CHAPTER V

GREENWICH AND OTHER SOUTH-EASTERN SUBURBS OF LONDON

[Sidenote: Greenwich]

Occupying as it does a unique position on the Thames, which is here often crowded with British and foreign shipping, owning in the group of buildings collectively known as the Hospital one of the masterpieces of eighteenth-century domestic architecture, and in its park one of the most beautiful open spaces near the capital, whilst its Observatory gives to it the distinction of a leader in astronomical research, Greenwich has long ranked as one of the most important and popular suburbs of London. It is mentioned as Grénawic in the _Anglo-Saxon Chronicle_, and its history, which is intimately bound up with that of England, can be traced back to the time of Alfred the Great, when it was a mere scattered hamlet, the home of a few poor fishermen. In the days of the protracted struggle with the invading Northmen, their fleet often lay at anchor for months together near Greenwich, within easy reach of their camp on the high ground at the edge of Blackheath, now known as East and West Coombe, that until quite recently retained traces of {101} their defensive earthworks. It was near Greenwich that the noble St. Alphege, Archbishop of Canterbury, who had been taken prisoner at the siege of that town in 1001, was massacred by the Danes on April 1, 1002, in revenge for his persistent refusal to buy his life at the expense of his friends, and it is supposed to have been on the actual scene of his martyrdom that the parish church was built many centuries afterwards.

The manor of Greenwich, with that of Lewisham, to which it originally belonged, was given by Ethelruda, a niece of King Alfred, to the monks of the Abbey of St. Peter at Ghent, who held it till it was seized by the Crown after the disgrace of Bishop Odo of Bayeux. When in 1414 the alien religious houses were suppressed, it was granted by Henry V. to the newly founded Abbey of Sheen, but later it again reverted to the Crown. There seems to have been a royal residence and chapel at Greenwich as early as the thirteenth century, for it is related that on a certain occasion King Edward I. made an offering of seven shillings and his son, the future Edward II., one of three shillings and sixpence, at each of the holy crosses in the chapel dedicated to the Blessed Virgin at Greenwich, though exactly where that chapel was situated there is no evidence to show. Later, Henry IV. made his will, dated 1408, at his manor-house of Greenwich, and his son Henry V. bestowed the estate on Thomas Beaufort, Duke of Exeter, for his life. On his death in 1417 it was given to Duke Humphrey of Gloucester, uncle of the king, and some few years {102} afterwards two hundred acres of land were added to the property, whilst permission was granted to its owner to build on to the manor-house, a concession confirmed and increased in 1437. The duke, aided by his wife Eleanor, quickly converted the ancient residence into a palace, to which he gave the name of the Pleasaunce, or Placentia, that occupied the site of the western wing of the present hospital--the crypt of its chapel being still preserved beneath the portion now used as a museum--and he began to build the tower that now forms part of the famous Observatory. In 1447, however, Duke Humphrey's work was suddenly cut short by his death, and the greatly improved property reverted to the Crown, to which it has ever since belonged. The park was added to and stocked with deer by Edward IV., and Henry VII. greatly improved the palace, building a brick front on the riverside. He also completed the tower begun by Duke Humphrey, and built a convent close to the palace for the Grey Friars, to whom Edward IV. had already, in 1480, given a chantry and a little chapel dedicated to the Holy Cross, that probably formed the nucleus of the new monastery. Henry VIII. was born at Placentia, and to the end of his life he had a very great affection for it, sparing no expense to beautify it. In its chapel he was married to his first wife, Katharine of Aragon; in its hall he presided over many stately banquets, and took part in its park in many a brilliant tournament. He and his court generally spent Christmas at Greenwich, and it was there, in 1511, that the first masked ball took place in England. {103} The Princess Mary was born at Greenwich in 1516, and a year later her aunt, Mary, Queen-Dowager of France, was married with much pomp and ceremony, in the chapel of Placentia, to the Duke of Suffolk. In 1517 no less than three queens--Katharine of Aragon, Margaret of Scotland, and Mary, Queen-Dowager of the same country--were together at Greenwich, and in 1527 a grand entertainment was given there to the French ambassadors, who had come to ask the hand of the Princess Mary, then eleven years old, for the Duke of Orleans, the second son of the King of France, although she was already affianced to the Emperor Charles V. It was at Placentia, too, that the fickle Henry VIII. spent part of his honeymoon with Anne Boleyn, and thence that the newly wedded pair made their triumphal progress up the river for the coronation of the bride at Westminster on May 15, 1533, escorted by a long procession of gaily decked barges, bearing the Lord Mayor and Aldermen of London, the officers of the royal household, the bishops, and great nobles with their retinues, making up such a goodly pageant as had never before been seen on the Thames. In the autumn of the same year the Princess Elizabeth was born at Greenwich, and baptized in the chapel of the Grey Friars convent. For the next two years the happiness of her father and mother in each other seemed to be complete; they were often together at Placentia, dividing most of their time between it and Hampton Court Palace, but after the birth at the latter of Anne Boleyn's still-born son, the clouds that had already begun to {104} gather before that event became more threatening than ever. At a tournament held in the palace park at Greenwich on May Day 1536, Henry found the excuse he had been long looking for for the condemnation of his wife. The unfortunate queen accidentally dropped a handkerchief, and the king chose to assume that it was meant as a signal for one of the competing knights. Without vouchsafing a word of explanation he started from his seat, called to a few attendants to follow him, and hastened off to London, ordering as he went the execution of Anne's brother. The next morning the same measure was meted out to the queen herself; she was hurried off to the Tower, her request that she might be allowed to take leave of her child being refused. On the 19th of the same month she was executed, her husband, to whom she had addressed a most pathetic appeal, having steadily declined to see her again. The death a year later of her successor, soon after the birth of the future King Edward VI., must have appeared a judgment on the double crime of murder and bigamy, for the king was married to Jane Seymour the day before the death of Anne, and it is just possible that even Henry's hardened conscience may have reproached him, for he avoided Greenwich, with its melancholy associations, for some little time after the loss of his third queen. In January 1540, however, it was the scene of the magnificent reception of the hated Anne of Cleves, whose reluctant suitor had decided to divorce her before the ceremony at which he promised to cherish her till death should part him {105} from her. On the occasion of this mock marriage, that was celebrated in the private chapel of Placentia, the whole of the park and of the adjoining Blackheath, in spite of the inclement season of the year, was dotted with tents and pavilions of cloth of gold for the accommodation of the queen and her ladies. To quote from Hall's _Chronicle_, the 'esquires gentlemen pensioners and serving men (were so) well horsed and apparelled that whoever well viewed them might say that they for tall and comely personages and clean of limb and body' were able to give the greatest prince in Christendom a mortal breakfast if he were the king's enemy.' In the opinion of this partial chronicler, however, Henry himself, when he rode forth from the palace attended by all his great nobles and the foreign ambassadors, far excelled them all, so rich was his apparel, so gorgeous the trappings of his steed, 'so goodly his personage and his royal gesture.'

