palace. For his own use, however, in his private rooms, he was bent on procuring something more gorgeous still, having them hung with " white cloth of gold, blue cloth of gold, crimson velvet upon velvet, tawny velvet upon velvet, green velvet figur^e and cloth of bawdekyn." Of cloth of gold, also, were the "cloths of state," or canopies under which he sat at dinner, and the cloths on his tables at the same meal. His Inventory includes several entries such as this : " one cloth of estate of red cloth of tissue fringed with crimson silk and Venice gold, also one rich cloth of estate, embroidered with my Lord's arms." Space will not allow us to do more than mention that there were, besides, innumerable hangings, curtains, and WOLSEY'S GORGEOUS STUFFS AND CARPETS. 3 1 " traverses " of various coloured velvets, of tawny and blue "sarcenet," and of red and green say, some "paned violette and yalowe," and others green and red. For "foot-carpets," or mats, as we should call them, "cupboard carpets," and window carpets, he was content with such as could be purchased in England. But for the WOLSEYS OAK-PANELLED ROOM IN THE CLOCK COURT. floors of his more sumptuous chambers he would be satis- fied with nothing less than the choicest carpets from the East. The other furniture was of similar magnificence. As we have already noticed, there were at Hampton Court no less than 280 beds always ready for strangers; and from the Inventory we find that there were scores upon scores of beds of red, green, and russet velvet, satin, and silk, with rich curtains and fringes of the same materials, and all with magnificent " ceilers " and " testors " — that is, canopies and 32 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON v^OUKT. backs, while the counterpanes were of similar materials, often decorated with exquisite needlework. His own pillow-cases are described : " seamed with black silk and fleur-de-lys of gold"; and with "white silk and fleur-de-lys of red silk." Which bedsteads among the very many magnificent ones described in his Inventory, were for Wolsey's own use, is not CARDINAL WOLSEY IN BED. (From a Contemporary Drawing. ) stated therein. Probably he slept in the "Create Riche bedstede, having 4 gilte postes and 4 boulles' with Cardinall hattes gilte " ; or in the " Trussing bedstede of alabaster with my Lordes arms and flowers gilt upon the sides." If he re- clined in the first of these, his upturned eyes would meet a "ceiler" of red satin, "wrought with a great red rose of needlework, embossed with garters and portcullis; with a valance of fringe of white green, yellow, tawny and blue silk." Many oth^r beds of equal gorgeousness are mentioned, wolsey's furniture. 33 some of carved and gilt oak and other wood, with ceilers and testers of right arras of old work, " with the sun in the ceiler"; with testers of hawking and fowling; with "fowls and beasts having banners about their necks with the arms of England and France " ; " with small imagery of children bathing and playing in water " ; with trees and divers beasts with scriptures, and with pictures " of our Lady and her son in her arms wrought with needlework." The chairs, cushions, tables, chests, and cupboards that furnished Wolsey's palace were not less resplendent, being of silk, silk velvet, and cloth of gold, often embroidered with his initials or arms, and Cardinal's hats. The Cardinal's "andirons" were articles on which much artistic decoration CARDINAL wolsey's ARMS AS ARCHBISHOP OF YORK. (From a border of Tapestry in the Great Hall.) was lavished. For instance, he had eight pairs made of brass, some displaying roses and his own arms, others with mermaids, with lions, with angels, and with fools on the tops. Of seventeen pairs more of iron, six were enriched "with my Lordes armes and Cardinall hattes on the toppes," four with his arms and gilt balls, three with lions, five with dragons, two with balls, one with roses, and one with the arms of England. Twenty-two pairs more displayed his own arms, gilt, with balls of metal; and a few had scutcheons and crosses of St. George, and double roses " on either side of their shanks." " As for the furniture of his Chapel," says Cavendish, " it passeth my capacity to declare the number of costly orna- ments and rich jewels, that were used to be occupied in the same continually. For I have seen in procession about the D 34 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. hall forty-four of very riclv copes, of one suit, worn, besides the rich crosses and candlesticks and other ornaments neces- sary to the furniture of the same." A curious item in regard to the images was the " Seyntes Apparell," with which they were clothed, according to the usage of that day. There were two " coats for our Lady," one of crimson velvet, guarded with cloth of gold, and set with counterfeit pearls ; the other of black damask, guarded with crimson velvet, and bordered with white satin ; and also " a coat for her son," of black velvet, guarded with cloth of gold. There were, of course, numerous vestments, crosses, candlesticks, bells, censers, chalices, pixes of gold and silver, and many images of saints. His pictures were, as became an ecclesiastic, chiefly of a religious type, consisting of altar-pieces for his chapel and private rooms. But that he also appreciated the new develop- ment of pictorial art, we have evidence in his bespeaking a picture of Quentin Matsys. For jewellery, of course, the Cardinal had but little use ; but yet we find a goodly enumeration of rings, signets, aiglets, girdles, and chains, many of which were bestowed in presents to ladies and royal persons. There remains to be noticed the most valuable of all Wolsey's effects, namely his gold and silver plate, of which he had so large an amount that the Venetian ambassador, Marco Antonio Venier, estimated what he saw in 1527, at Hampton Court alone, as worth 300,000 golden ducats, or about ;^i 50,000, which, if we are to multiply by ten to give the equivalent in modern coin, yields the astounding sum of a million and a half! Giustinian gives the same sum as the value of his silver in 15 19; and he informs us that wherever he might be, there was always a sideboard of plate worth ;^2 5,000, and in his own chamber a cupboard with vessels to the amount of ;£3o,ooo. Nor must we suppose that his acquisitions were prompted merely by love of vulgar ostentation ; on the contrary, the old records show that he was ever on the alert to procure articles of artistic workmanship. And his taste in this regard was exhibited, not only in his crosses, censers, monstrances, paxes, chalices, and such like sacred vessels, but likewise in his chains, rings, staffs, seals, and candlesticks; while the THE Cardinal's household and retinue. 35 descriptions of his goblets, cups, flagons, bowls, basins, ewers, plates, saucers, dishes, etc., of gold, of silver, and of silver gilt, show that his collection, could it be brought to the hammer at Christie's, would outdo those of all modern collectors. CHAPTER in. CARDINAL WOLSEY'S MAGNIFICENCE. Rich as was the furniture of the Cardinal's palace, and vast as was its extent, it was only just adequate to meet the requirements of the enormous and splendid household which he maintained. The estimates given of the number of his retainers are various, but we shall be safe within the mark if we put them down as consisting of at least 500 persons. Among these were many lords and gentlemen of the first families in England, who, according to the custom of that age, took up their residence with the great ecclesiastics for the political and educational advantages thereby to be gained. His hall, in which there was constantly kept open table, was presided over by three officers — a steward (who was always a priest), a treasurer (who was a knight), and a comptroller (a squire). These were assisted by a cofferer, who was a doctor, and numerous marshals, yeomen, ushers, grooms and almoners. He had two principal kitchens, one being the privy kitchen for his own table. Here reigned his master cook, a functionary attired in velvet and satin, and wearing a gold chain round his neck. The small room where he sat and gave his orders to his subordinates may still be seen, opening into one of the great kitchens, now used as a lumber room on the north of the old palace. The servitors in the other kitchens and the adjoining offices (which also remain pretty much in their original state) were upwards of eighty in number, and consisted of assistant cooks, yeomen, grooms, and labourers of the kitchen, scullery, 36 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. pastry, scalding house, saucery, buttery, ewery, cellar, wafery, bakehouse, etc. Besides these there were the hall- kitchen, with two clerks of the kitchen, a clerk comptroller, a surveyor of the dresser, a clerk of the spicery and two master cooks and twelve assistant cooks, and labourers and children of the kitchen. Nearly a hundred servants more were employed in his wardrobe, laundry, woodyard, etc. ; and at the porter's lodge at the great gate were two yeomen and two grooms. The Cardinal's stud and stable were, of necessity, on a similar scale. Like the King, he had a master of the horse ; and also a clerk of the stable and a yeoman of the same, a saddler, farrier, a yeoman of his chariot, a sumpter man, a yeoman of his stirrup, a muleteer, and sixteen grooms besides helpers. Of horses and mules, besides upwards of a hundred serving for his household, for his escort, and for carts, there were " six horses to wait on my Lord at Hampton Court and other places," and six gray and white ambling mules " for my Lord's own saddle." The officers of his chapel were even more numerous still. Besides sixty priests in copes, who attended the services on great festivals and walked before the Cardinal in procession round the cloisters of Hampton Court, there were : first, a Dean, " a great divine, and a man of excellent learning " ; then a Sub-dean ; a repeater of the choir ; a Gospeller, and a Pisteller, that is, two priests, who respectively sang the gospel and the epistle of the day at High Mass ; twelve singing priests, twelve singing children, and sixteen singing laymen, besides " divers retainers of cunning singing men, that came at divers sundry principal feasts." These formed a choir that far excelled that of the King, who declared that, if it was not for the personal love he bore him, he would have boys and men and all. For his Majesty complained that "if any manner of new song should be brought unto both the said chapels to be sung ex improviso^ then the said song was better and more surely handled " by the Cardinal's choir than his own. But even all these were exclusive of his personal attendants, who numbered no less than a hundred and sixty persons. They were: his High Chamberlain, his Vice-Chamberlain, twelve gentlemen ushers, daily waiters, eight gentlemen THE CARDINAL'S POMP AS LORD CHANCELLOR. 37 ushers and waiters of his privy chamber, nine or ten lords, forty persons acting as gentlemen cup-bearers, carvers, sewers, etc. ; six yeomen ushers, eight grooms of the chamber; six and forty yeomen of his chamber, "daily to attend upon his person " ; sixteen doctors and chaplains, two secretaries, three clerks and four counsellors learned in the law. These, and many more whom we need not particularize, were constantly in attendance on him while he resided at Hampton Court; and the cost of entertaining them raised Wolsey's household expenses alone to something like ;^5o,ooo a year in modern reckoning. As Lord Chancellor, he had an additional and separate retinue, almost as numerous and various — clerks, running footmen, armourers, minstrels, sergeants-at-arms, heralds, etc. The display of such pomp and splendour could not fail to rouse to fury such austere spirits as Skelton and Roy, who, being unable to recognize anything in magnificence but the outward show, looked on it only as vulgar ostentation. The late Mr. Brewer, who made so deep a study of Wolsey's administration, and analyzed his character to its very ele- ments, attributes his taste for the magnificent to its true motives. " He was resolved," he says, " to invest his new dignity with all that splendour and magnificence, which no man understood better, or appreciated more highly than he did. Even in that age of gorgeous ceremonial, before Puritan sentimentalism had insisted on the righteousness of lawn sleeves ; when the sense aches with interminable recitals of cloth of gold, silks and tapestries, even then amidst jewelled mitres and copes, a Cardinal in his scarlet robes formed a conspicuous object. Not that Wolsey was the slave of a vulgar vanity ; magnificent in all his doings, — in plate, dress, tapestry, pictures, buildings, the furniture of a chapel or a palace, the setting of a ring, or the arrangements for a con- gress, there was the same regal taste at work, the same powerful grasp of little things and great. A soul as capacious as the sea, and minute as the sands upon its shores, when minute- ness was required he would do nothing meanly. The last great builder this country ever had, the few remains that survive him show the vastness of his mind and the universality of his genius." Wolsey himself, in answer to the upbraidmgs of Dr. Barnes, 38 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. one of the new puritanic sect, vindicated himself by asking : " How think ye ? were it better for me, being in the honour and dignity that I am, to coin my pillars and pole-axes, and give the money to five or six beggars ? Do you not reckon the commonwealth better than five or six beggars ? " To this Dr. Barnes, who himself tells the story, answered that he reckoned it " more to the honour of God and to the salvation of his soul, and also to the comfort of his poorer brethren, that they were coined and given in alms." To such theories Wolsey had much too much love of art and of magnificence to assent, — "yet in bestowing He was most princely : Ever witness for him Those twins of learning, that he raised in you, Ipswich and Oxford ! " While at Hampton Court, Wolsey, though not so over- whelmed with labour as when in London, found little time for exercise or recreation. He rose early, said usually two masses in his private closet, and by eight o'clock, after having breakfast and transacting some private business, he came out of his Privy Chamber in his Cardinal's robes, his upper garment, which was " either of fine scarlet, or else of crimson satin, taffety, damask, or caffa, the best that could, be got for money, and upon his head a round pillion, with a noble of black velvet set to the same in the inner side ; he had also a tippet of fine sables about his neck." He then gave audiences and received any person of import- ance. Of his appearance when attired in his Cardinal's robes, the best idea is afforded by his portrait, still preserved at his college of Christ Church. He was at this time about forty years old, and is described by the Venetian ambassador as " very handsome " ; though Skelton and Roy, his satirists, both speak of him as being disfigured by the small-pox ; and Skelton, in addition, taunts him with being — '* So full of melancholy With a flap afore his eye — " probably a hanging eyelid. The rest of the morning was occupied in reading, writing, wolsey's appearance. 39 and signing despatches and other documents, corresponding with the King, and inditing instructions to countless agents abroad. In the afternoon, if any time remained, he took his CARDINAL WOLSEY. recreation by walking in his galleries and cloisters when the weather was rough, and strolling in his park or garden when it was fine. Even then, however, his mind was not at rest, for Cavendish tells us he was accustomed to walk towards evening in his garden to say his even-song and other divine 40 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. service with his chaplain. And elsewhere he assures us that " what business matters soever he had in the day, he never went to his bed with any part of his divine service unsaid, yea, not so much as a single collect." The same delightful bio- grapher gives us, in his metrical life of his master, a pleasing picture of his habit of evening recreation : " My galleries were fayer, both large and long, To walk in them when that it lyked me best ; " " My gardens sweet, enclosed with walles strong, Embanked with benches to sytt and take my rest, The knots so enknotted, it cannot be exprest ; With arbors and alyes so pleasant and so dulce, The pestylent ayers with flavors to repulse." This stanza gives a vivid idea of Wolsey's old garden at Hampton Court ; though, unfortunately, but few traces of it now remain. It was situated to the south of the Base and Clock Courts, where can still be seen the inclosed parterres ^^known as the Pond Gardens — which were laid out, as we shall see further on, by Henry VIII. And along the very pathway, by which thousands of careless sightseers, in the summer months, now flock to see the great vine, paced the myriad-minded Cardinal 360 years ago, pondering his mighty schemes of imperial politics. When term began, he had to return to London to sit daily in Westminster Hall. His progresses from the palace on these occasions were made with the greatest display, his ordinary pomp as Cardinal being swelled by that of his office of Lord Chancellor. As he entered from his Privy Chamber, " apparelled all in red, as a Cardinal," into his Chamber of Presence, which was thronged with servants and "noblemen and very worthy gentlemen," waiting to attend him, he was preceded by his pursuivant-at-arms, with a great mace of silver- gilt, and by his gentlemen ushers calling out : " On, my lords and masters, on before; make way for my Lord's grace." In this manner he passed from his Presence Chamber through the hall, and down to the door, where he mounted his mule. Here the whole procession was formed, everyone almost being on horseback. First went the Cardinal's attendants, attired in liveries of crimson velvet THE CARDINAL'S PROCESSIONS. 41 with gold chains, and the inferior officers in coats of scarlet, bordered with black velvet. After these came two gentlemen bearing the great seal and his Cardinal's hat, then two priests with silver pillars or pole-axes, " and next two great crosses of silver, whereof one of them was for his Archbishop- wolsey's low gallery, on the ground floor of the south range, in the first court. rick, and the other for his legacy, borne always before him, whithersoever he went, or rode, by two of the most tallest and comeliest priests that he could get within all this realm." Then came the Cardinal himself " very sumptuously on a mule, trapped with crimson velvet, and his stirrups of copper gilt." He was followed by four footmen with gilt pole-axes in their hands, and many other followers, his yeomen being 42 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. in French tawny liveries, having embroidered on the backs and breasts of their coats the letters T and C under the Cardinal's hat. The annexed sketch, taken from an ancient drawing, exhibits the Cardinal and the suite setting out. With regard to these progresses, Roy asks : " Doth he use then on mules to ryde? Yea, and that with so shameful pr}'de That to tell it is not possible : More like a God celestiall Than any creature mortall With worldly pompe incredible. *' Before hym rydeth two prestes stronge, And they beare two crosses ryghte alonge, Gapynge in every man's face : After them followe two layemen secular. And each theym holdynge a pillar In their hondes, steade of a mace. ** Then followeth my Lord on his mule Trapp'd with gold under her cule In every poynt most curiously ; On each syde a pollaxe is borne, Which in none wother use are worne, Pretendynge some hid mistery. *' Then hath he servants five or six score. Some behind and some before, A marvellous great companye ; Of which are lordes and gentlemen. With many gromes and yemen, And of also knaves among." ** A great carle he is and fatt, Wearing on his hed a red hatt." The "red hat" was, like a red rag to a bull, a special source of irritation to, and a target for the scorn of, his numerous enemies : ** Whiles the red hat doth endure. He maketh himself cock sure ; The red hat with his lure Bryngeth all things under cure.*' CARDINAL WOLSEY'S POWER. 43 Even Sir Thomas More flung sarcasms at it in the House of Commons. Some of this rancour is, however, not surprising, if we are to beUeve the assertion of Tyndale, that, when it first arrived from Rome, it " was set on a cupboard and tapers about, so that the greatest Duke in the land must make curtesie thereto." The Cardinal's progresses to and from Hampton Court were not always performed by land. Sometimes he chose CARDINAL WOLSEY IN PROGRESS. (From a contemporary drawing.) the river, and embarked in his magnificent State barge "furnished with yeomen standing on the ails, and crowded with his gentlemen within and without." When Wolsey was residing at Hampton Court, he was continually receiving visits from the foreign ambassadors, who sometimes rode down from London to have audiences of him, and sometimes remained as his guests for a few days. On these occasions he did not fail to impress them with his own influence beside the King, and the greatness and power 44 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. of this country. Their despatches home constantly dwelt on these topics, and enhanced the weight of England's voice in the councils of Europe. If any special embassy came into the kingdom, it was to Wolsey's palace that they were first directed ; by him they w^ere received in almost regal state, and to him they addressed their diplomatic arts. Of the Cardinal's position in regard to foreign powers, no better idea can be formed than from Mr. Brewer's eloquent vindication of him, which we cannot refrain from quoting here : " The bent of his genius," says he, " was exclusively political, but it leaned more to foreign than domestic politics. It shone more conspicuous in great diplomatic combinations, for which the earlier years of the reign furnished favourable opportunities, than in domestic reforms. No man understood so well the interests of this kingdom in its relations to foreign powers, or pursued them with greater skill and boldness. The more hazardous the conjuncture, the higher his spirit soared to meet it. His intellect expanded with the occasion. . . . Proud cardinal and proud prelate were the terms lavished upon him by men as proud as himself with much less reason to be proud. . . . From a humble station by his own unassisted efforts he had raised him- self to the most conspicuous position, not in this nation only, but throughout the whole of Europe. ' He was seven times greater than the Pope himself,' is no exaggeration of the Venetian Giustinian, for he saw at his feet what no pope had for a long time seen, and no subject before or since, princes, kings, and emperors courting his smiles. Born to command, infinitely superior in genius to those who addressed him, piercing their motives at a glance, he was lofty and impatient. But there is not a trace throughout his correspondence of the ostentation of vulgar triumph or gratified vanity. Grave and earnest, it occasionally descends to irony, is sometimes pungent, never vainglorious. ... In genius, in penetration, in aptitude for business and indefatigable labour he had no equal. All despatches addressed to ambassadors abroad or at home passed through his hands, the entire political cor- respondence of the times was submitted to his perusal and waited for his decision." And this is only in accordance with contemporary testi- wolsey's magnificence. 45 mony. "He is omnipotent," says Erasmus, writing to Cardinal Grimani. " All the power of the State is centered in him," in the observation of Giustinian ; " he is, in fact, ipse rex, and no one in this realm dare attempt aught in opposition to his interests." Such a position in the State could not fail to expose him to the bitter assaults of the envious. Skelton bursts out : *' Why come ye not to Court? To whyche Court ? To the Kynges Courte, Or to Hampton Court? Nay to the Kynges Court : But Hampton Court Hath the preemynence, And Yorkes Place, With my lorde's grace, To whose magnifycence Is all the conflewence, Sutys and supplycacyons Embassades of all nacyons." But it was not only satirists and reformers who hated and maligned him. He had long been regarded with aversion by the aristocracy, who viewed with disgust the rise of the haughty upstart, and by the courtiers and politicians, who envied him, and disliked or could not understand his policy. And now at last the influence of the King, on whom he had alone depended, was beginning to forsake him. One of the first indications of this was Henry's asking him, with unmistakable signs of jealousy and displeasure, "Why he had built so magnificent a house for himself at Hampton Court ? " " To show how noble a palace a subject may offer to his sovereign," is supposed to have been his adroit reply ; whereon the King at once accepted the offer, and the lease of the manor of Hampton Court was surrendered into his hands. With the palace was included all its costly furniture, tapestries, and plate — forming assuredly the most magni- ficent gift ever made by a subject to his sovereign ! This occurred in June, 1525 ; but he still, until the time of his disgrace, continued, some years after he had certainly parted with it technically to the King, to write, as he had 46 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. previously done, in letters not addressed to the King, " From my manor at Hampton Court," and to make use of it as though still entirely his own. Towards the end of October in the year 1527, a great embassy, consisting of the Grand Master and Marechal of France, Anne de Montmorency, Du Bellay, the Bishop of Bayonne, with a retinue of a hundred persons " of the most noblest and wealthiest gentlemen in all the Court of France," with captains of the guard and their followers, to the number of five or six hundred horse, came over to England, solemnly to confirm the Treaty between France and England, and to invest Henry with the Order of St. Michael. After being received and regaled in London and at Greenwich, they were taken to visit Wolsey at Hampton Court, where the grand master and all his companions were, says Du Bellay, for four or five days, " festoye de tous les festimens qui se pouraient souhaitter." Of this entertainment Cavendish gives so delightfully quaint and vivid a descrip- tion that, though somewhat long, it would be spoilt by abridgment, and consequently we offer no apology for quoting it here at length : " Then was there no more to do but to make provision at Hampton Court for this assembly against the day appointed. My Lord Cardinal called for his principal officers of his house, as his Steward, comptroller, and the clerks of his kitchen — whom he commanded to prepare for this banquet at Hampton Court ; and neither to spare for expenses or travail, to make them such triumphant cheer as they may not only wonder at here, but also make a glorious report in their country, to the King's honour and that of his realm. His pleasure once known, to accomplish his commandment they sent forth all the caterers, purveyors, and other persons, to prepare of the finest viands that they could get, either for money or friendship among my Lord's friends. Also they sent for all the expertest cooks, besides my lord's, that they could get in all England, where they might be gotten, to serve to garnish this feast. The purveyors brought and sent in such plenty of costly provisions, as ye would wonder at the same. The cooks wrought both night and day in divers subtleties and many crafty devices ; where lacked neither gold, silver, ne any other costly thing meet for the purpose. The yeomen WOLSEY'S BANQUET TO THE FRENCH EMBASSY. 47 and grooms of the wardrobes were busied in hanging of the chambers with costly hangings, and furnishing the same with beds of silks, and other furniture apt for the same in every degree." At this point we may notice the picturesque old doorway, which gave access into the spacious cellars, where the Cardinal's vast stores of costly wines and provisions were kept. The cellars themselves were transformed and enlarged by Henry VIIL, after Wolsey's death, but his arms were suffered to remain in the spandrels of the doorway. To resume Cavendish's narrative. "Then my Lord Cardinal sent me, being his gentleman usher, with two other of my fellows, to Hampton Court, to foresee all things touching our rooms, to be nobily garnished accordingly. Our pains were not small or light, but travel- ling daily from chamber to chamber. Then the carpenters, the joiners, the masons, the painters, and all other artificers necessary to glorify the house and feast were set at work. There was carriage and re-carriage of plate, stuff, and other rich implements ; so that there was nothing lacking or to be imagined or devised for the purpose. There were also four- teen score beds provided and furnished with all manner of furniture to them belonging, too long particularly here to rehearse. But to all wise men it sufficeth to imagine, that knoweth what belongeth to the furniture of such triumphant feast or banquet. " The day was come that to the Frenchmen was assigned, and they ready assembled at Hampton Court, something before the hour of their appointment. Wherefore the officers caused them to ride to Hanworth, a place and park of the King's, within two or three miles, there to hunt and spend the time until night. At which time they returned again to Hampton Court, and every of them conveyed to his chamber severally, having in them great fires and wine ready to refresh them, remaining there until their supper was ready, and the chambers where they should sup were ordered in due form. The first waiting-chamber was hanged with fine arras, and so were all the rest, one better than another, furnished with tall yeomen. There was set tables round about the chambers banquet- wise, all covered with fine cloths of diaper. A cupboard of plate, parcel gilt ; having also in 48 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. the same chamber, to give the more light, four plates of silver, set with lights upon them, and a great fire in the chimney. "The next chamber, being the chamber of presence, hanged with very rich arras, wherein was a gorgeous and precious cloth of estate hanged up, replenished with many goodly gentlemen ready to serve. The boards were set as the other boards were in the other chamber before, save that the high table was set and removed beneath the cloth of estate, towards the midst of the chamber, covered with fine linen cloths of damask work, sweetly perfumed. " There was a cupboard, made for the time, in length of the breadth of the nether end of the same chamber, six desks high, full of gilt plate, very sumptuous, and of the newest fashions ; and upon the nethermost desk garnished all with plate of clean gold, having two great candlesticks of silver and gilt, most curiously wrought, the workmanship whereof, with the silver, cost three hundred marks, and lights of wax as big as torches burning upon the same. This cupboard was barred in round about that no man might come nigh it ; for there was none of the same plate occupied or stirred during this feast, for there was sufficient besides. The plates that hung on the walls to give light in the chamber were of silver and gilt, with lights burning in them, a great fire in the chimney, and all other things necessary for the furniture of so noble a feast. "Now was all things in a readiness, and supper time at hand. My lord's officers caused the trumpets to blow to warn to supper, and the said officers went right discreetly in due order and conducted these noble personages from their chambers unto the chamber of presence where they should sup. And they, being there, caused them to sit down ; their service was brought up in such order and abundance, both costly and full of subtleties, with such a pleasant noise of divers instruments of music, that the Frenchmen, as it seemed, were rapt into a heavenly paradise. " Ye must understand that my lord was not there, ne yet come, but they being merry and pleasant with their fare devising and wondering upon the subtleties. " Before the second course, my Lord Cardinal came in among them, booted and spurred, all suddenly, and bade wolsey's last great entertainment. 49 them prof ace ; at whose coming they would have risen and given place with much joy. Whom my Lord commanded to sit still and keep their rooms ; and straightways being not shifted of his riding apparel, called for a chair, and sat him- self down in the midst of the table, laughing and being as merry as ever I saw in my life. Anon came up the second course with so many dishes, subtleties, and curious devices, which were above a hundred in number, of so goodly proportion and costly, that I suppose the Frenchmen never saw the like. The wonder was no less than it was worthy indeed. There were castles with images in the same ; Paul's church and steeple, in proportion for the quantity as well counterfeited as the painter should have painted it upon a cloth or wall. There were beasts, birds, fowls of divers kinds, and personages, most lively made and counterfeited in dishes ; some fighting, as it were, with swords, some with guns and crossbows; some vaulting and leaping; some dancing with ladies, some in complete harness, justing with spears, and with many more devices, than I am able with my wit to describe. Among all, one I noted : there was a chessboard, subtilely made of spiced plate, with men to the same ; and for the good proportion, because that Frenchmen be very expert in that play, my Lord gave the same to a gentleman of France, commanding that a case should be made for the same in all haste, to preserve it from perishing in the conveyance thereof into his country. " Then my Lord took a bowl of gold, which was esteemed of the value of five hundred marks, filled with hypocras, whereof there was plenty, putting off his cap, said, ' I drink to the King my Sovereign Lord and Master, and to the King your Master,' and therewith drank a good draught. And when he had done he desired the Grand Master to pledge him, cup and all, the which cup he gave him ; and so caused all the other lords and gentlemen in other cups to pledge these two royal princes. Then went the cups merrily about, that many of the Frenchmen were fain to be led to their beds. Then went my Lord, leaving them sitting still, into his privy chamber to shift him ; and making there a very short supper, or rather a small repast, returned again among them into the chamber of presence, using them so nobly, with so loving and familiar countenance £ 50 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. and entertainment, that they could not commend him too much. *'And whilst they were in communication and other pastimes, all their liveries were served to their chambers. Every chamber had a bason and a ewer of silver, some gilt and some parcel gilt, and some two great pots of silver in like manner, and one pot at the least with wine and beer, a bowl or goblet, and a silver pot to drink beer in ; a silver candlestick or two, with both white lights and yellow lights of three sizes of wax ; and a staff torch ; a fine manchet, and a chet-loaf of bread. Thus was every chamber furnished throughout the house, and yet the two cupboards in the two banqueting chambers not once touched. Then being past midnight, as time served they were conveyed to their lodgings to take their rest for that night. In the morning of the next day (not early), they rose and heard mass, and dined with my Lord, and so departed towards Windsor, and there hunted, delighting much of the castle and college, and in the Order of the Garter. They being departed from Hampton Court, my Lord returned again to Westminster, because it was in the midst of the term." The banquet just described in honour of the French Embassy, was Wolsey's last great entertainment at Hampton Court. He still continued, however, to reside here a good deal, though the troubled course of events, which were hurrying him to his doom, and the frequent prevalence of the sweating sick- ness, allowed him neither opportunity nor leisure for dispensing his splendid hospitality. At the end of June, and during the greater part of the months of July and August, 1528, he was staying at the palace with a very few attendants, on account of a sudden and violent outbreak of that disease. No less than forty thousand persons in London were attacked ; and although of these only two thousand died, yet the strangeness and suddenness of the seizures were well calculated to strike terror. During the panic, Wolsey received several affectionate letters from the King, who, like the Cardinal, shut himself up quite alone, begging him to take care of himself, and cautioning him to " keep out of the air, to have only a small and clean company about, not to eat too much supper, WOLSEY'S LAST DAYS AND FALL. 51 or drink too much wine," and to take some pills which he had had made up for him, and sent him, teUing him to be of good comfort, and expressing his sorrow that he was so far away. At this point, as we are about to bid farewell to the great Cardinal, respect for tradition demands, perhaps, that we SEIZURE OF THE CARDINAL'S GOODS. (From a Contemporary Drawing.) should notice the legend of the "Cardinal Spider." This enormous insect, with its fat reddish-brown body and its long jointed hairy legs, often attains the size of five inches in width ; and, when seen crawling about a bedroom at night, will startle even persons of tolerably composed nerves. It is alleged to be a kind of spider peculiar to Wolsey's palace, and being 52 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. in some mysterious way connected with his disastrous fate, to be destined for ever to haunt the scene of his former greatness. Such is the story. The fact, however, is that this supposed unique specimen of the arachnida is well known to zoologists under the name of "Tegenaria Guyonii or Domestica," a species which, though certainly found in extraordinary abundance in the old nooks and corners of Hampton Court, is yet not unknown elsewhere in the valley of the Thames. During the anxious period that followed the arrival of Campeggio in England, Wolsey, harassed on all sides, and filled with forebodings of his impending fate, often hid himself in retirement at Hampton Court, where, because the sweating sickness was again virulently raging, " he fortified his gallery and garden, and would suffer only four or five persons to see him." This was on July 3rd, 1529, and it was the last time he ever set eyes upon his dearly-loved brick towers and courts. Two days afterwards he returned to London to attend the further sittings of the legatirie court ; and in a few weeks more — •• Wolsey, that once trod the ways of glory And sounded all the depths and shoals of honour *' — was flung from his high estate, banished the King's presence, stripped of his dignities, robbed of all his vast possessions and goods, and sent in disgrace to Esher Place. There he remained in retirement and disgrace for several months, brooding over his fallen greatness and the King's ingratitude ; while Henry, accompanied by Anne Boleyn, the Cardinal's most persistent enemy, installed himself close by at Hampton Court. Their proximity led to Wolsey's receiving almost daily messages from the Court, sometimes of hope, and sometimes of new hardships in store for him, so that he was k'ept in a continual state of anxious suspense, which so preyed on his mind and worried his already feeble and shattered frame, that at about Christmas time he fell dangerously ill. When the King heard that he was likely to die, he seemed to relent for a while and to feel some remorse for his ungrateful treatment of one whose only fault had been to have served him too well. He sent him messages of comfort, and a ring as a token of goodwill, and ILLNESS AND DEATH OF CARDINAL WOLSEY. 53 even induced Anne Boleyn to send him a tablet of gold hanging at her girdle, "with very gentle and comfortable words." But the machinations of his enemies were not suspended ; and, for fear of the King seeing and forgiving him, they got him banished to his diocese of York. We need not follow him in the last few miserable months of his life, when every galling indignity that the ingenuity of HENRY VIII. AND ANNE BOLEYN, SENDING TOKENS OF GOODWILL TO THE SICK CARDINAL. (From a Contemporary Drawing.) his enemies could devise was heaped upon his head. On the morning of the 29th of November, 1530, at eight o'clock, the once proud Cardinal and mighty minister of Henry VIIL, attended only by a few faithful followers, breathed his last in Leicester Abbey, a prisoner in custody of the Lieu- tenant of the Tower, on the charge of high treason against his sovereign lord the King. Speaking of the death of Wolsey, Mr. Brewer says : "So fell the great Cardinal, and the greatness and splendour of 54 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. Henry's reign departed with him. There may be qualities which men desire more than these, and consider more con- ducive to the interest and happiness of nations ; but these will not be denied to Wolsey's administration ; nor, in these respects, can any of his successors be compared with him, for greatness and magnanimity are not the qualities we should attribute to Cranmer or to Cromwell. From a third- rate kingdom, of little account in Europe, Wolsey raised this nation to an equality with the highest. For a time, at all events, peace and war depended on its fiat. It held the scales between the two great contending powers, and if that was a satisfaction to a proud and ambitious prince, Henry had the satisfaction of seeing the two most powerful mon- archs of Christendom contending for his favour. No nation ever yet achieved greatness by its internal policy alone. It is only by mixing in the wide theatre of the world, by its ex- ternal relations, by measuring its strength with others, that any nation attains to eminence ; and without greatness even its virtues are apt to reflect the littleness of its vices."' And elsewhere he observes, " It was not in domestic affairs or local politics that the genius of Wolsey displayed itself to the best advantage, but in diplomacy and statesmanship. Unaided by fleets or armies, ill supported by his master, and by colleagues of very moderate abilities, he contrived by his individual energy to raise his country from a third-rate state into the highest circle of European politics. Englishmen have been so long accustomed to this supremacy, are so sensitive to any diminution of their reputation and influence abroad, that they cannot recognize the difificulty of Wolsey's task, or the merits of the man who first conceived and realized this conception of his country's greatness. Gasping and enfeebled from the wounds of the Civil Wars, content to purchase internal tranquillity at the price of obscurity, menaced by Scotland on one side, by Ireland on the other, without fleets or armies, or a foot of colonial ground, — it required all the proud originality of genius to overlook the material disproportion of England and contend for the palm with the greatest and most ancient kingdoms in the world." HENRY VIII. ENTERb INTO POSSSESSION. $5 CHAPTER IV. HENRY VIII. AT HOME. As soon as Wolsey had been banished to Esher, Henry hastened to enter into absolute possession of Hampton Court and all its treasures ; and he immediately gave orders for the enlarging, improving, and still further embellishing of Wolsey 's palace. Among the first things taken in hand was the adding to the " King's lodgings," as they were termed, of a new gallery, a new library and study, and several smaller rooms ; while for his Majesty's recreation a " close bowling alley " and a " close tennys play," or tennis court, were built on the north-east of the palace. A new set of kitchens and " offices appertaining to the same," such as a new buttery, pantry, pastry, spicery, larder, dry-fish-house, cellar, etc., were also begun before Wolsey's death. Another of Henry VIII.'s first cares was to mark his ownership of the palace by affixing his arms and badges to every part of the building. We consequently find that the bills for the years 1530 to 1532 abound with charges for carving of the King's arms, heraldic beasts, devices and badges in stone and wood, and for painting and gilding them. On every pinnacle and on every coping, on the gables and on the battlements, were lions, dragons, leopards, hinds, harts, grey-hounds, and antelopes, carrying gilded vanes, emblazoned with the crown, rose, fleur-de-lys, and portcullis. The garnishing of the interior likewise involved much ex- pense and labour, especially that of " the upmost gallary," the roof being of rich antique work, gilded, and decorated with carved badges, leaves and balls, and angels with the King's words or mottoes on scrolls, with cornices and case- ments of like splendour. These galleries, which seem to have been brought into vogue by Wolsey some fifteen years before this, were peculiar to English architecture, and as such were objects of curiosity and admiration to foreigners. An Italian, the record of 56 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. whose travels in England is preserved among the Venetian archives, and who visited the palaces, both at Whitehall and Hampton Court, which had formerly been the late Cardinal's, remarks with particularity on the "galleries, which are long porticoes or halls, without chambers, with windows on each side, looking on gardens or rivers, the ceilings being mar- vellously wrought in stone with gold, and the wainscot of carved wood representing a thousand beautiful figures ; and round about there are chambers, and very large halls, all hung with tapestries." The particulars which we have cited above relating to the painting and decoration of the exterior and interior of Hampton Court, and many similar ones which we shall notice further on, relating to the building and the works, are derived from the original manuscript bills still preserved in the Record Office, and comprised in twelve large folio volumes of some eight hundred or a thousand pages each. Most of them are written with exquisite care and neatness, and the headings of each fortnightly account are beautiful specimens of pen- manship. They are replete with curious matter as to the cost of material, the price of labour, and the state of trade and the handicrafts generally, and afford a complete picture of the decoration and furniture, and even of the inner life, in the palace of Henry VHI. So elaborately and minutely were these accounts kept by the clerk of the works, that the name of every daily labourer, and of every mason, bricklayer, carpenter, joiner, painter, carver, glazier, gilder, and tiler employed, is set out in full from fortnight to fortnight, with the sum paid to him ; while every portion of the work is so particularized that we can identify every carving, every mould- ing, and every piece of colouring and gilding, and find by whom it was executed and what it cost. In one of the volumes we find evidence of Henry's patronage of the fine arts. For there are entries of two or three pay- ments to Toto del Niinziato (or Anthony Tote, as he was called in England), who, like Lucca Penni (Bartholomew Penne) and Holbein, was one of the foreign artists employed by the King. When Henry VHI. came to Hampton Court after the disgrace of the Cardinal, he was accompanied by Queen Katharine, and at this time they both, says a foreign ol> HENRY VIII. AND ANNE BOLEYN. 57 server, " paid each other reciprocally the greatest possible at- tention, or compliments in the Spanish fashion, with the utmost mental tranquillity, as if there had never been any dispute whatever between them. Yet has the affair not slackened in the least, as both parties are collecting votes in France, Italy, and other places. At any rate, this most virtuous queen maintains strenuously that all her King and lord does, is done by him for true and pure conscience's sake, and not from any wanton appetite." The foreigner refers to the canvassing, that was then going on in Henry VIII.'s behalf, of the most learned divines and doctors of the Civil Law, in all the Universities of Europe, LEAD WATER SPOUT, PUT UP BY HENRY VIII. for an opinion favourable to the King's contention that his marriage with his deceased brother's wife was contrary to divine and natural law, and consequently null and void from the beginning. Pending their decisions, he summoned on August nth, 1530, a numerous assembly of clergy and lawyers at Hampton Court, including Warham, Archbishop of Canterbury, and More, Lord Chancellor, " to ascertam whether, in virtue of the privilege possessed by this kingdom, Parliament could and would enact that, notwithstanding the Pope's prohibition, this cause of the divorce should be de- cided by the Archbishop of Canterbury." Their answer to this question does not appear to have been very encouraging ; so that Henry abandoned this idea for a while, and tried how he might influence the Pope by threats of setting his power at 58 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. naught if his demands were not conceded. He sent for the Papal Nuncio to Hampton Court, and had a long conference with him, in which he told the Nuncio plainly that he was determined to carry out his intentions with regard to the divorce, and that at all hazards. Then, after reproaching the Pope for his conductin the affair, he proceeded to declare "that if his HoHness would not show him in future more considera- tion than at present, he should take up his pen and let the world know that he (the Pope) possessed no greater authority than that held by Moses, which was only grounded on the declaration and interpretation of the Holy Scripture, every- thing beyond that being mere usurpation and tyranny, and that should he be driven to take such a step, the damage and injury thereby inflicted on the Apostolic See would be irreparable and far more fatal than that caused by the writings of others, for with his learning and rank, kings, princes, and all others would side with him." All this and much more the King spoke with a great appearance of regret, and with tears in his eyes. In the meanwhile, Anne Boleyn — the Lady Anne, as she was now called — was living at Hampton Court, treated with every consideration by her royal lover. A suite of rooms was superbly furnished for her accommodation, a retinue of attendants was appointed to wait on her, and Henry passed a great part of his time in the society " of his awne darling," as he termed her, riding out with her, teaching her to shoot at the target, walking in the park, or strolling in the gardens in the summer evenings, and sometimes having supper with her in her own chamber. Even as early as the year 1528, before the fall of Wolsey, the workmen were employed on "Anne Bouillayne's lodgynges at Hampton Courte " ; while after the Cardinal's death we come across further entries on account of what were then termed "the Lady Anne's lodgynges." The King's privy purse expenses, also, contain notes of large disbursements on her account. At Christmas, 1530, he made her, at Hampton Court, a present of ;^ioo, at another time of ;£"i8o, and again of ;£'4o, " to play with " ; and, in addition, repaid her losses at bowls and other games. Large sums are likewise debited for her dress — for crimson satin, furs, purple velvet, and crimson cloth of gold ; and for PRESENTS FOR ANNE BOLEYN. 59 a shooting costume, with bows, arrows, shooting gloves, and other articles for archery. And mention is especially made of a splendid evening dress of black satin, edged with black velvet, and lined with black fur, all the details of the cost, material, and making of which are minutely set out in the King's private account book, and which cost his Majesty ;^ioi 15s. 8d. In fact, in three years he spent, on her dress alone, nearly ;^5oo, which must be regarded as an enormous sum, when we bear in mind that the then value of money was about twelve times what it is now. His extravagant outlay, where she was concerned, contrasts strangely, indeed, with the niggardly gifts he was accustomed to bestow on his daughter Mary, on whom he spent, in a whole year, not a fifth part of the sum he lavished on his " entirely beloved sweetheart's " evening dress. Henry VHI. and Anne Boleyn were at Hampton Court when the news of Wolsey's death reached the King. Caven- dish, who hastened to Court to give him the details of his last hours, found him shooting at the rounds in the park. *' Perceiving him occupied in shooting," writes Cavendish, " I thought it not my duty to trouble him, but leaned to a tree, intending to stand there, and to attend his gracious pleasure. Being in a great study, at the last the King came suddenly behind me where I stood, and clapped his hand upon my shoulder, and when I perceived him, I fell upon my knee. To whom he said, calling me by name, ' I will,' quoth he, * make an end of my game, and then will I talk with you,' and so departed to his mark, whereat the game was ended. " Then the King delivered his bow unto the yeoman of his bows, and went his way inward to the palace, whom I followed ; howbeit he called for Sir John Gage, with whom he talked until he came at the garden postern gate, and there entered ; the gate being shut after him, which caused me to go my ways. "And being gone but a little distance, the gate was opened again, and there Sir Harry Norris called me again, commanding me to come in to the King, who stood behind the door in a nightgown of russet velvet furred with sables ; before whom I kneeled down, being with him there all alone the space of an hour and more, during which time he 60 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT, examined me of divers weighty matters concerning my lord, wishing that liever than ;£"2 0,000 that he had Hved." Henceforth Hampton Court became one of the favourite palaces of Henry VHI., who, while he resided there, devoted much of his time to those sports and athletic exercises in which he was so great an adept, and to which he was always much attached. " His Majesty," writes the Venetian ambas- sador, three days after Wolsey's death, "is staying at Hampton Court, where he resides willingly " ; and a few days after he records that he is still there, "enjoying his usual sports (sportj) and royal exercises; and the Queen remains constantly with him, nor does she at all omit to follow her lord and husband, so much reciprocal courtesy (mansue- tudine) being displayed in public that anyone acquainted with the controversy cannot but consider their conduct more than human." Six months afterwards, however, on the 14th of July, 1 53 1, Henry took his leave of Katharine at Windsor, and rode to Hampton Court, never to see her again. No other of the King's houses, indeed, was so well adapted for the pursuit both of outdoor and indoor amusements. The parks were extensive, and immediately after coming into possession he had caused them to be well stocked with deer and other game ; and Windsor forest, and Richmond, Oat- lands, and Hanworth Parks were also within easy reach. In his love for the chase he resembled his ancestor William the Conqueror ; and so keen a sportsman was he that Giustinian assures us "he never took this diversion without tiring eight or ten horses, which he caused to be stationed beforehand along the line of country he meant to take." Shooting and hawking were sports to which he was equally addicted ; and he had a large rabbit warren made in Bushey Park, and reared both partridges and pheasants. Occasionally, also, he angled for fish in the Thames, or in the ponds in the garden, which were filled for the purpose. In his privy purse expenses we find payments to fishermen for bringing him rods to Hampton Court, and for helping him to fish there. For jousts and tournaments, in which he frequently took part, a large piece of ground, of about nine acres in area, called "The Tilt Yard" (now degraded into a kitchen garden), was chosen. Here the lists, superbly decorated, TOURNAMENTS IN THE TILT YARD. 6l were set out, and surrounded by the pavilions of the cham- pions, ornamented with their arms and banners; and all around were the stands and stages, hung with tapestries and embroideries of gold and silver, for the spectators, who were themselves " decked in sumptuous array, the field presenting to the eye a rich display of magnificence." In various parts of the ground, also, were five towers, one of which still remains, whence an admirable survey of the scene could be obtained ; while another point of vantage was the gallery, still existing, in the north-west angle of the palace, from which there is an admirable view of the whole field. " We may also add the splendid appearance of the knights engaged in the sports ; themselves and their horses were most gor- geously arrayed, and their esquires and pages, together with minstrels and heralds, who superintended the ceremonies, were all of them clothed in costly and glittering apparel. Such a show of pomp, where wealth, beauty, and grandeur were concentrated, as it were, in one focus, must altogether have formed a wonderful spectacle, and made a strong im- pression on the mind, which was not a little heightened by the cries of the heralds, the clangour of the trumpets, the clashing of the arms, the rushing together of the combatants, and the shouts of the beholders." When the King himself took part in the tournament, a grand procession was formed, headed by the marshal of the jousts on horseback, dressed in cloth of gold, and surrounded by thirty footmen in liveries of yellow and blue. Then followed the drummers and trumpeters, all dressed in white damask ; next forty knights and lords in pairs, all in superb attire, and many in cloth of gold ; then " some twenty young knights on very fine horses, all dressed in white, with doublets of cloth of silver and white velvet, and chains of unusual size, and their horses barded with silver chainwork, and a. number of pendent bells." Next came their pages, on horseback, their trappings, half of gold embroidery, and half of purple velvet, embroidered with stars ; and then the jousters, armed, with their squires and footmen. Last of all came his Majesty, "armed cap-cL-pie^ with a surcoat of silver bawdakin, surrounded by some thirty gentlemen on foot, dressed in velvet and white satin, and in this order they went twice round the lists." 62 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. The jousts usually lasted several hours ; and Henry, being an admirable horseman and of great dexterity and quickness, often made his opponents measure their length on the sod, when from the galleries, stands, and towers there went up a shout of applause from the assembled spectators that made the walls of the palace ring again. During the courses the j ousters performed feats of horse- manship, the King especially distinguishing himself "in supernatural feats, changing his horses, and making them fly rather than leap, to the delight and ecstasy of everybody." Another of Henry's pastimes was shooting at the butt, in which he also excelled, drawing, according to several autho- rities, the best bow in England. In this amusement he was engaged, as we have seen, when Cavendish came to announce Wolsey's death; and he was often joined in it by Anne Boleyn. Her brother. Lord Rochford, was his constant companion in these and similar pastimes, and frequently won large sums from him. Besides these, Hampton Court was not wanting in indoor recreations, which might be pursued in wet and wintry weather. The tennis court, or " close tennys play," which is the oldest one in England, and has since been the model of all other courts in the kingdom, had just been finished ; and Henry was a frequent and skilful player in it. Numerous entries relating to the games he played are to be found in his privy purse expenses ; for instance, on the i6th of December, 1 53 1, five shillings were paid "to one that served on the King's side at tennes at Hampton Court " ; and at other times pay- ments of money are noted for bets which he lost to the other players and the spectators — for on all occasions his passion for gambling asserted itself. When he played, the gallery underneath the pent-house was usually crowded, and Giustinian, who had watched him, says : " He is extremely fond of tennis, at which game it is the prettiest thing in the world to see him play, his fair skin glowing through a shirt of the finest texture." He had tennis slippers or shoes and drawers made especially for wearing when he played, and " tenys cotes " of blue velvet and of black velvet, for putting on when he rested. Among other diversions of the same sort afforded in this palace were : an " open tennis play " — evidently a sort of HENRY VIII. SINGING SONGS. 62, lawn tennis — and an open and two close bowling alleys. One of these alleys, which existed till about a hundred years ago, is shown in the old print. It was about 270 feet long, and lit by numerous windows on both sides. There was another similar one near the river. The long winter evenings, when not enlivened with the masquerades and revels, in which Henry took particular delight, were usually passed in playing games of chance, such as backgammon, dice, and shovel-board, at which he betted deeply, so that his losses in the course of one year amounted to as much as ^3,500. Wherever the Court moved it was attended by a large number of minstrels of all kinds, for Henry was exceedingly fond of music, and was a very fair musician himself. He played with taste and execution on the organ, harpsichord, and lute ; and several songs of his own composition, which are extant, give us a high idea of his attainments in that sphere. Of his skill in singing all witnesses speak in high praise, and many a time, of an evening, Henry's powerful voice was heard re-echoing in the courts and cloisters of Hampton Court. The words of his songs, some of which are in French, were also of his own composition, and mostly very effective ; and several of them became extremely popular, especially that called " Pastime with Good Company." In this, his favourite one, Henry declares that his heart is set on hunting and singing, and dancing and love, and warmly pleads for youth that it " must have some dalliance." In others of his love songs he justifies his amours, on various pretexts, charac- teristically resolving to give up pleasure at last, when he is too old to enjoy it. At the same time, however, he lays claim to the virtue of constancy in love, declaring : and, " As the holly groweth green, and never changeth hue, So I am — ever have been — unto my lady true. " " For whoso loveth, should love but one — Change whoso will, I will be none." His taste for literature is well known ; he spoke French, Spanish, Italian, and Latin thoroughly; and he furnished a large library in the palace with books from York 64 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. Place, and had a catalogue made of them. Besides his book which earned him the title of Defender of the Faith, he at one time intended to publish a work in which he had long been engaged, on his divorce, a subject he had so deeply studied that Campeggio declared that he knew more about the canon law bearing on the point than any man living. But while Henry never stinted himself in his pleasures and the lighter studies, he did not suffer them to interfere with the more serious duties of his position. After Wolsey's death every despatch was submitted to him, and carefully read and docketed, and the whole business of the State was carried on with the greatest regularity and without delay. Varied and attractive, however, as were the pleasures of his country seat, still the pressure of urgent State affairs often obliged him to forego them, and compelled his presence in London. Consequently, we find repeated references to his going from Hampton Court to Westminster, Whitehall, St. James's, and the Tower, his journeys to and from these places being usually made by way of the Thames, in the State barges. But besides his London palaces, he was frequently visiting those of Greenwich, Richmond, Windsor, Nonsuch, Hatfield, Beaulieu, Hunsdon, Grafton, the More, Hanworth, and Oatlands ; and the migrations of the Court, backwards and forwards, between all these places, were incessant and perpetual. Chapuys, the Imperial ambassador, was quite perplexed by this insular restlessness : " I sent one of my men to Hampton Court," he writes, in a despatch to Vienna, " to ask for an audience from the King ; but he was already gone to Windsor and other places to amuse himself, and pass away the time, accompanied only by the Lady (Anne Boleyn, who in these excursions rode behind him on his pillion), the grand equerry, and two more." A little further on the ambassador adds : " For the last fortnight he has done little else but go from place to place, except on two occasions, when John Joachim went to visit him at Hampton Court." One of the principal points in which the Court and house- hold of Henry VHL differed from those of a modern EngUsh sovereign was in the vast number of persons who habitually resided, and were provided for, at the King's expense, within "-'" ^fir-fOA!/*; BACK COURT, BY THE GREAT KITCHEN. 66 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. the walls of the royal manor. This was the case not only with the gentlemen ushers, grooms-in-waiting, and daily waiters (who, be it remembered, in those days actually ren- dered the services their names imply), and the numerous cup-bearers, yeomen, sewers, and other servants attached to the various offices, but also with the great officers of State, ministers, and privy councillors; so that when the Court was in residence the palace was thronged by at least a thousand persons. It is not surprising, therefore, to learn that so motley an assemblage gave rise to many abuses and disorders at Court, and was by no means easy to keep in control. Accordingly, in 1526, Wolsey found it necessary to draw up the " Ordinances of Eltham " for the regulation of the royal household, and " the establishment of good order and the reformation of sundry errors and misuses " that had crept in. The ordinances were to apply while the Court was residing at the King's manors, at Hampton Court, and elsewhere. Stringent rules had to be enacted against such practices as purloining of locks off doors, stealing of tables, cupboards, and various household implements, and the keeping by officials and visitors of large numbers of servants within the Court at the King's charge, that they might thus relieve themselves from the burden of maintaining them, or employ them to do their duties for them. Another abuse to be cor- rected was "the great confusion, annoyance, infection, trouble, and dishonour, that ensueth by the numbers as well of sickly, impotent, inable and unmeet persons, as of rascals, and vagabonds, now spread, remaining and being in all the Court." Ordinances, also, with a sanitary purpose were laid down, "for the better avoiding of corruption and all un- cleanness out of the King's house, which doth engender danger of infection, and is very noisome and displeasant unto all the noblemen and others repairing to the same," directing a certain number of scullions to sweep and clean twice a day all the courts, galleries, and places within the Court, a^d forbidding under pain of imprisonment "the leaving of dishes, saucers or vessels about the house, or the throwing away of any reliques of meat, etc." Another regulation was as follows : " The King's High- ness also straightly forbiddeth and inhibiteth, that no person REGULATIONS FOR THE ROYAL HOUSEHOLD. 6j whatsoever he be presume to keep any greyhounds mas- tives, hounds, or other dogges, in the Court, other than some few small spaniels for ladyes or others, nor bring or leade any into the same except it be by the King's or Queen's commandment ; but the said grey hounds and doggs to be kept in kennels, and other meete places, out of the Court, as is convenient, soe as the premises dewly observed, the house VIEW OF ONE OF THE OLD OFFICES IN HENRY VIII. 's PALACE. may be sweete, wholesome, cleane and well furnished, as to a prince's honour and estate doth appertain." It was about the time of which we are writing that the ancient mediaeval custom of the whole household dining together in hall was beginning to decline. This was an in- novation on the habits of the good old times that Henry regarded with great disfavour. Accordingly one of the ordinances, after reciting that " sundry noblemen, gentlemen and others, do much delight and use to dyne in corners and secret places . . . not repaireing to the King's chamber nor 68 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. hall, nor to the head officers of the household ... by reason whereof the good order of the said household and chamber is greatly impaired and the said officers oftentimes destitute of company at their boards," proceeds to enact that there shall always be a public table, to which those at Court shall be obliged to repair. The regulations for the ordering of the King's Privy Chamber are very minute and curious. The first declares that " Inasmuch as in the pure and cleane keeping of the King's Privy Chamber, with the good order thereof, con- sisteth a great part of the King's quiet, rest, comfort and preservation of his health, the same above all things before mentioned is principally and most highly to be regarded ; and considering that right mean persons, as well for their more commodity do retire and withdraw themselves some- times apart, as for the wholesomeness, sweetness of their chambers do forbear to have any great or frequent resort in the same; much more is it convenient that the King's Highness have his privy chamber and inward lodgings reserved secret, at the pleasure of his grace, without repair of any great multitude." Then follow detailed directions as to the duties of the gentlemen and grooms of the privy chamber, which con- sisted of getting up at six o'clock, lighting the fire, cleaning and sweeping the room, fetching and warming the King's doublet, hose, and shoes, and afterwards dressing him in "reverent, discreet and sober manner." By other regula- tions they are enjoined " not to hearken and enquire where the King is, or goeth, be it early or late, without grudging, mumbUng or talking of the King's pastime; late or early going to bed ; " nor to repeat any Court gossip, — regulations which, we suppose — such is the discreetness of modern courtiers — would now be entirely superfluous. The elaborate ceremonial observed in the daily making of the King's bed, the directions for which occupy several pages of print, is a curious instance of Tudor etiquette. First, a groom of the bed-chamber or a page went and sum- moned four yeomen of the wardrobe, who brought the bed- clothes, and four yeomen of the bed-chamber and a gentle- man usher. When they entered the bed-chamber, four of the yeomen placed themselves on one side of the royal MAKING HENRY VIIl/S BED. 69 bed and four on the other, while the groom with his torch stood at the foot, and "the gentleman usher apart, com- manding them what they should do," Then "a yeoman with a dagger searched the straw of the bed, that there be no untruth therein." Next, the feather-bed was placed on the bed, " one of the yeomen tumbling over it for the search thereof," after which the blankets and sheets, at the word of command from the gentleman usher, were solemnly laid one by one upon the bed by the eight yeomen, who were strictly commanded to lower them in such a way that they should all touch the bed at all points at the same moment. Then follow several paragraphs concerning the tucking up of the bed-clothes, and the smoothing of the pillows ; which done, the yeomen made a cross upon, and kissed, the place where their hands had touched. When the ceremony was com- pleted, a page or groom was left in charge "unto the time the King be disposed to go to it." We find in the Chapter House manuscripts some parti- culars for " the garnishing and painting " and enlarging of one of the bedsteads which Henry used at Hampton Court. This was probably the same magnificent bedstead which was at the palace when the inventory of the King's effects was taken at his death. Its description is interesting as affording an idea of Tudor furniture. The posts, which, as well as the head, were " curiously wrought," were painted and gilt, and surmounted by four "bullyeons of timber work gilt," with four vanes of iron painted with the King's arms. The ceiler and tester were of cloth of gold tissue and cloth of silver paned, that is, worked in alternate diamond-shaped pieces together, and embroidered at the seams with a work of purple velvet. Both in the ceiler and on the tester were embroidered the King's arms, crowned with the crown imperial, in a garland of roses and fleurs-de-lys. The fringes and valances were of Venice gold, and the curtains purple and white, paned together, and garnished on both sides with Venice gold. By the same " Ordinances of Eltham " the diet allowances or " Bouche of Court," as it was termed, to which any per- son resident in the palace was entitled, was accurately fixed according to his rank or position. Thus a duke or duchess was allowed in the morning one chet loaf, one manchet, and 70 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. one gallon of ale ; in the afternoon, one manchet and one gallon of ale; and for after supper one chet loaf, one manchet, one gallon of ale, and a pitcher of wine, besides torches, faggots, and other necessaries. But a countess was allowed nothing at all after supper, and a gentleman usher had no allowance for the morning or afternoon. As, however, " Bouche of Court " was in addition to the excellent meals provided for everyone at the King's table, no one had cause to complain. The miscellaneous offices in the palace, connected with the provisioning, housekeeping, furnishing and cleaning departments, with all their officers and attendants, were each similarly subject to a series of distinct regulations, and owned their separate local habitations. Various as these offices had been in Wolsey's time, they were still more numerous now that the whole royal establishment had to be accommodated within the building; so that, as we have already mentioned, they were enlarged and extended by Henry VIII. as soon as he came into possession of Hampton Court. Not only do we hear, therefore, of the great kitchens, privy kitchen, cellar, larder, pantry, buttery, scullery, ewery, saucery, wafery, which had formed part of the Cardinal's establishment, but particulars occur, also, of the King's new kitchen, the fish kitchen, the chawndry, pastry, confectionery, squillery, sellery, spicery, poultry, accatry, washing house, scalding house, boiling house, pitcher house, still house, coal house, fish house, feather house, hot house, jewel house, pay house, counting house, check house, victual- ling house, store house, almonry, etc. Nearly all these, with their appurtenances, and with dwelling chambers annexed for the officers, clerks, and yeomen of the same, were situated behind the first three courts on the north side, and formed the long range of irregularly-gabled buildings, inclosing several small picturesque courtyards, which extend nearly the whole length of the palace. To attempt to identify the exact position of each of them now, after they have been so much transformed, would lead us into an almost hopeless archaeological puzzle ; but a care- ful survey of these purheus would still afford considerable interest to the curious antiquary, and enable him to recall much of the domestic economy of the Tudor Court. The THE GREAT KITCHEN. 72 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. positions of the three great kitchens, at any rate, can be easily identified, and their forms and dimensions followed out and mentally discriminated from the many walls, parti- tions, and living rooms which have been built up into them. One of them, indeed, remains almost exactly in its pristine state. It is 40 feet long by 28 feet wide, and, to the apex of the open-raftered roof, 40 feet high; and looking on its lofty mullioned windows, its great arched fireplaces, 7 feet high and 18 feet broad, where many an ox has been roasted whole, and its hatches or dressers, on which the dishes were placed, abutting on the serving place, our minds are forcibly recalled to the grandeur and profusion of Tudor hospitality. The serving place itself, also, is at once recognized by the external framework of the dressers, which communicate with the kitchens and other offices whence the dishes were brought up the backstairs of the hall to the royal table. The accommodating of so vast and varied an assemblage as the whole of the King's Court and household, necessitated at the same time the enlarging of several other parts of the palace. This was especially the case with Wolsey's hall, which, though doubtless a fine and spacious room enough, yet did not satisfy Henry's regal requirements and more gorgeous taste. Accordingly, two months before the Cardinal's death — namely, in October, 1530 — we find that the workmen were already employed in unroofing and pulling down the old hall, and laying the foundations of the " King's New Hall." The whole size and proportions of the new hall were to be on a scale of grandeur and magnificence suitable to a place which had now become one of the King's favourite residences. And here again arises the question, which we have before discussed in connection with Wolsey's original foundation of Hampton Court, as to who was the architect employed by Henry VIII. in the erection of these additional buildings. Britton, in his work on " Architectural Antiquities," makes mention of one Eustace Mascall, who, he tells us, was for seventeen years chief clerk of accounts for all the buildings of Henry VIII. within twenty miles of London, and whose name he inserts, apparently on that ground alone, in his list of mediaeval architects, though he cannot venture to specify any of his works. Mascall certainly appears in nearly all the WHO WAS HENRY VIII.'S ARCHITECT? 73 Hampton Court bills, as acting in the capacity of clerk of the works here for the King ; and the inference that he probably prepared the designs for Henry VHI.'s works, if not also for Wolsey's, might seem to derive considerable colour from the fact that he was always employed as the Cardinal's clerk of ENTRANCE TO HENRY VIII. S CELLARS UNDER THE HALL AND GREAT WATCHING CHAMBER. the works at his college at Oxford, to the style and details of which Hampton Court bears, in many particulars, a very close resemblance — the halls indeed being almost exact counterparts. With more warrant, perhaps, though by no means with any certainty, we may give the credit of the architectural excellences of the old Tudor Palace to " Mr. Henry Williams, 74 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. priest, surveyor of the works at Hampton Court," in whose presence the payments were made every month, "by the hands of the Right Reverend Father in God, Prior of Newark, Paymaster of the same." WilHams's duties, at any rate, must have involved a considerable supervision of details, at a time when every workman was an artist, and the func- tions of architect, builder, and artisan were not so distinct as they are at the present day. And if it could be shown that he was also surveyor for the erection of the hall at Christ Church, the inference that his office was tantamount to that of architect would be prttty strong. The resolve of Henry VI H. to make Hampton Court one of the most superb of the palaces belonging to the Crown, led him to secure the fee simple of the manor, which, it will be remembered, had been leased by the Knights Hospitallers to Wolsey for a term of ninety-nine years. An agreement, therefore, was concluded on the 30th of May, 1531, between the King and Sir William Weston, prior of the order, for the granting to his Majesty of the manor of Hampton Court, in exchange for other messuages ; and on the 5th of June fol- lowing, the grant was formally executed. This fact is to be noted, as it has hitherto been stated that the reversion came into the King's hands by arbitrary seizure on the suppression of the monastic orders, when their property was confiscated to the Crown. Throughout the years 1531, 1532, and 1533, scores of workmen and artificers of all sorts were engaged on the building of the Hall, as Henry was anxious for its immediate completion ; and the works were pressed on with the greatest activity. Curious evidence of this is afforded by entries in the old bills of " Emptions of tallow candles spent by the workmen in the night times upon the paving of the Hall, for the hasty expedition of the same," and of extra payments to bricklayers, masons, carpenters, carvers, painters, and gilders for " working in their owre tymys (hour or over times) and drinking times for the hasty expedition of the same." The King besides gave orders for pressing workmen to be em- ployed on the royal works, and Edward Arnold, mason, received a special commission "to rest {i.e., arrest) and take up freemasons," and Edmund More " to rest and take up carvers," with the same object. WORKMEN AND MATERIAL. 75 Of the workmen employed on the royal works, it is worthy of remark that they were Englishmen, nearly without ex- ception, and almost invariably the inhabitants of the neigh- bouring towns and villages — such as Kingston, Moulsey, Hampton, Epsom, Teddington, and Chertsey, Even the most delicate carvings and paintings of the roof, which are sometimes stated to have been the work of Italians and other foreigners, are proved to have been entirely executed by men so palpably Anglo-Saxon as Michael Joiner, Richard Ridge of London, John Wright of South Mimms, John White OLD LATTICE WINDOW, WITH VENTILATORS OF PERFORATED LEAD. of Winchester, John Hobbs, Henry Blankston, John Hethe, Reginald Ward of Dudley, John Spencer of Hampton, John Reynolds of East Moulsey, etc. A remarkable fact, also, is that, in spite of the statute of Henry VI. against the Free- masons, the King openly retained the craft for the erection of his buildings at Hampton Court. Thus we find, in the old bills, that the master freemason, John Molton, received i2d. a day, the warden, William Reynold, 5^-. the week, and setters and lodgemen, to the number of some ninety or a hundred altogether, 35. %d. and 3^. 4^. the week respect- ively. The wages of the carpenters, bricklayers, joiners, 76 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. painters, plasterers, plummers, sawyers, sarveters, scaffolders, paviors, gardeners, carters, and labourers, were of analogous amount, and varied from \2d. a day, in the case of the master workmen, to 4^. a day in that of the common labourers, of whom about two hundred were always em- ployed on the works. The materials used in the construction of the hall, and in the works and decorations of other portions of the fabric, were nearly all supplied from the environs of London. Thus the bricks, of which thousands upon thousands were brought into the palace every month, came from Bronxham, Taplow, and other neighbouring places, and there was also a brick-kiln in the park ; while the stone, whether ready cut and carved or in the rough state, was chiefly hewn in the quarries of Reigate, Barrington, and similar places, though there are occasional entries of the purchase of Caen stone, with the cost of the freight from France to St. Katharine's wharf, and up the Thames in barges to the palace. The timber, which was chiefly oak, was brought in enormous quantities from Dorking, Holmwood, Leatherhead, Banstead, Berewood, and St. John's Wood ; and of lead many hundred tons had to be provided for the roofs, water-tables, and pipes. Relating to the carriage of chalk, lime, and plaster, there are intermin- able entries ; and we find, among others, an item of ;£5 5^. paid to "Richard Dyreck of Paris" for the delivery of plaster of Paris at the Tower Wharf. The ironwork — especially that for the standards, staybars, frames, and " lockats " of the windows — was supplied almost exclusively by John a Guylders, smith, and the glass by Galyon Hone, the King's glazier. As a specimen of the framing and glazing of the old windows, a sketch is given on the preceding page of a small one, in which the old latch is very artistic, and where the substitution, in two of the diamond lattices, of perforated lead instead of glass affords example of an effective, if primitive, mode of ventilation. It is not surprising, considering the vast stores of material that were being bought, and the large number of men, amounting to several hundreds, of all trades, who were being employed, that the bills about this time were exceptionally heavy, amounting to as much as ;;^4oo a month, or about ;£'5o,ooo a year in modern currency. ANNE BOLEYN'S AMUSEMENTS. 7/ CHAPTER V. ANNE BOLEYN AND JANE SEYMOUR. While the King's new Hall was building, Anne Boleyn, though as yet unmarried to Henry VHI., was ever ad- vancing in greater favour with him, and frequently came with him to reside at Hampton Court. And here, in 1533, after attaining the summit of her ambition by being crowned in Westminster Abbey on June ist, she came in July to spend her honeymoon, and presided as Queen at superb banquetings, masques, interludes, and sports. Sir Thomas More, who soon after heard, when a prisoner in the Tower, of her "dancing and sporting," prophetically exclaimed, " Alas ! it pitieth me to think into what misery, poor soul ! she will shortly come. These dances of hers will prove such dances, that she will spurn our heads off like footballs, but it will not be long ere her head will dance the like dance." For the present, however, Anne felt secure and happy enough, and had little to cause her any forebodings, except the awkward habit Henry was acquiring of flirting with the ladies of her Court. While here, she divided her time be- tween hunting, playing bowls with Henry, gambling at cards, shovel-board and other games, and her needlework and music. Of her needlework there were specimens to be seen at Hampton Court for many years after her death. In music she shared the taste of Henry, and we may suppose that she often accompanied his songs on the vir- ginals, as among the Hampton Court accounts there is re- ference to this instrument, the prototype of the piano. It must have been about the period of this visit of Anne Boleyn to the palace, that the beautiful groined ceiling of the gateway between the Base and the Clock Courts was erected. It is of the graceful fan-groin design ; and in the quatrefoils of the central circular panel are found, besides the badges of Henry VIII., Anne Boleyn's own badge — the falcon — and her initial, A, entwined with an H in a true-lover's knot. The King and Queen were again at Hampton Court in ;8 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. the summer of 1534, when ambassadors from the free city of Lubeck, one of the Hanseatic towns, came over to England to court the alUance of Henry VIII. in a grand northern Protestant confederacy. They came up the river in rich barges, accompanied by their attendants gorgeously clad in scarlet, embroidered with the motto, "Si Deus pro nobis, quis contra nos?" and were received in great state by Henry. A few days after, they came back on a second visit, when Dr. Otto Adam von Pack, the chief of the ANNE BOLEYN'S GATEWAY. embassy, a man famous for his intrigues in central Germany, made the King a long laudatory Latin oration, which lasted two hours. " Among other things, he reviled horribly the authority of the Pope, and praised inestimably the King for many things, especially for his great learning and enlighten- ment from God, by which he had come to a knowledge of the truth, both as to the authority of the Pope and about his marriage." The King was so pleased with this judicious flattery, that he gave the doctor a handsome present. ANNE BOLEYN. (From the picture attributed to Holbein at Warwick Castle.) 80 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. The reception of these ambassadors must have taken place in one of the King's State Rooms on the east side of the Clock Court; for the Great Hall, though by this time nearly completed, was as yet not quite ready for use. Its external appearance, of which a good idea can be formed from the annexed plate, was very little different then from what it is now. Its length, which is ii8 feet or so on the outside, occupies the whole breadth, and more, of the Clock Court, otherwise called, in the time of Henry VIII., " The Inner Court where the fountaine standeth " ; and in height from the ground to the topmost part of the gable-end it stands 92 feet. The range of small windows in the low storey over which it is raised, appertain to the old buttery and cellars, now subdivided into some thirty wine and coal cellars, store- rooms, and other offices. In the corner, on the right hand, is a beautiful bay window, reaching nearly the whole height of the hall, and abutting, in the inside, on the dais. In the other angles of the hall are octagonal turrets, which rise about as high as the top of the roof, and of which each was formerly surmounted by a leaden " type," at the apex of which was a lion, leopard, or dragon, holding a vane gilded and painted with the King's arms, and on the top of the eight crocketed pinnacles, at the angles of the octagon, smaller vanes of a like sort. Similar vanes decorated the pinnacles on the tops of the buttresses. The outline of the gable is peculiar, the pitch of the roof being cut off obtusely and flattened at the apex in a way which is very uncommon, and which is done so as to conform with the interior. Along the top of the roof there appears to have been a sort of decorated parapet or fret-work ; and in the middle rose the " femerell," or louvre, unfortunately de- stroyed about a century and a half ago — a mass of pierced and fretted tracery, ablaze with gilding and colour, and with numerous vanes fluttering and glittering in every breeze. As, on the eighty or more old Gothic halls in England, there scarcely survives a single good and genuine example of the mediaeval louvre— the best known, that on ^Vestminster Hall, being far from a satisfactory imitation of the original — the records on this point are of peculiar value. The louvre was made of wood, and consisted of three storeys or tiers. EXTERIOR OF THE GREAT HALL. FROM THE CLOCK COURT. 