From London to Lands End | Page 4

occasion of. The gardens extend
almost to the bank of the river, yet are never overflowed; nor are there
any marshes on either side the river to make the waters stagnate, or the
air unwholesome on that account. The river is high enough to be
navigable, and low enough to be a little pleasantly rapid; so that the
stream looks always cheerful, not slow and sleeping, like a pond. This
keeps the waters always clear and clean, the bottom in view, the fish
playing and in sight; and, in a word, it has everything that can make an
inland (or, as I may call it, a country) river pleasant and agreeable.
I shall sing you no songs here of the river in the first person of a
water-nymph, a goddess, and I know not what, according to the humour
of the ancient poets; I shall talk nothing of the marriage of old Isis, the
male river, with the beautiful Thame, the female river (a whimsey as
simple as the subject was empty); but I shall speak of the river as
occasion presents, as it really is made glorious by the splendour of its
shores, gilded with noble palaces, strong fortifications, large hospitals,
and public buildings; with the greatest bridge, and the greatest city in
the world, made famous by the opulence of its merchants, the increase
and extensiveness of its commerce; by its invincible navies, and by the
innumerable fleets of ships sailing upon it to and from all parts of the
world.
As I meet with the river upwards in my travels through the inland
country I shall speak of it, as it is the channel for conveying an infinite
quantity of provisions from remote counties to London, and enriching
all the counties again that lie near it by the return of wealth and trade
from the city; and in describing these things I expect both to inform and
divert my readers, and speak in a more masculine manner, more to the
dignity of the subject, and also more to their satisfaction, than I could
do any other way.
There is little more to be said of the Thames relating to Hampton Court,
than that it adds by its neighbourhood to the pleasure of the situation;
for as to passing by water to and from London, though in summer it is
exceeding pleasant, yet the passage is a little too long to make it easy to
the ladies, especially to be crowded up in the small boats which usually
go upon the Thames for pleasure.
The prince and princess, indeed, I remember came once down by water
upon the occasion of her Royal Highness's being great with child, and

near her time--so near that she was delivered within two or three days
after. But this passage being in the royal barges, with strength of oars,
and the day exceeding fine, the passage, I say, was made very pleasant,
and still the more so for being short. Again, this passage is all the way
with the stream, whereas in the common passage upwards great part of
the way is against the stream, which is slow and heavy.
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