HAMPTON COURT

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXVI, 13 February 1932, Page 10

HAMPTON COURT

AN ENGLISH SHOW PLACE (By T.C.L.) Of all the royal ievidences in or near London, Hampton Court is probably the best known. Only lb miles from the eity, close to the river Thames, Hampton Court, with its “wilderness” and famous “maze” is a. very popular place with the young Londoner. He can yet. there by road, rail or river, and there is much to be said in favour of each route. On a tine week-end the Thames in the Richmond and Hampton districts is a study in British democracy. All sorts and conditions of men and women are (here, and every known kind of river craft may be encountered if a “water picnic” is the day's programme. Ask the average Londoner what he : knows about Hampton Court and to whom it belonys and he probably will be quite uncertain. lie will hazard ! that the London County Council is the controlling authority, but he will tell you at once of the wonders of the maze and that there are vines in the gardens 1 “hundreds” of years old. As a matter ' of fact, there is a famous vine, planted in 17(1,5, of which London is as proud 1 as is Sydney of one planted at Pnrramj matta 22 years later. Yet Hampton Court Palace has a , history, and though it is no longer . occupied by royalty, residence therein is only by royal consent. As is generally known, it is occupied by men and women who have either rendered the State some special service or who have made a name in arts and science. To be given quarters at Hampton Court is a, high honour, though there is very little “limelight’ ’about any action in this direction. The main approach to this ex-royal residence is through an avenue of chestnut trees a mile in length in Bushev Park. On “Chestnut Sunday” tens of thousands make the trip to see the beautiful old trees in flower. And what a sight they are! The men who built the palace and laid out the grounds had an eye for beauty and the picturesque. They built and planted for the future more perhaps than for the present, and the pepole of the present day who now enjoy the result of their vision and enterprise have much to thank them for. It was, of course, the very nature of the Englishman of old to make a castle of his home and to plant shrubs and trees. That is why rural England even in these post-war days is like a great park. No other country is quite like it. Indeed, no other country has the same appeal, the same attraction, to the colonial. How the early colonists came to leave such a beautiful country and to brave the unknown in a new arid savage country on the other side of the globe and to make the journey in cockleshell boats with scant accommodation, salt food and no facilities or privacy or comforts for the women folk is an unending source'of surprise to the visitor to England to-day. The explanation is that our forebears were of rare courage and grit and fired with a desire to build up their fortunes in a new country and incidentally found another country.

Hampton Court is no mean building, i Built of warm red brick, with its main gateway retaining something of a for- < tress-like approach there is a. dignity in the simplicity, almost severity, of I the design that is most impressive. It is admittedly one'of the iinest specimens of TudoV acliitecture. The two original wings 'are rill that remain of the palace Cardinal ‘ Wolsey erected

when he was basking in royal favour. A little over 400 years ago, in Ibid, Henry VIII. “presented” Wolsey with the lease of some land that belonged to tile "Knights Hospitaller.” Six years later the building, then .unsurpassed for" its magnificence, was called by Wolsey in a letter to the King

"your manor,” and though Wolsey lived at Hampton until ld2B it appears that Henry had claimed ownership at least two years previously. After Wolsey’s fall Henry VIII. lived at Hampton, and added the Great Hall and the chapel. llis daughter, Queen Elizabeth, stayed there frequently. She increased the improvements to the gardens that even then had a reputation beyond the capital. A foreign ambassador, describing his reception at the. palace by the Queen, ■Speaks of the gardens as “most pleasing. with rosemary so planted and mull'd to the walls as to cover them entirely, a method extremely common -it England.” It is practically certain that Shakespeare’s King Henry VIII. was acted in those gardens, and that the “gentle Will” was himself a member of the cast. King James I. tried to use the mellowing influence of Hampton Court to bring harmony between the established churches of England and Scotland, but theology and horticulture would not mix. Charles f. loved the retreat. He had jLhe canal to the river made so that the royal barge might come and go with us much or little publicity as the King or his courtiers saw lit. Later, when troubles were black, the palace was actually disposed of by Charles, but Oliver Cromwell annulled the sale, and when the Restoration took place Hampton Court was once more a royal residence, and remained so until the .reign of George IT. It suffered some vicissitudes. By the time William 111. reign-, cd only two of the. five original quadrangles remained. William called in the great Sir Christopher Wren, the architect of St. Paul’s, who designed the third that is still in existence. It is to the same King William that the quaintly precise lay-out of the palace gardens is due. He had the Dutchman’s love of orderliness, and this extended to gardens as well as to statecraft. He found irregular percolations froip the canal of Chari.s I. all over the

grounds and had them straightened and fountains erected. Avenues of trees run out from the extensive and beautiful lawns like the spokes of a wheel. A sunken Italian garden adds distinction to the environs of the palace. The maze attracts the attention of the curious. Borders of seasonable flowcis provide colour and interest to tile visitor, who is loth to leave such beautiful surroundings even to inspect the interior of the stately old .palace. (To he continued.)