Over the Ocean Part 18

"So you see, sir, the _H_american revolver is nothink new--_h_only a _h_old _H_english _h_idea, _h_arfter _h_all."

This prodigious broadside of h's was unanswerable. So we said nothing, and shall look for the English model from which the American sewing-machine was invented.

Of course, there is no one who will think of visiting the Tower without seeing the regalia of England, which are kept here in their own especial stronghold, ent.i.tled the Jewel Tower. It is astonis.h.i.+ng to see the awe and wonder with which some of the common people look upon these glittering emblems of royalty, which they seem to regard with a veneration little short of the sovereign.

The royal crown is a cap of rich purple velvet, enclosed in hoops of silver, and surmounted by a ball and cross of splendid diamonds. The Prince of Wales's crown is a simple pure gold crown, without jewels. The queen's diadem, as it is called, is an elegant affair, rich in huge diamonds and pearls. This crown was made for the consort of James II.

St. Edwards crown, shaped like the regular English crown,--with which we are all familiar, from seeing it represented in the arms of England, and upon British coin,--is of gold, and magnificent with diamonds, rubies, pearls, emeralds, and other precious stones. Here we also have sight of the other paraphernalia of royalty, which, to American visitors, looks somewhat theatrical and absurd, and continually suggest the thought of what empty pageants are the parade and mummeries of kings and princes.

Here is the royal sceptre, a rod formed of gold, and richly adorned with jewels, surmounted by a cross, which is placed in the right hand of the sovereign at coronations; and the rod of equity, another sceptre, ornamented with diamonds, and surmounted with a dove with outstretched wings, which is placed in the left hand; a queen's sceptre, richly ornamented with jewels; the ivory sceptre of James II.'s queen; and the elegantly-wrought golden one made for Mary, queen of William III.; swords of Justice and Mercy, coronation bracelets, spurs, anointing vessels, baptismal font, spoons, salt-cellars, dishes, and numerous other--coronation tools, I must call them, reminding one, as they lay there spread out to view in their iron cage, of one of those displays of bridal presents at an American wedding, where the guest wonders at the ingenuity of the silversmith in producing so many articles for which, until he sees them, and is told what they are designed for, he could not imagine a used could be found.

From the blaze of diamonds and precious stones, and the yellow glitter of beaten gold, we turned away to once more walk through the historic old fortress, and examine the record that is left behind of the part it has played of palace, fortress, and prison.

The tourist gets but a confused idea of the Tower in one visit, hurried along as he is by the warder, who repeats his monotonous, set descriptions, with additions and emendations of his own, and if he be not "i' the vein," omitting, I fancy, some portion of the regular round, to save himself trouble, especially if an extra _douceur_ has not been dropped into his itching palm. Then there are walks, pa.s.sages, windows, and apartments, all celebrated in one way or another, which are pa.s.sed by without notice, from the fact that a full description would occupy far too much time, but which, if you should happen to have an old Londoner, with a liking for antiquity, with you, to point them out, and have read up pretty well the history of the Tower, you find are material enhancing the pleasure of the visit.

I suppose St. Paul's Church, in London, may be called the twin sight to the Tower; and so we will visit that noted old monument of Sir Christopher Wren's architectural skill next. In looking at London _en ma.s.se_, from any point,--that is, as much of it as one can see at once,--the great dome of St. Paul's stands out a most prominent landmark, its huge globe rising to the height of three hundred and sixty feet.

We used to read an imprint, in our young days, stamped upon a toy-book, containing wonderful colored pictures, which communicated the fact that it was sold by Blank & Blank, Stationers, St. Paul's Churchyard, London, and wondered why bookstores were kept in burial-grounds in London. We found, on coming to London, that St.

Paul's stood in the midst of a cemetery, and that the street or square around and facing it--probably once a part of the old cemetery--is called St. Paul's Churchyard; a locality, we take occasion to mention, that is noted for its excellent shops for cheap dry goods and haberdashery, or such goods as ladies in America buy at thread stores, and which can generally be bought here a trifle cheaper than at other localities in London. St. Paul's Churchyard is also noted for several excellent lunch or refreshment rooms for ladies and gentlemen, similar, in some respects, to American confectionery shops, except that at these, which are designated "pastry-cooks," cakes, cold meats, tarts, sherry wine, and ale may be had; and I can bear witness, from personal experience, that the quality of the refreshment, and the prices charged at the well-kept pastry-cooks' shops of St. Paul's Churchyard, are such as will satisfy the most exacting taste.