Neither the doomed Catherine Howard nor the more fortunate Catherine Parr, who, but for the fact that she survived her husband, would probably have shared the fate of her predecessor, were ever at Greenwich, but the palace there was the home for a short time of Edward VI., who spent the Christmas of 1552 there, and died in it in 1553. Queen Mary, too, occasionally resided at Placentia, leading an extremely quiet life, that was one day disturbed by an alarming incident, for a salute from a passing vessel was fired by mistake from a loaded gun, and a ball pierced the wall of the room in which she sat with her ladies, fortunately without injuring anyone.

{106}

It was Queen Elizabeth who restored to her birthplace something of the éclat it had enjoyed during her father's lifetime. She spent the greater part of several summers there, celebrating on April 23 the fête of St. George, the patron-saint of England, with great pomp, receiving foreign ambassadors in state, and giving audience to her own faithful subjects when it suited her humour and convenience. In the first year of her reign she reviewed in her park at Greenwich a large company of London volunteers, who had banded themselves together to aid her against the rebel Duke of Norfolk, and it was in the palace that she held her first chapter of the Order of the Garter, after which she went to supper with her devoted adherent, the Earl of Pembroke, at his seat of Baynard's Castle, who, the repast over, attended her whilst she indulged in her favourite pastime of boating on the Thames, the royal barge attended by hundreds of smaller craft passing to and fro again and again, to the delight of the crowds assembled on the banks to watch the brilliant scene.

Many significant stories are told of the doings of the maiden queen at Greenwich; how, for instance, she caused a dishonest purveyor of poultry to be hanged on the complaint of a farmer who boldly intercepted her on one of her progresses, crying in a loud voice, in spite of all the efforts of the attendants to silence him, 'Which is the Queen? Which is the Queen?' Elizabeth herself replied to him, listened to all he had to say, and granted his request without more ado, although he dared to assume that she had {107} devoured the hens and ducks seized by her servant, declaring that she could eat more than his own daughter, who was blessed with a very good appetite.

Every year on Maundy Thursday it was the queen's habit to wash one of the feet of as many poor women as the years of her own life, and the ceremony on these occasions was alike lengthy and imposing. A service in the chapel inaugurated the proceedings, and the feet of the chosen women having been first thoroughly cleansed by members of the queen's household, her majesty entered the hall attended by her whole court, and performed her part with great condescension, kissing each foot she had washed with earnest devotion and making over it the sign of the cross. Gifts of wearing apparel and food were then presented to the women, one of them chosen beforehand receiving the costume worn by her majesty.

