Peeps at Royal Palaces of Great Britain. Beatrice Home

      CHAPTER I

       Table of Contents

      WESTMINSTER PALACE

      Scarcely anything remains to-day to remind us of the vast size and the magnificence of the Palace of Westminster, the royal residence of the English Kings from the time of Edward the Confessor until the reign of Henry VIII. For five centuries the monarchs of England kept their Court on the island of Thorney, within the sound of the bells of the great minster raised by the piety of the saintly Edward. Though the early Kings were seldom long in one place, they regarded Westminster as their principal palace, and often kept their Christmas festivals there, a time of general feasting at the royal expense.

      Cnut is supposed to be the first King to settle at Westminster, whither he had gone, after his conversion to Christianity, to be near his friend Abbot Wolfstan, and we are told that the incident of his rebuke to his courtiers concerning the tide occurred on the shores of the River Thames. At that time Westminster was surrounded by water, being built on the island of Thorney, an islet that rose out of the low-lying marshy ground overspread by the wide and unembanked river.

      It is customary to attribute the ruin of the many beautiful and stately buildings of past ages, to the agency of civil wars, the fanatical zeal of Protestant reformers, or the carelessness of the Cromwellian soldiers; but far more deadly foes than the cannon-balls of enemies or the mistaken energies of religious zealots, were the destructive fires that time and again destroyed the splendid structures that adorned the vanished centuries. Westminster, though immune from other foes, suffered terribly from fires, which have robbed us of the greatest part of one of the most picturesque of palaces. Just after Edward I. had finished repairing his royal dwelling a huge fire broke out, so tremendous that the palace was rendered uninhabitable, obliging the King to accept the hospitality of York Place, the London house of the Archbishops of York. Edward II. rebuilt the palace, which remained the main royal residence until a disastrous fire in 1512 drove the monarchs away for ever. Though much was destroyed, a considerable part of the King's house remained, together with the beautiful chapel of St. Stephen and the great hall of the palace; but yet another fire attacked this remnant in 1834. From this last conflagration only Westminster Hall, the crypt of the chapel, and an old tower (now hidden away among the narrow byways of the abbey precincts) survived.

      The Palace of Westminster, described by Camden as "large and magnificent, a building not to be equalled in that age," was of great extent, stretching from the abbey to the river. It consisted of a mass of rambling buildings erected with little regard to any fixed plan, but resulting in a picturesque medley of gabled roofs, carved stonework, delicate window tracery, noble halls, and exquisite chapels. Medieval palaces required to be large, for all the King's work was done upon his own premises. Bakers, brewers, chandlers, armourers, blacksmiths, carpenters, furriers, masons, gardeners, barbers, stablemen, embroiderers, weavers—all lived and worked within the palace walls, and received wages and lodging. As Sir Walter Besant tells us, in his fascinating history of Westminster, the palace was "a crowded city, complete in itself, though it produced nothing and carried on no trade; there were workshops and forges and the hammerings of armourers and blacksmiths, but there were no stalls, no chepe, no clamour of those who shouted their goods and invited the passengers to 'Buy, buy, buy.'" Within this city, crowded within a confined space, dwelt about fifteen thousand people all occupied with the King's business, from the judges, bishops, and high State officials, down to humble laundry-women.

      A strongly-fortified wall ran all round the palace, for medieval Kings needed their royal residences to be places of defence as well as of regal splendour. There were gates leading to the Abbey, to Whitehall, and to the river, where the King's barges lay to take him down to the Tower of London in the city, or up the river towards Windsor. Immediately beyond the busy throng of the palace and the monastic buildings of the Abbey, lay green fields and pleasant rural scenes. Between the palace and the noisy city, a mile away, stood palatial houses of the great nobles and bishops, facing the broad and sparkling Thames.

      Of all the beautiful buildings that once formed the extensive palace only the great hall remains, now known as Westminster Hall. William Rufus built it in 1097, declaring that, large though it might appear, it was "but a bedchamber" in comparison to what he intended to make. But practically nothing is left of the work of Rufus, for we learn that three hundred years later, in 1397, Richard II. ordered the "walls, windows, and roof to be taken down and new made." The following year