The present St. Paul's, which was completed in 1710, can hardly be called _Old_ St. Paul's. The first one built on this site was that in 610, by Ethelbert, King of Kent, which was burned, as was also its successor, which received large estates from the Conqueror. But the Old St. Paul's we read so much about in novel and story, was the great cathedral immediately preceding this one, which was six hundred and ninety feet long, one hundred and thirty broad, was built in the form of a cross, and sent a spire up five hundred and twenty feet into the air, and a tower two hundred and sixty feet; which contained seventy-six chapels, and maintained two hundred priests; from which the pomp and ceremony of the Romish church vanished before the advance of the Reformation; which was desecrated by the soldiery in civil war, and finally went down into a heap of smouldering ruins in 1666, after an existence of two hundred and twenty years. That was the Old St. Paul's of ancient story, and of W. Harrison Ainsworth's interesting historical novel, which closes with an imaginative description of its final destruction by the great fire of London.

Sir Christopher Wren, the architect, and grand old Free and Accepted Mason, built the present St. Paul's, laying the corner-stone in 1675, and the cap-stone in the lantern in 1710--a thirty-five years' piece of work by one architect, and most ably and faithfully was it done.

Appropriate, indeed, therefore, is the epitaph that is inscribed on the plain, broad slab that marks his last resting-place in the crypt on the spot where the high altar of the old cathedral once stood. Beneath this slab, we are told, rests the builder; but "if ye seek his monument, look around you." The corner-stone of St. Paul's was laid with masonic ceremonies, and the trowel and mallet used on the occasion are still reserved by the lodge whose members at that time officiated.

It is impossible to get a complete general view of the whole of St.

Paul's at once, it is so hemmed in here in the oldest and most crowded part of London. Here, all around us were Streets whose very names had the ring of old English history. Watling Street, a narrow lane, but old as Anglo-Saxon times; Newgate, where the old walls of London stood, is near at hand, and Cannon Street, which runs into St. Paul's churchyard, contains the old London Stone, once called the central point of the city, from which distances were measured; Ludgate Hill, little narrow Paternoster Row, Cheapside, and Old Bailey are close by, and a few steps will take you into Fleet Street, St. Martins le Grand, or Bow Lane. You feel that here, in whatever direction you turn, you are in old London indeed, near one of the solid, old, historical, and curious parts of it, that figure in the novels and histories, and with which you mentally shake hands as with an old acquaintance whom you have long known by correspondence, but now meet face to face for the first time.

St. Paul's is built of what is called Portland stone; originally, I should suppose, rather light colored, but now grimed with the universal blacking of London smoke. The best view of the exterior is from Ludgate Hill, a street approaching its western front, from which a view of the steps leading to the grand entrance and the statues in front of it is obtained.

One does not realize the huge proportions of this great church till he walks about it. Its entire length, from east to west, is five hundred feet; the breadth at the great western entrance, above referred to, is one hundred and eighty feet, and at the transept two hundred and fifty feet. The entire circ.u.mference of the church, as I was told by the loquacious guide who accompanied me, was two thousand two hundred and ninety-five feet, and it covers two acres of ground. These figures will afford the reader opportunity for comparison, and give some idea of its immensity. The height of the cross on the dome is three hundred and sixty feet from the street, and the diameter of the great dome itself is one hundred and eighty feet.

There is ever so much that is curious and interesting to see in St.

Paul's, and, like many other celebrated places, the visitor ascertains that it cannot be seen in the one, hurried, tourist visit that is generally given to them, especially if one wishes to give an intelligible description to friends, or convey his idea to those who have not had the opportunity of visiting it. For my own part, it was a second visit to these old churches I used most to enjoy, when, with local guide-book and pencil in hand, after perhaps refres.h.i.+ng memory by a peep the night before into English history, I took a two or three hours' quiet saunter among the aisles, the old crypts, or beneath the lofty, quiet old arches, or among the monuments, when I could have time to read the whole inscription, and pause, and think, and dream over the lives and career of those who slept beneath

"The storied urn and animated bust."

There are over fifty splendid monuments, chiefly to English naval and military heroes, in St. Paul's, many of them most elaborate, elegant, and costly groups of marble statuary; but I left those for the last, and set about seeing other sights within the old pile, and so first started for the Whispering Gallery. This is reached by a flight of two hundred and sixty steps from the transept, and about half way up to it we were shown the library belonging to the church, containing many rare and curious works, among them the first book of Common Prayer ever printed, and a set of old monastic ma.n.u.scripts, said to have been preserved from the archives of the old St. Paul's, when it was a Roman cathedral. The floor of this library is pointed out as a curiosity, being composed of a mosaic of small pieces of oak wood. Next the visitor is shown the Geometrical Stairs, a flight of ninety steps, so ingeniously constructed that they all hang together without any visible means of support except the bottom step.