It is said to have been at Greenwich that Sir Walter Raleigh was first presented to the queen, and the oft-told episode of the cloak is by some authorities supposed to have taken place there, the gallant young courtier having flung down his richly decorated mantle on the landing-stage just in time to prevent his royal patron from wetting her feet as she alighted from her barge opposite the palace. Whether there be any truth in this version of the story it is certain that Raleigh was often at Greenwich, as was also his rival the handsome Earl of Essex, who was so soon to succeed him in the favour of the fickle queen. It may possibly have been from {108} Placentia that Raleigh started for Ireland in 1587, and it was certainly there that he learned to love his future wife Bessy Throckmorton, one of the queen's maids of honour, jealousy of whom had much to do with his committal to the Tower in 1592.

To the end Queen Elizabeth retained her affection for Greenwich, and some of the last walks she took were in her beloved park there, in which is preserved a mighty hollow oak-tree, capable of holding no less than twenty people, that is still known as Queen Elizabeth's and is protected by a railing from injury. Her successor James I., however, cared little for the palace or its grounds, and bestowed them both in 1605 upon his wife, Anne of Denmark, who became much attached to her new possession. She greatly improved the old palace and began the building of another, to which she gave the name of the House of Delight. Her affection for Greenwich was shared by her son, Charles I., and his wife, Henrietta Maria, who were often in residence there before their troubles began, and had the House of Delight, which now forms the central portion of the Royal Naval School, completed by Inigo Jones. They opened negotiations, too, with some of the chief artists of the day, including Rubens, who was often their guest at Placentia, for the painting of the walls of the new palace, but the terms asked were prohibitive, and all too soon more pressing matters took up all the king's time and thoughts. After his fatal journey to Scotland Charles I. was never again at Greenwich and for some little time after his death the palaces there were deserted, but later Cromwell resided for {109} some time in the older of the two. On the Restoration the Greenwich estate became once more the property of the royal family, and the widowed queen Henrietta Maria lived in one of the palaces for a short time. That of Placentia was, however, now in such a melancholy state of decay that it was decided to pull it down, and a new palace was begun on its site after the designs of Inigo Jones, of which, however, only one wing was completed, with which, says Pepys in his _Diary_, 'the king was mightily pleased,' but his majesty's ardour soon cooled, and writing in 1669 the gossipy journalist remarks: 'The king's house at Greenwich goes on slow but is very pretty.' Gradually the slowness became stagnation, Charles II. lost all interest in the work, and neither he nor his successors, James II. or William III., used the new palace as a residence. The wife of the latter, however, who cherished many happy memories of Greenwich, resolved to turn the royal buildings there to account by using them as a hospital for disabled seamen. The idea, it is said, first occurred to her after the great victory of La Hogue in 1692, at which so many English sailors were crippled for life; and without waiting for the return of her husband from Holland, she at once ordered various alterations to be made to render the building suitable for its new purpose. Later William entered very cordially into the scheme, and in 1694 the palace and the estate connected with it were formally given over to trustees 'for the relief and support of seamen of the Royal navy ... who by reason of age or other disabilities shall be incapable of further service {110} ... and also for the sustenance of the widows and maintenance and education of the children of seamen happening to be slain or disabled in such sea service.'

Unfortunately Queen Mary died before the work inaugurated by her was completed, but William III. resolved to make the hospital a worthy memorial of her, and entrusted the task of supplementing the existing buildings with another of noble proportions to Sir Christopher Wren, under whom was to work as treasurer John Evelyn, and as secretary the famous dramatist and architect Sir John Vanbrugh, who in 1714 built the mansion known as Vanburgh Castle, still standing on Maize Hill on the eastern outskirts of the park, in which a number of French prisoners were shut up during the last war with France.

Greenwich Hospital was designed without fee by Sir Christopher, for love, as he said, of the cause of the seamen, and is considered one of his masterpieces. With his usual skill in subordinating detail to general effect and dovetailing the new on to the old, he made the colonnades connecting his work with that of his predecessors appear an integral part of a single harmonious scheme, and fortunately there is nothing incongruous with that scheme in the additions made since his death. As it now stands the hospital consists of four groups of buildings, named respectively after Charles II., Queen Anne, Queen Mary, and King William. The two first on either side of the great square face the river and are both handsome structures, but they are excelled in beauty of design by the two last. In Queen Mary's is the richly decorated chapel completed in 1789 {111} that replaces an earlier building destroyed by fire in 1779, whilst King William's encloses the most important feature of all, the fine Painted Hall originally the refectory of the pensioners, that was decorated between 1708 and 1729 with a series of mural and ceiling paintings by Sir James Thornhill, and is now used as a national gallery for portraits of naval heroes and pictures of marine subjects, some of which, notably Turner's 'Battle of Trafalgar,' are real masterpieces. Many banquets to royal and other distinguished guests have been held in the Painted Hall, but the most memorable association with it is the fact that in it in 1806 the dead body of Lord Nelson lay in state for three days before it was taken by boat on January 8 to be interred in St. Paul's Cathedral.