82 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. diminishing in size, the sides made of open work, and the tops or roofs cased with lead. From the upper edge of each storey rose a set of carved pinnacles, surmounted with beasts carrying vanes, while at the centre and summit of the whole was "a great lion bearing a great vane gilded," emblazoned with Henry VIII.'s arms, and covered with a large close crown. But imposing as the Great Hall looks on the exterior, rising high above the surrounding buildings, it is its interior which is the most magnificent, and on which King Henry lavished the greatest labour and expense. The first impres- sion it gives on entering is one of an excessive richness bordering on the florid; and this has been laid to the account of the restorations that were carried out about forty years ago. But though the effect is certainly rather too fresh and raw for an old building, the restorer seems to have done little more than follow the indications of the original colour- ing, which, as the records prove, was of a very gorgeous nature. Most of the panels of the roof were painted blue, while the projecting parts showed the colour of the oak, and were here and there relieved with gilding. The painting of the carved pendants, corbels, and spandrels was of course more elaborate About the time at which the roof was repainted, that is to say, between the years 1840 and 1846, all the windows of the hall were reglazed with painted glass, designed and executed by Willement, who, considering the then state of that art, deserves much credit for the taste and accuracy of the restoration. Unfortunately, not a trace of the old glass now remains, most of it having perished in the course of years, and the remnant, we may presume, being removed when the reglazing was carried out. The dazzling effect of the hall in its present state is enhanced by the brilliancy of the eight pieces of tapestry, wrought with silk, and silver and gold thread, which portray "The History of Abraham." When we come to inspect the hall in detail, one of the most prominent features that strike us is the great bay window, at the upper end on the right-hand side, extending from the floor to the roof, and lighting the dais or haut-pas^ where stood the King's table. This window contains as GREAT BAY WINDOW ON THE DAIS IN THE GREAT HALL. 84 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. many as forty-eight lights, of which the thirty-six to the front are shown in the annexed print. In the ceiling or vault of the bay is a miniature fan-groin, with pendants, of extreme beauty and delicacy. The raised step, or hal-pace^ at this window was formerly paved with green and white tiles, and the rest of the hall with plain tiles. All these, we regret to note, have been " restored " away, and their places supplied by large flag-stones. At the lower end of the hall, placed across its breadth, is a screen of fine deep-toned oak, behind which are the main entrances into the hall — one, on the south side, leading down a flight of stone stairs to Anne Boleyn's Gateway, and so into the open courts ; the other, on the north side, leading down a flight of wooden steps into the cloister, and thence to the kitchens and offices, and to all the interior of the palace. At the back, exactly in the centre of the wall, was a door, now bricked up, into the pantry. The screen is divided, as was usual in mediaeval halls, into three com- partments, leaving two openings into the body of the hall, through which the company passed, and the servants brought up the dishes when grand banquets took place. Each course was heralded, as is recorded in the old romance, by the music of the merry minstrelsy : *' Fro kechene came the fyrst cours With pipes, and trumps, and tabours." The compartments, which, as well as the passage between them, were in olden days commonly called " the Screens," are flanked by heavy oak pillars, with moulded bases and capitals, and are formed into panels with carved tracery, showing the Tudor badges and Henry VIII.'s initials. Above the screens is a loft, called " The Minstrel Gallery," which is reached by the spiral staircase in a turret in the south-west corner of the hall. Here were placed the minstrels in their picturesque attire, who played during banquets, interludes, masquerades, balls, and other festivities. The original front or balustrade of the gallery has been destroyed, but a not inappropriate modern one is now substituted. The most gorgeous part, however, of the Great Hall is the elaborate and ornate roof, probably the most splendid example in the Perpendicular style ever erected in England. THE GREAT HALL. FROM THE DAl'St S6 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. That of Westminster Hall is, indeed, grander and more imposing ; those of Crosby Hall and Eltham Palace purer in taste ; but the roof of the Great Hall of Hampton Court Palace maintains an undisputed pre-eminence for complexity of workmanship and richness of decoration. To analyze its structure in detail would be alien to the scope of these pages, but a general idea of its plan and appearance can be formed from the plate of the Hall here inserted, while the architectural student will find full parti- culars as to all its parts in the author's larger work, " The History of Hampton Court Palace." Contemporaneously with the building of the Great Hall, there were carried on several other works of scarcely less importance ; such as the re-decoration of the adjoining room, henceforth called "The King's Great Watching Chamber," or " Guard Chamber " ; the enlarging and beautifying of the apartments occupied by the King; and the raising of an entirely new suite of State Rooms for Anne Boleyn. The last were in substitution of the " Queen's Old Lodgings " before referred to, and were projected and carried out on a scale of unexampled splendour. But these sumptuous apartments Anne Boleyn was de- stined never to occupy, for her brief reign was rapidly draw- ing to its tragical close. Very soon after their marriage Henry's passion for her had shown signs of cooling, and the disappointment he felt at her not giving birth to a son rankled in his breast and increased his estrangement. He had already begun, as we have said, during the Christmas that followed their honeymoon visit to Hampton Court, to flirt with the young ladies of her Court. And it was not improb- ably in one of the rooms of this palace that Anne surprised Jane Seymour, her maid of honour, engaged in most affec- tionate conversation with him. Anne, whose temper was always quick, was incautious enough to show her resentment; but Henry was not a man to tolerate any interference with his amours, or to stand a rebuke from a woman. He abruptly turned away, and from that moment her doom was practically determined. About four months after, his " own darling," on the 19th of May, the anniversary of the very day of her triumphal entry as Queen into London, was executed on Tower Green, That night JANE SEYMOUR. (From the picture at Hampton Court. 88 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. Henry supped with Jane Seymour, and the next morning they were married. The trial and execution of one Queen and her replacement by another was not a sort of event, in the reign of Henry VIII., to cause any interruption in the building of the " Queen's New Lodgings." Everything went on at Hampton Court as usual ; only that the magnificent apartments, which had been begun for the unfortunate Anne Boleyn, were com- pleted for her rival. Still, the rapid succession of Henry's wives caused some perplexity to the workmen and decorators. For scarcely had they carved or painted a falcon, Anne Boleyn's badge, in juxtaposition with the rose or portcullis, or linked an A with an H in a true-lover's knot, than the badge and monogram were out of date. In the case of the groined ceiling under the Clock Tower, the initial of her murdered Majesty was suffered to remain ; but elsewhere the painters, gilders, and glaziers were busily occupied, during the summer months of 1536, in adapting their heraldic embelUshments to the altered circumstances. Even the figure of St. Anne, in stained glass, in the east window of the chapel, shared the degradation of her name- sake, and was taken down from its exalted position. In the two tablets, also, of carved stone at the chapel door, which had been executed some two or three years before, and emblazoned with Henry VIII.'s and Queen Anne's arms. Queen Jane's quarterings took the place of her predecessor's, and the A, which was linked with an H in a true-lover's knot, was painted out and replaced by a J. In the meanwhile the works on the King's apartments were being continued ; and it was probably in the year 1536 that the final touches were put to Henry VIII.'s "Great Watching Chamber" or "Guard Chamber," which, as we have said, had been nearly completed during the reign of Anne Boleyn. Among all the State Rooms in the palace there is scarcely one so large and fine as this; and with its low ceiling of intricate ribs and pendants, its great semicircular oriel of thirty-six lights, its high clerestory windows, and its quaint and faded hangings of antique arras, it preserves more of an old-world aspect than almost any other room in England. During the first year or so of Jane Seymour's reign she BIRTH OF EDWARD VI. 89 does not appear to have resided at Hampton Court at all. But she retired here, on September i6th, 1537, "to take her chamber," previous to her accouchement, which was expected in about a month. We may presume that she was installed in the new rooms, which were now ready, and fitted with every magnificence. The annexed print of the old east front of the palace, as completed by Henry VHI., gives the view of them from the outside. The elevation is certainly irregular, and not imposing ; but for that very reason, probably, the apartments were all the more convenient and comfortable inside. Henry accompanied his wife, or followed soon after, and VIKW OF THE OLD EAST FRONT OF HAMPTON COURT PALACE, AS FINISHED BY HENRY VIII. he was present when, on Friday, October 12th, being the vigil of St. Edward's day, at two o'clock in the morning, she gave birth to a son. On the announcement of this happy event, the joy of the whole nation, which thus found the dreaded danger of a disputed succession between Mary an3 Elizabeth set at rest, knew no bounds. The news was communicated by a circular signed by Jane Seymour, sent to all the estates and cities of the realm. In answer to this, congratulations poured in upon all sides, and " Te Deums " were sung, bells rung, and bonfires lit in nearly every town in England. Of course the Pro- testant party were especially elated. Latimer's expressions of delight were so extravagant as almost to border on the blasphemous. "There is no less rejoicing," wrote he to 90 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. Cromwell, " for the birth of our Prince, whom we hungered for so long, than there was, I trow, inter vtcinos, at the birth of John the Baptist. God give us grace to yield due thanks to our Lord God — the God of England ! For, verily, He hath showed Himself the God of England; or rather an English God, if we will consider and ponder His proceedings with us ! " Nor was his Majesty, who had so long and ardently desired an heir, and been so often disappointed, less overjoyed at the appearance of a son. The baptism was arranged with that eye to the picturesque which was never wanting in those days, and took place on Monday, the 15th of October, in the chapel. That building and the " holiday closets," or oratories, adjacent to it, had just been much embellished by Henry VIII. New stained glass had been placed in the windows, and elaborately carved stalls, with " crests " or canopies, such as we 'see in St. George's Chapel at Windsor, had recently been erected. A new organ and organ-house also had been added, and the splendid arched roof, with its great pendants of angels holding escutcheons with the King's and Queen's arms and mottoes, and boys playing on musical instruments, had just been "gilt with fine gold and fine bice, set out with other fine collars," and "set with antique of lead, gilt with the King's word." Unfortunately this is the only part of the chapel still remaining in its pristine state, the stained glass having been knocked out during the Great Rebellion ; the stone mullions of the windows, the tiles, the stalls, and other fixtures and ornaments taken away in the reigns of King William III. and Queen Anne, and replaced by work, of a more modern kind ; and the east window blocked up, and the pillared Italian canopy erected over the altar, at the same period. The procession, which was " made, gathered and put in readiness " at the door of the " Prince's Lodgings," or royal nursery — situated to the north of the Chapel Court — passed thence through the Council Chamber, which was also in the same part of the palace. First went all the gentlemen, squires, and knights, two and two, to the number of eighty. They all carried torches of virgin wax in their hands, which, however, were not lit till after the christening. After them came the children and ministers of the chapel, together PRINCE EDWARD CARRIED IN PROCESSION. 9I with the Dean and chaplains, all in surplices and copes Next came the King's Council, and then the great lords, spiritual and temporal. Then followed the Comptroller and Treasurer of the Household ; next the ambassadors and their suites; after them the Queen's Chamberlain, the King's Chamberlain, and the Lord High Chamberlain of England ; THE CnAPEL. Cromwell, Lord Privy Seal, the Lord Chancellor, the Duke of Norfolk, and the Archbishop of Canterbury. Next came the various persons who were to take part in the ceremony itself. First, the Earl of Sussex, and another Lord carrying "a pair of covered basins, and a towel upon that, with a cup of assay." " Next after, a taper of virgin wax, borne by the Earl of Wiltshire, with a towel about his neck." After that, " a salt of gold, richly garnished with pearl 92 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. and stone, borne by the Earl of Essex, with a towel about his neck." The "chrysom richly garnished, borne by the Lady Elizabeth, the King's daughter, the same for her tender age was borne by the Viscount Beauchamp, with the assist- ance of the Lord Morley." Lastly came the Prince him- self, carried by the Marchioness of Exeter, " assisted by the Duke of Suffolk and the Lord Marquis her husband." The train of the Prince's robe was borne by the Earl of Arundel and sustained by Lord William Howard. "The nurse went equally with him that supported the train, and with her the midwife." A rich canopy was borne over the prince by four gentlemen of the King's Privy Chamber ; and CARRYING OF PRINCE EDWARD TO THE FONT. (From an original sketch of the whole procession in the College of Arms.) torches were borne about the canopy by four other gentle- men. " Next after the canopy went the Lady Mary, the King's daughter, appointed for the lady godmother, with her train borne by the Lady Kingston." After the Lady Mary, "all other ladies of honour and gentlewomen, in order after their degrees, did follow." In this order the procession, attended by the King's and great nobles' servants, passed through the Council Chamber, along part of the "Haunted Gallery," and so into the " King's Great Watching Chamber," at the upper end of the Great Hall. Thence it passed through the Hall, down the Great Stairs, under Anne Boleyn's Gateway, into the Second THE CHRISTENING OF PRINCE EDWARD. 93 or Clock Court, and then along the cloister towards the chapel door. All the way was lined with men-at-arms, attendants, and servants holding torches ; and in the court- yard the ground was strewn with rushes ; and barriers de- corated with rich hangings, were erected, behind which thronged all the dwellers in the palace. No other spectators, however, were present, for access to the Court had been THE CHAPEL DOORWAY. prohibited by proclamation, on account of infection from the plague, which was prevailing at the time. In this manner the procession moved to the chapel door, where a large porch had been erected, " covered with rich cloth of gold or arras, and double-hanged with rich arras, and the floor boarded and covered with carpets." Here, and at every point, were stationed gentlemen ushers. All the body of the chapel and the choir were likewise hung with tapestries, and " the high altar richly garnished with plate 94 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. and stuff." In the middle of the choir had been erected a font of soUd silver gilt, " set upon a mount or stage." While the Prince was being prepared for the christening within the "travers," the "Te Deum " was sung by the choir, and then he was brought forth and baptized with all the elaborate ceremonial of that age. After the christening had been performed, all the torches were immediately lit, and Garter King-at-Arms proclaimed his name and style in the following form : " God of his Almighty and infinite grace, give and grant good life and long to the right high, right excellent and noble Prince, Prince Edward, Duke of Cornwall, and Earl of Chester, most dear and entirely beloved son to our most dread and gracious lord. King Henry the Eighth." [Largess ! Largess !] The procession then formed again in the same order as before, preceded by the sergeants-at-arms, with the heralds sounding their trumpets, and all the torches lit. Various persons also carried the christening gifts that had been made to the Prince, among which was a cup of gold given by the Princess Mary. Thus they proceeded to the Queen's Bed- chamber, into which the Prince was brought by some of the principal persons ; the trumpets, in the meanwhile, "standing in the utter court within the gate, there blow- ing, and the minstrels playing, which was a melodious thing to hear." During the baptism Henry VHI. had remained with Jane Seymour in her bedroom, where the Prince was then presented to him, "and had the blessing of Almighty God," our Lady, and St. George, and his father and mother." Very soon after this ceremony the Queen was taken with a serious illness, aggravated by having been allowed by those who had charge of her to eat improper food and catch cold. But all their art and care were unavailing ; and on Wednes- day, the 24th of October, at two o'clock at night, the soul of Henry VHL's third Queen quietly passed away. The grief of the King at her death is said to have been very deep and sincere, though the fact that he at once with- drew from the palace " to a solitary place, not to be spoken with, leaving some of his counsellors to take order about her burial," on the plea that " he could not find it in his heart " to remain, may not unfairly be attributed to a desire 96 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. to avoid the long and dreary ceremonies that preceded the burial. Next day the corpse was " embowelled," that is, embalmed, " and wax-chandlers and plumbers, and such others did their office about her." On the following day, Friday, the body was removed, with much solemnity, from the room in which she died, on a hearse covered with a rich pall of cloth of gold, and a cross set upon it, to the Presence Chamber, which had been prepared for the lying-in-state. Here the hearse was placed in the middle of the room, with twenty- four tall tapers about it; all the walls were draped with black; and an altar was provided for masses to be said, "richly apparelled with black, garnished with the cross, images, censers, and other ornaments." This done, dead masses were said and dirges sung, day and night for a week, for the repose of her soul ; and the ladies of the Court, with the Princess Mary, in mourning habits, with white kerchiefs over their heads and shoulders, " kneeling about the hearse in lamentable wise," kept incessant watch by the body. On the last day of October, the body, after it had been solemnly blessed with holy water and incensed with smoking censers, by the Bishop of Carlisle, her almoner, assisted by the Bishop of Chichester and many other ecclesiastical dignitaries, was removed in procession to the chapel, with the priests and choir singing and carrying tapers. Here the same rites were continued till November the 12 th, on which day the coffin was carried to the "Clock Court," where it was placed on a funeral car, drawn by four horses trapped with black velvet, " with four escutcheons of the King's arms and Queen's, beaten in fine gold upon double sarcenet : and upon every horse's forehead a shaffi-on of the said arms " — decorations evidently much in the style of the modern undertaker. On the bier was "a representation of the Queen in her robes of estate — one of those waxwork effigies well known to sightseers in Westminster Abbey — with a rich crown of gold upon her head, all her hair loose, a sceptre of gold in her right hand, and on her fingers rings set with precious stones, and her neck richly adorned with gold and stones ; and under the head a rich pillow of cloth of gold tissue ; her shoes of cloth of gold, with hose and smock, and all otlier ornaments." SPECTRE OF JANE SEYMOUR. 97 Princess Mary was the chief mourner ; and she, as well as all the ladies of the Court, rode on horses trapped with black velvet. In this manner the whole funeral cavalcade proceeded to Windsor, where the body was buried in St. George's Chapel. At St. Paul's a solemn dirge and a requiem, attended by the Lord Mayor, the Aldermen, and the Common Council, were sung ; and the Corporation also ordered twelve hun- dred masses to be said for the repose of her soul, within the bounds of the City. But even this large number of masses does not appear to have been sufficient for the repose of the soul of the maid of honour, who had supplanted her Queen and mistress, Anne Boleyn, in the affections of Henry VIII. For, if we are to credit the assurances of those who believe in supernatural visitations, a spectre of Queen Jane, clothed all in white, has been seen to emerge from the doorway in the Queen's old apartments, and wander about, with a lighted taper in her hand, on the stairs and in the neighbouring Silver-Stick Gallery. Having made this digression into the spirit world, we may as well here introduce the reader to another and better known Hampton Court ghost, the accounts of whose appearances are more definite and circumstantial than are usually forth- coming in such cases. The ghost in question is that of Mistress Sibell Penn, who, in October, 1538, exactly a year after Jane Seymour's death, became Prince Edward's dry- nurse and foster-mother. Her duties in this capacity she dis- charged with such care, fidelity, and loyal affection, that she won the gratitude and esteem of Henry VIII., as well as the fond regard of her foster-son. When he grew up and became King she continued to live at Court, and after he died was treated with kindness and consideration by Queen Mary and Queen Elizabeth, and apparently was given apart- ments at Hampton Court. Here, at any rate, in the autumn of 1562, she was taken ill with the small-pox, and she died in the palace on the 6th of November. Her body was buried in Hampton Church, and a fine monument, consisting of a life-sized recumbent efifigy of the old lady, under a marble canopy supported on Corinthian pillars and pilasters was raised over her tomb H 98 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. On the monument is the date of her death, her coat-of-arms, and a rhyming epitaph to her memory. The inscription and the rest of the monument still remain intact in the staircase going to the organ-loft ; but it appears that when the old church was pulled down in 1829, Mrs. Penn's tomb was irreverently disturbed, and her remains scattered — though one account declares that all that was found under the monument was a hair-pin and a little hair, from which it was inferred that her body had been previously removed. But whenever the desecration may have been perpetrated, certain it is — as the story goes — that immediately after the shifting of the position of Mrs. Penn's monument, strange noises, as of a woman working at a spinning-wheel, and muttering the while, were heard through the wall of one of the rooms in the large apartment in the south-west wing of the palace. When search was made, by the Board of Works, in the direction whence these mysterious sounds proceeded, an ancient, and till then unknown chamber was discovered, in which an antique spinning-wheel and a few other articles were found, and the old oak planks were seen to be worn away where the treadle struck the floor. The idea broached at that time was that, on account of the de- secration of her tomb, her spirit had returned to haunt the rooms which she had occupied in life. No further manifestations, however, were noticed until about five or six years ago, when — according to the ghost- story-tellers — the phenomena were renewed, and have since become increasingly frequent and startling. The accounts describe the constant prevalence of mys- terious sounds — such as the low whirring of an unseen spinning-wheel, the weird mutterings of a sepulchral voice, and the stealthy tread of invisible feet. It is even affirmed that Mrs. Penn's tall, gaunt form, dressed in a long gray robe, with a hood over her head, and her lanky hands outstretched before her, has been seen in the haunted chamber — a supernatural visitation, which was rendered the more im- pressive from the narrator being a recent arrival at the palace, and consequently ignorant of the legend. And when, afterwards, attention was drawn to Mrs. Penn's monument (the existence of which was, at that time, un- GHOST OF EDWARD VI.'S NURSE. 99 known to anyone in the palace), and it was found that the description of the ghost exactly corresponded with the ap- pearance of the effigy, the coincidence was so startling as to shake the judgment even of the most sceptical. Enough has now been probably stated to establish the THE GHOST OF MRS. PENN, EDWARD VI. 's NURSE, claim of Mrs. Penn to rank among the best authenticated of historical ghosts. To return to the current of our narrative. Although Henry VIII. left Hampton Court at once on the death of Jane Seymour, and, apparently, did not return there until November in the following year, the infant Prince Edward was left behind in the royal nursery at the palace, where, almost immediately, a regular household, of considerable 100 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. state and dignity, was established for his protection and care. Sir William Sydney was placed at its head as chamberlain, and his subordinates consisted of a chief steward, a vice- chamberlain, a comptroller, a lady mistress, a cofferer, a dean, and several others, including .the nurse and rockers. All of these officials were subjected to an elaborate code of regulations, which were drawn up and promulgated, probably by Cromwell, with all the formality of an Act of Parliament. The document, after a good deal of verbiage, proceeds to lay down a series of stringent regulations for the safe-guard- ing of the young prince — forbidding the admittance of any- one, of whatever state or dignity, to the precincts of the royal nursery, or the touching of his person, cradle, or anything belonging to him, without a special permit ; decreeing a careful inspection and testing of the food he ate, and the water he drank ; and enacting a detailed etiquette as to the brushing, cleaning, and airing of his clothes. Fenced and protected by such precautions, the little prince passed the first year of his existence in good health and without mishap, in the royal nursery, or "the Lord Prince's Lodgings," as his rooms were sometimes called, on the north side of the Chapel Court, and here he was visited several times by his sister, the Lady Mary, then living close by at Richmond. In the meanwhile, during the year following Jane Seymour's death, the work of enlarging and embellishing the palace was as actively continued as before ; and by the end of 1538 Henry VIII.'s additions to Wolsey's original palace were pretty well complete. Of the internal arrangements of Henry VIH.'s new rooms we can arrive at no idea ; but of the outward aspect of the frontage facing the river we have some memorials in the old view of which we give engravings on pages 102 and 129. From these views we can get some idea of the con- formation and position of Henry VHL's gardens, on which much labour and care were expended. Though not so extensive as they now are, they were pleasant and curious, and in a style not much dissimilar from that advocated by Bacon in his delightful essay. The ruling idea was to lay them out in such a way as to be suitable to the variable conditions of our climate ; so that for cold and wet weather 102 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. there were dry walks, walled parterres, sheltered alleys, and cloisters and houses half-open to the air ; and for summer- time shady nooks, grassy plots, flowery bowers, banqueting houses and " arbours," Nor was there any stint of artificial embellishments. Studded about in all parts were sundials ; and along all the walks and flower-beds, on the low walls that divided the various parterres, and round about the numerous ponds in the Pond Garden, were fixed heraldic VIEW FROM THE RIVER THAMES OF THE OLD PALACE OF HAMPTON COURT, AS FINISHED BY HENRY VIII. (From a plate in the ** Vetusta Monumenta," engraved after an ancient painting. ) beasts on pedestals, bearing vanes and shields with the King's arms and badges. All these additions, which we have been describing, to the grandeur and convenience of Hampton Court, rendered it a place of great attraction for foreigners visiting England, who, coming to see it as one of the sights of the country, were amazed at its immense size and dazzling splendour. THE MANOR CREATED AN HONOUR. IO3 CHAPTER VI. ANNE OF CLEVES, CATHERINE HOWARD, AND CATHERINE PARR. While the King's new buildings and gardens were in process of being embellished and finished, further improvements were also undertaken in the parks. As we have stated before, the manor of Hampton Court was composed origin- ally, as now, of two main divisions — Bushey Park and the House or Home Park, lying respectively to the north and the south, and separated from each other by the Kingston Road. But the King, at this period, caused them to be subdivided by brick walls into smaller inclosures. These inclosures, however, though all well stocked with game, and well adapted for coursing or shooting, offered little convenience for the King's favourite sport of stag-hunting, which, now that he was getting old and fat, he wished to enjoy close at hand, without having to incur the fatigue of going to Windsor Forest. With a view, therefore, of forming an extensive hunting-ground immediately adjacent to the palace, the King proceeded to acquire by purchase or ex- change all the manors near Hampton Court, on both sides of the River Thames, and, by an Act of Parliament passed in 1539, erected them into an Honour, that is, a seigniory of several manors held under one Baron or Lord Paramount — a clause enacting that "the manor of Hampton Court should henceforth be the chief capital place and part of the said Honour." The next thing was to enact, by the same statute, that a great part of the extensive tract of country comprised within the boundaries of the Honour — namely, the "lord- ships, manors, towns and villages of East Molesey, West Molesey, Walton, Esher,Weybridge,and part of Cobham,and other parishes," apparently Bylieet, Thames Ditton, Wisely, Hersham and Shepperton, which are all on the Surrey side of the river — should be marked out and inclosed within a wooden paling, created a New Forest or Chase, to be called 104 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. Hampton Court Chase," " for the nourishing, generation, and feeding of beasts of venery and fowls of warren," and reserved for the King's sport. It was likewise provided that all the same liberties, jurisdictions, privileges and laws and officers necessary for the punishment of offenders, that appertained to any ancient forest in the kingdom, should also belong to this. It is not to be wondered at, that all this became the cause of much complaint from the inhabitants of those places — " their commons, meadows, and pastures being taken in, and the same parishes all overlayed with deer, and very many households being let fall in, the families decayed and the King's liege people much diminished and the country there- abouts in manner made desolate." Not that they dared to make their grievances heard while "old Harry" was alive; on the contrary, his " loving subjects were content for the comfort and ease of his Majesty to suffer " in silence. But at once on the accession of Edward VI. they petitioned the Council for redress. Their prayer was favourably listened to, and orders were given forthwith that the deer should be removed and the pahng taken down — the Council explaining that this royal hunting-ground had been made at a time when " His Highness waxed heavy with sickness, age and corpulency of body, and might not travel so readily abroad, but was constrained to seek to have his game and pleasure ready at hand." They were careful, however, to put in the proviso, " That if it shall please his Majesty to use the same as a chase again," the order was not to be taken in prejudice to the sovereign. Consequently the district, though in fact dechased, is still technically a Royal Chase, and the paramount authority over all game within its limits is vested in the Crown, represented by an officer styled the Lieutenant and Keeper of Her Majesty's Chase of Hampton Court. Henry VIII. and his fourth wife, Anne of Cleves, do not appear to have ever resided together at Hampton Court as man and wife ; but the King was here towards the end of November, 1539, expecting definite and certain news of her arrival in England ; and the lady herself spent a few days here, while waiting with complete composure for the decree of divorce, which was pronounced in the month of July, 1540. After that she moved to Richmond. MARRIAGE OF CATHERINE HOWARD. I05 HENRY VIII. AND HIS COUNCIL. (From a contemporary Drawing.) As soon as Anne of Cleves had gone, the King arrived at the palace to pass his honeymoon with his new wife, Catherine Howard. No record is extant of the marriage I06 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. ceremony, but it must have taken place at Hampton Court about the 8th of August, on which day she was openly shown as Queen, and sat next to the King in the royal closet in the chapel. She afterwards dined in public at a grand banquet, where the Princess Elizabeth sat by her side. These bare facts are all the incidents to be chronicled of the wedding day of Henry VIH. and Catherine Howard. Soon after this Henry and Catherine Howard went on an extended wedding tour, returning to Hampton Court on the 19th of December. Though they had, by that time, been married five months, Henry was still so much in love with her that he would not have their seclusion interfered with. They accordingly spent the following four or five months in retirement at this palace, where the Privy Council, with the King presiding, met almost daily for the transaction of the business of the nation. Here, also, they came back after a short summer progress, on the 24th of October, 1541. So far the married life of Catherine Howard had been passed smoothly enough, and she might be considered happy, if such a word could be applied to a wife of Henry VIH. His affection for her appeared to grow deeper every day, and it seemed as though he had at length found a consort who suited him. The day after their return to the palace, Henry heard mass in the chapel, and " receiving his Maker, gave Him most hearty thanks for the good hfe he led and trusted to lead with his wife ; and also desired the Bishop of Lincoln, his ghostly father, to make like prayer, and give like thanks with him on All Souls' Day." But in the meanwhile Catherine's enemies had been at work, and the blow they were preparing was ready to fall upon her un- suspecting head. Henry was already seated at chapel hear- ing mass, when the insidious Cranmer came up to him, and, unobserved, slipped into his hand the paper containing the damning disclosures against the virtue of his Queen. It is always difficult to trace the objects, or to gauge the motives of any action of Henry VIH.'s, for under his bluff geniality of manner there was a craftiness and subtlety, inherited from his father and his Yorkist ancestors, which would have done credit to Philip H. It is possible, there- fore, that, notwithstanding all his protestations, he gladly seized on the accusations made against Catherine as a means THE QUEEN ACCUSED AND ARRESTED. I07 of delivering himself from a tie that had already grown irksome to him. However this may be, on being first informed of them, he at least affected to be quite incapable of believing them, and when, in the short investigation that he immediately instituted, the early misconduct of the Queen was proved to him beyond all reasonable doubt, he was like a man pierced to the heart, appearing as distressed as he was undoubtedly mortified and enraged. After vainly struggling for utterance, his pride and firmness gave way, and he burst into a passion of tears. The Queen was at once confined to her own room, and next morning the King rode away to the neighbouring palace of Oatlands, never to set eyes on her again. But before his departure a scene is said to have occurred, which, as it belongs to the legendary lore of the old palace, may be mentioned here ; though it would be indiscreet to inquire too particularly after the authorities for a story of this sort. The old mysterious "Haunted Gallery," the door of which is on the right hand as you go down the Queen's Great Staircase, has its name from being supposed to be haunted by the shrieking ghost of Queen Catherine Howard. It was here, at any rate, that she escaped from her own chamber, when confined in it before being sent to the Tower, and ran along to seek an interview with Henry VIH., who was hearing mass in the royal closet in the chapel. Just, however, as she reached the door, the guards rudely seized her, and carried her back ; while her ruthless husband, in spite of her piercing screams, which were heard almost all over the palace, continued his devotions unmoved. And in this gallery, it is said, a female form, dressed in white, has been seen coming towards the door of the royal pew, and just as she reaches it, has been observed to hurry back with disordered garments and a ghastly look of despair, uttering at the same time the most unearthly shrieks, till she passes through the door at the end of the gallery. The gallery is now the lumber-room for old pictures, and, as the staircase is locked up at night, the voice of the shrieking Queen is said to be but rarely heard. When Henry had left the palace, several members of the Council came to her, informed her of the specific accusations made, and solemnly charged her with high treason. While I08 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. in their presence the unhappy Queen maintained a bold front, and vehemently denied all ; but when they left her to realize alone the awful position in which she stood, her heart failed her, and she burst into an agony of passionate grief. Cranmer, who afterwards privately repaired to her, by the King's direction, to communicate his pleasure with regard to her, " found her," he says, in a letter to Henry, "in such lamentation and hevynes, as I never sawe no creature, so that it woulde have pityed any mannes harte in the worlde, to have loked opon her." At one time her paroxysms were so intense that he feared for her reason, and even her life, and was obliged to leave her for awhile with her waiting-women, without attempting to discharge his commission. When he returned, he found her still in the same distress, but tried to calm her by assuring her of the King's benignity and mercy, craftily suggesting that if she would only confess her fault, the royal pardon should be extended to her. At this " she held up her handes, and gave most humble thankes unto your Majestic, who had shewed unto her more grace and mercie, than she herself thought mete to sue for, or cowde have hoped of. And then, for a tyme, she beganne to be more temperate and quiete, savynge that she stil sobbed and wepte ; but after a little pawsynge, she sodenly fel into a new rage, much worse than she was bifore." Cranmer succeeded at last in somewhat mitigating her agitation, and he then entered on a long conversation with her, mainly directing his efforts to extort an acknowledgment from her that there had been a contract of marriage between herself and Derham, so that the King might have had his own marriage with her declared null and void. However, Catherine, with most unaccountable perversity, would not admit the pre-contract, which alone could have afforded some means of escape from her fate. But she signed a confession, which Cranmer had prepared, of the main charges against her, as regarded her conduct before marriage. A few days after this interview a letter came down to Cranmer from the Council in London, most of whom were Catherine's deadly enemies, enjoining him to summon " all the ladies, gentlewomen, and gentlemen in the palace, and declare to them the abominable demeanour of the Queen, CATHERINE HOWARD'S GHOST. 109 with the whole of the King's Majesty's sorrowful behaviour, and careful proceeding in it, so that the world may know and see that which is hitherto done to have just cause and foundation." But they were now careful to add that no mention was to be made of the pre-contract, which might have served for her defence, and which Cranmer, to his credit be it said, had laboured to establish, out of compassion for THE HAUNTED GALLERY. her, but which Henry would not hear of as an excuse. The declaration of the Queen's misbehaviour was made in the Great Watching Chamber, and all her household were dis- charged there and then. From Hampton Court she was removed soon after this under an escort to Sion House, whence in a few weeks she was led to the Tower and the scaffold. The many misfortunes in Henry VHI.'s matrimonial no A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. career that were associated with Hampton Court, did not deter him from returning there again soon after Catherine Howard's execution ; and it was at Hampton Court, also, that he passed his sixth honeymoon, having married Catherine Parr, widow of Lord Latimer, in the Queen's closet ad- joining to the chapel, on July 12th, 1543, proclaiming her Queen the same day. As Henry VHL's reign drew towards its close, and he HENRY VIII. 'S PRIVATE STAIRS, IN THE CLOCK COURT, LEADING TO HIS PRIVY CHAMBER. increased in age and corpulence, he spent more and more of his time in the retirement of his riverside palace ; where, now that his aggravated infirmities were gradually compelling him to give up all the more active sports, he could find plenty of agreeable indoor amusements. In the winter, especially, when the weather was too rough for him to walk in his garden, he could exercise his unwieldy frame with bowls or a quiet game of tennis, or by pacing up and down HENRY VIII.'S DOMESTIC LIFE. Ill the vast cloisters and galleries of the palace, which, if placed on end, would have extended to a total continuous length of no less than a mile. At the same time, as he came to lead a more retired and sedentary life, his old pastimes of backgammon, shovel- board and cards, and his taste for theology, literature, and music were great resources to him. In particular, he still continued to keep up his music; and if he gave up singing HENRY VIII. PLAYING ON THE LUTE; WITH HIS JESTER, WILL SOMERS, SINGING. (From his illuminated Psalter, preserved in the British Museum.) himself, there was nothing he delighted in more, in his later years, than accompanying the songs of his jester. Will Somers, on the lute. But Henry's health, which had long been very indifferent, was now beginning rapidly to decline. The ulcer in his leg, from which he had suffered for many years, had latterly grown worse and worse, and rendered him, in the last few months of his life, so helpless, that his enormous and unwieldy body could not be moved from one room in the palace to another 112 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. without the aid of machinery. This, combined with the frenzy of irritability in which his ailments kept him, and the suspicion and jealousy with which he regarded everyone who came near him, rendered the closing scenes of his career a terrible contrast to its bright beginning. Hampton Court, however, was not to witness his last hours, for he left this palace for London before the end of 1546, to die on the 28th of January of the following year, at Westminster, uttering with his last breath, according to one account, the awful words " All is lost 1 " CHAPTER VII. EDWARD VI. AND THE PROTECTOR SOMERSET. The first visit which Edward VI. made as sovereign to the place of his birth was in June, 1547, six months after his accession to the throne. This was the period of the Duke of Somerset's greatest influence and power. In addition to his title of " Lord Protector," his style now ran — " Edward, by the grace of God, Duke of Somerset, Protector of the Realm"; and he sat, on all occasions, not only in the Presence Chamber, but also in Parliament, on the right- hand of the youthful King. In the meanwhile Edward was not only reduced to a state of impotence and insignificance, but stripped of even the commonest privileges and amuse- ments, kept in a state almost of subjection, and surrounded with little of the external splendour of royalty. But the career of the proud Protector was to be short-lived. His magnificence and his wealth, and the extravagance that pervaded every branch of the administration, were beginning to excite the murmurs of the people, who contrasted them with the impoverished condition of the country and the confusion in its finances. Nor was the political aspect of affairs less threatening. The successes that marked the beginning of his administration were slight and transient, the disasters that followed were, on the contrary, prolonged and severe. EDWARD VI. (From the picture at Petworth.) I 114 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. At last, as we learn from Holinshed, " many Lords of the Realm as well as Councillors, misliking the government of the Protector, began to withdraw themselves from Court, and resorting to London fell to secret consultation for redress of things." This was towards the end of September, 1549. Somerset and his party, Cranmer, Sir John Thynne, his secretary, Cecil, Paget, and Petre in the meanwhile remained at Hampton Court. It would seem that at the outset the Lords in London did not design any severe action against him, but intended rather to remonstrate with him for the shortcomings of his adminis- tration, and the failure of his enterprises, and to urge that the late King's will should be carried out, and that the executors whom he had nominated should be appointed to act as guardians of the kingdom during the minority of the King. But the news of what was brewing in London being secretly conveyed to the Protector, and doubtless in an exaggerated form, filled him with vague alarm. He conjured up in his imagination that the Lords were not only seeking his over- throw, but perhaps plotting against his life. He accordingly drew up a commission, or proclamation, for the King's signa- ture, copies of which were sent out in all directions, imploring his loving subjects to repair to Hampton Court to defend " his most royal person, and his entirely beloved uncle," while at the same time printed handbills were disseminated in the neighbouring towns and villages, calling on them " in the name of God and King Edward, to rise to defend him and the Lord Protector against those who would depose the Lord Protector, and so endanger the King's royal person," and urging them to do so because he was the friend of the people, and the enemy of those who injured the poor commons by extortion and oppression. To the Lord Mayor and Corporation of London he sent a command to despatch a thousand men to his assistance, and to the Lieutenant of the Tower to admit no member of the Council within the gates. The next day, the 6th of October, preparations were made to put Hampton Court in a state of defence, and for once in its history the old palace assumed the aspect of a fortress. The moat, which on ordinary occasions was allowed to run low, was hastily filled ; the gates were fortified, and on the battlements and towers and turrets every preparation was THE DUKE OF SOMERSET. Il6 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT, made for sustaining a siege. All the morning the din and hurry of martial preparation resounded through the palace, Edward himself tells us, in his own diary, that five hundred suits of armour were brought down from the armoury, to arm the servants and other men attendant on the Protector and himself, so that with the soldiers and guards there was a goodly body of men for defence. DOORWAY OF THE GREAT GATE-HOUSE. But as the day wore on, the uneasiness of the Protector increased. No news, indeed, was brought of the approach of any hostile force ; but Petre, whom he had despatched the day before to the Lords in London, " to know for what cause they gathered their powers together, and, if they meant to talk with him, that they should come in a peaceable manner," and to treat for an amicable arrangement, had not yet returned, and the delay began to excite serious suspicions in his mind. THE GREAT GATE-HOUSE, RESTORED, Il8 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. The summons of the criers whom he had sent out, and the proclamation he had circulated, had, it is true, been so far responded to, that a large crowd had collected in the outer Green Court ; but that they had come rather out of curiosity than sympathy was evident enough. Besides, rumours had reached him, which were too pre- cise to be altogether devoid of truth, that the members of the Council in London had seized the Tower, displaced his Lieutenant, and installed an officer of their own ; and that his messenger had been forcibly detained. There was evidently no time to lose : it would be hopeless to attempt to hold his own at Hampton Court unless he could count on the surrounding population. Perhaps the sight of their young King might animate them to loyal enthusiasm and produce the desired effect. Edward was, therefore, hurried from his lodgings, and though it was already dark, and he was suffering from a cold, he was brought into the First Court, where the soldiers were drawn up in martial array. The scene must have been a striking one, as the young and feeble King and his uncle emerged through the archway of the Clock Tower, with Cranmer, Paget, Cecil, and others, preceded by the heralds sounding a march on their trumpets, while the flare of the torches gleamed on the armour of the guards, who greeted them with cheers. Arrived at the Great Gate-house, where the heavy oak doors had been rolled open, Somerset and the King ad- vanced to the stone bridge over the moat in front of the gate. History does not record what reception they gave their young sovereign when, at the bidding of his uncle, he addressed them, and said, " I pray you, be good to us and our uncle." Somerset himself then harangued them, imploring them to defend him, and warning them that it was the King that was aimed at in the actions of the Council, and that if he fell he was determined not to fall alone, but that the King would fall also. So piteous and selfish an appeal was little calculated to arouse the enthusiasm of his hearers. It was received in complete silence; and Somerset, mortified and apprehen- sive, went back into the palace to ponder on the situation he was in. He soon arrived at the conclusion that the only thing to EDWARD VI. AND THE PROTECTOR SOMERSET. 1 1 9 do was to fly to a place of greater security. So, in an hour or two after, at nine or ten o'clock at night, in spite of the feeble condition of Edward, he hurried him away, with all his people and guards, to Windsor Castle. Five days after he made an abject submission to his enemies, and was lodged a prisoner in the Tower; while Edward, who was probably not sorry to be released from EDWARD VI. AND HIS COUNCIL. (From a Woodcut on the title-page of the Statutes of 1551.) his tutelage, returned to Hampton Court — or 'Ampton Court, as he preferred to write it — to appoint Warwick, the Protector's deadly enemy. Lord Great Master and Lord High Admiral. Edward was at this palace again in July, 155 1, and this sojourn of the King's at Hampton Court is memorable for the issuing, on July i8th, by the Council of the famous proclamation addressed to the bishops, inviting them and 120 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. their flocks "to resort more diligently to common prayer than they had done, and especially to refrain their greedy appetites from that insatiable serpent, covetousness," and warning them that the sweating sickness had been sent as a punishment for their sins. It is amusing to note the effrontery here exhibited by the very men who were daily helping themselves in the coffers of the State, and were characterized by the Protestant preacher, Thomas Lever, **as fishers of money instead of men." Heading the names attached to the proclamation is that of the Duke of Somerset, who was still allowed to be present at the deliberations of the Council on affairs of State ; and he was present again on the 4th of October, on which occa- sion the King announced his intention of raising Warwick to the dignity of Duke of Northumberland, and of conferring the dukedom of Suffolk on the Marquis of Dorset. On the nth of the same month, Somerset had the mortification of witnessing, in the Great Hall of Hampton Court, the sumptuous ceremonies that attended these promotions in the peerage. But more crushing troubles were in store for him. On the 7th Sir Thomas Palmer had preferred in secret his charges against Somerset; and on the 13th the King was informed of them, and hastily removed to Westminster. We will not inquire here into the truth of the accusations, nor into the fairness of the trial that followed. Suffice it to say that, after unsuspectingly attending the Councils at Hampton Court on October the nth, 12th, and 13th, he was arrested in the Council Chamber on the i6th of the same month, instantly sent to the Tower, and six weeks after found guilty of felony, and condemned to death. On the 22nd of January following, the King laconically notes in his diary, that his uncle "had his head cut off upon Tower Hill, between eight and nine o'clock in the morning." THE PRISON, SO CALLED, IN THE ROUND KITCHEN COURT. 122 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. CHAPTER VIII. QUEEN MARY, KING PHILIP, AND THE PRINCESS ELIZABETH. Edward VI. *s last visit to Hampton Court took place in September, 1552; and two years after this, on the 23rd of August, Queen Mary and Philip II., five days after they had made their public entry into London, and exactly a month after his arrival in England, retired to Hampton Court to spend their honeymoon. The King's reception had not been very cordial, and he was, doubtless, not sorry to remove from the capital, where the hostility universally exhibited to his attendants and followers, and the brawls which continually occurred, indicated what a deep ill-feeling existed between the two nations. Though Mary, even at this early period of their married life, was, if not repugnant, at any rate an object of indiffer- ence to him, he appears to have behaved, for a short time at least, with some outward show of deference. A con- temporary writer, who wrote to Spain from the spot, and whose report has been recently published, declares that he never left her side, always assisted her to mount and dis- mount, dined with her continually in public, and never failed to attend the services of the Church with her on feast days. Yet the account he gives of her shows what an unattractive bride she must have been. He describes her as " ugly, small, lean, with a pink and white complexion, no eyebrows, very pious and very badly dressed. ^^ The visit must have been a gloomy one for both of them, for they remained in great retirement, allowing very few members of the Court to accompany them, and indulging in none of that magnificence, profusion, and pageantry which constantly followed the Tudor Court. This was set down by the people to Philip's haughty Spanish exclusive- ness, complaining that " the hall-door within the court was constantly shut, so that no man might enter unless his PHILIP II. OF SPAIN. (From the picture by Antonio More at Woburn Abbey.) 124 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. errand were first known ; which seemed strange to EngUsh- men that had not been used thereto." No less disgust was excited by the niggardly table kept by the happy pair. Instead of celebrating their marriage, as was the good old English custom, with feastings and festivities, to which all were welcome, they dined in private on maigre dishes — fish, buttered eggs, and oatmeal — another instance, so said the English, of morose churlishness. The King's Spanish attendants, however, who accom- panied him to England, naturally looked at the question from a different point of view. They regarded the English as hopeless barbarians and incorrigible heretics, with whom it was impossible to associate as equals, and yet whom they dared not treat as inferiors. Even the ladies disgusted them. According to the Spaniard quoted above, their dresses were of common and coarse material, and ill-made ; they wore black stockings, and showed their legs even as far as the knee; they were ugly and very ungraceful, especially when dancing, which with them consisted only of constrained gestures, and shuffling gait. " There is not a single Spanish gentleman," he concludes, "who would give a farthing for any of them, and they care equally little for the Spaniards. The English, in fact, hate us as they do the devil, and in that spirit they treat us. They cheat us in the town, and anyone venturing in the country is robbed." This John Bull feeling was a constant cause of complaint by foreign visitors to England in Tudor days. *' The English," says a Frenchman who travelled here a year or two after, " are great lovers of themselves and everything belonging to them, and think there are no other men like themselves, and no other world but England. Whenever they see a hand- some foreigner, they say that * he looks Uke an Englishman, and that it is a great pity he should not be an Englishman.' " As to banquets, our Spanish critic remarks, that "the English have no other idea of a feast than eating and drink- ing ; they understand no other way of enjoying themselves." And then he goes on to comment severely on the eighteen kitchens in the royal palace, and on the hundred sheep, twelve oxen, eighteen calves, and the tuns of beer — "so abundant that the winter flow of the river at ValladoHd is not greater in quantity " — that were daily consumed on the VIEW OF THE CHIMNEYS OF THE GREAT KITCHEN, TENN'S COURT LANE. 126 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. royal table. This love of our ancestors for good cheer, in the reign of Queen Mary, is confirmed by another French- man who was in England soon after. " The English," says he, "are great drunkards, and if an Englishman would treat you, he will say in his language, ' Will you drink a quart of Gascoyne, of Spanish, of Malmsey wine ? ' Their conversa- tion is continually interspersed with phrases such as these : *Drind iou,' ' Iplaigiou,' * Bigod sol drind iou agoud oin' (meaning thereby : I drink to you, I pledge you, By God, I shall drink you a good wine)." Like the Spaniard, he cen- sures them for the large quantities of beer they drink, and declares that in England " there is no kind of order ; the people are reprobates, and thorough enemies of good manners and letters, for they do not know whether they belong to God or the devil, and their manners are very unpolite." On the 3rd of April in the following year, 1555, Philip and Mary came again to Hampton Court, in which palace the Queen intended to have her confinement, which she fondly imagined was soon going to take place. According to the custom of that time, therefore, she retired entirely from public view, and for some weeks we hear little news from Court, except that, on the 8th of April, Courtenay was admitted to kiss hands before his departure for the Netherlands, and that the Duke of Alva spent a few days with Philip. In the meanwhile processions were organised and masses were said in London to draw down the Divine blessing upon the expected offspring, and " a solemn prayer was made for King Philip and Queen Mary's child, that it might be a male child, well-favoured and witty." On the 23rd of April, being St. George's Day, after a grand high mass in the Chapel Royal, King Philip, as Sovereign of the Order of the Garter, went with the Knights, and the Lords of the Council in their robes, in procession round the cloisters and courts of the palace, attended by heralds, and accompanied by the Lord Chancellor, and by Bishop Gar- diner in his mitre, and followed by a crowd of noblemen and ecclesiastics, with acolytes bearing crosses and carrying tapers, thurifers swinging censers, and clerks and priests all in copes of cloth of gold and tissue. As they marched round the cloister of the old Inner Court (which stood on the site NEWS THAT A PRINCE WAS BORN. 12/ of the present Fountain Court) solemnly singing the hymn "Salve festa dies," the Queen looked down on them from the window of her bed-chamber, and watched them pass, so that she was seen by hundreds of spectators. This was con- sidered a somewhat serious breach of etiquette, but it was, doubtless, done in order publicly to testify to Mary's rever- ence for the ceremonies of the Catholic faith, and to refute the rumour then current that she was dead. Immediately after this, the birth of the anxiously expected heir was believed at length to be imminent, and the greatest excitement prevailed in the palace. The nursery was got ready, mid wives, nurses, and rockers were engaged, and " a cradle veri sumptuouslie and gorgeouslie trimmed" was pre- pared ; and on it were inscribed the verses : ** The child which thou to Marie, O Lord of might hast send, To England's joie in health Preserve, keepe and defend." Indeed, so completely confident were they as to the antici- pated event, that not only were passports made out for the Queen's messengers, who were to be the bearers of the joyful intelligence, but despatches were also prepared for the English ambassadors abroad, and letters for the continental sovereigns, announcing the fact of her Majesty's safe delivery. These documents were signed by the King and Queen " Given under our signet at our house of Hampton Court," the date being left in blank to be filled in afterwards, and the wordy^y left unfinished, so that by the after addition of s or of /e it would serve for a boy or a girl. One of these singular letters however — namely, the one which was to be sent to Cardinal Pole — was more decidedly worded, and went so far as to settle the sex of the expected baby, informing him in express terms " that God had been pleased, amongst his other benefits, to add the gladding of us with the happy delivery of a Prince. ^^ These curious evidences of the infatuation of the royal confidence may still be seen in the Record Office. At length, on the last day of the month, the glorious hour in which should be brought forth the hope of England and of the Catholic world was declared to have arrived. Messengers I2» A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. were despatched in advance to announce the happy event in London, where the news was received with the ringing of bells, the singing of the " Te Deum " in several churches, the preaching of thanksgiving sermons, and the lighting of bonfires. Indeed one devout priest went so far, in his religious enthusiasm, as to describe the very appearance of the child — "how fair, how beautiful and great a prince it was, as the like had not been seen." The news even crossed the Channel to Antwerp, where the great bell of the Cathedral was set ringing, salutes were fired by the vessels in the river for the actual birth, and the English mariners supplied by the Regent with a hundred crowns to drink the health of the new-born prince. But, as Machyn observes, " the morrow after, yt was torned ordur ways, to the plesur of God." No child had been born ; and suspicion began to arise that some very consider- able mistake had been made. Still Mary herself had no misgivings. So religious processions were ordered, and up and down marched the priests "through city and suburb, park and square ; torches flared along Cheapside at midnight behind the Holy Sacrament, and five hundred poor men and women from the almshouses walked two and two, telling their beads on their withered fingers. Then all the boys of all the schools were set in motion, and the ushers and the masters came after them; clerks, canons, bishops, mayor, aldermen, officers of guilds. Such marching, such chanting, such praying, was never seen or heard before or since in London streets." CHAPTER IX. RECONCILIATION OF MARY AND ELIZABETH. It was at this juncture that Elizabeth arrived at the palace, having been sent for by the Queen, perhaps that she might be a witness of the birth, and because that event would probably terminate the political intrigues that had hitherto I30 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. found a centre in her. Philip also wished to be conciliatory towards her, partly because he hoped by that means to in- gratiate himself with the English people, and partly perhaps with a view to eventually making her his wife, if, as he prob- ably suspected would be the case, Mary should after all be childless, and not live long. Mary also, on the advice of Philip, had at length made up her mind to pardon her sister, against whom, in spite of strong suspicion, nothing treason- able had ever yet been proved. Bedingfield, under whose custody she was at Woodstock, had received orders on the 1 7 th of April to bring her with all speed to Court, with her servants and guards ; and the party set out on the journey, with every precaution, on the 25th, arriving four days after at Hampton Court. But if Elizabeth had expected that her sister intended at once to pardon her and receive her in a way befitting the heiress to the throne, she was disappointed. For, instead of being brought in state through the principal entrance and ushered into the royal presence, Bedingfield and his guards conducted her like a prisoner to a back gate, whence she was taken to the apartments assigned to her, and closely guarded. The rooms she occupied were in the Water Gallery, which is shown on the right in the engraving on the preceding page, and which was doubtless selected on account of its isolation from the rest of the building. All communication with anyone was forbidden, and for a day or two she only saw her own bed-chamber women and Bedingfield. But on the ist or 2nd of May a message came from the Queen directing her to prepare herself to receive Philip, and to attire herself in the most splendid robe she possessed. Of what passed at the interview — the first that ever took place between these two illustrious persons, who were destined afterwards to become such deadly enemies — we have no re- cord. The King came to the Princess's apartment by a private passage or cloister ; and the visit was kept so pro- found a secret that none except those immediately concerned knew it had taken place at all, and no mention has ever been made of it by any English historian. Information of it, however, reached the French and Venetian ambassadors, from whom nothing that happened in the palace could be con- cealed, and they duly reported it to their respective Courts. QUEEN MARY. (From the picture by Antonio More at Woburn Abbey.) 132 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. We may assume that the impression made on the King by Elizabeth was a favourable one, as his subsequent conduct proves, though there is nothing to support the conjecture of some authors that he fell in love with her. After the King's visit, Elizabeth was suffered to remain for about a fortnight in dismal solitude, being permitted neither to go out nor to receive any visitors. Her great- uncle, however. Lord William Howard, was allowed to see her, and " used her very honourably, condoled with her, and raised her dejected spirits with comfortable speeches," and promised her that he would use his influence to procure her an interview with some of the Council. This exactly fell in with Mary's view, who thought that thereby her sister might be induced to throw herself on her mercy and acknowledge her guilt. But nothing was further from Elizabeth's mind than to retreat at this time from the high position of injured inno- cence, which she had assumed throughout her troubles. Accordingly, when Stephen Gardiner, Bishop of Winchester, soon after presented himself, with Petre and Lords Arundel and Shrewsbury, she at once divined their object, and was a match for their manoeuvring. With great humility, we are told, they " humbled themselves before her Grace ; and she was not behind them in courtesy, but lovingly saluted them again ; " and, without waiting to hear their mission, she addressed them first. "My honourable Lords," said she, " I am glad with all my heart to see you, for methinks I have been kept a great while from you desolately alone. Committed to the hands of a strict keeper, my humble re- quest is to all your Lordships, that you would be the happy instrument of my further enlargement. It is not unknown to you what I have suffered now a long time ; I beseech you, therefore, to take me into your loving consideration." When she had spoken, the bishop, kneeling down, answered by saying, " Let me request your Grace but to submit yourself to the Queen, and then I doubt not but that you shall pre- sently enjoy an happy issue of your desires." But if he thought that in this way he could extort the avowal which she had with innate sagacity persistently refused to make, he was much mistaken. "No," she replied, "rather than I will so do, I will lie in prison all the days of my life. If ever I ELIZABETH IN CONFINEMENT. 1 33 have oifended her Majesty in thought, word, or deed, then not mercy but the law is that which I desire. If I yield, I should then against myself confess a fault which was never on my part intended, by occasion whereof the King and Queen may then justly conceive an evil opinion of me. No, no, my Lords," she continued, " it were much better for me to lie in prison for the truth, than to be at liberty, suspected by my Prince." Her answer was carried to the Queen, and the next day Gardiner and his colleagues came again, and kneeling before her, told her that " the Queen marvelled at her boldness in refusing to confess her offence, so that it might seem as if her Majesty had wrongfully imprisoned her Grace." " No," answered Elizabeth, "I never had such a thought; it may please her Majesty to punish me as she thinketh good." "Well," replied Gardiner, "her Majesty willeth me to tell you, that you must tell another tale before you are set at liberty." " Alas ! " rejoined Elizabeth, " I had rather be here in custody, with honesty and truth, than abroad suspected of her Majesty. And this which I have said, I will stand to, for I will never belie myself." " Why, then," said Gardiner, " your Grace hath the advantage of me and the rest of the Lords, for your long and wrong imprisonment." "What advantage I had," she answered, "God and your own conscience can best tell, and here before Him I speak it, for that dealing which I have had amongst you I seek no remedy, but pray that God may forgive you all." " Amen, amen," said he ; and sc they departed, " she being fast locked up again." A week elapsed before anything further happened. But at the end of that time, one night at ten o'clock, Elizabeth suddenly received a message that she was to go at once to the Queen. Such a summons at that late hour was enough to fill even her stout heart with apprehension. While she hastily prepared herself for the meeting, visions of imprison- ments, visions of the rack, possibly of murder or the scaffold, floated before her imagination: and she begged her ladies and attendants to offer up their prayers on her behalf, for she could not tell whether they would ever see her again. At the foot of the stairs of her apartment, Elizabeth, accompanied by her ladies in waiting, was met by Beding- 134 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. field and Mistress Clarence, a lady in waiting to the Queen, who conducted her across the garden, while her gentlemen ushers and grooms went before her, carrying torches, and led her up the privy stair to the Queen's lodgings. There her ladies and gentlemen were commanded to remain while Mary's confidential attendant ushered her into the Queen's bedroom, where her Majesty was. Everything had been done so far to impress the imagina- tion and play upon the fears of Elizabeth; and the same course was followed now. When Elizabeth entered the room she found Mary alone, seated on a chair of State, to receive her not as a sister, scarcely even as a queen, but rather as a judge. Nearly eighteen months had passed since they had met, but the lapse of time had done little to soften the feeling of resentment and aversion with which the elder sister regarded the younger; and their meeting now was rather due to policy than any feeling of forgiveness. The Princess curt- seyed three times as she advanced, and then, falling on her knees, " she desired God to preserve her Majesty, not mis- trusting but that she should prove herself as true a subject towards her Majesty as ever did any, and even so desired her Majesty to judge her; and said that she should not find her to the contrary whatever report otherwise had gone of her." But the Queen answered sharply, ''Then you will not confess yourself to be a delinquent, I see ; but rather stand stoutly on your truth. I pray God your truth may become manifest." " If not," said the Princess, " I will request for neither favour nor pardon at your Majesty's hands." " Well, then," answered the Queen, "you stand so stiffly on your truth, belike you have been wrongfully punished and im- prisoned." " I cannot and must not say so to your Majesty," was Elizabeth's adroit reply. "Why then, belike you will report it so to others ? " rejoined Mary. " Not so, an please your Majesty," answered she ; " I have borne and must bear the burden myself; and if I may but enjoy your Majesty's good opinion of me, I shall be the better enabled to bear it still, and I pray God when I shall cease to be one of your Majesty's truest and loyal subjects, that then I may cease to be at all." QUEEN MARY'S AGONY OF DISAPPOINTMENT. 1 35 The Queen had not been more successful in extorting an avowal from her sister than the Lord Chancellor. She only muttered in Spanish, " Sabe Dios " — " God knows " — and then, according to Leti, added, " Whether innocent or guilty I forgive you," and, turning aside, left her to be conveyed to her former custody. Thus terminated this famous interview, and with it ended Elizabeth's imprisonment. A week after she was set at liberty, and henceforth she was allowed to have her separate establishment, and was treated with the deference belonging to the heiress to the throne. It has been said by the best authorities, both Foxe and Heywood, that during this conversation Philip was concealed behind the arras, and witnessed what passed. This is by no means unlikely ; but the inference that he did so in order to be at hand to protect Elizabeth from any unseemly violence from her sister, is an absurdly gratuitous assumption. That Philip should have played the eavesdropper is only consonant with the tortuousness of his character. In fact, he seems, during his short residence at Hampton Court, to have been always creeping and sneaking about the passages of the palace. One morning he was walking in the Maids of Honour's Gallery, and noticing, as he passed, a small window which admitted daylight into the bedroom of Lady Magdalen Dacre, a lovely girl of sixteen, he peeped in. Seeing that she was at her toilet, he took the liberty of throwing open the casement and putting his arm through. But the beauti- ful English maid of honour was not disposed to suffer such an impertinence from the Spanish King. She seized a stick that was in the corner close by her, and gave him such a blow that he hastily withdrew his arm, and hurried away. These events took place about the last week in May, by which time the belief that the Queen was about to become a mother no longer existed in the minds of anyone except the Queen herself. Week after week passed by, and no child appeared. Processions, prayers, masses were offered up, but in vain ; and whispers now began to be heard that after all she never would have a child ; and that she was fast hastening to her grave. At first those about her found it difficult to convince her. But slowly and irresistibly the dreadful truth began to dawn 136 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. on her mind, and all her hopes gave way, one by one, in an agony of pain and despair. Her only consolation was prayer ; the book of devotions she used at this time is still in existence, worn and fingered at the pages on which are found the prayers for the unity of the Church and the safe delivery of a woman with child. The accounts transmitted by the foreign ambassadors to their respective Courts pre- sent a deplorable picture of her condition. For weeks she would lie in her bed without speaking, like one dead. Then she would sit for whole days on the floor, huddled up, with her knees against her face, her whole body swollen with disease, her countenance distorted and haggard, and her mind shaken with the ruin of all her hopes. This aspect of affairs could not but conduce to the ad- vantage of Elizabeth, who, now that she was at liberty, found herself treated with respect and consideration by the courtiers, who turned towards her as the rising sun. When they came to the receptions, which she was now allowed to give, they went on bended knee to kiss her hand, and even the Papal Nuncio and Philip were observed to make obeisance before her. Yet she never wavered from her accustomed circumspection, nor behaved so as to excite the hostility of her susceptible sister. On the contrary, she affected the most complete submission to her wishes, professed herself a fervent Catholic, attended mass in the Royal Chapel, and received the Communion from the hands of Gardiner. It was at this period that, when cross- examined by Mary as to her faith in transubstantiation, she is supposed to have eluded the difficulty by replying : ** Christ's was the word that spake it; He took the bread and brake it ; And what his word did make it, That I believe and take it." Yet she was ill at ease at Court; and when Mary, wearied with disappointment and sickness, removed, after four months' seclusion, on the 3rd of August, for a few days to the neighbouring house at Oatlands, Elizabeth asked to be allowed to retire from Court, a request which was willingly granted. As the Queen was going through the park to enter her barge, which was ready at the water- WHOM IS QUEEN ELIZABETH TO MARRY? 1 37 side to take her up the river, she met a poor man on crutches, who, on seeing her, threw away his crutches for joy, and ran after her. She was so touched by this incident, which she perhaps thought akin to a miracle, that she ordered him a reward from the privy purse. CHAPTER X. QUEEN ELIZABETH AT HOME. During the reign of Queen Elizabeth, though Hampton Court was frequently inhabited by her Majesty and the Court, it was not the scene of any events of great historic interest ; for the Queen reserved it almost exclusively as a residence to which she might retire in times of festivity, or for short seasons of rest and quiet. She made her first visit here, after her accession, in the year 1559, when she had been on the throne about nine months, and the questions of her marriage and the uncertainty of the succession were beginning to cause great anxiety to her advisers. Their attention was already directed to the Earl of Arran, the Duke of Chatelherault's eldest son, who, as a Protestant and a member of the Royal House of Scotland, appeared to Cecil and other English statesmen a most suitable consort for Elizabeth. Their view was that, if a match could be got up between him and Elizabeth, that union of the English and Scottish crowns which had so long been the aim of English statesmen, could be effected at one stroke ; while at the same time a severe and effective blow would be dealt at the pretensions of Mary Stuart, who by the death of Henri II. had just become Queen Consort of France. This scheme appears to have approved itself to Elizabeth, who told Quadra, the Spanish ambassador, that "she would take a husband that would make the King of France's head ache." Accordingly Arran, who had just escaped from France, and was hiding in Switzerland, was invited over to England ; 138 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. and visited by the Queen at Cecil's house in the Strand, where he lay concealed ; and at the end of August he was brought down secretly to the neighbourhood of Hampton Court, to have another interview with the Queen. He would seem to have come from some hiding-place on the Surrey side of the river, perhaps at East Molesey, and to have crossed the river, and landed on the towing-path near the old Water Gallery. Here he was met by Cecil, who admitted him into the Queen's Private Garden, where a clan- destine meeting took place between him and her Majesty. The interview lasted some time; but whatever may have passed, it did not tend to confirm Elizabeth in the proposed match. Arran was a man of very narrow intellect, and, what probably weighed not less with the Queen, totally devoid of any personal beauty or accomplishments. De- cidedly he was not the man for her ; he might be useful as a political tool, but as a sharer of her crown she would not have him at any price. "She would never," as she told the Spanish ambassador, "have a husband who would sit all day by the fireside. When she married, it should be a man who could ride and hunt and fight." Another interview with him, probably also at Hampton Court, only strengthened her earlier impression ; and not all the exhortations of her Council, nor the prospect of the union of the two crowns and the damage to the cause of the Guises, could bend her from her purpose. Thus was the first aspirant to the hand of the Virgin Queen dismissed. In all these transactions the greatest secrecy was observed. Not only were all the letters and despatches to the Queen's agents in the North written in ciphers, which were continually being altered, and intrusted only to messengers on whom the greatest reliance could be placed, but the negotiations were kept a secret, even from many members of the Council. So successful were these schemes, that Noailles, the French ambassador, whom it most concerned to know Arran's move- ments, was kept entirely in ignorance, not merely of the underhand part the Queen was playing in Scotland, and of her interview with the earl, but even of his passage through England, until two months after. On the 6th of September, five days after Arran left Hamp- ELIZABETH'S SUITORS. 1 39 ton Court, Noailles came down from London to pick up the news at Court, and see and confer with Elizabeth. One of the first topics that he touched on was the escape of Arran from France, and he expressed a hope, on the part of the King of France, that if the earl should come to England, he might at once be arrested. Elizabeth answered, without betraying any discomposure, that she had no news of him, but that if he should fall into her power, the King might rest assured she would do what he wished. His diplomacy, in fact, was in every way baffled by the cunning of the young Queen ; and he himself admitted that he was quite discon- certed by the way in which, whenever she was in a difficulty, she turned it off with a laugh. De Quadra, the Spanish ambassador, was not one to be so easily deceived. He had, as he boasted to his master, Philip IL, his spies everywhere, even about the Queen's person, and he knew everything she did and every word she said ; so much so, that he was able to announce Arran's arrival in England to the Spanish Court almost as soon as it was known to Elizabeth and Cecil. Nevertheless, she still continued to reject all suitors for her hand, and Hans Casimir, the eldest son of the Elector Palatine, who, as a Protestant, ventured to be very sanguine of success, fared no better than several other would-be hus- bands of the Catholic faith. In answer to his proposal, she sent him an evasive and scarcely encouraging answer ; but the duke, determined not to miss the chance of the greatest match in Europe through any faint-heartedness, and confident in his personal charms, requested Melville, the Queen of Scots' agent, who in the spring of the year 1564 was on a visit to the Electoral Court, and about to pass through England on his way to Scotland, to convey his portrait to the Virgin Queen. Melville, how- ever, who was convinced that Elizabeth would not entertain the match, only consented to be the bearer of the picture on condition of his being also furnished with those of his father and mother and whole family, and with a diplomatic commission of such a nature that he might be enabled to introduce the subject incidentally, and as if without design. When the envoy arrived in England, apparently in the month of April, the Queen was at Hampton Court, whither 140 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. he went to have an audience of her. During their inter- course Melville, who was an adroit diplomatist, took an oppor- tunity of warmly praising the German Protestant Princes, and especially of eulogizing the Elector Palatine. On which the Queen observed that he " had reason to extol that prince, for he (the Prince) had written very favourably of him (Melville), and that he fain would have retained him longer in his ser- vice." To this Melville replied, "that he was loath to quit the elector ; and to have the better remembrance of him, he had requested to have his picture, with those of his wife, and all his sons and daughters, to carry home to Scotland." " So soon," says Melville, " as she heard me mention the pictures, she inquired if I had the picture of Duke Casimir, desiring to see it." But Melville, prepared with an answer calculated to disarm suspicion, told her he had left the pictures in London, and that he was going on thence at once to Scot- land. On this, Elizabeth said that he should not go till she had seen them, and told him to bring them down to her at Hampton Court. So the next day he delivered them all to her, when she said she desired to keep them all night, and appointed a meeting with him the next morning in her garden, in the meanwhile asking Lord Robert Dudley to give his opinion of the picture of Duke Casimir. His lordship's criticism of his rival was doubtless not over favourable ; for when Melville met the Queen on the following morning, "she caused them," says he, " to be delivered all unto me, giving me thanks for the sight of them. I offered unto her Majesty all of the pictures, so she would let me have the old elector's and his lady's (a sly way of trying to get her to retain the portrait of the duke only), but she would have none of them. I had also sure intelligence that first and last, she despised the said Duke Casimir. Therefore I did write back from London to his father and him in cipher, dissuading them to meddle any more in that marriage." A few months after this, Melville returned to the English Court as the accredited agent of Mary Queen of Scots, who despatched him with the especial object of pacifying Eliza- beth, and apologizing for the angry letter she had written when the English Queen had offered her Lord Robert Dudley as a husband. During his stay of nine days, which ELIZABETH AND HER ADMIRERS' PORTRAITS. I4I were mostly spent at Hampton Court, Elizabeth saw him every day, and sometimes three times a day, before noon, in the afternoon, and after supper, and their colloquies frequently turned on the Queen of Scots, with regard to whom Elizabeth was very curious, and for whom she professed the greatest affection. "She expressed a great desire to see her ; and because their so-much-to-be-desired meeting could not hastily be brought to pass, she appeared MY LORD ROBERT DUDLEY'S PICTURE." with great delight to look upon her Majesty's picture. She took me," continues the envoy, "to her bedchamber, and opened a little cabinet, wherein were divers little pic- tures wrapped within paper, and their names written with her own hand upon the papers. Upon the first that she took up was written ' My Lord's picture J I held the candle, and pressed to see that picture so named; she appeared loath to let me see it, yet my importunity pre- vailed for a sight thereof, and I found it to be the Earl of 142 A SHORT PIISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. Leicester's picture." Melville then asked her to let him have it to take home with him to his queen, but she refused, alleging that she had but one picture of his ; whereupon he, seeing Leicester at the furthest part of the chamber with Cecil, said to her, " You have here the original ! " After that Elizabeth took out Mary's miniature and kissed it, and Melville kissed her hand as an acknowledgment "of the great love evidenced therein to his mistress." But as it was now late, she made an appointment with him to meet her next morning at eight o'clock. The place appointed was the garden, where she was accustomed to take every morning, at that hour, a brisk walk, " to catch her a heate in the colde mornings " ; though, when the public eye was on her, she was careful not to fall into the vulgarity of quick walking, but "she, who was the very image of majesty and magnificence, went slowly and marched with leisure, and with a certain grandity rather than gravity." Elizabeth, indeed, appears to have been very fond of her gardens at Hampton Court, and had them well kept up and frequently improved. Visitors in her reign tell us that they were especially noted for the " sundry towers, or rather bowers for places of recreation and solace, and for sundry other uses," which were placed at various points in the gardens ; and for " the rose- mary so nailed and planted to the walls as to cover them entirely, which is a manner exceeding common in England," and " laid out with various other plants, which are trained, intertwined and trimmed in so wonderful a manner, and in such extraordinary shapes, that the like could not easily be found." In her reign, also, numerous plants hitherto un- known were introduced. Harrison, in his " Description of England," says, " If you looke into our gardens annexed to our houses, how wonderfullie is their beautie increased, not onelie with floures and varieties of curious and costlie work- manship, but also with rare and medicinal hearbes sought up in the land within these fortie yeares." And after de- scribing his own garden, he goes on, " If therefore my little plot, void of all art in keeping, be so well furnished, what shall we think of those of Hampton Court, Nonesuch, etc. ? " But there is no occasion to dwell on the aspect of the gardens ; their general state and appearance were not much ELIZABETH'S VANITY AND LOVE OF DRESS. 1 43 different from what they had been in her father's time, and besides, Bacon, who knew the place well, has given us in his delightful essay the very picture of what they were. In this interview in the garden, and in various others which Melville had with Elizabeth during his visit to Hampton Court, every sort of topic was touched upon, Mary having particularly instructed her envoy "to leave matters of gravity sometimes, and cast in merry purposes, lest she should be wearied, she being well informed of that queen's natural temper. Therefore," proceeds he, " in de- claring my observations of the customs of Dutchland, Poland and Italy, the buskins of the women were not forgot, and what country weed (dress) I thought best becoming gentlewomen." His sagacity was soon shown not to have been at fault, for Elizabeth, entering readily into the topic, assured him that she had clothes of every sort ; and gave proof of it by appearing, thenceforward, every day in dresses of different fashions ; one day the French, another the English, another the Italian, and so on, asking him which became her best. Melville, who was a skilful flatterer, answered, in his judg- ment, the Italian dress, an opinion which he says, " I found pleased her well, for she delighted to show her golden- coloured hair, wearing a caul and bonnet as they do in Italy. Her hair was more reddish than yellow, curled in appearance naturally." Her fondness for attiring herself in fantastical dresses is well exemplified by the curious portrait of her painted by Zucchero about this time, and still to be seen at Hampton Court, in which she wears a long loose dress of thin white material, embroidered all over with flowers and birds, and edged with lace. On her head is a high conical cap, or head-dress, and she has shoes of blue and white, embroidered with gold, and trimmed with blue braid. Of her hair, which in all her portraits is carefully crimped and curled, she was particularly vain. " She next desired to know of me," continues the envoy, *' what colour of hair was reputed the best, and whether my queen's hair or hers was best ; and which of them was the fairest?" To this he cleverly answered, "The fairness of them both was not their worst fault." But she would not be put off by so ambiguous a compliment, and begged him 144 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. again to declare which he thought the fairest. Upon which he replied, " You are the fairest queen in England, and mine is the fairest queen in Scotland." But still she was not satisfied. Melville, however, out of loyalty, could not be pre- vailed upon, even with all his desire to flatter Elizabeth, to give her the preference over his own divine queen, and would only say, "they are both the fairest ladies in their countries; your Majesty is whiter, but my queen is very lovely." After that she inquired "which of them was of the highest stature ? " To which he answered, " My queen." " Then," said Elizabeth triumphantly, " she is too high, for I myself am neither too high nor too low ! " She next asked what exercises she used. "I answered," says the envoy, " that when I received my despatch, the queen was lately come from the Highland hunting : that when her more serious affairs permitted, she was taken up with reading of histories : that sometimes she recreated herself in playing upon the lute and virginals." On which Ehzabeth asked " if she played well ? " " Reasonably well for a queen," was his discreet reply. This turn in their conversation seems to have suggested to Elizabeth that she might as well take the opportunity of showing off" before Mary's agent her skill in music, an accomplishment of which she was especially vain. That same day, accordingly, by a carefully-prepared accid- ent. Lord Hunsdon took Melville into a quiet gallery of the palace to hear some music, where, though he said he durst not avow it, they might hear the Queen play upon the vir- ginals. "After I had hearkened awhile," says Melville, " I took by the tapestry that hung before the door of the chamber, and seeing her back was towards the door, I entered within the chamber, and stood a pretty space, hear- ing her play excellently well ; but she left off immediately, so soon as she turned her about and saw me. She appeared to be surprised to see me, and came forward, seeming to strike me with her hand, alleging that she used not to play before men, but when she was solitary to shun melancholy. She asked me ' how I came there ? ' I answered, ' as I was walking with my Lord of Hunsdon, as we passed by the chamber- door, I heard such melody as ravished me, whereby I was drawn in, ere I knew how, excusing my fault of homeli- ELIZABETH SHOWS OFF HER MUSIC. 