Up we go, upward and onward, stopping to see the big bell,--eleven thousand four hundred and seventy-four pounds,--which is never tolled except for a death in the royal family. The hour indicated by the big clock is struck on it by a hammer moved by clock-work; but the big clapper used in tolling weighs one hundred and eighty pounds. The clock of St. Paul's seems a gigantic timepiece indeed, when you get up to it; its faces are fifty-seven feet in circ.u.mference, and the minute-hand a huge bar of steel, weighing seventy-five pounds, and nearly ten feet in length; the hour or _little_ hand is another bar of about six feet long, weighing forty-four pounds. The figures on the dial are two feet three inches long, and the big pendulum, that sets the machinery of this great time-keeper in motion, is sixteen feet long, with a weight of one hundred and eight pounds at the end of it.

The Whispering Gallery is a gallery with a light ornamental iron railing, running entirely round the inside of the base of the cupola, a distance of one hundred and forty yards; and whispered conversation can be carried on with persons seated at the extreme opposite side of the s.p.a.ce; the clapping of the hands gives out almost as sharp a report as the discharge of a rifle. This Whispering Gallery is a fine place to get a good view of the great paintings in the compartments of the dome, which represent leading events in the life of St. Paul. It was at the painting of these pictures that the occurrence took place, so familiar as a story, where the artist, gradually retiring a few steps backward to mark the effect of his work, and having unconsciously reached the edge of the scaffolding, would, by another step, have been precipitated to the pavement, hundreds of feet below, when a friend, seeing his peril, with great presence of mind, seized a brush and daubed some fresh paint upon the picture; the artist rushed forward to prevent the act, and saved his life. From this gallery we looked far down below to the tessellated pavement of black and white, the centre beneath the dome forming a complete mariner's compa.s.s, showing the thirty-two points.

Above this are two more galleries around the dome,--the Stone Gallery and Golden Gallery,--from which a fine view of London, its bridges and the Thames, can be had, if the day be clear. Above we come to the great stone lantern, as it is called, which crowns the cathedral, and bears up its huge ball and cross. Through the floor, in the centre of this lantern, a hole about the size of a large dinner-plate is cut, and as I stood there and looked straight down to the floor, over three hundred feet below, I will confess to a slight feeling of contraction in the soles of the feet, and after a glance or two at the people below, dwarfed by distance, I hastily retired with the suspicion of, what if the plank flooring about that aperture should be weak!

Next comes an ascent into the ball. A series of huge iron bars uphold the ball and cross; the s.p.a.ces between them are open to the weather, but so narrow, that the climber, who makes his way by aid of steps notched into one of the bars, as he braces his body against the others, could not possibly get more than an arm out; so the ascent of ten feet or so is unattended with danger, and we found ourselves standing within this great globe, which from the streets below appears about the size of a large foot-ball, but which is of sufficient capacity to contain ten men.

It was a novel experience to stand in that huge metallic sphere, which was strengthened by great straps of iron almost as big as railroad rails, and hear the wind, which was blowing freshly at the time, sound like a steams.h.i.+p's paddle-wheels above our head. Thirty feet above the globe rises the cross, which is fifteen feet high, and which the guide affirmed he really believed American visitors would climb and sit astride of, if there were any way of getting at it.

Having taken the reader to the highest accessible point, we will now descend to the lowest--the huge crypt, in which rest the last mortal remains of England's greatest naval and greatest military heroes,--Nelson and Wellington,--heroes whose pictures you see from one end of the island to the other, in every conceivable style--their portraits, naval and battle scenes in which they figured, busts, monuments, statues, engravings, and bronzes. No picture gallery seems complete without the death scene of Nelson upon his s.h.i.+p in the hour of victory; and one sees it so frequently, that he almost yields to the belief that the subject is as favorite a one with British artists, as certain scriptural ones used to be with the old Italian painters.

