tiful Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire, held her court within its walls, and when Fox, Burke, Wyndham, Fitzpatrick, and Sheridan, did homage at her feet. It would be difficult, at the present day, to convey even the slightest notion of the sensation which the lovely and charming Duchess, herself a poetess and a wit,-created in the last age, or of the influence which she exercised over the fashion and politics of her time. Distinguished by her high rank, her surpassing lovelinesss, and the peculiar fascination of her manners;—surrounding herself with the gay, the beautiful, the witty, and the wise;-Devonshire House, under the auspices of this charming woman, displayed a scene of almost romantic brilliancy to which the court of our own day can present no parallel. Berkeley House, it may be remarked, was the residence of the Cavendish family, at least as early as the reign of Charles the Second. We find the venerable Christiana, widow of William the second Earl,-to whom she had been given away at the altar by James the First, maintaining a splendid and hospitable establishment here in 1674, when Waller and Denham were her guests; in 1697, we find William the Third dining with William the first Duke, and here both the first and second Dukes, and the "beautiful Duchess," breathed their last.

The gardens of Clarendon House appear to have adjoined those of Berkeley House, and to have extended to the east as far as the present Burlington Arcade. Clarendon House, the delight and

CLARENDON HOUSE.

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pride of the great Earl of Clarendon, is said, by Burnet, to have cost him 50,000l.; a vast sum, if we consider the relative value of money in the days of Charles the Second's time, and at the present time. His enemies called it Dunkirk House, asserting that it had been built with a sum which he had received as a bribe from the French government for permitting the sale of Dunkirk. Evelyn writes on the 15th of October, 1664, "After dinner, my Lord Chancellor and his lady carried me in their coach to see their new palace, now building at the upper end of St. James's Street, and to project the garden." Pepys also writes, on the 31st of January 1665-6, "To my Lord Chancellor's new house, which he is building, only to view it, hearing so much from Mr. Evelyn of it; and indeed it is the finest pile I ever did see in my life, and will be a glorious house." Evelyn speaks of Clarendon House as possessing many architectural defects, but he adds that, on the whole, it stood most gracefully, and was a stately and magnificent pile.

In Evelyn's Diary for the 27th of August 1667, a few days after the disgrace of the great Chancellor, we find an interesting passage connected with Clarendon House." I visited the Lord Chancellor," says Evelyn, " to whom his Majesty had sent for the seals a few days before: I found him in his bed-chamber very sad. The Parliament had accused him, and he had enemies at Court, especially the buffoons and ladies of pleasure, because he thwarted some of them and stood in their way.

I could name some of the chief. The truth is, he made few friends during his grandeur among the royal sufferers, but advanced the old rebels. He was, however, though no considerable lawyer, one who kept up the form and substance of things with more solemnity than some would have had." Again Evelyn adds, on the 9th of December, "To visit the late Lord Chancellor, I found him in his garden at his new-built palace, sitting in his gout wheel-chair, and seeing the gates setting up towards the north and the fields. He looked and spake very disconsolately. Next morning I heard he was gone."

The Chancellor died in exile, and shortly afterwards Clarendon House was sold by his successor to Christopher Monk, second Duke of Albemarle, for 25,000. The Duke appears to have resided here for some time, but afterwards parted with it for about 35,000%., when it was immediately levelled to the ground, and the present Dover Street, Al-' bemarle Street, Old Bond Street, and Grafton Street, were erected on the site of its beautiful gardens. Evelyn witnessed with great pain "the sad demolition of that costly and sumptuous palace of the late Lord Chancellor, where he had often been so cheerful with him, and sometimes so sad." And on the 19th of June 1683, he writes, "I returned to town with the Earl of Clarendon : when passing by the glorious palace his father built but a few years before, which they were now demolishing, being sold to certain undertakers, I

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turned my head the contrary way till the coach was gone past it, lest I might minister occasion of speaking of it, which must needs have grieved him, that in so short a time their pomp was fallen." Close to Berkeley Street is an archway (leading to the "Three Kings" public-house and livery stables,) on each side of which is a Corinthian pillar, which, according to Mr. D'Israeli, are the last remains existing of Clarendon House.

Burlington House stands on the site of a house built by the celebrated poet Sir John Denham, in the reign of Charles the Second. The present mansion was erected by Richard Boyle, third Earl of Burlington, who was the architect of his own house, as he also was of the Duke of Devonshire's palladian villa at Chiswick, and, in conjunction with the Earl of Pembroke, of Marble Hill, near Twickenham.

Who plants like Bathurst, and who builds like Boyle?

Horace Walpole says of Burlington House:"I had not only never seen it, but never heard of it, at least with any attention, when, soon after my return from Italy, I was invited to a ball at Burlington House. As I passed under the gate by night it could not strike me. At day-break, looking out of the window to see the sun rise, I was surprised with the vision of the colonnade that fronted me. It seemed one of those edifices in fairy tales, that are raised by genii in the night's time." Pope was a constant visitor at Burlington House, and has celebrated "Burlington's delicious meal" in some verses which we have already quoted. Gay, too, tells us

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that he always entered Burlington House with "cleaner shoes," and we find the great musician Handel a cherished guest. Gay says, in his "Trivia:"

Burlington's fair palace still remains,

Beauty, within ;-without, proportion reigns;

There Handel strikes the strings, the melting strain
Transports the soul, and thrills through every vein ;
There oft I enter-but with cleaner shoes,

For Burlington's beloved by every muse.

In Dover Street, at the close of life, on the site of the "fair gardens" which he had formerly laid out for his illustrious friend Lord Clarendon, lived the amiable and high-minded philosopher, John Evelyn. Here, also, when the death of his royal mistress, Queen Anne, drove him from St. James's Palace, lived the witty and amiable Dr. Arbuthnot, the friend of Swift, Pope, and Gay, and beloved by every man of genius who lived in the Augustan age of England.*

Albemarle Street derives its name from Christopher, second Duke of Albemarle, who succeeded the Earls of Clarendon in the possession of Clarendon House. Till very recently the " Duke of Albemarle" public-house was still to be seen in Dover Street. Albemarle Street witnessed the last scenes of " Harley's closing life;" that celebrated statesman having breathed his last at his house in this street, on the 21st of May, 1724.

It was in Albemarle Street, at the house of Lord Grantham, that George the Second, when Prince of Wales, kept his court, after his memorable quarrel

* Biog. Brit., Supplement.