1822.] The Island of St. Michael's.-May-Games. In some springs it is limpid and transparent; in others turbid, of a white or reddish hue. All the waters generally deposit a blue or red clayey substance. Crystals of alum and sulphur are found in abundance; some of which are beautiful and curious; and where the vapour issues and exudes from the apertures of the rock, the crystals are from one to two inches in length. A small river bends its course through the valley; on whose edge in several places are hot springs, and occasionally in the middle of the stream a perceptible agitation may be observed, which is doubtless produced by them; and an ochry sediment is deposited on the pebbles and stones of its bed, while the bushes on the banks are incrusted with sulphur and alum. The taste of these waters greatly varies in some it has a stong impregnation of vitriolic acid; ir others carbonic; in others aluminous, or ferruginous; while in others i is perfectly insipid. Not far from these hot springs is a hill of pumice stone, from which issue several springs of cold water. In their short conse some deposit a pale yellow ochry sedment, and others that of a higher ccour. The taste of the water is sharp, the smell ferruginous, and the ungency excessively penetrating. In glass it sparkles like Champagne. To the West, not quite half a mile, are several other hot springs, to which invalids resort, who seek their uses. Farther on, are also others of a similar nature. Nearly a mile further to the West, is a small river called Sanguislenta, or bloody river, from its red colour. On its banks are several cold springs of a strong ferruginous taste and smell. About a mile South of this river, beyond a range of mounLains, is a cluster of hot springs, possessing properties as various as the others. One of them is about twentyfour feet in length, and twelve in breadth. Near it are several cold springs in a state of agitation similar to the hot ones. They have a sharp taste and smell, and are highly impregnated. The inhabitants residing near the springs render them subservient to their use by placing their cooking utensils on the water, or on the smoking crevices, and thus prepare their different meals. It is not to the human race alone that these wonderful productions are useful, but also to the cattle, who at times 323 may be seen entering the sulphureous AN ACCOUNT OF THE CELEBRATION IT was usual, on the first of May, for all the citizens who were able, to divert themselves in the woods and meadows with May-games; diversions not confined to the lower class, but equally the entertainment of persons of the highest rank; a remarkable instance of which is inserted in Hall's Chronicle, under the year 1515, when that author observes, that King Henry VIII. and Queen Catharine, accompanied by many lords and ladies, rode a maying from Greenwich to the high ground of Shooter's Hill, where, as they passed along, they saw a company of 200 tall yeomen, all clothed in green, with green hoods, and bows and arrows. One, who was their chieftain, was called Robin Hood, and desired the King and all his company to stay and see his men shoot; to which the King agreeing, he whistled, and all the two hundred discharged their arrows at once; which they repeated on his whistling again. Their arrows had something placed in the heads of them that made them whistle as they flew, and altogether made a loud and very uncommon noise, at which the King and Queen were greatly delighted. The gentleman who assumed the character of Robin Hood then desired the King and Queen, with their retinue, to enter the green wood, where, in arbours made with boughs, intermixed with flowers, they were plentifully served with venison and wine, by Robin Hood and his men. About two years after, an event happened which occasioned the epithet of evil to be added to this day of rejoicing. The citizens, being extremely exasperated at the encouragement given to foreigners, a priest, named Bell, was persuaded to preach against them at the Spital; and, in a very inflaming sermon, he invited the people to oppose all strangers: this occasioned frequent quarrels in the streets, for which some Englishmen were committed to prison. Suddenly a rumour arose, that on May-day all the foreigners would be assassinated, and several strangers fled : 324 May Games temp. Henry VIII.; this coming to the knowledge of the King's Council, Cardinal Wolsey sent for the Lord Mayor and several of the City Council, told them what he had heard, and exhorted them to preserve the peace. Upon this affair a Court of Common Council was assembled at Guildhall, on the evening before Mayday, in which it was resolved to order every man to shut up his door, and keep his servants at home; and this advice being immediately communicated to the Cardinal, met with his approbation. Upon this, every Alderman sent to inform his Ward, that no man should stir out of his house after nine o'clock, but keep his doors shut, and his servants within till nine in the morning. This order had not been long given, when one of the Aldermen, returning from his Ward, observed two young men at play in Cheapside, and many others looking at them. He would have sent them to the Compter, but they were soon rescued, and the cry raised of "Prentices, prentices! Clubs! Clubs!" Instantly the people arose: by eleven o'clock they amounted to six or seven hundred; and the crowd