The crypt contains the immense pillars, forty feet square, which support the floor above, and in that part of it directly beneath the dome is the splendid black marble sarcophagus of Lord Nelson, surmounted by the cus.h.i.+on and coronet. This sarcophagus was originally prepared by Cardinal Wolsey for his own interment at Windsor, but now covers the remains of the naval hero, and bears upon its side the simple inscription "HORATIO, VISCOUNT NELSON." In another portion of the crypt is the large porphyry sarcophagus of the Duke of Wellington, the enclosure about it lighted with gas from granite candelabra, while all about in other parts of the crypt, beneath the feet of the visitor, are memorial slabs, that tell him that the ashes of some of England's most noted painters and architects rest below. Here lies Sir Christopher Wren, who built St. Paul's, and who lived to the good old age of ninety-one. Here sleeps Sir Joshua Reynolds, Sir Thomas Lawrence, and Benjamin West, painters; here Robert Mylne, who built Blackfriars'

Bridge, and John Rennie, who built Southwark and Waterloo Bridges, besides many others of more or less note. In another part of the crypt is preserved the great funeral car, with all its trappings and decorations, which was used upon the occasion of the funeral ceremonies of the Duke of Wellington, and which the guide shows with great _empress.e.m.e.nt_, expecting an extra sixpence in addition to the three s.h.i.+llings and two pence you have already expended for tickets to different parts of the building.

The expenses of the whole sight are as follows: Whispering and other two galleries, sixpence; to the hall, one s.h.i.+lling and sixpence; library, geometrical staircase, and clock, eight-pence; crypts, sixpence. Total, three s.h.i.+llings and two-pence. And now, having seen all else, we take a saunter through the body of the church, and a glance at the monuments erected to the memory of those who have added to England's glory upon the sea and the field of battle.

One of the first monumental marble groups that the visitor observes on entering is that of Sir William Ponsonby, whose horse fell under him in the battle of Waterloo, leaving him to the lances of the French cuira.s.siers. It represents Ponsonby as a half-clad figure, slipping from his horse, that has fallen to its knees, and holding up his hand, as he dies, to receive a wreath from a rather stiff-looking marble angel, that has opportunely descended at that moment.

The statue of Dr. Samuel Johnson, represented with a scroll in his hand, and in the att.i.tude of deep thought, stands upon a pedestal bearing a long Latin inscription.

The monument by Flaxman to Lord Nelson is quite an elaborate one. It represents him in his naval full dress, and a cloak falling from his shoulders, standing upon a pedestal, leaning upon an anchor and coil of rope. Upon the side of the pedestal are cut allegorical representations of the North Sea, the German Ocean, the Nile, and the Mediterranean, and the words Copenhagen--Nile--Trafalgar. At one side of the pedestal crouches a huge marble lion. At the other stands Britannia, with two young sailors, pointing out the hero to them for their imitation.

The statue of John Howard, the philanthropist, represents him in Roman costume, trampling upon some fetters, a key in his right hand, and a scroll in his left. A ba.s.s-relief on the pedestal represents the benevolent man entering a prison, and bringing food and clothing to prisoners. A very beautiful inscription tells of his many virtues, his modesty and worth; of his having received the thanks of both Houses of British and Irish Parliaments for his services rendered to his country and mankind, and that his modesty alone defeated various efforts which were made during his life to erect this statue.

There is a fine statue of Bishop Heber, who, half a century ago (May 15, 1819), wrote the beautiful missionary hymn, "From Greenland's icy mountains," which has since then been translated into foreign tongues at every missionary station, and sung all over the world. The statue, executed by Chantrey, represents the bishop kneeling, with his hand resting upon the Holy Bible.

There are two monuments that will attract the attention of Americans, from the fact of their being in memory of generals who gained their laurels in military operations in this country. The first is that of General Robert Ross, who, in 1814, "executed an enterprise against Was.h.i.+ngton, the capital of the United States of America, with complete success." Valor is represented as placing an American flag upon the general's tomb, over which Britannia is weeping,--maybe at the vandalism of the "enterprise." The other monument represents Generals Pakenham and Gibbs, in full uniform, who, as the inscription informs us, "fell gloriously, on the 8th of January, 1815, while leading the troops to an attack of the enemy's works in front of New Orleans."

Lord Collingwood, who was vice-admiral, and commanded the larboard division at the battle of Trafalgar, has a splendid monument, upon which a man-of-war is represented bringing home his remains, attended by Fame and other allegorical figures. That eminent surgeon, Sir Astley Cooper, who died in 1842, has a fine monument, erected by his contemporaries and pupils.