Until 1865 Greenwich Hospital continued to be one of the most useful and appreciated charitable institutions of the United Kingdom, but at that date it was decided, in accordance with the wishes of the seamen, that they should be allowed pensions enabling them to live in their own homes. In 1869 the last of the inmates left, and four years later the buildings were re-opened as a naval college, those named after Queen Anne being set aside as a museum of naval relics, models of ships, etc., for the use of the students, to which, however, the public are admitted. From the first the new school throve in a remarkable way, and at the present day as many as a thousand pupils are received in it at a time.

The parish church of Greenwich, dedicated to St. Alphege, occupies the site of an earlier one, {112} that in its turn is supposed to have replaced a chapel marking the spot where the martyrdom of the holy man it commemorated took place. The present building was completed in 1718, and is a fairly good example of the Renaissance style then in vogue. It contains a fine memorial window to its titular saint, who is represented in his bishop's robes raising the right hand in blessing, an ornate royal pew, some good carving by the famous Grinling Gibbons, and on one of the walls a quaint old painting representing Charles I. in prayer. In the crypt beneath rest Major-General Wolfe, the hero of Quebec, the celebrated musician, Thomas Tallis, and the famous beauty, Polly Peacham, who became Duchess of Bolton, and resided with her husband the duke at Westcombe Park. In the same place was also interred the noted antiquarian, William Lombarde, who lived in the time of Elizabeth and founded the picturesque almshouses named after her, still to be seen opposite the modern railway station, but when the old church was pulled down his tomb was removed to Sevenoaks.

Greenwich Park, that was first roughly enclosed by Duke Humphrey of Gloucester and his wife Eleanor in 1433, was further protected some two centuries later by a brick wall erected by order of James I. The grounds were laid out by the famous landscape gardener, Le Nôtre, chosen by Charles II., who took a great interest in the progress of the work, himself planting many trees, including the noble avenue of Spanish chestnuts that is still one of the most noteworthy features of the park. {113} It was the same monarch who decided to transform into an Observatory the tower built by Duke Humphrey, which had been the home for many years of the younger members of the royal family, and in which the Princess Mary, one of the daughters of Edward IV., died in 1482. Later the building, to which the inappropriate name of Mirefleur was given, was used as a prison, and in it Queen Elizabeth had the Earl of Leicester shut up after his marriage to the widowed Duchess of Essex. James I. gave the property to Henry Howard, Earl of Northampton, founder of the still flourishing Trinity Hospital, and he greatly enlarged the Tower, converting it into a really fine mansion. The work of transforming it into an observatory was entrusted to Sir Christopher Wren, who found it necessary to have the greater part taken down, but he used the old materials; and in spite of the many additions that have been made since his time, the group of buildings, with their numerous turrets and domes, harmonise well with each other and their surroundings. Through Greenwich Observatory runs the meridian line from which longitude is reckoned, and from it the exact time is conveyed by electricity every day at one o'clock to the chief towns of Great Britain. In it elaborate records are made of the daily changes in temperature, the direction of the wind, and many other data of importance to astronomical and meteorological science. The great telescope, that is twenty-eight feet long and has an object glass of twenty-eight inches, is the most powerful anywhere in use, and near to the chief entrance is the huge astronomical clock that shows the {114} true official time. Many distinguished men have held the important post of Astronomer-Royal at Greenwich, including Flamsteed, Halley, Bradley, and Sir George Airey, under whose enlightened auspices the observatory has won first rank amongst similar institutions elsewhere, a position it seems likely long to maintain if its interests are protected from the dangers that have recently begun to threaten them. The annual reports issued by the Astronomer-Royal are practically a history of astronomical science, and it is impossible to overestimate the value of the quiet, systematic, unremitting work done under his auspices all the year round, or of the unceasing vigilance of the experts whose business it is to make sure that all the instruments used are in the highest possible state of efficiency.

From the immediate vicinity of the Observatory, especially from Flamsteed Hill, a fine view is obtained of the river with its shipping--the Isle of Dogs, and its church, connected by a subway with the mainland, and the country between Greenwich and London; but, unfortunately, the long famous prospect from One Tree Hill, so called after a single giant growth that formerly surmounted its summit, is now nearly shut out by trees and shrubs, the planting of which it is impossible to justify, for they were certainly not needed. In spite of this, however, Greenwich Park remains one of the most beautiful and popular open spaces within easy reach of the capital. The deer which roam about in it are so tame that they will eat out of the hands of strangers, and even when it is crowded {115} with holiday-makers it still retains something of the old-fashioned aroma of days long gone by. The Ranger's Lodge, now used as a restaurant and meeting-place for local clubs, that has one entrance from Greenwich Park and another from Blackheath, so that it forms a kind of link between the two, is a fine old mansion associated with many interesting memories of the time when the post of Ranger was held by noble or royal personages. It was once the home, for instance, of the famous Philip, Earl of Chesterfield, and later of the Dowager-Duchess of Brunswick, whose daughter, the unhappy Caroline, Princess of Wales, lived near by in the now destroyed Montague House, going once a week to see her child, the Princess Charlotte, who was under the care of her mother. In comparatively recent times the Lodge was occupied by Prince Arthur of Connaught when he was studying at the Woolwich Academy, and in its grounds, recently added to the public park, is a model of a fort built by him, and a curious bath bearing a quaint inscription.