145 ness, as being brought up in the Court of France, where such freedom was allowed ; ' declaring myself willing to endure what kind of punishment her Majesty should be ROUND KITCHEN COURT, SHOWING THE BAY WINDOW OF THE GREAT WATCHING CHAMBER, AND A WINDOW OF ONE OF THE OLD UPPER GALLERIES. pleased to inflict upon me, for so great an offence. Then she sat down low upon a cushion, and I upon my knees by her, but with her own hand she gave me a cushion to lay under my knee, which at first I refused, but she com- L 146 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. pelled me to take it. She inquired whether my queen or she played best? In that I found myself obliged to give her the praise." Elizabeth was equally fond of the lute, " on which," says Camden, " she played very handsomely." She and Leicester were on one occasion found by Norfolk sitting on the floor together in the Privy Chamber, listening to a boy playing on that instrument. Sometimes she used to sing to the ladies and gentlemen of the Court ; and once, after she had been entertaining them in this way at Hampton Court, some of those who had been present fell into a discussion as to the merits of the performance. Most of the company con- mended it, but Lord Oxford, Burghley's son-in-law, on the contrary, protested, "By the blood of G — , that she had the worst of voyce, and did everything with the worst grace that ever any woman did." This disparaging judgment was reported to the Queen and Council, and Oxford had cause to rue his rash freedom of speech, for it formed one of the charges against him when he was committed to the Tower not long after. At the same time she loved music for its own sake, as well as for its being a fascinating female accomplishment. For, to whichever of her palaces she went, there was always a great number of musicians in attendance, such as trumpeters, lute-players, harpers, sackbutt and flute-players, and many others, to the number of a hundred, who played while the Queen dined or supped, and on State occasions at banquets, balls, and masquerades. In her own chapel, also, she was very particular that the music should be of the very best. Four sets of singing boys were maintained on the royal establishment, and royal warrants were issued " to take up apt and sweet children " to be instructed in the art of sing- ing, who were carefully trained. Her organist, Dr. Tye, "a peevish and humoursome man," sometimes played in such a fashion that she sent the verger to tell him that he played out of tune, whereupon he sent her word that " her ears were out of tune." At Hampton Court she had a great many musical instruments, among them one entirely of glass, except the strings. She seems to have maintained her pre- dilection for music to the end, for Hawkins declares, in his " History of Music," that " in the hour of her departure she THE QUEENS SINGING AND DANCING. 147 ordered her musicians into her chamber, and died hearing them." To return to Melville and the Queen. Although he told her he was anxious to get back to Scotland, she insisted on detaining him two days after the interview just described, " that I might," says he, " see her dance, as I was afterwards informed. Which being done, she inquired at once whether she or my queen danced best? I answered, my queen danced not so high or disposedly as she did." Next morning Melville was conveyed by Leicester in his barge from Hampton Court to London, and, as they were being rowed down the river, Leicester asked him what the Queen of Scots thought of him and of the proposition that he should marry her. " Whereunto I answered," says Mel- ville, " very coldly, as I had been by my queen commanded. Then he began to purge himself of so proud a pretence as to marry so great a queen, declaring that he did not esteem himself worthy to wipe her shoes, and that the invention of that proposition of marriage proceeded from Mr. Cecil, his secret enemy; 'For if I,' said he, 'should have appeared desirous of that marriage, I should have offended both queens, and lost their favour.'" CHAPTER XI. QUEEN ELIZABETH'S CONFERENCES AND ENTERTAINMENTS. In the autumn of 1568, when the conference for the trial of the differences between Mary Queen of Scots, now a prisoner in England, and her subjects, had been adjourned from York to London, Elizabeth was residing at Hampton Court, and here a council was summoned on the 30th of October, to decide on what should be the future course of proceedings. Hitherto Elizabeth seems to have sincerely sympathized with her unfortunate cousin, and to have desired a result 148 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. which might lead to her reconciliation with the rebel lords and her restoration to her throne. But the news which reached her about this time was beginning to work a change in her feelings. She heard with alarm that the excitement among her Catholic subjects was increasing, that the chival- rous interest aroused in the northern counties in Mary's cause was rising to a dangerous pitch, and that the Duke of Norfolk was intriguing to marry her. Cecil immediately took advantage of this mood to further his designs ; so that a few days before the Council met he was able to congratu- late himself that the Queen of Scots would not " be advanced to greater credit than her cause will deserve," and that the CARVED STONE ON QUEEN ELIZABETH S WINDOW. disposition of his mistress was now " rather to put her back than to further her." The effect of this was at once apparent on the meeting of the Council. It was then determined that Murray should be induced by promise of protection and countenance, to produce his alleged proofs of his Queen's guilt, that at the same time Mary should be informed how desirous Elizabeth was that the investigation " should have some good end " ; but that " because this manner of proceeding cannot be so secretly used, but that knowledge thereof will by some means come to the Queen of Scots," precautions should be taken against her escaping by removing her to Tutbury, a place of great security, as soon as the Regent consented " to show and make proof of the Queen of Scots' guiltiness for the murder of her husband.'* ELIZABETH'S RECEPTIONS OF AMBASSADORS. I49 While the conference was holding its sittings in London, and Murray was putting in the accusations against Queen Mary ; while Lennox was appearing, contrary to the under- standing, and appealing for judgment against her ; and while her commissioners, Lord Herries and Bishop Ross, were denouncing this and other breaches of the engagements, Elizabeth remained at her palace in the country, giving audiences to La Mothe Fenelon, the newly-appointed am- FOOT OF THE GREAT HALL STAIRS. bassador from the French Court; and to M. le Cardinal de Chatillon, brother of Coligny, the envoy of Conde and the Huguenots, with equal distinction. On his first visit. La Mothe was met with all the customary pomp at the foot of the great stairs, and thence conducted through the Great Hall to the Presence Chamber, where he was ushered before Elizabeth, who was seated in her chair of State. She conversed with him for upwards of an hour on the state of parties in France and the affairs of Spain and Scotland. M. de Chatillon, who sought an audience of her a few I50 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. days after, was received with similar cordiality, though less formality. He found her in the park hunting; she dis- mounted, and went with him into a cottage close by, and there they had a long and intimate conference. La Mothe's second interview was as unconventional : for he was admitted alone into the Queen's Privy Chamber, where she received him without ceremony, reclining on a couch in a charming undress, excusing herself by telling him she had had an accident when out driving in her coach. La Mothe was an adroit flatterer and courtier, and soon ingratiated himself with her. He praised her appearance, hinted that all the princes of Europe desired her hand, and listened with becoming interest and composure to her account of Alva's insolence in writing her a familiar letter, v/hich she designated as a " valentine." Soon after this a great council of peers was summoned at Hampton Court, to whom the proceedings of the conference were declared, and the proofs exhibited. At the first meeting, on December 14th, the fatal contents of the casket were themselves produced. Mary's alleged letters to Bothwell, one long sonnet, and the alleged con- tract of marriage were produced, and then, according to Cecil, were "duly conferred and compared for the manner of writing and fashion of orthography, with sundry other letters, long since heretofore written and sent by the said Queen of Scots to the Queen's Majesty," and in the colla- tion " no difference found." But the winter's evening was fast closing in, and the proceedings were hastily adjourned till the following day. How far the six great peers who had been summoned were convinced by the proofs submitted to them we do not know, but that unanimity did not prevail we learn from the Spanish ambassador, who wrote to Philip that some of the members ventured to check the passionate violence of Cecil against Mary. No opinion, at any rate, was expressed by them as to her guilt or innocence. They merely thanked Elizabeth for the confidence she had reposed in them, and stated their opinion that " they did not think it meet for her Majesty's honour to admit the said queen to her presence as the case did stand." Thus terminated these proceedings in as unsatisfactory and abortive a manner as could be imagined for the cause PRODUCTION OF THE CASKET LETTERS. 51 of truth and justice, but not inconvenient for Elizabeth and her advisers. The ensuing month was occupied by incessant negotiations between Elizabeth and Mary's commissioners. First, she urged that Mary should answer the accusation against her, at the same time refusing to allow her to do so in person. Next, she promised that if she would confirm her abdication, and throw herself on her protection, she would befriend her. But when both these offers were refused, and Mary, on the contrary, persisted in her demand to be allowed to defend herself in person, and requested a view of, or at least copies of, the evidence produced against .')ii,...^ig.iiL...>..,>iV., OLD LEADEN WATER-SPOUTS ON QUEEN ELTZAT^ETH's T?ARN. her, Elizabeth summoned Murray and his associates to Hampton Court, and told them, through Cecil, that as nothing had been produced against them, and "as on their part they had seen nothing sufficiently produced nor shown against the Queen their Sovereign, whereby the Queen of England should conceive or take any evil opinion of the Queen her good sister for anything yet seen," she gave them leave to depart. On the 13th of January, 1569, Murray accordingly left for Scotland, with the casket and the letters, and a present from Elizabeth of ;£5,ooo. Henceforth, until the close of Queen Elizabeth's reign, but few events of historic interest took place at Hampton Court. For, though her Majesty continued to pass some 152 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. weeks of almost every year at the old palace, her visits were usually made during the intervals of political calm, when she wished for privacy and quiet, or sought relaxation from the cares of state in the gaieties and festivities of Christmas-tide. To specify all the particular occasions when Hampton Court rejoiced in the royal presence would be to give but little more than a tedious list of dates. We shall, therefore, content ourselves with glancing rapidly over the concluding years of this reign, only dwelling on such topics as may serve to illustrate the sort of life led by the Queen and her Court at the palace. At no period in the history of England was Christmas celebrated with more joviality and rejoicing than during the reign of Elizabeth; and nowhere with more magnificent festivities and with more profuse hospitality than at the Queen's Court. Possessing in a pre-eminent degree the old EngHsh love of gaiety, pageantry, and good cheer, her Majesty entered with earnestness and delight into all the national sports and pastimes, and endeavoured by her example to foster them among her subjects. A true child, too, of the Renaissance, she ever felt a hearty sympathy with all the brighter and more romantic aspects of life — being entirely undefiled by the taint of that sour and morose Puritanism, and that morbid introspectiveness, which were already infecting so many of her subjects, and were destined in the reigns of her successors to stamp out from the English character so much of its former freshness, heartiness, and joyousness. Consequently Christmas-time at Hampton Court — which, with its Great Hall, long galleries, vast reception rooms, and eight or nine hundred bedrooms, was better adapted for entertainments at this festive season than any other of the royal palaces — was one long series of banquets, balls, mas- querades, masques, revels, plays, sports, and pastimes. The banquets sometimes took place in the Hall, and sometimes in the adjoining Great Watching Chamber ; after which the company retired to the Withdrawing Room, and the minstrels began to play : when ** My grave Lord Keeper led the brawls," and the Court and the guests could then enjoy the inestim- CHRISTMAS FESTIVITIES. 1 53 able privilege of witnessing her Majesty dance a coranto or galliard. On other nights there were masquerades or games ; and in the daytime tilting and tennis matches, shooting and hunting parties, and the many sports and games of merry old England. But the chief amusements of the Court were the masques and plays, which enlivened almost every night from Christ- mas Eve to Twelfth Night, and which were presented with the greatest magnificence in the Great Hall of the palace — a fact enduing that room with a very special interest as one of the two or three surviving Elizabethan theatres in England. The " Accounts of the Revels at Court " contain a number of particulars relating to the performances at Hampton Court, affording us valuable indications of the " mounting " of dramatic entertainments at this period. The entries relating to the carpenters', carvers', and joiners' works, which were taken in hand many days previous to the holidays, conclusively prove — contrary to the too prevalent notion — that the scenic effects in the Elizabethan drama were of a most elaborate, realistic, and gorgeous kind. The stage, which was erected at the lower end of the hall in front of the "screens" and minstrel gallery, was composed of strong scaffolding, posts, rafters, and screens, "having also apt houses made of canvas, framed and painted accordingly as might serve their several purposes." For instance, there were charges in regard to some of the plays for "painting of seven cities, one village, and one country-house," and for bringing into the Court trees to represent a wilderness. Nor could the players complain that they were denied any convenience ; for the pantry, behind the " screens " at the lower end of the hall, was set apart as a " tyring-room," or green room ; and the Great Watching Chamber at the upper end put at their disposal for rehearsals. We find, also, that there was a wardrobe department, to which was intrusted the "airing, repairing, amending, brushing, spunging, rubbing, wiping, sweeping, cleaning, putting in order, folding, laying up and safe bestowing of the garments, vestures, apparel, disguisings, properties, and furniture .... which else would be mouldy, musty, moth- eaten and rotten." 154 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. Then there were the tailors, haberdashers, buskin-makers, upholsterers, and silk-weavers, all of whom were busily occupied in making dresses and properties, such as wings, hair, snowballs, vizors, wands, counterfeit fruit, fish, and flowers, and many other articles, showing the scrupulous attention given to theatrical details. The lighting of so large an auditorium as the Hall natur- ally presented some difficulties; but they were cleverly overcome by stretching wires across the open roof from the beams on one side to those on the other, and hanging from them small oil lamps. The effect of this method of illumina- tion was that, instead of a glare of torches and candles on a level with the eye, a soft and diffused glow was reflected all over the Hall from the gilded rafters and tracery of the roof. At the same time, high up on the walls there were silver sconces with candles ; and " candlesticks with perfumes to burn at the end of the matches." Such were the arrangements for the presenting of the masques and plays at Hampton Court during the Christmas- tides of 1572, 1575, and 1576. The Christmas-tide of the following year, 1577, also, was kept by the Queen at Hampton Court ; and in regard to this visit there is preserved the list of " New Year's Gifts," that were exchanged between the Queen and her subjects. Not only did these courtesies pass between Elizabeth and the courtiers always about her person, but all the great people of the State, whether in office or not, and whether resident at or absent from Court, were expected to contribute some sub- stantial offering. The list, which opens with the names of the Queen's relatives. Lady Margaret Lennox and Lady Mary Grey, is arranged under headings, beginning with the great officers of State, then Dukes and Duchesses, Mar- quises, Earls, and so on, down to the humblest gentlemen in the household. The presents consisted of various articles of use and ornament ; but especially of magnificent dresses and jewellery, and to a great extent of gold coin. Thus, the Countess of Derby gave her Majesty " a petticoat of white satin raised, and edged with a broad embroidery of divers colours"; Leicester a magnificent "carcanet of gold, enamelled, garnished with sparks of diamonds and rubies, and pendants of pearls"; and the Lord Treasurer THE FISH COURT, 156 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. Burleigh a purse with ;^3o. In this manner Elizabeth received every year presents to the value of something like ;^i 0,000 ! It is true that she, on her part, gave gifts in return ; but as they were chiefly small silver-gilt articles, of a value quite out of proportion to those she received, her bargain was a good one, and she remained with something like ;^8,ooo to the good. The entertainment of all those regularly attached to the Court, together with the number of great personages, with their retainers and servants, who flocked to the palace to partake of the hospitality of the Queen at these festive seasons, involved an enormous outlay for the supply of food. Every day wagon-loads of provisions of all sorts were brought into the Court. The Queen's own " Book of Diet " enumerates tons upon tons of butter, eggs, milk, cheese, and other farm produce; some twenty varieties of fish; count- less barrels of beer and hogsheads of wine ; and every sort of game and poultry — venison, hares, rabbits, partridges, pheasants, teals, snipe, larks, ducketts, capons, chickens — that were suppHed by the purveyors to her Majesty. At these times of festivity Queen Elizabeth, who in- herited from her father an ardent love of stag-hunting, often shared in the sports provided for the entertainment of her guests at Hampton Court, and shot the deer with her own bow. But though a thoroughly keen sportswoman, she always associated with the day's hunting something of the romantic pageantry with which she loved to invest every action of her life. For instance, we read on one occasion of "a delicate bower being prepared, under the which were her Highness' musicians placed, and a cross-bow by a nymph, with a sweet song, delivered to her hands to shoot at the deer." And there is record of her going out " to hunt the hart," in her younger days, attended by twelve ladies in white satin on ambling palfreys, and a large retinue of gentlemen, dressed "in russet damask and blue embroidered satin, tasselled and spangled with silver, with bonnets of cloth of silver, with green feathers " ; and of her being met, on entering the chase, by fifty archers, also in green, with scarlet boots and yellow caps, with gilded bows, who presented her a silver-headed arrow, winged with peacocks' feathers. At the same time, more practical matters were not over- FURNITURE OF ELIZABETH'S PALACE. 1 57 looked ; and some convenient place in a shady wood was usually chosen, near a stream, where the party might sit down to have luncheon. In 1592 the palace was visited by the Duke of Wirtemberg, who gives the following account of it in his diary : "This is the most splendid and most magnificent royal palace of any that may be found in England, or, indeed, in any other kingdom. It comprises ten different large courts, and as many separate royal and princely residences, but all connected ; together with many beautiful gardens, both for pleasure and ornament — some planted with nothing but rosemary ; others laid out with various other plants, which are trained, intertwined, and trimmed in so wonderful a manner, and in such extraordinary shapes, that the like could not easily be found. In short, all the apartments and rooms in this immensely large structure are hung with rich tapestry, of pure gold and fine silk, so exceedingly beautiful and royally ornamented that it would hardly be possible to find more magnificent things of the kind in any other place. In par- ticular, there is one apartment belonging to the Queen, in which she is accustomed to sit in state, costly beyond every- thing ; the tapestries are garnished with gold, pearls, and precious stones — one table-cover alone is valued at above fifty thousand crowns — not to mention the royal throne, which is studded with very large diamonds, rubies, sapphires, and the like, that glitter among other precious stones and pearls as the sun among the stars. " Many of the splendid large rooms are embellished with masterly paintings, writing tables inlaid with mother-of-pearl, organs, and musical instruments, which her Majesty is par- ticularly fond of." Similar testimony to the splendour of Hampton Court in Queen Elizabeth's reign is borne by the French ambassador. *' I have seen," wrote he, " in the palaces of Windsor and Hampton Court, but especially at the latter, more riches and costly furniture than I ever did see, or could have imagined." And Bohun, in his "Character of Queen Elizabeth," is equally emphatic on this point. " In the furniture of her royal palaces," says he, " she ever affected magnificence and an extraordinary splendour; she adorned the galleries with excellent pictures, done by the best artists; the walls she 158 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. covered with rich tapestries. She was a true lover of jewels and pearls, all sorts of precious stones, plate, plain, bossed of gold and silver, and gilt; rich beds, fine coaches and chariots, Persian and Indian carpets, statues, medals, etc., which she would purchase at great prices. The specimen of her rich furniture, which was moveable, was to be seen a long time after her death, at Hampton Court, above any of the other royal houses in her times. And here she had caused her naval victories obtained against the Spaniards, to be represented in excellent tapestries, and laid up amongst the richest pieces of her wardrobe." In the winter following the Duke of Wirtemberg's visit, the Court was again at Hampton Court, where Christmas was celebrated with all the usual festivities. In the midst of them Robert Carey, Earl of Monmouth, who had deeply offended Queen Elizabeth in transgressing her favourite prejudice by perpetrating matrimony, arrived at the palace. "Our first encounter," says Carey, "was stormy and terrible, which I passed over with silence. After she had spoken her pleasure of me and my wife, I told her that * she herself was the fault of my marriage, and that if she had but graced me with the least of her favours, I had never left her nor her Court ; and seeing she was the chief cause of my misfortune, I would never off my knees till I had kissed her hand, and obtained my pardon.' She was not displeased with my excuse, and before we parted we grew good friends." From this time forward to the end of EHzabeth's reign we find scarcely any further references to Hampton Court ; her Majesty, in the last eight years of her life, seldom residing here. Her last visit took place in the summer of 1599; but we can find no particulars of it, except that she was seen through one of the windows of the palace, "dancing the Spanish Panic to a whistle and taboureur [pipe and tabor], none being with her but my Lady Warwick." Her visit did not last more than three or four days, after which she went back again to Nonsuch. " At her Majesty's returning from Hampton Court," wrote the Scottish ambassador, "the day being passing foul, she would (as was her custom) go on horseback, although she is scarce able to sit upright, and my Lord Hunsdon said, * It was no meet for one of QUEEN ELIZABETH'S LAST VISIT. . 159 her Majesty's years to ride in such a storm.' She answered in great anger, ' My years ! Maids, to your horses quickly ; ' " and so rode all the way, not vouchsafing any gracious coun- tenance to him for two days. As she passed Kingston, one old man fell on his knees, praying God * that she might live a hundred years,' which pleased her so, as it might come to pass ; which I take to be the cause that some preachers pray she may last as the sun and the moon." But her hour was now drawing nigh ; and three years and a half after, on the 24th of March, 1603, Elizabeth of England, in the seventieth year of her age and the forty-fourth of her reign, breathed her last at Richmond Palace. THE DUNGEON. l6o A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. CHAPTER XII. JAMES I.'S CHRISTMAS ENTERTAINMENTS. James I. had not been long on the throne of England before, desiring to behold in turn all the palaces of his new king- dom, he came from Windsor Castle to reside for a short time at Hampton Court. He had been here only a day or two, when he issued a proclamation which must have brought home with clearness to the minds of his new sub- jects, how the rule they had now come under differed from that of Queen Elizabeth, and how completely the romantic element that had invested her era with such lustre was closed for ever. During the past reign the dignity of knighthood had been conferred only as a special mark of royal favour on men distinguished for great and gallant services to their sovereign and country; and it was an honour that heroes bearing names of such imperishable renown as Sir Philip Sidney and Sir Walter Raleigh were ambitious to deserve, proud to receive, and jealous to guard. It derived likewise a special value from being a personal, and not an hereditary distinction. But the canny Scotch King James, with the sordid and mercenary ideas that tainted even that which most nearly concerned his kingly honour, saw in it only a means of lining with good English gold his by no means too amply filled pockets. It must be said, however, that the suggestion is stated to have first come from the Earl of Salisbury, who is credited with having urged it on James, telling him " he should find his English subjects like asses, on whom he might lay any burden; and should need neither bit nor bridle, but their own asses' ears." When the King objected that it might discontent the generaUty of the gentry: "Tush, Sire," he replied, " you want the money, that will do you good ; the honour will do them very little harm." Thus it was that on the 17th of July, 1603, he issued from Hampton Court a general summons to all persons HUNDREDS OF NEW KNIGHTS. l6l who had ;^4o a year in land, or upwards, to come and receive the honour of knighthood (of course with the ob- hgation of paying the necessary fees) ; or, if they decHned a proffered dignity thus cheapened and vulgarized, they were enjoined to compound for the audacity of so doing by the payment of substantial fines to the Royal Commissioners appointed for that purpose. Three days after, in compli- ance with the King's gracious summons, two gentlemen, Mr. John Gammes of Radnorshire and Mr. WiUiam Cave of Oxfordshire, presented themselves at Hampton Court, and were the first to receive knighthood at the hands of his Majesty. These two, however, were but a small and insig- nificant advance guard, when compared to the vast main body of troops of country gentlemen already on the march towards London from all parts of England and Wales. They flocked, indeed, in such numbers, that six days after the issue of the summons there were awaiting the King's pleasure several hundred would-be knights. Ac- cordingly James came up, on the 22nd of July, from Hampton Court to Whitehall ; and there, on the following day, disposed of the first batch of no less than three hundred knights. The exertion of giving the accolade to so many persons would naturally be a very laborious one on a hot July day ; so the ceremony was appointed to take place in the Royal Gardens. In addition to this, as will be remembered, King James, later on in his reign, when rather hard up for cash, hit upon the expedient of founding " the noble order of Baronets," who were each of them to pay a fee of ;£"i,ooo on creation, and were in return for the honour conferred on them, " to defend and ameliorate the condition of the Province of Ulster, aid towards the building of churches, towns, and castles, and proffer their lives, fortunes, and estates to hazard in the performance of this duty," and *' maintain and keep thirty soldiers there." Some of our modern baronets would be rather aghast if called on to render any such services in return for the honours they bear ! In the meanwhile the King had also been proportionately lavish with the higher honour of the peerage ; and on the 2 1 St of July he created, with great ceremonial, in the Great Hall of Hampton Court, eleven peers, in the presence of M l62 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. the Queen and the Court. Altogether during his reign he conferred as many as a hundred and eleven peerages, about seven times as many, in a reign of twenty-two years, as his predecessor, Queen Elizabeth, had created in a reign of twice that duration. Soon after this the King and Queen went on a progress in the southern counties, until about the beginning of the month of December, when they resolved to move to Hampton Court for the ensuing festive season. Probably the recollection of the splendid entertainments of which this palace had been the scene during the reigns of the Tudor sovereigns, and espe- cially of the late Queen, suggested it as the most appropriate royal residence in which to celebrate their first Christmas- tide after their advent to the throne. Of all the English palaces it was then, as it is now, the most spacious ; and, with its magnificent suite of reception rooms, the most adapted for brilliant Court gaieties. The desire of the King and Queen to rival the splendour of their predecessors doubtless had weight with them in selecting a grand masque, to be written by Samuel Daniel, as the principal feature of the festivities, for it was just about this time that these entertainments were beginning to be popular. Towards the close of Queen Elizabeth's reign they had gradually tended towards the form they eventually assumed under the skilful hands of Ben Jonson, and were, in fact, developing from mere masquerades or mummings into dramatic re- presentations of a high lyrical order, which found their noblest embodiment in Milton's sublime poem, "Comus.'* It will be interesting, therefore, not only to give some account of the Court festivities at this season, but also to give a description of Daniel's masque, because it was, in a certain sense, the first true masque ever presented, and because it holds a position midway between the earlier revels of Tudor times and the more finished compositions into which they afterwards developed. The scenery and mechanical appliances for the masque were probably designed by Inigo Jones. He had just re- turned from Denmark, where he had been staying with the Queen's brother. Christian IV., from whom he brought letters of recommendation that soon procured him the office of architect to the Queen, His name is frequently men- A GRAND MASQUE ORDERED. 1 63 tioned in subsequent years as the designer of the scenic effects in the many masques given at Court, nor was his share in them considered of less miportance than that of the author. The great architect, indeed, seems to have taken considerable pride in his contributions to these entertain- ments ; and Ben Jonson's omission on one occasion to confess the value of his assistance nearly led to a serious breach be- tween them. Once, when the principal effect was obtained by the revolving of a large globe, on which various pictures were represented, Inigo Jones did not disdain to do the duty of scene-shifter and turn the machinery himself, so important did he regard these matters. With respect to the music of the masque, nothing positive can be ascertained. All that we know is, that Master Alphonso Ferrabosco, "a man planted by himself in that divine sphere and mastering all the spirits of music," as Ben Jonson says of him, was a frequent composer of the music of the marches and songs interspersed in these charming trifles. What remains of his compositions leads us to en- dorse the high opinion held of him by his contemporaries, and he may well have employed his talents on this oc- casion. Samuel Daniel, the author of the masque, was born in 1562, and by the time of which we are treating, had achieved a very considerable reputation as a writer of graceful and polished verse. He was a great favourite with the Queen, and she soon made him a gentleman-in-waiting extraordinary, and after- wards a groom-in-waiting of her privy chamber. He was also appointed " Master of the Queen's Children of the Revells," who were to be trained for the acting of stage plays, and whose education he had to supervise. Among the Record Ofifice papers, in an old account, halt worm-eaten and decayed with damp, there is an entry for work done in relation to this masque : Item, Paid for making readie the loiver ende, ivith certain Roomes of the Hall at Hampton Court for the Queene^ s Mat^ and ladies against their masque by the space of three dayes. From this we gather that the old pantry behind the " screens " at the lower end of the hall was set apart as a l64 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. " tyring-room," or green room, for the Queen and her ladies, and the Great Watching Chamber at the upper end put at their disposal for rehearsals — as had been the custom in Queen Elizabeth's time. In the meanwhile there was no lack of amusement and occupation for the rest. The whole world was flocking to Hampton Court; ambassadors to offer their congratula- tions, nobles and gentlemen to testify their loyalty to their new sovereign, and crowds of needy adventurers on the look out for the honours, pensions, and places which were being showered in such profusion by James on his new subjects. The crowd was so great that even with upwards of 1,200 rooms, besides outbuildings, the palace could not contain the numbers of retainers and servants that congre- gated here, so that tents had to be set up in the park to shelter them. Every day there were festivities : banquets, receptions of ambassadors, balls, masquerades, plays, tennis matches, and a grand running at the tilt. The plays were performed by the "King's Company of Comedians," who had been incorporated by a warrant of King James a few months before this. Prominent among their names — coming, in fact, second on the roll — is that of William Shakespeare ; and we make no doubt that he was staying with the rest of his company in this palace at this Christmas time, and that his plays were performed before the Court. They were " freely to use and exercise the arts and faculty of playing comedies, tragedies, histories, enter- ludes, moralls, pastoralls, stage plaies, and such other like, as thei have already studied, or hereafter shall use or studie, as well for the recreation of our loving subjects, as for our solace and pleasure, when we shall think good to use them." That they were at Hampton Court this Christmas is evident from the " Accounts of the Treasurer of the Chamber." It was at the lower end of the hall in front of the "screens," as they were called, that the stage was always erected when the plays were enacted here, and many a time the players in Shakespeare's company, including probably himself, made their entrances and exits through the openings shown in the subjoined sketch. The festivities culmin&ted on Sunday the 8th of January, 1604, with the grand representation of Daniel's "Vision of BAY WINDOW IN THE GREAT WATCHING CHAMBER. 1 66 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. the Twelve Goddesses." It may surprise some that a Sunday was chosen for so profane an entertainment ; but it should be remembered that in England, until the days of the Puritans, the Sabbath was not observed with the rigour that it was afterwards. Plays, revels, bear-baiting, dancing, leaping, archery, etc., were not only allowed, but encouraged. For King James, soon after the time we are treating of, pub- lished his " Book of Sportes " for the use of his subjects, in which he declared these and many other recreations to be lawful on Sunday, and stigmatized the puritanical mode of observing the day as leading to "filthie tippling and drunkennesse." The time was about nine or ten o'clock in the evening, and towards that hour the guests would be seen coming from their lodgings in various parts of the palace, or from lodgings outside the gates, along the cloisters, preceded by their attendants bearing torches. They would pass up the large wooden staircase which leads from the cloisters to the Hall, through the doors now closed, but which then opened under the Minstrel Gallery. Others would arrive under the archway beneath the clock, and go up the stone staircase, the usual entrance now, also leading into the Hall under the Minstrel Gallery. The King, the Prince, and the ministers and great Lords of State, on the other hand, would approach from the Great AVatching Chamber at the upper end of the Hall, which then communicated directly with the galleries and chambers belonging to the State Rooms. The whole appearance presented by the Hall must have been very imposing. On both sides the seats for the spec- tators were arranged, rising doubtless in tiers one above an- other, and leaving a large space in the middle of the room for the procession of the Goddesses to advance, and ample scope for them to execute their " measures." At the lower, or Minstrel Gallery end, was reared an elaborate piece of scenery, representing a mountain, rising high into the roof, and concealing the whole of the end wall ; at the upper end of the Hall on the left-hand side, on the dais, was built the "Temple of Peace," with a lofty cupola, and in the interior an altar tended by the Sibylla. Not far from the Temple was the cave of Somnus, " Sleep." When everything was ready, and all the company as- BRILLIANT SPECTACLE IN THE HALL. 1 67 sembled, the doors at the top of the Hall would be flung open, and the heralds proclaiming aloud "The King," would sound a loud blast on their trumpets, at which the whole company rising would make obeisance to the King, who entered with a throng of courtiers, and counsellors, and am- THE SCREENS IN THE GREAT HALL. bassadors. He sat beneath the canopy of State, placed near the beautiful south oriel window. The spectacle must have been brilliant in the extreme. The beautiful scenery for the masque, the splendid and costly dresses of the crowd of courtiers and ladies, the gor- geous colours and marvellous workmanship of the tapestry l68 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. hangings, " than which the world can show nothing finer," the rich decorations of the exquisitely moulded windows, filled with lustrous stained glass, and above all the glorious Gothic roof, with its maze of delicately carved and softly tinted beams, spandrels, and corbels, amid the pierced tra- cery of which flickered hundreds of little lamps, must have combined to produce an effect not often experienced in modern times. Milton surely had some such scene in his mind when he wrote the lines : *' P'rom the arched roof, Pendent by subtle magic many a row Of starry lamps and blazing cressets fed With naphtha and asphaltus yielded light As from a sky." And when we consider who were present on that night : all the beauty, rank, and state of the Courts of England and Scotland; ambassadors of foreign Powers; statesmen on whom hung the present and future destinies of the British Empire; and beyond all, both the greatest philosopher, Bacon, and the greatest poet, Shakespeare, that the world has ever known — we feel that the interest of the occasion is not undeserving of notice. And now the masque began : First appeared "Night," decked in a black vesture, set over with glittering stars. She rose up by a sort of trap- door arrangement in the middle of the floor from the cellars below, and marched slowly up to the cave, where her son " Sleep " lay, awakening him in a speech beginning "Awake, dark Sleep," etc. Her son at once obeyed her summons, and at her request consented to call forth a Vision to gratify the assembled Court, which he forthwith proceeded to do by an invocation and a waving of his wand, and then retired to slumber again. As soon as he had gone, Iris, the messenger of the God- desses, appeared on the top of the mountain, clad in a robe striped with all the colours of the rainbow, and descending, advanced to the Temple of Peace. Here she announced to the Sibyl, the priestess thereof, the approach of a " celestial presence of Goddesses," and at the same time gave her a DESCRIPTION OF DANIEL'S MASQUE. 1 69 scroll, in which she might read a description of them, and of the symbolical meaning of their several attires. As soon as the Sibyl had finished reading the description of the Twelve Goddesses, there were seen at the top of the mountain the three Graces in silver robes, emerging from the rocks and trees, and coming down the winding pathway hand in hand, with stately step, to the sound of a loud march, played by minstrels attired as satyrs, or sylvan gods, and seen half disclosed amid the rocks. Next came the Goddesses, three and three, in various coloured dresses, which are fully described in Daniel's explanatory intro- duction to the masque, each followed by a torchbearer dressed in a flowing white robe, studded over with golden stars, their heads bespangled with the same, and carrying long gilded waxen tapers. Thus in order the whole procession wended its course down the mountain's sinuous pathway, the whole being so arranged as to admit of all the performers being seen on the mountain at once. When the Goddesses reached the foot of the mountain, they marched up the centre of the Hall towards the Temple of Peace, while the Graces stood aside on the dais, and sang a song of three stanzas. In the meanwhile the God- desses went up one by one, and presented their gifts to the Sibyl, and then turning, came down into the midst of the Hall. Then, when the Graces had finished their song, they danced their measures, as Daniel says, " with great majesty and art, consisting of divers strains, framed into motions, circular, square, triangular, with other proportions exceed- ing rare and full of variety," and then pausing, "they cast themselves into a circle." The Graces hereupon sang another song, while the Goddesses prepared "to take out the Lords," which they did as soon as the song was finished, and danced with them various "galliards" and "corantoes." After this Iris appeared again, and announced to the Sibyl that "these Divine Powers" were about to depart, and then they "fell to a short parting dance, and so retira^ up the mountain in the same order as they came down." From thence they went with the King and the ambas- sadors to a banquet provided in the Presence Chamber I/O A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. "which was despatched with the accustomed confusion: and so ended that night's sport with the end of our Christmas gambols." The "accustomed confusion" with which, ac- cording to the Court chronicler, the banquet was despatched, was characteristic of the times. At a masque by Ben Jonson, acted by the Queen and her ladies at Whitehall soon after, the riot at supper was so great that, in the general scramble for food, " down went tables and trestles before one bit was touched." " There was no small loss that night of chains and jewels, and many great ladies were made shorter by their skirts." The gaieties that we have been describing were soon, however, to give way to more serious affairs. The religious question, which in the general excitement of the accession of the new King had fallen somewhat in the background, was now coming forward again for attention and settlement. The Puritans, who, relying on the fact of the King having been educated among Presbyterians, were looking forward to a policy of conciliation on his part, had framed, in the autumn of 1603, the famous "Millenary Petition" — so called from the number of those whose sentiments it expressed — stating their grievances and craving various reforms. Their demands, however, opened too many debatable points to be granted or refused without much consideration. James, therefore, consented that a conference should take place, in which all the questions at issue should be discussed between the representatives of the two parties — the Bishops and Deans on the part of the Church of England, and several divines deputed to speak the mind of the general Puritan body. The discussion was to take place in the presence of the King, and the 1 2th of January was appointed by royal proclamation as the date on which it was to open. The day, however, was afterwards deferred until Saturday the 14th; and in the meanwhile, on the evening of Friday the 1 3th, those who had been ordered to attend waited on the King, who sent for them " into an inner withdrawing chamber, where in a very private manner, and in as few words, but with most gracious countenance," imparted to them why they had been summoned. Next day was held the first formal meeting of the Con- ference, in the King's Privy Chamber, one of the large THE MILLENARY PETITION. 171 rooms of Henry VIII. 's suite of State Apartments on the east side of the Clock Court, which were altered in the reign of George II. It seems that the Chapel had been first selected as the ENTRANCE TO THE BUTTERY UNDER THE PANTRY AND GREAT HALL. place of meeting; but this arrangement was afterwards changed — which was fortunate, considering some of the incidents of the subsequent proceedings. On the first day the Puritans were not called in; but the matters to be discussed with them were virtually decided on in conference 1/2 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. between the King and the Episcopalian party, powerfully represented in the persons of the Lords of the Privy Council, the Bishops and five Deans, "who being called in, the door was close shut by my Lord Chamberlain. After a while his excellent Majesty came in, and having passed a few pleasant gratulations with some of the Lords, he sat down in his chair, removed forward from the cloth of state a pretty distance." His seat was, of course, at the head of the board. The King opened the proceedings by a speech of an hour's duration, in which he began by blessing "God's gracious goodness" ("at which words," says Barlow, "he was observed to put off his hat "), " who hath brought me into the promised land^ where religion is purely professed, where I sit amongst grave, learned, and reverend men ; not as before, elsewhere^ a king without state, without honour, without order, where beardless boys would brave us to the face ! " He then went on to assure them that he was altogether opposed to any innovation, but that his pur- pose was, "like a good physician, to examine and try the complaints," and that "if anything should be found meet to be redressed, it might be done without any visible alteration," and for that purpose he had called them to- gether. Entering next into the points which he meant to take his stand upon, he expressed his own views on the principal topics with great emphasis and force. When he had concluded. Archbishop Whitgift made a few remarks, addressing the King on his knees. After lihat a general discussion followed, lasting three or four hours, " the King alone," says Dean Montagu, who wrote an account of it to his mother a day or two after, " disputing with the Bishops so wisely, wittily and learnedly, with that pretty patience, as I think never man living heard the like." He also took the opportunity of propounding his panacea for England's standing political difficulty — the state of the Emerald Isle. " For Ireland the conclusion was (the King making a most lamentable description of the state thereof) that it should be reduced to civility, planted with schools and ministers, as many as could be gotten." So ended the first day's conference, from which it was pretty evident that the King and his advisers had resolved to JAMES I. HOLDS FORTH ON THEOLOGY. 1 73 make very few, if any, concessions ; and certainly none that would be substantial. In the meanwhile the representatives of the Puritans re- mained outside the door, "sitting on a form." On the following Monday, between eleven and twelve in the morning, the King summoned the four Puritan divines before him into the Privy Chamber, to hear them state their case. The Bishops, except those of London and Win- chester, did not attend on this occasion ; but the Deans and Doctors were admitted, as well as Patrick Galloway, some- time minister of Perth, who was allowed to be present as a spectator. When they were all assembled the King took his seat as on the day before, "the noble young Prince sitting by, upon a stool," and his Majesty delivered himself of " a short, but a pithy and sweet speech to the same pur- pose which the first day he made." He ended by saying " he was now ready to hear at large what they could object or say ; and so willed them to begin. Whereupon they four kneeling down. Dr. Reynolds the Foreman, after a short preamble gratulatory," proceeded to state four points on which they based their requests. We need not follow in detail the tedious theological wrangle that ensued — how, when the learned and dignified Puritan was calmly and respectfully, but firmly propound- ing his view, the intolerant Bishop of London, burning with all the intensity of religious hate, rudely interrupted him, and told him that they should be thankful to the King for his great clemency in permitting them to speak against the liturgy and discipline of the Church, as by law estab- lished, and upbraiding them "for appearing before his Majesty in Turkey gowns and not in your scholastic habits, according to the orders of the University " ; how the King, for whose especial edification this rancorous outburst of episcopal zeal was designed, felt bound, in his judicial character of Moderator, to reprove the Bishop for his "sudden interruption of Dr. Reynolds, whom you should have suffered to have taken his liberty, for there is no order, nor can there be effectual issue of disputation, if each party be not suffered, without chopping, to speak at large " ; and how, when Dr. Reynolds dealt with other matters of doctrine and worship, which were vital to the Puritan con- 174 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. science, but which naturally seemed, "both to the King and the Lords very idle and frivolous, occasion was taken in some by-talk to remember a certain description which Mr. Butler of Cambridge made of a Puritan, viz., A Puritan is a Protestant frayed out of his wits." In such a fire of interruption and audibly whispered sneers had the Puritan divine to lay his case before the Head of the Church of England ! In the discussion that followed a great many topics were touched upon, among them the translation of the Scriptures ; and it is interesting to note that it was a sug- gestion of the spokesman of the Puritan sect which led to the compilation of the famous English authorized version of the Bible. " May your Majesty be pleased," asked Dr. Reynolds, "that the Bible be new translated, such trans- lations as are extant not answering the original?" But here the Bishop of London broke in again : " If every man's humour might be followed there would be no end of translating." Fortunately, however, James's instincts as a scholar made him look on this matter in a more liberal spirit. " I profess," said he, " I could never see a Bible well translated in English ; but I think that of all, that of Geneva is the worst. I wish some special pains were taken for a uniform translation; which should be done by the best learned in both universities, then reviewed by the bishops, presented to the Privy Council, lastly ratified by royal authority to be read in the whole church, and no other." " But it is fit that no marginal notes should be added thereto," interjected the irrepressible Bishop of London ; on which his Majesty observed, " That caveat is well put in, for in the Geneva translation some notes are partial, untrue, seditious, and savouring of traitorous conceits; as when from Exodus i. 19 disobedience to kings is allowed in a marginal note." Shordy afterwards " the King arose from his chair, and withdrew himself into his inner chamber a little space. In the meantime a great questioning was among the Lords about that place of Ecclesiasticus xlviii. 10, with which, as if it had been rest and upshot, they began afresh, at his Majesty's return ; who, seeing them so to urge it, and stand upon it, calling for a Bible, first shewed the author of that JAMES I. BROWBEATS THE PURITAN DIVINES. 175 book who he was ; then the cause why he wrote it ; next analysed the chapter itself, shewing the precedents and con- sequents thereof; lastly, so exactly and divine-like unfolded the sum of that place, arguing and demonstrating so that the stisurrus at the first mention, was not so great as the astonishment was now at the King's sudden and sound and indeed so admirable interpretation." Another point dis- cussed was the objection against interrogatories in baptism ; which, being a profound point, was put upon Mr. Knew- stubs to pursue, " who in a long perplexed speech," accord- ing to the Episcopalian Barlow, "said something out of Austin ! " But by this time the King's humour for listening to Puritan arguments was getting exhausted, and he de- clared he did not understand what Knewstubs was driving at, and asked the Lords arid Deans if they could either, who of course deferentially declared that they were even more puzzled than his Majesty. And when the divine proceeded to take exception to the cross in baptism, on the ground that "the weak brethren were offended at it," James could stand it no longer, and asked him sharply : " How long will such brethren remain weak ? Are not forty-five years suf- ficient for them to grow strong in ? and who are they that pretend this weakness 'i We require not subscriptions of laics and idiots^ but of preachers and ministers, who are not still, I trow, to be fed with miik, being enabled to feed others. Some of them are strong enough, if not head-strong. And howsoever they in this case pretend weakness, yet some, in whose behalf you now speak, think themselves able to teach me, and all the bishops of the land ! " No wonder, when the modest Puritan divine found his temperately pre- ferred arguments met with royal browbeating of this sort, that he became confused and abashed ; a demeanour which was at once complacently taken by the King, and flatteringly declared by his courtiers, to be conclusive evidence how acute and overwhelming was his Majesty's reasoning, and how impotent were the wretched precisian's arguments, when opposed to the theology of the British Solomon ! A similar reception was accorded to Mr. Knewstubs' elaborate argument on the power of the Church to add the use of the cross in baptism, with regard to which he said " the greatest scruple is, how far the ordinance of the Church 176 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. bindeth, without impeaching Christian liberty" — on which James burst out, " I will not argue that point with you, but answer therein, as Kings are wont to speak in Parliament, Le Roy s'avisera;" adding, "It smelleth very rankly of Anabaptism, and is Uke the usage of a beardless boy (one Mr. John Black), who, the last conference I had with the ministers of Scotland, told me, 'That he would hold con- formity with me for matters of doctrine ; but for matters of ceremony, they were to be left in Christian liberty to every man, as he received more and more light from the illumi- nation of God's spirit — even till they go mad with their own light. But I will none of that ; I will have one doctrine, and one discipline, one religion in substance and ceremony ; and there I charge you never to speak more to that point (how far you are bound to obey) when the Church hath ordained it. Have you anything else to say ? ' " In spite of this rather discouraging style of discussion, Dr. Reynolds, after objecting to the use of the surplice, took exception to the words in the marriage service, " With my body I thee worship." To this, however, James answered that it was a usual English term, as "a gentleman of worship," etc., and the sense agreeable to the Scriptures — " Giving honour to the wife." Then turning to the doctor, who happened to be an unmarried man, he laughed and jeered at him, saying, " Many a man speaks of Robin Hood, who never shot in his bow. li you had a good wife yourself, you would think all the honour and worship you could give her were well bestowed ! " So far James had listened with some show of tolerance ; but when the Puritan divine had the audacity to proceed to express a desire that the clergy should have meetings every three weeks for prophecyings, " His Majesty," says the Bishop, " was much stirred, yet, which is admirable in him, without passion or shew thereof, exclaimed, ' If you aim at a Scottish presbytery, it agreeth as well with monarchy as God and the Devil. Then Jack and Tom and Will and Dick shall meet, and at their pleasures censure me and my Council and all our proceedings. Then Will shall stand up, and say, " It must be thus." Then Dick shall reply, and say, "Nay, marry, but we will have it thus." And, therefore, here I must once more reiterate my former speech, Le Roy "NO BISHOP, NO KING." I77 s^avhera. Stay, I pray you, for seven years, before you demand that of me ; and if you find me pursy andfat^ and my windpipes stuffed, I will, perhaps, hearken to you. For let that government be once up, I am sure I shall be kept in breath ; then shall we all of us have work enough — both our hands full. But, Dr. Reynolds, till you find that I grow lazy, let that alone. ... No Bishop, no King ! ' " And then, for it was already night, asking Reynolds abruptly if he had any more to object, and the doctor meekly saying "No," he appointed the following Wednesday for both parties to meet him. Then, " rising from his chair, as he was going to his inner chamber, 'If this be all,' quoth he, 'they have to say, I will make them conform themselves, or I will harry them out of this land, or else do worse.'" Such is the toned-down official account by Dr. Barlow, who was present reporting, of the second day's proceedings, " which," he adds, " raised such an admiration in the Lords, in respect of the King's singular readiness and exact know- ledge, that one of them said he was fully persuaded his Majesty spake by the instinct of the spirit of God. My Lord Cecil acknowledged that ' very much we are bound to God, who had given us a King of an understanding heart.' My Lord Chancellor, passing out of the Privy Chamber, said unto the Dean of Chester, standing by the door, ' I have often heard and read that Rex est mixta persona cum sacerdote ; but I never saw the truth thereof till this day.' Surely," adds Barlow, on his own account, " whoever heard his Majesty might justly think that title did more perfectly fit him, which Eunapius gave to that famous rhetorician in saying that he was 'a living library and a walking study.'" A rather different version, however, of what passed is given by another eye-witness, Sir John Harrington, in a letter to his wife, written in the evening of the day on which these proceedings had taken place : " The King talked much Latin, and disputed with Dr. Reynolds ; but he rather used upbraidings than arguments ; and told them they wanted to strip Christ again, and bid them aivay with their S7iivelling. Moreover he wished those who would take away the surplice, might want linen for their own breech I The Bishops seemed much pleased, and said his Majesty N 178 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. spoke by the power of inspiration. I wist not what they mean ; but the spirit was rather foul-mouthed." On Wednesday, January i8th, the third sitting of the Conference was held, and was attended by all the Privy Councillors, and all the Bishops and Deans. The principal matter of debate on this occasion was the Court of High Commission and the oath ex officio^ on which account the Knights and Doctors of the Arches were also summoned ; but the Puritans, the other party to the suit as it were, who were the most interested in the matters debated, were not admitted until the close of the sitting. After the King had propounded these matters for discussion in a brief speech, one of the Lords, with seeming audacity, ventured to characterize the proceeding of that court as "like unto the Spanish In- quisition, and that by the oath ex officio they were forced to accuse themselves." This remark was probably made by arrangement, in order to give King James an opportunity of defending both institutions, which he did in an elaborate and carefully prepared impromptu speech, " so soundly and in such compendious but absolute order," according to the official report, " that all the Lords and the rest of the present auditors stood amazed at it." The Archbishop of Canterbury did not hesitate to declare that " undoubtedly his Majesty spake by the special assist- ance of God's spirit " ; while the Bishop of London, not to be outdone by any fellow ecclesiastic in fulsome flattery, \hrew himself upon his knees, protesting before the whole company that "his heart melted within him (as so, he doubted not, did the hearts of the whole company) with joy, and made haste to acknowledge unto Almighty God the singular mercy we have received at his hands, in giving us such a king, as since Christ's time the like had not been ! " " Whereunto," continues the report, " the Lords, with one voice, did yield a very affectionate acclamation " ; and the Doctors of the Civil Law " confessed that they could not, in many hours' warning have so judicially, plainly, and accu- rately and in such a brief, described it." All this, of course, gratified the royal pedant immensely ; and he then proceeded to commit " some weighty matters for them to be consulted of," the last of which was " for the sending and appointing of preachers into Ireland, * whereof,' FULSOME FLATTERY OF THE BISHOPS. 1 79 saith his Majesty, 'I am but half a king, being lord over their bodies ; but their souls seduced by Popery ! ' " At this stage, when everything had been practically con- cluded and decided on, Dr. Reynolds and his fellow Non- conformist divines were called in, and told what had been determined on ; and, after some desultory "consultation, " his Majesty made a gracious conclusion, which was so piercing," says Barlow, " that it fetched tears from some on both sides. My Lord of London ended all, in the name of the whole company, with a thanksgiving unto God for his Majesty, and a prayer for the health and prosperity of his Highness, our gracious Queen, the young Prince, and all the Royal issue. His Majesty then rose, and retired to the Inner Chamber; and all the Lords then went to the Council Chamber, to appoint Commissioners for the several matters before referred." Thus ended the famous Hampton Court Conference, so momentous in its results, which convinced the Puritans that they had nothing to hope for from King James, and which showed him that they were not to be won over by minor concessions in matters of detail. Henceforth the two parties stood out opposite each other in an attitude of uncom- promising hostiUty, which was to develop later on into the death-struggle of the Great Rebellion. Had James been more anxious to conciliate the Dissenters than to display his own learning, mutual concessions might have been arrived at, which would have doubled the power of the Church of England, fixed his throne on an unshakable basis, and saved his son's head. Fortunately, perhaps, for the cause of civil and religious liberty, no such strengthening of the forces of absolutism and ecclesiasticism resulted from the Conference, and the Puritans were left free and unfettered to work out, in their own rough and somewhat uncouth way, the political and religious emancipation of England. The direct effects of the Conference were, in fact, but trivial and insignificant, and have been summed up in the pithy sentence, "that the King went above himself; that the Bishop of London ap- peared even with himself; and that Dr. Reynolds fell beneath himself." The Puritans, as is usual with discomfited disputants, l80 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. blamed their representatives, who, they declared, were not of their nomination or choosing, which was probably true enough ; and, besides, complained, with more justice, that the points in controversy, instead of being discussed, had been privately determined on between the King and the Bishops, and then nakedly propounded for acceptance, so that the Puritans had only been brought forward to be made a spectacle to their enemies, to be browbeaten and threatened, and borne down by dictates of royal authority. Indeed, we cannot but wonder at the hardihood of the four dissenting divines, in accepting so unequal a contest, with the King as moderator, who was himself the most bitter and violent partisan of all. Needless to say that they equally objected to the garbled account of the proceedings, which was put forth by the Court party, and which — partial as it proves the conduct of the royal moderator to have been, and insulting and humiliating as it shows his treatment of the Puritans to have been — yet throws a careful veil over the less creditable incidents and the grosser expressions of the King. The whole conference was probably determined on by James with no other object than of gratifying his pedantic vanity, and exhibiting himself in the character of a learned and subtle disputant. Of his own estimate of his achieve- ments at Hampton Court we get a glimpse from a letter he wrote, a day or two after its close, to a friend of his in Scot- land. "We have kept," says he, "such a revel with the Puritans here this two days, as was never heard the like : quhaire / have peppered ihaime as soundlie as yee have done the Papists thaire. It were no reason, that those that will refuse an airy sign of the cross after baptism should have their purses stuffed with any more soHd and substantial crosses. They fled me so from argument to argument, without ever answering me directly, ut est eonim moris^ as I was forced at last to say unto thaime, that if any of thaime had been in a college disputing with thair scholars, if any of their disciples had answered thaime in that sort, they would have fetched him up in place of a reply; and so should the rod have plyed upon the poor boycs t I have such a book of thaires as may well convert infidels, but it shall never convert me, except by turning ne more earnestly against thayme." THE PRINCE OF WALES'S SPORTS. l8l CHAPTER XIII. JAMES I.'S AMUSEMENTS. Early in February, 1604, the Court left this palace for Royston, and soon after Henry, Prince of Wales, came down to reside at Hampton Court with some of his household and attendants. Here, for the following eight or nine months, he devoted himself to his studies and artistic pursuits, and to the athletic exercises in which he so much delighted and excelled. Of horses and all belonging to them he was particularly fond, and, though preferring hunting for the pleasure he took in galloping rather than for the sport, he often went out stag-hunting in the parks, and was an unerring shot with the bow. He also spent much of his time in toss- ing the pike, leaping, shooting at the butts throwing the bar, vaulting and playing at bowls and tennis, for all which sports there was every convenience and facility at Hampton Court. Of his skill at tennis there is frequent mention, and it may have been here that his companion Essex, one day when they were playing at tennis together, threatened to strike him across the head with his racket for calling him "the son of a traitor." The Prince remained at this palace throughout the sum- mer, and was still here when the King and Queen came back in the autumn, the period of the year at which, from this time forth, the King was accustomed to come and reside here. So uniform, in fact, was he in his movements, as well as in his diet, that Weldon remarks that " the best observ- ing courtier of our time was wont to say, were he asleep seven years, and then awakened, he would tell where the King every day had been, and every dish he had at his table." The King was again at the palace at the end of Septem- ber, 1605, when, on Michaelmas Day, Bancroft, Archbishop of Canterbury, was sworn a Privy Councillor; and he re- mained here through October, until just before the meeting 1 82 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. of Parliament and the discovery of the Gunpowder Plot; returning again in December, during the trial of the con- spirators. He was often at this palace, also, in the February following, for a few days in the middle of the week, probably to have some sport in the parks. In the summer of 1606 Hampton Court was honoured by a visit from the Queen's brother. King Christian IV. of Denmark, who was over in England spending a short time with his relations. He was accompanied by a bodyguard of a hundred men dressed in blue velvet and silver, with twelve trumpeters and twelve pages. He and his suite left Greenwich on August 6th, accompanied by his sister and brother-in-law, to inspect their Majesties' palaces in the neighbourhood of London and to hunt in the parks. Having gone first to Richmond, where they hunted and slept the night, they came over the next day and "dyned at Hamp- ton Court, and there hunted and killed deare, with great pleasures ; and surely the King of Denmark was very much delighted with the gallantnesse of these Royall Pallaces of his Majestic, as did appeare by his earnest noting of them, and often recounting of their pastimes and pleasures." Of King Christian's personal appearance we may judge from his portrait by Vansomer, in the King's Second Pre- sence Chamber at Hampton Court, which was painted about this time, and which shows him to have been a tall, fine-looking man. With it may be compared the descrip- tion of him, given by an eyes-witness, who tells us that he was " of goodly person, of stature in no extremes; in face so like his sister that he who hath seen the one may paint in his fancy the other." He resembled his sister also in his love of pleasure and gay entertainments, and was, indeed, a thoroughly jolly good fellow, boisterous and good-tempered, and delighted at having a really rollicking time while over in England with his sister and brother-in-law, who, on their part, made his visit an excuse for a regular "fling," with tilting matches, running at the ring, tennis, hunting, shooting, sports, masques, banquets, and carousals of all kinds. " We had women and wine too," writes Sir John Harrington from Court, "of such plenty, as would have astonished each beholder. Our feasts were magnificent, and the two royal THE ROYAL DANE KEEPS WASSAIL. 1 83 guests did most lovingly embrace each other at the table. I think the Dane hath strangely wrought on our good Eng- lish nobles ; for those whom I could never get to taste good English liquor, now follow the fashion and wallow in beastly delights. The ladies abandon their sobriety, and are seen to roll about in intoxication. I have passed much time," continues he, "in seeing the royal sports of hunting and hawking, where the manners were such as made me devise the beasts were pursuing the sober creation, and not man in quest of exercise and food." At Hampton Court, however, King Christian did not make a prolonged stay, apparently remaining only one night to witness the performance of a play, doubtless in the Great Hall of the palace, presented by the King's company of actors. Shakespeare, as we have seen, was at this time a prominent member of the company ; and it is highly probable that he was present (if not indeed himself on the boards) when his fellow actors were performing, perhaps, one of his own plays before the royal Dane. It may have been some knowledge of the King's convivial habits that suggested the lines in " Hamlet " : •* The King doth wake to-night, and takes his rouse, Keeps wassail, and the swaggering up-spring reels ; And, as he drains his draughts of Rhenish down, The kettle-drum and trumpet thus bray out The triumph of his pledge. " After the King of Denmark's departure from England, about a week subsequent to his visit to this palace. King James came down here for a short stay, returning again in September. This was a time when that royal pedant, ever delighting in " the rattle of the dry bones of theology," was desirous of discussing some arrangement to be made with the Pres- byterian Church of Scotland. To this end he had sent for several representative Presbyterian ministers from beyond the Tweed, to come and confer with him at Hampton Court, doubtless anticipating with complacency a repetition of the theological wrangles in which he had engaged with the Puri- tans, and looking forward with delight to another opportunity of displaying his learning to a crowd of ecclesiastical syco- phants. The Presbyterians were accordingly summoned to 1 84 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. attend at Hampton Court on September 20th; and four eminent English divines were selected to preach in turn be- fore his Majesty and them. We can imagine the disgust and vexation of the Scotch " meenisterrs" at having to listen in silence, with patience, and without protest, to the lengthy, tedious, argumentative dis- courses of the Court preachers, in favour of episcopacy, on the duty of passive obedience, and the divine origin of arbi- trary power; while the pedantic King James sat narrowly eyeing them, and noting the effect on them of each text and each argument propounded. Dr. Barlow, whom we have spoken of as reporting the proceedings of the Hampton Court Conference of 1604, and who was now Bishop of Lincoln, led off on the 21st of Sep- tember with a sermon on " the antiquity and superiority of Bishops." The next day the King gave the Scotch ministers a private audience, when he enforced Barlow's sermon with arguments from his own theological armoury, and submitted several questions to them bearing on this topic — for instance, as to its being within the King's exclusive province to con- voke and prorogue ecclesiastical assemblies. The King, however, did not succeed, even by the most persistent and rigorous cross-examination, in extracting any but very in- direct and evasive replies from the cautious and canny Scots. " I see," he said at last, " that you are all set for maintaining that base conventicle of Aberdeen. . . . But you will not, I trust, call my authority in question, and subject the determination of the same to your assemblies ? " This, they said, was far from their thoughts ; but if his Majesty should be pleased to set down in writing what he required, they should labour to give him satisfaction. On the 23rd Dr. Buckeridge followed with a sermon on tlie words of a text, "Wherefore ye must needs be subject, not only for wrath, but also for conscience sake " (Rom. xiii. 5) ; " in canvassing whereof," says Archdeacon Spotswood, who was present, "he fell upon the point of the King's supremacy in causes ecclesiastical, which he handled both soundly and learnedly to the satisfaction of all the hearers ; only it grieved the Scotch ministers to hear the Pope and Presbytery so often equalled in their opposition to sovereign princes." PASSIVE OBEDIENCE THE FIRST DUTY. 1 85 With great wealth of illustration, and a vast amplitude of quotations of texts, citations, and authorities, the erudite and courtly divine clearly established, for the gratification of his pedantic royal master and the edification of the Scotch presbyters, that "kings and emperors, as they have their calling from God, so they admit no superior on earth but God, to whom only they must make account." He warned his hearers, also, that God is more quick to revenge the wrongs and treasons committed against his Lieutenants and Viceroys, than the greatest sins against himself, and im- pressed upon them that the supreme duty of all subjects was to render passive obedience to royal authority. " If he be a good prince, causa est^ He is the cause of thy good, temporal and eternal ; if an evil Prince, occasio est, He is an occasion of thy eternal good, by thy temporal evil. Si bonus, nutntor est tuus ; si nialus tentator tuus est^^ and so on, through an interminable mass of quotations, until the sermon is almost as much in Latin as in English. " If he be a good king he is thy nurse ; receive thy nourish- ment with obedience ; if he be an evil prince he is thy tempter, receive thy trial with patience ; so there 's no resist- ance ; either thou must obey good princes willingly, or en- dure evill tyrants patiently." The learned thologian went on : " The process of this conscience is by way of syllogism \ the proposition is framed by the synderesis of the soule," and so on. It must have been indeed a trial to listen with patience to such intolerable rubbish ! This, however, was precisely the sort of thing in which the King delighted, and we are not surprised to find that it was shortly after published by royal command, with copious marginal notes, references, and elucidations. This course (that of sending for the Presbyterian ministers to be preached and prated at) " the King took," observes Spotswood, "as conceiving that some of the ministers should be moved by power of reason to quit their opinions and give place to the truth ; but," as he justly adds, " that seldom happeneth when the mind is prepossessed with prejudice either against person or matter. And in effect they returned to Scotland of the same opinion still, no good end having been served by their visit." Another idea concerning the functions of the kingly office 1 86 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. with which James I. was strongly imbued, was the one that it was essential to his royal dignity to maintain the noble sport of stag-hunting ; and even to revive something of the stringency of the earlier game laws, which made indulgence in any field sports the exclusive privilege of the crown and the aristocracy. That James was really a genuine sportsman, or that he was adapted in physical constitution to the endurance of the dangers or the fatigues of the chase, we need not at all suppose. Still, he was sufficiently keen to be " earnest, without any intermission or respect of weather, be it hot or cold, dry or moist, to go to hunting or hawking." And to this sport he thought everything should give way. Once, when Lord Salisbury came to him, and, in the name of his Council, implored his Majesty on his knees to postpone a hunting party for a few days, until some important matters of business were disposed of, he fell into a great passion, crying out : "You will be the death of me, you had better send me back again to Scotland." Conduct of this sort did not add to his personal popularity, nor to that of his royal sports, and the writer of an anonymous letter threatened him that unless he thought more of the good government of his people instead of " for ever running after wild animals," his hounds would all be poisoned. But he paid no heed whatever to any remonstrances. On the contrary, he showed excessive annoyance, and frequently expressed great anger and vexation at the slight regard his subjects often seemed to him to have for his sylvan pleasures, and their want of due consideration for his ex- clusive prerogative in game. His feelings at last found vent in a " Proclamation against Hunters, Stealers and Killers of Deare, within any of the King's Majesties Forests, Chases or Parks, "which was "Given at our Honour of Hampton Court, the g^^ day of September Ano. Dmi. 1609." Its quaint phraseology is curiously illus- trative of the diffusive and conversational style in which State documents of those times were often worded. "We had hoped," begins his Majesty in a highly offended and reproach- ful tone, " seeing it is notorious to all our subjects how greatly we deHght in the exercise of Hunting, as well for our Recrea- tion, as for the necessary preservation of our heaUh, that no man, in whom was either reverence to our person, or fear of PROCLAMATION AGAINST VULGAR SPORTSMEN. 1 8/ our Lawes, would have offered us offence in these our sports ; considering especially," continues the royal pedant, who evidently drafted the document himself, in his lecturing way, " that the nature of all people is not onely in things of this qualitie but in matters of greater moment so far to con- form themselves to the affection and disposition of their Sovereign, as to affect that which they know to be liking to them and to respect it, and to avoyd the contrary : and we must acknowledge that we have found tJie gentlemen and persons of the better sofi (who know best what becometh their duetie) have restrained their owne humours, and formed themselves therein to give us contentment : yet falleth it out, notwithstanding, that neither the example of them, nor respect of the Lawes, nor duety to us, hath had power to reforme the corrupt natures and insolent dispositions of some of the baser sort, and some other of a disordered life." The scolding, domineering tone of this proclamation — so different from that in which Queen Elizabeth would have spoken, in similar circumstances — shows how little King James understood the English character ; while the touch of contempt for the poorer classes betrayed in the contrast drawn between the conduct of " gentlemen and persons of the better sort," and that of "the baser sort," is an instance of a want of sympathy with the mass of the people which goes far to account for his unpopularity. After commenting further on, for some paragraphs, with mingled sorrowful reproach and indignant rebuke on such " trespassing against reason," " insolent humour," and *' bar- barous uncivil disposition," he proceeds to threaten that un- less there is some amendment in his subjects' conduct, he will have to put into force the ancient forest laws in all their pHstine stringency. Another great cause of annoyance to King James in re- gard to his hunting, was the great number of people, who not only flocked to the royal meets to see the fun and stare at his Majesty, but who sometimes even ventured, without special permission, to join the sport and follow the hounds. This the King thought most highly reprehensible on the part of the populace ; and once, at the beginning of his reign, when his loyal subjects crowded from all sides to catch a sight of their new sovereign, he fell into so violent a passion that he 1 88 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. cursed everyone he met, and swore that if they would not let him follow the chase at his pleasure he would leave Eng- land. He subsequently issued another proclamation in special reprobation of this practice : " Forasmuch as we have often, since our first coming into England, expressed our high displeasure and offence at the hold and barbarous insolency of multitudes of vulgar people, who, pressing upon us in our sports as we are hunting, do ride over our dogs, brake their backs, spoil our game, run over and destroy the corn, and not without great annoyance and sometimes peril both of our own person and to our dearest son the prince, by their heedless riding and galop- ing " . . . " our will and pleasure is " that they should be presently apprehended and conveyed to the nearest gaol, there to remain during the royal pleasure. We cannot wonder after all this that James's selfish sport- ing proclivities should have given rise to much discontent. Osborne complains that " one man might with more safety have killed another, than a rascal-dear ; but if a stag had been known to have miscarried, and the authour fled, a proclama- tion, with a description of the party, had been presently penned by the Attorney-General, and the penalty of his Majesty's high displeasure (by which was understood the Star Chamber) threatened against all that did abet, comfort or relieve him — so tragical was this sylvan prince against dear-killers and indulgent to man-slayers." Weldon, also, another satirist of James and his Court, declared "that the King loved beasts better than men, and took more delight in them, and was more tender over the life of a stag than of a man." In spite, however, of his keenness for hunting, there was not much of the true sportsman about him, for he would perpetrate acts so unsportsmanlike, according to our modern notions, as to go into his park and take pot-shots from be- hind a tree at the tame deer as they browsed in the shade ; while his most desperate runs were usually confined within the fences of inclosed parks or woods. "The hunt," says the author of the Travels of John Ernest, Duke of Saxe-Weimar, who came to England in 1 613, and who was entertained by the King with a great hunt, and whose visit to Hampton Court we will notice JAMES I. OUT HUNTING, "TAKING THE ASSAY." I90 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. a little further on, " generally comes oif in this way : the huntsmen remain on the spot where the game is to be found, with twenty or thirty hounds; if the King fancies any in particular among the herd, he causes his pleasure to be signified to the huntsmen, who forthwith proceed to mark the place where the animal stood ; they then lead the hounds thither, which are taught to follow this one animal only, and accordingly away they run straight upon his track ; and even should there be forty or fifty deer to- gether, they do nothing to them, but chase only the one, and never give up till they have overtaken and brought it down. Meanwhile the King hurries incessantly after the hounds until they have caught the game. There is there- fore," adds the foreigner, " no particular enjoyment in this sport." On such occasions he went to the meet of the hounds dressed in a suit "green as the grass he trod on, with a feather in his cap, and a home instead of a sword by his side : how suitable to his age, calling, or person," remarks one of his censors, " I leave to others to judge from his pictures." This we are enabled to do from the accompany- ing print of his Majesty receiving from the huntsman the knife with which he is to " take the assay," that is, the first cut on the stag's breast, to discover how fat he is. This print is a facsimile of a woodcut in Turberville's " Noble Art of Venerie," published in 1611. So amply did the King stock the parks at Hampton Court with game, and so renowned did the place consequently become, that to have a day's hunting here was considered by all travellers visiting the palace to be " the thing to do," and foreigners of distinction, especially, liked to be able to boast that they had witnessed " le sport Anglais " in King James's famous preserves at Hampton Court. One of these travellers was the son of the Landgrave Maurice of Hesse, Prince Otto, of whose visit to England in the year 161 1, when he was aged only seventeen, there is in the library of Cassel a curious manuscript narrative, which contains a valu- able description of the palace. He mentions especially that in the King's porch on a tablet is the inscription : "Nihil pace commodius et sanctius ; tamen cum bella vitare non possumus, interdum suscipienda : sed pax servanda semper." "PEACE WITH HONOUR. I9I This Latin stanza in commendation of peace is very char- acteristic of King James, who, as the French Ambassador observed, " hated war from habit, principle and disposition, and would (to use his own words) avoid it like his own damnation. For he was born and bred up with a base and weak heart, and imagines (after the manner of princes who devote themselves to religion, the sciences, and sloth) that he can never be forced into a war against his will, by duty or conscience, or forcible and legitimate reasons." His reluctance to engage in any warlike enterprises, and especially his backwardness in intervening on behalf of the struggling Protestants on the continent, increased his un- popularity with the people, who could not but despise a king with no other foreign policy than the negative one of non- intervention. His satirist, Weldon, also severely blames him for preferring diplomatic to military methods, and declares that James would rather "spend ;£"ioo,ooo on embassies to keep or procure Peace with Dishonour, than ;^i 0,000 on an army that would have forced Peace with Honour;''^ — a sentence, by the way, which shows that a famous modern phrase had been coined several centuries earlier than is generally supposed. Prince Otto continues : " This Palace of Hampton Court has 700 rooms, as the Vice-Chamberlain, who led us round, informed us, among which are 80 splendid royal chambers, all decorated with beautiful gold tapestries, the like of which we have not seen, which tapestry was hung up in honour of his Highness the Landgrave Otto, besides other tapestry being underneath. The golden tapestry, which hangs in the Queen's and other apartments, and which Henry VHL bought, is said to have cost JP^<^o a yard, and to have been offered to many other potentates first, ... so Hampton Court now possesses them. The Palace has seven courts and two fine gardens, and fine parks." Another visitor to Hampton Court Palace about this time was Ernest, Duke of Saxe- Weimar, who records that " in all the state chambers stood a royal throne, a seat, and a canopy above, either of golden work or satin. In the rooms stood large beds, nine feet long and as many wide, adorned in the most costly fashion. In one room, which is called the * Paradise Room,' is to be seen a great treasure of gold 192 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. tapestry and royal robes, and a beautiful large unicorn's horn. All the apartments and galleries were laid with rush matting. The pleasure gardens, also, are very beautiful here as every- where, and laid out in the best manner." The Duke of Saxe-Weimar's account of his hunting ex- periences with James I. we have already noticed. This, however, recalls the fact that the Queen, who occasionally shared the King's sports and shot deer Uke him, mistook her mark one day at Theobalds, just before Saxe-Weimar's visit, and, instead of the stag, killed Jewel, "the King's most principal and special hound, at which he stormed exceed- ingly awhile ; but after he knew who did it, he was soon pacified, and with much kindness wished her not to be troubled with it, for he should love her never the worse, and the next day he sent her a diamond worth ;^2,ooo as a legacy from his dead dog." An interesting reminiscence of her sporting tastes still exists at Hampton Court in Vansomer's curious picture, dated 1617, of her Majesty as the "Huntress Queen," as Ben Jonson flatteringly calls her. She is standing by the side of a fat sorrel steed, with a cream-coloured mane, be- hind which is a negro groom in red, holding the bridle. In a leash she holds two small greyhounds, while another is jumping up to her; they wear little ornamental collars embroidered in gold, with the Queen's initials, A.R. In the background is seen the Palace of Oatlands. Her hunt- ing costume is somewhat fantastic, consisting of a dark green velvet skirt of cut velvet, with a bodice of the same material, very tight at the wrist and very low cut : the whole trimmed with lace and red ribbons. On her head she wears a conical hat of gray felt with a red plume. The whole composition recalls the lines of Dryden : " The graceful goddess was arrayed in green, About her feet were little beagles seen, Who watched with upward eyes the movements of their queen." Soon after this picture was painted, the Queen's state of health began to give rise to a good deal of anxiety at Court. She was suffering, in fact, from a complication apparently of gout, dropsy, and phthisis, and continued to grow worse during her residence in London all through the winter. In 193 the autumn of 1618, her health still declining, she removed, after a short stay at Oatlands, to the Palace of Hampton Court, where she was seized one night with such a bad attack of spitting of blood that she was nearly choked in her sleep, and her physicians had to be sent for in great haste. Ill as she was, however, she did not neglect her old trotege Sir Walter Raleigh, who was now under sentence of death, and about to perish on the scaffold, and who in his extremity addressed the following appeal to her in verse : *' Then unto whom shall I unfold my wrong, Cast down my tears, or hold up folded hands ? To her to whom remorse does not belong ; To her who is the first, and may alone Be justly termed the Empress of Briton ! Who should have mercy, if a Queen has none ? " She was probably not unmindful of the fact that in one of her former illnesses Raleigh had cured her with a medi- cine of his own preparation, called "Raleigh's Cordial," when her own physicians were at their wits' end to know what to do. Accordingly she wrote a supplicatory letter to Buckingham asking him to prevail on the King to pardon him. But her intervention on his behalf was of no avail, and on the 29th of October, 1618, "the gallantest worthie that England ever bred," was beheaded on Tower Hill. "The Empress of Briton," as Raleigh styles her, or "the Empress of the North," as she is entitled in an old print, seems at first to have derived some good from the air of Hampton Court, for a few days before this we read that " the Queen began to recover ; and her advisers were urgent that she should remain at this Palace, as it seemed to suit her so well." On Christmas Day she was able to hear a sermon from the Bishop of London, "in the chamber next Para- dise"; and a few days after she received a visit from Buckingham and Prince Charles, while the King came to see her twice a week. The rally, however, was but of short duration; and on the 22nd of February she began to grow rapidly worse, and the symptoms showed that her dissolution was now close at hand. One of her attendants, writing after her Majesty's death to some lady abroad, gives a detailed o 194 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. account of her last illness, which we will quote in its original quaintness of expression. "Whereas your Ladyship desires to be satisfied of the form of her Majesty's death it was thus. She was reasonably well recovered to the eyes of all that saw her, and came to her drawing-chamber and to her gallery every day almost ; yet still so weak of her legs, that she could not stand upon them, neither had she any stomach for her meat, the space of six weeks before she died." On Monday the ist of March, it was evident to those about her that her end was drawing nigh ; and the news being quickly known "all the Lords and Ladies almost about this town (London) went to Hampton Court, but very few were admitted." The Lord Privy Seal, however, and the Archbishop of Canterbury, and the Bishop of London, were allowed to enter her room, when they knelt by her bedside and addressed her, " Madame, we hope that as your Majesty's strength fails outwardly, your best part groweth strong." They then said a prayer which she followed word by word ; after which the Archbishop said, " Madame, we hope your Majesty doth not trust to your own merits, nor to the media- tions of saints, but only by the blood and merits of our Saviour Christ Jesus you shall be saved ? " They put these questions to her because they were aware of the current rumours that she had secretly embraced the Catholic faith. "I do," she answered, "and withal I renounce the media- tion of all saints, any my own merits, and do only rely upon my Saviour Christ, who has redeemed my fault with His blood." "This being said," continues the eye-witness whom we are quoting, " gave great satisfaction to the Bishops, and to the few that heard her. Then the Prince was brought in to her, and she made him welcome, and asked him how he did. He answered ' At her service,' and two or three ques- tions merrily. Then she bade him go home. 