A splendid marble group, representing a war-horse bounding over a fallen soldier, while his rider is falling from the saddle into the arms of a Highlander, is erected to the memory of Sir Ralph Abercromby, who fell in Egypt in 1801. A marble figure of a sphinx reposes each side of the monument. The statue of Sir Joshua Reynolds is by Flaxman, and represents him clad in the robes of a doctor of law, with a volume in one hand, and the other resting upon a medallion of Michael Angelo. The inscription, in Latin, describes him as "prince of the painters of his age."

Numerous other groups of statuary from the monuments of naval and military heroes represent them surrounded by allegorical figures of History, Fame, Valor, &c., and inscriptions set forth their deeds of bravery, and their services to the nation for whom they poured out their blood and yielded up their lives.

Monuments to those whose names are well known in this country will also attract the attention of American visitors, such as that to Henry Hallam, the historian of the Middle Ages; Turner, the celebrated painter; Napier, the historian of the peninular war; Sir Henry Lawrence, who died defending Lucknow, in 1857; and Sir John Moore, who fell at Corunna, and was buried at midnight on the ramparts, as described in the well-known ode commencing,--

"Not a drum was heard, not a funeral note, As his corpse to the rampart we hurried."

Thus it is in the sculptured marble you may in Westminster Abbey, St.

Paul's, and the old cathedrals of the country, read England's history again, and seem to approach nearer, and have a more realizing sense of her great men and their deeds, than from the pages of the printed volume.

In the rush of sight-seeing we had nigh forgotten Guildhall, the home of Gog and Magog, and the City Hall of London. And, in truth, it is really not much of a sight to see, in comparison with the many others that claim the visitor's attention; but we drifted down to the end of King Street one day, which carried us straight into the entrance of Guildhall, at the end of the street. The great entrance hall is quite imposing, being about one hundred and fifty feet long, fifty wide, and fifty high, lighted with windows of painted gla.s.s, while at one end, in a sort of raised gallery, stand the big wooden figures of the city giants, Gog and Magog. Around this great hall are several monuments and groups; among them, those to the Earl of Chatham, Wellington, and Nelson, and statues of Edward VI., Queen Elizabeth, and Charles I. The hall is used for elections, city meetings, and banquets--those noted feasts at which turtle soup is supposed to be so prominent a feature in the bill of fare.

There are in London quite a number of the buildings or halls of the guilds or trade a.s.sociations of old times--nearly fifty, I believe. Many of the trades have ceased to exist--their very names almost obsolete.

For instance, the a.s.sociation of loriners, united girdlers, and the bowyers. The members of some of these old corporations or guilds are by no means all artisans, and about all they have to do is to manage the charities and trust funds that have descended to them. They meet but once or twice a year, and then in the old hall, furbished up for the occasion. The very best of good eating and drinking is provided, and perhaps, on certain anniversaries, the curious records and annals of the old society are produced, and, perchance, some old anniversary ceremony gone through with.

Some of the societies have rare and curious relics, which are brought out on these occasions. For instance, the fish-mongers have the dagger with which Wat Tyler was stabbed by one of its members; the armorers and braziers some fine old silver work; and the barber surgeons a fine, large picture, by Holbein, representing Henry VIII. presenting the charter to their company. In Goldsmiths' Hall we saw a splendid specimen of the goldsmiths' work, in the shape of a gold chandelier, weighing over one thousand ounces. This hall was rebuilt in 1834, although the goldsmiths owned the site in 1323. By an act of Parliament, all articles of gold or silver must be a.s.sayed or stamped by this company before being sold.

In Threadneedle Street, appropriately placed, we saw Merchant Tailors'

Hall, built about 1667; and in the old hall of this company James I., and his son Prince Henry, once dined with the company, when verses composed especially for the occasion by Ben Jonson were recited. Here, in Threadneedle Street, is the Bank of England, sometimes called the "Old Lady of Threadneedle Street," which is also one of the sights of the metropolis, and covers a quadrangular s.p.a.ce of nearly four acres.

Armed with a letter of introduction from one of the directors, or, more fortunate, in company with one of them, if you chance to enjoy the acquaintance of any of those worthies, you can make the tour of this wonderful establishment, finis.h.i.+ng with the treasure vault, where you have the tantalizing privilege of holding a million or two dollars'

worth of English bank notes in your hand, and "hefting" ingots of gold and bricks of silver.