[Sidenote: Blackheath]

The common known as Blackheath, probably because of its sombre appearance, that adjoins the parish of Greenwich, is all that is left of a vast unenclosed tract of country, which between the time of St. Alphege and the early years of the nineteenth century often played an important part in the history of England. On it, in June 1381, Wat Tyler and his followers were encamped for some days, their numbers constantly increasing, before the march to London that was to end so disastrously. There Richard II. and his young {116} bride Isabel of France, Henry V. and his victorious troops fresh from Agincourt, and Henry VI. after his coronation at Paris, were at different times met by the Lord Mayor and Aldermen of London, who had come from the city to welcome them. There, too, after the tragic death of their leader, the adherents of Jack Cade knelt, with halters round their necks, before Henry VI. to plead for pardon; and there, a few months later, the same monarch, with his army around him, awaited the coming of the Duke of York, whose claim to the throne was stronger than his own, resolved, in spite of all his promises to the contrary, to have him sent a prisoner to London. It was on Blackheath that the son of the Duke, Edward IV. halted, in 1471, to receive the congratulations of the citizens of London on his return from Paris after signing the famous treaty of peace with Louis of France, and there, twenty-six years afterwards, Henry VII. met and cut to pieces the rebels from Cornwall, who had marched to London under the joint leadership of Lord Audley and the sturdy blacksmith Michael Joseph, whose burial-place, a mound locally known as the Smith's Forge, from which Whitefield used to preach, is marked by a group of fir-trees. To Blackheath came, in 1519, the Papal legate Cardinal Campeggio, to take counsel with the Catholic Duke of Norfolk, and there in the same year the High Admiral of France, the chivalrous Bonivet, attended by many young French gallants in gorgeous array, was welcomed with great pomp by the Earl of Surrey, who held the same office {117} in England. During the reigns of Henry VIII., Elizabeth, Charles I., and Charles II., Blackheath was, as a matter of course, the scene of many a pageant besides the one already alluded to in connection with Greenwich, when the wooer of so many fair women went forth from his palace there to receive his bride, the unattractive Anne of Cleves. The last great historical gathering which took place on the Heath was that of May 29, 1660, when the army was drawn up on it to welcome back Charles II., an event graphically described by Macaulay, who remarks: 'In the midst of the general joy at the restoration, one spot [Blackheath] presented a dark and threatening aspect, for though the king smiled, bowed, and extended his hand graciously to the lips of the colonels and majors, all his courtesy was in vain. The countenances of the soldiers were sad and lowering, and had they given way to their feelings the festive pageant in which they reluctantly formed a part would have had a mournful and bloody end.'

It was in the reign of James I., who introduced in his southern dominions the favourite game of Scotland, that was founded what is now the oldest athletic society of England, the Blackheath Golf Club, the history of which is one of unbroken continuity, for it has flourished ever since, surviving the popular fair, that until it was suppressed by Government in 1873 used to take place in May and October of every year. Blackheath is now in fact a local playground rather than a factor in the national life; much of it has been built over, and the little village {118} named after it has become a populous town. There remain, however, a few fine old mansions to recall the days gone by, notably that known as Morden's College at the south-eastern corner of the still unenclosed common, built in 1694 by Sir John Morden as a home for twelve decayed merchants, and added to later to meet the needs of the forty pensioners now received in it, the value of the property left in trust for the charity by the owner having greatly increased since his death.

The village of Charlton, on a hill about halfway between Greenwich and Woolwich, with its seventeenth-century church that has been well restored, and its many old cottages, is now much what Blackheath was a century ago, but it seems likely ere long to lose its picturesque appearance. It will always, however, retain the advantage of commanding a fine view of the Thames valley, and it is still in touch with much beautiful scenery. Its manor-house, known as Charlton House, said to have been designed by Inigo Jones, is a good example of the domestic architecture of the period at which it was built, and probably occupies the site of the ancient homestead that with the rest of the estate of Charlton was given by William the Conqueror to Bishop Odo of Bayeux.