'No,' he says, * I will wait upon your Majesty.' She answered, ' I am a pretty piece to wait upon, servant ! ' (for she ever called him so.) She bade him go to his chamber, and she would send for him again; he went. . . . After supper the Prince was brought to her again, but did stay no time. The Lords were very desirous to have her make her will. She prayed them to let her alone till the morrow, and then she would. Still ANNE OF DENMARK'S DEATHBED. 1 95 her voice was strong, but all her body and feet cold. None durst go into her for fear to offend her. We stayed all in the chamber next to her bedchamber till she sent a command to us to go to bed, and would not suffer us to watch that night; only the physicians in the night came to her." "About twelve o'clock she calls for the wench (Danish Anna) that sat by her, and bids her fill some drink to wash her mouth. She brought her a glass of Rhenish wine that she drank out, and says to the woman, ' Now have I deceived the physicians.' Then she bids the woman sleep by her, and in seeing her sleep, she would sleep. But within a quarter of an hour after, she again called to the woman, and bids her bring some water to wash her eyes, and with the water she brought a candle, but she did not see the light, and asked the woman for a light. She answers, * There is one here, Madame ; do you not see it ? ' 'No,' says the Queen. Then the woman called in the physicians, and they gave her a cordial, and sent for the Prince, and for the Lords and Ladies. This was about one o'clock. She laid her hand upon the Prince's head, and gave him her blessing. The Lords presented a paper to her (her will), and she did sign it as she could, but her sight was gone, which was to leave all to the Prince, and withal her servants to be rewarded. Then the Bishop of London made a prayer, and we all sat about her bed and prayed. And when her speech was gone, the Bishop calls to her, ' Madame, make a sign that your Majesty is one with your God, and longs to be with Him.' She held up her hand, and when the one hand failed her, she held up the other, till they both failed. To the sight of all that looked on her, her heart, her eyes, her face, was fixed upon God, and her tongue, while she had breath, expressed so much; and when that failed, her hands. And when all failed, the Bishop made another prayer, and she lay so pleasantly in the bed smiling, as if she had no pain ; only, in the last, she gave five or six little groans, and had the pleasantest going out of this world that ever anybody had ; and two days after looked as well as she did at any time this two years." She breathed her last at about four o'clock in the morning, passing away, according to an ancient tradition long current 196 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. in the palace, just as the old clock struck the hour. It is added that ever since that time the clock has always stopped whenever a death of any old resident occurs in the palace. Those curious in such superstitions declare that several un- doubted cases of this coincidence have occurred within recent years. Before the Queen was laid out d^post mortem examination was held, and "upon her opening, she was found much wasted within, especially her liver, as it were quite con- sumed." The corpse was then embalmed, and on the 6th of March it was taken by water in a royal barge to Somerset House, where it lay in state till May 13th, when it was buried with much funeral pomp in Westminster Abbey. The accounts as to the Queen's making her will, and as to the amount of property she left, vary somewhat. By some it was stated that " she made none other than a nuncupatory will, or by word of mouth," and that it " was rather in answer- ing and saying ' yea ' to anything that was demanded of her, than in disposing of aught herself, so that it is doubted by some already how far it will stand good and firm, especially if it fall out that the movables amount to better than ;^4oo,ooo, as is generally reported, and her debts not ;^4o,ooo ! " The testimony of the eye-witness, who alleges that she did put her signature to the will, is probably the more trustworthy version of what occurred. But, indeed, whatever may have been the fact, it had but small influence on the result ; for the King paid no more heed than he chose to her wishes, and disposed of a large portion of her jewels and effects to Buckingham — bestowing on him in addition ;£'i,2oo in land, and the keeping of Somerset House. Prince Charles, however, was allowed to enjoy the grants or monopolies on cloths and sugar, which had been lately given to the deceased, and which were worth about ;£"i3,ooo a year. But the bulk of her personal estate, which was reckoned by one authority as worth as much as ;£8oo,ooo, was added to the property of the crown; her jewels and plate (valued at ;^4oo,ooo and ;^90,ooo respec- tively) being brought to the King's palace in four large carts. All this, together with the saving of nearly ;^9o,ooo a year for the expenses of her household and her jointure, caused the news of her demise, which King James received in the KING JAMES I. (From the portrait at Hampton Court, by Vansomer.) 198 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. midst of a round of amusements at Newmarket, to be much less of a blow to his Majesty than one might have supposed. In fact, he bore it with such exemplary fortitude and kingly equanimity, that he thought it only proper to show how bravely he was bearing up, by going to the races within three weeks of her death, even before the funeral had taken place ! He was ready enough, however, to seize the occasion to emphasize his favourite notions of the divine and sacred nature of royal personages, and their mystic kinship with the Deity. This he did in an epitaph, in which he claimed the comet, which had recently blazed in the sky, as a heavenly portent of the Queen's death : **Thee to invite the great God sent His star ; Whose friend and nearest kin good princes are ; Who, though they run their race of men, and die, Death serves but to refine their majesty. So did my Queen her Court from hence remove, And left this earth to be enthroned above ; She is changed, not dead, for sure no good prince dies, But, like the sun, sets only for to rise." Nevertheless, in deference to human custom, the divine King James thought it best to don mourning for a while, as if his wife's death was like that of any other mortal. To this period may, therefore, perhaps be referred Vansomer's portrait of him now in the Queen's Bedchamber at Hampton Court, in which he is dressed entirely in a "melancholy suit of solemn black." In his right hand he holds the "George" of the Order of the Garter; his left rests on the corner of a table, on which are the crown, sceptre, and orb ; while on the ground lie a breastplate and other armour. The picture, however, if it was painted at this time, can scarcely have been dry, when, just a month after his Queen's funeral, his mourning was discarded for " a suit of watchet satin, laid with blue and white feathers, insomuch," observes the satirical John Chamberlain, " that all the company was glad to see him so gallant, and more like a wooer thaii a mourner. But what decorum it will be, when ambassadors come to condole (as here is one from the Duke of Lorraine with two or three and twenty followers, all in black), let them consider whom it concerns ! " Vansomer's picture, whether painted at this time or not, PORTRAITS OF KING JAMES. I99 is, at any rate, interesting on account of the rarity of original portraits of this King ; who, according to Weldon, was always very reluctant to be painted. The caustic pen of the same author draws a description of his person, which may aptly be compared with his portrait in the State Rooms at Hampton Court : " He was of middle stature, more cor- pulent through his clothes than in his body, yet fat enough, his clothes ever being made large and easy, the doublets quilted for stiletto proof; his breeches in great pleats and full stuffed. He was naturally of a timorous disposition, which was the reason of his quilted doublets ; his eyes large, ever rolling after any stranger that came in his presence, insomuch, as many for shame have left the room, as being out of countenance. His beard was very thin ; his tongue too large for his mouth, which ever made him speak full in the mouth, and made him drink very uncomely, as if eating his dtink, which came out into the cup of each side of his mouth. His skin was soft as taffeta sarsenet, which felt so because he never washed his hands^ only rubbed his finger ends slightly with the wet end of a napkin." There is also at Hampton Court another picture of James I., likewise attributed to Vansomer, which represents the King in royal robes of crimson, lined with ermine, with the crown on his head, holding the sceptre in his right hand and the orb of empire in his left. He is standing in one of the rooms of the old palace of Whitehall, through a lattice window of which is seen Inigo Jones's Banqueting House. This fixes the date of the picture to be 1620; for the Banqueting House was begun in 16 19, and Vansomer died on January 5th, 1621. The mention of Inigo Jones reminds us that in 16 15 he had been appointed Surveyor of his Majesty's Works ; in which capacity the Palace of Hampton Court came more or less under his supervision. It happens also that it was in relation to the preparing of rooms here for the Spanish ambassador — the famous Count Gondomar — that he wrote one of the few letters which have been preserved from his pen. The granting of lodgings within the precincts of the royal palace to any ambassador was a privilege long resisted and refused by the King, in spite of persistent solicitations on their Excellencies' partj 200 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. and it was conceded to Gondomar on the occasion in question, only as a very exceptional and special favour, limited to the summer months of the current year, 1620, and granted to him then merely because James was desirous of winning his goodwill in favour of his cherished project of the Spanish match. Even so, the apartments allotted to him were not in the main building, but in one of the detached towers of the palace, a subtle distinction which greatly diminished his Excellency's gratification. The King's return to Hampton Court took place, as usual, in the autumn ; and in the month of January following, per- haps in order to allay any jealousy that might be aroused by the civilities shown to the Spanish ambassador at Hampton Court, the French ambassador was " nobly entertained with hawking and hunting " at the same place. After this we find nothing to record in the annals of the palace until September, 1623, when a certain Dr. Whiting incurred the severe displeasure of the King for some sermon he preached before his Majesty in the chapel in the palace. What was the nature of the remarks that gave such great offence we do not know, though we may suspect that it was either some inadequacy in the recognition of the doctrine of the divine right of kings, or some other of James's pet dogmas, or an attack on the Spanish match, which, on the score of religion, was naturally very distasteful to the clergy. At any rate, the preacher's delinquency was thought so grave, that it resulted in his being had up before the Council, who wrote that they " found him penitent and submissive ; yet his offence requiring exemplary justice, they had committed him ; although the happy return of the Prince makes this day more fit for grace and gladness." In effect, Dr. Whiting was very soon after liberated, though on condition of being inhibited from preaching. " The happy return of the Prince " was from his famous romantic expedition into Spain, whither he had gone with Buckingham, to sue in person for the hand of the Infanta. The " entente cordiale " was, however, of short duration ; and the match, very soon after the Prince's return, was entirely broken off; so that when, at the end of September, 1624, the Spanish agent, who was acting as charg^ d'affaires during the absence of the ambassador, came to Hampton CHARLES I. AND HIS WIFE. 201 Court, he was pointedly slighted and scarcely any notice taken of him. This is the last reference to Hampton Court which we find during the reign of James I. Instead of Charles's marriage with the Infanta, a match was negotiated with the daughter of the King of France. But before the preliminaries were finally settled, "the Wonder of the World," as James is styled in the dedication of the authorized version of the Bible, was no more. CHAPTER XIV. CHARLES I.'S QUARREL WITH HIS QUEEN. Charles I., in the earlier part of his reign, frequently visited Hampton Court, either for pleasure or to entertain distin- guished foreigners, or sometimes to avoid the danger of the plague, which was on several occasions raging in London, when all communication between that city and the palace was forbidden. On this latter account it was that he came to make his first stay here as king about the 6th of July, 1625, three months after his accession to the throne, and two or three weeks after his marriage. Accompanying him, of course, was his newly-married wife, then only fifteen years of age, Henrietta-Maria of France, daughter of Henri IV. and Marie de Medicis. She brought with her a large train of French followers and servants, con- sisting of a hundred and six persons, both men and women, and lay as well as clerical. At the head of the clergy, who numbered some thirty priests, was Daniel du Plessis, Bishop of Mende, the Queen's Grand Almoner, and Father Berulle, her confessor, while her lay attendants included two ambas- sadors — the Marquis d'Effiat and M. de la Ville-aux-Clercs — the Comte de Tillibres, her chamberlain, and many lords and ladies in waiting. Among her ladies was one deserving of special notice, namely, a certain Madame de Saint-Georges, who had been the Queen's companion and friend in her 202 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. childhood, and who, by the overweening and pernicious in- fluence she had acquired over the mind of the Queen, had aheady made much mischief between the newly-married pair. Charles, in fact, soon recognized in her one of those intrigu- ing, confidential female friends, who so often fasten them- selves on weak-minded women, and ruin the happiness of so many homes. He, therefore, quickly formed the determina- tion of banishing her from Court altogether on the first provocation ; and, in order to lose no time in marking his dislike to her, he declined, when starting for Hampton Court, to get into the large coach provided for himself, his wife, and her suite, that he might take instead a small one, where there was only room for two or three English Court ladies, but no seat for Madame de Saint-Georges. This slight offered to her friend so annoyed the Queen, that she could not refrain from showing her resentment, though she had the tact to use expressions more playful than offensive. Of this incident the Duke of Buckingham, if he was not a witness, was at any rate speedily informed by Charles, who made his favourite his confidant in everything, allowed him to interfere in his most private concerns, and made him the medium of communicating his wishes to his young wife. Accordingly, at once after their arrival at this palace, Buckingham sought an interview with the Queen to expos- tulate with her on her conduct towards Charles. As soon as he was ushered into her presence, he began in threatening lan- guage to tell her that the King, her husband, could no longer endure the way in which she lived with him ; that if she did not change her demeanour towards him, means would be found to make her do so, which would render her the most miserable woman in the world ; adding that as for himself, he understood well enough that he was in no great favour with her, but that he did not care a rap on that account, as he possessed the goodwill of his master, and that her illwill towards him would not benefit herself. This extraordinary outburst, by which Buckingham seems to have hoped to terrify the Queen, and to acquire an ascendency over her youthful mind, surprised her greatly ; but she answered calmly and prudently enough, that she was not aware of having given the King, her husband, any CHARLES I.'S DISAGREEMENT WITH HIS WIFE. 203 cause to be angry with her, nor would she ever ; and that, such being the case, she could not conceive that he should bear her any grudge ; that to him only she looked for her joy and happiness ; and that as to Buckingham, so far from wishing to be his enemy, she was anxious to treat him with all the consideration which was his due, if only he would behave towards her as he ought. Next day the Duke, as though oblivious of his conduct of the day before, or as if he imagined that his insults were acts of courtesy, came again to her and coolly begged her to accept his wife, his sister, and his niece as ladies of her bed- chamber. She replied that the late Queen of England had had but two ladies attending her in that capacity, and that she had brought three with her from France, with whom she was quite contented ; but that nevertheless she was willing to refer the matter to the French ambassadors. On receiv- ing this answer, Buckingham at once had recourse to them himself, and represented to them, as strongly as he could, how great might be the services he could render to the Queen and to France. They could not disregard the force of these considerations, and they were already arranging means whereby to satisfy him, when the Bishop of Mende over- ruling them made them consider seriously how hazardous it would be, for a young Queen like her, to put heretical women about her at her first coming into England, how scandalized all Catholics would be, both in England and abroad, and what the Pope would say. So convincing, indeed, did his arguments seem to them, that they put an end to the scheme, to the great annoyance of Buckingham, who, from that moment, conceived the most bitter hatred against him. After the Queen had stayed a short time at Hampton Court, she went with the King to Windsor Castle, on account of the increase of the plague, which had now extended to the neighbourhood of Hampton Court, though it did not break out within the precincts of the Royal Manor, an im- munity probably due to the admirable sanitary arrangements with which it had been endowed by Cardinal Wolsey. The King and Queen remained away from Hampton Court for about two months, during which time the bicker- ings between Charles and Buckingham on one side, and 204 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. Henrietta-Maria and Madame de Saint-Georges on the other, continued unabated. One of the chief sources of contention was the onerous nature of the stipulations in the marriage treaty for the free practice by the Queen and her attendants of the CathoHc reUgion, and the reluctance the King showed to observe them, on account of their exceeding unpopularity in England. Equally productive of trouble was the injudicious way in which the French ecclesiastics flaunted their exemption from the penal laws in the face of everyone. This was especially the case with the Queen's confessor. Father Berulle, who was always by her side, and whose aggressiveness led to more than one discreditable scene. One day when the King and Queen were dining together in public in the Presence Chamber, " Mr. Hacket (chaplain to the Lord Keeper Williams) being there to say grace, the confessor would have prevented him, but that Hacket shoved him away; whereupon the confessor went to the Queen's side, and was about to say grace again, but that the King, pulling the dishes unto him, and the carvers falling to the business, hindered. When dinner was done, the confessor thought, standing by the Queen, to have been before Mr. Hacket, but Mr. Hacket again got the start. The confessor, nevertheless, begins his grace as loud as Mr. Hacket, with such a confusion, that the King in great passion instantly rose from the table, and taking the Queen by the hand, retired into the bedchamber." Conduct of this sort he, of course, put down to the malign influence of Madame de Saint-Georges; and it made him more than ever resolved to rid himself of the whole crew, to which end he accordingly began to work immediately after his return to Hampton Court at the beginning of the month of November. At this time the plague was still raging violently not only in London, but also in the neighbourhood of Kingston ; and a proclamation was issued, prohibiting all communications between London, Southwark and Lambeth, and this palace. Following his Majesty hither was the French ambassador, the Marquis of Blainville, who was very anxious to be lodged in the palace during his attendance on the Court, and who tried every manoeuvre he could think of to efiect his purpose. CHARLES I. (From a rare old print in the British Museum.) 2o6 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. Sir John Finett, the Master of the Ceremonies, gives an amusing account of his efforts to this end. " I, finding," he says, "his ambition was to lodge in the King's house there, acquainted my Lord Chamberlain with it (who had already given orders for his Lodging at Kingston) and received from his Lordship answer, ' That his Majesty would never allow any ambassador to be lodged so near him.' Whereupon, letting the ambassador know (as dextrously as I could) what order had been already taken for his residence at Kingston ; his answer at first was 'What was his Majesty's pleasure should be his obedience ; ' but proceeding, asked, ' The plague having been (as I am told) so much and so lately in that town, may I not be lodged within the King's House at Hampton Court ? ' I replied, ' It had not been the custom for ambassadors to be so lodged.' ' Yet,' said he, ' the Duke de Chevereux had his lodging in the house at Richmond, and so had the Marquesse de Fyat.'" To this Finett did not reply, but sent a message to the King, who directed him to explain the exceptional circumstances of those cases, and that the King was absent from the palace when they were put up. In conclusion Finett declared that "neither his Majesty nor the King his father had ever lodged any am- bassador in their houses while they themselves lodged in them, and that his Majesty now would be loth to make a * precedent ' that would hereafter beget him so great a trouble as this was like to be, and that therefore his Majesty hoped that the ambassador would not take it in ill part if he did not in this correspond with his desires." There for a time the matter rested, but Blainville did not relax his efforts, and continued to supplicate and intrigue to get a footing in the palace, until at last, at the urgent soli- citation of the Queen, his request was granted, and he was allowed to reside in Hampton Court Palace. But even then he was not admitted into the main building ; the rooms assigned to him being "all those next the river, in the garden, which were sometime Lady Elizabeth's" — that is, Charles I.'s sister, the Queen of Bohemia — the building being the same "Water Gallery" in which Queen Elizabeth, when Princess, was lodged by her sister Queen Mary as a State prisoner. The presence of his Excellency in the palace, especially CHARLES COMPLAINS TO HIS MOTHER-IN-LAW. 20/ as it involved providing him and his suite with board at the expense of the King, was viewed with great disfavour by the officials at Court ; and in a letter to the Duke of Bucking- ham, written from Hampton Court about this time, Mr. Secretary Conway freely dilates on the expense and incon- venience thus occasioned. "The ambassador," writes he, " gives much trouble to the household here. He hath pro- cured from his Majesty a lodging in this house, and so his diet comes to be divided here for himself, and at Kingston for his company; so an increase of several new demands came in, for wood, and coals and twenty other things ; and so for Madame St.-Georges, the Bishop, and that train, which makes the white staves to scratch where it itcheth not. It must come to be examined by commissions ; if I am one, I will never give my consent to additions." This shows commendable zeal on the part of Mr. Secretary Conway for economy in the public expenditure, the necessity of which becomes apparent when we learn that the charges for the ambassador's household amounted in a month or two to over ;^2,ooo. Two days after the return of the Court to Hampton Court, the disagreement between Charles and his wife broke out in another direction, over the settlement of the Queen's house- hold, Henrietta maintaining that it was her prerogative, under the marriage treaty, to bestow the offices connected with the management and the collection of the revenues of her dowry, on her French followers. This, whatever may have been the correct interpretation of the treaty, was certainly an aggressive attitude for her to take up ; and Charles, in a letter which he wrote to the Queen-Mother of France, complained much of her undutiful conduct in this regard, attributing it to Madame de Saint-Georges, " who taking it in distaste because I would not let her ride with us in the coach (when there were many women of higher quality), claiming it as her due (which in England we think a strange thing), set my wife in such a humour against me, as from that very hour to this no man can say she has behaved two days together with the respect that I have deserved of her. As I take it, it was at her first coming to Hampton Court that I sent some of my council to her, with the regulations that were kept in the Court of the Queen my mother, and desired the Comte de Tilli^res 208 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. that the same might be kept. The answer of Queen Hen- rietta to this deputation was, * I hope I shall be suffered to order my own house as I list' Now if she had said," con- tinued the King, " that she would speak with me herself, not doubting to give me satisfaction, I would have found no fault in her, for whatsoever she had said I should have imputed it to her ignorance of business ; but I could not imagine her affronting me so by refusal publicly. After this answer, I took my time when I thought we had leisure to dispute it out by ourselves, to tell her both her fault in the publicity of such answer, and her mistakes ; but she gave me so ill an answer that I omit to repeat it. Likewise I have to complain of her neglect of the English tongue, and of the nation in general." In another letter, also addressed to her mother about this period, he renewed his complaints. " One night, after I was a-bed, my wife put a paper in my hand telling me 'It was a list of those she desired to be ofificers of her revenue.' I took it, and said that * I would read it next morning ; ' but, withal, I told her * that, by agreement in France, I had the naming of them.' She said, * There were both English and French in the note.' I replied, that 'Those EngUsh whom I thought fit to serve her, I would confirm ; but for the French it was impossible for them to serve her in that capacity.' She said, * All those in that paper had breviates from her mother and herself, and that she would admit no other.' Then I said, * It was neither in her mother's power, nor hers, to admit any without my leave ; and if she rehed on that, whomsoever she recommended should not come in.' Then she plainly bade me ' take my lands to myself, for since she had no power to put in whom she would into those places, she would have neither lands or houses of me ' ; but bade me * give her what I thought fit by way of pension.' I bade her remember to whom she spoke, and told her ' she ought not to use me so.' Then she fell into a passionate discourse, ' how she is miserable, in having no power to place servants ; and that business succeeded the worse for her recommenda- tion.' When I offered to answer, she would not so much as hear me, but went on lamenting, saying ' that she was not of such base quality as to be used so! ' But," continued Charles, " I both made her hear me, and end that discourse." CHARLES I. AND THE QUEEN'S FRENCH SUITE. 209 In all this affair Charles, in the opinion of De Tillieres, showed " une bassesse bien grande et une arrogance insup- portable " ; but in that of his courtiers he was only making a very necessary stand for his own dignity, and for the assertion of his proper authority, which they assured him would suffer irremediably unless he kept his wife in subjec- tion, as no one would think a man capable of governing a kingdom who was unable to govern his wife. In the meantime the Court continued at Hampton Court, and it was from this palace that Charles wrote to Bucking- ham, who was then in Holland on his way to France, to in- form him of his determination to send away the French suite on the first opportunity. In another of Charles's letters to the Duke, without date, but apparently belonging to this time, he says : " As for news, my wife begins to mend her manners ; I know not how long it will continue, for they say it is by advice, but the best of all is they say the Monsieurs desire to return home. I will not say this is certain, for you know nothing they say can be so." It was while affairs were in this posture that Buckingham returned to England, burning with indignation against the French, and more than ever determined to assist the King in his resolve of expelling them from the kingdom, whereby he would revenge himself for being denied access to France, and rid himself of the only influence likely to dispute his para- mount supremacy at Court. Accordingly he came down without delay to Hampton Court, and at once set to work inflaming Charles against them, and fomenting his disagreement with his wife. In the interviews he had with the Queen on Charles's account, he showed the most extraordinary presumption, telling her plainly that, unless she gave in to whatever he wished, he would do all he could to put them on bad terms with each other ; and actually having the audacity to remind her that " Queens of England had been beheaded before now ! " All this shows that the Queen, on her part, had much to bear, through the King's excessive partiality for Buckingham, in the license he allowed him in speaking to her, and from the way in which he made him the confidant of all his grievances against her. In this, in truth, she had quite as P 2IO A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. much ground of complaint as the King had in regard to Madame de Saint-Georges ; and we cannot but feel pity for her, when we remember that she was still a mere girl of six- teen years of age, in a foreign country, and among a people and in a Court alien in religion and language, and with only her own French attendants to whom she could look for any assistance or sympathy. That in these circumstances, she should sometimes have behaved injudiciously is not surprising, especially when we consider the difficult position in which her religion was con- tinually placing her. We have a striking instance of this in her refusal to be crowned with the King by the Archbishop of Canterbury, when that ceremony, which had been deferred on account of the plague, took place on February 2nd, 1626, about a month after the Court returned to London from Hampton Court. This act, though it did her credit as a conscientious Catholic, who could not, consistently with her religious pro- fessions, take part in what she regarded as an heretical rite, performed by men in revolt against the Church of God, was naturally a cause of deep offence to Charles and his people. Indeed, it was interpreted as an intentional slight offered to the religion of England, which was never forgiven, and which rankled particularly in the breasts of the bitter-hearted Puritans. After this, things went on from bad to worse, and at last they reached such a pass that Charles, after removing the French attendants from Court, finally expelled them from the kingdom altogether, bag and baggage. The letter to Buckingham, in which he gave the final order for their removal, is too remarkable not to be cited in full: "Steenie " I have receaved your letter by Die Greame. This is my answer. I command you to send all the French away by tomorrow out of the Towne. If you can, by faire meanes (but strike not long in disputing), otherways, force them away, dryving them away lyke so manie wylde beastes, until ye have shipped them, and so the Devill goe with them. Lett me heare no answer, but of the performance of my command. So I rest • • Your faithfull constant loving friend "Charles R, *• Oaking the 7 August 1626," CHARLES I. "IN A GREAT PASSION. 211 So peremptory a measure naturally excited the greatest commotion at the French Court ; for, however necessary it may have been politically, it was undoubtedly a flagrant violation of the treaty of marriage, and gave the French only too good reason to rail against "la facility des Anglais a tout promettre et leur effronterie a ne rien tenir." In fact, it would have at once led to a war between the two countries, had not Richelieu preferred diplomatic measures, and des- patched the Marshal de Bassompierre, an accomplished and able diplomatist, as a special envoy to try and arrange a com- promise. After a good deal of preliminary conferring between Bassompierre and Buckingham, and a formal reception of the French envoy by King Charles, he was again received by the King in a long audience in one of the galleries of the palace. His Majesty, according to his Excellency, "put himself into a great passion," complained of the intrigues and factions of the French — their malice in endeavouring to wean the Queen's affections from him, and their insolence in setting her against England, the language, and everything English. At last he got so angry as to exclaim to the ambassador, " Why do you not execute your commission at once, and declare war ? " To which Bassompierre answered firmly and with dignity, " I am not a herald to declare war, but a Marshal of France to make it when declared." In his account of the interview Bassom- pierre proceeds to say, "I witnessed there an instance of great boldness, not to say impudence, of the Duke of Buckingham, which was, that when he saw us the most warmed, he ran up suddenly and threw himself between the King and me, saying, ' I am come to keep the peace between you two.' Upon which I took off my hat, and as long as he stayed with us I would not put it on again, notwithstanding all the entreaties of the King and of himself to do so ; but when he went, I put it on without the King desiring me. When I had done, and that the Duke could speak to me, he asked me why I would not put on my hat while he was by, and that I did so so freely when he was gone. I answered that I had done it to do him honour, because he was not covered and that I should have been, which I could not suffer ; for which he was much pleased with me, and often mentioned it in my praise. But I had 212 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. also another reason for doing so, which was, that it was no longer an audience, but a private conversation, since he had interrupted us, by coming in, as a third, upon us. After my last audience was over, the King brought me through several galleries to the Queen's apartments, where he left me, and I her, after a long conversation, and I was brought back to London." The negotiations were continued after this for some time, but they resulted in no substantial concessions from Charles ; for it was impossible to shake his determination to be rid of the people who had worked so much mischief in his household and his home. CHAPTER XV. CHARLES I. AS KING AND CAPTIVE. From 1626 to 1630 no events of any importance took place at Hampton Court, though Charles was frequently here with his Court, often two or three times a year, and at all seasons. On these occasions the Duke of Buckingham, who was now at the summit of his influence, was of course always in attendance on the King ; and to this period belongs the curious picture of him and his family, painted in 1627 and attributed to Honthorst, which may be seen at Hampton Court, and of which we here insert an engraving. After the assassination of Buckingham, on August 23rd, 1628, until the beginning of the troubles of the Civil War, Charles paid only occasional visits to the palace. He was here, for instance, in November, 1630, when a play, founded *' upon a piece of Persian story," was, by the Queen's express desire, presented at Hampton Court; and again in the summer of the year 1636, when, on June 12th, Strafford kissed hands on his appointment as Lord Deputy of Ireland, and had a final and secret audience before starting for that country. ^■^- \&^ 214 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. The plague was again at this time very prevalent in London, and a proclamation was issued forbidding anybody from that town coming within ten miles of the palace, or plying by barge up and down the river, or bringing any goods or commodities to and fro. These prohibitions were, of course, often broken, and the blockade run by adventurous persons who saw their way to making a profit thereby ; and several persons were summoned for this offence before the Lords of the Privy Council, and severely punished. Great complaint was also made that " divers Londoners obtained houses near Hampton Court and Oatlands, and these in habit going daily to and from London, which cannot be without great peril to their Majesties," and the Justices were commanded to remove such persons from their houses, and to enjoin those who had settled there before neither to go ta London themselves, nor allow their servants to go there, on pain of being turned out, and having their houses shut up. The continuance of the plague kept the Court at Hampton Court all through the autumn and winter, until Christmas time ; but the fear of contagion did not prevent the players being summoned from London, and "commanded to as- semble their company, and keep themselves together near the Court, ready to give frequent performances in the Great Hall of the palace." The plays performed at Hampton Court on this occasion included, among a great many others, "The Moor of Venice " and " Hamlet " ; and it is interesting to note that we have here conclusive evidence that in the Great Hall of Hampton Court Shakespeare's plays were acted by his own contemporaries before Charles I. and his Couit. When Charles came to this palace on these occasions, we may presume that he sometimes dined in public in the Great Hall or some other of the State Rooms, as he did when in London. At any rate we have an interesting reminiscence of the custom in an old picture preserved at this palace, which was painted by Van Bassan for Charles, and is in- scribed with the date 1637. Though the architecture indi- cates that the chamber depicted was not one at Hampton Court, yet in other points the picture is sufficiently illustrative of similar scenes at this palace. The King and Queen are seated at the table side by side, with the little Prince n a D O < (U 2l6 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. (afterwards Charles II.) at the end of the table. They are being served by gentlemen-in-waiting. At the end of the room is a raised and recessed gallery or dais, where the public are looking on. About this period Charles gave orders for some improve- ments to be made in the gardens of Hampton Court, which were decorated with statues, both of the classical and Re- naissance periods; and he bestowed much care on the furnishing of the rooms, and their embellishment with pictures and other works of art and curiosities. It was in 1639 that he had his catalogue of pictures compiled by Vanderdoort, and in it there are three or four hundred pictures specified as being in this palace at that time — many of which, after having gone through various vicissitudes, are now still to be found here. Among these we would especially note the " Triumph of Julius Caesar," a splendid composition of nine pieces, Mantegna's greatest and richest work, which is still the glory of Hampton Court. It must have been about the same time that King Charles, who was fairly fond of sport, conceived the idea of making a great park for red as well as fallow deer between Hampton Court and Richmond, where he had a great deal of wooded land, affording excellent cover for game, and large wastes which, with the domains of the two palaces, would have formed a magnificent and extensive inclosure to serve him as an agreeable and convenient hunting-ground close to London. There were, however, some parishes that had rights of common on the wastes, and many farmers and gentlemen had houses intermingled with them, so that his Majesty experienced considerable difficulty in treating with them for the purchase of their interests. Altogether the scheme, which would have involved the inclosing of a tract of country ten miles round, was very unpopular, and he was strongly advised against it by Lord Cottington and other ministers, both on account of the great expense it would involve, and of the murmurs that were excited among the country people on all sides. The King, however, would not brook opposition to his wishes, and when Lord Cottington tried to dissuade him from it, he declared, " He was resolved to go through with it, and had already caused brick to be burned, and much of the wall to be built upon his own land." THE GRAND REMONSTRANCE. 217 But the building of the wall before people had consented to part with their lands or their common looked as if they were to be by degrees shut out of both, and increased the popular excitement and indignation. At last Archbishop Laud, who was always very anxious for the King to be on good terms with the people when none of his own "fads" were concerned, undertook to remonstrate with him. Eventually the King yielded to persuasion, and the project was aban- doned : the second royal attempt to create a "new forest" at Hampton Court being thus nullified like the first.^ After the year 1639 the excited state of political affairs left Charles but little leisure to amuse himself at Hampton Court. He was residing here, however, at the beginning of August, 1 640, when the plague breaking out, and two or three deaths occurring in the stables, the Court hastily left the palace. He was here again, also, after his return from Scotland on the 26th of November, 1641, to rest awhile from the toil and burden of business ; and he was still at this palace when the Grand Remonstrance, which set out in the most powerful language all the errors and misdeeds of his Government, was voted in the House of Commons. This document, which must have been especially mortifying to Charles, as directly appealing to public opinion against him, was presented to his Majesty himself on December ist at Hampton Court. " The King was much concerned at the harshness of it, but promised an answer as soon as the weight of business would permit, and desired there should be no publishing that de- claration till they had received his answer to it." To this request, however, they paid no attention ; but immediately blazoned it throughout the kingdom — a course Charles took as an act of great disrespect to himself. Three days after, perhaps to counteract, to some extent, its effect among the citizens of London, he sent for seven of the City aldermen to Hampton Court ; and in response to a petition they brought with them, that he should come up and reside in London, "whereby the trade of the City, which had been so much hindered by the King's long absence in Scotland, might be revived," he promised to leave Hampton ^ As to Henry VHI.'s inclosure of the Chase of Hampton Court, and its subsequent dechasing in the reign of Edward VL, see ante p. 103-4. 2l8 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. Court in a day or two, and come to Whitehall ; while, " to express his extraordinary love to the City," he made them all knights. By such actions does he seem to have thought, in his delusion, that he could stem the tide of disaffection among his subjects, an opinion which was certainly shared by the courtier-scribe who records the fact, and who exclaims, in a fervour of loyal enthusiasm, "What encouragement can subjects have more to love and obey a King than to have such favour and love shown by a King, for whose prosperous, happy and successive reign, it behoves us all to pray : else there is no question to be made, but that judgment will be showered down upon our heads by the Heavenly King, for not loving so good a heavenly King." Whether or not his subjects in general were equally im- pressed mattered little ; for all that went before was forgotten when, exactly two months after, on February 4th, 1642, Charles made his memorable attempt to arrest the Five Members in the House of Commons. Six days after, morti- fied by the failure of his design, and alarmed by the menac- ing demeanour of the Parliament and the tumult that was raging in London, he suddenly left Whitehall, with his wife and children and all his household, for Hampton Court. Here so little preparation had been made for their reception, that Charles and the Queen had to sleep in one room with their three eldest children. The results of this fatal step — which has been aptly com- pared to the flight of Louis XVI. from Paris to Varennes — are too well known to be dilated on here. It was, in fact, a throwing down the gage of battle, and the roar of " Privi- lege of Parliament" that rose from a hundred thousand throats as Charles drove through the streets, was the blast, as it were, that heralded the Great Rebellion. The tactical error of the step had equally far-reaching results : for by this first flight in a life ever afterwards so fugitive, Charles surrendered London without striking a blow, and thus left the Round- heads in triumphant possession of the Tower, the arsenals, and all the ofiices and departments of State. The shout of exultation that burst from the trained bands as they marched past the deserted Palace of Whitehall, brandishing the " Pro- testation " on their pikes, showed that they, at any rate, fully gauged the deep significance of the King's flight. OUTBREAK OF THE CIVIL WAR. 219 The King's adherents, on their part also, began to grow dimly conscious of the altered position of affairs, and Colonel Lunsford, who had escorted the King and Queen to Hampton Court, after seeing them safely lodged in the palace, went on with his band, two hundred strong, to Kingston, to take possession of a magazine of arms in that town. Here Lunsford and his men were visited next morning by Lord Digby, who drove over from the palace in a coach and six to thank them in the King's name for what they had done, and to urge them to set about collecting recruits. For doing this Lord Digby was soon after attainted of treason, for " levying war " ; while Lunsford was arrested by the Parlia- mentarians and lodged in the Tower. The King's stay at Hampton Court lasted but a few days, for on the 12th of January, overwhelmed with the shame and peril of his situation, he moved to Windsor Castle for greater security. Clarendon describes in pathetic words his "sad condition, as fallen in ten days from a height and greatness that his enemies feared, to such a lowness that his own servants durst hardly avow their waiting on him," He was back again here, however, just for one night, when conduct- ing the Queen from Windsor to Dover, on her departure from England at the end of February. After that Hampton Court saw him no more until five vears later, when he was brought by the Roundheads as a prisoner to his own palace. In the meanwhile, to the year 1645, ^^^ ^^^^ of the Civil War had rolled over the country without much affecting Hampton Court; though we may well imagine that the varying fortunes of the two contending factions must have been followed with intense interest by the inhabitants of the palace, who probably consisted of a few score of royal officials and servants. The principle, however, on which the Parlia- ment proceeded, of still recognizing the existence of the monarchy whilst taking up arms against the monarch, prob- ably secured them from any molestation as long as they took no active part in the struggle. But in 1645, ^ft^r the Battle of Naseby, which practically decided the fate of the Royalist cause, the Parliament took possession of the palace, setting seals on the doors of the State Apartments. In their intolerent Puritan zeal to sweep 220 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. away all surviving traces of what they held to be idolatrous worship, they laid a profane and sacrilegious hand on all the religious emblems and artistic decorations of the chapel. In a newspaper of the time we read the following paragraph : " Sir Robert Harlow gave order for the putting down and demolishing of the popish and superstitious pictures at Hampton Court, where this day the altar was taken down, and the table brought into the body of the church, the rails pulled down, and the steps levelled, and the popish pictures and superstitious images that were in the glass windows were also demolished, and order given for the new glazing them with plain glass ; and among the rest, there was pulled down the picture of Christ nailed to the cross, which was placed right over the altar, and the pictures of Mary Magdalen and others weeping by the foot of the cross, and some other such idolatrous pictures were pulled down and demolished. " The following year, 1646, saw Charles's flight from the besieged city of Oxford to Newark, where the Scotch were encamped, and where he surrendered himself into their hands — a confidence which they rewarded, not many months after, by selling him to the English Parliament, from whose control he was transferred to the custody of the army. By them he was treated with much more consideration and generosity than he had experienced at the hands of the Scotch or the Parliament, and after several removes was eventually installed, on August 24th, 1647, in his Palace of Hampton Court, which had been prepared for his reception, his goods and household servants having been transferred thither from Oxford after the surrender of that city. Here he remained for a period of some two months and a half, in a state of comparative ease and dignity, " rather as a guarded and attended prince than as a conquered and purchased captive." He dined in public in the Presence Chamber with the Same state and ceremony as formerly, and, when dinner was over, any gentleman who wished was admitted to kiss his hand. Among those who came was John Evelyn the diarist, who records under date October loth, 1647: "I came to Hampton Court, where I had the honour to kiss his Majesty's hand, he being in the power of those execrable villains, who not long after murdered him." The citizens also flocked from London in considerable numbers, as they had formerly done at the end of a Pro- CHARLES BROUGHT CAPTIVE TO THE PALACE. 221 gress, when the King had been some months absent from London. All his old servants, too, had free access to him, and many Cavaliers, who had done him active service in the Civil War, came to pay their respects, and were allowed to confer with him without reservation. Even his two most intimate and faithful followers, Mr. John Ashburnham and Sir John Berkeley, who had been voted delinquents by the Parliament, and who had fled beyond the seas, were per- mitted to return and to take up their abode within the palace, and to be constantly about the King's person. He had also the consolation of the administrations of his own divines of the Church of England, who "could administer spiritual comfort according to the rites of that Church." But what pleased him most was being allowed access to his children, who were then staying under the care of the Earl of Northumberland at Sion House, whither he was sometimes allowed to ride over to see them, and whence they occasionally came to stay at the palace with him. It must have been an affecting scene to behold the King, for- getting awhile the cares and troubles that beset him on all sides, amid the domestic joys which formed the one bright spot in his unfortunate career. He found relaxation also in hunting in the park, playing at tennis, and in similar recreations. Nevertheless, he was still so far under surveillance as to have the Parliamentary Commissioners always residing with him in the palace, as well as a guard of soldiers under Colonel Whalley, one of the officers of the Parliamentarian army, who was always in attendance on him, nominally for his protection only, but in reality more for his supervision, and with strict injunctions against his removal. At the same time the headquarters of the army were now at Putney, a place chosen for the purpose, as being at an equal distance from the Parliament in London, and the King at Hampton Court ; and from Putney came Cromwell and the other superior officers to pay their respects to King Charles. It was observed that "Fairfax kissed the royal hand; but Cromwell and his son-in-law, Ireton, though they did not come behind the general in phrases of loyalty, seemed to decline the ceremonial." 222 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. There can be little doubt, indeed, that the magnetic influence of royal smiles was beginning to work on the acrid austerity of the Roundhead soldiers. "The King," says Clarendon, " enjoyed himself at Hampton Court much more to his content than of late ; the respects of the chief officers of the army seeming much greater than they had been. Cromwell himself came oftener, and had long con- ferences with him ; talked with more openness than he had done, and appeared more cheerful." Charles had also the sagacity to try and win over Cromwell's wife, who was pre- sented to him by his own desire, Ashburnham taking her by the hand and leading her up to Charles, who received her very graciously, and afterwards entertained her, with the wives of Ireton and Whalley, at dinner. The exact nature of the negotiations that were all this time in progress between Charles and Cromwell have not been positively ascertained. Some have maintained that Cromwell was sincerely and disinterestedly endeavouring to compose the quarrel between the King and the Parliament ; while others have gone so far as to declare that Cromwell was prepared, if it should suit his personal aims to betray the popular cause, to undertake the restoration of the monarch to all his former prerogatives, on condition of receiving for himself the Earldom of Essex and a pension of ;^io,ooo a year. However this may be, it is certain that the question of an accommodation between Charles and the army was much discussed between them, and that the terms which the officers were ready to offer him were much more favourable than those of the Parliament. Had he but clearly understood his real position and frankly accepted their overtures, and could he only have brought himself to treat them with the same candour with which, it seems, they were dealing with him, there is no reason to suppose that an agreement might not have been come to, which would have led to his being once more firmly established on his throne, though of course with a much diminished prerogative. But while Charles was negotiating with Cromwell, he was, at the same time, dallying with the rival propositions of the Parliament, vainly imagining that by intrigue and kingcraft he could succeed in playing off one party against CROMWELL'S CONFERENCES WITH CHARLES L 223 the other, and act as arbiter between both, to his own ad- vantage. It would be beyond the scope of our narrative to detail the many ins and outs of the negotiations — the nine- VIEW OF THE NORTH OF THE PALACE IN TENNIS COURT LANE. teen propositions of the army, the counter propositions of the Parliament, the King's answers; and the suggestions, alterations, and modifications that transformed the posture of affairs from day to day. Suffice it to say that the rough, straightforward Round- 224 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. head soldiers found out at last that Charles was utterly un- trustworthy, and that while he was affecting to agree with them, he was in truth playing a double, if not a treble game — intriguing with the Scottish Commissioners for a concerted invasion of England by a numerous army in the spring, as well as bargaining with the Parliament. Accord- ingly they gave up in disgust all idea of an arrangement with him, and gradually ceased to come any longer to Hampton Court. They were probably led to take this course not a little also by the murmurs that were beginning to be heard against them in the army, especially among the new sect of Levellers, for their conciliatory dispositions towards " the man of sin, Charles Stuart," and their unholy bargaining with the children of Satan. An impeachment was even threatened against Cromwell. Nevertheless, an appearance of friendly feeling towards the King was still kept up by the heads of the army for some time after they had resolved to have no more to do with him. For this they have been accused, and perhaps not unjustly, of duplicity ; but as Ireton himself said, " He gave us words, and we paid him in his own coin, when we found he had no real intention to the people's good, but to prevail by our factions, to regain by art what he had lost by fight." With him, in fact, there was always some mental reservation that nullified the force of any compact which contained concessions to those who, in his eyes, were nothing else but rebels in arms against their anointed sovereign. The cast of his mind, in fact, as well as his methods, was distinctly feminine rather than manly, and it was a sort of character excessively obnoxious and irritating to the sturdy, robust. Roundhead soldiers. Meanwhile Charles continued the same mode of life at Hampton Court as heretofore, playing tennis, riding or walk- ing in the park, keeping up a voluminous correspondence with his wife in France, and giving audiences to visitors. Nevertheless, he seems to have begun, about this time, to have a presentiment that a crisis was impending in his affairs; and to his friends who came to him he bade a tender farewell, as though he were parting with them for a long time, if not for ever. AN IMPENDING CRISIS. 225 In the memoirs of Lady Fanshawe, wife of one of his most devoted adherents, there is a very touching account of her last interview with King Charles at this palace. " During the King's stay at Hampton Court," writes she, "my husband was with him, to whom he was pleased to talk much of his concerns. I went three times to pay my duty to him, both as I was the daughter of his servant and wife of his servant. The last time I ever saw him, when I took my leave, I could not refrain weeping ; when he had saluted me, I prayed God to preserve his Majesty with long life and happy years, he stroked me on the cheek, and said, * Child, if God pleaseth, it shall be so ; but both you and I must submit to God's will, and you know in what hands I am ; ' then turning to your father, he said, * Be sure, Dick, to tell my son all that I have said, and deliver those letters to my wife ; pray God bless her ! I hope I shall do well ; ' and taking him in his arms, said, * Thou hast ever been an honest man, and I hope God will bless thee and make thee a happy servant to my son.'" The tone of Charles's conversations with Sir Richard and Lady Fanshawe seems to indicate that he was beginning, as we have said, to have forebodings concerning the future, and, as no progress was made in the negotiations towards an accommodation with his enemies, he could not but grow uneasy as to his position. Nor could he be indifferent to the ominous rumours current, which were frequently carried to him, that he was in danger of assassination while he remained at Hampton Court, nor to the strong hints, amounting to warnings, which he received on several sides, that it would be wise for him to secure his own safety by flight. He had, however, given his word to his custodian, Colonel Whalley, that he would not make any attempt to escape without giving him notice and formally withdrawing his promise. Accordingly Charles felt bound in honour before taking any step in the matter, to notify to the colonel that he wished to be held discharged from his pledge. This he did, through Ashburnham, who sought an interview with Whalley, and told him that the King would no longer consider himself bound to his engagement. Whalley asked Q 226 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. him the reason, to which Ashburnham replied, " the multi- plicity of the Scots about the Court was such, and the agitators in the army so violently set against the King, as (for ought I knew) either party might as well take him from Hampton Court." This was immediately reported by Whalley at the head- quarters of the army ; and as a result, Ashburnham, who, it may be observed, had used very similar language to Crom- well, was next day dismissed from his post of attendant about the person of the King, and forbidden the precincts of the palace, while the guards about his Majesty were doubled. Nevertheless, no new restraints were put upon Charles's liberty, and his children were still allowed to visit him as before, the Princess Elizabeth coming to see him at the end of October, and being lodged in a chamber near the King's, opening on to the Long Gallery. Here were stationed two sentinels, who, according to the Princess, made such a noise at night that she could not sleep, so that Charles, perhaps with the hope that they might be removed, complained to Whalley about it. The Colonel, however, assured him that if the soldiers made any noise it was contrary to his express desire and command, and that he would " double his commands upon them, and give them as strict a charge as he could, not to disturb her Highness." This he did. Notwithstanding, a second com- plaint was made, when Whalley told the King that stricter commands he could not give, and that the soldiers assured him they came so gently through the gallery and made so little noise that they conceived it impossible for the Princess to hear them. However, " if his Majesty would be pleased to renew his engagement,'' he said, "he would place the sentinels at a more remote distance." This, however, Charles refused to do. " To renew my engagements were a point of honour. You had my engagement; I will not renew it ; keep your guards." CHARLES I. RESOLVES TO ESCAPE. 227 CHAPTER XVL CHARLES I.'S ESCAPE FROM HAMPTON COURT. After the events narrated in our last chapter, things went on at Hampton Court much as before, except that Charles, having now relieved himself from the obligation of his pledged word, immediately set about scheming how he should effect his escape. He sent Mr. Legge, who was now the only one of his old attendants still permitted to remain with him, to see and confer with Ashburnham, who lingered in the neighbourhood, and who himself afterwards entered into communications with Sir John Berkeley on the subject. The result of their discussions was that a meeting between them and the King was arranged to take place one evening in the Long Gallery, to which Ashburnham and Berkeley were to gain access secretly. In the meanwhile the rumours as to the peril he incurred in remaining at Hampton Court grew so persistent that all hesitation in Charles's mind as to the wisdom of the step he was about to take was dissipated ere the time for adopting a final resolution arrived. Indeed, on the morning of the very day when the meeting was to take place, he received an anonymous letter signed only with the initials E. R., warning him against a design formed by the agitators to take away his life. This was on the loth of November, on the afternoon of which day Berkeley and Ashburnham were let in through the back way by Colonel Legge, and ushered into the King's presence. Ashburnham, who was the chief spirit in the enterprise, began by assuring his Majesty that he was ready to obey him in everything, but still he "did most humbly beg of him that he would be pleased to say whether really and in very deed he was afraid of his life in that place, for his going from thence seemed to them an occasion of a very great change in his affairs." His Majesty "protested to God, 228 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. that he had great cause to apprehend some attempt upon his person, and did expect every hour when it should bee." Ashburnham replied that " it did not then become them to make any further inquiry, but to apply themselves to the discharge of their duties, and therefore if his Majesty would be pleased to say whither he would go, they would carry him thither, or lose themselves in the endeavour of it." The King then told them that "he had some thoughts of going out of the kingdom, but for the shortness of the time to pre- pare a vessel to transport him, and for the other reasons Ashburnham had sent him by Major Legge, he was resolved to go to the Isle of Wight." The details of the plan were then settled, and Ashburn- ham and Berkeley withdrew to prepare for their execution on the following day. Next morning being a Thursday, which was one of the days on which Charles wrote his letters abroad, he remained most of the day occupied in his own room. He granted an audience, however, to Colonel Whalley, who asked to see him in order to show him the following remarkable letter from Oliver Cromwell : *' For my beloved cousin Colonel Whalley, at Hampton Court, These. '* Putney, November, 1647. " Dear Cos. Whalley, "There are rumours abroad of some intended attempt on his Majesty's person. Therefore I pray have a care of your guards. If any such thing should be done, it would be accounted a most horrid act. . . . "Yours, "Oliver Cromwell." This letter is especially interesting as lending some colour to the accusations brought against Cromwell, that not only was he aware that the King was meditating an escape and took no steps to prevent it, but that he was even fostering it by retailing the alarming rumours current — if indeed he had not himself set them afloat for that very purpose, and was, in effect, treacherously working for this end in order to entrap and ruin him. After showing Cromwell's letter to Charles, Colonel Whalley withdrew, and the King was left alone and undis- THE OLD POND GARDEN, 230 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. turbed to write his letters, it being a mail day, until five or six o'clock. About that hour it was his custom to come out from his bed-chamber to go to evening prayers ; and half an hour after that to go to supper, when Colonel Whalley set guards about his bed-chamber, as his Majesty usually retired early. On the day in question, accordingly, Colonel Whalley came as usual at about five o'clock into the anteroom next to the King's bed-chamber, where he found the Parlia- mentary Commissioners and bed-chambermen assembled, waiting for his Majesty. What then ensued had best be told in Colonel Whalley's own words, extracted from his report to the House of Commons : " I asked them," he said, "for the King; they told me he was writing letters in his bed-chamber. I waited there without mistrust till six of the clock ; I then began to doubt, and told the bed-chamber- men, Mr. Maule and Mr. Murray, I wondered the King was so long a-writing ; they told me he had (they thought) some extraordinary occasion. Within half an hour after I went into the next room to Mr. Oudart, and told him I marvelled the King was so long a-writing. He answered, he wondered too, but withal said, the King told him he was to write letters both to the Queen and Princess of Orange, which gave me some satisfaction for the present. But my fears with the time increased, so that when it was seven of the clock, I again told Mr. Maule I exceedingly wondered the King was so long before he came out. He told me he was writing, and I replied, possibly he might be ill, therefore I thought he should do well to see, and to satisfy both myself and the House, that were in fear of him. He replied, the King had given him strict commands not to molest him, therefore durst not, besides he had bolted the door to him. I was then extreme restless in my thoughts, lookt oft in at the key-hole to see whether I could perceive his Majesty, but could not ; prest Mr. Maule to knock very oft, that I might know whether his Majesty were there or not, but all to no purpose. He still plainly told me he durst not disobey his Majesty's commands." While these discussions were going on outside the King's room, the decisive step had already been taken some time ; for as soon as the shades of the dark November evening THE KING'S FLIGHT FROM THE PALACE. 23 1 had fallen, King Charles left his chamber accompanied only by Colonel Legge, and, passing through the room called " Paradise," went by the private passage to the riverside. Here he was met by Berkeley and Ashburnham, and in their company probably crossed the river in a boat to the Surrey side, where they all took horse, and proceeded in the direction of Oatlands, and thence towards Southamp- ton. In the meanwhile, Colonel Whalley's anxiety as to the King increasing, he went at about eight o'clock to Mr. Smithsby, Keeper of the Privy Lodgings, desiring him to go along with him the back way, through the Privy Garden, to the Privy Stairs, where he had sentinels stationed. To resume Whalley's narrative : " We went up the stairs, and from chamber to chamber, till we came to the next chamber to his Majesty's bed-chamber, where we saw his Majesty's cloak lying on the midst of the floor, which much amazed me. I went presently back to the Commissioners and bed- chambermen, acquainting them with it, and therefore desired Mr. Maule again to see whether his Majesty was in his bed- chamber or not ; he again told me he durst not. I replied, that I would then command him, and that in the name of the Parliament, and therefore desired him to go along with me. He desired I would speak to the Commissioners to go along with us. I did. We all went. When we came into the room next the King's bed-chamber, I moved Mr. Maule to go in. He said he would not, except I would stand at the door. I promised I would, and did. Mr. Maule immediately came out, and said, the King was gone. We all then went in, and one of the Commissioners said, ' It may be the King is in his closet' Mr. Maule presently replied and said he was gone. I then, being in a passion, told Mr. Maule, I thought he was accessory to his going ; for that afternoon he was come from London, it being a rare thing for him to be from Court. I know not that he hath been two nights away since I came to wait upon his Majesty." When there was no longer any doubt that the King had fled, the greatest excitement prevailed throughout the palace, and Whalley at once sent parties of horse and foot to search the lodge in the park and Ashburnham's house at Ditton, while he forwarded despatches to Fairfax and Crorn- 232 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. well at the headquarters at Putney, to apprise them of what had happened. On the King's table he found three letters — one addressed to the Parliamentary Commissioners, one to be communi- cated to both Houses of Parliament, and another to himself, which was as follows : "Hampton Court, li November, 1647. "Colonel Whaley, " I have been so civilly used by you and Major Huntingdon, that I cannot but by this parting farewell acknowledge it under my hand ; as also to desire the continuance of your courtesie, by your protecting of my household stuffe and moveables of all sorts, which I leave behind me in this house, that they be neither spoiled or embesled : only there are three pictures here which are not mine, that I desire you to restore ; to wit, my wives picture in blew, sitting in a chaire, you must send to Mistris Kirke [one of the Queen's dressers] ; my eldest daughter's picture, copied by Belcam, to the Countess of Anglesey, and my Lady Stannop's picture to Cary Rawley [Carew Raleigh— Sir Walter's son]. There is a fourth which I had almost forgot, it is the original of my eldest daughter (it hangs in this Chamber over the board next to the chimney), which you must send to Lady Aubigny. So, being confident that you wish my preservation and restitution, I rest, "Your friend, "Charles R. " P.S. — I assure you it was not the letter you shewed me to-day, that made me take this resolution, nor any advertisement of that kinde. But I confess that I am loath to be made a close prisoner, under pretence of securing my life. I had almost forgot to desire you to send the black grew bitch to the Duke of Richmond." This letter, while showing how ready Charles was to acknowledge any little attention or kindness, betrays at the same time how constitutionally impossible it was for him to understand facts^ and to appreciate his real position. It is almost pathetic to note the way in which he writes of his much cherished works of art and articles de vertu (under the designation "household stuffe and moveables"), as if they were in truth still his, and as if he would shortly re-enter into possession of them all again. Everyone else, of course, appreciated the deep signi- ficance of the step Charles had chosen to take; and the excitement both in London and at the headquarters of the army at Putney, when the news became known, was very great. Among the chief officers of the army the feeling was not unmingled with one of gratification that things had at CHARLES AND THE HOUSE OF COMMONS. 233 last been brought to a crisis. Cromwell, immediately on receiving the intelligence, rode over post-haste to Hampton Court to learn the particulars for himself; and, as soon as he had conferred with Whalley, sat down and indited a letter to the Speaker of the House of Commons, informing him of the King's flight. The tone in which Cromwell spoke of Charles's escape, taken with the sending of the warning letter to Whalley, confirms the suspicion that he was not unprepared for what occurred, if, indeed, he had not connived at it and tried to bring it about. Certain it is that the continued residence of the King at Hampton Court had begun to grow very embarrassing to him, and Marvell the poet, his friend and panegyrist, actually commends him for his cleverness in entrapping Charles into this injudicious act. As to Charles's Letter or Declaration to the Parliament, which Cromwell inclosed to the Speaker, it was a somewhat lengthy and elaborate document, vindicating the step he was taking, and expatiating on the position of affairs. It was, in fact, an appeal to public opinion against the usage to which he had been subjected by the Parliament and the army, and it shows how confident he seems to have been that he would be able to retreat to some place of secrecy, whence he might begin, in safety, once more bargaining with, and at the same time intriguing against, his enemies. These documents, together with Cromwell's own letter to the Speaker, were read when the two Houses met next day — Friday, November 12th — and measures were at once taken to prevent the King's flight to foreign parts by order- ing all the ports to be closed and embargo to be laid upon all ships ; while it was declared to be an offence punishable with loss of estate and life, for anyone to detain the King's person, and not to reveal the fact to both Houses of Parlia- ment. The House of Commons met again on Saturday the 13th, when " Colonel Whalley was called in and gave a particular relation of all the circumstances of the King's going away from Hampton Court." He also handed in the warning letter from Cromwell, which he had shown to Charles. The House then ordered "that Colonel Whalley do put in writ- ing the said relation, and set his hand to it ; and that he do 234 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. leave a copy of the said letter from Lieutenant-General Cromwell." Whalley accordingly drew up and presented to the House " A More Full Relation of the manner and circumstances of His Majesties departure from Hampton Court," the docu- ment from which we have largely quoted above. In it he vindicates himself against any blame for the King's going away ("for I cannot term it an escape," he says, "because he never was in custody as a prisoner ") by laying stress on the fact that the most eminent officers in the army all agreed that he " could no more keep the King if he had a mind to go than a bird in a pound. I was not to restrain him from his liberty of walking, so that he might have gone whither he had pleased ; neither was I to hinder him from his privacy in his chamber, or any other part of the House, which give him an absolute freedom to go away at pleasure. The House is vast, hath 1,500 rooms, as I am informed, in it, and would require a troop of Horse upon perpetual duty to guard all the outgoings. So that all that could be ex- pected from me, was to be as vigilant over the King as I could in the daytime ; and when after Supper he was retired into his Bed-chamber, to set sentinels about him, which I constantly performed, as is well known to the Commissioners and others." From Oatlands, as we have said, Charles and his com- panions made their way to the Isle of Wight, and at the very time that the Commons were hearing Whalley's narrative of his escape from the palace, he had already surrendered him- self to Colonel Hammond, the Governor of the Island, and was lodged in Carisbrook Castle as a prisoner of State, though he was still treated with some deference and respect. While Charles was still confined at Carisbrook, there broke out the Second Civil War, a memorable episode of which was the Royalist rising that took place at Kingston- on-Thames, under the Earl of Holland, at the beginning of the month of July, 1648. The mustering of their force of some six hundred horse, not a mile from Hampton Court, doubtless excited a deep interest in the palace, which must have been intensified when Holland was gallantly joined in his rash enterprise by the young Duke of Buckingham and his brother, Lord Francis Villiers, " a youth," as Clarendon DEATH OF LORD FRANCIS VILLIERS. 235 tells us, "of rare beauty and comeliness of person," only eighteen years of age. After they had been in the town about two days they all advanced towards Reigate, but were compelled to retreat thence upon Kingston again, where their last skirmish occurred in the lane between the town and Surbiton Common. " Here," says Aubrey, " was slain the beautiful Francis Villiers, at an elm in the hedge on the east side of the lane, where his horse being killed under him, he turned his back to the elm, and fought most valiantly with half-a-dozen. The enemy, coming on the other side of the hedge, pushed off his helmet, and killed him, July 7th, 1648, about six or seven o'clock in the after- noon." With the fate of this gallant young Cavalier is connected a story about Hampton Court, which we ought perhaps to narrate here, though we cannot pretend to give it the same credence, or attach the same significance to it, as would the believers in supernatural occurrences and spiritual visitations. It seems that now some twenty-seven years ago, there dwelt in one of the suites of private aparments on the west side of the Fountain Court, a certain Lady , who had, for several years, assured her friends that she was frequently conscious of the presence in her rooms of two invisible beings ; and that she was greatly disturbed by the mysterious sounds of rapping that emanated from them in various quarters of her apartments. So convinced, indeed, was Lady of the genuineness of her weird and unearthly visitants, that she addressed a formal complaint to the Lord Chamberlain on the subject. His lordship, however, answered, so the story goes, that "he declined to move in the matter, as it was not one that fell within the purview of his department " ; but he referred her ladyship to Her Majesty's Board of Works. To that august and omniscient body she accordingly had recourse ; but, in reply to her requisition, was informed, so it is said, that "the Board" declined to interfere in the matter, on the ground that " there were no funds at their disposal " for any such purpose, and that the jurisdiction of the First Commissioner did not extend to the Spirit World. There for a time the matter rested, the two departments still maintaining their attitude of sceptical and masterly 2l6 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. inactivity, and Lady still complaining that her rooms were haunted, and inveighing bitterly against the incredulity and apathy of " that tiresome Board of Works." At last, however, a few years after, on the 2nd of November, 187 1, some workmen, while excavating in the cloister of the Fountain Court, nearly opposite Lady 's door, for the purpose of carrying out the new system of drainage, came upon two perfect human skeletons, about two feet below the level of the pavement. They were the remains of two full- grown men, and, from the position in which they were found, it was evident that they had been hastily buried or rather, perhaps, thrust beneath the surface of the ground. No satisfactory explanation has ever been offered as to their history. It was suggested, at the time of their dis- covery, that they might be the remains of Lord Francis Villiers and some other cavalier, ignominiously interred here by the Roundheads, after their deaths in the skirmish. But this con- jecture has been proved not to be founded on fact, the body of Lord Francis Villiers having been buried, after the Restora- tion, in Westminster Abbey, where his tomb may still be seen. It is not likely, indeed, that history will ever now reveal the identity of these two skeletons ; but the condition in which they were found, and several points in regard to the topography of the palace, render it not improbable that they had been interred some two hundred and fifty years, and they may, therefore, be assigned with some probability to the period of the Great Rebellion. However this may be, the discovery quite set at rest in the mind of Lady all doubts as to the origin of the mys- terious beings, and the weird sounds that had haunted her apartments, and she triumphantly exclaimed : " Just like that stupid Board of Works ! Why, of course, those are the two wretched men who have been worrying me all these years, and the Board never found it out ! " Whether, on the bodies receiving Christian burial at Hampton Church, the super- natural manifestations thereafter ceased, the story does not record. To return to Charles I. After his detention at Caris- brook Castle, he never set eyes on Hampton Court again ; but about a year after was moved from the Isle of Wight to London, soon to take his trial in Westminster Hall. CHARLES I.'S PROPERTY TO BE SOLD. 237 CHAPTER XVn. THE COMMONWEALTH. HAMPTON COURT FOR SALE. Charles L's head had no sooner rolled on the scaffold at Whitehall, than the Parliament at once proceeded to deal with all the property of " the late Charles Stuart," directing inventories to be taken of all his goods and chattels, and surveys to be made of his lands, houses, and palaces. This was done with a view to their being forthwith turned into money ; and to effect this object in regard to the per- sonal property of the royal family, a bill was almost im- mediately introduced into Parliament, and passed on July 4th, 1649, the valuers at once setting themselves to work to prepare a most full and ample inventory, taking account of all the furniture, pictures, tapestries, carpets, plate, jewels, utensils, and movables of all sorts to be found in each palace. A contemporary copy of the inventory, if it be not the original, is still preserved among the Harleian manu- scripts in the British Museum, making an enormous folio volume of some thousand pages, about seventy-six of which are filled with a list of " Goods Viewed and Appraised att Hampton Court, in the custody of Wm. Smithsbie, Esq., Wardrobe Keeper, October 5th, 1649." Attached to the entry of each lot is its estimated worth, and the price for which it was eventually sold, with the name of the purchaser. The sale, which began in the winter of 1649-50, was the most gigantic on record, and lasted on and off for nearly three years. Many of the tapestries, however, were never put up to auction; and, instead of the names of purchasers, we find such notes subjoined to the entries as " Now in the use of the Lord Protector "; "In his Highness Service att Hampton Court"; " In his Highness Service." The high values placed on the tapestries contrast markedly with those assigned to some of the finest pictures in the col- lection. Thus the great picture of Charles I. on a brown horse, recently acquired by the National Gallery at the cost 238 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. of ;£"! 1,000, was valued at only JQ200 ; the Venus del Pradoj one of the finest works of Titian, now at Madrid, fetched only ;£6oo ; Mantegna's " Triumph of Julius Csesar," one of the most precious treasures of the English Crown, was valued at ;£'i,ooo, and Raphael's famous Cartoons at only;£"3oo! These last two lots, however, were not disposed of, but were reserved, by order of the Council of State, together with Titian's " Herodias with the Head of John the Baptist" (valued at ;^ 150) and other pieces, for the decoration of the palace, which was soon after occupied by Cromwell. The pictures at Hampton Court numbered altogether 332, and were valued at ;^4,675 i6s. 6d. There was, in addition, a great deal of splendid furniture, some of which had belonged to Cardinal Wolsey, such as beds, chairs, canopies, church robes, chests, instruments of music, looking-glasses, and also many antiquities and curiosities, the description and prices of which must sound most tantalizing to modern connoisseurs. Thus Cardinal Wolsey's looking- glass, surmounted with his arms, went for;^5; Henry VIH.'s cane for 5^.; his hawking glass was valued at a shilling, "but 2S. was bid for it " ; his gloves, valued at 6d. went for is. ; "six comb-cases, which were Henry y^ VIH^^V' sold for 7^. In the meanwhile, ere the valuing and inventorying of the personal effects of the King had been proceeded with far, an Act was passed, on the i6th July, 1649, declaring that "for- asmuch as the Parliament, finding the office of a King in this nation to have been unnecessary, burthensome, and danger- ous, hath utterly abolished the said kingly office " ; therefore be it enacted that all "honors, manors, castles, houses, messuages, chases, parks, and lands, and all tenements and hereditaments, royalties, privileges, franchises, immunities, and appurtenances" belonging to the late King should be sur- veyed, valued, and sold for the benefit of the Commonwealth. In view of this a rough survey of the Manor of Hampton Court was accordingly forthwith made, and laid on the table of the House of Commons, being afterwards elaborated into a more exhaustive one, which was not completed until April, 1653. Altogether, the total of the annual values amounted to ;^i,204, and the total of the gross values to ;^io,765 iqj-. 9^. From the way in which the several portions of Hampton Court are valued separately, it would appear that it was con- HAMPTON COURT EXCEPTED FROM THE SALE. 239 templated to divide it into lots and sell it to various bidders, with a view perhaps of destroying its palatial character and aspect, if indeed the expression which occurs in the survey, " when it shall be cleared of the sayd buildings," does not imply that it was intended to obliterate all traces of its royal and historic associations by demolishing the palace entirely The Council of State, however, advised that Hampton Court, together with Whitehall, Westminster, and a few other palaces, should be excepted from the sale and " be kept for the public use of the Commonwealth," and an exempting clause was accordingly inserted in the Bill. A similar exception was made in regard to some of the furniture and movables of utility in this palace, as distin- guished from works of art and curiosity ; for in the following month of April the Council of State gave an order that " the hangings and carpets which were at Hampton Court when the Committee was there, were to be reserved to the use of the Commonwealth." For the next year or two, however, no suitable purpose was found, to which the palace or its furniture could be devoted, and the many stirring events that were taking place in the three kingdoms — the battles of Rathmines, Dunbar, and Worcester, and the thrilling escape of Charles II. — prevented the question from being much considered. But with the return of Cromwell and his victorious army south- wards, it occurred to the Council of State that Hampton Court would be a convenient place for him to retire to, as he seems to have taken a liking to the locality, and a suite of apartments was accordingly prepared for him and his family at the pubHc expense. Here, therefore, after a trium- phant procession in his state carriage through London, where he received a most enthusiastic welcome from the citizens, and was presented with addresses of congratulation from the Parliament and the City Corporation, he arrived on the evening of the 12th of October, 1651. It is curious to think of Cromwell thus installing himself in the very palace which, a few years previous, had been the scene of his intimate conferences with Charles I., and in which he had perhaps cast an envious eye on the regal splendours of his great victim. We hear no more of Hampton Court for upwards of a 240 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT, year; but in the month of November, 1652. a bill was in- troduced into Parliament for the sale of the late King's houses and lands exempted from the operation of the former Act, among which, as we have seen, was Hampton Court. The bill at first proceeded pretty smoothly, and on November 27th it was "Resolved that Hampton Court, together with Bushey Park and the other two parks, the Harewarren, and Meadows there, with the Appurtenances belonging to the State there, be sold for ready money." This resolution, however, was not suffered to stand for more than a month; for when the question was put, on December 29th following, that "Hampton Court, etc., do stand in the bill," the House divided, when thirty voted with the noes, and eighteen voted with the yeas, "so it passed with the negative." The minority, however, were by no means disposed to acquiesce in this decision, and on December 31st, "the question being propounded that leave should be given to speak against the vote that Hampton Court and other lands thereto belonging should not be sold by the bill, and the question being put, that this question be now put, it passed with the affirmative. And the main question being put : It was Resolved that leave shall be given to speak against the vote." The question being thus re-opened, the debate resulted in a reversal of the previous decision of the House, which perhaps had been arrived at by a snap division, and "the Mansion-House, commonly called Hampton Court, in the County of Middlesex, with the Barns, Stables, Outhouses, Gardens, Orchards, Yards, Courts, belonging to or used and enjoyed with the said Mansion House, with the Park commonly called the House Park, and the two Parks there, the one called the middle Park, and the other called Bushey Park," were accordingly ordered to stand part of the bill, which was passed into law on the last day of the year. But the question was yet far from having been finally determined, for the full survey of Hampton Court being completed on April 5th, 1653, and laid on the table of the House a few days after, the Parliament, probably at the instigation of some of Cromwell's friends, who knew of the liking he had taken to Wolsey's palace, passed a resolution on Friday, April 15th, 1653, that "the House called Hamp- PARAPET OF THE GREAT HALT, AS SEEN FROM THE ROOF. R 242 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. ton Court with the appurtenances, and the three Parks thereunto belonging, and what is contained in the survey, be staid from sale until the Parliament take further order : And that the Trustees and Contractors be enjoined to for- bear to make sale thereof accordingly." Nevertheless, on the 23rd of August, this vote, on the recommendation of the Committee for raising moneys, was again rescinded, and the Manor and Palace of Hampton Court were once more to be put up to auction. Ere a month had elapsed, however, namely, on the 20th of September, another departure was taken, by the Parlia- ment resolving that " there should be an offer of Hampton Court to the Lord General (Cromwell) in exchange for New Hall upon a proportionate value," and that "Sir Anthony Ashley Cooper do tender this offer to the Lord General from this House." But the time was not yet ripe for such an assumption of state and dignity,, and Cromwell, while returning " his humble acknowledgments for the great respects of the House towards him therein," yet desired that it would "proceed to dispose thereof according to their former resolution." Not much heed, however, was paid to this pretence of disinterestedness, for it was ordered that " the house called Hampton Court, with the outhouses and gardens thereunto belonging, and the little park wherein it stands, be stayed from sale until the Parliament take further order." The parks, other than the House Park, were, however, put up to auction ; and contracts were entered into by the Trustees of the Royal Lands for the sale, on November 15th, 1653, of Bushey Park and its appurtenances to Edmund Backwall for ;£6,638 7^. ; and, on December 3rd, of the Middle Park to Colonel Norton for ;^3,7oi igs. The fee of the Manor and Honour of Hampton Court had previously been sold to a Mr. John Phelps, of London, gentleman, for ^750- But almost immediately after these transactions, that is to say on the i6th of December, 1653, the whole aspect of affairs was changed by Cromwell being proclaimed Lord Protector of the Commonwealth, when steps were at once taken to re-acquire, on behalf of the State, the premises recently sold. CROMWELL OCCUPIES THE PALACE. 