Then there are twenty-four directors to this bank, and about a thousand persons employed in it: clerks commence at the age of seventeen, receiving fifty pounds per annum for their service, and the salary of a chief of department is twelve hundred pounds. Some old, gray-headed men that we saw, who had grown round-shouldered over their ledgers, we were informed had been in the employ of the bank for over forty years. The operation of collecting the specie for a bank note, which I tested, is one requiring considerable red tape and circ.u.mlocution. You go from clerk to clerk, registering your address and date of presentation of notes and their number, till finally you reach the individual who is weighing and shovelling out sovereigns, who pa.s.ses out the specie for the paper. These notes, after being once presented, are never re-issued, but kept on hand, first having the signatures torn off, for seven years, and then burned. We visited the storehouse of these "relics of departed worth," in the bank, where millions of tatterdemalions were heaped up, awaiting their fiery doom.

That royal gift of Cardinal Wolsey to Henry VIII.--Hampton Court Palace--is not only noted for its a.s.sociations of bluff King Hal and the ambitious cardinal, but as being the residence of several of the most celebrated of the British sovereigns. The estate went into the clutches of Henry in 1526. It is about twelve miles from Hyde Park, in London, and the palace covers about eight acres of ground. It was here that Edward VI. was born, and his mother, Jane Seymour, died a few days after; and it was here that Catharine Howard first appeared as Henry VIII.'s queen, in 1540; and in this palace the licentious brute married his sixth wife, Catherine Parr; here Edward VI. lived a portion of his short reign, Queen Mary spent her honeymoon, and Queen Elizabeth visited. Charles II. was here during the plague in London; and Oliver Cromwell saw one daughter married and another die beneath its roof; Charles II. and James II., William III. and George II., have all lived and held court in this famous old place, which figures so frequently in the pages of English history; and so short a distance is it from London, and so cheap are the excursion trains, that, on a pleasant day a mechanic, his wife, and child may go out, visit the magnificent old palace, all its rooms, see all its paintings, its superb acres of lawn, forests, garden, fountains, court-yards, and walks for two s.h.i.+llings (the railroad fare to go and return for the three). All at Hampton Court is open free to the public; they may even walk, run, and roll over on the gra.s.s, if they like, if not rude or misbehaved. Many spend a whole holiday in the palace and its delightful grounds, and on the pleasant Sunday afternoon I visited them, there were, at least, ten thousand persons present; yet, so vast is the estate, that, with the exception of the pa.s.sage through the different rooms, which are noted as picture galleries, there was no feeling as of a crowd of visitors.

The guides, who went through the different apartments, explaining their history, and pointing out the celebrated and beautiful paintings, asked for no fee or reward, although many a visitor drops a few pence into their not unwilling hands.

Entering the palace, we went by way of the King's Grand Staircase, as it is called, the walls and ceilings covered with elegant allegorical frescoes, and representations of heathen deities--Pan, Ceres, Jupiter, Juno; Time surrounded by the signs of the zodiac, and Cupids with flowers; Fame blowing her trumpet, and Peace bearing the palm branch; Bacchus with his grapes, and Diana seated upon the half moon; Hercules with his lion skin and club, and Ganymede, on the eagle, presenting the cup to Jove. From this grand entrance, with necks aching from the upward gaze, we came to the Guard-room, a s.p.a.cious hall, some sixty feet in length, with muskets, halberds, spears, and daggers disposed upon the walls, forming various fantastic figures.

From thence the visitor pa.s.ses into the first of the series of state apartments, which is ent.i.tled the King's Presence Chamber, and, after looking up at the old chandelier, made in the reign of Queen Anne, suspended from the ceiling, the guide begins to point out and mention a few of the leading pictures in each room. As there are eighteen or twenty of these rooms, and over a thousand pictures suspended upon the walls, to say nothing of the florid and elaborate decorations of the ceilings by Verio, the number is far too great to be inspected satisfactorily at a single visit; and upon many scarce more than a pa.s.sing glance can be bestowed as you pa.s.s along with the group of sight-seers. I jotted in my note-book several of those before which I halted longest, such as Charles I. by Vand.y.k.e, Ignatius Loyola by t.i.tian, and the portraits of beauties of Charles II.'s gay court, which are one of the great attractions of the collection. These portraits were painted by Sir Peter Lely, and some of them very beautifully executed: here are the Princess Mary, as Diana; Anne Hyde, d.u.c.h.ess of York; the d.u.c.h.ess of Richmond, whom Charles wanted to marry, and, if she looked like her portrait, we applaud his taste in female beauty; the sprightly, laughing face of Nell Gwynne; Lady Middleton, another beauty, but a frail one; and the Countess of Ossory, a virtuous one amid the vice and licentiousness of the "merry monarch's" reign.