[Sidenote: Eltham]

Two miles south-east of Greenwich is the popular suburb of Eltham, the name of which is a contraction of the Anglo-Saxon Ealdham, signifying the ancient homestead, that was in olden times an important town with a royal palace, of which the banqueting-hall alone remains. Given with {119} Charlton and many another valuable property in southern England to Bishop Odo of Bayeux by William the Conqueror, the manor of Eltham passed through many vicissitudes, reverting again and again to the Crown, and becoming after the Restoration the property of Sir John Shaw. The date of the erection of the palace, the ruins of which are situated near to the picturesque mansion known as Eltham Court, is unknown, but it is referred to as a royal residence in the supplement to the thirteenth-century _Historia Major_ of the famous Latin chronicler Matthew Paris, that is supposed to have been added by William Rishanger, a monk of St. Albans Abbey. In any case it seems certain that Henry III. spent Christmas of 1270 in it, though it was probably not then completed, and Edward II. and his wife Queen Isabella were very fond of it. It was in it that their son John, familiarly called John of Eltham, was born, and there his elder brother Edward III. took his young bride, Philippa of Hainault, in 1328. The first parliament of his reign was held in it, and he was residing there just before he broke free from the pernicious influence of his mother, whom he banished to Rising Castle. It was at Eltham that the famous banquet was given to the captive king John of France by Edward III. and the Black Prince in 1363, at which probably the princess royal, who was to become the wife of the prisoner, was present; and there the English monarch presided, the year before the death of his beloved son, over the parliament that met after the {120} conclusion of the long war with France. Richard II., who was made Prince of Wales at Eltham in 1375, spent a good deal of time there during his minority, and went there after his marriage in 1382 to his first wife Anne of Bohemia, who shared his affection for the palace. The royal couple kept Christmas at Eltham in 1384, 1385, and 1386, receiving on the last occasion Leo, King of Bohemia, who had come to England to plead for aid against the Turks, and also a less welcome deputation of the faithful Commons who had sought an audience to remonstrate with the young king on his extravagance.

In 1395, a year after the death of Queen Anne, which was such a bitter grief to Richard, the French historian Froissart, who was then engaged in writing his famous _Chronicles_, went to Eltham to present one of his books to the widowed king, and was present at a council, of which he gives a very graphic account. He was also, he relates, admitted to a private audience in the monarch's bedroom and he tells how he laid his gift upon the bed and how greatly the recipient appreciated it, for he dipped eagerly into the manuscript here and there reading portions of it aloud.

It was at Eltham in 1396 that the marriage was arranged between Richard II. and the eight-year-old Isabella, daughter of Charles VI. of France, and it was from the palace that the newly married pair went forth in great state for the coronation of the bride in Westminster Abbey. Isabella was but eleven years old when three years later her husband {121} was deposed, and they were never again at Eltham; but Henry IV. often held his court in the palace, spending Christmas there no less than four times. It was in it that he was first seized with the illness that terminated fatally in Westminster Abbey in March 1413, and there that his son and successor Henry V. spent much of the short time he lived in England. From Eltham Palace he hastened up to London in January 1414 to deal with the Lollards. Henry VI., after his long minority, and before he realised how insecure was his tenure of the throne, went to Eltham to superintend the restoration of the palace for the reception of his wife, Margaret of Anjou, and her infant son, the ill-fated Prince Edward, but so far as the royal family was concerned his labour was all in vain. The queen never saw the home prepared for her, and it was her bitter enemy Edward IV. who reaped the benefit of her husband's improvements. The new king became greatly attached to his palace at Eltham, and some authorities attribute the building of the banqueting-hall to him, though the probability is that he only enlarged and beautified it. In 1480 his third daughter Bridget was born in the palace, and baptized in the private chapel, and in 1482, three months before his sudden death, the king kept Christmas there with great pomp, daily entertaining more than two thousand guests. The founder of the Tudor dynasty too, Henry VII., whose marriage with one of Edward IV.'s daughters united the red and white roses, kept up the traditions of Eltham hospitality, and did much to embellish the palace, building, according to Hasted, a handsome {122} front towards the moat. The sixteenth-century chronicler Lambarde gives a vivid description of the fair residence at Eltham, but he also strikes the note of the waning of its glory, for he remarks that the court was beginning to prefer Greenwich to it. Henry VIII., it is true, was sometimes at Eltham, keeping Christmas there in 1515, when a mock tournament was held in the banqueting-hall, and again in 1526 when he took refuge there from the plague then raging in London, but he never really cared for the palace as a residence. In 1527 Cardinal Wolsey, who was still in high favour, spent a fortnight at Eltham, drawing up there what are known as the Statutes of Eltham, and are still honoured at the English court for regulating the affairs of the royal household. This was perhaps the last time that any important gatherings assembled in the once popular residence, for though Queen Elizabeth and James I. were sometimes there, their visits were but brief. Charles I. never lived in the palace, but his favourite painter Sir Antony van Dyck was once the guest of the king's physician Sir Theodore de Mayerne in what was then Park Lodge, and Horace Walpole in his chatty _Anecdotes of Painting_ refers to sketches made by the great master in the neighbourhood.