243 There was at first some difficulty in effecting the necessary surrenders on reasonable terms, because the purchasers had not only already paid the purchase-money and entered into possession, but had even disposed of part of their interests to other persons. However, after some negotiations, arrange- ments were eventually agreed upon for the redemption by the State of all the parks and lands sold, on the return of the purchase-moneys, and the payment of some ;^2,ooo surplusage by way of profit to the purchasers and their assignees. As to the manor, Mr. Phelps was easily induced to con- sent to a re-conveyance of it to Cromwell for ;£^75o, the price he had paid for it. This was effected on August 30th, 1654; and in the year 1657 Cromwell's name is entered in the Court Rolls as owner of the manor. In the meanwhile an order was issued directing that "the house at Hampton Court, with the Park and all the lodges, stables, and outhouses, and the houses in the Park, be forthwith cleared for the Protector's use; and all persons concerned to take notice and conform." Thus did the royal Palace of Hampton Court, the home of so many of England's Kings and Queens, pass into the hands of the Regicide, Oliver Cromwell. CHAPTER XVHL OLIVER Cromwell's private life at hampton court. From the 16th of December, 1653 — the date of Cromwell's installation as Lord Protector of the Commonwealth of England, Scotland, and Ireland — we find that " His High- ness," as he was henceforth designated, resided very fre- quently at Hampton Court, his visits, whether of short or of long duration, being all carefully chronicled in the official journals of the time. When the Protector came to reside at Hampton Court for any length of time, the members of the Council also came with him; "and there," says one of 244 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. the newspapers of the day, " the great affairs of the nation are transacted with labour and care as if they were at White- hall." His first visit after his promotion to his new dignity took place on April 15th, 1654, when we find it duly notified that "His Highness went this day to Hampton Court, and returned at night." Soon after this, his often-repeated journeys backwards and forwards from London to the palace, attracting the attention of his enemies, who were always on the look-out for an opportunity of despatching him, a plot was entered into by some desperadoes, with the intention of lying in wait to murder him, when he was on the road to Hampton Court. The conspirators were, however, unable to agree as to the point in the journey where the assassination should be attempted; so it was put off until the Protector was coming back, before which time he received information of the danger threatening him, and returned another way. If they had succeeded in perpetrating the crime, the others engaged in it were to have murdered the rest of the Council, and seized on Whitehall, " sparing only some that they had excepted, and some to be cruelly tortured." Another party was to seize the Tower. To a third was intrusted the redoubtable task of overpowering the Lord Mayor and aldermen ; while Charles II. was to be proclaimed king, and "was presently to be sent for, and with all his crew from all nations, whither they had fled, to hasten for England, and seize on all forts and harbours." The con- spirators, however, among whom was a brother of the Portuguese ambassador, having been tracked, arrested, and brought to trial at Westminster, were condemned to death. We could hardly believe that so dastardly a plot could have emanated even from the baser sort among the chivalrous Cavalier party, did we not know that about a month before its concoction a proclamation had been issued by Charles II., in which, after reciting the " accursed ways and means of a certain low mechanic fellow, by name Oliver Cromwell," went on to give, in the King's name, "free leave and liberty to any man whomsoever, within any of our three kingdoms, oy pistol, sword, or poison, or by any other ways or means whatsoever, to destroy the life of the said Oliver Cromwell ; wherein they will do an act acceptable to God and good MRS. CROMWELL, " THE LADY PROTECTRESS." 245 men, by cutting off such a detestable villain from the face of the earth," and giving his kingly word that the man, by whose hand the deed might be done, should have a pension of ;^5oo a year for the rest of his life. The presbyterians also lent themselves to these designs against his life, and one of their ministers, who had preached before his Highness at Hampton Court, seized the oppor- tunity of being in the palace, to " pump " the servant boy who waited on him, by asking him "what was the reason his Highness did sweat so much when he took exercise ? " The boy answered that he always wore a " close coat (that is a coat of mail) under his other clothes." This piece of information the rascally presbyter forthwith communicated to his co-religionists, who in their plots against his life took their measures accordingly. With Cromwell, when he established himself permanently at Hampton Court, also came Mrs. Cromwell, "the Lady Protectress," as she was half-satirically called, who, as the wife of the arch-enemy, was the favourite butt for Royalist abuse and ridicule. The Cavalier wits, indeed, seem to have borne her a particular aversion, and they were never tired of scoffing at " old Joan," as she was derisively called, and of recounting scandalous and comical stories about her. She was no doubt a plain, and perhaps a commonplace woman, and not being over-wise, and having no great aptitude for accommodating herself to her new and great position, frequently said and did things that afforded the smart ladies and gentlemen of the opposite party the most exquisite amusement. But beyond this, there does not appear to have been anything in her conduct or demeanour, which could fairly subject her to censure, for she seems to have settled down at Hampton Court to a simple, unosten- tatious life. Whatever she did, however, exposed her to laughter from the most opposite points of view. Some- times it was the preposterous airs that she gave herself as Lady Protectress, and her ridiculously awkward imitations of Court manners, that were found fault with. At another time it was her simple tastes — "the impertinent mean- nesses" of her mode of life, so unbefitting a lady of her station ! In a publication entitled " The Court and Kitchen of Joan 246 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. Cromwell," a scurrilous writer particularly makes fun of her household establishment at Hampton Court, laughing at her habits of " nimble housewifery," and declaring that she had employed a surveyor to make little labyrinths and trap-doors for her, " by which she might at all times, unseen, pass to and fro, and come unawares upon her servants, and keep them vigilant in their places." Besides, they accuse her of being continually down in the kitchen, worrying the cook about all sorts of trivial things, and being at the same time as niggardly and stingy as she was exacting. Even her character was assailed: some of the Hbellous pamphlets of the time charging her, without any shadow of foundation, with an excessive indulgence in strong Hquor. Nevertheless, in spite of the general homeliness of the lives of the Protector and his family at Hampton Court, the exigences of State functions sometimes compelled him to depart from his domestic habits and give great public enter- tainments, such, for instance, as the banquet with which he feasted the Swedish ambassador in this palace on July 26th, 1656. On occasions of this sort something of the old princely splendour of the Court of the Stuarts was imitated, the Pro- tector's bodyguard of halberdiers attending in the Banqueting Room, and the dishes being brought to the table by the servi- tors with the ceremonial of the old English Court. All this, of course, did not escape the censure of his critics, who commented severely on his " Court of Beggars, and such like mean people," who were rendered "very gay and jocund" by festivities of this sort. " A great deal of State," writes Heath, one of his bitterest satirists, " was now used towards him ; and the French Cringe, and other ceremonious pieces of gallantry and good deportment, which were thought un- christian and savouring of carnality, introduced in place of austere and down-cast looks, and silent mummery of starched and hypocritical gravity, the only becoming dress, forsooth, of Piety and Religion ! " Cromwell, however, was in truth chiefly solicitous about being treated with respect, in the presence of foreigners, as head of the English Commonwealth. Among his ordinary associates and the colonels of the army he still maintained his former relations of somewhat boisterous familiarity. Whitelock, who was in constant intercourse with him, tells MRS. CROMWELL "THE LADY PROTECTRESS. 548 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. us that " he would sometimes be very cheerful with us, and laying aside his greatness, be exceedingly familiar with us, and, by way of diversion, would make verses with us, and every- one must try his fancy. He commonly calk-d for" tobacco- pipes and a candle, and would now ar/d then take tobacco himself. Then he would fall again to his serious and great business, and advise with us in those affairs." Heath also gives us a similar account of his life at Hamp- ton Court, though, of course, tinged with a strong satirical animus. " His custom," says he, " was now to divert him- self frequently at Hampton Court (which he had saved from sale, with other houses of the King's, for his own greatness), whither he went and came in post, with his Guards behind and before, as not yet secure of his life from the justice of some avenging hand. Here he used to hunt, and at the fall of a Deer, where he would be sure to be present, embrue his hands in the blood of it, and therewith asperse and sprinkle the attendants; and sometimes to coax the neighbouring Rusticks give them a Buck he hunted, and money to drink with it. His own Diet was very spare, and not so curious, except in publique Treatments, which were constantly given every Monday in the week to all the officers of the Army not below a Captain, where he dined with them, and shewed them a hundred Antick Tricks, as throwing of Cushions, and putting live Coals into their pockets and boots ; a table being likewise spread every day of the week for such officers as should casually come to Court. . . . With these officers while he seemed to disport himself, taking off his Drink freely, and opening himself every way to the most free familiarity, he did merely lye at the catch of what should incogitantly and with unsuspected provocation fall from their mouths, which he would be sure to record and lay up against his occasion of reducing them to the speaker's memory, who were never likely to forget the prejudice and damage they had incurred by such loose discoveries of their minds and inclinations. . . . He had twenty other freaks in his head, for sometimes before he had half dined, he would give order for a drum to beat, and call on his Foot Guards, like a kennel of hounds, to snatch off meat from his table and tear it in pieces ; the like Jocos and Frisks he would have with other company; even with some of the nobility, when he would OLIVER CROMWELL AT HOME. 249 not stick to tell them, what Company they had lately kept, when and where they had drank the King's health and the Royal Family's, bidding them when they did it again, to do it more privately, and this without any passion, and as festivous droll discourse." Cromwell, however, also occupied himself with other amusements and tastes more refined than these rather rowdy gambols. For instance, he appreciated the arts sufficiently to keep Mantegna's " Triumph of Julius Caesar " at Hampton Court, in order that it might decorate the walls of this palace. That he was, besides, not indifferent to the beauty of the old tapestries preserved in the palace, is proved by the facts that not only did he have the Great Hall decorated with them, but that he even hung his own bedroom with such an ungodly and carnal subject as " five pieces of fine tapestry hangings of Vulcan and Venus ! " We learn this from the " Inventory of the goods at Hampton Court," taken after his death by order of the House of Commons, from which document we find his bedroom also contained the following furniture : " 2 window curtains, one of scarlet baize, the other of serge ; i small couch of fly coloured damask, and cased with watchet baize; 2 elbow chairs, ditto; 4 back stools, ditto ; I black table with a turned frame ; i pair of andirons with double brass ; i pair of creepers with fire-shovel and tongs ; I pair of bellows." In his dressing room were : " i old coberd; i Spanish table; 2 small Turkey carpets; i pair of andirons with double brass ; i pair of creepers, and fire-shovel, tongs and bellows; 4 back stools of Turkey work." All of these articles, except the " i old coberd " and the tapestries, which are described as belonging to the State, are entered in the inventory, which is still preserved in the Record Office, as being the private property of Cromwell ; and similar distinctions are made throughout that document in regard to the contents of every room in the palace. How he can have become possessed of the enormous amount of furniture and household goods, thus made out to be his own, is not clear. They evidently were part of the original con- tents of the palace ; and, perhaps, he bought them in bulk from the persons to whom they had been knocked down at the sale, and who had not removed them from the palace 250 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. when the Protector entered into possession of Hampton Court. Certain it is, at any rate, that they were claimed by his family after his death as his private property. Cromwell seems to have taken some interest also in the gardens and parks of Hampton Court, for we find that, soon after his coming into possession of the manor, he gave orders that the bridges and banks of the New or Longford River, which, as we have seen, was made by Charles I. to supply the fountains and ponds at the palace, should be repaired and the water made to flow again. The supply had been inter- rupted in 1648, when the inhabitants of the parishes of Feltham, Hanworth, Bedfont, Hampton and Teddington, through which its course lies, taking advantage of the poli- tical disorders, stopped its passage by sinking the bridges, and throwing down stones and gravel. They did this on account of the injury which, as it was alleged, this artificial water- course had frequently done them, by overflowing its banks and drowning the corn and hay in their fields, and ruining and rotting their sheep. Cromwell's action in restoring the obnoxious water-course was, therefore, not at all relished in the neighbourhood of Hampton Court. But he was now too secure to heed any disapproval : so much so, that having re-established the flow, he went on to divert it into the " Hare-warren " (that part of Bushey Park which lies along the north of the road from Kingston to Hampton Court), where he caused two ponds to be dug, which were thenceforward known as " the Hare-warren Ponds," a name now corrupted into " the Heron Ponds," and sometimes ab- surdly enough called "the Herring Ponds." At the same time he barred the passage, which had been considered an immemorial right of way, through the Hare-warren from Hampton Wick to Hampton Court, erecting palings across it, much to the dissatisfaction of the inhabitants of the Wick. But no open protest was ventured during the Protector's life- time, though in an anonymous satirical piece, hawked about the streets of London at this time, entitled " The Picture of a New Courtier, drawn in a conference between Mr. Titne- Server and Mr, Plain-heart ^^^ "Time-server," as one of Cromwell's sycophants, while contemplating with "trembling heart and shaking bones " the contingency of a change in the Government, is made to refer to this unpopular act in ask- CROMWELL'S AMUSEMENTS. 251 ing : " Who will have the fine houses, the brave parks, the pleasant fields and delightful gardens, that we have possessed without any right, and built at other men's cost ? Who shall enjoy the delight of the new Rivers and Ponds at Hampton Court whose making cost vast sums of money, and who shall chase the game in the Harewarren, that my dear master hath inclosed for his own use, and for ours also that are time- servers ? " Cromwell was, besides, very fond of music, often enter- taining those who were proficient in it; and patronizing John Kingston, a scholar of Orlando Gibbons, by appointing him organist and music master to his daughters. During his banquets at the palace he usually had music played, and after dinner, when the gentlemen joined the ladies in the drawing room, there was instrumental music and singing, Cromwell himself sometimes intoning a psalm for the com- pany. He took besides, like his secretary Milton, great delight in the orgau, and had two very fine ones put up in the Great Hall, the larger of the two being a gift from his friend. Dr. Goodwin, president of Magdalen College, Oxford, who took upon himself to remove it from the College and present it to the Protector. It is pleasant to picture to oneself the scene in the Hall of Hampton Court at this time, when Milton would seat himself at the organ under "the high-embowed roof," with the ** Storied windows richly dight. Casting a dim religious light," and would make "the pealing organ blow," while Cromwell and his family and attendants sat listening enraptured at the reverberations of the solemn music. The identical organ is now in Tewkesbury Abbey, to which it appears to have been presented by the authorities of Mag- dalen College, after having been returned to them at the Restoration. Another glimpse that history gives us of Cromwell's life at Hampton Court at this period, exhibits him to us with his family seated in the Chapel — probably in the royal pew — attending the sombre Presbyterian service; or listening to the sermons of the servile ministers, who, like the Court 252 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. chaplains under the monarchy, framed their discourses, when they had the privilege of preaching before his Highness, so as to flatter and please their chief auditor. There is record, for instance, " of a sermon preached before the Lord Protector at Hampton Court, by the minister of Hampton, about the latter end of Aug., 1655:" in which he drew "a parallel between David cutting off the top of Saul's garment, and the cutting off the late King's head; and how David was troubled for what he had done, though he was ordained to succeed Saul" — which was a delicate way of justifying the King's murder, and Cromwell's usurpation, doubtless very pleasing to his Highness. But though Cromwell was so comfortably established at Hampton Court, he was soon awakened again to the con- stant danger threatening him from his secret foes by the dis- covery, at the beginning of the year 1657, of another con- spiracy against his life, known to history as " Syndercomb's plot." The assassins, who, on this occasion, received en- couragement and assistance from Don Alonzo, a former ambassador of Spain in England, again selected one of Cromwell's journeys to Hampton Court as the best oppor- tunity for effecting their devilish purpose. A spot at Ham- mersmith was chosen, where they intended "planting an engine which, being discharged, would have, upon occasion, torn away coach and person in it, that should pass by." This seems to be the first recorded instance of an attempt to use an infernal machine; and it is strange to find the Duke of York, afterwards James II., and his brother, Charles II., calmly discussing, like a couple of dynamiters, such designs for "removing" the usurper — and the Duke, in a letter to his brother, speaking of it with approval, as " better laid and resolved on than any he had known of the kind." No wonder that the frequent discovery of conspiracies like these, and the suspicion that he was perhaps encompassed in his own palace by spies and traitors, should have begun to shake even Cromwell's iron nerves, and that the heart, which had never quailed in battle, should have been made to flinch at last before the haunting terror of unknown and invisible foes. We are assured by Heath that " he began to dread every MARRIAGE OF OLIVER'S DAUGHTER. 253 person or strange face he saw (which he would anxiously and intently view) for an assassin, that book of ' Killing no murder ' perpetually running in his mind. It was his constant Custom to shift and change his lodging, to which he passed through twenty several locks, out of which he had four or five ways to avoid pursuit. When he went between White- hall and Hampton Court, he passed by private and back ways, but never the same way backward and forward, he was always in a hurry, his Guards behind and before riding at full Gallop, and the Coach always filled, especially the Boot, with armed persons, he himself being furnished with private weapons ; and was now of more than difficult access to all persons." Nevertheless, he continued to receive his intimate friends and supporters at Hampton Court, and among those who associated on familiar terms with him and his family was Thomas, Viscount Falconbridge, who, after a short courtship, which Cromwell encouraged, became engaged to Mary Cromwell, his third daugher. The marriage was publicly solemnized in the chapel of the palace on Thursday, November 17th, 1657, by one of Oliver's chaplains, but the same day they were also privately married, according to the form prescribed by the Church of England, by Dr. Hewitt, with the privity of the Protector, who pretended to yield to it "in compliance with the importunity and folly of his daughter " — who was a staunch member of the Church of England — though he was doubtless also swayed not a little by the fear that, in the event of a Restoration, the marriage might otherwise be afterwards invalidated. The language in which the wedding was announced in the gazette of the day, the " Mercurius Politicus," shows how completely the poli- tical scribes of the time adopted the language of courtiers in treating of the doings of the Protector's family : "Tuesday, Nov. 17th. " Yesterday afternoon his highness went to Hampton Court, and this day the most illustrious lady, the lady Mary Cromwell, third daughter of his Highness the Lord Protector, was there married to the most noble lord, the Lord Falconbridge, in the presence of their highnesses, and many noble persons." Cromwell's behaviour, however, at these festivities was 254 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. not always consonant with such magniloquent phrases ; for at the marriage of his daughter Frances to Mr. Rich, a short time before, he amused himself with such vulgar horse-play as throwing about " the sack posset amongst all the ladies to spoil their clothes, which they took as a favour, and daubed all the stools where they were to sit, with wet sweet- meats." In the following summer we again find Cromwell residing here ; when, on July the 1 7th, there arrived his son, or as the "Mercurius Politicus " puts it, "the most illustrious Lord, the Lord Richard, who being returned from the western parts, was received by their Highnesses with the usual demon- strations of their high affection towards his Lordship." And on the 30th of the same month arrived "the most noble Lord Falconbridge, with his most illustrious lady the Lady Mary, being safe returned out of the North." It was, in truth, in his domestic life, and in the society of his children and grandchildren, that Cromwell now found his only solace, amid the besetting cares that darkened the last years of his life — the disaffection among the people, the clamour in the army on account of the arrears of pay, the constant plots against his life, and the falling away of so many of his old friends, who viewed with a very deep and natural disgust his abandonment of all his former principles, and his turning his back on the professions of his whole lifetime. By gathering his family about him, and cherishing their love, he sought to mitigate, in some degree, the feeling of desertion and isolation that all these troubles caused him. But even in his domestic relations he was now to meet with disappointments, still more painful. One of these was the defection of his son-in-law Fleetwood, to whom he had been especially kind and indulgent, but who now began osten- tatiously to court the Republican party, and to set his wife against her father; and though he was living close to Hampton Court, refrained from visiting Cromwell. But the bitterest trial to him of all was the serious illness of his favourite daughter, Elizabeth Claypole, the news of which was suddenly brought to him at the end of July in London, where he had gone for a few days on important business. He at once hastened back to Hampton Court, and put aside 255 all State affairs to watch unremittingly by her bedside. The exact nature of her disease is not known to history, nor does it appear to have been understood by her physicians, who, if we are to believe almost all the authorities, most lamentably mismanaged her case ; and it is certain that she underwent most acute sufferings, which her father witnessed with most poignant distress. To heighten the tragedy of the scene, the Royalist pamphleteers drew harrowing accounts of how, in the agony of her fever and pain, she wildly reproached her father with his crimes and cruelties, adjur- ing him most solemnly, with her dying voice, to make atone- ment, ere it was too late, by restoring the rightful sovereign to his ancestral throne. Though discredit has been thrown on the probability of this story, it is strongly corroborated by the testimony of Dr. Bates, Cromwell's physician, then resident in the palace, who may, not improbably, have witnessed what he relates, and who, in any case, would scarcely have given currency to an anecdote so startling, unless he beheved it had a good foundation in fact. However this may be, Mrs. Claypole's illness did not last long ; for she died about a week after she was first taken ill, at three o'clock in the morning of August the 6th, 1658, to the great sorrow of all the Court, and the inexpressible grief of her father. The funeral, which was carried out on the most sumptuous scale, took place a few days afterwards, the body being taken by water to Westminster, where it lay in state in the Painted Chamber, whence it was carried into the Abbey to be buried among the tombs of the Kings and Queens of England. This cruel blow, combined with the feeble state of his health, already shattered by sleepless nights and the haunting terrors of assassination, produced an immediate and most disastrous effect on the wretched Protector. Within a week of her death, he was seized with a bad attack of gout and other disorders; and for four or five days lay in a very dangerous state. A few days afterwards, however, he grew better for awhile, and on the 17th of August he was well enough to go out for an hour. It was most likely on this occasion that he was met, as he was riding in Hampton Court Park, by the Quaker, George Fox, with whom he had already had one or two interviews, 256 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. and who now came to present a petition in favour of his co- religionists, the victims just then of much persecution in various parts of the country, though Cromwell himself was not unwilling that they should receive every reasonable tolera- tion, and had been, in consequence, bitterly reproached by religious people of all the rival sects. " Before I came to him," says Fox, "as he rode at the head of his Life-Guards, I saw and felt a waft of death go forth against him, and when I came to him he looked like a dead man." After Fox had laid the sufferings of the Friends before the Pro- tector he told him to come and visit him at the palace. Fox, accordingly, went to stay the night at Kingston, and came over to Hampton Court on the following day; but on requesting to see Cromwell he learnt that he was ill and that the doctors would not allow him to see anyone. The fever was, in fact, insidiously creeping on ; and though he was afterwards able to walk once or twice in the palace gardens, on the 24th of August he was again confined to his room. The five physicians who were attending him pronounced that he was suffering from an ague, called a " bastard tertian " ; one of them, as he felt his pulse, observing that it intermitted. The words caught the ear of the sick man, and he at once turned deadly pale, a cold perspiration covered his face, and staggering, he begged to be taken to his bed ; where, when he had been revived by cordials, he made his private will. Next morning, when one of the doctors came to see him, he asked "why he looked so sad?" to which the doctor answering that "he was naturally anxious with the re- sponsibility of such a life as his resting on him," Cromwell replied: "You doctors think I am going to die." Then ordering the rest out of the room, and taking his wife caress- ingly by the hand, he said : "I declare to you that I shall not die by this illness ; of this I am certain." Observing the surprise these words caused, he added, " Don't think me crazed. I am telling you what is true ; and I have a better authority than your Galen or Hippocrates. God himself has vouchsafed this answer to our prayers — not to mine alone, but those of others who have a closer intercourse and greater familiarity with him than I have. Be cheerful ; banish all grief from your faces ; and act towards me as though I was a THE DYING PROTECTOR. 257 mere servant. You are able to do much by your scientific knowledge, but nature is more potent than all the physicians in the world ; and God surpasses nature in a still greater degree." The same communication was made to Thurloe and the different members of the Protector's family ; nor did it fail to obtain credence among men who believed that " in other instances he had been favoured with similar assurances, and that they had never deceived him." Even the doctors were impressed, or affected to be, by his apparent confidence: and one of them accidentally meeting another of his particular acquaintance coming out of the sick room, who happened to remark that "he was afraid their patient was going to be light-headed," replied, " You are certainly a stranger in this house ! Don't you know what was done last night ? The chaplain, and all who are dear to God, dispersed in several parts of the palace, have prayed to God for his health, and all brought this answer : ' He shall recover ! ' " Indeed, so certain were the Saints that all was now settled as they wished that "a public fast being ordered for his sake, and kept at Hampton Court, they did not so much pray to God for his health, as they thanked him for the undoubted pledges of his recovery." Dr. Goodwin, "his creature, and trencher-chaplain," as Ludlow disdainfully calls him, especially distinguished him- self in this way, giving out the form of prayer : " Lord, we beg not for his recovery, for that thou hast already granted and assured us of; but for his speedy recovery." And for a day or two it seemed as though their " saucy expostulation with God," to uBe a quaint expression of Warwick's, was Hkely to succeed in extorting a fulfilment of the promise, which it was sought to put on the Deity ; for Cromwell was well enough, on August 26th, to receive a visit from White- lock, whom he kindly entertained at dinner. But the improvement was short-lived. Instead of getting better Cromwell again grew worse, and the fever increasing, his mind was frequently affected with delirium. It was at length decided to try the effect of change of air ; and the dying Protector was removed to Whitehall. Here he lingered but a few days ; and on the night of the 2nd of September, the eve of his " fortunate day," the anniversary S 258 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. of the battles of Worcester and Dunbar, and in the midst of a terrific storm, the once mighty OHver breathed his last, " embalmed," says Thurloe, " with the tears of his people, and upon the wings of the prayers of the saints." CHAPTER XIX. THE RESTORATION. HONEYMOON OF CHARLES II. AND HIS WIFE. As soon as Cromwell had breathed his last, the Council assembled to deliberate, and after a short consultation pro- claimed his eldest son his successor in the Protectorate. But the burden under which even the great Oliver had staggered, soon proved too heavy for the feeble Richard, and before many months had elapsed, he had practically surrendered the government into the hands of the Long Parliament, the remnant of which now met and reasserted their claim to be the supreme constitutional authority in the country. The restored members had not been long in session when their attention was imperatively called to the impoverished state of the national exchequer, and especially to the diffi- culty of meeting the great and dangerously increasing arrears in the pay of the army. They likewise had to take over and provide for the payment of the late Protector's debts, of which Richard Cromwell handed in a schedule amounting to ;^29,ooo. To have had recourse to taxation would have been certainly inexpedient, if not impossible : the only thing to do, therefore, was to find out what property, belonging to the Commonwealth, might most conveniently be turned into money, to meet these pressing needs. A committee was accordingly appointed "to examine what furniture, hangings, and other goods, in Whitehall, Hampton Court, Somerset House, and St. James's do, or ought of right to belong to the Commonwealth," and it was ordered " that it be referred to the said committee to take special care that CROMWELL'S GOODS AT THE PALACE. 259 the Goods and Household stuff at Hampton Court be kept from Embezzlement and spoil, and to bring in an act for their sale." The inventory compiled by the Commissioners is, as we have before said, still preserved in the Record Office, and it contains much of curiosity relating to the furniture of the palace, and incidentally throws a good deal of light on the domestic life of the Protectorial family. As to how Cromwell became possessed of so many goods and chattels, we have already stated our inability to explain. We know, however, that the bulk of the contents of the palace was declared by Mrs. Cromwell to belong to her late husband's estate, though after the Restoration she was found to have collected a lot of things at a fruiterer's ware- house, which unquestionably had belonged to the Crown, and which she consequently was compelled to disgorge. Though the necessity of providing money for the public service was the ostensible reason for the resolution to sell the contents of Hampton Court, and so to leave it destitute of furniture, the Parliament was probably quite as much influenced by the intention of rendering it so comfortless as to discourage any desire Richard Cromwell might enter- tain of occupying it. Indeed, when he showed a reluctance to leave the State Apartments at Whitehall, the Parliament sent him repeated messages to vacate them, until he thought it best to obey their injunctions and go. One day, also, when he had come down to Hampton Court to shoot deer in the park, and had just shot one, a messenger arrived from the Commons, ordering that " none were to be killed," and he had to desist from his sport, not daring to shoot any more. With the same purpose in view, and likewise to prevent the royal palaces "from becoming objects of desire by ambitious men " in the future, a strong party in the House of Commons wanted to revive the long dormant order for the sale of Hampton Court and other royal manors and parks; and a resolution had actually been passed to that eff"ect when Ludlow fortunately interposed to save the palace. " For the house of Hampton Court, having been ordered to be sold that day," writes he in his " Memoirs," " which place I thought very convenient for the retirement of those that were employed in pubHc affairs, when they should be indis- 260 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. posed in the summer season, I resolved to endeavour to prevent the sale of it, and accordingly procured a motion to be made at the sitting down of the House to that end, which took effect as I desired. For this I was very much blamed by my good friend. Sir Henry Vane, as a thing which was contrary to the interests of a commonwealth. He said that such places might justly be accounted amongst those things that prove Temptations to Ambitious Men, and exceedingly tend to sharpen their appetite to ascend the Throne. But for my own part, as I was free from any sinister design in this action, so I was of opinion that the temptation of sovereign power would prove a far stronger motive to aspire by the sword to gain the sceptre, which, when once attained, would soon be made use of to force the people to supply the want of such accommodation." The palace, accordingly, was not sold, neither was the intention of disposing of its furniture persevered in ; and for the next six months or so, the question as to what use it should be put to, was left undetermined. But when Monk, in the month of February following, soon after his arrival in London, declared for a free parliament, and brought back the secluded members to the Long Parliament, a proposal was brought forward in the House for settling the Honour and Manor of Hampton Court, with its parks and other appurtenances upon him and his heirs ; and the bill for it was read a first time on the 25 th of February, and a second time two days after. But this proposal Monk thought a snare of his opponents to bind him against the King ; and he used all his influence with those members who were friendly to him to have the bill rejected. This was accordingly done, but, by way of compensation, a sum of ;^2o,ooo was voted to him on March 15th, 1660, together with the custody and stewardship of Hampton Court Manor and Park for life. The Restoration, which Monk was so instrumental in bringing about, took place, it will be remembered, just two months and a half after this, and one of the first acts of the restored monarch was to confirm Monk in the offices of lieutenant, keeper, ranger and steward of Hampton Court, with its parks and warrens, which he accordingly retained until his death. CHARLES II.'S IMPROVEMENTS. 26 1 The resumption by King Charles of the possession of this palace was marked also by the redecorating and re- furnishing of many of the rooms for occupation by the Court; and several alterations and repairs in the structure of the building were also put in hand. The Tennis Court, especially, was considerably improved. Charles had always been fond of tennis, and with his return the game, which had, of course, been condemned by the Puritans as ungodly and sinful, revived a great deal and came into much fashion- able vogue. Pending the completion of the new courts he was building in London, the King frequently played in this one, not only, it would seem, when in residence in this palace, but also when staying in London, whence he would come down to have a game of tennis, like many players of the present day. A letter of one Stephen Charlton, written to Sir R. Leveson about six months after his accession to the throne, and now preserved among the Duke of Sutherland's papers, gives us a ghmpse of his habits in this respect: "London, 21** Jan. 1 660- 1. The King is in very good health and goes to Hampton Court often, and back again the same day, but very private. Most of his exercise is in the Tennis Court in the morning, when he doth not ride abroad ; and when he doth ride abroad, he is on horseback by break of day, and most commonly back before noon." He appears to have been a fair player ; but the way in which his servile courtiers flattered him in this as in other things, utterly dis- gusted Pepys, who writes : "To the Tennis Court, and there saw the King play at tennis, and others ; but to see how the King's play was extolled without any cause at all was a loathsome sight, though sometimes, indeed, he did play very well and deserved to be commended; but such open flattery is beastly." Charles IL was rather fond of gardening, and one of his first cares after his accession was the putting of the gardens here in order, French gardeners being sent for to improve them, and a Mr. May being appointed supervisor of them. Later on in his reign. Rose, the royal head gardener, planted some very famous dwarf yew trees here, which were long celebrated as being the finest in England. To Charles H. also we owe the first laying out of the 262 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. Home Park in its present form — the planting of the great avenues of lime trees, radiating from the centre of the East Front of the palace, and the digging of the great canal, ex- tending from the same front towards the river to a distance of three-quarters of a mile. This fact is worthy of note, as hitherto it has been erroneously stated that it was William III. who carried out these works. The avenues are symptoms of the influence of that French taste, which Charles im- bibed only too strongly in many directions, during his sojourn abroad ; while the canal, fringed with rows of lime trees, is clearly a reminiscence of the Dutch scenery, with which he became familiar during his residence in Holland. The King's restoration to the throne of his ancestors was followed, exactly two years after, by his marriage to Catherine of Braganza, Infanta of Portugal, who, having sailed from Lisbon on the 23rd of April, St. George's Day, arrived off Portsmouth on the 14th of May, and came ashore when she had recovered from the effects of the journey, about a week after. On the day of her landing she received her first visit from Charles, and the very next day, the 21st of May, these two very new acquaintances were married. After staying two or three days at Portsmouth, the " happy pair" set out for Hampton Court — where it had been arranged that they should spend their honeymoon — "as well," says the chronicler, " for the salubrity as majesty of it, being one of the most magnificent structures of all the royal palaces"; and here, after stopping for a night at Windsor Castle, they arrived on the 29th of May, Charles's birth- day, and the anniversary of his entry into London after the Restoration. Their progress hither took place in great state, in a chariot drawn by six horses, and accompanied by footmen, runners, men-at-arms, and a stream of carriages, in which were the ladies and gentlemen of the Court, and of wagons and carts, which carried the guarda-infantas — that is, the fardingales of the Queen and her ladies, "without which," as Charles somewhat complainingly remarked, " there is no stirring." The royal coach must have driven across the bridge over the moat in front of the Great Gateway, through the First Court, to the foot of the Great Hall stairs under MARRIAGE OF CHARLES 11. 263 Anne Boleyn's archway, where they alighted, and passed up the stairs through two Hnes of guards, followed by the Comtesses of Pontevel and Penalva, the Countess of Suffolk, and other ladies and officers of the household. Under the screens of the Great Hall were assembled the Lord Chancellor Clarendon, the Lord Treasurer, and the Counsellors of State, who received the royal pair, and went before them up through the Hall and the Great Watching Chamber, to the Presence Chamber. Here they were greeted by the foreign ministers, who were present to offer the congratulations of their respective sovereigns on the marriage. The new Queen then proceeded through a suite of several State Rooms, in which were gathered, according to their de- grees and several qualifications, the nobility, the lords and ladies of the Court, and others. After receiving their homage, the Queen retired to her own room. The same night the Duchess of York came from London in her barge to pay her respects to her Majesty, and was received at the Privy Garden Gate by the waterside by King Charles himself, who, taking her by the hand, led her to the Queen, who received her in her bed-chamber. The Duchess offered to kiss her hand, but the Queen prevented her by raising her up and kissing her. The royal family then seated themselves near the Queen's bed, and conversed with her. Next morning the Queen was dressed by eleven o'clock, and received several ladies, among them the wife of Sir Richard Fanshawe, whom the reader will remember as being with Charles I. at Hampton Court just before his escape, and who had performed the office of groomsman to Charles H. at his marriage at Portsmouth. Lady Fanshawe tells us that she "had the honour from the King, who was then present, to tell the Queen who I was, saying many kind things to ingratiate me with her Majesty, whereupon her Majesty gave her hand to me to kiss, with promises of her future favour." The rest of that day was probably spent in making the acquaintance of the various courtiers ; and on the next, the 31st, the judges came to compliment her on her arrival. On June 2nd her Majesty received in state the Lord Mayor 264 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. and aldermen of the city of London, who, by Sir WiUiam Wylde, their recorder (who pronounced a Spanish oration), presented her with a gold cup and ;^i,ooo in it. On this and other days she also received addresses from the nobility, and the submissions of several deputies for the cities and towns of England. John Evelyn, the diarist, also came down from London to Hampton Court, and saw the Queen dining in public ; and was afterwards taken by the Duke of Ormonde to be pre- sented to her, and kiss her hand. His impression of her was tolerably favourable, for he states that " she was yet of the handsomest countenance of all the rest, and though low of stature, prettily shaped, languishing and excellent eyes, her teeth wronging her mouth by sticking a little too far out : for the rest lovely enough." But to say that she was "of the handsomest countenance" of any of the Portuguese ladies who followed in her train, was not a very high commendation ; for never, according to the universal opinion, both at Court and among the public, had a pack of such hideous, odious, disagreeable women been gathered together to attend a Queen. Lord Clarendon, who was not disposed to be censorious in this regard, stig- matized them as "old, ugly and proud, and incapable of any conversation with persons of quality and a liberal education " ; while the vivacious De Grammont, after saying that the Queen herself lent but little brilliancy to the Court where she came to reign, gives a caustic account of her retinue. It was composed, he says, of the Countess de Panetra, who came with her from Portugal, in the quality of lady of the bed-chamber ; " six frights, who called them- selves Maids of Honour, and a Duenna, another Monster, who took the title of governess to these extraordinary beauties." The Court was not less critical of the gentlemen in attend- ance on the Queen. Among these, especially, was one Taurauv^dez, who called himself Don Pedro Francisco de Silva, and who, though extremely handsome, "was," says De Grammont, "a greater fool than all of the rest of the Portuguese put together, and more vain of his names than his person." On him the Duke of Buckingham fastened the nickname of " Peter of the Wood," which so enraged him A FANTASTIC AND COMICAL RETINUE. 265 that, after many fruitless complaints and ineffectual menaces, he left England in disgust. "The Old Knight," also, "a lock of whose hair quite covered the rest of his bald pate, bound on by a thread very oddly," was another object of ridicule to the scoffers. Altogether, both the ladies and gentlemen of the Portu- guese suite formed such a fantastic and comical crew that, in a witty and critical Court like that of Charles II., they could not but be exposed to a constant fire of satirical com- ment. But what gave rise to even more criticism and laughter than their looks and general appearance, was the ludicrous Portuguese dress in which the Queen and her ladies insisted on attiring themselves, instead of the pretty and graceful fashion then prevalent at the English Court. Their obstinacy in thus adhering to their native costume, which was not only strange, but positively ugly and grotesque, could not but create a prejudice against them, and tend to diminish that feeling of respect for the new Queen, which it should have been the first aim of all of them to foster. It seems that, before leaving Lisbon, Catherine had been strongly urged by her brother, the King of Portugal, and by her mother, to cling pertinaciously to all her native peculiarities of manners, customs, language, and dress, being foolishly persuaded that to do so would greatly conduce to the dignity of Portugal, and would soon lead the English ladies to follow her example, so that it would end in the Portuguese costume being adopted by everyone at Court. Of this idea Charles had probably got some inkling before his future wife had left Portugal ; for he despatched to Lisbon a first-rate tailor, who was to fit her out in the smartest and best " tailor-made " French dresses : and when she landed at Portsmouth he sent her, at once, a most magnificent trousseau. But in both cases Catherine refused to take the hint — the tailor she would not even see, the trousseau she utterly de- clined to wear, and even now that she was under her husband's roof, she still, with petty feminine obstinacy, adhered to her foolish resolution, as unconscious, apparently, of the bad taste of appearing so singular among a foreign people in the Court where she had come to reign, as she evidently was of the stupidity of thereby giving her husband 266 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. a good cause of complaint against her so early in their married life. Never, in truth, was a more foolish mistake made. Had the dresses she and her ladies insisted on wearing had anything of smartness or chic, there would have been more excuse for the eccentricity; and had the wearers of them been remarkable for beauty of feature or form, there would have been more chance of carrying off their strangeness in English eyes, and more likeHhood of inducing the ladies of the Court to follow their lead and adopt the costume. But instead of this, the train of hideous, dowdy, old frumps, with their dumpy figures, their forbidding countenances, and their dark olive complexions, "decked out in their monstrous fardin- dales," with "their fortops turned aside very strangely," raised a perfect howl of derision wherever they went. Charles, who was keenly alive to the ludicrous, and always mutely sensitive to any ridicule cast on those connected with himself, and who was, all the time, only too conscious of the critical eyes and satiric tongues of his courtiers, implored her to lay this costume aside, and wear some of the trousseau he had presented to her. But for a long time Catherine was obdurate; until at length, finding that the king, who had used persuasion in vain, was becoming peremptory, she obeyed, yielding at last with bad grace on a point in which she was clearly in the wrong, and on which she should have given in, cheerfully and willingly, at the beginning. Throughout this dispute Catherine was so unfortunate as to receive nothing but bad advice from her ladies-in-waiting, who, being older than herself, and presumably possessed of more knowledge and experience of the world, should have encouraged her to take the wiser and more reasonable course, instead of from the outset doing everything in their power to set her against Charles, and to resist his authority in every way. Even after she herself had adopted the English costume, they themselves persisted in appearing before the whole Court in their grotesque guarda-infafitas, in defiance of her example, and in reproach, as it were, to her weakness in having surrendered. Eventually, however, even they had to conform, and were compelled to clothe their misshapen forms in the prevailing French fashion. The weakening of the new Queen's influence, caused by thus making her first stand A DISPUTE ABOUT DRESS. 267 against Charles on a question, in which eventual surrender on her part was inevitable, instead of reserving all her strength of will and firmness of purpose for a contest where principles and not trifles were involved, had, as we shall see in our next chapter, the most fatal results on her future life with her husband. After this things went on propitiously for some little time. For, though Charles was never in love with his wife, still he was sufficiently pleased with her youth, her simplicity, and her cheerful and innocent conversation to make the first few weeks of their sojourn at Hampton Court go off pretty well. The days were occupied with excursions on the river, sports in the parks, and games in the gardens ; the evenings with plays, music, and balls, in which the King, who excelled in dancing, greatly distinguished himself. Evelyn, who was at the palace for several days, gives us some account of what was going on. One day he saw the beautiful gondola sent to his Majesty by the State of Venice floating on the Thames, bearing, no doubt, the royal party, but he adds, "it was not comparable for swiftness to our common wherries, though managed by Venetians " ; on another day he was present when her Majesty took supper privately in her bedroom ; and on another he heard " the Queen's Portugal music, consisting of fifes, harps, and very ill voices." At the same time Evelyn made a careful inspection of the whole palace and its contents and curiosities ; and he particu- larly noticed " the Queen's bed, which was an embroidery of silver on crimson velvet, and cost ;£8,ooo, being a present made by the States of Holland when his Majesty returned, and had formerly been given by them to our King's sister, the Princess of Orange, and being bought of her again was now presented to the King. The great looking-glass and toilet of beaten and massive gold was given by the Queen Mother. The Queen brought over with her from Portugal such Indian cabinets as had never been seen here." But it was not only the furniture and interior of the palace that moved the interest of visitors. Its surrounding amenities, also, did not fail to attract observation; and Evelyn, especially, as a horticulturist, and the author of the " Sylva," speaks of — " The Park, formerly a naked piece of 268 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. ground, now planted with sweet rows of lime trees ; and the canal for water now near perfected," etc., a remark which proves that it is to Charles II., as we have already pointed out, and not to William III., as is usually stated, that we are indebted for the making of the Long Canal, and the planting of the great avenues in the Home Park. If any further proof of this fact were needed, we have it in a curious contemporary picture of the old east front of the palace before William III.'s alterations, taken from the park side, and showing the canal and the recently-planted lime trees. The picture was painted for Charles II. about this time by Danckers, a painter of architecture and land- scape, and it can be traced as being in the royal collection since the time of James II., in whose catalogue it is entered thus: "Hampton Court with the Canal, by Danckers." It was removed, a few years ago, at the author's suggestion, from St. James's Palace to Hampton Court, and an engrav- ing of it is here inserted. The space in front of this fagade of the palace was afterwards, as we shall show presently, occu- pied by the large semicircular garden laid out by William III., and on that account this end of the canal was partly filled up, so as to be now further removed from the palace than appears in this picture. Its present length is 3,500 feet, or nearly three-quarters of a mile, and its width 150 feet. On the gardens Evelyn makes the following observations : " In the garden is a rich and noble fountain, with syrens, statues, etc., cast in copper by Fanelli, but no plenty of water. The cradle walk of horn-beam [now called Queen Mary's Bower] in the garden is, for the perplexed twining of the trees, very observable. There is a parterre which they call Paradise, in which is a pretty banqueting house set over a cave or cellar. All these gardens might be ex- ceedingly improved, as being too narrow for such a palace." ^^m^m- 4J ^n Cn ^s !*^^--fe^^(^.-_^ OLD EAST FRONT OF HAMPTON COURT IN THE TIME OF CHARLES II. (From the picture by Danckers.) 270 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. CHAPTER XX. CHARLES II.'S DISAGREEMENT WITH HIS WIFE. In the meantime the King and Queen spending so long a time at Hampton Court was beginning to occasion con- siderable dissatisfaction in London, where the presence of the Court was missed, and where the business of the State was at a standstill. Pepys, in a note at the end of his Diary for June, says : " This I take to be as bad a juncture as ever I observed. The King and new Queen minding their pleasures at Hampton Court : all people discontented." But as Sir John Reresby remarked : " Though everything was gay and splendid and profusely joyful, it was easy to discern that the King was not excessively charmed with his new bride, who was a very little woman, and a pretty toler- able face, she neither in person nor manners having any one article to stand in competition with the charms of the Countess of Castlemaine, the finest woman of her age." Indeed, of the King's indifference to her, and his preference for Lady Castlemaine, the Queen had not long to wait before receiving very emphatic proof. Previous to Catherine of Braganza's quitting Portugal she had heard of the young and beautiful Mrs. Palmer, after- wards Countess of Castlemaine, a lady of good birth, whose father had lost his life in the service of the Crown; and she had been warned by her mother, on no account to receive her at Court, or even to allow her name to be mentioned in her presence. When, therefore, Catherine came to England and married Charles, she kept this resolution firmly planted in her mind. Unfortunately her husband had, on his part, for many reasons, come to exactly the opposite conclusion; and he was determined to insist, at all hazards, on the Queen not only acknowledging and receiving Lady Castlemaine at Court, but positively making her one of the ladies of her THE QUEEN AND LADY CASTLEMAINE. 2/1 bed-chamber, and admitting her into her most intimate acquaintance. He had made this resolve, partly out of his infatuation for that fascinating lady, and partly in con- sequence of a promise, which the imperious beauty had extorted from him, of giving her such a position at Court as could not be gainsaid, and which would be some com- pensation to her for her loss of position in more respectable or less tolerant society. Such being the intentions and inclinations of the chief persons concerned, we can imagine the significance of the scene that occurred one day at Hampton Court, in the Presence Chamber, where Catherine was sitting, surrounded by the Court, when the door opened, and Charles, leading Lady Castlemaine by the hand, himself presented her to the Queen. Catherine, who, of course, had never set eyes on the lady before, and who, perhaps, did not catch her name, nor fully understand who she was rose and received her with her usual graciousness. But a moment after, divining who she was, and conscious of the flagrant insult that had been put upon her in the face of the whole Court, she sat down, her colour changed, tears gushed from her eyes, her nose bled, and she fainted. She was then taken into her own room ; and all the company withdrew to talk over the scandalous scene they had just witnessed. So painful an upshot of the King's first step towards his project, should have made him, one would suppose, relin- quish it at least for a time. But not at all. On the con- trary, he looked upon the demeanour of the Queen in the affair "with wonderful indignation," and on receiving, in reply to his remonstrances, her answer that she would main- tain her resolution not to receive Lady Castlemaine, in spite of everything he might do or say, he became excessively ex- asperated. His pride was touched in the one quarter in which it was most tender — namely, the dread of appearing to the world as though he was governed by his wife, on which point, as Clarendon, whose pages are the authority for the particulars of this story, observes : " he was the most jealous and the most resolute of any man," though no man's nature was, in its essence, "more remote from thoughts of roughness or 2/2 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. hard-heartedness." He had persuaded himself, however, that his honour was involved in breaking down the resist- ance of his wife to his authority ; and for once the Merry Monarch, usually so pliable and yielding, was as firm as adamant. The courtiers, therefore, took their cue from the knowledge that the thing above all others in the world which the King shrank from, was to appear as though he was ruled by his wife. So they plied him unremittingly with urgent exhortations to make a stand now, assuring him that if he yielded on this point, he would ever afterwards be looked on as that most ridiculous of all objects — a hen- pecked husband. In a man such as Charles, so alive to the ludicrous, these representations were not without effect. Nor was he oblivious of the Queen's ill-advised obstinacy about her native dress ; how absurd she and her ladies had made themselves appear in the eyes of the whole Court; and how, when he insisted, she had been obliged to give in. This topic, also, his courtiers worked adroitly to the same end, holding up all the Queen's attendants to the most merciless ridicule, and indirectly pointing the shafts of their satire at the Queen herself. We can imagine the roars of laughter that greeted the sallies of the Court wits, such as Rochester, Buckingham, De Grammont, and Sir Charles Sedley, and of Charles's parasites, male and female, as- sembled in jovial supper parties around the Merry Monarch at Hampton Court, at the Guarda-damas, or Mother of the Maids, an austere, wrinkled old harridan, who looked more like an old housekeeper in fancy dress than a lady-in- waiting ; at " Peter of the Wood," with his Lusitanian pride and his six names ; at the " old knight " with his one lock of hair plastered across his bald pate ; at those six frights, the maids of honour, with their shapeless figures, their absurd top-knots, and their olive-green complexions ; and, by in- nuendo, at the Queen herself, with her short, stunted figure, her snub nose, and her protruding tooth ! No wonder that all this confirmed Charles in his resolu- tion not to give way to Catherine, whom he characterized as a bat instead of a woman ! For a man to be ruled by his wife was bad enough ; but to be ruled by such a wife ! On the other hand, we must not forget the feelings of the poor Queen — in a strange country, without counsellors, and CHARLES II.'S QUARREL WITH HIS WIFE. 273 without friends, married, after one day's acquaintance, to a man whose affections were already engaged, to whom she was an object of indifference, and who, instead of being her protector, was trying to exact a most humiliating concession from her ; while she, an alien in religion, and ignorant of the language and customs of the people, was surrounded by a crowd of cynics and scoffers. Never surely was a young woman placed in a more painful position .' But a still more bitter and cruel trial was yet in store for her. Hitherto, though Charles had freely expressed his displeasure to the Queen at her conduct when he presented Lady Castlemaine to her, and his determination that she should receive that lady at Court, he had not yet revealed to her his intention of insisting on her being appointed a lady of her bed-chamber. This plan, however, he now proceeded to unfold, preferring it on the transparent pretext that it was the only means of vindicating her ladyship's unjustly aspersed character to the world. But at this proposal the Queen was naturally only the more transported with indignation ; and she burst out into a torrent of angry reproaches against her husband. Finding that all his remonstrances with the Queen were of no avail, Charles bethought himself of having recourse to the persuasive powers of his Lord Chancellor, Clarendon, to whom he accordingly imparted his complaint of the Queen's " perverseness and ill-humours," and requested his assist- ance in his endeavour to break down her resistance to his project. Clarendon, though he knew of what had taken place in the Presence Chamber, had hitherto not heard of this pro- posal ; and he made bold to speak his mind pretty freely to the King, censuring particularly "the hard-heartedness and cruelty in laying such a command upon the Queen, which flesh and blood could not comply with," and urging many other good reasons of policy against his adhering to it. In answer, the King acknowledged that what his Chancellor said proceeded no doubt from affection for him; but he declared that he was bound in conscience and honour to do the utmost he could for her, "he would always avow to have a great friendship for her, which he owed as well to the memory of her father as to her own person ; and that he T 274 A SliORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. would look upon it as the highest disrespect to him in any- body who should treat her otherwise than was due to her own birth, and the dignity to which he had raised her. That he liked her company and conversation, from which he would not be restrained, because he knew there was and should be all innocence in it ; and that his wife should never have cause to complain if she would live towards him as a good wife ought to do, in rendering herself grateful and acceptable to him, which it was in her power to do." He added that he had proceeded so far in the business, and was so deeply engaged in it, that not only would the lady be exposed to all imaginable contempt if it was not carried through, " but his own honour would suffer so much, that he should become ridiculous to the worlds and be thought, too, in pupilage under a governor. Therefore he should expect and exact conformity from his wife herein, which should be the only hard thing he would ever require from her, and which she herself might make very easy, for the lady would behave herself with all possible duty and humility unto her, which if she should fail to do in the least degree she should never see the King's face again : and that in the future he would undertake never to put any other servant about her without first consulting her and receiving her consent and approba- tion." He concluded by saying that nothing should make him recede from the resolution he had taken ; and that he required Clarendon to use all the persuasive arts, of which he was master, to induce the Queen to comply with his wishes. Such a duty was not one that any man would willingly have had cast upon him, especially considering the isolated and forlorn condition of the young Queen ; least of all could it have been a congenial one to Lord Clarendon, to whom Catherine had been bidden by her mother to look for counsel and sympathetic guidance, and whom, as she touchingly assured him, she regarded as her only friend in England. Besides, the woman whom he was desired by the King to recommend as a lady of her bed-chamber, was one of his own bitterest personal enemies, hating him both on account of his grudging her the pernicious influence she wielded over the King, and on account of his forbidding his own wife to receive or even to notice her. CHARLES'S UNSHAKABLE DETERMINATION. 275 In these circumstances he was certainly hesitating to dis- charge the task assigned to him, if he was not actually endeavouiing to thwart the King in his project, when he received from his Majesty the following peremptory letter : '* Hampton Court, Thursday morning. " For the Chancellor. **I forgot when you were here last to desire you to give Broderick good counsel not to meddle any more with what concerns my Lady Castlemaine, and to let him have a care how he is the author of any scandalous reports, for if I find him guilty of such a thing, I will make him repent it to the last moment of his life. And now I am entered on this matter, I think it very necessary to give you a little good council, lest you may think that by making a farther stir in the matter you may divert me from my resolution, which all the world shall never do, and I wish I may be unhappy in this world, and in the world to come, if I fail in the least degree of what I resolved, which is of making my Lady Castlemaine of my wife's bed-chamber, and whosoever I find endeavouring to hinder this resolution of mine, except it be only to myself, I will be his enemy to the last moment of my life. You know how much a friend I have been to you : if you will oblige me eternally, make this business as easy to me as you can, of what opinion you are of; for I am resolved to go through with this matter, let what will come of it, which again I solemnly swear before Almighty God ; wherefore, if you desire to have the continuance of my friendship, meddle no more with this business, except it be to beat down all false and scandalous reports, and to facilitate what I am sure my honour is so much concerned in : and whomsoever I find to be my Lady Castlemaine's enemy in this matter, I do promise upon my word to be his enemy as long as I live. You may show this letter to my Lord Lieutenant, and if you have both a mind to oblige me, carry yourselves like friends to me in this matter. '* Charles R." The import of this letter there was no mistaking; and " the Keeper of the King's Conscience " had the disagree- able alternative plainly put before him, either of resigning the Great Seal, and incurring the King's eternal enmity, or of employing all his powers of persuasion and argument, to induce a friendless and inexperienced young woman, specially committed to his care, to enter into most intimate relations with a woman, whom he thought too infamous to associate with his own wife ! Clarendon was not long in making his election : and in- exhaustible were the plausible sophistries — set out with great diffuseness in his autobiography — with which, after the manner of politicians anxious to retain place and power, he 2/6 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. tried to excuse to his own conscience and to the world, his adoption of the baser alternative. It was, of course, not that he feared the displeasure of the King, nor that he clung to the lucrative post of the Lord Chancellorship. Not at all ! It was only his overwhelming sense of what was due to his sovereign and master, and his deep appreciation of the impera- tive exigences of the political situation, which compelled him to waive any objections he might have had, and to subordinate his individual predilections to the good of the State. With verbose and laboured cant of this sort, did Clarendon seek to justify himself for assuming the disgraceful role assigned him by the King ! Clarendon's first interview with Queen Catherine of Braganza, to try and induce her to conform to the King's wishes, was not much of a success. For when, in express- ing his regret at the misunderstanding that had arisen between their Majesties, he coolly did so in such a way as to show that the King imputed much blame to her, hinting also that he himself shared that view, she protested so passionately, and with such a torrent of tears, that there was nothing for him to do but to retire, stiffly observing " that he would wait upon her in a fitter season, and when she should be more capable of receiving humble advice from her ser- vants, who wished her well." Next day he came to see her again, and found her much more composed, and she vouchsafed to excuse the excite- ment which she had betrayed the day before, pathetically remarking that " she looked upon him as one of the few friends she had, and from whom she would most willingly at all times receive counsel, but that she hoped he would not wonder at, nor blame her, if having greater misfortunes upon her, and having to struggle with more difficulties, than any woman had ever been put to of her condition, she sometimes gave vent to that passion that was ready to break her heart." To this Clarendon hypocritically replied that "such was his devotion to her, that he would always loyally say to her what was best for her to hear, though it might not please her, and though it should render him ungracious in her eyes." On which Catherine humbly told him "that he should never be more welcome to her than when he told her of her faults." Of the permission thus accorded him, his lordship at once clarendon's interview with the queen. 277 took advantage, by explaining that her education, which had been almost entirely in a convent, had been such as to give her but little information "of the follies and iniquities of mankind," adding that otherwise "she could never have thought herself so miserable, and her condition so insupport- able as she seemed to think it to be." Whereupon " with some blushing, some confusion, and some tears," she stammered out that "she did not think that she should have found the King engaged in his affection to another lady — " and being unable from emotion to proceed further, gave the Chancellor the opportunity, as he tells us, of saying " that he knew well that she had been very little acquainted with or informed of the world." He added " that he came to her with a message from the King, which if she received as she ought to do, and as he hoped she would, she would be the happiest Queen in the world. . . . That he now dedicated himself entirely and without reserve to her ; and that if she met his affection with that warmth and spirit and good humour, which she well knew how to express, she would live a life of the greatest delight imaginable." This, and a great deal more in the same strain, Catherine heard with evident pleasure, thinking it all a prelude to an announcement that the King meant to renounce his design with regard to Lady Castlemaine. She accordingly begged Clarendon to help her "in returning thanks to his Majesty and in obtaining his pardon for any passion or peevishness she might have been guilty of, and in assuring him of all future obedience and duty." But the wily old Chancellor, having wheedled her up to this frame of mind, then proceeded to expound to her how fitting it was that her Majesty " should gratify this good reso- lution, justice and tenderness in the King, by meeting it with a proportionable submission and resignation on her part to whatsoever his Majesty should desire of her " ; and he then straightway proceeded to insinuate the full purport of his mission, namely, that the King wished her to make Lady Castlemaine a lady of her bed-chamber. He had, however, no sooner hinted at this, than she again burst out " with all the rage and fury she had shown yester- day, but with fewer tears, the fire appearing in her eyes, where the water was, declaring that the King's insisting on 2/8 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. such a condition could only proceed from hatred to her person, and his desire to expose her to the contempt of the world, who would think her worthy of such an affront, if she submitted to it, which rather than do so she would put her- self on board of any little vessel, and so be transported to Lisbon," and many other similar expressions, which out- burst Clarendon coldly interrupted by remarking that "she had not the disposal of her own person, nor could go out of the house where she was, without the King's leave " ; and he, therefore, advised her not to speak any more of Portugal, where many enough at Court already wished her to be ; and so, after advising her not to irritate the King by exhibiting any such feeHng as she had shown to him, or by giving him any definite or positive refusal to comply with his request, he left her. Such was the sort of chivalrous sympathy, which the highly religious and moral Clarendon thought it becoming to extend to the unfortunate Catherine ! He next had an interview with Charles, in which he told him of all the kind and conciliatory things she had said of him, assuring him that it was only her passionate love for him that made her, for the present, obdurate, and entreating him not to press her on the subject just for a few days. But Charles had other counsellors, who represented to him that what he contended for was not of so much importance in itself, as the manner of obtaining it ; that the point now involved was who should rule at Court, he or the Queen ; and that if he yielded now he would ever after be under the thumb of his wife. Advice of this sort was only too conson- ant with Charles's present mood, and that night, when he and Catherine met, "the fire flamed higher than ever," he reproaching her with stubbornness and want of duty, and she him with tyranny and want of affection ; talking loudly " how ill she was treated, and that she would return again to Portugal." To this he replied that she had better find out first whether her mother would care to have her back ; and that he would give her 'an opportunity of knowing this by sending to their home all her Portuguese servants, and that he would forthwith give orders for the discharge of them all, since they behaved themselves so ill ; for to them and their counsels he imputed all her perverseness." THE QUARREL INTENSIFIED. 279 The passion and noise of the encounter of that night reached too many ears to be a secret the next day ; and the BACK STAIRS TO THE GREAT HALL. whole Court was full of what ought to have been known to nobody. Besides, the mutual behaviour of their Majesties confirmed 280 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. all that had been heard, or could be imagined, for they did not speak to, and hardly looked at, each other, " Everybody," says Clarendon, "was glad they were so far from town, for they were still at Hampton Court, and that there were so few witnesses of all that passed. The Queen sat melancholic in her chamber in tears, except when she drove them away by a more violent passion in choleric discourse; and the King sought his divertissements in that company that said and did all things to please him." Affairs at the palace continued in this state for two or three days, at the end of which time Clarendon, at the in- sknce of the King, again saw the Queen, and entered into a long discussion with her, urging her, with the pharisaical cant of which he was so great a master, to yield to the King's demands, and blaming her for her vigorous resistance. The plea he chiefly used was that "as the husband would not impose a servant against whom just exceptions could be made ; so it was presumed that no wife would refuse to receive a servant that was esteemed and commended by her husband " — as if Lady Castlemaine was a woman that any man could truly regard as an estimable and a commendable companion for his wife ! — " and showing his trouble and wonder when she firmly declared, that however willing she might be to subordinate her personal feelings in the matter to those of the King," she could not, in conscience, give her consent. All his dexterous pleading, however, was without avail ; for the Queen declared to him her final determination that the King might do what he pleased, but that she would not consent to receive Lady Castlemaine as a lady of her bed-chamber. After this rebuff, Clarendon's part in the affair was at an end, and he retired from the contest, with the discredit of having failed to move the Queen's resolution, and still more with the dishonour of having stooped to accept the office of pander to the King's outrageous project. Charles now gave up all idea of influencing his wife in the matter through persuasion ; and tried instead what a little brutality would accomplish. Accordingly he seldom came into the Queen's presence, and when he did he treated her with studied coldness and indifference, neither speaking to nor noticing her. All this time he passed in the gay and care- HUMILIATIONS PUT ON THE QUEEN. 281 less company of those who, as Clarendon expresses it, " made it their business to laugh at all the world, and who were as bold with God Almighty as with any of his creatures "; and to make the Queen feel the more lonely, directed nearly all her Portuguese attendants to be shipped off back to Lisbon, with- out giving any reason for their sudden dismissal to the King and Queen of Portugal, and without offering them any re- muneration for having attended Catherine into England, so that she, not having as yet received any money of her own, had to see her old friends depart with their faithful services unacknowledged. That the cup of her humiliation might be filled, her law agent, who had undertaken to pay her dowry into the Treasury, and who, according to Charles, had made default, though, in fact, he had not, was thrown into prison ; while her venerable friend and relative, the Portuguese ambas- sador, was so grossly insulted on her account, that he was made ill, and after a long sickness " which all men believed would have killed him, as soon as he was able to endure the air, he left Hampton Court, and retired to his own house in the city." All this time Charles steadily pursued his point: Lady Castlemaine came to Hampton Court, and had apartments assigned her in the palace, and she was every day, with brazen face, flaunting herself in the Queen's presence, the King being in constant conversation with her, while the Queen sat alone and unnoticed, the courtiers ostentatiously flocking round Lady Castlemaine, whose favour they valued more than hers. If Catherine, resenting these indignities, rose to retire to her own room, scarcely any of those present troubled themselves to attend her; but the company re- mained in the room, while as she left she could hear the intentionally ill-suppressed whispers and titterings, levelled at her "prudery." Charles, who at the outset of the mis- understanding had appeared worried and dejected, now assumed an air of the most perfect gaiety and good-humour, which made her feel — as it was intended to do — her isolation the more acutely. " On all occasions she was forced to see that there was a universal mirth in all company but in hers, and in all places but in her chamber " ; and while her even- ings were spent alone, those of the King were passed among 282 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. his boon companions, men and women, at jolly supper parties, the jokes and incidents of which were the one topic of conversation and laughter by the whole Court the next day — so that in everything, and at all times, the Queen should always feel completely " out of it." Never, in truth, was a woman, much less a Queen, placed in a more humiliating and cruel position ; and it is a marvel that she should have endured it so long. At last, however, overwhelmed by the misery of her situation, and her spirit beaten down by the reiterated slights put upon her, she thought it best to end the contest by yielding unreservedly to her husband's wishes. Suddenly, one day, when least expected, Catherine condescended first to notice, then to speak to, Lady Castlemaine ; and soon after treated her with marked familiarity. " She was merry with her in public, talked kindly of her, and in private used nobody more friendly." From that time forward the struggle was at an end : the Queen, having submitted to the King's terms, at once. regained his goodwill, was admitted to share in all the gaieties that were going on, and, resuming her position in the Court, was henceforth treated with the respect due to the Queen of England. But though she purchased peace by this unconditional surrender, there were not wanting those who, though they had rendered her no assistance in her struggle with the King, now pretended that they had always " looked upon her with great compassion, commended the greatness of her spirit, and detested the barbarity of the affronts she underwent " ; and who censured her most severely for not persevering in her former dignified resistance. Conspicuous among these, and excelling them all in loath- some cant, was the man who had himself employed all his arts of sophistry and persuasion to induce her to accede to the King's demands, namely, the moral and religious Clarendon, who, in his autobiography, sharply blames her "for this sudden downfall and total abandoning her own greatness, this low demeanour, and even application to a person she had justly abhorred and worthily condemned" — the "downfall" he had himself tried to bring her to; the "abandoning her greatness," which he had himself coun- selled ; the " low demeanour " he had himself urged her to CHARLES II. AND HIS QUEEN RECONCILED. 283 adopt ! The baseness of the Pharisee could not sink to lower depths ! Almost immediately after the reconciliation between Charles and Catherine, they had to go together to Greenwich to pay a visit of welcome to the Queen-Mother, Henrietta Maria, who had just come over to England to offer in person her congratulations on their marriage. The King and Queen set out from Hampton Court on the 28th of July, attended by a brilliant suite, and after a very amicable visit of four hours' duration, they returned the same day to this palace, and supped together in public. The following day the King went up to town on business — or pleasure — "and in the evening the Queen, accompanied by her household, went to meet his Majesty on the road — a gallantry which the King so highly appreciated, that he expressed his -pleasure most heartily, which was much applauded by the Court." A day or two afterwards the Queen-Mother came to Hampton Court to return their visit. It must have been with sad and painful feelings that she revisited the palace in which she had first resided with Charles I., thirty-six years before, just after her own marriage ; and in which she had not set foot for twenty years, since their fatal flight from London in 1642, after the attempted arrest of the Five Members. When the Queen-Mother arrived, the King her son re- ceived her at the foot of the Great Hall stairs, and on her alighting led her up to the Hall, where the Queen, who was waiting for her, came forward to receive her. After the first greetings, they passed through the Hall and Guard Chamber to the Presence Chamber, were the two Queens seated themselves under the " cloth of state," or canopy, the Queen- Mother on the right of Queen Catherine, while the Duchess of York sat a little removed to the left. " The King and the Duke of York stood, and either one or the other acted as interpreters between the two Queens, for Catherine could not speak French, nor Henrietta Spanish, much less Portu- guese." Charles and Catherine dined in private with the Queen- Mother the first day of her arrival at Hampton Court, and in the afternoon the Duke and Duchess of York joined them 284 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. in the Queen's Chamber, where they heard her Majesty's Portuguese band." A few days afterwards she left Hampton Court and returned to Greenwich. Charles and Catherine, however, remained on here till the 23rd of August, the day fixed for their State entry into London, which took place by river, with all the magnificent aquatic pageantry which was usual in that age. They em- barked at Hampton Court in the afternoon in their own State barge, with the bargemen in their picturesque scarlet liveries, and were accompanied by the Duke and Duchess of York, Prince Rupert, his brother Prince Edward, and the Countess of Suffolk, the first lady of the bed-chamber to the Queen. The ladies and gentlemen of the Court followed in other barges. When they reached Teddington, a larger vessel, which drew too much water to have proceeded higher up the river, was in waiting to receive the royal party. This vessel had glass windows, and a crimson awning bordered with gold. At Putney was another barge, in which they were to make their public entry. It was fashioned like "an antique-shaped open vessel, covered with a state or canopy of cloth of gold, made in form of a cupola, supported with high Corinthian pillars, wreathed with flowers, festoons, and garlands." In it were four and twenty oarsmen clad in scarlet. All down the river the banks were lined with spec- tators, who gave the King and Queen a cordial reception ; and at every point the procession was joined by barges and boats of all sorts, until, as it neared Westminster, the river was so thick with them that the water could not be seen between. So, at any rate, we are informed by Pepys, who must have had a good view, as he was on top of the Banqueting House at Whitehall, and who computed the boats of all sorts that he saw in one sight to number at least a thousand. Evelyn, also, witnessed the scene in the barge of the Royal Society; and he gives the following graphic account of what he saw : " I was spectator of the most magnificent triumph that ever floated on the Thames, con- oidering the innumerable boats and vessels, dressed and adorned with all imaginable pomp, but above all the thrones, arches, pageants, and other representations, stately barges of the Lord Mayor and companies, with various inventions, music and peals of ordnance both from the vessels and the A SPLENDID AQUATIC PAGEANT. 