But Be The Going And Coming How It Will By Water, It Is An
Exceeding Pleasant Passage By Land, Whether We Go By The Surrey
Side Or The Middlesex Side Of The Water, Of Which I Shall Say More
In Its Place.
The situation of Hampton Court being thus mentioned, and its
founder, it is to be mentioned next that it
Fell to the Crown in
the forfeiture of his Eminence the Cardinal, when the king seized
his effects and estate, by which this and Whitehall (another house
of his own building also) came to King Henry VIII. Two palaces fit
for the kings of England, erected by one cardinal, are standing
monuments of the excessive pride as well as the immense wealth of
that prelate, who knew no bounds of his insolence and ambition till
he was overthrown at once by the displeasure of his master.
Whoever knew Hampton Court before it was begun to be rebuilt, or
altered, by the late King William, must acknowledge it was a very
complete palace before, and fit for a king; and though it might
not, according to the modern method of building or of gardening,
pass for a thing exquisitely fine, yet it had this remaining to
itself, and perhaps peculiar--namely, that it showed a situation
exceedingly capable of improvement, and of being made one of the
most delightful palaces in Europe.
This her Majesty Queen Mary was so sensible of, that, while the
king had ordered the pulling down the old apartments, and building
it up in that most beautiful form which we see them now appear in,
her Majesty, impatient of enjoying so agreeable a retreat, fixed
upon a building formerly made use of chiefly for landing from the
river, and therefore called the Water Galley, and here, as if she
had been conscious that she had but a few years to enjoy it, she
ordered all the little neat curious things to be done which suited
her own conveniences, and made it the pleasantest little thing
within doors that could possibly be made, though its situation
being such as it could not be allowed to stand after the great
building was finished, we now see no remains of it.
The queen had here her 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 because the originals were all in being, and often to be
compared with their pictures. Her Majesty had here a fine
apartment, with a set of lodgings for her private retreat only, but
most exquisitely furnished, particularly a fine chintz bed, then a
great curiosity; another of her own work while in Holland, very
magnificent, and several others; and here was also her Majesty's
fine collection of Delft ware, which indeed was very large and
fine; and here was also a vast stock of fine china ware, the like
whereof was not then to be seen in England; the long gallery, as
above, was filled with this china, and every other place where it
could be placed with advantage.
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