After the death on the scaffold of Charles I., Eltham Palace was taken possession of by parliament, and a report was drawn up of its condition, in which it is stated that it consisted of a fair chapel, a great hall, and several suites of apartments covering an acre of ground, all very much out of repair. {123} A little later the entire building was sold for the modest sum of £2753, the chapel and all the rooms were pulled down, and the grand banqueting-hall was converted into a barn. Several centuries elapsed before any effort was made to rescue it from this degraded position, but in 1828, at the instance of the Princess Sophia, who was then living at Greenwich, it was carefully restored, and it now remains, with the picturesque ivy-clad bridge spanning the moat, a notable witness to what must have been the beauty and grandeur of the group of buildings of which it was once the most remarkable feature. The hammer-beam roof, in spite of the loss of most of its pendants, ranks with that of Westminster Hall as a fine example of combined lightness and strength of construction, and the effect of the vast and lofty hall, with its grand bays at the upper end, must indeed have been impressive before the windows by which it was lighted from both sides were blocked up.

When Eltham Palace was pulled down, the three parks that had belonged to it were also practically destroyed, all the venerable trees in them having been cut down, so that, as remarked by a seventeenth-century writer of somewhat gruesome tastes, there was scarcely one left to make a gibbet, the deer were killed off, and what had long been one of the most beautiful neighbourhoods near London was transformed into a scene of desolation.

In spite of its many interesting associations there is now little that is distinctive about modern Eltham. Its church, however, retains the quaint wooden tower and shingle spire of an earlier building, and {124} there are a few fine old mansions in the neighbourhood, notably the Elizabethan Well Hall, now a farmhouse, in which Sir Thomas More's favourite daughter, Margaret Roper, lived for some time.

Two densely populated suburbs, that not long ago were remote and secluded villages, picturesquely built on the Ravensbourne, are Lee and Lewisham, the former connected with Eltham Palace by a subterranean passage which was discovered in 1836, and is supposed to have formed part of a complete system of communication between the latter and the outer world. Its exit from the Eltham end was protected by massive iron gates beneath the moat, near to which a flight of steps led down to a strong-room, probably used as a hiding-place for treasure, though, strange to say, there are no local traditions concerning it.

[Sidenote: Chiselhurst]

All that is now left at Lee to recall the old days when it was an outlying hamlet of Eltham, is the tower of the ancient parish church; and Lewisham, the name of which means the homestead in the meadow, is even more modernised, though its history can be traced back to Anglo-Saxon times, when it seems to have formed part with Greenwich and the two Coombes of one property that was given, as related above, by Ethelruda, a niece of King Alfred to the Abbey of St. Paul's at Ghent, in connection with which a Benedictine priory was founded at Lewisham, the memory of which is preserved in the name of the Priory Farm occupying its site. Another suburb in close touch with Eltham is Mottino-ham that retains more of its rural character than either {125} Lee or Lewisham; and not far away are the still pretty villages of Rushey Green, Catford, and Catford Bridge. More celebrated than any of these, however, is the important settlement of Chislehurst, that, owing chiefly to the exceptional beauty of its situation on a lofty common, defended from encroachment by a natural rampart of woods, seems likely to be able long to defy the levelling influences which have spoiled so many of the districts of outlying London.

Originally but a remote and secluded hamlet scarcely known to the outside world, Chislehurst has of late years become a centre of archæological interest, for in addition to its other attractions it enjoys the unique distinction of being in close touch with one of the most remarkable and extensive systems of subterranean galleries and caves, the ramifications of which are supposed to be many miles in length, that have yet been discovered in England. The existence of this underground world was long known, but it is only recently, thanks to the enterprise of Mr. Ryan, proprietor of the Beckley Arms Hotel, in whose grounds there is an entrance to it, that it has been opened to the public. Mr. Ryan had many of the galleries and chambers cleared of the rubbish--the accumulation of centuries--encumbering them, and lighted them with electricity, so that it is now possible to explore them without fear of being lost or buried alive. The origin and purpose of this wonderful net-work of excavations are alike unknown, some experts claiming that they were used for Druidical worship, two altar tables, probably used {126} for sacrifices, having been found; whilst others are of opinion that they were used as hiding-places in times of war, or as storehouses for grain and treasure. Some few of the smaller chambers, that are mere cells, can only be entered on all fours, and could be defended by a single man, whilst the larger ones are capable of holding as many as fifty people. There were two ways of gaining access to them, one by steps in the sides of the shafts pierced here and there, the other with the aid of a notched pole which could easily be removed, and Mr. Nicholls, Vice-President of the Archæological Society, in a deeply interesting pamphlet on the subject, expresses an opinion that in times of danger the whole population of the district may have lived contentedly underground for weeks at a time. 'The little colony,' he says, 'might be working in the fields or tending their cattle; suddenly a cry of alarm is raised, the lookout man rushes in and reports that the enemy is approaching in force. If,' he adds, 'the incursion were too strong to be resisted, there would be an immediate stampede; the population would swarm down the shafts, and in a few minutes not a sound would be left to guide the invaders. Even if the raiders succeeded in finding a shaft they would be practically helpless, since one or two resolute men at the foot could hold it against a host.' Possibly the caves may have been used in succession by many different tenants, the Britons after their defeat by the Romans may have withdrawn into yet deeper recesses of the forests, and their conquerors may have driven new galleries through the ancient moatings, to be in {127} their turn supplanted by the Jutes, the Angles, and the Saxons, so that could the whole story of the excavations be read, fresh light might be thrown on much of the early history of Southern England. As time goes on, and further explorations are made, new facts may come to light, but at present, in spite of the many theories advanced, the mystery remains unsolved.