285 shore, going to meet and conduct the new Queen from Hampton Court to Whitehall, at the first time of her coming to town. In my opinion it far exceeded all the Venetian Bucentoras, etc., on the Ascension, when they go to espouse the Adriatic." All this splendour and rejoicing must have seemed like a keen satire to poor Catherine, after all the humiliations she had lately been subjected to, and the misery she was suffer- ing still. But there was yet much more that she was to be called upon to endure. Only a fortnight after her triumphal entry into the capital, we hear of her having to drive away from a ball given by the Queen-Mother at Somerset House, in one coach with the King, Lady Castlemaine, and young Crofts (afterwards Duke of Monmouth). Well might she reply to Lady Castlemaine — who bounced into her bedroom one day, as she was at her toilet, saying, impertinently, " I can't think how you can have the patience to sit so long a-dressing ; " — well might she reply, " Madam, I have so much reason to use patience, that I can well bear such a trifle." CHAPTER XXL HAMPTON COURT UNDER CHARLES II. AND JAMES II. After Charles II.'s long sojourn with his Queen at Hamp- ton Court in the summer of 1662, he rarely came to stay for any considerable time, as he much preferred to pass his time amid the gaieties and dissipations of Whitehall or Newmarket. Nevertheless, he paid occasional visits here, and the State Apartments were always kept ready for his reception ; and alterations and improvements were continually being made in and about the palace. Among these was the fitting up of a suite of rooms for the use of Lady Castlemaine, who always insisted in being most luxuriously housed in all the royal palaces. In the meantime the palace was frequently visited by 286 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. foreigners of distinction, who in this reign came in consider- able numbers to travel in England, and of whom several have left us records of their impressions. Among them was the Due de Monconys, who drove down here in a coach and six on the 23rd of June, 1663, accompanied by M. de la Moliere ; and who remarked of the country which he traversed, that it was wonderfully beautiful, like it is everywhere in England. What struck him most in the palace itself was the mass of towers, turrets, cupolas, pinnacles and ornaments of all sorts which pro- duced a confusion that was not unpleasing. In the garden he noticed the fountain, " composed of four syrens in bronze, seated astride on dolphins, between which was a shell, supported on the foot of a goat. Above the syrens, on a second tier, were four little children, each seated, holding a fish, and surmounting all a large figure of a lady — all the figures being of bronze, but the fountain itself and the basin of marble." This description evidently refers to the same fountain as the one noticed by Evelyn, the statues of which he states to be by Fanelli. The figure at the summit was, according to the Inventory of 1659, a statue of Arethusa: though as she holds a golden apple in her hand, it seems probable that it represents Venus. It was afterwards moved by William III. into the centre of the great basin in Bushey Park, where it has since been known as "the Diana fountain" — a misnomer, which it probably acquired from the sylvan surroundings of its present position, and which it would now be difficult to correct. After August, 1662, we do not hear of Charles or his Queen being at Hampton Court until June 29th, 1665, when they retired here from Whitehall, on account of the plague, which had been raging already for some time in London, and which was now rapidly increasing and spread- ing, the deaths in the capital alone amounting to two thousand a week. Here the Court remained about a month, in comparative security and isolation ; though the King went frequently to Sion to transact business with the Council, which met there for greater safety. The quarantine between London and Hampton Court ANECDOTE OF VERRIO. 287 was not so strict, however, that it did not allow of Pepys coming down to the palace occasionally. On Sunday, July 23rd, he notes : " To Hampton Court, where I followed the King to chapel and there heard a good sermon ; and after sermon with my Lord Arlington, Sir Thomas Ingram, and others, spoke to the Duke about Tangier, but not to much purpose. I was not invited anywhere to dinner, though a stranger, which did also trouble me; but yet I must re- member it is a Court, and indeed where most are strangers ; but, however. Cutler carried me to Mr. Marriott's, the house- keeper, and there we had a very good dinner and good company, amongst others Lilly the painter." On the 26th of July the King went down the river for the day to Greenwich and Woolwich, where he was met by Pepys, who came the day after to Hampton Court to see him and the Queen set out for Salisbury, whither they went on account of the increase of the plague in the environs of London. Afterwards he saw the Duke and Duchess of York, who were going northwards ; and he kissed the duchess's hand ; " and it was the first time I did ever, or did see anybody else, kiss her hand, and it was a most fine white and fat hand. But it was pretty to see the young, pretty ladies dressed like men, in velvet coats, caps with ribbons, and with lace bands, just like men." Charles H. continued to the end of his reign to pay occasional flying visits here ; and to his latter years belongs an anecdote told of Verrio the painter, who had done much decorative work for the King in the way of painting ceilings and staircases. Verrio, it seems, was very extravagant, and kept a most expensive table, so that he often pressed the King for money with a freedom, which his Majesty's own frankness indulged. "Once at Hampton Court, when he had but lately received an advance of ;^i,ooo, he found the King in such a circle that he could not approach him. He. called out : ' Sire, I desire the favour of speaking to your Majesty.' 'Well, Verrio,' said the King, 'what is your request ? ' Money, Sir, money ; I am so short of cash, that I am not able to pay my workmen ; and your Majesty and I have learnt by experience, that pedlars and painters cannot give long credit.' The King smiled and said he had but lately ordered him ;£"i,ooo. 'Yes, Sir,' replied he, 'but that 288 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. was soon paid away, and I have no gold left.' *At that rate,' said the King, * you would spend more than I do, to maintain my family.' 'True,' answered Verrio, 'but does your Majesty keep an open table as I do ? '" The reign of James II. was, as far as the history of Hampton Court is concerned, an uneventful one ; for it is not certain whether, as King, he ever passed a single night in the palace ; though he seems to have held a Council here about the 29th of May, 1687, at which "the militia was put down and the licensing of ale-houses was put in other hands than the justices of the peace." James, however, was frequently in the neighbourhood of Hampton Court, namely at Hounslow Heath, which adjoins the outskirts of Bushey Park, and on which was encamped during the year 1687 the army of 16,000 men, on whose support he relied to carry out his schemes against the liberties of the English people. But his armed force was regarded, by his subjects, with little else but derision; of which we have a good example in the contemptuous irony of the following lines, published at the time : " Near Hampton Court there lies a Common, Unknown to neither man nor woman ; The Heath of Hounslow it is styled ; Which never was with blood defiled, Though it has been of war the sea^ Now three campaigns, almost complete. Here you may see great James the Second (The greatest of our Kings he 's reckoned) A hero of such high renown, Whole nations tremble at his frown ; And when he smiles men die away In transports of excessive joy." We have a reminiscence, also, of this reign in the canopy, now in the Queen's Audience Chamber, which was removed here from Windsor Castle, and under which King James there received the Papal Nuncio — an incident which gave deep offence to his Protestant subjects — and another in the old cast-iron fire-back in the Queen's Gallery, which bears the royal arms, his initials, I. R., and the date 1687. ACCESSION OF WILLIAM AND MARY. 289 CHAPTER XXII. WILLIAM AND MARY AT HAMPTON COURT. The accession of the Prince and Princess of Orange to the English throne marks as great an epoch in the history of Hampton Court as it does in that of England, for it was during their reign, and under their superintendence, that the greater part of the old Tudor State Apartments was pulled down, the new palace erected, and the parks and gardens laid out in the form in which we behold them at present. Until their proclamation as King and Queen, on February 13th, 1689 — the day after Mary's arrival in London, and three months after the landing of William at Torbay — William had been too engrossed with affairs of State to find time to visit any of the royal palaces out of London ; but when once firmly seated on his father-in-law's throne, he began to look about him for some place where, without being too far away from his ministers, he might be free from the press and crowd of Whitehall, and give full indulgence to his unsociable inclinations. With this object in view he soon turned his attention to Hampton Court, and, ten days after the proclamation, came down with the Queen to spend two or three days here. With its situation, and the aspect of the surrounding land- scape, William was at once captivated : for not only did the flatness of the country remind him of the scenery of his own dear home in Holland, but even from the very windows of the palace he could look out on a long straight canal, fringed with avenues of lime trees, such as met his eye at Haarlem and the Hague. The seclusion of the place also, combined with its convenient proximity to the capital, rendered it just such a residence as he was in search of. Accordingly, after paying several short visits to this palace, he and Queen Mary moved hither for a more prolonged stay, at the beginning of March. U 290 A SHORT HtSTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. While William was attending to business, Mary amused herself by inspecting everything, walking out five or six miles a day, superintending the gardening, making fringe, and playing basset, and doubtless doing as she had done at Whitehall, on her first arrival as Queen, where she went from room to room, looking at all the arrangements, and sleeping in the same bed where the Queen of James II. had slept. The Duchess of Marlborough, who was in attendance on her when she first arrived, tells us that she ran about " looking into every closet and conveniency, and turning up the quilts upon the beds, as people do when they come into an inn, and with no other sort of concern in her appearance but such as they express." Evelyn's testimony is to a like effect : " She smiled upon all, and talked to everybody ; so that no change seemed to have taken place at Court as to queens, save that infinite throngs of people came to see her, and that she went to our prayers." In this last particular, however, the zeal of the newly-installed sovereigns rather outran their discretion ; for it was complained of the Queen that her Protestant feeling was so deep as to lead her to suppress the fiddlers and other musicians who used to play in the Chapel Royal ; while the King set his face against any church music at all, and deeply offended the prejudices of English ecclesiastics by adhering to the Dutch custom of wearing his hat in chapel. It was here, also, that he shocked the religious feelings of many of his new subjects by scoffing at the old English custom of touching for the King's evil — a superstition consecrated by the usage of centuries, and sanctioned by the highest authorities in the Church. The close of Lent was the usual time for the ceremony ; and the fact of the King being at twelve miles' distance from London did not prevent a crowd of poor scrofulous wretches flocking from the capital to Hampton Court, to crave the magical virtue of the kingly touch. They received, however, but little medical consola- tion at the end of their laborious journey. "It is a silly superstition," exclaimed William ; " give the poor creatures 4 some money, and let them go." Previous to this. Queen Mary had written to a friend of hers in Holland, giving her impressions of Hampton Court, and saying that, though the air was very good, the place had oeen much neglected, and was, in her opinion, wanting in NEW ROYAL APARTMENTS DETERMINED ON. 29I many of the conveniences of a modern palace. William was of the same opinion. " The King," says Burnet, " found the air of Hampton Court agreed so well with him, that he re- solved to live the greatest part of the year there ; but that palace was so very old built and so irregular, that a design was formed of raising new buildings there for the King and Queen's apartments." The architect to whom was intrusted the designing of the new apartments was Sir Christopher Wren, by whose aid he hoped to rear an edifice that might in some degree vie with, if it could not excel, the palatial splendours of Versailles. This, of course, determined the architectural style of the building, which — our own old English Gothic being then in great disrepute — was to be that of the debased Renaissance of Louis XIV. Wren's task was, as a consequence, no easy one ; for he had to unite his own to another work, totally different in style, and yet do so in such a manner as to main- tain an appearance of consistence in the whole design, and to exhibit no glaring incongruity. This result, at any rate — whatever we may think of the new building iii other respects — Wren, it must be confessed, has been pretty successful in attaining; partly through having employed red brick, with dressings of white stone in the windows, doors, and string courses, as in the old Tudor work, and partly, also, by arranging the new buildings into the shape of a quadrangle, in conformity with the plan of Henry VHL's old Cloister Green Court, on the site of which Wren's new State Apart- ments stand. When we learn that, in addition to working with these fetters on his constructive skill. Wren had to consult William III.'s taste in everything, and to defer to his sovereign's judg- ment instead of following his own, it is not surprising that the building, as it was finally completed, should scarcely be worthy of the great architect's genius. Horace Walpole, indeed, tells us, on the authority of a descendant of Sir Christopher's, that he submitted another design for the alteration of the ancient palace " in a better taste, which Queen Mary wished to have executed, but was overruled." If this, however, means that an imitation of the old Tudor building was projected, we cannot but be glad, with Wren's mock Gothic Towers at Westminster before our 292 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. eyes, that the style selected was one with which he was more familiar. In any case, it is much to be regretted that King William should have deemed it advisable to destroy Henry VIII.'s old State Rooms, with the galleries, towers, and turrets appurtenant to them; which comprised the most interesting parts of the old palace, and were impressed with the historic associations of two centuries. The new apart- ments he wished to build might, one would suppose, have been erected without any demolition of the older structure. Altogether, we heartily wish that William of Orange, foreigner as he was, had never thought of laying his irreverent hand at all on the ancient home of our English Kings and Queens. That he should have had any senti- mental feeling about preserving and perpetuating the charm- ing old red-brick courts with their mullioned windows, quaint gables, and moulded chimney shafts, or the curious chambers in which so many interesting events had occurred — with their fretted ceilings, their latticed casements, their old stained glass, and their gorgeous tapestries — could not be expected ; but, leaving the old palace intact, he might have carried out instead the idea, which he is believed to have entertained at one time, of erecting an entirely new palace at the west end of the town of Hampton, on an elevation about half a mile from the River Thames, which design, however, is said to have been abandoned on account of the time necessary for such an undertaking. However this may be, we can say for certain that William and Mary's existing quadrangle was far from being the whole building that the King and his architect contemplated erect- ing at Hampton Court. For it is expressly stated in Wren's " Parentalia " that the apartments built for the King and Queen were " a part only of the Surveyor's design for a new Palace there " ; and in the Office of Her Majesty's Works there is preserved a careful and detailed plan — probably drawn by the hand of Sir Christopher himself — for a magni- ficent new Entrance Court to the palace, on the north side, and an approach to it from Bushey Park, which improve- ments would doubtless have been carried out, as essential adjuncts to the new apartments actually erected — to say nothing of schemes still more grand and extensive, which we ohall notice in a subsequent chapter — had not want of WILLIAM'S RUDENESS TO PRINCESS ANNE. 295 money delayed the works, and the death of King Williai. supervened, before his projects were completed. The fact that we do not, therefore, see Wren's entira design should be borne in mind when criticising his work at Hampton Court, especially if we are disposed to find fault with the insignificance of the approach. While William and Mary were busying themselves with plans and suggestions for the new buildings, preparations were actively going on in London for their coronation, and in view of that great event, their Majesties publicly received the sacrament in the Chapel at Hampton Court from the hands of the Archbishop of York, on the 31st of March. A few days after, they went to London for their coronation in Westminster Abbey, on April nth; but they soon re- turned to the palace again. Here they were joined by the Princess Anne, who took up her abode at Hampton Court, where a suite of rooms had been prepared for her reception, in expectation of her approaching confinement. But in spite of her condition, she was treated with no civility or kindness by her sister and her brother-in-law, and sometimes with positive disrespect and indignity, William not only refusing to let her have the allowance settled on her, but scarcely giving her enough for her commonest wants. " I could fill many sheets," says the Duchess of Marlborough, " with the brutalities that were done to the Princess in this reign. William III. was, indeed, so ill-natured, and so little poHshed by education, that neither in great things nor in small had he the manners of a gentle- man. I give an instance of his worse than vulgar behaviour at his own table, when the Princess dined with him. It was in the beginning of his reign, and some weeks before the Princess was put to bed of the Duke of Gloucester. There happened to be just before her a plate of green peas, the first that had been seen that year. The King, without offering the Princess the least share of them, drew the plate before him and devoured them all. Whether he offered any to the Queen I cannot say, but he might have done that safely enough, for he knew she durst not touch one. The Princess Anne confessed, when she came home, that she had so much mind for the peas that she was afraid to look at them, and yet could hardly keep her eyes off them." 294 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. The regal dinner hour was half-past one, or two at the latest. Supper took place at half-past nine ; if Queen Mary had to write a letter or despatch at eleven at night, she could not keep her eyes open. Except for brief excursions, William was rarely seen beyond the precincts of Hampton Court, and great dissatisfaction was already beginning to be expressed, in various quarters, at the King's spending so little of his time in London. Even his ardent supporter. Bishop Burnet, is constrained to admit the justice of the complaint. " The King," he says, " a very few days after he was set on the throne, went out to Hampton Court, and from that palace came into town only on council days : so that the face of a court and the rendez- vous, usual in the public rooms, was now quite broken. This gave an early and general disgust. The gaiety and diver- sions of a court disappeared." The founding of an English Versailles was, in fact, an idea in every way repugnant to the ordinary Londoner ; "and," as the Bishop adds, " the enter- ing so soon on so expensive a building afforded matter of censure to those who were disposed enough to entertain it." Reresby also mentions that Lord Halifax, the minister, told him " that the King's inaccessibleness and living so at Hampton Court altogether, and at so active a time, ruined all business ; that he had desired him to be in town some- times.", He pointed out to him also the inconvenience it entailed on his ministers, who, every time they went to see him, lost five hours in going and coming. But the King would listen to no remonstrances. " Do you wish to see me dead ? " he asked, peevishly. His absence from the seat of government was the more inconsiderate at this time, as a question of the very highest importance was just then being debated, namely, what should be the provisions of the Bill of Rights, and especially whether the crown should be entailed on the Electress Sophia and her issue. This last point was rendered the more pressing as misgivings were beginning to arise whether the Princess Anne would ever have a child at all, in which case the ultimate chances of the descendants of the Electress would be of more immediate interest. But in the middle of the discussion such doubts were laid at rest. For on the 24th of July, — as announced in the BIRTH OF WILLIAM, DUKE OF GLOUCESTER. 295 "London Gazette," — "about four o'clock in the morning, her Royal Highness the Princess Anne of Denmark was safely delivered of a son at Hampton Court. . . . Her Royal Highness and the young Prince are very well, to the great satisfaction of their Majesties, and the joy of the whole Court, as it will, doubtless, be of the whole kingdom." The birth of a young prince — a fact which would, at any rate for a while, allay the national anxiety as to the succes- sion — could not fail to be received with delight, not only by the partisans of the Revolution, but also by the many Englishmen whose chief concern was for a peaceful solution of the political difficulties. At various places the news was hailed with public rejoicings, with the ringing of bells, and the burning of bonfires. William himself, in spite of the aversion with which he regarded the Princess Anne, was careful to mark his sense of the importance of the event by standing sponsor to the child, and giving him his own name, William. Compton, Bishop of London, formerly tutor to the Queen, was selected to perform the baptism ; and the accomplished Dorset, who was then Lord Chamber- lain, and with whom the Princess had taken refuge just eight months before, when she deserted her father, represented the King of Denmark. Lady Halifax, wife of the famous ** Trimmer," now Lord Privy Seal, was godmother. The ceremony took place on Saturday the 28th of July, in the evening, in the Chapel, where just a hundred and fifty years before had been baptized Henry VHI.'s infant son, Edward. The King declared at the font that he was to be known as the Duke of Gloucester. [n the meanwhile the works for the new palace were being actively proceeded with ; and by the time the Prince was born, the demolition of the old Cloister Green Court would appear to have been completed, and the foundations of the new building already laid. John Evelyn tells us that he went to Hampton Court on the i6th of July, 1689, on business, the Council being there, and that " a great apart- ment and spacious gardens with fountains was beginning in the Park at the head of the canal." The canal, which, as already explained, was dug by order of Charles H., and which originally reached close up to the old East Front of the Tudor palace, had been laid out in 296 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. such a direction as to make its central line intersect that frontage at right angles, exactly through the middle of the gateway. Naturally, therefore, this was now the ruling limitation in the planning of the foundations of Wren's new State Apartments, the intention being — as is clearly shown by a delineation made by Sir Christopher for William III., and preserved among his papers in the Library at All Souls' College, Oxford — that the hne of the Long Canal, and those of the diverging side avenues, should converge on the centre point of the new East Front, where, of course, the main en- trance on that side would be. The length of the East Front is 300 feet, and the width of the east range 68 feet. As the shape of the new buildings was to be rectangular, according to the rules of pseudo-classic architecture, the direction of the South Front was at once determined. Its length is 315 feet, and the width of the range 78 feet. Thus we have two of the sides of the new quadrangle ; which was completed, on the north by a range 42 feet wide, built parallel to the Chapel, and on the west by a low connecting gallery or screen, 109 feet in width, not extending in height above the first floor, and erected only a few feet distant from the old western side of Henry VIII.'s Cloister Green Court. The internal dimensions of this quadrangle — now known as "the Fountain Court" — do not, it is strange to say, form a perfectly rectangular space, for though the north and south sides are each 116 feet 10 inches long, the east and west sides differ in length to the extent of 13 inches, the east side being no feet i inch, while the west is only 109 feet long. How this arose, there is nothing to show. Such was the ground-plan of the edifice which Evelyn saw rising on the site of the recently demolished Tudor court ; and from the configuration of the walls, so far as then completed, he can have seen that though the projected building might be grand, massive, and spacious, it would be wanting in most of the elements of originality or picturesque- ness. By the " spacious gardens with fountains beginning in the Park," Evelyn means the present Great Fountain or Public Garden, which lies on the east side of the palace. The preliminary steps towards forming a new garden out of the park had already been taken, it would seem, by Charles IT., 298 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. who planted the large semicircle of lime trees on this side of the palace. It was indeed a fine idea of his thus to link together the converging ends of the great avenues with a grand and bold curve of lime trees, which, sweeping round to the line of the East Front of the palace, and to the walls of the old gardens, inclosed a great semicircular space of g~ acres : and the design of laying out this space as a splendid fountain-garden, was equally apt and judicious on the part of William and Mary. The bird's-eye view after Kip's contemporary en- graving will give the reader an idea of the whole scheme. The plan of the gardens, we are assured by Defoe in his account of Hampton Court in the " Tour through the whole Island of Great Britain," was " devised by the King himself; and especially the amendments and alterations were made by the King or the Queen's special command, or both, for their Majesties agreed so well in their fancy, and had both so good a judgment in the just proportion of things, which are the principal beauties of a garden, that it may be said they both ordered everything that was done." In carrying out their magnificent scheme, they invoked the aid and advice of George London, a pupil of Rose, the famous gardener of the time of Charles IL, and his suc- cessor in the post of Royal Gardener, to which he was appointed immediately after the Revolution, at a salary of ;£"2oo, and in addition made a page of the backstairs to Queen Mary. With London was associated another in- genious gardener named Henry Wise, who entered into a sort of partnership with him, and worked in conjunction with him in all the improvements that he carried out in the gardens and parks of Hampton Court. It is doubtless to London or Wise that Defoe alludes, when, in mentioning the gardening operations undertaken by William and Mary at Hampton Court at the beginning of their reign, he tells us that " the fine parcel of limes, which form the semicircle on the south [? east] front of the house, by the iron gates, looking into the park, were, by the dexterous hand of the head gardener removed, after some of them had been almost thirty years planted in other places, though not far off." This remark — had we not the authority of Switzer for ascribing the great semicircle to Charles II.— would have THE GREAT SEMICIRCULAR GARDEN. 299 led us to suppose that the lime trees in question were first planted at this time by William and Mary ; but we conceive that on this point Switzer's positive and certain statement must be conclusive, as he shows intimate acquaintance with Hampton Court, and probably worked in these very gardens himself, under London and Wise, whose pupil he was, and whose works he details ; while Defoe wrote thirty-five years after the event from hearsay information, which he may have misunderstood or misapplied. It may, however, be that the semicircle was at this time enlarged and extended, and the lime trees shifted further eastward in the park ; though it is equally probable that Defoe is alluding to the subsequent removal, in 1699 ^^^ 1700 — five years after the death of Queen Mary — of those lime trees, which were on the circumference of the semicircle nearest the palace, and the shifting of which was necessitated, as we shall see when we reach that period, by the extension of the gardens down to the river on the south, and to the Kingston Road on the north, so that the limes in front of the palace no longer form a complete semicircle, but only a segment of one, and instead of reaching to the line of the facade, turn off at a distance of fifty yards from it, in a parallel direction. Throughout the months of August and September in the year 1689 William and Mary remained in seclusion at Hampton Court ; but on the last day of September, William left Hampton Court for Newmarket, in order to be present at the autumn meeting, and returned to the palace on the loth, quite " cleaned out," for besides having had a bad time of it on the race-course, he was very "hard hit" at cards, at which he played every night, and lost as much as four thousand at one sitting. A few days after, instigated perhaps by the remonstrances of his ministers and the com- plaints of the public against his being at a distance from London, he removed from this palace to Holland House for the winter. 300 A SVIORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. CHAPTER XXIII. QUEEN MARY AT HOME IN HER NEW PALACE. Pending the completion of the new State Apartments, which in any case could not, even with the most urgent despatch, be got ready for the King and Queen's occupation for a considerable time, their Majesties were desirous of having a set of rooms fitted up with all the modern conveniences of that day, in some part of the old palace, where they might reside in comfort, while superintending the buildings and the laying out of the new gardens. This need was felt especially by the Queen, who was already greatly attached to Hampton Court, and who liked to retire to it whenever she could get away from London, during her husband's long absences in Ireland and abroad. Accordingly she fixed upon a building, at one tirxie occu- pied by Queen Elizabeth when Princess and under restraint by order of her sister, and occasionally assigned to visitors at Court, but chiefly used as a landing-place from the river, and thence known as the " Water Gallery," which, by its detached situation, at some distance from the main building, was admirably adapted for the purpose of a temporary resid- ence while the new palace was being finished. It was, therefore, about this time, put into the hands of the decorators and furnishers, who soon made of it, under the Queen's direction, "the pleasantest little thing within doors that could possibly be made, with all the little neat curious things that suited her conveniences." Here Mary delighted to take up her abode : and her retreat would do credit to any aesthetic lady of the present day. The decoration of the rooms was superintended by Sir Christopher Wren, and included painted ceilings and panels, richly carved doorways and cornices, with festoons of fruit and flowers in limewood by the delicate hand of Grinling Gibbons, oak dados, hangings of fine artistic needlework, and corner fireplaces with marble mantelpieces surmounted THE WATER GALLERY FURNISHED. 3OI by diminishing shelves, on which were placed many rare and curious pieces of oriental and blue and white china. The taste for this she was the first to introduce into England, and for her choicest specimens she had cabinets specially made by Gerrard Johnson, a clever cabinet-maker of the time, which were placed in a room called " the Delft-Ware Closett," and many of which may now still be seen in various of the State Rooms. Other rooms of hers in the Water Gallery were : " the Looking Glass Closett," which she en- gaged James Bogdane, the fashionable painter of animals, to decorate for her ; her " Marble Closett " in the same suite, which was likewise finely painted and decorated ; and her "Bathing Closett," which was fitted with a white marble bath, " made very fine, suited either to hot or cold bathing, as the season should invite. She had also here a dairy, with all its conveniences, in which her Majesty took great delight," being once heard to say that she " could live in a dairy." Here, at the Water Gallery, and in the gardens close to it, Mary spent most of her time ; sometimes plying her needle on the balcony of beautiful wrought iron, which overhung the then uncockneyfied Thames, and watching the barges float to and fro ; sometimes superintending the laying out of the gardens, or attending to her botanical collection ; some- times discussing with Wren the details of the new building, and sometimes sitting at work with her ladies, beneath the shade of the curious intertwined trees, still known by the name of " Queen Mary's Bower." Her habit of working with her needle was much extolled by her sycophantic panegyrist Burnet, who, in his essay on her memory, declares that, " In all those hours that were not given to better employment, she wrought with her own hands ; and sometimes with so constant a diligence, as if she had been to earn her bread by it. It was a new thing, and looked like a sight, to see a Queen work so many hours a day." Specimens of her needlework, consisting of hangings and coverings for chairs, couches, and screens, were long shown at Hampton Court, and were described as " extremely neat and very well shadowed." They were all removed from the palace some years ago. It was in the Water Gallery, also, that the Queen had her 302 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. " Gallery of Beauties, being the Pictures, at full length, of the principal Ladies attending upon her Majesty, or who were frequently in her Retinue; and this was the more beautiful sight," in Defoe's opinion, ''because the originals were all in Being, and often to be compared with their pictures." Sir Godfrey Kneller was the artist who painted this series of portraits, henceforward known as "the Hampton Court Beauties," to distinguish them from Lely's Beauties of the Court of Charles II. " Of the Beauties of Hampton Court," remarks Horace Walpole, " the thought was the Queen's during one of the King's absences ; and contributed much to render her un- popular, as I have heard from the authority of the old Countess of Carlisle, who remembered the event. She added, that the famous Lady Dorchester advised the Queen against it, saying : ' Madam, if the King was to ask for the portraits of all the wits in his court, would not the rest think he called them fools?'" The Queen, however, would not be dissuaded; she apparently wished to emulate the enterprise of the Duchess of York, for whom Lely painted his series of " Beauties " ; and Kneller, on his part, entered thoroughly into the spirit of the idea, and did his best to rival his predecessor. But his productions, it must be confessed, cannot compare with their models, either as works of art or objects of interest. They are heavy in style, and have much sameness in their designs ; and the originals could boast of none of those romantic adventures, or piquant and scandalous anecdotes, which have immortalized the "Beauties" of the Merry Monarch. Kneller was knighted, however, for his perform- ance, and received besides a medal and a chain worth ;£^3oo. Lord Lansdowne, the poet, who knew all the ladies, and celebrated several of them in his verse, concludes his " Pro- gress of Poetry," by the following reference to them : " Oh, Kneller ! like thy picture were my song, Clear like thy paint, and like thy pencil strong, The matchless beauties should recorded be, Immortal in my verse, as in thy gallery." The " Hampton Court Beauties " remained at the Water THE OLD GREENHOUSE, WITH AN AMERICAN AGAVE IN FLOWER, AND OUEEN MARY's ORANGE TREES. 304 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. Gallery after the Queen's death, until that building was demolished on the completion of the new palace, on account of its obstructing the view, when they were placed in a room directly under the King's Guard Chamber, thenceforth called the " Beauty Room," where William III. used some- times to dine in private. Since the rearrangement of the pictures about forty years ago, they have adorned the walls of King William's Presence Chamber. While Queen Mary was living at the Water Gallery, she devoted much of her time to gardening, and she gathered to- gether here a number of choice exotics and other rare plants, for which she sent gardeners at great expense to Virginia, the Canary Islands, and other places. Her collection was in- trusted to the care of Dr. Plunkenet, a distinguished herbalist, whom she appointed her head gardener at a salary of ;^2oo a year, and who assisted her to raise many foreign, and especially tropical plants, from seed in the hothouses. Many of these were long preserved at Hampton Court; and, indeed, some remnants of her collection may still be seen in the Privy Garden — in the winter in the greenhouse and orangery, and in the summer ranged on the walk in front ot the south side of the State Apartments. Of the general appearance presented by the gardens at this time, a good idea can be formed from the plate already inserted at page 297, and that by Sutton Nicholls on page 309. In the Privy Garden there is to be noticed the long arbour of wych or Scotch elm, one of the most interesting curiosities of Hampton Court Gardens, usually known by the name of "Queen Mary's Bower." It is 100 yards in length, 20 feet high, and 12 feet wide, and the branches of the trees are so wonderfully intergrown and interlaced, as to form an avenue completely inclosed and roofed in. It was, perhaps, in existence prior to the building of the new palace and the alterations in the gardens ; for Evelyn tells us in his Diary, under date June 9th, 1662, that "the cradle-work of horne-beame, in the Garden, is for the perplexed twining of the trees very observable." The trees, however, are not hornbeam, but wych elm. During the summer of 1690, while William was in Ireland, Mary, who had been appointed Regent in his absence, was so busily occupied with public affairs in London, that she PROGRESS OF THE WORKS. 305 rarely had an opportunity of coming down to Hampton Court. She managed, however, to do so now and then, to see how things were getting on, and to report on the progress of the works to her husband. On these occasions, she by no means contented herself with a mere perfunctory and un- intelligent inspection : on the contrary, we are assured in Wren's " Parentalia " that " the Queen pleased herself from time to time in examining and surveying the drawings, con- QUEEN MARY S BOWER. trivances, and the whole progress of the present building, and in giving thereon her own judgment, which was exquisite ; for there were few arts or sciences in which her Majesty had not only an elegant taste, but a knowledge much superior to any of her sex in that, or, it may be, any former age." But the absence of the King, and the great expenses con- sequent on the war, made it very difficult to extract the re- quisite funds for carrying on the works, from a reluctant and deplenished Treasury. Mary, who was very anxious that the 306 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. new apartments should be got into a forward state against the King's return, and who had probably received letters from him exhorting her to press them on, writes to him on the subject on June 24th (O.S.), 1690: "As for the build- ings, I fear there will be many obstacles, for I spoke to Sir J. Lowther this very day, and hear so much use for money, and find so little, that I cannot tell whether that of Hampton Court will not be the worst for it, especially since the French are in the Channel, and at present between Portland and us, from whence the stone must come." Three weeks after, on the 12th of July, 1690, she came down to the palace to see how the works were progressing, arriving so early in the morning as to be able to see what she wanted, and get back to Whitehall by midday. On the night of the same day she wrote, while in bed at eleven o'clock, to tell the King that things were still going on very slowly, "want of money and Portland stone being the hindrances, and indeed, in a time when there are such pressing necessities, I am almost ashamed to speak about it, and yet it is become so just a debt that it ought to be paid." But though the debt amounted to ;£54,484, it remained un- liquidated for nearly ten years — a state of things that seems to have been chronic in those days, as far as the works at Hampton Court were concerned. As to the Portland stone, it was required for the frame- works of the windows, the string-courses and other stone ornaments in the new building ; and we may observe that through the want of it, the window-dressings of the top storey, on the inner side of the east range of Wren's quad- rangle, were put in with Bath stone. This stone, however, de- cayed so much in comparison with the rest of the stonework, that a few years ago it had to be restored, and was replaced in Portland stone — the deficiency which Queen Mary bewailed being thus at last made good, two hundred years later. The buildings were, by the beginning of 169 1, sufficiently advanced to enable William and Mary to judge what the general appearance of the new edifice would be. As we have already indicated, its form is a massive and imposing, rather than a beautiful block, in the debased pseudo-classic style of the later Italian Renaissance, with windows, square, round, and oblong, arranged uniformly on horizontal lines. GENERAL ASPECT OF THE NEW BUILDING. 307 The material used in its construction is red brick for the surface of the walls, relieved with Portland stone in the windows, doorways, coigns, string-courses, balustrades and other ornamental details, to harmonize with the older parts of the palace. But the red brick, which invests the gables, parapets, bay windows, turrets, and chimneys of the old irregulsurly built Tudor structure with so charmingly pictur- esque an air, produces, when employed in these large uniform EAST FRONT AND GREAT FOUNTAIN GARDEN. rectangular elevations, an impression of pretentious mean- ness rather than splendour or beauty. This, however, is due, not merely to the architectural style of Wren's palace, but also, in a great measure, to the difference in colour of the brickwork, which in the older building, besides being of a deeper and richer prevailing tone, varies, in different bricks, from light pinks to deep crimsons and purples, so that in a few square feet of wall space we may sometimes find a dozen or more different shades, while every brick in the new building is of an exactly similar tint of glaring scarlet, still 308 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. remaining as raw and untoned as ever after the lapse of exactly two centuries of time. Of this only a visit to Hampton Court can convey an adequate idea. But of the stiffness of outline and the sameness of architectural feature in the new palace, the reader can form some conception from the annexed facsimile of an engraving of the East Front. The main idea of Wren's design here, as also in the South Front and within the quadrangle, was evidently borrowed from some of the palaces, which he had seen during his travels in France ; and in regard to this facade to the east, he and his royal master, who supervised the works through- out, intending it to be the principal front of the new building — facing as it does the Great Fountain Garden and the canal and avenues of the House Park — resolved that it should be decorated with more lavishness than the rest of the new structure. On this account the compartment in the centre, which includes five out of the twenty-one bays, is all faced with stone, very richly ornamented and carved. On the ground floor, the entrance gates, occupying the three central bays, and leading from the cloisters of the new quad- rangle into the garden, are flanked by four rectangular stone piers supporting a stone plinth, on which stand four fluted columns of the Corinthian order. These columns them- selves flank the three middle windows of the first floor, and sustain a large triangular pediment, finely sculptured in bas- relief. On each side are two pilasters of the same order supporting a continuation of the entablature. The windows of the first or principal floor are those of the royal apartments, the three middle ones being the Queen's Drawing Room; the round windows above them light the entresol, or, to use the preferable old English word, the half-storey, which, in the case of the loftier State Rooms, is included in their height ; and the square windows of the top storey are those of the apartments assigned to various officials and attendants about the Court. The height of this, as well as of the South Front, is 60 feet 2 inches. The general architectural effect of this fa9ade has been well criticised by Dallaway, the editor of Walpole's " Anec- dotes " : " The innumerable mezzanine circular windows, placed under a range of others exactly square, a pediment beneath the balustrade obscuring others in part, and the 310 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. architraves of the central parts of the brick fronts profusely sculptured over the whole surface, leave little repose for the eye, and offend in that respect no less than the palaces of Borromini and Mansart." The fault, indeed, of the great pediment not rising above the balustrade, and not standing out, as it should, with only the sky as a background, is one so palpable and gross, that it would be strange if an architect with the ability and train- ing of Wren had perpetrated it of his own accord. Perhaps this was one of the points in which he had to submit to have his better judgment controlled and overruled by the whims and wishes of the King and Queen. Another salient defect is the protrusion, above the balus- trade, of the ugly and shapeless brick chimneys, appearing as incongruous excrescences, which the architect, as though ashamed of such features of mere use, had endeavoured in vain to conceal. This affords us an opportunity of con- trasting the pretentious artificialities of this style of archi- tecture with the truth and flexibility of the old English Gothic close by, where the chimneys, instead of being a disfigurement to the building, are treated as indispensable adjuncts to it, and are arranged in pleasing clusters of delicately moulded shafts, which form harmonious orna- ments to the whole design. Similar criticisms apply, in a general way, to the South Front, which is on a like plan, only varying from the East Front in having wings, 56 feet 6 inches wide, projecting 8 feet 4 inches from the main frontage, and in having its centre differently treated and less highly embellished. This last, in fact, simply consists of four plain unfiuted engaged Corinthian columns, supporting an entablature on which are inscribed the words : " gvlielmvs et maria r.r.f." — that is, " William and Mary, King and Queen, built [this Palace]," the initials "r.r.f." standing for the Latin words Rex Regina Fecerunt. Above the entablature are continuations of the columns in the form of four decorated pilasters, which extend through the balustrade, and on the tops of which formerly stood statues. The small stone pediments over the two windows midway between the centre and the wings are very finely decorated with stone carvings, consisting of cupids support- VARIOUS WORKS AND DECORATIONS. 311 ing shields with the arms of William and Mary, surmounted by crowns. These and other decorative carvings, as we shall see shortly, were executed a year or two later than the time of which we are just now treating, and appear to have been from the hand of a sculptor of the name of Caius Gabriel Gibber, father of the celebrated actor. Thus far as regards the East and South Fronts of_ the new palace. THE COLONNADE. But, in the meanwhile, the inward side of Wren's Quad- rangle was also being completed, and here, though the general design of the elevation is much the same as that of the two great fagades, it varies in having, on the ground floor, an open arcade of semicircular arches, supported on rectangular pillars or piers of stonework. The arches — from the inner sides of which branch brickwork groinings, forming the roof of the cloister and supporting the floor of the State Rooms above — are twelve in number on the north 312 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. and south sides, and eleven in number on the east and west. The height of the cloister is 1 2 feet. Lest the architectural critic should be disposed to blame Sir Christopher Wren for making these cloisters so low, we must record the fact, as stated in Wren's " Parentalia," that his Majesty " excused his surveyor for not raising the cloisters under the apartments higher ; which were executed in that manner according to his express order." Another portion of the work, perhaps the most creditable of all to Wren's genius, is the Colonnade in the Second or Clock Court, which was built across its south side to form an approach to the King's Great Staircase, and also to mask the irregular though picturesque range of buildings behind. Though out of place amidst Tudor surroundings, it is in itself very handsome. It consists of seven couples of Ionic pillars, with pilasters of the same order at either end against the wall, supporting an entablature and balustrade at the top. Over the two middle couples stand two large carved vases of stone ; and below are ornaments of foliage, masks, and various trophies of war. Its dimensions are : length, 89 feet 4 inches ; internal height, from floor to ceiling, 20 feet 6 inches ; external height, to the top of the parapet, 27 feet 9 inches. Throughout the years 1692 and 1693, though William and Mary were not often here, great activity prevailed in the new buildings, and the workmen were busily occupied in completing and filling in what had hitherto been little more than the outline and shell of the new palace. In the interior, staircases were being built, floors laid, and door- ways, windows, wainscot, and ironwork fitted ; while on the exterior, carvings and other decorative works were being executed by the most experienced hands. The old bills preserved in the Record Office afford us many curious particulars relating to these works, and the interest they possess in connection with the history of the palace, as well as the light they throw on the state of the decorative arts and the prices paid for artistic work, render some of them well worthy of notice here. Thus we find that Louis Laguerre, the well-known assistant and imitator of Verrio, and the painter of the great staircase at Petworth, and many of the apartments at DECORATION OF THE FOUNTAIN COURT. 313 Burleigh for Lord Exeter, was employed to decorate the twelve circular spaces of the round-window or half-storey on the south side of the Fountain Court, with frescoes, in chiaroscuro, of the Twelve Labours of Hercules. In this commission was also included the painting of four other similar spaces — doubtless those in the middle of the South Front — with representations of the Four Seasons. These last, however, though indicated in Sutton Nicholls's engrav THE FOUNTAIN COURT, ing of this facade, have now disappeared— all the eight "dummies " of this facade being now painted in imitation of windows, as, indeed, four of them had originally been by Laguerre himself. The " Labours of Hercules " are now much damaged by time and weather, although restored not very long ago, and their artistic merit can never have been very great. Yet jQ^6, which was the sum Laguerre received for the whole job, was wretchedly inadequate remuneration for painting sixteen 314 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. frescoes, each five feet in diameter, on a scaffold some fifty feet from the ground ! While he was engaged on this work, WiUiam III. gave him apartments in the palace; and he was also appointed, according to Horace Walpole, to repair Mantegna's nine splendid pictures of the "Triumph of Julius Caesar," which were at Hampton Court, and "had the judgment to imitate the style of the originals, instead of new-clothing them in vermilion and ultramarine." We cannot, however, but wish that his somewhat coarse brush had never been suffered to touch them at all. The carvers engaged to decorate the new palace were remunerated on a much more liberal scale — thus ;£^9i83J. 5^. was paid to William Emmett "for carving worke by him performed in and about sev" partes of the s^ New Buildings." It is not possible to identify precisely the portions of the work which he executed ; but we may, with some prob- ability, ascribe to him most of the subsidiary ornamental stonework, such as the garlands of flowers within the arches of the arcade in the Quadrangle, the stone framework of the round windows, which are carved to represent lions' skins, and the vases over the Communication Gallery. Other similar carvings, which we perhaps also owe to Emmett, are the vases and trophies over the cornice of the Ionic colonnade in the Clock Court, and the key-stones over the windows of the ground floor on the East and South Fronts, which key-stones are carved with heads and the initials of William and Mary in monogram. All this work, however, was doubtless performed under the supervision of GrinHng Gibbons, who — probably through the influence of Wren — had been appointed "master carver" of the works at Hampton Court, and who seems to have been as competent an artist in stone, as in that exquisite wood-carving, for which he is so generally famous, and some of the finest specimens of which may be viewed in this palace. Indeed, that he himself executed, with his own hand, a good deal of the ornamental stone-carving on the exterior of the new palace, seems evident from the entries in the old accounts, where we find that between the years 1691 and 1694, a debt of ^£^744 16s. od. was incurred towards " Grinlin Gibbons for carving by him performed in and about the ORNAMENTAL STONE-CARVINGS. 315 said buildings"; and again, in the accounts for the years 1694 to 1696, a large sum is entered as payable to "Grinlin Gibbons, Ma*" Carver, for carving comishes, moldings and picture frames; for architrave, freeze, sub-base and other carvers worke by him done in and about the s*^ Build- ings." AVhat were all the precise portions of the carver's work " in and about the said buildings " which emanated from Gibbons's chisel, it would be futile to endeavour to discover now. But we shall probably be correct in assigning to him the very fine and vigorous heads on the key-stones of the arches of the Fountain Court; while the second of the two entries just cited seems to prove that, besides the carv- ing in wood of cornices and picture frames, he executed most of the decorative stonework of the central compart- ment of the East Front — the frieze, in truth, betraying in an unmistakable manner the influence of his well-known style in wood, being carved with vases and baskets of flowers and fruits. The fine bas-relief, however, in the great pediment over the architrave is not from his hand — his lack of skill in composition or with the human figure doubtless accounting for the assignment of this task to another artist. That other sculptor, who received ;^40o for " Insculpting the ReUevo on the Timpan of the Great Frontispiece, with Iconologicall figures, and for sev" Journies of himself and men to look after the performance," was Caius Gabriel Gibber, " statuary," father of the celebrated Colley Gibber ; and he executed the work in question between the month of April, 1694, and the same month in 1696. It represents "The Triumph of Hercules over Envy," and seems to have been intended as a sort of compliment to King William III. — though in physique, at any rate, his Majesty was anything but a Hercules, and "Envy" was scarcely an apt emblem under which to personify the feelings of a dethroned monarch towards his usurping nephew and son-in-law, who had ejected him from his kingdom, robbed him of all his posses- sions, and seated himself in his place. Nevertheless, as a work of art it is admirable, and must be reckoned among the very best works of Gibber, who has hitherto been chiefly known to amateurs of sculpture by what he did at Chatsworth, and by his excellent figures of 3l6 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. Melancholy and Raving Madness, formerly before the front of Bedlam, and immortalized by Pope in that scathing couplet on his son, Colley Gibber : • ' Where o'er the gate by his famed father's hand Great Gibber's brazen, brainless brothers stand." Much Other carving about the palace was done by Gabriel Gibber, and in fact to him seems to have been intrusted most of the finer sculpture as distinguished from .the decora- tive embeUishments. Thus there is, in the old accounts, an item annexed to his name : " For carving two coates of armes in Portland stone, sev" statues and Figures in metall, and for carriage of the statues and other charges — ;£53o." The " coates of armes " are evidently the beautiful pieces of stonework, which surmount the small pediments over two of the windows on the first floor in the South Front, and which exhibit cupids supporting shields with the royal arms crowned. The statues and figures were doubtless some of those that formerly served to decorate the top of the palace and the gardens, but were removed to Windsor by George IV. Gabriel Gibber, we also find, carved for Hampton Gourt " a great Vauze of white marble, enricht with divers orna- ments, with a pedestal of Portland stone, also enricht " for a sum of ;!^i34 ; and there was a companion vase sculptured by one Edward Pearce, and described as " a great Vauze of white marble, all the figures enriched with leaves and fes- toons of shells, and Pedestal of Portland stone likewise all members enricht." It was evidently to these that Defoe refers, when, in his account of Hampton Gourt in 1724, he says : " At the entrance gate into the garden stand advanced, on two pedestals of stone, two marble Vases or Flower- Pots of most exquisite workmanship, the one done by an Englishman, the other by a German." Their pedestals still remain as formerly, but the vases are now at Windsor. Similar urns, vases, and statues were placed about the gar- dens in formal opposition to each other at measured points, on pedestals, on terrace walls, and on flights of steps. In decorations of this sort, and in designing and planning extensive schemes of gardening, rather than in the minutiae of botany and flower-beds, lay William III.'s predilection. STONE-CARVINGS BY GABRIEL GIBBER. 317 And what with levelling of ground and raising of terraces, cutting of drains and making of fountains, building of walls and erecting of iron gates, he had almost as much on hand, at this period, in the gardens, as in the new buildings. One of the ornamental works, which we owe to him, de- serves special notice. We refer to the splendid gates or screens of exquisitely wrought iron, which were made to inclose the gardens, and which remained in situ till some twenty-five years ago — the admiration and. delight of every appreciative visitor to Hampton Court. PEDIMENT OF A WINDOW IN THE SOUTH FRONT, SURMOUNTED BY WILLIAM AND MARY's COAT-OF-ARMS. They were designed by a Frenchman named Jean Tijou, as appears from a book of copper-plate engravings published by him in 1693, entitled " Nouveau Livre de Desseins, Invent^ et Dessine par Jean Tijou " (" A New Booke of Drawings Invented and Designed by John Tijou"), and described in French and in English as " Containing severall sortes of Ironworke as Gates, Frontispieces, Balconies, Staircases, Pannells, etc., of which the most part hath been wrought at the Royal Building at Hampton Court." From, this work we reproduce the annexed plate, showing one of the best screens and a pair of gates, from which the reader can judge how magnificent an embellishment they 3l8 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. formed to the gardens of Hampton Court, and how excellent was the workmanship lavished upon them. Indeed, they are the finest specimens of decorative ironwork ever executed in England, and it is doubtful whether that metal has ever, in any country or in any age, been moulded into forms more exquisitely delicate and graceful. The graceful curves of the foliated scroll-work, and the lightness and delicacy of the leaves, stems, and tendrils of the forged and beaten metal, are truly admirable, and reflect the greatest credit on the handicraftsman, whose artistic hammer and chisel wrought it into these beautiful shapes. The name of that handicraftsman is, as it happens, pre- served to us. He was one Huntingdon Shaw, of Nottingham, who is buried in Hampton Church. Formerly the designing, also, of these beautiful screens was attributed to Shaw ; but a suspicion that this was not altogether in accordance with fact suggested itself to the author when, on searching among the old Treasury Papers for Shaw's name, he failed to come across any reference to him — although the names and wages of all the artificers engaged on the works, from the great artists such as Cibber, Gibbons, Verrio, and Laguerre, down to the commonest labourers, are frequently mentioned. And this suspicion was confirmed, when among a " List of Debts in the Office of Works in 1701," preserved in the Record Office, an entry was found, under the heading of " Hampton Court Gardens," of ";^i,982 o^. 7^. due to John Tijou, Smith " — the conclusion being that in Tijou we must recog- nize the real author of these magnificent works of art. The clue thus afforded resulted in the discovery of the rare and curious book of Tijou's above cited, whereby the correctness of our surmise was demonstrated. To Shaw, however, there may still remain the honour of having, with unequalled skill and art, carried out the designs of the master, under whose immediate supervision he probably worked. The twelve superb screens themselves unfortunately no longer decorate the gardens for which they were made. They were removed to the South Kensington Museum in 1865, a time when Hampton Court was also denuded of Raphael's cartoons, and of much furniture and tapestry, to stock that institution, then in its struggling infancy. Their removal 320 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. was defended on the pretext that they were perishing from neglect and rust, as if they could not have been repaired, repainted, and taken care of where they stood ! Assuredly the time has arrived to consider, whether these splendid works of art should not all be restored to the royal palace, for which they were originally designed, where they would be seen by more people and to greater advantage, and whence, in the view of many, it was a mistake ever to have removed them. The sounder views that now prevail on questions of historic art, and the interest attaching to local association, should, we venture to think, effect this desirable restitution before long. (This was done in 1902.) Two of them, indeed, were afterwards, in deference to many protests, returned to Hampton Court, and are now placed, somewhat incongruously, in the Queen's Guard Chamber ; while five others are scattered about in various museums throughout England. To return to the current of our narrative. All the works above described were still in active operation, when on December 28th, 1694, Queen Mary, who had been taken ill with small-pox but a few days before, breathed her last at Kensington Palace. It is to be noticed, therefore, that her Majesty probably never occupied the State Apartments of the new palace, the construction of which she had watched with so lively an interest ; and further, that the works in the palace, gardens, and parks, which, one would infer from Macaulay's observations on William's improvements at Hampton Court, were carried out in a few months, were not in effect completed, as we shall find, for upwards of twelve years. After the demise of Queen Mary the works at Hampton Court came more or less to a standstill for several years ; for the King felt her loss so keenly as to care no more for the buildings and gardens, which they both had projected and superintended together. As Switzer observes : *' Upon the death of that illustrious Princess, gardening and all other pleasures were under an eclipse with that Prince ; and the beloved Hampton Court lay for some time unregarded." But early in January, 1698, an event occurred which in- duced King William to turn his attention once more to Hampton Court, and to make up his mind to complete what he had begun in conjunction with his wife. For, on the 4th WHITEHALL DESTROYED BY FIRE. 32 1 of that month, the famous palace of Whitehall, which had already been partially consumed by fire in 1691, was, through the carelessness of a Dutch washerwoman, reduced to a heap of smoking ruins. Without heeding the ridiculous accusation of the Jacobites, that the King himself instigated the firing of it, we can well believe that the destruction of that interesting shrine of English history — founded by Cardinal Wolsey, enlarged by Henry VI II., and sanctified by the memories and associa- tions of five generations of Tudors and Stuarts — affected William of Orange but little. For in our history he took small interest, and for English tradition or antiquities he had no reverence or sympathy; and from the eagerness with which he demoHshed the ancient State Apartments at Hampton Court, and abandoned Greenwich and Richmond, and other ancient palaces of the sovereigns of England, to neglect, we might almost suppose that there was some foun- dation for the notion of the followers of King James, that he had " an unconquerable aversion to inhabit the houses of the uncle he had driven out." We are, consequently, not surprised to learn that the flames, that devoured Wolsey's chapel and the "glorious gallery," that destroyed Holbein's splendid frescoes, and played round the Banqueting House of Inigo Jones, whence the Martyr- King had stepped forth on to the scaffold, though watched with grief and dismay by the inhabitants of London, excited little concern in the breast of the alien Prince. Perhaps, indeed, he viewed it with less than indifference ; for, abhor- ring as he did the right which every Londoner enjoyed, by a prescription too long to be gainsaid, of entering Whitehall and seeing the King sitting at table and dining in state, he probably welcomed the opportunity this conflagration afforded him of putting an end to a custom, which, though considered unobjectionable by the genial and popular Tudors and Stuarts, undoubtedly was excessively obnoxious and irk- some to his shy, unsociable nature, and his exclusive habits, and to that " disgusting dryness," which, even according to his toady Bishop Burnet, " was his character at all times." In his secret correspondence with Heinsius he frankly owned : "The loss is less to me than it would be to another person, for I cannot live there." No attempt was therefore Y J22 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. made to rebuild the devastated home of our Enghsh kings, though public opinion strongly urged that this should be done, and though the opposition writers bitterly attacked him for not doing so, and for not availing himself of the opportunity thus offering itself of giving London a palace worthy of England's kings. On the contrary, the portions that escaped the fire were demolished, and the ground scandalously parcelled out among his Dutch parasites. A fresh reason was thus afforded for expending further sums on the completion of the new palace at Hampton Court, the works at which, after having been more or less suspended for nearly six years, were now ordered to be pressed on to completion without delay. CHAPTER XXIV. KING William's works and improvements. Very soon after the disastrous fire at Whitehall, King William instructed Sir Christopher Wren to furnish him with "an estimate of the expense of fitting the Inside of the Rooms of State at Hampton Court." The estimate, which is dated April 28th, 1699, and which is entirely in Sir Christopher's handwriting, was discovered in 1847, all saturated with wet, and reduced almost to a pulp. With great care it was dried unhurt, unravelled and flattened into pages, and is now safely preserved in the Record Office. The works, which, we may observe, relate only to the King's own rooms, and do not apply to the Queen's rooms or the bulk of the rest of the new palace, were authorized and begun forthwith ; and about a fortnight after — on Monday, the 15th of May — the King came down to Hamp- ton Court to dine and see what progress was being made. The first six rooms cost ;£^5,246, while the "finishing of the Great Bed Chamber," the King's Writing Closet, the so- called Queen Mary's Closet, and several other rooms and lobbies, raised the total to ;£7,o92 19^. o^d. ROOMS ADORNED WITH GIBBONS'S CARVINGS. 323 These charges, however, were independent of the sums paid to Verrio for painting the King's Great Staircase, William III.'s State Bedchamber, and his Dressing Room; and possibly, also, those paid to Gibbons for the exquisite carvings with which he ornamented every room. As to Gibbons, we have already seen in a previous page, that he had, in the earlier half of the decade, done a good deal of work here for the King, both in stone on the outside, and in wood in the inside, of the palace ; and in the summer of this year, 1699, we may be sure that he was hard at work on those beautiful garlands of fruit, flowers, and dead game in limewood that are among the most attractive ornaments of the King's State Apartments. His skill in this particular style of work — which he may be said to have originated, and in which he has remained without a rival to this day — was con- summate. Never before or since has an artist's hand given to wood, with such exquisite delicacy, the loose and airy lightness of the leaves and petals of flowers, and the downy softness of the feathers of birds. And it was not only in limewood that he produced these remarkable effects : even in oak he achieved results, which were almost more wonder- ful, considering the difficulty of working in so hard a wood. Of this there is a beautiful specimen, in one of the rooms on the ground floor in the south-east angle of the new palace, in the suite which seems to have formed part of William III.'s private apartments, and which communicates by a private stair with the State Apartments on the first floor above. This carving, which consists of a beautiful oak mantelpiece representing various musical instruments and a music score, was probably executed in the summer of the year of which we are now writing; as was doubtless also that in King William's State Bedchamber, which is more elaborately de- corated in this respect than other rooms of the suite ; and which, beside the usual festoons, is ornamented with a rich border or frieze of foliated scroll-work just below the cornice. It was the King's State Bedchamber, also, on which Verrio first began to work, and on the ceiling of which he expended his best efforts of art, when he came — probably in the summer of 1699 — to paint the State Apartments for William III. For some time after the Revolution, he, as a 324 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. Catholic and a loyal adherent of King James, refused to work for William of Orange at all ; but at length, by persua- sion of Lord Exeter, for whom he had executed a great many ceilings and staircases at Burleigh, he condescended to serve the heretical usurper in this palace. The ceiling of the State Bedchamber, which, as we have said, he seems to have undertaken first, and which may be looked upon as one of his most successful achievements, is appropriately painted with designs emblematic of Sleep, showing in one part Endymion reposing in the lap of Morpheus, while Diana, in her crescent, admires him as he slumbers ; and in the other part a figure of Somnus, with his attendants. The border has four small landscapes, and boys with baskets, intermingled with poppies. The King — so we learn from a letter of Verrio's, written after his Majesty's death — " contracted for painting his great bedchamber at Hampton Court at a rate certain, which came to the neat sume of ;£"4oo, and was paid. It was agreed he should be paid at the same rate for whatever work he did. He had painted the great staircase and little bedchamber, amounting to ;£"i,8oo." The room here men- tioned as the *' Little Bedchamber" is the one which adjoins the great State Bedchamber, and is now known as the " King's Dressing Room." Verrio's ceiling, which is still as fresh as on the day it was painted, represents Mars reposing in the lap of Venus, while Cupids steal his shield, armour, spear, sword and helmet, and entwine his arms and legs with wreaths of roses. The border is decorated with orange trees in ornamental pots or vases, with jasmine and other trees, and with parrots and other birds. The whole appear- ance of this little room, which is only 24 feet by 14, is pretty and attractive; and the corner fireplace, with its marble chimney-piece, its antique iron fireback — showing Neptune and attendant mermaids — and its curious oak mantelpiece, the shelves of which diminish as they rise one above another, and have pieces of Queen Mary's china ranged upon them, is characteristic of old times. With regard to the painting of the King's Great Staircase, it is certainly one of Verrio's largest and most gorgeous, if not most important, works ; and though, in the opinion of Horace Walpole, he painted it " as ill as if he had spoiled it king's great staircase painted by verrio. 325 out of principle," we cannot, for our own part, see that it is much worse than most of his other efforts — unless, indeed, that being larger, there is more of it, and we hold the view that the less of Verrio the better. In his own day, at any rate, his performances were held in THE king's great STAIRCASE. very high esteem. Evelyn thought " his design and colour- ing and exuberance of invention comparable to the greatest old masters, or what they do in France " ; while others grew so enthusiastic as to give vent to their feelings in verse : " Great Verrio's hand hath drawn The gods in dwellings brighter than their own." 326 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. His fame, however, was short-lived, and Pope's couplet : ** On painted ceilings you devoutly stare Where sprawl the saints of Verrio and Laguerre," has given the cue to all criticism since. The painting of this staircase, which is 43 feet long, 37 feet wide, and about 40 feet high, affords us a characteristic and glaring example of the tasteless exuberance of Verrio's pencil : Gods and Goddesses, Nymphs and Satyrs, Baccha- nalians and River Deities, Virtues and Attributes, Zephyrs and Cupids, Apollo and the Nine Muses, ^neas and the twelve Caesars, Juno and her peacock, Diana and the rain- bow, Ganymede and the eagle, Fame blowing her trumpet. Fate slitting the thread of life, Ceres with a wheatsheaf, Peace with an olive branch. Pan with his reeds, Hercules with his club, Romulus and the wolf, Julian the Apostate, with Mercury as his secretary, all jostle one another in amazing confusion, in impossible attitudes and wonderful attire, sitting on reeds, floating on clouds, sailing between columns, and reclining beneath canopies of rainbows, flowers, and zephyrs' heads. The general effect, however, if one does not linger over the details, is striking and gorgeous, and the whole decora- tion of the staircase, with its walls in their lower part painted in monochrome with emblems and trophies of war, its broad steps of Irish stone, and its handsome baluster of wrought iron, is splendid and magnificent enough, even for the most sumptuous fancy, and forms as good a specimen as there is anywhere in England of that gaudy French taste, which in this reign finally triumphed over our less pretentious, but more picturesque native style. But the improvements were not confined to the interior of the palace. Orders were at the same time given by the King for increasing the number of fountains in the great semicircular garden, for designing th«> magnificent terrace, or Broad Walk, no less than 2,300 feet, or nearly half a mile long, in front of the eastern facade, and for laying out the two oblong divisions of the gardens on both sides of the central part, between the Broad Walk and the House Park. William himself attended to all the details, "particularly the LONDON AND WISE'S STYLE OF GARDENING. 327 dimensions of the fountains, and what quantity of water they should cast up, and increased the number of them after the first design." The items during the summer months amounted to about ;£^5,ooo. The estimate for these works bears the date 1699, ^^^ the signature " George London," who, as we have seen, was one of the King's head gardeners ; and to him, in conjunc- THE FLOWER- POT GATE. tion with Henry Wise, his coadjutor, belongs the credit of laying out all the gardens and parks at Hampton Court in their present general form. Their style, as carried out here, as well as at Chatsworth, which they had laid out five years before, and at Blenheim, which they undertook subsequently, combined the special features of the French taste, such as fountains, terraces, flights of steps, statues, etc., and those of the Dutch, such 328 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. as box, clipped yews, and borders of plants and flowers figured like lace patterns. Indeed, they comprehended in their scheme almost as many things as are declared by Evelyn to be necessary for a royal garden, namely : " knots, trayle-work, parterres, compartments, borders, banks, em- bossments, labyrinths, daedals, cabinets, cradles, close-walls, galleries, paviUons, porticoes, lanthorns, and other relievos of topiary and horticular architecture ; fountaines, jettes, cas- cades, pisceries, rocks, grottoes, cryptae, mounts, precipices, ventiducts, gazon theatres, artificial echoes, automate and hydraulic music." It is to this period that belongs the beautiful old gate, known by the name of the " Flower-Pot Gate," which stands at the end of the Great Broad Walk. It is flanked by two handsomely carved piers of Portland stone, which, among other ornaments, have panels carved with William III.'s initials, and a sceptre and sword crossed, with the crown above. The piers are surmounted by charming figures of boys bearing baskets or pots of flowers, whence the name of this gate. To the same time, also, we may ascribe the Labyrinth or Maze, now one of the best known and most popular attractions of Hampton Court, which has afforded infinite amusement and delight to three genenaons of English boys and girls. The winding walks, though they do not cover a space of more than a quarter of an acre, amount to nearly half a mile. There is a stand adjacent, in which the custodian places himself, in order to extricate you by his directions, should you acknowledge that you are completely tired and puzzled. Switzer, however, condemned this maze for having but four stops, whereas he had given a plan for one with twenty ! Besides the account, belonging to the summer of this year 1699, for improving the Great Fountain Garden, there is another one, signed ** Henry Wise," in the same volume of the Treasury Papers, relating to the laying out of Bushey Park in the form which it now presents, with its stately lime-tree groves, its great circular basin, and its chestnut trees, which stretch away on the north side of it, in a magnificent avenue a mile long. Some of the items of charges, which show how a bare flat piece of ground was transformed into one of the noblest parks in England, may LAYING OUT OF BUSHEY PARK. 329 be not uninteresting to gardening antiquaries ; and are there- fore collected in the appendix to the third volume of the author's " History of Hampton Court Palace." Here we will only observe that the works consisted in making a great drive through the park, 60 feet in width and about a mile in length; in forming, near the Hampton Court end, a circle, in the centre of which was dug a great Basin — now called "the Diana" — 400 feet in diameter and 5 feet in depth ; in planting, on both sides of the road and parallel to it, and also round the circle, four rows of lime trees, with a row of horse-chestnuts next to the road, to form the great Chestnut Avenue, leading from Teddington to the north entrance of Hampton Court; and in making THE MAZE. two other avenues, each originally about three-quarters of a mile in length, divergent from the circle and at right angles to the great avenue, one leading to the Paddock, and the other leading to Hampton. The trees numbered altogether 732 limes and 274 chestnuts; and all these works, such was the cheapness of labour and materials, cost but ;;^4,3<:>o. This Great Chestnut Avenue was evidently laid out with the object of forming a grand approach, not merely to the Lion Gates and the Wilderness, which now close its vista, but also to a new and stately Entrance Court, which in size and splendour would have been adequate to the importance of the palace, and in keeping with the magnificence of Wren's Quadrangle. The plan for these improvements, which is preserved in the Office of Her Majesty's Works, shows that 330 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. it was intended to have carried a road straight through the Wilderness and across the old moat, to lead up to the new court, 300 feet long by 230 feet broad, which would have occupied the ground now called " the old Melon Ground " and the intervening space up to the Great Hall. The Court Yard was to be inclosed on the east and west sides by buildings, doubtless the same in style as the rest of the new palace ; the north side, towards the avenue, was to be open ; and on the south side there were to be, besides other archi- tectural features, a colonnade and several great flights of steps. These were to lead up to the Great Hall, which was to be entered in the centre of its north side, and was to be the vestibule of the palace, whence access was to be obtained through a series of fine spacious new chambers, to the suite already constructed. The execution of this design would, of course, have in- volved the destruction of much of the older buildings, which, under the circumstances, fortunately remain to us, such as the old kitchens and the Tudor cloisters. Had it not been for this, we should have had every reason to regret that a scheme, calculated to add so much dignity to Hampton Court, was not carried out, it being especially an approach and entrance, worthy of its size and splendour, that the palace at present lacks. But beyond this there are among Wren's papers several outline plans, indicating that still more extensive schemes had, at any rate, been sketched out, which would have involved the destruction of the first two Tudor courts at least, if not of nearly the whole of the old palace, and the substitution for them of rectangular blocks in the same classic style as the quadrangle actually built. Of this we have confirmation in what Defoe says : " I have been assured that had the Peace continued, and the King lived to enjoy the continuance of it, his Majesty had resolved to have pulled down all the remains of the old Building ; such as the Chapel, and the large Court within the First Gate, and to have built up the whole Palace after the manner of those two Fronts already done." " In these," he goes on to say, " would have been an entire set of Rooms of State for the receiving, and if need had been, Lodging and entertaining any foreign Prince, with his Retinue j also for offices for all PROPOSED NEW GRAND NORTH ENTRANCE. 33 1 the Secretaries of State, Lords of the Treasury, and of Trade ; to have repaired to for the Despatch of such Business, as it might be necessary to have done there upon the King's longer Residence there than ordinary ; as also Apartments for all the great officers of the Household ; so that had the House had two great Squares added, as was designed, there THE king's guard CHAMBER. would have been no room to spare, or that would not have been very well filled. But the King's death put an end to all these things." Had they been accomplished, William would indeed have succeeded— as was ever his aim in his works at Hampton Court— in matching the glories of Versailles on the banks of the Thames, and England would have been endowed with one of the vastest and most splendid palaces in Europe. 332 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. With such extensive schemes in hand, we shall not be surprised to find that no less than 400 men were daily en- gaged in expediting the works, against the King's return from Holland, whither he went on June ist, 1699. But even while abroad, and amid the delights of his old beloved home at Loo, King William was not forgetful of the new palace he was raising at Hampton Court. So anxious was he that everything should be ready when he came back, that, at the end of the month of August, he sent over his housekeeper, Mr. Bryan, from Holland, to announce that he should return at the latter end of September ; and that he expected the new apartments at Hampton Court to be ready by that time, for several foreign princes were coming with him, who were to be lodged in that palace, " where all foreign ambassadors were for the future to have their audience." They were accordingly pushed on with all pos- sible expedition. Notwithstanding every effort, however, and although workmen were employed without intermission, it was found impossible to have them quite ready in time, though the King's return was delayed until nearly the third week in October. Four days after his arrival at Kensington, as soon as he could escape from the press of State business, and the receiving of loyal addresses and deputations, he came down to inspect the new buildings, which, in their now almost completed state, pleased him exceedingly. The magnificent Guard Chamber, of which we insert a sketch, excited uni- versal admiration, and the King declared that "the new apartments for good proportions, state and convenience jointly, were not paralleled by any palace in Europe." The success of Wren's State Apartments only stimulated him to aim at still further dignifying what was intended to be henceforth the chief residence of the sovereigns of England. Every sort of amusement and opportunity for every kind of sport were to be provided in close proximity to the palace. "Fish ponds and decoys," says Luttrell, "are making at Hampton Court ; the deer are to be removed out of that Park (/>., Bushey Park), and trees and shrubs to be planted for a hare warren and pheasants, that there may be always game at hand." KING WILLIAM'S STATE BEDCHAMBER. 333 CHAPTER XXV. WILLIAM III. IN HIS NEW PALACE — FURTHER WORKS. In the meanwhile the furnishing of William III.'s rooms was rapidly proceeded with; and to enable the reader to conjure up before his imagination the King's domestic life at Hampton Court, we will describe the internal appearance and contents of one or two of them. First, we will glance at his Great State Bedchamber, a room 33 feet 9 inches long, 23 feet 7 inches wide, and 30 feet high, of which the ceiling painted by Verrio, and the carvings executed by Gibbons, we have already noticed. His bed, formerly in this room, and now in the Private Dining Room, was a great four-poster, with hangings of crimson velvet, decorated in its four angles with immense plumes. In the corner of the room, by the bed, stood, and stands to this day, the King's great clock, six feet high from the ground, with two small dials on its face, telling the day of the month and other intervals of time, and surmounted by decorative figures in ormolu. It was made by the celebrated Daniel Quare, and goes for one year, but though in good repair it is no longer wound up. In other corners of the room, near the doors, were two curious barometers, one made by Tompion, which still remain in the positions they originally occupied, and between the windows is a fine pier-glass, with a border of cut blue glass, also dating from William's time, and bearing his mono- gram, W. R., surmounted by a crown, in blue and white engraved glass. There are, besides, in various rooms, some of the old stools and high-backed chairs which belonged to the suite of furniture in this bedroom, and also several large bowls and jars of blue Delft ware, with the King's arms and monogram painted on them, which served both for use and for orna- ment. The jars, in which bulbous flowers such as tulips and hyacinths were planted, are especially noteworthy. They stand about four feet high. 334 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. The fireplace, with its old cast-iron fireback, its carved oak mantelpiece, its looking-glass, and its shelves, whereon are ranged several pieces of old Delft ware and china, forms another salient feature still remaining unaltered ; and when we restore, in imagination, the damask curtains that hung by the windows, as well as the tapestry of the " History of Joshua," and the eight silver sconces, chased with " The Judgment of Solomon," that formerly decorated the walls, we have a complete and vivid picture of the room as it was when inhabited by William III. Next to the State Bedchamber is the King's little bed- chamber or Dressing Room, which we described in a pre- ceding chapter ; and beyond is the King's Writing Closet, a small room, 24 feet by 17, likewise fitted with carved oak panelling, and formerly hung with pea-green damask. Its original furniture consisted of little else than the King's writing bureau, and a few chairs and stools. Opposite the windows of this room is a door in the wainscot, leading to a private staircase, the balusters of which are of most beautiful wrought iron. The stairs lead to a suite of rooms on the ground floor, which must have belonged to the King's apart- ments, and also to a private way into the garden, so that the King could go out unobserved. On the other side of the State Bedchamber were : the King's Sitting Room ; next to that his Drawing Room (since used as an "Audience Chamber") ; next his Privy Chamber, and lastly, the Great Presence Chamber, which we shall describe on a future page. All these rooms were furnished in a similar way, with tapestries, with Turkey carpets or oriental matting, with stools, chairs, and settees of crimson and other coloured damask, embroidered in silver and gold, or silk worked with exquisite needlework, with pier- glasses, with marble tables, and with china cabinets. Much of this furniture can still be seen distributed in various rooms ; some of which still retain their beautiful chandeliers, one being of silver gilt, another of silver, and a third of elaborately cut glass. Other ornaments of King William's rooms deserving of special notice were the fire-dogs, of which several sets remain. One pair is particularly beautiful, and was made in 1696-7, probably by Andrew Moore. Each piece is of silver gilt, FURNITURE OF THE KING'S STATE ROOMS. 335 standing sixteen and a half inches high, having scroll-shaped pedestals, repoiissee with foliage and festoons of oak leaves and acorns, and surmounted by a boy holding a basket of fruit, while in front of each is a medaUion, with W. R. in monogram crowned. Magnificent, however, as the furnishing of William III.'s rooms was, it would probably seem meagre if gauged by the ideas of our own day, when ladies cram their rooms as /.'. KING WILLIAM III.'S STATE BEDCHAMBER. though they were upholsterers' show-rooms or bric-ci-brac shops — though in appropriateness and taste the fashion of the time of William III. was perhaps not so much wanting. At last the King's apartments being ready for his reception, he came down on Friday, November 17 th, to stay here for five days. It was probably during one of these visits of the King's to Hampton Court that he gave orders for the com- pletion of the rest of the State and other rooms in the palace, for the full details as to which we must refer to the third volume of the " History of Hampton Court Palace," 336 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. He also gave directions for further improvements in the gardens — especially the formation of the magnificent Broad Walk in front of the East Fagade of the palace, which extends from the Flower-Pot Gate on the highway to Kings- ton, to the Water Gallery by the riverside, a distance of no less than 2,264 f'set, or nearly half a mile in length, its width being 39 feet. King William was back again at Hampton Court in the summer of the following year; but even amid the charms of his new palace, he was pining for his annual visit to Holland. To him, in truth, England was always a foreign country ; and as Macaulay, his panegyrist, is constrained to admit, " as soon as the passing of the last bill of supply had set him at liberty, he turned his back on his English subjects, and hastened to his seat in Guelders, where during some months he might be free from the annoyance of seeing English faces and hearing English words." In the first few days of the month of June he had been unwell, Vernon noticing, on the 4th, that he looked pale, and had been a little feverish, which was attributable either to his riding in the sun, or walking about the gardens in the evening without a great coat. On the score of his state of health, he took his meals as often as possible in private, using for this purpose the room already mentioned under the names of the " Beauty Room " and " Oak Room," which is on the ground floor, under the " King's Guard Chamber," and is connected by the Orangery with the King's Private Apartments, in the south-east corner of the palace. While on this topic we may mention a very curious memorandum as to his diet, drawn up while he was at Hampton Court in the summer of the year after the period of which we are now treating, by the doctors attending on him : " He eat most of the first course, viz., soup made of pulse, pot herbs, and stewed meat. Of the second service he used to eat but little ; but he eat a great deal of fruit, though never, or very seldom, between meals. . . . For five or six months of the year, both his wine and his beer was always cooled in ice ; and the last was always bottled. His breakfast was only a dish of chocolate, without any water m it." In the meanwhile his ill-health increased his desire to ANXIETY ABOUT THE KING'S HEALTH. 