CHAPTER IV.

The Admiralty-Whitehall-The Treasury-Downing-street-Westminster Abbey-Henry VII.'s Chapel-Poets' Corner - Chapel of Edward the Confessor-Funeral of Cromwell-St. Margaret's-Old Palace Yard -Westminster Hall-its historical Associations-Courts of Law and Equity, and the Star Chamber,

ARLIAMENT-STREET and White. hall are full of notable buildings, and still more remarkable for their historical associations. We begin with the head-quarters of the Army and Navy.

The Admiralty, built by Ripley, in the reign of George II., is on the site of a mansion called Wallingford House; it is a heavy building receding from, but communicating with, the street by advancing wings; the portico of the main building is a tasteless specimen of the Ionic order. The court is enclosed by a stone screen, decorated with naval emblems. It is here the higher departments of the business of the navy are transacted. The Lords of the Admiralty have apartments here.

Opposite the Horse Guards stands Whitehall Chapel, from one of the windows of which the unfortunate monarch Charles I. suffered decapitation. Could the walls of this ancient edifice tell the story of the doings and sayings they have witnessed, the chronicle would go a great way to fill up the medieval history of England. From the time of the Tudors to that of the Stuarts, the names of most of the illustrious personages who have influenced the destinies of the Empire are associated with the records of this place.

It was the Palace of the Kings of England from the reign of Henry VIII. to William III. It was originally called York House, having been a residence of Cardinal Wolsey, and so named by him; it received its present designation on its transfer to the Crown. Whitehall formerly occupied an area of great extent, fronting the Thames on the east, St. James's Park on the west, and stretching from Scotland Yard on the north to Canon-row, Westminster, on the south. There was a public thoroughfare through the Palace, but the number of funerals which passed to St. Margaret's, Westminster, offending Henry VIII., he had a cemetery formed at St. Martin's-in-the-Fields.

The great event which distinguished Whitehall is so well known, that it seems unnecessary to do

more than merely refer to it. However, those who not need to be informed, may be reminded that here Charles I. was executed on the 30th January, 1649. The reader who has gathered his knowledge of that event from Hume-so long the most popular of English historians-might imagine that the unfortunate King passed his last days in Whitehall, and was merely brought from the interior to the outside of that edifice to suffer. Such is not the fact; the King spent the last three days of his life in St. James's Palace; and was brought from thence through the Park to Whitehall on the fatal morning, some hours before that fixed for the execution. He remained in his bed-chamber engaged in acts of devotion till the final hour arrived, when he was led along the galleries to the banquetting-house, through the wall of which a passage was broken to the scaffold. A man in a closed visor stood ready to perform the office of executioner. After the short and feeling address to the few persons who could hear him, and his affecting colloquy with good Bishop Juxon, to whom he replied, "I go from a corruptible to an incorruptible crown, where no disturbar ce can have place," the king laid his head upon the block, and the man in the visor struck it from his body at one blow. Another man in a similar disguise held it up immediately,

all dripping with blood, and exclaimed, "This is the head of a traitor !"

Whitehall was formerly a residence of Cardinal Wolsey, but was surrendered to the Crown when that proud prelate lost the favor of his sovereign.

Inigo Jones, the architect to James I., projected a new palace on a magnificent scale upon the site of the present building. Had the scheme been carried out it would have been the most vast and

symmetrical design ever devised. The present building, which is sometimes called the Banquetting House, presents the earliest specimen of pure Italian architecture in England. Charles I. contemplated carrying out the proposed plan of his predecessor, but only completed the decoration of the ceiling by Rubens, which cost £3,000. This Banquettingroom was converted into a chapel by George I. The whole pile was the residence of James II., but in 1698 a destructive fire consumed all but that portion which now remains. Here some of the regiments stationed in London formerly attended Divine Service. The Treasury, which extends on the opposite side of Whitehall, consists of a long line of splendid stone buildings of the Tuscan and Ionic orders. Here are the several government offices connected with the Treasury department; and here is deposited the talisman that keeps to

gether the social fabric of the Empire. Downingstreet contains the offices of the Privy Council, the Board of Trade, and the official residence of the Prime Minister. From this obscure street issue forth edicts and measures which sometimes shake the world. Downing-street, in a word, bears the same relation to the politics of the British Empire, as Lombard-street and the Bank of England do to its monetary affairs.

Passing down Parliament-street we approach that venerable pile-Westminster Abbey. This magnificent structure, although inferior in architectural splendor and symmetrical proportions to many other celebrated Cathedrals, is yet an imposing and august edifice. It is dingy-almost black, like most other buildings of London-from the prevailing smoky atmosphere of the city; yet this very blackness adds to its picturesque effect. Viewed longitudinally it appears vast in extent and height.

It was founded in the sixth century, and is said to be on the ruins of a temple of Apollo, and was restored by Edgar in 969, and re-erected by Edward the Confessor in 1065. He devoted onetenth of his property to its erection: subsequent monarchs still further enriched the stately edifice, ↑ and Henry VII. added, at the eastern extremity,