period of the Great Exhibition year, which is erroneously supposed to be the opening of the era when a sort of fraternisation took place between commerce and the crown. Under the old reign, too, the honour took a homely, but not an undignifiedand if still a ceremonious, yet a hearty shape. It may be questioned, if royalty were to pay a visit to the family of the present Mr. Barclay, whether the prince consort would celebrate the brief sojourn, by kissing all the daughters of "Barclay and Perkins." He might do many things not half so pleasant.

Gog and Magog has never looked down on so glorious a scene and so splendid a banquet as enlivened Guildhall, and at which the Queen and her consort were royally entertained, at a cost of something approaching 80007. Indeed, both sovereigns united in remarking that "for elegance of entertainment the city beat the court end of the town." A foreign minister present described it as a banquet such only as one king could give another. And it was precisely so. The King of the City exhibited his boundless hospitality to the King of England. The majesty of the people had the chief magistrate for a guest.

The majesty of the people, however, if we may credit the Earl of Albemarle, the author of the "Memoir of the Marquis of Rockingham and his contemporaries," was by no means so civil to the royal guests as the occasion warranted. The passage in which this much is asserted is so curious as to warrant extract, with such explanation as may be necessary by the way.

"On the 9th of November, George III., who had been married only two months, went in state with his youthful Queen, to dine with the Lord Mayor. It was their Majesties' first visit to the City. Mr. Pitt, yielding to Lord Temple's persuasions, and, as he afterwards declared, against his better judgment,' went with him in his carriage, and joined the procession." Pitt, the "great commoner," the terrible "Cornet of Horse," hated and dreaded by Sir Robert Walpole, had only just resigned office, because he could not get his colleagues to

agree with him in an agressive policy against Spain, to be at war with which power, was then a passion with the people. For this reason, Pitt was their idol, and the court party their abomination. Hence, the result of Pitt's joining the procession might partly have been anticipated. The royal bride and bridegroom were received by the populace with indifference, and Pitt's late colleague with cries of "No Newcastle salmon!" As for Lord Bute, he was everywhere assailed with hisses and execrations, and would probably have been torn in pieces by the mob, but for the interference of a band of butchers and prize-fighters, whom he had armed as a bodyguard. All the enthusiasm of the populace was centred in Mr. Pitt, who was "honoured* with the most hearty acclamations of people of all ranks; and so great was the feeling in his favour, that the mob clung about every part of the vehicle, hung upon the wheels, hugged his footman, and even kissed his horses."

The royal bride must have been astonished, and the bridegroom was indignant at what, a few days after the banquet, he called "the abominable conduct of Mr. Pitt." The court members of parliament were directed to be personally offensive to him in the house, and all the fashionable ladies in town went to see the noble animal baited.

The year of pageants ended with matters of money; and parliament settled on Queen Charlotte 40,000l. per annum, to enable her the better to support the royal dignity; with a dowry of 100,000l. per annum, and Richmond Old Park and Somerset House annexed, in case she should survive his Majesty. On the 2nd of December, the King went in state to the house to give the royal assent to the bill. The Queen accompanied him, and when the royal assent had been given, her Majesty rose from her seat and curtsied to him the grateful acknowledgments which were really due to the representatives of the people who gave the money.

Somerset House was but an indifferent town residence for either Queen or Queen Dowager, and the King showed his

taste and gratified Queen Charlotte, when, in lieu of the abovenamed residence, he purchased for her that red brick mansion, which many of us can yet remember, which stood on the site of the present Buckingham Palace, and was then known as "Buckingham House." It was subsequently called the "Queen's House." The King bought it of Sir Charles Sheffield for 21,000l., and settled it on his consort by an act of parliament obtained some years afterwards.