337 leave England ; and all his private letters at this time abound in expressions of impatience at being so long detained by business. His anxiety to be off was not unnatural, for his health was really occasioning much solicitude to his ministers and physicians. Unfortunately, however, his three doctors, Sir Thomas Millington, Dr. Radcliffe, and Dr. Laurence, agreed in nothing — neither as to the disease, nor as to the remedies. Dr. Radcliffe thought the swelling in the King's leg was little less than dropsy, and advised "purging and asses' milk." MiUington, on the other hand, said both such remedies were contrary to the King's constitution, and he was for the King's taking garlic, " as it might be prepared and qualified." "That," said Radcliffe, "will destroy such weak lungs as the King's." " Weak lungs ! " cried Millington in answer, " why his lungs are the soundest part about him ! " Then they fell out as to his Majesty's journey. Radcliffe maintained that he would be the worse for going to sea, while Millington asserted that he would be all the better for going to Loo — opinions which might certainly be consistent. So far they could differ without serious altercation. But when Millington happened to say " that Dr. Hatton ought to be called to the consultation, he being the King's first physician, and long acquainted with his constitution, Rad- cliffe, as if he were frightened at the name, flung out of the room in a passion; and so they broke up, resolving nothing." A few days after, however, they seem to have so far agreed as to let Radcliffe have his way ; for we find it duly and solemnly recorded, that on the night of Wednesday, June 26th, 1700, King William III. "took a pill that the doctors gave him," and we learn also from another source that it was composed of "Pillula Stomachicsecum cum gummis, the volatile Salt of Hartshorn, and the Syrup of violets." At the same time they prescribed "20 drops of the tincture of the Salt of Tartar to be taken every day ; and the juice of 30 Hog-lice at six o'clock at night." The " next day " we are surprised to learn that "he looked very well and was cheerfuU." But the success of a rival's remedy could carry no conviction to the minds of the other worthy medicos, and Laurence, who sided with Millington, announced that he z 338 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. had determined not to relinquish his own prescription of garlic. At the same time, Locke the philosopher, who happened to have come down to Hampton Court on business, was asked, as a scientific man, to take a diagnosis of the King's condi- tion, and he was able so far to endorse Millington's opinion as to state that, in his view, "if the King had a dropsy, he would not have so fresh a colour." Thus fortified with the philosopher's pronouncement, Millington and Laurence pro- ceeded to treat his Majesty after their own fashion, and accordingly on the 23rd he was ordered " 2 grains of Scam- mony sulphurated, with 26 grains of the Stomachic pills, to be taken at night, going to bed." That their recipes were not without an effect of some sort is clear from Vernon's account of an interview he had with the King a few days after. He says : " I was at Hampton Court this morning, and the King seeming a little heavy, I asked him *if he were out of order ? ' He said, ' he should be very well, if they would leave off giving him remedies. He had taken something that had put his stomach out of order.' " But the hour of his escape both from England, and from the antagonistic remedies of his physicians, had now arrived. Next day, being Wednesday, July 3rd, he held a grand council at the palace, which was attended by the Lords Justices, who came to bid him farewell. Up to the last moment, however, the doctors would not relax their hold on his Majesty. A few days after another consultation was held and they prescribed more severe remedies. " I hope," says Vernon, " the King will be better, when he is out of their hands at Loo." During the King's absence from England this summer the work of improvement at Hampton Court was again actively renewed — the remaking of the ground which lies between the South Front of the palace and the river, and which had hitherto escaped the reformer's hand, being now undertaken by his Majesty's orders. The scheme, as decided on in consultation with Sir Christopher Wren, Talman, and Wise, involved, in the first place, the demolition of the old Water Gallery, which by its situation impaired the appearance of the new palace, and obstructed the view of the river from the State Apartments. This work was soon accomplished, THE GREAT TERRACE AND PAVILIONS. 339 the Board of Works reporting, on the 25th of Septem- ber, 1700, that it had already been taken down, and all the useful material preserved, as the King directed, and " used in places where it hath saved money in lieu of new materialls." In the same report it is stated that " the foundations of the New Terrace were in prosecution of a design for a building sent to Loo, and approved by the King, but were not intended to be carried higher than the level of the terrace this year." Here we have the inception of the Great Terrace along the riverside, extending from the end of the Broad Walk, for a distance of 2,300 feet, or nearly half a mile, to the Bowling Green and Pavilions at the end of it. Switzer, the writer on gardening, pronounces it " the noblest work of that kind in Europe." A reference to Kip's bird's-eye view on page 297 will show its position and appearance. The Pavilions were four small square houses, built in the corners of the Bowling Green. Here, throughout the reigns of Queen Anne, George I., and George H., the Court used to resort on summer afternoons and evenings to play bowls, to sit about in nooks and arbours watching the game, and to play ombre and sip tea and coffee in the Pavilions. A reproduction of an old print of them is given further on at page 365. CHAPTER XXVI. WILLIAM III.'S DECLINING HEALTH AND DEATH. On King William's return from Holland in the autumn of the year 1700, he came straight back to the palace, arriving on the night of Sunday, October the 20th ; and the next day the State Apartments were thronged with the nobility and gentry, who came down from town to offer him their con- gratulations on his safe return. 340 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. In the meanwhile an event had taken place which for a time overshadowed all questions of domestic politics, and which was destined to have the most far-reaching and tremendous consequences. On the evening of the ist of November William received at Hampton Court " the terrible news," as he designated it, of the death of the King of Spain, which, occurring as it did in the midst of the negotiations for the Second Partition Treaty, plunged the whole of Europe in a ferment. Three days after William received further intelligence here, which burst upon him like a thunderbolt. This was the news that Louis XIV., in viola- tion of his solemnly pledged word, had accepted the will made by the late King of Spain, in favour of the Duke of Anjou, bequeathing to him the whole of the vast dominions, in the Old World and the New, subject to the Spanish Crown. Of his indignation and dismay, no words but his own could convey any idea. Writing to Heinsius the next day, the 5th of November, from Hampton Court, he says : " I never relied much on the engagements with France ; but I must confess I did not think they would, on this occasion, have broken, in the face of the whole world, a solemn treaty, before it was ^"ell accomplished. The motives alleged in the annexed memorial are so shameful, that I cannot con- ceive how they can have the effrontery to produce such a paper. We must (?onfess we are dupes ; but if one's word and faith are not to be kept, it is easy to cheat any man." But what caused him even still greater vexation and anxiety was the mood in which the English people received the news. We need not dwell here on the strange aberra- tion of popular feeling, too often paralleled in modern times, which, fanned by interested party politicians, looked upon the Partition Treaty as more obnoxious to English interests than the King of Spain's will. William had to deal with that deplorable indifference to foreign politics, and with one of those strange infatuations, which have so often foiled the calculations of our astutest statesmen. " The blindness of the people of England," as the King himself said, "was indeed incredible." " They are all quiet here," he goes on to say, " and trouble their thoughts little with the great change in the affairs of the world. It seems as if it were MORE ROYAL PHYSICKINGS. 34I a punishment from heaven that people here are so little sensible to what passes without the island, though we ought to have the same interests and anxieties as those upon the Continent." His only course now was to try and " engage the EngUsh people," as he put it, " by a prudent conduct, by degrees, and without their perceiving it." It was as much in pursuit of this object as from any other cause, that he proceeded forthwith to seek for popular support by dis- missing all the Whigs and calling the Tories to his counsels. William, however, fettered as he was by the position of political parties, and the state of public opinion in England, was powerless to adopt the measures which he thought vital to the security of Europe. He was, indeed, harassed on all sides, and his worries began again to affect his health. " His Majesty is not very well," writes Vernon, " his appetite abates, and his legs are more swelled ; but it chiefly arises from his great thought- fulness in relation to the public. Physicians have been consulted, and have prescribed remedies." What these were we learn from the curious record of the royal physickings which we have already cited. The night of his return to Hampton Court he was given " half a dram of the cream of tartar (to be taken twice a day) ; a ptisane (to be taken at pleasure) of the clarified decoction of barley, after a warm infusion of Eryngo roots condited, sal prunellae, and the spirit of black cherries." At the same time they recommended "the frequent use of tablets, made of the species de Althaea, with Sal prunelloe. Loaf-sugar, and Mucilage of Gum Tragacanth." But a few days after the treatment was changed to " Nynslchtius' elixir vitrioli and Spa water " ; and these were followed in quick succession, during the next month or so, by gentian, centaury, tartar vitriolated, salt of wormwood, salt of steel, balsamic syrup, Epsom salts in chicken broth, crabs' eyes, steel prepared with sulphur, hog's lice, chalybeate pills, elder flowers, after which recourse was again had to the old prescriptions, to be afterwards followed by a new set of remedies, "four spoonfuls a day of the juices of garden scurvy-grass, water- cresses, brooklime and oranges, with Rhenish wine and wormwood compound, with some drops of the tincture of steel." 342 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. In the meanwhile William was giving constant attention to further works and improvements in the parks, gardens, and the palace, particulars of which we need not trouble the reader with here. Early on Monday, the 30th of June, 1701, King William again left Hampton Court for his palace of Loo in Holland, where he resided three or four months. From Loo William III. went on to Breda, and from there to the Hague, whence, after being detained for three weeks by adverse winds, he sailed on November 3rd for England, landing at Margate unexpectedly early the following morning, the 4th, the anniversary of his own birth, and of his landing in 1 688 at Torbay. From the coast he came post-haste to Hampton Court, avoiding the fatigue of a progress through London, which the enfeebled state of his health could not have suffered him to bear, and reached the palace on the evening of the 5th, about eight o'clock, "much tired with his journey, so that he went immediately to bed." That very same night he signed a commission for the proroguing of Parliament. No moment could have been more aptly chosen for his return. During his absence an event had occurred of in- calculable importance in the history of the world. James II. had died, and, in a moment of ill-considered bravado, Louis XIV. had acknowledged the Pretender as King of England. This was just the one thing needed to revive William's fast vanishing popularity, for it touched the English nation in what has ever been its most sensitive point — its jealous dislike of the interference of foreigners in its domestic affairs. The effect was, in truth, instantaneous. All the pride of the English nature, all its enthusiasm for liberty and its impatience of foreign influence, all its pent-up loyalty and patriotism were exalted to the highest pitch. The voice of disaffection was hushed, while the whole nation rallied with one accord round the throne. It was a striking instance of those revulsions of English national feeling, which have so often perplexed and bewildered foreign poli- ticians, and disturbed their deepest calculations. Even while William was yet abroad, addresses had been drawn up by public bodies in every part of the kingdom, declaring their devotion to his crown and person, and their KING WILLIAM'S TRIUMPHANT RETURN. 343 high resentment at the indignity offered to him and the English people. And now, on the day of his arrival, even at Hampton Court, the King could find no refuge from the importunate loyalty of his subjects. Deputations from cities, counties, universities, besieged him all day. He doubtless received them in his new Presence Chamber, which is one of the finest of Wren's stately suite of rooms, and which has undergone but little change in appearance since that day. The throne, or chair of State, by which he stood, was placed underneath the canopy of crimson damask, which still remains fixed to the wall in its original position, with its valance richly embroidered in silver and gold, with the rose, thistle, fleur-de-lis, harp, and the cypher W. R., all crowned. The same emblems were embroidered on the rest of the furniture, which was of crimson damask, en suite ; and they were embossed on the beautiful silver chandelier which still hangs from the lofty coved ceiling. Opposite the throne there was, as there is to-day, the large allegorical picture of William, which had just been finished by Kneller, and in which he is represented landing in England after the Peace of Ryswick in 1697, in armour, on a white horse, trampling on the emblems of war, attended by Mercury, Peace, and Plenty, and welcomed to British soil by Neptune. The rich dark panels of Norway oak, relieved by delicately- carved festoons of fruit and flowers in limewood from the incomparable hand of Gibbons, and lightened by inter- mediate hangings of rich tapestry, formed an admirable background for the assembled Court. We can imagine the ceaseless throng passing up Verrio's resplendent staircase, making their way through the stately Guard Chamber, and surveying with curiosity all the magnificence of the new palace, of which so much had been reported, and then approaching the feeble but high- spirited King, who stood to receive them pale, haggard, and coughing. It is not surprising that the King was, as he wrote to Heinsius, "quite exhausted by the labour of hearing harangues and returning answers," and that he was reported to look a little pale." Yet so great was his energy, and so anxious was he to see how the works in the grounds of the palace were getting on, that on the first day on which he 344 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. received addresses, he spent two hours, ill as he was, in the cold November afternoon, walking about the gardens ; and afterwards dined in public. The swelling in his leg was, at this time, better, " by the help of the medicines administered to him by Dr. Bidloe, whom his Majesty brought over with him from Holland " : and what those remedies were we learn from the diary of his health, kept without intermission from this time to the day of his death. He was, by the orders of Doctors Bidloe, Blackmore, and Laurence, to take " Forty drops of the Tincture of the Salt of Tartar, morning and evening in a draught of medicinal wine." Whether or not such a dose is to be found in the modern pharmacopoeia, it was credited with a good result, for " soon after the swelling of his legs fell so much that on the 9th he expressed himself to this effect : * I did not think that one could recover so soon ; I rode out yesterday on horseback, and eat lustily.' " His Majesty dined that day in public with the Prince and Princess of Denmark, and despatched (though it was Sunday) a great deal of business in council and elsewhere. At night, however, his legs were more swelled again : " As I take it," said his Majesty, "this is occasioned by standing so long." The fervent demonstrations of loyalty and regard which we have just noticed, afforded the very opportunity which the King was in want of, to shake off his Tory ministers, and to relieve himself of the Tory House of Commons, which had thwarted and affronted him again and again. On the evening of his arrival here, he had, as we have seen, prepared the way by signing a commission for proroguing Parliament till the 13th; but before that day arrived, the question of a dissolution was discussed. Fortunately this topic is one of those which Macaulay has treated of, in a separate and completed fragment of the last unfinished chapter of his history ; and we may therefore have recourse to his graphic pages for an account of what occurred : ** The whole kingdom, meanwhile, was looking anxiously to Hampton Court. Most of the ministers were assembled there. The most eminent men of the party, which was out of power, had repaired thither, to pay their duty to their sovereign, and to congratulate him on his safe return. It was remarked that Somers and Halifax, so malignantly per- THE PARLIAMENTARY POSITION. 345 secuted a few months before by the House of Commons, were received with such marks of esteem and kindness as WiUiam was little in the habit of vouchsafing to his English courtiers. The lower ranks of ooth factions were violently agitated. The Whigs, lately vanquished and dispirited, were full of hope and ardour ; the Tories, lately triumphant and secure, were exasperated and alarmed. Both Whigs and Tories waited with intense anxiety for the decision of one momentous and pressing question : Would there be a dis- solution ? On the 7th of November the King propounded that question to his Privy Council. It was rumoured, and is highly probable, that Jersey, Wright, and Hedges advised him to keep the existing parliament. But they were not men whose opinion was likely to have much weight with him ; and Rochester, whose opinion might have had some weight, had set out to take possession of his vice-royalty just before the death of James, and was still at Dublin." According to Boyer, two illustrious peers represented to his Majesty " the necessity of calling a new Parliament," urging " that the present one would never do His Majesty's business, nor the nation's." The King, it is asserted, showed great reluctance to follow this advice, but the friends of the impeached lords removed his Majesty's scruples. " William, at any rate, had, as he owned to Heinsius, some difficulty in making up his mind. He had no doubt that a general election would cause delay ; and delay might cause much mischief After balancing these considerations during some hours, he determined to dissolve." Accordingly, on Tuesday, the nth of November, 1701, the King announced his intention in council ; and the following day a proclamation dissolving Parliament, and calling together a new one, to meet on the 30th of Decem- ber, was issued from Hampton Court at eleven o'clock at night. While the country was passing through the turmoil of a general election, William remained quietly at Hampton Court, anxiously watched and tended by his intimate friends — the staunch and ever-faithful Portland and the filial and loving Albemarle, who now both perceived, only too clearly, that the health of their beloved master, which had been so long failing, was at last about entirely to break down. Every 34^ A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT symptom, in truth, plainly indicated that his end was fast drawing nigh. And though it was necessary in the then state of affairs to keep facts of this sort secret, and practise a kind of pious deception on the world, lest the mere news of his indisposition should inspirit the enemies of the Hber- ties of Europe, William himself could not be deceived as to his real condition. While talking one day, about this time, " of the successes of Charles XII. of Sweden in the North against the Poles and Saxons ; and of Prince Eugene in Italy against the French, he fetched a sort of languishing sigh, and said, ' It is a fine thing to be a young man ! ' " And it is recorded that while walking in intimate converse with Portland one day this winter, "in his garden at Hampton Court, he declared 'that he found himself so weak that he did not expect to live another summer.' But he charged him at the same time ' to say nothing of it till he was dead.'" Yet his undaunted spirit, "fretting the pigmy body to decay," continued manfully to struggle on against the weakness and disease that were fast wasting his already emaciated frame. Not only would he abate nothing of the labours of his cabinet, where he was busy framing fresh combinations to curb the restless ambition of the French King, but he absolutely refused to forego his favourite exer- cises, and occasionally, in the Bushey and House Parks, "took the divertisement of hunting attended by a great number of the nobility," though when he returned he had " to be carried up the steps of the palace." The " hunting " was either that unsportsmanlike and cruel diversion of coursing, or stag-hunting, of both of which he gives an account in a letter to Portland : " I am hunting the hare every day in the Park with your hounds and mine. The rabbits are almost all killed, and their burrows will soon be stopped up. The day before yesterday I took a stag to forest with the Prince of Denmark's pack, and had a pretty good run, as far as this villanous country will permit." This exercise, indeed, he had always regarded as essential to his health, and when remonstrated with by Dr. Bidloe for not taking more rest, he answered : " Every one tells me that I do myself an injury by hunting hard ; but if I do not follow violent exercises, the freedom of my respiration is much impair'd, and thereupon my feet swell more than at WILLIAM DISREGARDS HIS PHYSICIAN'S ADVICE. 347 Other times. Faint exercises do not avail me; but you'll see, that as soon as I have hunted hard this swelling will abate." His physician's advice to use " Warm Bags of the Powder of Cummin-Seed, Mint, Roses and Lavender to be applied to his leg" was as little regarded. He used them only twice, saying, " This breaks my rest, and I must sleep : I had rather have swelled legs than not sleep." After that, when the doctor was advising him to go to bed betimes, to be regular in his diet, and so on, his Majesty made answer to this effect : "At this, rate I must always have a doctor to tend me. I'll do what I have a mind to. I am very well acquainted with my own constitution. All the doctors would have me take hot things, and lead a sedentary life : but they are mistaken. Every one that is above 30 or 40 years ought to be his own physician. From my infancy I have all along lov'd shooting, and have oftentimes been wet up to the knees, after which I always fed heartily, without shifting myself, and then slept in a chair, being very tired. Now my legs being always cold, I believe that has occasioned the swelling of my feet ; but so long as I eat well, I am of the opinion, 'twill do me no great harm." He had made this protest against the course of treatment recommended by his physicians, some two or three years previous to the period, which we have now reached ; and though his condition had long passed the stage when he could follow his own inclination with impunity, nevertheless he still persisted in defying the doctor's advice. How troublesome a patient they found him, is plainly demon- strated by the subjoined extracts, from the journal of his illness, beginning with the day on which he dissolved Parlia- ment. " Nov. iitii. His physicians advised him to eat more moderately ; but without regarding their remonstrances he eat more than ordinary both at noon and night ; and when he went to bed was very sleepy, but his legs were much swelled. The 14*^ his legs were in a tolerable con- dition and he breath'd freely. The 16*'^ he slept in a chair for a long while and had no appetite. The 17^^^ he was better and went a shooting. The 18*^ D^ Hutton and D»" Blackmore being called to Court by my Lord Chamberlain, found his Majesty's legs a little thicker than ordinary, and joined with D^* Bidloe in the following Prescription : — *' Take of the Extract of Rhubarb, a scruple ; Resin of Jalap, 6 grains ; 348 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. Tartar vitriolated, 5 grains; with a sufficient quantity of Balsamick Syrup, make pills to be taken early in the morning. *' Exhibit twice a day 20 drops of the Tincture of sassafras, extracted v/ith the tincture of the salt of Tartar. Repeat the Pills made of the Volatil Salt of Amber, Extract of Gentian, etc. "Take of the Roots of Florentine Orris and Tormentil, the Tops of Southernwood, Roman wormwood, Rosemary Flowers, Pomegranate- flowers, Leaves of Marjoram and Thyme, Olibanum and Benjamin, of each a sufficient quantity. Make a fumigation for His Majesty's legs." Whether modern science would recognize these extra- ordinary prescriptions as efficacious, we must leave the faculty to determine ; though we certainly find it stated that "upon the use of the above mentioned remedies, His Majesty recovered apace, and on November 25th (O.S.) spoke to this purpose : ' I find myself very well, I have eat with a good appetite, and my legs are fallen in some measure.'" During the remainder of the month his health still con- tinued to cause incessant and increasing anxiety. His breathing grew more difficult; he was attacked with head- aches and shivering fits, and his spirits sank. But what troubled him most was the state of his legs, which he feared was owing to dropsy, and caused him much inconvenience. "My legs are always swelled," said he to Dr. Bidloe; "can't that swelling be removed? For if it reaches above my knees, I shall walk like a sprained hare ; and if it goes further, I doubt I shall not be able to go a step." On that the doctor proposed " a sweating of his legs in a stove" ; but his Majesty replied, " How can that succeed ? 'Twill heat me ; besides that, no force can make me sweat. I have often been told that if I could sweat I was cured. But as soon as I take a sudorifick medicine, I become thirsty, and then I can- not sleep, and I am oppressed in my breathing." But Bidloe explained that the stove would be so contrived as to affect only his legs. It was accordingly made ; and the King, after using it once or twice, declared that it did him great benefit. But the imperative call of duty soon obliged him to ex- change the repose and seclusion of Hampton Court for the less congenial air of Kensington, in order that he might be at hand to open Parliament, which was summoned to meet on the 30th of December. The night of Monday, the 22nd of December, 1701, accordingly, was the last that he ever WILLIAM III.'S ACCIDENT WHILE HUNTING. 349 passed beneath the roof of his beautiful and cherished abode on the banks of the Thames. The remove to the neighbourhood of foggy and smoky London was not calculated to improve his condition ; but his spirit never quailed before his increasing infirmities. With a view as much to reassure the public mind in regard to his condition, as to relax his mind from the cares of State, he made it his custom, soon after his arrival at Kensington, to come down once a week, on Saturday, to hunt in the park at Hampton Court. In accordance with this plan, on Saturday, the 21st of February, though he had suffered from an attack of giddiness in the head that very morning, and though his body was more infirm and his legs were more swollen than usual, he set out for a day's stag-hunting. The account of what followed is best told in what purport to be the King's own words: " I was riding in the park at noon, and while I endeavoured to make the horse change his walking into a gallop, he fell upon his knees. Upon that I meant to raise him with the bridle, but he fell forward to one side, and so I fell with my right shoulder upon the ground. 'Tis a strange thing, for it happened upon a smooth level ground." It would appear from this account that the King was not aware that his horse had stumbled on a mole-hill, and it is strange that this fact is only mentioned in one contemporary historical account. The fall was so violent that William's right collar-bone was broken, and he had to be carried into the palace, prob- ably to the royal apartments on the ground floor, in the south-east angle of Wren's building. Fortunately, Monsieur Ronjat, the King's sergeant-surgeon, was at hand, being perhaps in attendance on his Majesty in case of accidents, or possibly happening to be staying at Hampton Court. He at once set the bone, and after feeling his Majesty's pulse, told him he was feverish, and that in the case of any other person in the same condition he would advise bleed- ing. " As for that," replied William, " I have now and then had a headache, and some shivering fits, this fortnight, and had this very morning a pain in my head before I went out a-hunting.' No bleeding, therefore, was resorted to, and in the evening, finding himself better, he resolved, contrary to 350 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. his doctor's advice, to return at once to Kensington. It must have been quite dark long before he set out, as he did not arrive till nine o'clock ; and he slept almost the whole way, in spite of the jolting of the coach. On arriving at Kensington Palace, he went straight to his Great Bed- chamber, and seeing his Dutch doctor Bidloe, said to him : " I have got a hurt in my arm, pray come and see it " ; and then gave him the account of the accident quoted above. " Ronjat," he added, "says there 's a little bone broken; and indeed I feel some pain towards my back; there, there," said he, pointing with his left hand to the shoulder-blade. Bidloe then examined him, and finding his pulse in good order, dissuaded him from being bled, and told him that " the right channel-bone was broke obliquely a little below its juncture with the shoulder-blade." The King then asked if it was well set ; whereon Dr. Bidloe saying it was not, a sharp wrangle ensued between him and Ronjat, who, on the King appealing to him to vindicate himself, main- tained that it was well set, "but that the jolting of the coach and the loosening of the bandage had occasioned that disunion." The fractured bone was then set again, and William went to bed, and slept the whole night so soundly that the gentlemen who sat up to watch him declared that " they did not hear him complain so much as once." Turning now to consider the precise circumstances of this famous accident, it is strange to find in regard to an occurrence, which caused so much excitement at the time, that almost every incident of it is involved in obscurity and doubt, and that there are considerable discrepancies in the various contemporary accounts. We need not, however, discuss these questions here, but it is not a little curious that among the many accounts, published immediately after the event, not one should mention the fact of the King's horse stumbling on a mole-hill ; and we should have been inclined to suspect that the story of " the little gentleman in black velvet " was a figment of later Jacobite fancy, were it not that it is mentioned by Vernon in a private letter, two days after the event. It is strange, too, to find Ralph, the Jacobite historian and William's great critic and asperser, writing in apparent ignorance of this detail in 1746, and observing that : " Tradition says that he, who had removed DEATH OF WILLIAM III. 35 1 the landmarks of kingdoms, was thrown by an anthill; but however this may be," etc. Oldmixon, however, his apologist, in his history, pub- lished in 1734, after citing William's remark that it was "a strange thing, as it happened on smooth level ground," ob- serves, " but a mole had heaved it up, and left a hole there, in which the horse's feet struck." It is almost superfluous, after showing the uncertainty that exists as to the place where the accident happened, to remark that all attempts which we might make to identify the exact spot of ground where William's horse stumbled, must be futile. Nothing more definite will probably ever be known than that the accident occurred near Hampton Court, and most likely in one or other of the parks. It is not within the purview of these annals to trace the further course of the King's illness, after his removal to Kensington Palace, nor to recount the discreditable wrangles of the rival doctors that raged around the sick-bed of the dying monarch. Though at first it seemed as if his fall would be followed by no serious results, this favourable aspect did not last long. He was seized with shivering fits and other alarming symptoms, and on the morning of Sunday, the 8th of March, 1702, the spirit of William III. passed to its account. CHAPTER XXVII. QUEEN ANNE AT HAMPTON COURT. "THE RAPE OF THE LOCK." Queen Anne, on whose short reign of twelve years we now enter, has but few and unimportant associations with the history of Hampton Court ; for though she visited the palace several times, her sojourns were never eventful or prolonged, her Majesty much preferring Windsor and Ken- sington as residences. Nor did she enter upon any con- 352 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. siderable new works in the palace, gardens, or parks, though she carried on and completed such improvements as had been begun by William III., but remained unfinished at the time of her accession. Her connection, in fact, with the subject of these pages may be summed up in the well-known lines of the third canto of Pope's " Rape of the Lock " : '* Close by those meads, for ever crowned with flowers, Where Thames with pride surveys his rising towers, There stands a structure of majestic frame Which from the neighb'ring Hampton takes its name. Here Britain's statesmen oft the fall foredoom Of foreign tyrants, and of nymphs at home ; Here thou, great Anna ! whom three realms obey, Dost sometimes counsel take — and sometimes tea." The phrase, "dost sometimes counsel take," proves to have a more definite signification and appropriateness, than would be supposed by the casual reader, foi Queen Anne, especially in the first few years of her reign, used frequently to come over to Hampton Court, while staying at Windsor Castle, for the purpose of presiding over meetings of her Privy Council, which were held in the Cartoon Gallery, otherwise known as the Great Council Chamber, or King's Gallery. Thus we have record of councils being held here in July and August of the year 1 702, within a few months of her accession, and again in the summers of 1703 and 1704 and subsequent years. This King's or Cartoon Gallery is one of the finest rooms at Hampton Court, and looked magnificent when the seven great cartoons of Raphael, for the reception of which it was built, still hung on its walls. The chimney-piece is a fine bas-relief in white marble of Venus drawn in a chariot by cupids ; but of its beauty, as well as that of the carving of the capitals of the oak pilasters, and of the cornice and the doorways, only a visit can give an adequate idea. The other rooms composing the King's suite of State Apartments were, doubtless, also occupied by Queen Anne whenever she was at Hampton Court; as well as two or three rooms of the Queen's suite, which, having remained unfinished at the death of William HI., were probably com- CLAMOROUS CREDITORS OF ROYALTY. 353 pleted for her use about this time. As to which bed- chamber she slept in, when residing at the palace, we cannot say for certain ; most likely it was the " Queen's State Bed- chamber," in the east side of the Fountain Court, though its ceiling was not decorated until after the accession of George I. Her bed, at any rate, is traditionally identified as the one now in that room — a magnificent four-poster, with rich hangings of fine silk velvet, worked with an elaborate pattern, of architectural designs and conventional vases and flowers, in orange and crimson, on a white ground. In the meantime various works were proceeded with, in the parks and gardens, with the object, as we have said, of putting the finishing touches to what William IIL had begun. Her Majesty, however, as far as concerned expenditure on Hampton Court, or indeed, on any of her palaces, was always the reverse of profuse ; and it was with the greatest difficulty, and only after a most persistent " dunning," that the workmen, who had been employed on the Hampton Court works for many years by the late King, and whose accumulated arrears of debts against the Crown amounted to thousands of pounds, could succeed in getting paid what was due to them. Among the first and most clamorous of these creditors of royalty was Verrio, the painter, to whom there was owing a sum of ;£"i,i9o on account of the painting of the King's Great Staircase and the Little Bedchamber, of which we have spoken on a former page. The necessities of Verrio — or " Signor " Verrio, as he preferred to call himself in his memorial, imagining that it was a title of honour — '* were very pressing for money, and without speedy assistance he was like to be reduced to great extremity." In response to this appeal her Majesty directed the payment to him of ;£"6oo ; and having done so, forthwith commissioned him to paint the ceiling of "the Great Room," so that eighteen months later we find him again crying out for cash, and stating that he wanted it for colours, etc., to finish the great room at Hampton Court ; that he had received only ;^2oo ; but that another " ;^5oo would serve for his subsistence and charges until the room was complete." His memorial was A A 354 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. referred to Sir Christopher Wren, who recommended that he should have the ;^5oo " till the room be finished, measured and allowed in proportion to his other works." The room in question is the Queen's Drawing Room, the central room of the East Front, and one of the finest of the suite, being 41 feet long, 35 feet wide, and 30 feet high. From it the visitor can judge of the real taste of this reign, which was nothing better than an imitation of the bastard classic of Louis XIV., as distinguished from the so- called " Queen Anne style," which never had any existence at all, except an imaginary one in the brains of modern aesthetes and china-maniacs. Verrio's ceiling represents Queen Anne in the character of Justice, with scales in one hand and a sword in the other ; her dress is purple, lined with ermine. Over her head a crown is held by Neptune and Britannia ; while surrounding her, and floating in the clouds, are various allegorical figures representing Peace, Plenty, etc. " On the sides of this room,"- we are told in 1741, "are more paintings of Verrio, representing the British fleet, and Prince George of Denmark pointing to it ; and the four parts of the world, shown by four figures ; but these were thought so indifferent that they are now concealed and covered over with hangings of green damask." A flock paper, affixed to a stretched canvas, now takes the place of the old hangings ; but the painted walls behind them remain as they were. It is worthy of consideration, whether it would not be well to uncover the painted walls, and show the room as it was in the time of Queen Anne, that the visitor to Hampton Court may have a truer idea of the decoration of that period. (Done in 1 899.) Soon after painting this room, Verrio's eyesight failed him ; and it is stated by Walpole that " Queen Anne gave him a pension of ^200 a year for life, but he did not enjoy it long, dying at Hampton Court in 1707," doubtless in his apartments in the palace. Other creditors of the Crown had equal, if not more, dif- ficulty in getting their bills attended to, to say nothing of their being settled. Thus Richard Stacey, master-bricklayer, who was owed ;^6,48i os. ii^d. for work done at Hampton Court and elsewhere, and who stated that " part of the work at Hampton Court was finished in her present Ma^'* MORE ARREARS OF DEBT. 355 reign, although directed by the late King," was met by the Treasury with the evasive answer, " There is no money at present for arrears." A similar reply was given to " John Tissue," i.e. Jean Tijou, who prayed for payment of ;£i,889 ij-. d^d. still due and owing to him for the ironwork at Hampton Court, in regard to which he was " indebted to several persons, who threaten to imprison him." Nor do we find that any notice whatever was taken of the petition of Thomas Highmore, her Majesty's sergeant- painter, who was owed ;£i63 odd, for painting done in the gardens at Hampton Court, although the Board of Works reported that the painting was since her Majesty's accession, that the allegations of the petition were true, and that the claim was just and should be paid. Queen Anne made a somewhat prolonged stay at Hamp- ton Court in the autumn of 1710, and it was probably during this sojourn of hers at the palace that she gave orders for the re-decoration of the Chapel, the elaborate Tudor ceiling of which was repainted, the walls embellished with carving by Gibbons, the windows deprived of their Gothic mullions, the floor paved with black and white marble, and new pews made of fine Norway oak in the classic taste. These alterations are, of course, quite out of harmony with the original style of the Chapel, though they are made to blend with considerable skill ; and time and historic associa- tion help to tone the incongruity. Probably it was at the same period that the old gallery at the west end of the Chapel, over the ante-chapel, was entirely altered, the magni- ficent Tudor decorations of Henry VHI. being swept away, and a small royal pew made in the centre of it for the Queen. The ceiling of the pew is noteworthy, being painted, probably by the hand of Verrio, with a group of cherubim sustaining the British crown imperial over Queen Anne's initials, A. R., and waving over it an olive-branch. About the same time, also, a new organ was ordered to be made for the Chapel by Christopher Schrider, one of "Father" Schmidt's pupils, and who, having become his son-in-law, succeeded, after his death in 1708, to his business, and in 17 10 to his post of "Organ-Maker to her Majesty." The cost of Schrider's organ was ;£^8oo. 356 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. To the summer of the year 1 7 1 1 is to be assigned an in- cident, originally of most trivial import, but which will be perpetuated, as long as the English language endures, by the imperishable fame with which it has been invested through the genius of Pope. We refer to the cutting off of a lock of a lady's hair, which occurred at Hampton Court about this time, and which led to the composition of the immortal poem, "The Rape of the Lock." The exact date of the occurrence, on which that airy poetic structure was founded, has nowhere been revealed, even amid the vast mass of critical comments which, for nearly two centuries, have been showered upon every line, allusion, and expression in that exquisite creation. But from the facts that the first sketch of the poem was written in 1711, in less than a fortnight's time, and that it was conceived in response to the request of a friend, Mr. Caryll, to put an end to an estrangement that had arisen between two families, hitherto on terms of great intimacy and friendship, we may presume that the incident itself took place but a very short time previously. The facts, so far as they transpierce the poetic glamour with which they have been clothed, or can be derived from other sources, were these : One summer's day there set out on an excursion to Hampton Court a party of friends, amongst whom were Lord Petre, " the Baron " of the poem, Sir George Brown of Berkshire, fmmortalized under the designation of "Sir Plume," Mrs. Morley, who figures as " Thalestris," and Miss Arabella Fermor, the heroine of the poem, under the name of " Belinda." These four friends, who by the way were all Catholics, were accompanied by one or two others, and started, probably from London, to go up the Thames, and spend the day at the palace. Their progress up the river is exquisitely described in the verses : '* But now secure the painted vessel glides, The sun-beams trembling on the floating tides ; While melting music steals upon the sky, And softened sounds along the waters die. Smooth flow the waves, the zephyrs gently play, Belinda smiled, and all the world was gay. Arrived at Hampton Court, the company had dinner "THE RAPE OF THE LOCK.' 357 whether in the Banqueting House, the Pavilions, some of the private apartments, or at the " Toy " inn, there is no- thing to show; and, afterwards, they sat down to play at the then fashionable game of ombre, described so wonder- fully in the third canto of the poem as finally published. In the middle of the game utensils for coffee were brought in, and, as was the custom in those days, the ladies of the "THE RAPE OF THE LOCK. (From the engraving by Lud. du Guernier in the first edition of the completed poem, published in 17 14.) party roasted and ground the coffee berry, and boiled the water : *' For lo ! the board with cups and spoons is crowned, The berries crackle, and the mill turns round ; On shining altars of Japan they raise The silver lamp ; the fiery spirits blaze. From silver spouts the grateful liquors glide, While China's earth receives the smoking tide. At once they gratify their scent and taste, And frequent cups prolong the rich repast." 358 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. It was just after this that "the Baron," Lord Petre, with a pair of scissors belonging to " Clarissa," one of the ladies of the party, was tempted to cut a lock of Miss Fermor's hair, as she bent her beautiful head over her cup. The accom- panying plate affords a curious contemporary illustration of the scene. ** The peer now spreads the glittering forfex wide, T' inclose the lock ; now joins it, to divide. Ev'n then, before the fatal engine closed, A wretched sylph too fondly interposed ; Fate urged the shears, and cut the sylph in twain (But airy substance soon unites again). The meeting points the sacred hair dissever From the fair head, for ever, and for ever ! " This liberty "the nymph," who was the victim of it, deeply resented; and Lord Petre refusing to restore the lock, a serious breach arose between the two families. Miss Fermor is made to deplore what had occurred in the follow- ing couplets : " For ever cursed be this detested day, Which snatched my best, my fav'rite curl away j Happy ! ah, ten times happy had I been If Hampton Court these eyes had never seen ! " The poem, however, attained its object, and effected the reconciliation it was written to bring about, by making, as Pope expresses it, a jest of it, and laughing them together. This is not the place to enter into any careful gauging of the merits of the poem, or into the many discussions and disquisitions that have been lavished on the question of the use of the supernatural " machinery," and Pope's resulting quarrel with Addison on the subject. But we may draw attention to the fact, already adverted to, that, poetic excel- lence and merit altogether apart, " The Rape of the Lock " presents us with the most perfect picture in miniature pos- sible of life at Hampton Court during the reign of Queen Anne. We have already cited at the beginning of this chapter the opening lines of the third canto, beginning with the words, " Close by those meads," etc. : the verses that follow them, with their delicate irony on the fashionable frivolities of the inhabitants of Hampton Court at that time, GEORGE I. ARRIVES AT HAMPTON COURT. 359 give us a peep into the interior social life of the palace, than which nothing could be more vivid : '* Hither the heroes and the nymphs resort To taste awhile the pleasures of a court ; In various talk the instructive hours they passed, Who gave the ball, or paid the visit last ; One speaks the glory of the British Queen, And one describes a charming Indian screen ; A third interprets motions, looks, and eyes ; At every word a reputation dies. Snuff or the fan supply each pause of chat. With singing, laughing, ogling, and all that." Thus it comes about that the subject-matter of these pages is associated with the most brilliant and exquisite mock-heroic poem in the English, or perhaps any, lan- guage, replete with all the subtlest delicacies of humour, satire, language, and invention, and redolent of the refined and airy graces of the artificial world which it so intimately describes. Hampton Court, in the autumn of the year 171 1, was again visited for a short time by the Queen, who arrived on October 23rd, in a terrible storm of rain ; and here she entertained the envoys of the King of France. She was at this time laid up with gout, and Swift, writing to Stella, says, "She is now seldom without it any long time together; I fear it will wear her out in a very few years " — a prognostica- tion which was verified in less than three years. CHAPTER XXVni. GEORGE I. AT HAMPTON COURT. George I., not long after his arrival in England, removed from London to Hampton Court, thinking it a commodious place to which he might retire from his obnoxious subjects. The King, as we are told by the Comte de Broglio, who came over to England as ambassador from France, had no 36o A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. regard for the English people, never received in private any English of either sex, and was almost entirely ignorant of the language ; none even of his principal officers were admitted to his chamber in the morning to dress him, nor in the even- ing to undress him, as had been the custom of the Court till his time. Here, accordingly, at a distance from London, and with no royal duties to discharge, he felt himself thoroughly at home. The only occasions on which George I. appeared in any state, was on his arrival at or his departure from the palace. When he returned to London he walked, or was carried in a sedan-chair, to the riverside, with six footmen in front, and six yeomen of the guard behind, accompanied by the courtiers and attendants ; and the whole party embarked in State barges hung with coloured cloth. This agreeable mode of travelling to and from Hampton Court was the favourite one with the Prince of Wales, who, in the summer of 1716, when the King went to Hanover, was appointed Regent, and allowed by the King to reside at Hampton Court. Here, accordingly, they established them- selves; and during their sojourn they lived in semi-regal state, and made use of the beautiful suite of apartments in the eastern range of the new palace, formerly occupied by Queen Anne, and still known as the Queen's State Rooms. Of the State Bedchamber we append a sketch. The ceil- ing had just been painted by Mr., afterwards Sir James, Thornhill, who had succeeded Verrio and Laguerre as a de- corator of palaces and public buildings. It was by Halifax's influence that Thornhill was employed. The Duke of Shrewsbury, who had become Lord Chamberlain on George I.'s accession, intended that it should be executed by Sebastian Ricci ; but Halifax, who was then First Commis- sioner of the Treasury, preferring his own countryman, told the Duke that " if Ricci painted it he would not pay him." The power of the purse, of course, prevailed, and Thornhill was given the commission. This ceiling is, in truth, the best at Hampton Court. The design shows Aurora rising out of the ocean in her golden chariot, drawn by four white horses, and attended by cupids; below are Night and Sleep. In the cornice are portraits of George I., with the crown, over the bed; of ^i: ■^4^" , >•«*'. i THE queen's state BEDCHAMBER, SHOWING THE CEILING PAINTED BY SIR JAMES THORNHILL IN I716. 362 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. Caroline, Princess of Wales, over the fireplace ; of George II., as Prince of Wales, opposite his wife, and of their son, Frederick, Prince of Wales, at this time a boy of nine years of age, over the window. The bedroom is 30 feet long by 254- feet broad, and 30 feet high. The bed, with furniture to match, which, as we remarked in a previous chapter, is believed to have been Queen Anne's, and was doubtless used by the Prince and Princess of Wales when occupying the palace this summer, has remained undisturbed ever since. The material has suffered much from age, but it reveals, when closely inspected, a workmanship of great delicacy. A beautiful chandelier of silver elaborately decorated with glass balls, hangs from the centre of the ceiling. Here, at Hampton Court, their Royal Highnesses, on this occasion at any rate, were determined to show how gracious and amiable they could be; and how gay and splendid a Court they could hold. Their motive was, doubt- less, to exhibit a sharp contrast to the stiff formality of the King's conduct, which had already excited disgust in Eng- land. Accordingly, we find that all that England could then boast of wit, intelligence, and beauty, was welcomed at the palace. Here came Philip Dormer, Lord Stanhope, after- wards third Earl of Chesterfield, who had been appointed, the year before, a gentleman of the bedchamber to the Prince, and who, though but twenty years of age, was already acknowledged as without a rival in that brilliant wit for which he became so famous ; Carr, Lord Hervey, and his more celebrated, though not more clever brother, John ; Lord Scarborough, Charles Churchill, brother of the Duke of Marlborough, and many others. Among the ladies were Lady Walpole, Sir RoT^ert's wife, Mrs. Selwyn, mother of the well-known George, and the famous Mrs. Howard. But the most delightful members of that charming society were the beautiful and vivacious ladies-in-waiting to the Princess, and especially those two paragons. Miss Bellenden and Miss Lepell. Of Miss Mary Bellenden, who, with her sister Margaret, was celebrated by Gay, " Madge Bellenden, the tallest of the land, And smiling Mary, soft and fair as down," THE PRINCE AND THE LADIES-IN-WAITING. 363 Walpole, in his account of the society which used to meet in Mrs. Howard's apartments in the palace, says : " Above all for universal admiration was Miss Bellenden. Her face and person were charming, lively she was almost to etourderie^ and so agreeable that she was never afterwards mentioned by her contemporaries but ' as the most perfect creature they had ever known.' " It was not to be expected that the Prince should be insen- sible to such charms. But the lively lady-in-waiting treated his Royal Highness with singular spirit and pertness. She records herself, how she used to stand in his presence, with her arms saucily crossed before her, and when he asked her whether her hands were cold, she told him they were not, but that " she crossed them because she liked to stand so." The Prince, however, was a persevering admirer ; and never ceased to ply her with attentions, without receiving anything in return but saucy remarks or playful scorn. There was also at Hampton Court this year her friend and companion, " youth's youngest daughter, sweet Lepell," who, in the estimation of most persons, equalled, if she did not excel her, in all these courtly charms : " What pranks are played behind the scenes, And who at court the belle ; Some swear it is the Bellenden, And others say Lepell." " Dear Molly Lepell," as Pope called her, was indeed en- dowed — if we are to credit the unanimous testimony of all her contemporaries, such as Pope, Gay, and Chesterfield — with every charm that can engage affection and regard. Her beauty was only equalled by the vivaciousness of her manner, and the brilliancy and wit of her conversation; and Lord Chesterfield, who was no mean judge on such a question declared that she was a perfect model of the finely-polished, high-bred, genuine woman of fashion. " She had been bred," he says, "all her life at courts, of which she has acquired all the easy good-breeding, and the politeness, without the frivolousness. No woman ever had more than she had ' le ton de la parfaitement bonne compagnie, les manieres en- gageantes, et le je-ne-sgais-quoi qui plait.' " In the summer of this year these charming maids of 364 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. honour had every opportunity of exercising their social talents. Every day was absorbed by one long round of amusement and gaiety. In the morning the Prince and Princess usually went on the river in barges finely carved and gilt, and hung with crimson silk curtains. As they were rowed along by the stout oarsmen dressed in the royal liveries, something of the restraint that royalty imposes was discarded in the flow of wit and repartee, and the lively chatter of the maids of honour ; or, perhaps, they sang a glee or a ballad, while the plash of the oars was stilled for a few minutes as they floated idly down the stream. In the middle of the day they came home, when the Prince and Princess dined in public in the Princess's apart- ments with the whole Court, the lady-in-waiting serving at table. In the afternoon the Princess saw company, or read and wrote letters ; and later on, as evening came on, usually walked for two or three hours in the gardens. The rest of the Court found occupation in strolling among the fountains, and beneath the shady lime groves, or in loitering by the water edge of the canals ; or they repaired to the bowling- green at the end of the terrace walk by the riverside, remind- ing one of the lines in Dryden : '* Hither in summer evenings you repair To taste the fraicheur of the cooler air." Some of the gentlemen played bowls, while the rest looked on with the ladies, or strolled along the terrace, to gaze over the wall at the Thames flowing beneath, or sat flirting in the shady nooks and arbours that were judiciously disposed around. The four pavilions, also, that stood at each corner of the bowling-green, were adapted for intimate converse. They were fitted up as drawing rooms, boudoirs, and card rooms, where those who would might join in a game of ombre or commerce, or sip cofiee or tea, while listening to some fair musician accompanying herself to one of Lans- downe's songs on the spinet. Here they lingered long into the evening ; and the Prince, we make no doubt, was frequently of these parties. The Princess, too, after her evening walk, often joined the com- pany, and would stay playing cards at the Pavilions till long 366 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. after dark. But one rainy and dark night the Countess of Buckenburgh, one of the German ladies, who was very fat, tripped and fell as she was walking home, and put her foot out of joint, and after that accident the Princess did not stay so late, but often had cards in the Queen's Gallery from nine till about half-past ten, to which she commanded a few of the inhabitants of the palace. Sometimes, also, the Princess used to ask company to sup with her in the Countess of Buckenburgh's chamber. That lady, and indeed most of the German followers of the Court, detested the English, and were always loud in their abuse. On one occasion she declared before several English ladies that "English women do not look like women of quality, but make themselves look as pitifully and sneaking as they can ; they hold their heads down and look always in a fright, whereas foreigners hold up their heads, and hold out their breasts, and make themselves look as great and stately as they can, and more nobly and more like quality than you English." To which Lady Deloraine, with a sar- castic reference to the countess's corpulence, replied, " We show our quality by our birth and titles, madam, and not by sticking out our bosoms." While the Princess received in the State Rooms, such of the ladies and gentlemen of the Court, as had not received the royal summons, made up parties in the private apartments of the palace to spend the evenings. Of these gatherings, Mrs. Howard's little supper parties were the most frequented and celebrated ; and her apartments (which were known by her most intimate friends as the " Swiss Cantons," and her- self as " the Swiss," perhaps on account of the neutral posi- tion which her prudence and discretion enabled her to maintain at Court) became the fashionable rendezvous of all the brilliant wits and beauties in the palace, to whom we have already referred, and who were attracted by her social talents and charms. It was, indeed, a pleasant time, which long dwelt in the remembrance of those who took a part in its enjoyments. Of this we have many testimonies. Miss Howe, who was a maid of honour, and one of the wittiest of them, and cer- tainly the greatest flirt at the palace at this time, thought that no other life was worth living. When she went away REMINISCENCES OF MRS. HOWARD'S PARTIES. 367 to spend a month or two in the country, she wrote from her retreat to a friend : '* One good thing I have got by the long time I have been here, which is, being more sensible than ever I was of my happiness in being a maid of honour. I won't say God preserve me so neither : that would not be so well." It was to her that Pope addressed the lines in answer to the question, What is prudery ? ^ " 'Tis a beldam Seen with youth and beauty seldom. *Tis an ugly envious shrew That rails at dear Lepell and you." Giles Earle, also, who belonged to Mrs. Howard's set, and afterwards became groom of the bedchamber to the Prince, writes to her the following summer, August loth, 1717, when the King and Prince were at Hampton Court together, saying, " Would to God I was at Hampton Court ; I stupify myself by eternally thinking of that place." And nearly twelve years after. Miss Lepell, in the meanwhile married to John, Lord Hervey, whom she used to meet at Hampton Court, dwells fondly on the reminiscences of the old days. She writes, in answer to a letter from Mrs. Howard from Hampton Court, as follows : "The place your letter was dated from recalled a thousand agree- able things to my remembrance, which I flatter myself I do not quite forget. I wish I could persuade myself that you regret them, or that you could think the tea-table more welcome in the morning if attended, as formerly, by the Schatz [a nickname given to Lady Hervey when Miss Lepell]. ... " I pass my mornings at present as much like those at Hampton Court as I can, for I divide them between walking, and the people of the best sense of their time : but the difference is, my present com- panions [books] are dead, and the others are quite alive. If you would have the good nature to add, by your letter, the charms of Hampton Court to the pleasures of Ickworth, they will be received and acknow- ledged with gratitude by, dear Mrs. Howard, " Your faithful humble servant, **M. Hervey." And in another letter to Mrs. Howard, a few days after, she says : " My spirits, which you know were once very good, are so much impaired, that I question if even Hampton Court breakfasts could recover them." 368 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. Hampton Court, in the month of August, 1717, was again visited by the Prince and Princess of Wales and all their suite, as well as by the King. But the presence of his Majesty did not at all conduce to the cheerfulness of the palace. On the contrary, the endeavours of his son and daughter-in-law in this direction met with no encouragement, and, indeed, were entirely neutralized, by the overwhelm- ing dulness which pervaded everyplace where George I. ever resided. Besides, he regarded with no sort of favour the efforts which the Prince and Princess were making to gather a Court about them, and to acquire popularity by their gaiety and condescension. Pope, who came to visit Hampton Court at this time, records his impressions of the dreariness of the life at Court in a letter to Teresa and Martha Blount, written on September 13th, 17 17: ** I went by water to Hampton Court, unattended by all but my own virtues, which were not of so modest a nature as to keep themselves, or me, concealed ; for I met the Prince with all his ladies, on horseback, coming from hunting. Mrs. B. [Bellenden] and Mrs. L. [Lepell] took me into protection, contrary to the laws against harbouring papists, and gave me a dinner, with something I liked better, an opportunity of con- versing with Mrs. H[oward]. We all agreed that the life of a Maid ot Honour was of all things the most miserable : and wished that every woman who envied it had a specimen of it. To eat Westphalia ham in a morning, ride over hedges and ditches on borrowed hacks, come home in the heat of the day with a fever, and (what is worse a hundred times) with a red mark on the forehead from an uneasy hat ! all this may qualify them to make excellent wives for foxhunters, and bear abundance of ruddy complexioned children. As soon as they can wipe off the sweat of the day, they must simper an hour and catch cold in the Princess's apartment ; from thence (as Shakespeare has it) to dinner, with what appetite they may ; — and after that, till midnight, walk, work, or think, which they please. I can easily believe no lone house in Wales, with a mountain and a rookeiy, is more contemplative than this Court ; and as a proof of it, I need only tell you Miss L[epell] walked with me three or four hours by moonlight, and we met no creature of any quality but the King, who gave audience to the Vice-Chamberlain, all alone, under the garden walk. "In short, I heard of no ball, assembly, basset table, or any place where two or three were gathered together, except Madam Kilmansegg's, to which I had the honour to be invited, and the grace to stay away." In the meanwhile the differences between the King and the Prince, which had been smouldering for some time, were now about to break out into an open flame. The exact GEORGE I.'S THEATRE IN THE GREAT HALL. 369 cause of the quarrel is unknown, but it is probable that the King conceived a jealousy of his son showing so much fond- ness for acting the king, and being so eager to win popular favour; while towards his daughter-in-law, whom he was accustomed to speak of as " cette diablesse la Princesse," he had always nourished an inveterate dislike. At any rate, after they had spent a couple of months with the King at Hampton Court, the mutual relations of the various members of the royal family became so strained that the Prince and Princess, with their attendants and adherents, retired altogether from the palace, while the King put a notice into the " Gazette " that he would not receive at his Court anyone who should visit the Prince. When the King came to Hampton Court again, in the summer of the succeeding year, 17 18, the Prince held an op- position Court at Richmond. His Majesty's, however, was, for this one occasion at least, the gayer of the two ; for he had ordered a theatre to be erected in the Great Hall, which was opened on the 23rd of September, with "Hamlet"; and on the ist of October " Henry VHL, or the Fall of Wolsey," was represented on the very spot which had been the scene of the Cardinal's greatest splendour. Cibber, in his amusing " Apology for his Life," remarks of the theatricals here, "This throwing open a theatre in a royal palace, seemed to be reviving the old English hospitable grandeur, where the lowest ranks of neighbouring subjects might make merry at Court, without being laughed at themselves." " Still," as he goes on to observe, " a play presented at Court or acted on the public stage is a very different enter- tainment. For at Court, where the Prince gives the treat, and honours it with his own presence, the audience is under the restraint of a circle where laughter or applause raised higher than a whisper would be stared at. This coldness and decency," he continues, " of attention at Court, I ob- served, had but a melancholy effect upon the impatient vanity of some of our actors, who seemed inconsolable when their flashy endeavours to please had passed unheeded : their not considering where they were quite disconcerted them ; nor could they recover their spirits till from the lowest rank of the audience some gaping John or Joan in the fulness of their hearts roared out their approbation," Be 370 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. The theatre in the Great Hall was never used again after this, except once in the year 1731, when George II. enter- tained here the Duke of Lorraine. The stage, nevertheless, continued to block up the Hall till the year 1798, when James Wyatt, then Surveyor-General of the Board of Works, obtained George III.'s permission to remove it, which was accordingly done, and the Hall restored to its original form and beauty, as we now see it. The mention of the Surveyor-General of the Board of Works reminds us it was in the year which we have now reached, 17 18, that Sir Christopher Wren, the most illustrious of all the holders of that office, was, after nearly fifty years spent in the active and assiduous service of the Crown and the public, and in the fourscore and sixth year of his age, driven from the post that he had filled so long, with such conspicuous and splendid success. This shameful and ungenerous act, though perhaps not emanating directly from the King, who seems to have been instigated to it by some of his favourites, has deservedly been ever regarded as one of the worst blots on a reign sufficiently blurred and bespattered, without this additional and gratuitous stain. The fact was, however, that the great English architect was altogether of too noble a nature to stoop and cringe to the corrupt and hungry crew of parasites, who dispensed the patronage of the first George ; and it was inevitable that he should be pushed aside for one whose character was more compliant, and whose gross ignorance and incompetence were more in consonance with the in- fluences paramount at Court. Such a one was William Benson, in whose favour, probably by a judicious distribu- tion of largess, the patent which Wren had received from Charles IL, and which he had held under five successive sovereigns, was withdrawn, on the 26th of April, 17 18. Wren bore the slight thus put upon him with exemplary fortitude and dignity. He retired to Hampton Court, say- ing only with the Stoic : " Nunc me jubet fortuna expeditius philosophari." His residence, however, was not in the palace, but in a house on the Green, which he had taken on lease from the Crown in 1708, at a rent of ;;^io a year for fifty years, and which he considerably improved. DISMISSAL OF SIR CHRISTOPHER WREN. 37 1 Sir Christopher's old house and garden are but little changed to this day : the terrace that he constructed by the riverside, where he built an arbour, his old tool-house, the tree on the lawn, beneath the shade of which he loved to sit, his drawing room, his dining room, his bedroom, all remain, much in their original state, consecrated for all time by their association with England's greatest architect. Here, within sight of the palace that he had reconstructed and embellished, he passed the greater part of the last five years of his life, " free from worldly cares, in contemplation and studies," says his grandson and biographer, " and prin- cipally in the consolation of the Holy Scriptures, cheerful in solitude, and as well pleased to die in the shade as in the light." The pretext for his supersession, after such signal services rendered to the State, with so splendid a record of great achievements, and with a mind that retained, in spite of his years, all the vigour and freshness of youth, was founded on the old and specious pretence that economies would thereby be effected in the public service. This well-worn device was paraded by the man who looked to stepping into his shoes, and who, when duly installed, proceeded to level a series of accusations of extravagance and carelessness against the late Board, supplementing them with specific charges of the grossest jobbery, against some of the subordinate officials in the department. These accusations, however, Benson was far too astute to prefer himself; but induced his brother Benjamin, whom he had pitchforked into the post of Clerk of the Works at Whitehall, and one Colin Camp- bell, a servile agent of his own, to formulate them in a memorial to the Treasury. This memorial the Lords of the Treasury, regardless of Wren's retirement from the King's service, the circumstances attending it, his advanced age, and his many other claims on their forbearance, forwarded to him to report upon. The dignified, and indeed pathetic letter which the old man wrote from Hampton Court, and in which he protested against this procedure would, if any vindication of Sir Christopher Wren were needed, have entirely exonerated him from any responsibilities for the abuses denounced in the Benson memorial, even had they proved to be true. As 372 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. it happened, however, they appear to have turned out, on investigation, to be entirely devoid of foundation; and so great was the discredit which overtook Benson on this account, and for his gross incapacity, jobbery, and miscon- duct, that he was soon after ignominiously expelled from his appointment, and only escaped prosecution by the renewed influence of the foreign favourites exerted in his favour — an influence, which afterwards positively secured him another post, in a different sphere, with a salary of ^1,200. Benson's dismissal from the Office of Works took place scarcely more than a twelvemonth after his appointment. Wren, therefore, had not long to wait for his vindication. But in his Hampton Court retreat, with his clear and vigor- ous mind engrossed to the last day of his life in scientific researches, he let the world go by, and cared for none of these things. Once a year only did he leave home to be borne to London, to sit for awhile under the dome of his own great cathedral ; and it was on the last of these visits that he caught the cold which hastened his end. It was his custom latterly to sleep in his dining room after dinner, and on the 25th of February, 1723, his servant, who con- stantly attended him, thinking he slept longer than usual, and going in to rouse him, found him dead in his chair. The old-fashioned panelled room, in which he died, is on the ground floor of Mr. Fletcher's house, on the left-hand side as you come in from the Green. From Hampton Court his remains were removed to London to repose beneath the shelter of St. Paul's. In the meanwhile the Board of Works was not the only department of State in which disorders and irregularities were declared at this time to prevail at Hampton Court. The conduct of his Majesty's household was equally im- pugned : for, in a letter, addressed by King George, on the 5th of May, in the year after Wren's dismissal, 1719, to the Lord Chamberlain, the Duke of Newcastle, animadversions are made on an abuse, which seems always to have been more or less existent at Hampton Court, and which it taxed even the strong arm of Henry VIII. to grapple with — namely, the practice of persons, who had no sort of right to occupy rooms in the palac<^ at all, calmly settling themselves down there, probably with the connivance of some friendly DULNESS OF GEORGE II.'S COURT. 373 or corrupt official, and in this manner endeavouring surrep- titiously to acquire a sort of prescriptive footing, which it was afterwards difficult to dispute, and from which it was still more difficult to dislodge them. The ordinances, however, of a George I. were not likely to have much effect in a case where a Henry VIII. had failed to secure obedience — and, as we shall have occasion to note later, the abuse continued to flourish till nearly the beginning of the present century. CHAPTER XXIX. COURT LIFE UNDER GEORGE II. George II., after his accession, still preserved his old affec- tion for Hampton Court; and the Court came here for several months, on July 2nd, 1728, and, for the next ten years or so, a regular practice was made of spending a couple of months every summer in this palace. Neverthe- less, times were now sadly changed from what they had been, and life at Court, which had lost so many of its brightest ornaments, was oppressed with an intolerable, if decorous dulness, which George II., who was never of a really vivacious temperament, seems to have thought more befitting his new dignity. Mrs. Howard, in answering Lady Hervey's letter, cited in a previous chapter, dweUing on the memories of old Hampton Court days, says : " Hampton Court is very different from the place you knew ; and to say one wished Tom Lepell^ Schatz, and Bellenden at the tea-table is too interested to be doubted. Frizelation, flirtation y and dangUation are now no more, and nothing less than a Lepell can restore them to life ; but to tell you my opinion freely, the people you now converse with [that is, her books] are much more alive than any of your old acquaintance. " The rooms at Hampton Court occupied by King George and Queen Caroline at this time remain very much as they did a hundred and fifty years ago ; particularly her Majesty's 374 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. Dressing Room, in which is the tall marble bath where her Majesty performed her ablutions, and on the same side is the door into her private chapel. Here prayers were read while the Queen dressed, the door being left ajar so that the chaplain's voice might be heard. The bedchamber woman-in-waiting was one day ordered to bid the chaplain, Dr. Maddox (afterwards Bishop of Worcester), begin the service; but seeing a picture of a naked Venus over the fireplace, he made bold to remark, "And a very proper altar-piece is here, madam ! " The fact was, the Queen had no very great regard for the ministrations of the clergy; and though she was fond of studying theology, and of having discussions with the learned divines of the period, her views on religion were very far from orthodox. Her levees, which were probably held in the Queen's State Bedroom already mentioned, were "a strange picture of the motley character and manners of a queen and a learned woman. She received company while she was at her toilet; prayers, and sometimes a sermon, were read ; learned men and divines were intermixed with courtiers and ladies of the household; the conversation turned on metaphysical subjects, blended with repartees, sallies of mirth, and the tittle-tattle of a drawing room." But, except for these diversions of the Queen's, life at Hampton Court always moved at this time in the same un- interesting and tedious groove, an admirable sketch of which is given in a letter of Lord Hervey's, written in 1733 • " Hampton Court, July 31st, 1733. " I will not trouble you with any account of our occupations at Hampton Court. No mill-horse ever went in a more constant track, or a more unchanging circle, so that by the assistance of an almanack for the day of the week, and a watch for the hour of the day, you may inform yourself fully, without any other intelligence but your memory, of every transaction within the verge of the Court. Walking, chaises, levees and audiences fill the morning ; at night the King plays at com- merce and backgammon, and the Queen at quadrille, where poor Lady Charlotte [de Roucy] runs her usual nightly gauntlet — the Queen pulling her hood, Mr. Schutz sputtering in her face, and the Princess Royal rapping her knuckles, all at a time. It was in vain she fled from persecution for her religion : she suffers for her pride what she escaped for her faith ; undergoes in a drawing room what she dreaded from the Inquisition, and will die a martyr to a Court, though not to a church. The Duke of Grafton takes his nightly opiate of lottery, and sleeps as LIFE AT GEORGE II.'S COURT DESCRIBED. 375 usual between the Princesses Amelia and Carolina ; Lord Grantham strolls from one room to another (as Dryden says), "like some discon- tented ghost that oft appears and is forbid to speak," and stirs himself about, as people stir a fire, not with any design, but in hopes to make it burn brisker, which his lordship constantly does, to no purpose, and yet tries as constantly as if it had ever once succeeded. At last the King comes up ; the pool finishes, and everybody has their dismission : their Majesties retire to Lady Charlotte and my Lord Lifford ; the Princesses, to Bilderbec and Lony ; my Lord Grantham to Lady Frances and Mr. Clark ; some to supper, and some to bed ; and thus (to speak in the scripture phrase) the evening and the morning make the day." Lord Hervey, who fills such a large space in the Court life of this period, was occupied, in the summer of 1733 at Hampton Court in other ways, besides attending on the King and Queen, and writing memoirs, letters, and Court verses. For, throughout the month of August, he was busy composing a satire, entitled "An Epistle to a Doctor of Divinity from a Nobleman at Hampton Court, August 28, 1733," in which he sought to reply to the attacks made against him by Pope. There can be no doubt that he was most justly irritated by the way in which the poet, without any provocation on his part, had referred to him several times in his satiric pieces, under the opprobrious sobriquet of " Lord Fanny," laughing at his taste for versifying, hinting at his physical infirmities, and maligning, in the most odious terms, his friend Lady Mary Wortley Montagu. The prin- cipal lines in which Hervey was aimed at, and which im pelled him to compose his reply, were these : * ' The lines are weak, another 's pleased to say, Lord Fanny spins a thousand such a day ; " and, again, " Like gentle Fanny's was my flowery theme." Accordingly, he set to work, with no very great prudence, to attack, in the heroic couplet, the poet who handled that form of verse with such masterly effect. But his lordship's satire, though no doubt the best he could produce, was disastrously unequal to such a contest. In the whole epistle there are scarcely any lines of more vigour than the following, in which he disparages Pope's claims to be re- garded as a poet 00 account of his translation of Homei's "Iliad": 3/6 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. "Such Pope himself might write, who ne'er can think, He who at crambo plays with pen and ink, And is called poet, 'cause in rhyme he wrote What Dacier construed, and what Homer thought." Such verse is indeed " impar congressus Achilli," and is only worth remembering from the fact of its having drawn from Pope, in prose, the " Letter to a Noble Lord," one of the keenest pieces of ironical writing in the English language, and in poetry, the terrible character of Sporus, perhaps the most powerful, and at the same time the most brutal, piece of satiric invective in the whole range of modern literature. In the meanwhile Queen Caroline occupied herself with her various pursuits of art, literature, and gardening ; and she took up, especially, with the prevailing fashion of landscape gardening, of which Kent, who was no better horticulturist than painter or architect, was the prophet and oracle. It was about this time, and we may assume through her in- fluence, that the large plain lawns were substituted for the numerous fountains and the elaborately figured flower-beds of scroll-work and lace-pattern, in the semicircular parterre in the Great Fountain Garden. The alterations were carried out in deference to the taste adverted to by Pope, in the "Epistle to the Earl of Bur- lington " : " Tired of the scene parterres and fountains yield, He finds at last, he better likes a field." But Pope was a critic difficult to please; and though he himself contributed somewhat to bringing the new style into vogue, he was as severe in his condemnation of these plain grass plats as of the figured beds, which they superseded. Thus, in another couplet, he censures him who — "One boundless green or flourished carpet views, With all the mournful family of yews." And, in a note of his own to this last line, animadverts on these "pyramids of dark green, continually repeated, not unlike a funeral procession." How apposite was this criti- cism to the gardens at Hampton Court, will at once strike the reader on looking at the annexed plate, taken from a print published soon after the alterations were carried out about the year 17 30. 3/8 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. Again, in the same satire, Pope seems to point at these gardens, where statues of the fighting and the dying gladi- ators were placed, on stone pedestals, in the centres of the lawns : ' * Here Amphitrite sails through myrtle bowers, There gladiators fight, or die in flowers." It is fortunate, however, that the alterations were of this superficial nature, and that no attempt was made to follow every varying caprice of gardening fashion, which has ever been to destroy, in one generation, what the previous one "with incessant toil and hands innumerable scarce per- formed." After the death of Queen Caroline, which took place in November, 1737, we hear little of George II. and his Court residing at Hampton Court ; and although it was not till the accession of George III. that the sunshine of royalty was permanently withdrawn, its decline in royal favour may be said to have begun from that time. Occasionally, however, George II. would come down to the palace to spend the day, especially in the summer on Saturday afternoons. At other times the King would pass a few days here, though he never stayed long. The bedroom he occupied on these occasions still exists, pretty much in the state it then was ; and in a room near it is the bed of crimson silk, which he used when last at Hampton Court, with his portmanteau placed at the foot of it. " After dinner," if we may believe Wraxall, " the King always took off his clothes, and reposed himself for an hour in bed of an afternoon. In order to accommodate himself to this habit, Mr. Pitt, when, as Secretary of State, he was sometimes necessitated to transact business with the King during the time he lay down, always knelt on a cushion by the bedside — a mark of respect which contributed to render him not a little acceptable to his Majesty. At his rising, George II. dressed himself com- pletely a second time, and commonly passed the evening at cards with a select party." As George II. grew older his temper did not improve, and when irritated by his ministers or attendants, he would kick his hat or wig about the room. With his grandson, afterwards George III., his anger sometimes became quite OCCASIONAL VISITS TO THE PALACE. 379 uncontrollable; and once, in the State Apartments of Hampton Court Palace,, he so far forgot his kingly dignity as to box the ears of the youthful heir of the throne. This insult, it is said, so disgusted George II L with the place that, according to his son the Duke of Sussex, he could never after be induced to think of it as a residence ; and it is to this, therefore, that is due the fact that, since the death of George IL, Hampton Court has never been inhabited by any sovereign of these realms, and that the history ot Wolsey's palace, which for nearly three centuries had formed part of the majestic current of English national life, has, during the last hundred years or more, flowed in a quiet and uneventful channel of its own. Previous, however, to the accession of the third George, the palace had gradually, as a consequence of the continued absence of the Court after the death of Queen Caroline, became more and more of a show place, to which excursions were frequently made from London and the neighbouring towns and country houses. At this period visitors were conducted through the State Rooms by the deputy-house- keeper, who, for her services, exacted a fee, the greater part of which found its way into the pockets of the lady house- keeper, whose post was consequently one much sought after and very lucrative. Horace Walpole, who lived within four miles at Straw- berry Hill, always took much interest in Hampton Court, and frequently came over to look at the pictures and study the architecture and archaeology of the palace ; and to him we are indebted for a number of valuable observations on these topics, elucidatory of its history, art, pictures, and curiosities, which have been duly noticed in the course of these pages. He records also an amusing story of the Misses Gunning, the famous beauties, who, when iho. furore about them was at its height, could not walk in the streets or the park without being followed by hundreds of people ; who found crowds collected at their door to see them get into their chairs ; and whose rumoured presence at the theatre caused a run on the seats. "As you talk of our beauties," wrote he to Sir Horace Mann on August 31st, 1751, "I will tell you a new story of 38o A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. the Gunnings, who make more noise than any of their pre- decessors since the days of Helen. They went the other day to see Hampton Court ; as they were going into the Beauty Room, another company arrived ; the housekeeper said, ' This way, ladies ; here are the Beauties.' The Gun- nings flew into a passion, and asked her what she meant ; that they came to see the palace, not to be shown as a sight themselves." The " Beauty Room " here referred to is the one which we have once or twice noticed, on the ground floor, in the south range, under the King's Guard Chamber, now called the " Oak Room." CHAPTER XXX. HAMPTON COURT DURING THE REIGN OF GEORGE III. — THB PALACE DIVIDED INTO PRIVATE APARTMENTS. George HI.'s accession to the throne, which took place on the 25th of October, 1760, marks, as we have already indicated, a new era in the history of Hampton Court ; for thenceforth the regal splendours of the palace came entirely to an end, it definitely ceased to be a residence in the actual occupation of the sovereign, and the whole building, with the exception of the State Rooms, was gradually divided into suites of apartments, allotted by the grace and favour of the King to private families. Nevertheless, it may be doubted whether the King had formed a deliberate intention never to inhabit this palace at all, and still more whether he contemplated that it should cease to be a royal residence. Its prolonged disuse by him, however, had, in eflect, this result; for being gradually denuded of most of its furniture, and the State Apartments dismantled and untenanted during his long reign, the expense of preparing it for habitation by the King and Court would have been so considerable, that this fact alone would always THE ROYAL APARTMENTS DISUSED. 38 1 have been an obstacle to its being occupied, either by him or by his successors — if any of them had ever taken a fancy to do so. In the meanwhile, however, Hampton Court was not entirely abandoned to neglect — the palace being still kept up, and a certain sum annually spent on necessary repairs. As to the gardens at this period, they remained under the care of Lancelot Brown, the famous landscape gardener, better known as "Capability" Brown, on account of his frequent use of that word in reference to grounds submitted to his skill. He had been appointed Royal Gardener at Hampton Court in 1750 by George 11. Luckily Brown, when asked by the King to " improve " the gardens here and adapt them to the modern style, had the good sense and honesty to decline the unpromising task, " out of respect to himself and his profession"; and thus they escaped the destruction that overtook so many of the old gardens of England, and have preserved — especially the Privy Gardens — much of their charming old-fashioned air to this day. Nevertheless, it was probably he who replaced most of the terrace steps in the Privy Gardens — though two flights were left — by gravel and grass slopes, for the theoretic reason that " we ought not to go up and down stairs in the open air." Reverting to the topic of the use to which the palace was put on the accession of George HI., we should observe that there were, probably, but few persons then residing in it beyond officials and servants; though it is likely enough that, here and there, some dependants of the Court were in occupation of apartments, to which they may have been admitted by permission or order of the Lord Chamberlain, or to which they might have acquired a sort of prescriptive right, by some of the irregular and surreptitious devices and methods, noticed under the reign of George L These were, as we then explained — to prolong their stay indefinitely, on one pretext or another, in rooms assigned to them when summoned to Court for a brief visit ; to get a footing in the building, by begging a grant of a few rooms from the Lord Chamberlain, or by bribing the housekeeper, or some such functionary, to lend them a room or two, and then stealthily to add other neighbouring rooms thereto, until, by a mingled system of begging, borrowing, and stealing, these Court 382 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. "squatters," as they might be termed, sometimes procured for themselves whole suites of large and comfortable apart- ments — such were some of the discreditable dodges resorted to by the more unscrupulous. Indeed, successfully to circumvent these tortuous practices, and to extend an adequate supervision over a palace of the enormous size of Hampton Court, with its innumerable rooms, and its nooks and corners of all sorts, was a task, which would have taxed the resources even of the most vigilant of Lord Chamberlains. Thus it was that the autho- rities, to save themselves an infinity of trouble, sometimes thought the best way out of the difficulty was officially to recognize and legalize the occupancy of the " squatter," to avoid the scandal of forcible evictions. In these matters, however, George III., who was deter- mined to be king in fact as well as in name, endeavoured to introduce reform ; and the management of his palaces being organized with greater strictness, these reprehensible practices were, to a great extent, restrained. From the very first year of his reign he laid down the rule, that no one was to occupy rooms in Hampton Court Palace without a written authorization from the Lord Cham- berlain addressed to the housekeeper, specifying the exact suite granted ; and, as he seems very soon to have decided to devote most of the palace to the use of private families, the empty "lodgings," as they were termed, were rapidly as- signed to various persons, at first by letter, and subsequently, from about the year 1765, by warrants under the hand of the Lord Chamberlain. In the early part of the reign of George III. the apartments thus allocated for private occupation, which now amount to about fifty-one — exclusive of those tenanted by the house- keeper, the clerk of the works, the head gardener, the custodian of the pictures, the foreman of the works, and some half-a-dozen other officials and workmen — did not number more than about forty. Concerning their in- habitants at this period, we find a few remarks in a letter of Hannah's More's — "Holy" Hannah, as Horace Walpole used to call her — who was a frequent guest of Garrick's in his villa at Hampton, and who spent a few days in the palace about the year 1770. "The private apartments are OCCUPANTS OF THE PRIVATE APARTMENTS. 