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 vicechamberlain, 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-guarding of the young prince-forbidding the admittance of anyone, 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 VIII.'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 conformation and position of Henry VIII.'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

THE CHAPEL COURT, AS SEEN FROM PRINCE EDWARD'S (EDWARD VI.) LODGINGS.

there were dry walks, walled parterres, sheltered alleys, and cloisters and houses half-open to the air; and for summertime 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.

103

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 originally, 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 exchange 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 Paramounta 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 "lordships, manors, towns and villages of East Molesey, West Molesey, Walton, Esher, Weybridge, and part of Cobham, and other parishes," apparently Byfleet, 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

"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 thereabouts 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 paling 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.