Originally a dependency of Dartford, now a thriving manufacturing town, the manor of Chislehurst, the name of which is supposed to signify a wood of pebbles, was given by King John to a Norman noble known as Hugh, Earl of St. Paul, and after many vicissitudes it became the property, in 1584, of the Walsingham family, to whom it was granted on a long lease by Queen Elizabeth. The Walsinghams were already in residence in Chislehurst, and the future minister, Sir Francis, was born in the village in 1536, though exactly where is not known, the so-called manor-house near the church, which is generally spoken of as his birthplace, not having been built until 1584.

The parish church of Chislehurst, though practically modern, was built on the lines of its sixteenth-century predecessor, and with its lofty spire presents a picturesque appearance. It contains the altar tomb of the Walsingham family and several other noteworthy memorials, including a fifteenth-century brass in memory of Alan Porter, and a monument to William Selwyn, designed by Chantrey. The font is said to be of great antiquity, and may possibly have been in use in Saxon times, and in {128} the churchyard are some interesting old tombs, including that in which rest the remains of Mr. and Mrs. Bonar, who were murdered by their servant in 1813.

A well-preserved cock-pit, now fortunately disused, opposite the church, is another Chislehurst link with the past, and in the neighbourhood are some fine old mansions, of which the most noteworthy is Camden Place, named after the antiquarian William Camden, who bought it in 1609, but more celebrated as having been the scene of the cruel fate of Mr. and Mrs. Bonar, and the home later of Napoleon III., who died in it in 1873. The widowed Empress Eugénie lived in it for some time, and built the memorial chapel in connection with the little Roman Catholic chapel in Crown Lane, in which rested the remains of her husband, and later of her son, before their removal to the Mausoleum at Farnborough, near her present home. It was at Camden Place that the Empress received the news of the death in South Africa of the Prince Imperial, to whose memory she erected the fine cross outside the entrance gates.

Within easy reach of Chislehurst, and sharing to some extent the beauty of its surroundings, are the charming village of Beckley, that owns a fine modern church and a picturesque tower, the latter now the property of the Kent Water Company, and the thriving town of Bromley, the name of which is derived from the broom that flourishes in the neighbourhood. The latter owns what was once the palace of the bishops of Rochester, {129} built on the site of the ancient manor-house, and now a private residence, in the grounds of which is a medicinal well dedicated to St. Blaise, that used to be credited with miraculous powers of healing, and is associated with the memory of King Ethelbert, for to commemorate his conversion to Christianity special indulgences were granted to those who drank its waters. Another noteworthy feature of Bromley is the well-restored parish church--in which rests the wife of Dr. Johnson--rising from the highest point of the town, and approached by an avenue of venerable elms from a picturesque lych gate, whilst here and there in the town are a few quaint old houses, and a little outside it the seventeenth-century buildings of Bromley College, now a home for the widows and daughters of clergymen.

[Sidenote: Beckenham]

Another village of Kent that has of late years grown into a town is Beckenham, prettily situated on a tributary of the Ravensbourne, in the original straggling high street of which there remain, however, several ancient half-timbered houses. The old manor-house known as Beckenham Place, too, is still standing, and the modern parish church is as nearly as possible a reproduction of the old one that was pulled down on account of its melancholy state of decay in 1885. The well-preserved lych gate, with an avenue of yews leading from it to the southern entrance, is but little changed from what it was long years ago, and in the rebuilding of the church care was taken to preserve the old monuments, that include the altar-tomb of Sir Humphrey Style, who died in 1552, and that of {130} Dame Margaret Damsell, who passed away in 1563.

The history of Beckenham Manor can be traced back to pre-Norman times: it was given by William the Conqueror to Bishop Odo of Bayeux, and in the reign of Edward I. it was in the possession of the De la Rochelle family. Later it was owned, in right of his wife, by William Brandon, who was standard-bearer to Henry, Earl of Richmond, and was killed at the battle of Bosworth. During the reign of Henry VII., Charles, Duke of Suffolk, the son of this William Brandon, often visited Beckenham Place, and is said to have there entertained Henry VIII. when that monarch was on his way to meet his bride Anne of Cleves.

The rapidly growing suburb of Shortlands--the birthplace of the historian George Grote--connects Beckenham with Bromley, and in touch with it are several noted mansions, including the Georgian Langley House, Eden Lodge, named after the first Lord Auckland, who lived in it for many years, and was often visited by William Pitt, and the eighteenth-century Kelsey House, on the site of an earlier residence that is often referred to in the records of the reigns of Henry III. and his successors.

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