383 almost all full," writes she ; " they are all occupied by people of fashion, mostly of quality ; and it is astonishing to me that people of large fortune will solicit for them. Mr. Lowndes has apartments next to these, notwithstanding he has an estate of ;£"4,ooo a year. In the opposite ones lives Lady Augustus FitzRoy. You know she is the mother of the Duke of Grafton." The astonishment here expressed that rich people should solicit the favour of apartments at Hampton Court, betrays a strange want of knowledge of the world on the part of " Holy Hannah " ; though the success of their solicitations might well have moved her surprise. On the whole, how- ever, the persons who received grants of rooms at this time, though usually of position and rank, were not generally of large means ; nor do they appear to have been altogether undeserving objects of the King's favour. In many cases, at any rate, it is clear that apartments — which, it may be ob- served, were then held by gentlemen as well as ladies, and by married ladies as well as maiden ladies and widows — were often given in reward for, and recognition of, the services of the recipients, or of their immediate relatives, in the Army or Navy, or at Court. The form of the warrant in use from about 1765 to 1781 was simply an order from the Lord Chamberlain to the under- housekeeper, to deliver the keys and possession of certain rooms to the person to whom they were granted, to be held by the grantee until further order. This simple form, how ever, soon proved insufficient for the circumstances ; for it was found that the ladies and gentlemen holding apartments were so little sensible of the favour they enjoyed, as often to make no use of them for months and even years together, and also to go away and leave them without anyone to take care of them, or without even handmg the key to the housekeeper. In consequence of this, regulations had to be made about the year 1781 against such lax practices. They were em- bodied in the new form of warrant, which was used thence- forth, and in which it was expressly stated that " the Lodgings are to be inhabited by [Her Ladyship] or some part of her Family a part of every Year, or they will be supposed Vacant and disposed of accordingly; and when [Her Ladyship's] Family are absent from Hampton Court, it is expected that 384 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. a servant of their own shall be left in the Lodgings, or that they will leave the keys thereof with the Under-housekeeper, for the time being, agreeably to the late Regulation." But a much graver scandal than that aimed at in this regulation had, in the meantime, grown up, and was flourish- ing rankly at Hampton Court — namely, that some of the residents, looking on the rooms, which they held in the palace of their sovereign during his royal pleasure, as if they were their own freehold, coolly proceeded, without asking anyone's leave, to make alterations in permanent structures, to exchange and barter rooms with each other, and actually to let their rooms, not only to their relations and friends, but sometimes even to any stranger, who would pay them their price. This last most gross and improper practice is referred to in a letter written by order of the Lord Chamberlain, on the 9th of September, 1778, where it is pointed out to the deputy-housekeeper that "as it is a Rule laid down, under his Majesty's approbation, that no Apartments granted in His Palaces, by the Lord Chamberlain, should be held by Persons, who have not His Lordship's Warrant and In- dulgence for the same ; His Lordship desires that you will take care that this Rule is not infringed in Hampton Court Palace." Little attention, however, seems to have been given to this warning by the guilty parties ; and, indeed, the abuse continued to prevail to such an extent, that at last King George III. became so excessively indignant at the scant respect paid to his wishes, and at the way his orders were systematically disregarded by the recipients of his favours, and at the gross misconduct, as he considered it to be, of those who, living in his house as his guests, by his gracious permission, were so impertinent as to lend his rooms to other people without his leave or sanction, that he instructed the Lord Chamberlain, Lord Hertford, to address a stringent letter to the housekeeper of Hampton Court Palace con- demning in forcible terms this and similar irregularities. The transfer of apartments for motives far less pure than those of friendship or acquaintance, constituted, of course, the gravamen of the offence; and we regret to have to record that, in spite of incessant remonstrances from the HORACE WALPOLE AND HIS RELATIONS. 385 Lord Chamberlain's office during the subsequent sixty years or so, some of the inhabitants of Hampton Court Palace — though they stopped short of the scandal of openly letting their apartments — continued to indulge in this irregular practice " under the rose," throughout the reigns of George III., George IV., and William IV. Of the inner social life of Hampton Court Palace at this period, we shall not attempt any exhaustive or elaborate description ; in the first place, because there is but little special material for the purpose, and in the second, because a general idea of it can easily be obtained by the perusal of the letters of Horace Walpole, who, living at Strawberry Hill, but four miles off, was in the same social atmosphere, as it were, as the inhabitants of the palace, and who frequently met them at dinners, balls, and parties, either in the neigh- bourhood, or in their own apartments. Many of them, indeed, were his own near relations ; and writing to Lady Ossory from Strawberry Hill on the 4th of August, 1782, he observes : "I have dined again with Princess Amelia and with the Hertfords at Ditton, and see a great deal of my family, who are cantoned around me like those of a patriarch, when tribes begin to increase and remove to small distances. My brother [Sir Edward Walpole] is at Isleworth, Lady Dysart at Ham, the Keppels at the Stud, the Waldegraves at the Pavilions, and Lady Malpas in the Palace." By the " Pavilions " Walpole signifies the buildings in the Bowling Green at the end of the Pavilion Terrace or Long Walk, already mentioned more than once in these pages, and of which an engraving is given on page 365. About the year 1718 one of these Httle garden houses (doubtless the still existing south-east one) was adapted as a residence for Mr. Christopher Tilson, and subsequently the adjoining one was similarly altered, and the two connected by further buildings. In 1 745 all four Pavilions were granted to Princess Amelia, the daughter of George II., for whom further im- provements were made, and who lived here for some years. At the time of Walpole's letter they were in the occupation of the King's brother, the Duke of Gloucester, and his wife Maria, Sir Edward Walpole's second illegitimate daughter, whose first husband had been the Earl Waldegrave. The Duchess of Gloucester, as she had then become, v;as the cc 386 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. most beautiful woman of her day — " not a fault in her face and person, and the detail charming. A warm complexion, tending to brown, fine eyes, brown hair, fine teeth, and infinite wit and vivacity." With her at the Pavihons were her three beautiful and far-famed daughters, the Ladies The Pavilion^ Hampton Court Park, the Seat of H.R.H. the Duke of Kent. (Facsimile from an Engraving dated 1816.) Waldegrave, so well known from Sir Joshua Reynolds's charming picture. We may observe here that on the Duchess of Gloucester's death the Pavilions became the residence of the Duke of Kent, in virtue of his office as Ranger ; and after him of his equerry, General Moore. It was in the General's time that Theodore Hook, who often stayed at Thames Ditton on the opposite side of the river, and who delighted in the situation, THE DUKE OF KENT. 387 wrote, in 1834, his well-known verses on "The Swan at Ditton," among which occur the lines : "I'd rather live, like General Moore, In one of the Pavilions That stand upon the other shore Than be the King of Millions." After the death, in 1854, of the General's widow, all the buildings were demolished, except the existing south-east Pavilion, which was then successively granted to two widows of distinguished officers. In 1894 the occupation of the Pavi- lion was granted by Her Majesty the Queen to the author. An inhabitant of Hampton Court during the reign of George III., who should be mentioned, was William V.^ Prince of Orange, whose mother was Anne, daughter of George II., and who, having to fly from his dominions in 1795, on the invasion of Holland by the French Revolu- tionary troops, took refuge in England, where he and his family were received with much kindness and sympathy by George III., and by the public in general. The King at once assigned him apartments at Hampton Court, whence, very soon after his arrival, on the 28th of May, 1795, he issued a protest against the decree of the States- General abolishing the Stadtholdership. The exact extent of the apartments in the palace occupied by him and his family, cannot be precisely ascertained; but we know that they embraced the suite in the range on the east side of the Clock Court, with several adjacent rooms, including such of the State Rooms, in the ranges north and south of the new palace, as abut on the Fountain Court. The Stadtholder and his family continued to reside here until 1802, when they returned to the Continent, after the Treaty of Amiens. It is, perhaps, to his wife and her ladies-in-waiting that the walk under the elms and chestnuts against the Tilt Yard wall owes its curious name of the " Frog Walk," which, it is supposed, was the favourite promenade of the Dutch Fraus or Flows of her Highness's household. 388 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. CHAPTER XXXI. HAMPTON COURT DURING THE REIGNS OF GEORGE IV. AND WILLIAM IV. George IV.'s accession to the throne on the 29th of January, 1820, caused Httle, if any, change in the fortunes of Hampton Court ; and of its history at this period we have not much to record, beyond some reminiscences and anecdotes, handed down by tradition, or culled here and there from memoirs and letters of the time. As to the palace itself, it presented, as far as the State Rooms were concerned, a most desolate and deserted appearance. " These princely halls," remarks a visitor in 1823, "have come to be almost as silent as their dead master's tomb. They have nothing to echo back but the hurried footstep of a single domestic, who passes through them daily, to wipe away the dust of their untrodden floors, only that it may collect there again ; or the unintelligible jargon of a superannuated dependant, as he describes to a few straggling visitors (without looking at either) the objects of art that have been deposited in them, like treasures in a tomb." An air of stately desolateness attached also to the sur- roundings of the palace ; the same writer observing that about them there was an appearance which he knew not " how to describe otherwise than by calling it courtly. . . . The great wide, yet unfrequented road, worn only in the middle, and grown with grass at the sides — the great walls that line the wide pathways on either hand, and the great stately elms, that stand out, here and there, almost in the middle of the road, as you see them nowhere else — all give an imposing appearance, that I do not remember to have seen elsewhere." In the meanwhile, however, the private apartments con- tinued to be as much sought after as ever; and whenever a vacancy occurred, there were always several eager applicants for the coveted privilege of free quarters in his Majesty's palace. REMINISCENCES OF THE WELLESLEYS. 389 One illustrious inhabitant requires particular mention in this place, namely, the Countess of Mornington, mother of those two great brothers, the Marquess Wellesley, the brilliant and sagacious statesman who consolidated the British Empire in India, and the Duke of Wellington, who saved the liberties of Europe, and conquered Napoleon. NORTH-EAST ANGLE OF THE OLD PALACE, WITH THE GATEWAY INTO LADY MORNINGTON's GARDEN. The apartments occupied by Lady Mornington, who had, at this time, been residing at Hampton Court for about thirty years, were those on the ground floor in the north- east angle of WiUiam III.'s palace, formerly occupied, in the reign of George II., by the Prince of Wales. Here Lady Mornington was often visited by her two famous sons ; and here several persons still living remember seeing them to- 390 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. gether — " the mother of the Gracchi and her sons," as she proudly liked to call herself. Adjoining her apartments is a little inclosed garden — still known as " Lady Mornington's Garden " — where she loved to sit, and where she planted a catalpa tree, ever since cherished in memory of her, though it is, unfortunately, now reduced to little more than a bare stump. A slight reminiscence of the Duke of Wellington, also, still lingers at Hampton Court, for it was he who gave the name of " Purr Corner " to the nook in the east front of the palace, on the right-hand side of the gate as you come out from the cloister into the garden. There was, in former days, a seat in this spot, which, being warm and sheltered, was the favourite one with the more elderly ladies in the palace; and here they used to sit basking in the sun, and talking and gossiping — whence the Iron Duke's reference to the feline murmur that pervaded this corner. Turning now to the social life of the palace at this time, we find that its chief centre was the Duke of Clarence, after- wards William IV., who had been appointed Ranger of Bushey Park in 1797, on the death of Lady Guildford (formerly North), and who, during the reign of George IV., resided almost entirely at Bushey House, leading the life of a country gentleman, and superintending a farm, which he had formed in the park. Being of an easy and genial temper, he became a great favourite with his neighbours, whom he entertained with much hospitality, and in the amusements of whom, whether balls, dinners, races, cricket matches or pugilistic contests on Molesey Hurst, he always took a keen interest. He was, also. President of the " Toy Club," a society which held its meetings in that famous hostelry the " Toy," whence it took its name. The memory of the club still lingers about Hampton Court, though its local habitation at the west entrance to the palace vanished upwards of forty years ago. The members of the " Toy Club " met once a month, to dine together with much conviviality — the Duke of Clarence's joviality and kindliness making everyone feel at his ease, and imparting to the evening's entertainment a freedom, and an absence of restraint, not usual in the presence of royalty. As to the dinners, though good, they do not appear to have REMINISCENCES OF THE SHERIDANS. 391 been extravagantly choice, if we are to judge from the fact that a marrow pudding was always served for the special delectation of his Royal Highness. It is said that when he afterwards became king, he used to declare that the dinners at the " Toy Club " were the most enjoyable he had ever been present at. **PURR CORNER. Prominent in all entertainments in and near Hampton Court, and doubtless, especially, at the meetings of the " Toy Club," were those two brilliant brothers, Frank and Charlie Sheridan, whose mother, Mrs. Tom Sheridan, daughter-in-law of the great Sheridan, had been given apartments in 1820, and whose youth was passed in the palace, and of whom 392 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. tradition still preserves a faint, though fast-fading, memory. Suffice it to say here, that at Hampton Court they fully maintained their reputation for those boyish high spirits, which rendered them the spoilt darlings of society, and those rollicking practical jokes which, usually having an element of humour, were relished by all except the victims of them. Besides Mrs. Sheridan's two sons and her daughter, Mrs. Norton, who married in 1827, there were with her at Hampton Court at this time her two other daughters, the eldest, Helen Selina, who married, in 1825, Lord Dufferin ; and the youngest, Jane Georgiana, who, marrying on June loth, 1830, Lord Seymour, afterwards became Duchess of Somerset, and was the Queen of Beauty at the famous Egling- ton tournament in 1839. Lady Dufferin, as everyone knows, became the mother of the present Lord Dufferin and Ava, who, doubtless, inherited many of his captivating and splendid qualities from his mother's family, and the career of whom has been, perhaps, the most brilliant and honour- able of any Englishman of this century. He also, as a little boy, was much at Hampton Court with his mother ; and writing from India a few years ago, in the midst of the Burmah campaign, to a dear and lifelong friend, the late Mr. Alfred Montgomery, whom he first met at Hampton Court, he says of the old palace : " I cannot tell you what an affection I have for that place, and what tender memories It brings back to my recollection." The accession of the Duke of Clarence as King William IV., on the 20th of June, 1830, opened a somewhat new prospect for Hampton Court; for his Majesty, having resided so long within the precincts of the manor, took a good deal of interest in the palace; and it was he who seems first to have conceived the idea of making it a sort of receptacle or museum for the many curious pictures which had hitherto been stored away, out of sight, in the other royal palaces. With this object, he sent from Kensington, St. James's, Windsor Castle, Buckingham House, and Carl- ton House, hundreds of canvases — many of them little better than rubbish — to swell the contents of Hampton Court, and to accommodate which several extra State Rooms were added to those already open to the inspection of sight- seers. His Majesty also gave orders that the King's Great THE PALACE OPENED FREE TO THE PUBLIC. 393 Staircase, which was in a dilapidated condition, should be restored and repainted. In the meanwhile the popularity of Hampton Court as a place of excursion from London continued to grow. Admission to the palace, however, was still under the same conditions — that is, a fee of a shilling or so was exacted from each visitor, and parties were conducted, or rather " driven," to use the expression of a disgusted connoisseur, through the State Apartments by the deputy-housekeeper or one of her housemaids, who pointed out the pictures with a long stick, calling out, in a loud voice, at the same time, the names of the subjects and their painters to the awe-stricken company — a pro- cedure that allowed of little opportunity for studying or enjoying them. CHAPTER XXXn. QUEEN VICTORIA — HAMPTON COURT AS A POPULAR RESORT. With the accession of her present most gracious Majesty Queen Victoria to the throne, there opened a new era in the history of Hampton Court ; for one of the first acts of her reign was to order that the State Rooms should be thrown open to all her subjects without restriction, and without fee or gratuity of any kind. This was done in November, 1838, since which date they have never been closed to the public, — except, of course, in times of national mourning, — and every facility has been afforded, ever since, for seeing and enjoying Hampton Court and its treasures. This boon has been most thoroughly appreciated by her Majesty's subjects. The highest records of visitors have been in the Great Exhibition years : 350,000 in 1851, and 370,000 in 1862. In 1890 the numbers were 240,000, and this is about the present average. Altogether it is reckoned that no less than 12,000,000 persons have passed through the State Rooms during the sixty years of the reign of the Queen. As to the day of the week on which Hanipton Court is 394 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. most visited, it is interesting to note that Sunday was, is now, and always has been, the most popular of all — the visitors on that day usually amounting to half the total for all the other days in the week put together, and occasionally attaining as large a figure as 5,000 on a single Sunday. As to the general conduct of the excursionists on that day, as well as all the other days of the week, the author can tender his emphatic testimony, after a continuous experience of some twenty years, that it is entirely unexceptionable. True, the visitors do not walk about on the Sabbath day with an air of prim self-satisfaction ; true, they are not all dressed in long black coats, and tall chimney-pot hats; on the con- trary, the Sunday sightseers arrive full of high spirits, intent on enjoying themselves ; and they have even been known — horribile dictu ! — to smile, to laugh, to sing, to run, and do many other things, calculated to draw down on them the severest censure from our rigid precisians. But to those whose eyes are not jaundiced by the blight of Puritanism, there could be no more cheering sight than the happy crowds of young men and women who, throwing aside their weekday cares, come down to Hampton Court on Sunday, to enjoy themselves in an unconventional and un- restrained fashion; wandering through the State Apartments ; gazing at the palace and the pictures ; treading the velvet turf and scenting the flowers in the gardens; strolling in the lime walks ; roaming beneath the broad-boughed avenues, or picnicking among the ferns in Bushey Park ; rollicking in the maze ; skimming along on bicycles, or rowing on the river. Indeed, to anyone who would like to know what *' a free Sunday" means, we would commend a visit to Hampton Court some afternoon of that day, in the height of the sum- mer. He will then witness — what is to be seen in no other place in Great Britain — the much-dreaded "Continental Sunday " in full swing, within twelve miles of Charing Cross. Arriving by the crowded train, and standing for a moment on the centre of the bridge, a bright and animated scene meets the eye. On all sides are to be seen hundreds of omnibuses, vans, char-k-bancs, brakes, cabs, dog-carts, and carriages and conveyances of all sorts, including several coaches; all of which have brought their parties for the palace, the gardens, the parks, and the river. On the river, SUNDAY VISITORS. 395 above all, the scene is of the gayest : it is often so crowded with rowing boats, steam launches, sailing boats with various coloured sails, and houseboats decked with drapery and flowers, that one would imagine a regatta was going on. Through Molesey Lock also, just above the bridge, ceaseless streams, literally of hundreds of pleasure boats, each with their merry party of holiday makers, pass all day long ; while upon the banks stroll throngs of young people, not perked out in "Sunday-go-to-meeting best," but men rationally dressed in easy shooting suits or flannels, and girls in neat and pretty lawn tennis or boating costumes. In the mean- while, perhaps, from the deck of some pleasure craft, floating down the stream opposite the Water Gallery, there is a "sound of music on the waters," in the lively strains of the last new valse ; while a crowd of boats gathers around, and on the ear " drops the light drip of the suspended oar." To exchange a scene like this, with all its freshness, naturalness, and abandon^ for the hot London streets and parks on Sunday, with their conventional dressed-up crowds, parading, prayer-book prominently in hand, along the pave- ments, or crawling in dense masses by Rotten Row, enables us to judge how heavy is the load of formalism that still weighs upon so many English men and women. Reverting now to the period immediately subsequent to the opening of Hampton Court free to the public, we should notice that the palace thenceforth was much better cared for, and that many excellent restorations were carried out, both on the exterior and in the interior of the building. The hideous sash windows, for instance, that had so long disfigured many parts of the old Tudor West Front, were replaced by Gothic mullioned, casemented, and latticed windows ; the ornamental stone-carvings were restored ; and chimney-shafts, of finely moulded brick, substituted for the shapeless and graceless masses of yellow brick of the Georgian era. The restoration of the interior of the Great Hall was also undertaken : the walls, so long bare, being rehung with old tapestry; the east and west windows being filled, in 1843, and the side windows in 1847, with appropriate stained glass by Willement ; and the roof redecorated. All these matters were carefully supervised by the late Mr. 396 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. Edward Jesse, then Surveyor of the Royal Parks and Palace, who had a happy knack, in all the regulations he laid down, of combining that freedom from vexatious restraint so essen- tial to the public enjoyment of a popular resort with the respect and dignity which should invest a royal palace, and the re- verence with which a great historic building should be treated Mr. Jesse was the inventor of the felicitous phrase, which has ever since been inscribed on the notice-boards in the gardens, "The public is expected to protect what is in- tended for the public enjoyment," a sentiment which won the commendation of the great French critic, M. Taine, and which, while much facilitating the protection of the flowers and plants from heedless mischief-makers, has had no small influence in educating the popular conscience to the proper appreciation of Hampton Court and its attractions, now almost invariably evinced by all classes of excursionists. A recipient of the Queen's favour at Hampton Court about the period which we have now reached, was Professor Faraday, to whom, in 1858, her Majesty, at the thoughtful and kindly instance of the Prince Consort, offered the Crown house on the Green, which now bears the name of " Faraday House." Needless to say that Faraday had not solicited this favour; and he, at first, hesitated to accept it, fearing lest he had not the means to do up the house properly. But when he was informed that all that was need- ful would be done at no cost to himself, he accepted her Majesty's gracious offer with deep and unfeigned gratitude, not only for the kindness itself, but for the delicate and considerate way in which it was tendered. Here, accordingly, two doors from the house formerly occupied by Sir Christopher Wren, this noble, illustrious man passed the evening of his life, still eager in the quest of scientific truth, yet enjoying the repose of the summer life in the country, and delighting above all "in the beauty of the sunsets from the palace gardens." His death took place at Faraday House on August 27 th, 1867. Nothing else worthy of note occurred in relation to Hamp- ton Court until about the year 1880, when there began an epoch in the annals of Hampton Court which has been, in various ways, interesting and eventful. In the first place, it was in 1880 that her Royal Highness Princess Frederica and HAMPTON COURT OF TO-DAY. 397 her husband, Baron von Pawel Rammingen, came to reside at Hampton Court, the Queen having placed at her disposal the suite of rooms in the West Front of the palace, formerly known as the " Lady Housekeeper's " ; and in these apart- ments, on the 7th of March in the following year, was born their daughter Victoria, an event which was the occasion of a private visit by her Majesty the Queen to the Princess. Unfortunately, her Royal Highness's little daughter died within three weeks after her birth. In this sad event, the Princess and the Baron had the lively sympathy of everyone at Hampton Court and in its vicinity. For, short as had then been the Princess's residence in the palace, she had won all hearts by the kindliness and courtesy of her nature, and her consideration for all those with whom she had been brought in contact. Since then, as years have gone by, the cordial feeling, entertained by her neighbours towards her Royal Highness and her husband, has increased and deepened into a sentiment of warm regard and affection. In the meanwhile the historical and artistic aspects of the Palace of Hampton Court, which had, for a long time — in fact, since the first few years immediately succeeding its free opening to the public — been almost entirely overlooked and neglected, began, about the period we have now reached, to receive renewed attention. This was principally due to the appointment, in 1874, of Mr. A. B. Mitford, C.B., as Secretary to the Board of Works, who, appreciating at its priceless worth the picturesque and romantic edifice in- trusted to the care of his office, and taking, not merely a perfunctory, but a warm, personal interest in everything relating to it, at once devoted all his energy and taste to preserving its ancient structure, and to effecting everything that might add to its attractions and interest. One work only, which was at once taken in hand, may be particularized here. It was the establishing of a system of precautions and appliances against fire — the efficiency of which was tested only too soon, by the way they successfully coped with two serious conflagrations. Of the division of Hampton Court Palace into private apartments, and its occupation by private families, we have already said something when dealing with the reign of George III. We may further observe here that the suites, which 398 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. now number altogether fifty-three, vary considerably in size, comfort, and convenience; some, such as that formerly the Lady Housekeeper's, having as many as forty rooms, with five or six staircases ; others, that is, the smaller suites, having no more than ten or twelve. The average accom- modation Hes between fifteen and twenty rooms; but the sizes, again, of the rooms themselves vary very much, some being exceedingly large and lofty; others, on the contrary, very small and low. Scarcely any two suites, either, resemble each other in arrangement or shape — a fact partly due to the haphazard way in which the palace was first diverted from its original to its present use, and private and separate residences cut and carved out of a series of rooms, intended for the very different purpose of accom- modating a Court. Some indeed are, as it were, complete houses in themselves, of several storeys, with front and back doors and staircases, with large entrance halls, galleries, and passages ; others, again, are rather in the nature of " flats," all the chief rooms, and sometimes the offices also, being on one floor ; while others are something between the two, resembling rather what are known in London as "upper parts." Again, though, in some cases, the suites of apartments are entirely self-contained and compact ; in others they are in- conveniently disjointed and disconnected ; the offices, per- haps, being on the ground floor, and the rest of the rooms in the upper storeys ; the bulk of the suite on one floor, up one staircase, and a couple of bedrooms on another floor, up a different staircase; or, again, as in one or two cases, the kitchen and offices being across a semi-open cloister. Anomalies such as these were partly occasioned by the capricious fashion in which, in old days, rooms in one corner of the palace were, for no apparent reason, attached to an apartment far away at the other end of the building ; and partly by the way in which some of the inhabitants would take any room that might be vacant, anywhere in the palace, and appropriate it to their own use. In the present day, of course, anything of this sort would be utterly impossible ; for not only is the Lord Chamberlain's full and deliberate sanction requisite, before the smallest nook or corner can be occupied by an inhabitant, but every MULTIPLICATION OF AUTHORITIES. 399 room, and even receptable, is separately numbered, and its allocation to any particular person carefully recorded in the books of the department. In the meantime such inconveni- ences as still subsist are much less than they were formerly. Life, however, in the royal palace is subject to some strange peculiarities where, owing to the subdivision of departments, distinct and even antagonistic authorities claim control. An amusing case of this is recorded of some windows of a royal palace which needed cleaning, but which remained dirty for a considerable time, because the outside of the panes being subject to the Woods and Forests, and the inside to the Lord Steward, nothing could be done until these two high departments of State were induced to combine for this important purpose. But a still more curious instance of this sort of thing occurred at Hampton Court, many years ago, to a lady who inhabited a suite of private apartments in the palace. By way of preamble we must remark that "the spheres of influence " of the various departments are, in a broad and general way, delimited thus : the outside or " shell " of the building, including all that relates to structural maintenance and repairs, falls under the jurisdiction of the Board of Works ; the regulation of the interior of the building, involv- ing all such high questions as the use to which rooms are to be put, the opening and closing of doors, and the passing from one room to another, are within the province of the Lord Chamberlain; while, superimposed over all, and, to a certain extent, co-ordinate with both the foregoing, is the undefined and indefinable authority of the Lord Steward, or the "Board of Green Cloth" : so that, to decide, in certain cases, whose is the responsibility, and whose the power, may give rise to discussions transcending in nicety the most re- condite legal arguments, and involving points of the subtlest metaphysics. Further to complicate matters, the portions of the palace open to the public are, even as regards their interior, to a certain degree, within the purview and control of the Board of Works ; while, in addition to these three de- partments, there is the Office of Woods and Forests, which, at one time, had a roving commission over everything in the nature of parks, gardens, and open spaces. When we add to all these, the departments of the Master of the Horse, 400 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. the Horse Guards, and the War Office, to say nothing of the MetropoHtan Police, all of which occasionally join in the fray, if they deem that their prerogatives are being tampered with, or their dignity lightly treated, our readers will under- stand something of the difficulties of getting anything done at Hampton Court. No better instance, as we have said, could be given of this than the story of the lady mentioned above, who applied for the privilege of having access to the gardens, down a disused staircase, which communicated with her rooms. In the first place, she had to apply to the Lord Chamberlain's department for permission to use the staircase, and to open the doors at the top and the bottom of it. This having been, after much discussion, conceded, she thought she would have no difficulty in passing through the door, at the bottom of the stairs, into the passage that leads to the garden. But in this she was pitiably mistaken. She did, indeed, manage to reach the door, and the Lord Chamber- lain had opened it, but she could not cross its threshold without authorization from the Board of Works ; for woe to anyone who breaks their " shell " without leave ! This obstacle, however, being in due course surmounted, the lady thought she would now be allowed to pass, without any further obstruction, through the passage into the garden. But it is one thing to get into one end of a passage in a royal palace, quite a different thing to get out of it at the other. For, barring her way into the garden, all three " Boards " again confronted her : first, the Lord Chamber- lain, brandishing his keys ; next, the Board of Works, with their "shell"; then the Board of the Lord Steward, who always mysteriously appears on the scene when least ex- pected, flourishing his "green cloth," and objecting to every- thing everywhere, on no grounds in particular. The three "Boards," however, were once more propitiated; and the lady rashly thought that, at last, the goal of her hopes was won. But she had reckoned without another " Board." For, after reaching the garden door by the combined authority, and the joint and several assents and consents of the three chief departments ; after turning the lock by leave of the Lord Chamberlain, opening the door by leave of the Lord Steward and passing through it by leave of the Board BATTLING WITH THE " BOARDS. 401 of Works, she could not get into the garden, through a small iron gate, without the high permission and authority, for that purpose duly sued for, and after full consideration, deliberation, and consultation, properly had and obtained from the First Commissioner and Board of her Majesty's Office of Woods and Forests. For a while the matter looked ominous, for the " Board " at first would not relent — the sensibility, so it was maliciously said, of some sensitive Commissioner having been ruffled, by the way in which his THE PUSH. permission had been taken for granted. The lady, in fact, would, we suspect, have been pining at the gate of this paradise to this day, had she not wisely approached this Commissioner in a proper spirit of deference, so that at last the " Board " was soothed, permission was given, " the gate was passed, and heaven was won." The above is by no means a solitary instance of a lady occupying apartments at Hampton Court getting her way in spite of the opposition of the officials of the Crown. For a story is told of a refractory resident, some years ago, who, when informed by the Lcrd Chamberlain that some fine old DD 402 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. tapestry, belonging to the Crown, which hung in her rooms was required for another of the royal palaces, replied, that as the tapestry was in the apartments when she received her warrant, she altogether declined to part with it. My lord re- monstrated, my lady was firm ; my lord insisted, my lady was inexorable. At last his lordship threatened that unless she gave it up voluntarily he would send some of his myrmidons and have it forcibly removed, to which her ladyship replied that, if he dared to do so, she would set fire to the palace ! The determined character of the lady being well known, her threat prevailed, and she remained in undisturbed possession of the tapestry until her death. Before leaving this topic, we may refer to an idiosyncrasy of the life of the inhabitants of the palace, the use of an old sedan-chair, mounted on wheels, drawn by a chairman, and called "the Push," which is used by the inhabitants for going out in the evening to dinners or parties from one part of the building to another. This curious survival of a by- gone age, of which we have inserted a sketch on the pre- ceding page, is probably the only sedan-chair in actual use in England. Having now brought our narrative down to the present time, we will just glance, before closing these pages, at the general aspect of the palace and its surroundings as they appear to-day ; and first of the parks and gardens, though no words of ours can convey any adequate conception of their enchanting beauty in the early summer. It is then that the ancestral hawthorns, which thickly stud the whole i,o8o acres of the area of Bushey Park, are in full flower, and the air scented by the sweet odour of the blossom of the lime trees, which compose the quadruple aisles, as it were — each fourteen yards wide, from row to row — of the great avenue down the centre of the park, fifty-six yards wide, and a mile and forty yards long, its centre, or nave, being flanked by stately horse-chestnuts, which, when themselves in full blossom, about the middle of May, present an appearance of unrivalled splendour. Their wide, low, sweeping branches are then laden with myriads of spiked white flowers, tinged with red, to which the massy, dark green piles of foliage serve as an admirable background ; and which, falling, powder and bespangle the turf below with countless stars. The sight of ASPECT OF THE PARKS AND GARDENS. 403 this magnificent chestnut avenue, in all the pride of its growth, and the full glory of its bloom, usually draws thousands of visitors from London and the neighbourhood ; and the Sunday when it is at its zenith, called " Chestnut Sunday," is announced beforehand in the newspapers. It is at the same time that the Home Park, of 752 acres, is also at its prime, and offers a picture of surpassing loveli- THE HOUSE OR HOME PARK AND LONG CANAL. ness and delight. For the great avenues that border the Long Canal, and bend the graceful amplitude of their lower branches, arch like, towards the water ; as well as the side avenues that stretch away in long divergent vistas — "living galleries of ancient trees" — are composed of limes, every separate twig of which carries its fragrant blossom ; so that the air far around is pervaded with the intensest per* 404 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. fume, and filled with the murmuring music of innumerable bees. At such a time, it is indeed an exquisite pleasure to stroll over the fresh green velvet turf 3 to wander beneath the low- hanging branches, by the side of the long sheet of water, whose placid surface, whereon " broad water-lilies lie tre- mulously," is broken only by the plash of some sluggish carp ; to watch a herd of deer, browsing peacefully amid the ferns, or gracefully gliding beneath the cool shade of the trees ; to come, perhaps, upon one solitary fawn, drinking at the water's edge, which bounds away, startled at the sound of an approaching step : all this combines to form a picture of stately grandeur and repose, which endues this park with an indefinable fascination and a poetic beauty, entirely its own. The gardens of Hampton Court, also, have a captivating charm peculiar to themselves, chiefly derived from so much of their original formal trimness, and their old-fashioned air, as they are still permitted to retain. This is especially the case with the Private Gardens, which retain more, perhaps, of the form and spirit of former days than any others in England, the grounds being laid out in a way suited to the variability of our climate : for winter, walled parterres and sheltered alleys ; for summer, grassy banks and plots, shady bowers and nooks, refreshing fountains, and flowery arbours — all of which give it an air of repose and seclusion, and an irresistible charm, entirely unattainable by the most lavish expenditure and display of modern horti- cultural art. To see them in all their beauty, one should visit them on some sunny morning, towards the latter end of the month of May, when all the flowers are just budding forth, and all the shrubs are in bloom. Standing on the terrace, or looking from the windows of the palace, nothing could be then more enchanting than the scene. On either side are the fresh grassy slopes of the two terraces ; and between them are three vistas or alleys extending to the Thames — the centre one a shady walk entirely canopied by over-arching boughs of " tressy yew," amid which is just seen the picturesque old fountain ; and the two others carpeted with turf, edged with brilliant masses of candy-tuft and alyssum, and embanked THE EXQUISITE BEAUTY OF THE GARDENS. 405 with the blossom of lilac, laburnum, laurestina, and syringa. A pretty effect is produced by one alley being bordered with candy-tuft, so that it forms a long line of white, and by the other alley being bordered with alyssum, so as to make a similar line of brilliant yellow. The graceful statue of a girl with flowers in her lap, most appropriately placed a few years THE PRIVY GARDEN. ago on the old stone pedestal in the left alley, irresistibly reminds us of the lines : " Now the bright morning star, day's harbinger, Comes dancing from the East, and leads with her The flowery May, who from her green lap throws The yellow cowslip, and the pale primrose. " From the terrace one should stroll beneath the dark green branches of the yew trees, or along the ever-verdant grass walks, to the fountain that plashes gently in the middle of the parterre ; and thence returning, through the leafy arcade 406 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. of Queen Mary's Bower — a " dappled path of mingled light and shade" — pass to the old " Pond Garden," which remains very much as it did when Henry VIII. strolled therein with Anne Boleyn ; and where, in the midst of a walled inclosure, surrounded with flowering creepers of all sorts, an old foun- tain trickles in front of a picturesque arbour. This is indeed a spot of the daintiest and rarest beauty, the product of nigh four centuries of time, which no expenditure of money or art could possibly create. But even the Public Gardens have still some elements of this kind, which go to intensify a beauty chiefly derived from delightful groves of lime ; shelving banks of grass ; winding streams with floating water-lilies; wide, level lawns; long, soft walks of velvet turf; evergreen trees of many-toned verdure ; dark-boughed yews and variegated hollies ; walls with clustering roses and creepers; and borders rich with masses of sweet and lovely flowers. All these cover an expanse of thirty acres; while eleven more — called "the Wilderness," in which is the Maze — form a pleasant and shady retreat of winding walks, overshadowed by the foliage of ancient trees. To appreciate, however, the full fascination of the gardens of Hampton Court, they should be seen and enjoyed in all circumstances ; at all times of the year ; and at every hour of the day — in early spring, when the tender leaves of the limes contrast with the sombre tints of the yews ; when the lawns are dressed in the dazzling brightness of fresh green, and the borders lined with crocuses, tulips, and hyacinths ; in the early summer, when the lilacs, laburnums, cyringas, wisterias, and lime trees are flinging their mingled fragrance on the air ; and in the height of the summer, when all the flower-beds are ablaze with splendour, and the fountain is joyously spouting its streaming showers, which flash like diamonds in the beams of the golden sun, and then melt into vaporous spray. They should be seen even in winter, when the boughs of the yew trees and hollies are spangled with hoar-frost, or enwreathed with snow ; and when the red walls of the old palace, fringed here and there, at " coigns of vantage," with intercepted flakes, stand out glowing with an unwonted ruddiness, amid the dazzling whiteness of the sur- rounding scene. THE GARDENS AND PALACE AT NIGHT. 407 They should be seen, also, in the freshness of the dewy morning : in the stillness of the midnight hour : when the Long Canal gleams like a sheet of silver in the moonlight, slanting down the avenue ; and when naught is heard but the nightingale's distant music, floating across the river from the hedgerows, where they sing embowered. There could, indeed, be no more encljanting scene than is then afforded VIEW, LOOKING EAST, OF THE LONG CANAL AND GREAT AVENUE IN THE HOUSE OR HOME PARK. from the upper windows of the palace, whence the gardens are viewed lying beneath, dimmed in a silvery mist ; while, far away, beyond garden, park, and river, the eye can wander over the undulations of a glimmering expanse, reaching to the Surrey hills. It is at night that the palace, also, is invested with its most romantic garb. Few things, in truth, could be more 408 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. impressive than the solemn stillness that then pervades the spot, which, but a few hours before, echoed to the sound of thousands of voices and the tramp of thousands of feet ; and it would be difficult to match the exquisite beauty of the pic- turesque old courts, gables, towers, and turrets, when their broken outline stands out against a sky bathed in the radi- ance of the rising moon ; or the poetic aspect of the Foun- tain Court, when the moonbeams shoot down upon the water of the circular fountain in its midst, glitter on the panes of the old windows, or mingle with the lights that blink and flicker through the arches of the arcade beneath ; while all night through the sound of the cool trickle of the fountain soothes the ear. Elsewhere, in the courts and cloisters of the vast building, not a sound : only the measured tread of the sentry, as he paces up and down in front of Wolsey's gate ; or the clank of the keys, and the groan of the hinge of the old oak door, as the watchman, on his rounds, vanishes with his lantern into the gloom of the Hall or the Haunted Gallery, It is at such times that a thousand stirring thoughts rush in upon the mind, a thousand swelling feelings fill the heart — thoughts of the moving scenes these walls have witnessed, of the thrilling deeds which have been done, upon the very spot whereon we stand. And contemplating the visionary pageant of the past, unfolded to the mental view, as the centuries roll by before us, and succeeding generations of the mighty dead step forth to play their transitory part, and disappear, we are drawn to dwell on memories of our own brief time ; of happy days gone by for ever ; of sweet loved faces passed away ; of tender hearts that throb no longer ; of gentle voices silent ever more. And yet, while musing thus, and feeling how short is history, and how fleeting time ; how soon the present fades away into the past — there often comes upon us a sense of permanence in change; a thought that, as around us so much still endures unchanged, all things that have been and will be are indissolubly linked with what succeeds; and that time itself is but the ever-varying aspect of eternal things. And herein lies the deep significance of such a story as we have endeavoured in this volume to set forth ; and the high AN EMBLEM OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 409 function that, we trust, this antique pile of Hampton Court may long continue to discharge. And there is yet another aspect in which we may regard it; for it stands to-day, consecrated by antiquity, as an emblem and monument of English history, combining the picturesque and romantic elements of an ancient monarchy with the orderly development of popular freedom ; linking together the honour and prosperity of the Royal House with the progress and happiness of the toiling multitude ; stand- ing, too, as a symbol, palpable and tangible, of that tender attachment between Queen and people which has distin- guished the reign of Victoria among those of all other sove- reigns of England ; and which inspired the gracious act of freely opening to all her subjects the beautiful home of her ancestors at Hampton Court. THE END. INDEX. Albemarle, George Monk, Duke of, 260. Alva, Duke of, 126, 150. Anne, Princess, afterwards Queen, 293 ; gives birth to a son, 295 ; her accession, 351 ; takes counsel in this palace, 352 ; rooms occu- pied by, 353 ; won't pay the Crown creditors, 354 ; her so-called " style," 354 ; her drawing room, 354 ; slow to discharge her debts, 355; redecorates the chapel, 355. Anne Boleyn, Henry VIII. makes loveto,2, 13; installedat Hampton Court, 52 ; sends a token of good- will to Wolsey, 53 ; treated with consideration by Henry VIII., 58 ; given a black satin evening gown by Henry VIII., 59 ; shoots at the butt with the King, 62 ; rides out with Hfenry VIII. , 64 ; her honey- moon, 77 ; her gateway, 77 ; re- proaches Henry with his flirting, 86; her execution, 86; her arms displaced for Jane Seymour's, 88. Anne of Cleves, 104. Anne of Denmark, wife of James I., her dress, etc., for Daniel's masque, 162, et seq ; shoots the King's favourite hound, 192 ; Vansomer's portraits of, 192 ; se- riously ill, 193 ; her deathbed, 195; her death, 196; her will, T96, Ashburnham, John, allowed to re- turn to Charles I., 221; intro- duces Mrs. Cromwell to the King, 222 ; dismissed from his post of attendant to Charles I. , 226 ; plots the King's escape, 227 ; conducts the King from Hampton Court, 231. Bassompierre, M. de, his mission to the English Court, 211. "Beauty Room, The," or "Oak Room," 304 ; the Misses Gunning in, 380. Bellenden, Miss Madge, 362, 368. Berkeley, Sir John, allowed to re- turn to Charles I., 221 ; plans the King's escape, 227 ; accompanies Charles I. when escaping, 231. Bidloe, Dr., attends William III. 344, 347, 350. Blainville, Marquis de, French am- bassador, 206 ; intrigues to get apartments in the palace, 206. Brown, Lancelot, "Capability, "381. Buckingham, George Villiers, Duke of, visits Anne of Denmark when ill, 193 ; returns from Spain, 200 ; his insolence to the Queen, 202 ; Charles I.'s letters to, about the Queen, 209; his correspondence with Charles about the French " monsers," 210; confers with Bassompierre, 211; picture of, and his family, 212. Buckingham, George Villiers, 2nd Duke of, 264. Burnet, Bishop, records William III.'s predilection for Hampton Court, 291, 294; extols Queen Mary, 301 ; his mention ol William III., 321. Bushey Park, 3 ; rabbit warren in, 60; in Henry VI I I.'s time, 103; the deer in, 190; various notices of, 240, 242 ; the Harewarren in, 250 ; pathway in blocked by Cromwell, 250; the Diana foun- tain in, 286 ; laid out by Wise, 328 ; Wren's projected grand new approach to the palace from, 329 ; pheasantry in, 332 ; its beauty in summer, 402. Caroline, wife of George II., as Princess of Wales, 362 ; her lively Court, 363 ; hated by George I., 368 ; as Queen, at her toilet, 412 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. 374 ; her love of gardening, 376 ; her death, 378, Castlemaine, Barbara VilUers, Coun- tess of, Duchess of Cleveland, 270; Charles II. 's attachment to, 270 ; introduced to Queen Cathe- rine, 271 ; Charles II. determined to have her received by his wife, 272 ; Charles II insists on making her lady-in-waiting to his Queen, 273, 277 ; her apartments in the palace, 281, 285; at last received by the Queen, 282. Catherine of Arragon, dines and sups with Wolsey, 11 ; her room, 13 ; comes to Hampton Court with Henry VIII., 56; Henry VIII. leaves, 60. Catherine of Braganza, Infanta of Portugal, arrives off Portsmouth, 262 ; arrives, as wife of Charles II., at Hampton Court, 263; her ridiculous retinue, 264 ; her fan- tastic costume, 265 ; her bed, 267 ; resolved not to receive Lady Castlemaine, ^70 ; Lady Castlemaine presented to her, 271 ; ridiculed by the Court wits, 272 ; her forlorn condition, 273 ; the King determined to make her yield, 274 ; her inter- views with Clarendon, 276 ; threatens to leave England, 278 ; isolated in her own Court, 281 ; submits, and receives Lady Cas- tlemaine, 282 ; visits Queen Hen- rietta Maria, 283 ; subjected to humiliations, 285; retires to Hamp- ton Court on account of the plague, 286. Catherine Howard, married in the palace, 105 ; accused by Cranmer, 106 ; her supposed ghost, 107 ; charged with high treason, 108 ; her execution, 109. Catherine Parr, marriage of, 110. Cavendish, Wolsey's gentleman- usher, 12, 33, 39, 46, 59. Cecil, William, sides with the Duke of Somerset. 114, 118; his schem- ing with Arran and the Scotch rebels, 137, 138, 139 ; mentioned, 142, 147 ; his conduct in regard to Mary Queen of Scots, 148, 150, 151. Cecil, Sir Robert, afterwards Earl of Salisbury, i6o, 177. Chapel, the, 33, 88, 90, 93, 96 ; de- secrated by the Puritans, 219 ; William and Mary in the, 290 ; William, Dukeof Gloucester, bap- tized in the, 295 ; redecorated by Queen Anne, 355. Charles I. , as Prince of Wales, 193 ; visits his dying mother, 194; at his mother's deathbed, 194-195 ; his dislike of his wife's followers, 202; his disagreement with her, 203 ; bickerings between him and his wife, 204 ; refuses apartments to the French ambassador, 206; complains to his mother-in-law about his wife, 207 ; fresh out- break of disagreement with his wife, 208 ; informs Buckingham of his intention to dismiss the French suite, 210; drives them out like wild beasts, 211 ; in a great passion, 211 ; occasional visits to the p>alace, 212 ; projects an immense new hunting-ground, 216; Grand Remonstrance pre- sented to, 217 ; flies to Hampton Court, 218 ; brought captive to the palace, 220 ; visited by his ad- herents, 221 ; is under Parliamen- tary surveillance, 222 ; Cromwell and other officers of the Parlia- mentary army pay their respects to, 223; negotiates with Crom well, 223 ; the army disgusted with his double dealing, 224 ; his touching interview with Sir R. and Lady Fanshawe, 224 ; his guards doubled, 226; visited by his children, 226; schemes to escape, 227 ; fears attempts against his life, 228 ; escapes from Hampton Court, 230; his letter to Colonel Whalley, 232 ; his declaration to the Parliament, 233; his flight to the Isle of Wight, 234 ; his goods inventoried and appraised, 237 ; his honours, manors, parks, 238. Charles II., at dinner with his father, 215 ; mentioned, 239, 244 ; incites to murder Oliver Crom- well, 244, 252, 260 ; his Restora- tion, 261 ; the palace redecorated by, 261 ; renovates the Tennis Court, 261 ; plays tennis, a6i ; fond of gardening, 261 ; his im- provements at Hampton Court, INDEX. 413 262 ; lays out the House Park, 262 ; arrives at Hampton Court with his Queen, 263 ; annoyed by his wife's obstinacy about her dress, 265 ; insists on his Queen dressing like an Englishwoman, 266 ; plants the avenues in the House Park, 268 ; minding his pleasures at Hampton Court, 270; determined to force Lady Castle- maine on the Queen, 271 ; pro- poses to make her lady-in-waiting to his Queen, 273 ; interviews with Clarendon, 274; humiliates his Queen, 280; visits Queen Henrietta Maria, 283 ; triumphal journey by river to Westminster, 284 ; occasional visits to Hamp- ton Court, 285, 287 ; an anec- dote of him and Verrio, 288. Chestnut Avenue, 329, 402, Christian IV. of Denmark, 162, 182, 183. Cibber, Caius Gabriel, his sculptures, 311, 315, 316. Cibber, CoUey, 369. Clarendon, ist Earl of, 219, 222, 234, 263, 264, 271-282. Claypole, Elizabeth, her serious ill- ness, 254 ; her death, 255. Cleveland, Duchess of. See Castle- maine. Lady. Clock or Stone Court, 20, 27, 80, 90, 312, 314. Cloister Green Court, the old, 236, 291, 295, 296. Colonnade, Wren's, 310. Comedians, King's Company of, 144. Commons House of, Grand Remon- strance voted by, 217 ; attempted arrest of the Five Members of, by ChajlesL , 218 ; Colonel Whalley's report to, on the King's escape, 234 ; Charles L and Cromwell's letters to, 233 ; orders the inven- torying, appraising, and sale of Charles L's goods, 237; orders Richard Cromwell not to shoot at Hampton Court, 259. See also Parliament. Conference between Anglicans and Puritans, 170-180. Courts. See Chapel, Clock, Cloister Green, First, Fountain. Ctanmer, Thomas, Archbishop of Canterbury, communicatPa me accusations against Catherine Howard to Henry VIH., 106; his interviews with Catherine Howard, 108 ; with the Duke of Somerset at Hampton Court, 114, 118. Cromwell, Frances, marries Mr, Rich, 254. Cromwell, Mary, marries Lord Fal- conbridge, 253 ; returns to the palace, 254, Cromwell, Oliver, 221; his con- ferences and negotiations, with Charles I. , 222, 224 ; his letter to Colonel Whalley, 228 ; rides to Hampton Court after Charles L's escape, 233 ; his letter to the Parliament, 233; his fancy for Hampton Court, 237, 238 ; takes possession of it, 239 ; proclaimed Lord Protector, 242; frequently resides at, 243 ; plots for assassinat- ing, 244 ; feasts the Swedish am- bassador, 246 ; his " Court of Beg- gars," 246 ; his familiar behaviour with his associates, 246 ; his pur- suits at Hampton Court, 248 ; his appreciation of tapestry, 249; furniture of his bedroom, 249; inventory of his goods at Hamp- ton Court, 249 ; orders the repair of the Longford River, 250.; makes the Harewarren ponds, 250 ; arbit- rarily closes a footway in Bushey Park, 250 ; occupations and amusements, 251 ; fond of music, 251 ; at chapel, 252 ; Syndercomb's plot for assassinating him, 252 ; beset with assassins, 253 ; marries his daughter Mary to Lord Falcon- bridge, 253 ; his practical jokes, 254 ; his attachment to Hampton Court, 254 ; domestic troubles, 255 ; is isolated from his old as- sociates, 255 ; his grief at the death of his daughter, Mrs. Clay- pole, 255 ; rides in the park, 256 ; his last illness, 257 ; grows better, 257 ; removes to Whitehall, 258 ; his death, 259 ; his debts, 259 ; his goods at Hampton Court, 259- Cromwell, Mrs., comes to Hampton Court, 245 ; comical stories about, 245 ; her Court and kitchen, 245; claims the Crown goods as her laie husband's, 259. 414 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. Cromwell, Richard, 254 ; proclaimed Protector, 258 ; prevented from shooting in the parks, 259 ; turned out of Whitehall, 259. Cromwell, Thomas, 90; draws up regulations for Prince Edward's household, loo. Danckers, his picture of Hampton Court, 268. Daniel, Samuel, his masque of the ' ' Vision of the Twelve God- desses," 162-169. Defoe, Daniel, 298, 330. Denmark, Kingof. ^^^ Christian IV. Denmark, Prince George of, birth of his son, 295. "Diana," Fountain, so-called, 286, 329. East Front, 296, 308, 314, 315. East Molesey, 103. Edward VI., birth of, 89; baptism of, 90-93 ; his nurse, 97 ; his household and lodgings. 100 ; first visit as King, 112 ; made to sign a proclamation, 114; presented by Somerset to the people, 118 ; hurried off to Windsor, 119 ; pro- motes Somerset's enemies, 120. Elizabeth, Queen, at Edward VI. 's christening, 92 ; arrives in custody at Hampton Court, 128 ; confined in the Water Gallery, 130 ; inter- view with Bishop Gardiner, 132 ; interview with her sister Queen Mary, 133 ; forgiven by her sister, 135 ; improved position at Court, 136 ; her accession, 137 ; marriage in contemplation, 138; interview with Arran, 138 ; her astute scheming, 139; interview with Melville, 140 ; her gardens, 142 ; her dress, 143 ; her curiosity as to Mary Queen of Scots, 144 ; her fondness for music, 146 ; her ac- tion in regard to Mary Queen of Scots' affairs, 147 ; gives audience to M. Chatillon and to La Mothe F6n61on, 149; her answer to Mary Stuart's Commissioners, 151 ; her tricky conduct as regards Mary Stuart, 151 ; Christmas at her Court, 152 ; presents to, 154 ; for the palace, 156; provision:! her love of hunting, 156 ; furniture of her palace, 157 ; her interview with Robert Carey, 158 ; her last stay at the palace, 158. Elizabeth, Princess, daughter of Charles I., 226. Elizabeth of York, 5. Emmett, William, carver, 314. Esher Place, 4, 52, 53, 103. Essex, Robeit Devereux, 3rd Earl of, 181. Evelyn, John, visits Charles I., 220 ; his account of Catherine of Bra- ganza, 264 ; his description of Hampton Court, 267 ; and of the park, 268 ; and of the gardens, 286 ; his account of Queen Mary's conduct on taking possession of her father's palaces, 290; visits Hampton Court, 295, 296 ; re- marks on Queen Mary's Bower, 304, 328. Fairfax, Lord, 221, 231. Falconbridge, Lady. 5e^ Cromwell, Mary. Falconbridge, Thomas, Viscount, 253. 254. Fanelli, statues by, 268. Fanshawe, Lady, 225, 263, Fanshawe, Sir Richard, 225, 263. Fermor, Miss Arabella , the Rape of her Lock, 356. Finett, Sir John, 206. First or Base Court, 20. Fleetwood, 254, Fountain Court, the old. See Clock Court. Fountain Court, the present {see Cloister Green Court), discovery of skeleton in, 235 : dimensions and plan of, 296 ; architectural features of, 311 ; Laguerre's frescoes in, 313 ; stone-carvings in, 314; seen by moonlight, 407. Fox, George, the Quaker, his inter- view with Cromwell, 256. Frederica of Hanover, Princess, comes to reside at Hampton Court, 396 ; affection and regard for, 397. Gardeners. See London, Wise, Browo. INDEX. 415 Gardens, the, Wolsey's, 8, 40; Henry VIII. 's, 100, 102; in the reign of Elizabeth, 142; in Cromwell's time, 250; in Charles II. 's time, described by Evelyn, 268 ; altered by William and Mary, 296, 297, 304, 316, 326, 338; in George II. 's time, 376; in George Ill.'s time, 381; their enchanting beauty at the present time, 402-406. Gardiner, Bishop of Winchester, 126, 132, 136. Gatehouse, Wolsey's great, 117. George I., removed from London to Hampton Court, 359 ; dulness of his Court, 368 ; quarrels with his son, 369 ; sets up a theatre in the Great Hall, 369 ; his shameful dismissal of Wren, 370 ; his letter concerning the unauthorized occu- pation of apartments in the palace, 372. George II., as Prince of Wales, 360 ; his flirtations with the ladies- in-waiting, 363 ; quarrels with his father, 368 ; leaves Hampton Court and holds an opposition Court at Richmond, 369 ; his visits as King, 373 ; dulness of his Court, 374 ; his bedroom and bed, 378 ; boxes his grandson's ears, 379. George III., abandons Hampton Court, 380 ; divides the palace into private apartments, 382 ; his reforms as to private apartments at Hampton Court, 383 ; his in- dignation at the lending of private apartments, 384 ; gives the Stadt- holder of Hollandapartments, 386. George IV. , accession of, 388. Ghosts supposed at Hampton Court, 97, 98, 109, 235 ; and see Penn, Mrs. , JaneSeymour, and Catherine Howard. Gibbons, Grinling, 314, 323, 355. Giustinian, the Venetian ambas- sador, 14, 28, 44, 62. Gloucester, William, Duke of, son of Queen Anne, birth and baptism of, 295. Gondomar, Count, 199. Goodwin, Dr., Cromwell's chaplain, gives him an organ from Mag- dalen College, 251 ; his prayer, 257- Grammont, M. de, 264. Great Hall, built by Henry VIII., 20, 72, 74, 80, 82, 84, 153 ; crea- tion of peers in, by James I., 161 ; plays and masques in, 164; Daniel's masque in, 166 ; more plays, 183 ; theatre erected in, by George I., 369. Great Watching Chamber, Henry, VIII.'s, 86, 88, 92. Green, the, Hampton Court, Wren's house on the, 370; Faraday'shouse on the, 396. Gresham, Sir Richard, 28. Guard Chamber, William III.'s, 332. Gunning, the Misses, story of, 379. Halifax, Lord, 294. Hampton, parish and manor of, 2, 4. Hampton Court, manor of, 5; leased to Cardinal Wolsey, 5; extraordin- ary salubrity of, 6, 262 ; Henry VIII. acquires the fee-simple of, 74; erected into an "honour," 103 ; survey of the manor and parks by the Commonwealth, 238 ; excepted from sale, 239 ; bill for its sale introduced, 240 ; it sales discussed, 240 ; offered to Crom- well, but declined, 242 ; manor sold to Mr. John Phelps, 242; bought back for Cromwell, 243 ; again to be sold, 259 ; bill for settling the honour and manor on Monk, 260. "Hampton Court Beauties," the, 302. Harewarren, in Cromwell's time, 240 ; Cromwell's ponds in, 250 ; in William III.'s time, 332. " Haunted Gallery," the, 107, 406. Heath, his account of Oliver Crom- well, 246, 248, 252. Henrietta Maria, her household train, 201 ; Buckingham's rude- ness in his interviews with her, 202 ; bickerings between her and her husband, 203 ; misbehaviour of her confessor, 204 ; fresh out- break of disagreement with Charles, 207 ; her passionate dis- course, with her husband, 208 ; visits Hampton Court in 1662, 283 ; gives a ball to Charles II. and his Queen, 285. Henry VIII., i ; with Katharine o<" Arragon at Hampton Court, 5 ; 4l6 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. visits the Cardinal, ii ; sings and plays on the lute, 12 ; repairs un- expectedly to Wolsey's palace, 12 ; his implicit trust in Wolsey, 13 ; at Wolsey's banquets and masquerades, 14 ; his affection for Wolsey, 19 ; his additions to and alterations of the palace, 20 ; praises Wolsey's choir, 36 ; re- ceives Hampton Court from Wol- sey, 45 ; his affectionate letters to Wolsey, 50 ; sends him Some pills, 51 ; dismisses Wolsey, 52 ; occu- pies Hampton Court, 52 ; sends tokens of goodwill to Wolsey, 53 ; his additions to the palace, 55 ; his galleries, 56 ; comes to Hamp- ton Court with Katharine of Arra- gon, 57 ; summons an assembly to consider his divorce, 57 ; threatens the Nuncio, 58 ; his affection for Anne Boleyn, 58 ; gives her a shooting dress, 59 ; makes Hamp- ton Court one of his favourite re- sidences, 60 ; his sports, jousts, and tournaments, 6i ; shooting at the butt, 62 ; plays tennis, 62 ; plays backgammon, etc. , 63 ; his songs, 63 ; his taste for literature, 64; his transaction of business, 64 ; his household, 66 ; the mak- ing of his bed, 68 ; domestic offices in his palace, 70 ; his new hall, 72 ; his architect, 73 ; ac- quires the fee-simple of the manor of Hampton Court, 74; his work- men, 75 ; his enormous expenses in building, 76 ; his honeymoon with Anne Boleyn, 77 ; flirts with the ladies of Anne Boleyn's Court, 77 ; his Hall, 80 ; his passion for Anne Boleyn cools, 86 ; marries Jane Seymour, 88 ; his delight at the birth of his son , 89 ; embellishes the chapel, 90; with Jane Sey- mour, blesses Ekiward VI. , 94 ; leaves Hampton Court on the death of Jane Seymour, 95 ; his new buildings completed, 100 ; his parks, 103 ; erects Hampton Court manor into an honour, 103 ; marries Anne of Cleves, and Catherine Howard, 104; goes a honeymoon trip with Catherine Howard, 106; hears the ncciisa- \ion against his Queen, 107 ; marries Catherine Parr, no; his home Hfe, in ; his frenzy of irrita- bility, 112; his death, 112; his cane, hawking glass, gloves, and comb-cases, 238. Henry, Prince of Wales, at the con- ference, 173 ; resides at Hampton Court, 181. " Heron Ponds." See Harewarren. Hervey, John, Lord, 362 ; married to Miss Lepell, 368 ; his sketch of Hampton Court life, 374 ; his satire against Pope, 376. Home Park. See House Park. Hospitallers, Knights of St. John of Jerusalem, 4, 5, 22, 74, Hounslow Heath, James H. en- camped on, 288. House or Home Park, 2, 3, 103 ; acreage and valuation of, by the Commonwealth, 240, 242 ; Crom- well riding in, 255 ; avenues and canals made by Charles H. , 260, 272 : canal and avenues of, 296, 299, 308 ; William HI.'s accident in, 349, 351 ; description of, in summer, 402. Howard, Mrs., 362, 366, 367, 373. James 1., 160; creates hundreds ol new knights, 161 ; founds the noble order of Baronets, 161; creates a large batch of new peers, 162 ; incorporates the King's Company of Comedians, 164; his " Booke of Sports," 166 ; attends Daniel's masque, 167 ; presides at conference between Anglicans and Puritans, 171 ; holds forth on theo- logy, 172; summons the Puritan divines before him, 173 ; brow- beats the Puritan divines, 175 ; jeers at Dr. Reynolds, 176 ; his own estimate of his achievement, 180 ; leaves Hampton Court for London, 181 ; sends for the Pres- byterian ministers from Scotland, 183 ; argues with them on religion, 184 ; has them preached at, 185 ; " in a great passion," 186 ; issues a proclamation against poaching, 187 ; flings curses at the followers of the hounds, 188 ; his costume while hunting, 190 ; his hatred of war, 191 ; visits his sick wife, 193 ; his callous conduct at his wife's INDEX. 417 death, 198 ; portrait of, 199 ; sa- tirical description of, 199 ; never washes his hands, 199 ; entertains the French ambassador, 200 ; en- tertains the Spanish ambassador, 201 : his death, 201. James II. discusses a plan for the murder of Cromwell, 252 ; his camp on Hounslow Heath, 288 ; death of, 342; and see York, Duke of. Jane Seymour, flirts with Henry VIII. and becomes Queen, 86; her arms and badge, 88 ; retires to Hampton Court, 89 : gives birth to a son, 89 ; illness and death of, 94; her body em- balmed and laid in state, 96 ; her obsequies, 96; 1,200 masses for her soul, 97 ; her spectre in the " Silver-stick Gallery," 97. Jones, Inigo, 162, 199. Kent, Edward, Duke of, at the Pavi- lions, 386. King's Great Staircase, 312, 322-325, King's State Bedchamber, 323, 334. Kitchen, Cardinal Wolsey's, 36 ; Henry VII I. 's 70. Kneller, Sir Godfrey, 302, 343. Laguerre, Louis, 312, 314 ; his sprawling saints, 325, 360. Leicester, Robert Dudley, Earl of, 140, 146, 154. Lepell, Miss, 362, 363 ; married to Lord Hervey, 367 ; her cherished reminiscences of Hampton Court, 368 ; Pope's moonlight walk with, 373- London, George, appointed gar- dener to William and Mary, 298 ; his style of gardening, 327. Long Canal, made by Charles II., 262, 268; mentioned, 295, 296; its beauty in summer, 402 ; by moonlight, 406. Long Parliament, the, 258, 260, Long Walk, or Pavilion Terrace, made by William III., 339. "Longford, or King's River," re- paired by Cromwell, 250. Lord Chamberlain, the, disclaims authority over ghosts, 235; George I.'s letter to, about irregularities at the palace, 372 ; his orders and warrants or apartments, 381 ; his rule against lending apart- ments, 383; his severe letter against letting apartments, 384 ; further remonstrances from, 384; his sphere of jurisdiction, 399 ; his control over doors and locks, 400. Lord Steward of the Household, his mysterious authority, 400. Maiano, Joannes, terra-cotta medal- lions by, 22. Mantegna, Andrea, his "Triumph of Julius Caesar," 238, 249, 314. Marlborough, Sarah, Duchess of, describes Queen Mary's unseemly conduct on taking possession of her father's palace, 290 ; her ac- count of King William's vulgarities and rudeness to Princess Anne, 293- Mary I., as Princess, at Prince Edward's (Edward VI.) christen- ing, 92 ; her christening presents, 94 ; at Jane Seymour's obsequies, 97 ; mentioned, 100; as Queen, her honeymoon, 122; " very pious and very badly dressed," 122 ; retires for her accouchement, 126 ; her expected child, 127 ; said to have given birth to a prince, 128 ; sends for her sister Elizabeth, 130 ; her interview with her at night, 133 ; her hopes of offspring dashed, 136 ; removes from the palace, 137. Mary II., Queen of England, pro- claimed Queen, 289 ; her unseemly delight at taking possession, 290 ; her impression of the palace, 291 ; appoints George London her gar- dener, 298 ; remains in seclusion at Hampton Court, 299; occupies the Water Gallery, 300; her china, delft ware, and needlework, 300 ; her Gallery of Beauties, 302 ; her love of gardening, her bower, 304 ; reports the progress of the works, 305 ; her arms, 317 ; dies at Kensington, 320. Melville, Sir James, envoy of Mary Queen of Scots, 139 ; deputed by Hans Casimir to urge his suit to Ehzabeth, 140; his interviews with Elizabeth, 141, 142, 143 ; hears her play music, 144 ; sees her dance, 146. E E 41 8 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. Milton, John, 162, 168, 251. Mitford, Mr. A. B. , appointed Secre- tary to the Board of Works, 397 : his care and zeal for Hampton Court, 397; his precautions against fire, 397. Mornington, Countess of, her apart- ments and garden, 389. Murray, Earl, Regent of Scotland, 148, 149, 151. Norfolk, Thomas, 4th Duke of, 146, 148. Parks, the, 60 ; game in, 256 ; and see Bushey, Course, House. Parliament, the, 217, 219, 221, 222, 224, 231, 233, 237-243, 258, 259. See also Commons, House of. Pavilions, the, building of, 339 ; mentioned, 357; Princess Caroline and the Court at, 364 ; the Duke of Gloucester and theWaldegraves at, 386 ; the Duke of Kent occu- pies, 386 ; recent occupants of, 387. Penn, Mrs. (Sibell Hampden), 97- 99. Pepys, Samuel, 261, 267, 284. Philip n. of Spain, honeymoon of, 122 ; his exclusiveness, 123 ; goes' in procession round the cloisters, 126 ; induces Mary to pardon Elizabeth, 130 ; his secret inter- view with Elizabeth, 130 ; his sneaking tricks, 135 ; his courtesy to Elizabeth, 136 ; his spies, 139. Pope, Alexander, couplet on Cibber, 316; on Verrio and Laguerre, 326 ; his " Rape of the Lock, " 356- 359 ; his admiration for Miss Lepell, 363 ; his description of Hampton Court life, 368 ; his attack on Lord Hervey, 375 ; his reply to Hervey 's satire, 376 ; criticises the new style of garden- ing, 377. 378. Pope, the, gives Wolsey a dispensa- tion from the Lenten observances, 18; reproached by Henry VIII., 58; his authority horribly reviled, 78. Presbyterians, sent for by James L, 183 ; preached at, 184 ; plot of, against Cromwell's life, 345. Presence Chamber, William ni.'s, 304, 334 ; described, 343. Private apartments, 372 : palace ap- portioned into, by George III., 382 ; occupants of in George III.'s reign, 383, 386; lax practices ot occupants, 384 ; gross abuse of letting apartments, 385 ; stringent letter against lending of, 385 ; oc- cupants of in George IV. 's reign, 388; in William IV. 's reign, 390; size and accommodation of, 397 ; authority of various departments over, 398. Privy Gardens, Charles I. escapes through the, 231 ; mentioned, 263; Queen Mary plants in the, 304 ; their old-fashioned air, 381 ; their exquisite beauty, 404. Puritans, the, their divines at the conference, 170-179 ; their hatred of Queen Henrietta Maria, 210 ; desecrate the chapel, 220. " Purr Corner," 389. " Push," the, 400, 401. Quadra, the Spanish ambassador, 137. 139- Quare, Daniel, clockmaker to William III., 333. Queen's Drawing Room, 308; as finished by Queen Anne, 354. Queen's Gallery, the, the Princess of Wales (wife of George II.) in, 366. "Queen Mary's Bower," mentioned, 268. Queen's State Bedchamber, in the new palace, 360. Raleigh, Sir Walter, 160, 193. " Rape of the Lock," Pope's, 352, 356-359- Raphael's Cartoons valued at the Commonwealth for ;^3oo, 238. Roy, satirist of Wolsey, 22, 37, 38, 42. Salisbury, Earl of, Robert Cecil, suggests the sale of knighthoods to James I., 160; implores James I. to postpone a hunting party, 186. Shakespeare, William, at Hampton Court, 164 ; his plays acted before the King of Denmark at Hampton Court, 183 ; his plays acted before INDEX. 419 Charles I. in the Great Hall, 214; his "Henry VHI." acted before George I., 369. Shaw, Huntingdon, worker in iron, his claim to the designing of the iron screens confuted, 318, Shooting, Henry VHI. fond of, 59, 60, 62 ; Queen Elizabeth goes out, 156 ; James I. goes out, 186 ; Anne of Denmark shoots the King's favourite hound, 192. Skelton, John, Wolsey's satirist, reflects on the Cardinal's peremp- toriness, 16, 17 ; attacks him for eating meat, 18 ; comments on his magnificence, 28 ; satirizes his love for tapestry, 30 ; alluded to, 37. 38 ; vilifies his political pre- eminence, 45, Somers, Will, Henry VHI.'s jester, accompanies him on the lute, iii. Somerset, Duke of, his administra- tion, 112; dissatisfaction against him, 113; invokes assistance, 114; fortifies the palace, 116 ; presents Edward to the multitude at the gate, 118 ; flees to Windsor, 119 ; conspiracy against him, 120 ; ar- rested, 120 ; beheaded, 120. South Front of Wren's building criticised, 308-310 ; carvingon, 316, 317- State Apartments, unoccupied and dismantled in George HI.'s time, 380 ; in George IV. 's reign, 387 ; in William IV.'s reign, 392; opened free to the public, 393 ; open on Sunday, 394. Swift, Jonathan, 359. Tennis Court, Henry VHI.'s, 55; Henry VIII. playing in his shirt in the, 60 ; Henry, Prince of Wales, plays in the, 181 ; renovated by Charles II., 261. Thornhill, Sir James, paints the ceiling of the Queen's State Bed- chamber, 360. Tijou, Jean, his book of designs in ironwork, 317 ; designs the famous screens at Hampton Court, 318 ; his bill unpaid, 355. Tilt Yard, the, 60 ; tournaments in, 61. Vansomer, his portrait of Christian IV. of Denmark, 182; his picture of Anne of Denmark and her hounds, 192 ; his portrait of James I., 197, 198. Verrio, Aatonio, anecdote of him and Charles II., 287 ; mentioned, 312, 318 ; paints William III.'s State Bedchamber, Little Bed- chamber, and Great Staircase, 323- 325 ; cries out for cash, 353 ; paints the Queen's Drawing Room, 354. Victoria, Queen, her accession, 392; throws the palace open free, 393 ; visits Princess Frederica, 396 ; attachment of her people to, 409. " Vision of the Twelve Goddesses," 166 ; and see Daniel, Samuel. Visitors in former days, 379; since the free opening, 393; their number on Sundays, 394. Walpole, Horace, remarks on an alternative scheme for a new palace, 291 ; his mention of Knel- ler's Hampton Court Beauties, 302 ; mentions Laguerre, 314 ; mentions Verrio, 324, 354 ; men- tions Miss Bellenden, 363; his interest in Hampton Court, 379 ; his relatives in the palace, 385, 386. Water Gallery, the. Queen Eliza- beth confined in, 130 ; Arran admitted at, to see Queen Eliza- beth, 138; the French ambassa- dor lodged in, 206 ; refurnished for Mary II., 300; Kneller's Beauties at, 301 ; Queen Mary resides at, 302 ; mentioned, 338. Weldon, Sir Anthony, his remarks about James I.'s love of sport, 188 ; his satiric description of him, 199. Whalley, Colonel, Parliamentary officer, 221, 222; his interview with Ashburnham, 225, 226; shows Cromwell's alarming letter to Charles I., 228 ; looks through the keyhole of Charles I.'s room door, 230 ; seeks for Charles I. by the back way, 231 ; finds that he has fled, 231 ; his full relation of the manner and circumstances of Charles I.'s escape, 233. Whitehall, Wolsey's palace at, 8, 45, 56; Henry VIlI.'s palace at, 64; 420 A SHORT HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT. James I. at, i6i, 170; Banqueting House at, 199 ; Charles I. at, 218, 219 ; Charles I. executed at, 237 ; excepted from the sale of the royal palaces, 239 ; plot to seize, 244 ; Cromwell removes to, 253 ; Cromwell dies at, 258 ; goods at inventoried, 258; Richard Cromwell ordered out of, 259 ; Pepys on the top of the Banquet- ing House, 284 ; Charles H. arrives with his Queen at, 285 ; Charles H. and his Queen leave, on account of the plague, 286 ; William HI.'s disHke of, 289; Queen Mary turns up the beds at, 290; Queen Mary at, 306; destroyed by fire, 321 ; old custom of the King dining in public in, 321. William HI., i, 8 ; the Long Canal and Avenues in the House Park wrongly attributed to, 262, 268 ; opens a new era in the history of Hampton Court, 289 ; wears his hat in church, 290 ; resolves to re- build the State Apartments, 291 ; his new Quadrangle, 291 ; his brutality to Princess Anne, 293 ; greedily gobbles up a plate of peas, 293 ; his life at Hampton Court in 1689, 294 ; censured for residing so much at Hampton Court, 294 ; at the Duke of Glou- cester's birth and baptism, 295 ; his additions to Hampton Court, 296 ; his gardening operations, 298 ; his arms, 311 ; responsible for the lowness of the cloisters, 312; employs Laguerre, and gives him apartments, 313 ; carving in compliment to, 315 ; his taste in gardening, 316 ; his renewed in- terest in Hampton Court, 320 ; his dislike of Whitehall, 321 ; in- structs Wren to prepare an esti- mate for fitting the inside of the palace, 322 ; his State Bed- chamber, 323; his little bed- chamber, or dressing room, 324 ; his Great Staircase, 324 ; increases the fountainsin the gardens, 326 ; his initials on the Flower-pot Gate, 327 ; his Guard Chamber, 331 ; his State Bedchamber, 333 ; furniture of his rooms, 334 ; his dislike of England, 336 ; his dining room and his diet, 336 I consultation about his health, 337 1 drinks the juice of thirty hog-lice. 337 ; his stomach out of order. 338 ; his return from Holland. 339 ; complains of English in- difference to foreign affairs, 340 ; extraordinary doses taken by. 341 ; arrives in England, 342 ; his triumphant reception, 343; swelling of his legs, 344 ; his fore- boding of his end, 346 ; dosed with extraordinary concoctions, 347 ; removes to London, 348 ; comes down to hunt at Hampton Court and falls from his horse, 349 ; his fatal accident discussed, 350 ; his death, 351. William IV. , as Duke of Clarence, 389 ; appointed Ranger of Bushey Park, 390; his geniality and jovial dinners at the " Toy Club," 390 ; accession of, 392 ; sends pictures to Hampton Court, 392 ; orders the repainting of the King's Great Staircase, 392. William V., Prince of Orange, Stadtholder of Holland, given apartments in this palace, 387. Wise, Henry, gardener to William and Mary, 298 ; his style of gar- dening, 327 ; lays out avenues in Bushey Park, 328, Wolsey, Thomas, Cardinal, 1,2; acquires a lease of the manor of Hampton Court, 5 ; consults physicians, 6 ; his enormous revenues and wealth, 7 ; made Cardinal, Lord Chancellor, and Legate k latere, 7 ; his school at Ipswich, college at Oxford, and palace in London, 8 ; his sanitary arrangements, 9 ; his style of architecture, 10 ; west front of his palace, 11; receives Henry VIII. and Katharine of Arragon, 12 Henry VIII. 's regard for him, 13; banquets, grand masques, and masquerades, 14 ; pestered by suitors, 15 ; refuses audience to various, 16 ; "not at leisure," 16; satirized by Skelton, 17 ; out- bursts of irritation, 18 ; his feeble health, 18 ; his devotion to Henry VIII., 19; extent of his palace, 20 ; exterior of his rooms in the INDEX. 421 Clock Court, 21 ; employs Italian artists, 22 ; his arms in terra cotta, 23 ; decoration of his rooms, 26 ; his rooms in the Clock Court, 27 ; his furniture, 28 ; his purchases of tapestry, 29 ; his tapestries satir- ized by Skelton, 30 ; more superb furniture, 31 ; his beds, 32 ; his chairs and cushions, 33 ; his jewellery and plate, 34; his house- hold and retinue, 35 ; officers of his hall, kitchens, and offices, 36 ; his retinue as Lord Chan- cellor, 37 ; his life at Hampton Court, 38 ; portrait of, 39 ; his progresses, 40; riding on his mule, 41 ; receives visits from the ambassadors, 43 ; his genius for foreign politics, 44 ; gives Hamp- ton Court to Henry VHI., 45; his grand entertainment to the French embassy, 46 ; his cellars, 47 ; banquet to the French em- bassy, 48; comes in " booted and spurred, "49; drinks Henry VHI. 's health, 49 ; danger of attack from the sweating sickness, 50 ; his fall, 52 ; his death, 53 ; estimate of his work, 54 ; his death an- nounced to Henry VHI. , 59 ; the ordinances of Eltham drawn up by him, 66 ; his tapestries sold by the Commonwealth, 238; his looking-glass, 238. Works, Board and Office of, go ghost-hunting, 98 ; disclaim control over the spirit world, 235 ; their "tiresome apathy," 236; Wren dismissed from the, 370 ; Benson dismissed from the, 372 ; juris- diction over the palace of the, 398. Wren, Sir Christopher, i; his colon- nade, 21 ; designs the new State Apartments, 291 ; ground-plan of his buildings, 296 ; decorates the Water Gallery for Queen Mary, 300 ; consults Queen Mary in his designs, 305 ; general aspect of his new building, 306 ; his East Front, 307; his South Front, 310 ; his colonnade, 312 ; em- ploys Gibbons on the works, 314 ; his interesting estimate for fitting the inside of the State Rooms, 322 ; his extensive schemes for Hampton Court, 330 ; success of his State Apartments, 332; his report on Verrio's petition for cash, 354 ; dismissed from his office of surveyor-general, 370; retires to his house on the Green, 371 ; his vindication, 372 ; his death, 372. York, Duchess of, pays her respects to Catherine of Braganza, 263; receives the Queen Dowager, 283 ; her " fine white fat hand," 287. York, James, Duke of, pays his respects to Catherine of Braganza, 263 ; receives his mother, 283 ; with Charles H., 287; and see James H. York Place, Wolsey's palace. See Whitehall. CHISWICK PRESS : CHARLES WHITTINGHAM AND CO. TOOKS COURT. CHANCERY LANE. LONDON. BY THE SAME AUTHOR, Dedicated by Special Permission to Her Most Gracious Majesty the Queen. THE HISTORY OF HAMPTON COURT PALACE VOL. I. IN TUDOR TIMES (Pp. 376). Second Edition. VOL. II. IN STUART TIMES (Pp. 312). VOL. III. IN ORANGE AND GUELPH TIMES (Pp. 566). Price One Guinea each. Profusely illustrated with 220 Engravings^ Etchings, Maps and Plans. Small ^to. OPINIONS OF THE PRESS. ' • Although Mr, Law's narrative is based upon patient archaeological investi- gations, he has succeeded in avoiding all dulness of detail, and has presented us with a succession of vivid pictures of courtly life in England under the rule of the magnificent Tudors." — The Times. " He possesses a rare faculty for unearthing from dusty piles of old manu- scripts and faded parchments, facts and fancies relating to Hampton Court, that under his magic touch form themselves into the shape and sequence of a con- tinuous story, . . . He makes the very walls to speak and the stones to cry out, and he marshals his incidents and arranges his figures with consummate skill. Mr. Law's book occupies a position of unique importance," — Morning Post. " It is seldom that one comes across so satisfactory a combination of research and recital. . . , Mr. Law has spared no pains in the collection of facts, and shown no little skill in his treatment of them." — The Academy. " Mr. Law's work, by adding the charm of historical association to so many nooks and corners of the buildings, has greatly increased the pleasure of a visit." — Saturday Review. "A story which reads like the stately portions of ' Kenilworth' — a splendid record of royal banqueting and processions, of princely extravagances, of the romance that accompanies even the ceremony of Court life, of secret happen- ings and dark tragedies, true things stranger than fiction." — Literary World. " Tastefully got up, pleasantly written, and liberally illustrated." — Spectator. " Claims the particular gratitude of the antiquarian, the architect, and the historical reader." — Daily Telegraph. " Picturesque and stately as was the sketch of the Tudor Times, the second volume gives a no less imposing view of the Stuarts." — Daily Chronicle. " Mr. Law's pages seem to glow with purple and gold ; and if mere words would dazzle, this description of Wolsey's life at Hampton Court would throw the rest of the book into obscurity." — St. James's Gazette. " A model of all that a book of the sort should be. . . . Mr. Law has no small historical gift. ... He tells us facts, not tiresomely, but covering their dry bones with the clothing of pleasant gossip." — Pall Mall Gazette. ' ' The charming manner in which the author avoids dulness and long-winded- ness ; the thorough mastery of the subjects, architectural and archaeological, discussed throughout, render it very readable. . . . The book may be regarded as a very model." — Vanity Fair. " It is scarcely possible to praise too highly the skill and industry which Mr. Law has given to his task. . . . The narrative has all the interest of a romance. . . . Well written, admirably illustrated, and excellently printed, the book is one which it is a pleasure to read and a pleasure to praise." — Graphic. "A work of great historic and artistic interest and importance." — The World. " No dull pages in the hooV."— The Scotsman. " A delightful book." — Manchester Guardian, " Good and scholarly work." — The Guardian. " A carefully and brightly written narrative." — Illustrated London News, " The work is altogether one of absorbing interest." — The Queen. " Brimful of interest." — Court Journal. " Vastly more interesting than most good novels." — The Magazine of Art. " A really delightful history." — The Bookseller. " Full of curious information and personal anecdote." — Surrey Comet. " A most interesting record of a most interesting building." — The Builder. " The work has been thoroughly well done. . . . Mr. Law has proved him- self admirably qualified for his important task. He has brought to the work all the industry and patience, the accurate habits and conscientious care necessaiy for a record of this kind. ... A vast amount of valuable material has thus been brought together, and, what is more, so well arranged and sifted as to form a vivid and picturesque narrative of Hampton Court from first to \&.s\.."— Church Quarterly. "To say that this history is interesting would be doing it less than justice. It is a work of high value as well, and will take rank amongst those which the historian of any reign, from Henry VIII. to Victoria, will naturally turn to for information, and from which he will seldom fail to derive material assistance in his own researches." — Glasgow Herald. " The interest of Mr. Law's volumes is historical, picturesque and anti-" quarian. To all classes of readers it thus makes appeal. An animated panorama of history is laid before us, the details given being those precisely of which ' your orthodox historian ' is most chary." — Notes and Queries. LONDON : GEORGE BELL AND SONS, YORK HOUSE, PORTUGAL STREET, W.C. 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