They Have Gotten A Kind Of Proverbial Saying Relating
To Hampton Court, Viz., That It Has Been Generally Chosen By Every
Other Prince Since It Became A House Of Note.
King Charles was the
first that delighted in it since Queen Elizabeth's time.
As for
the reigns before, it was but newly forfeited to the Crown, and was
not made a royal house till King Charles I., who was not only a
prince that delighted in country retirements, but knew how to make
choice of them by the beauty of their situation, the goodness of
the air, &c. He took great delight here, and, had he lived to
enjoy it in peace, had purposed to make it another thing than it
was. But we all know what took him off from that felicity, and all
others; and this house was at last made one of his prisons by his
rebellious subjects.
His son, King Charles II., may well be said to have an aversion to
the place, for the reason just mentioned--namely, the treatment his
royal father met with there--and particularly that the rebel and
murderer of his father, Cromwell, afterwards possessed this palace,
and revelled here in the blood of the royal party, as he had done
in that of his sovereign. King Charles II. therefore chose
Windsor, and bestowed a vast sum in beautifying the castle there,
and which brought it to the perfection we see it in at this day--
some few alterations excepted, done in the time of King William.
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