The locality had been a joyous one in previous years. A portion of the building occupied the site of the famous old Mulberry Gardens, originally planted by James I., where mortal nymphs and swains amused themselves after a fashion which would not be approved of in these more decorous days. It is perhaps worth noticing, that the spot successively belonged to the democracy, the aristocracy, and to royalty. The first building on the spot was Goring House, the property of that Lord Goring whose dragoons carried terror with them both to men and maidens during the Civil Wars. In that house, when the Parliament had become triumphant, the members established their speaker. In Cromwell's time, in the Mulberry Gardens adjacent, there was a great house of entertainment especially for wedding festivals and such gay doings. The gardens were long the resort of all gay people with gold in their purses. From the Goring family it passed under Charles II. to Lord Arlington, Secretary of State, and from his daughter and heiress, the Duchess of Grafton, it was purchased by Sheffield, Duke of Buckingham, the patron of Dryden. The house had been damaged by fire, and the duke had it entirely rebuilt by a Dutch captain and architect, named Wynde or Wynne. It remained in the Sheffield or Buckingham family until it was bought by George III. for Queen Charlotte. Therein were all the children born, with the exception of their eldest son, George Prince of Wales, who was born at St. James's Palace; and who demolished the old house in 1825, and erected on its site one of the ugliest palaces by which the sight was ever offended. Queen Victoria has had some difficulty to make it a comfortable residence; to

render it beautiful was out of the power even of her Majesty's architect, Mr. Blore. The edifice of his predecessor Nash

defied all his efforts.

Buckingham House was the first present made by King George to Queen Charlotte. It has disappeared, and, as consequently peculiarly belonging to history, a brief description of it, as given by Defoe, and by the Duke of Buckingham who was its owner, may be interesting to those who have interest in localities which have been the theatres of great events.

Defoe loquitur. "Buckingham House is one of the great beauties of London, both by reason of its situation and its building. It is situated at the west end of St. James's Park, fronting the Mall and the Great Walk; and behind it is a fine garden, a noble terrace, (from whence, as well as from the apartments, you have a most delicious prospect,) and a little park with a pretty canal. The court-yard which fronts the park is spacious. The offices on each side divided from the palace by two arching galleries, and in the middle of the court is a round basin of water, lined with freestone, with the figures of Neptune and the Tritons, in a water-work. The staircase is large and nobly painted, and in the hall, before you ascend the stairs, is a very fine statue of Cain slaying of Abel, in marble. The apartments indeed are very noble, the furniture rich, and many very good pictures. The top of the palace is flat, on which one has a full view of London and Westminster, and the adjacent country; and the four figures of Mercury, Secrecy, Equity, and Liberty, front the park, and those of the Four Seasons the garden. His Grace has also put inscriptions on the four parts of his palace. On the front towards the park, which is as delicious a situation as can be imagined, the description is, Sic siti lætantur Lares (the household gods delight in such a situation), and fronting the garden, Rus in Urbe (the country within the city): which may be properly said; for from that garden you see nothing but an open country, and an uninterrupted view, without seeing any part of the city, because the palace interrupts that prospect from the

garden." To this description of Defoe's, in which no one now would recognise even the adjacent locality, we add that of the Duke of Buckingham "The avenues to this house are along St. James's Park, through rows of goodly elms on one hand, and gay flourishing limes on the other. That for coaches; this for walking; with the Mall lying between them. This reaches to my iron palisade which encompasses a square court, which has in the midst a great basin, with statues and waterworks, and from its entrance rises all the way, imperceptibly, till we mount to a terrace in front of a large hall, paved with square white stones, mixed with a dark-coloured marble. The walls of it covered with a set of pictures done in the school of Raffaelle. Out of this, on the right hand, we go into a parlour 33 feet by 39 feet, with a niche 15 feet broad for a buffet, paved with white marble, and placed within an arch, with pilasters of divers colours, the upper part of which, as high as the ceiling, is painted by Ricci. Under the windows of this closet (of books) and green-house is a little wilderness full of blackbirds and nightingales. The trees, though planted by myself, require lopping already, to prevent their hindering the views of that fine canal in the park. After all this, to a friend I will expose my weakness, as an instance of the mind's unquietness under the most pleasing enjoyments, I am oftener missing a pretty gallery in the old house I pulled down than pleased with the salle which I built in its stead, though a thousand times better in all manner of respects."

This description, which is from a letter to the Duke of Shrewsbury, may give a general idea of the house as it stood, down to the time of its being presented to Queen Charlotte. In her time, Mr. Wyatt erected a grand staircase. West's pictures soon filled the great gallery, and that artist at least would not complain, as so many others did, that the Queen and King were mean patrons of art, seeing that the latter, to gratify his consort, paid West no less than 40,0007. for his labours. The principal of these pictures are now at Hampton Court. The Regulus brought West a very liberal pension.