still increasing, they rescued from Newgate and the Compter the prisoners committed for abusing the foreigners; while the Mayor and Sheriffs, who were present, made proclamation in the King's name; but instead of obeying it, they broke open the houses of many Frenchmen and other foreigners, and continued plundering them till three in the morning, when beginning to disperse, the Mayor and his attendants took three hundred of them, and committed them to the several prisons. While this riot lasted, the Lieutenant of the Tower discharged several pieces of ordnance against the city, but without doing much mischief; and about five in the morning several of the nobility marched thither, with all the forces they could assemble. On the 4th of May, the Lord Mayor, the Duke of Norfolk, the Earl of Surrey, and others, sat upon the trial of the offenders at Guildhall, the Duke of Norfolk entering the city with 1300 men. That day several were indicted, and on the next thirteen were sentenced to be hanged, drawn and quartered; for the execution of whom, ten gallowses were set up in several parts of the city, upon Reason of their Suppression. [April, wheels, to be removed from street to street, and from door to door. On the 7th of May, several others were found guilty, and received the same sentence as the former, and soon after were drawn upon hurdles to the Standard in Cheapside; but, when one was executed, and the rest about to be turned off, a respite came, and they were remanded back to prison. After this, the soldiers who had kept watch in the city were withdrawn, which making the citizens flatter themselves that the King's displeasure against them was not so great as they had imagined, the Lord Mayor, Recorder, and several Aldermen, went in mourning gowns to wait upon the King at Greenwich; when, having attended for some time at the Privy Chamber door, his Majesty with several of the nobility came forth upon which, all of them falling upon their knees, the Recorder, in the name of the rest, in the most humble and submissive terms, begged that heworld have mercy on them for their neglrence, and compassion on the offenders, vhom he represented as a small number of light persons. His Majesty let them know that he was really displeased, and that they ought to wail and be sorry for it; for, as they had not a. tempted to fight with those whon they pretended were so small a numi ber of light persons, they must have winked at the matter: he therefore ordered them to repair to the Lord Chancellor, who would give them an answer. Upon which they retired, deeply mortified. Being informed that the King was to be at Westminster Hall on the 22d of May, they resolved to repair thither; which they did with the consent of Cardinal Wolsey, Lord High Chancellor. The King sat at the upper end of the Hall, under a cloth of state, with the Cardinal and several of the nobility: and the Lord Mayor, Aldermen, Recorder, and several of the Common Council attended: the prisoners, who then amounted to about four hundred, were brought in their shirts, bound together with cords, and with halters about their necks; and among them were eleven women. The Cardinal having sharply rebuked the Mayor, Aldermen, and Commonalty for their negligence, told the prisoners, that, for their offences against the laws of the realm, and against his Majesty's Crown 1822.] May Day Collation given to the Queen of Sweden. THIS HIS being May-day, Whitelocke, according to the invitation he had made to the Queen, put her in mind of it, that as she was his mistress, and this May-day, he was by the custom of England to wait upon her to take the air, and to treat her with some little Collation, as her servant. The Queen said, the weather was very cold, yet she was very willing to bear him company after the English mode. With the Queen were Woolfeldt, Tott, and five of her ladies. Whitelocke brought them to his Collation, which he had commanded his servants to prepare in the best manner they could, and altogether after the English fashion. At the table with the Queen sat La Belle Countesse, the Countesse Gabriel Oxenstierne, Woolfeldt, Tott, and Whitelocke; the other ladies sat in another room. Their meat was such fowl as could be gotten, dressed after the English fashion, and with English sauces, creams, puddings, custards, tarts, tanseys, English apples, bon chrêtien pears, cheese, butter, neats' tongues, potted venison, and sweet-meats, brought out of England, as his sacke and claret also was; his beer was also brewed, and his bread made by his own servants, in his own house, after the English manner; and the Queen and her company seemed highly pleased with this treatment; some of her company said, she did eat and drink more at it, than she used to 325 do in three or four days at her own table. The entertainment was as full and noble as the place would afford, and as Whitelocke could make it, and so well ordered and contrived, that the Queen said, she had never seen any like it: she was pleased so far to play the good housewife, as to enquire how the butter could be so fresh and sweet, and yet brought out of England? Whitelocke, from his cooks, satisfied her Majesty's enquiry; that they put the salt butter into milk, where it lay all night, and the next day it would eat fresh and sweet as this did, and any butter new. made, and commended her Majesty's good housewifery; who, to express her contentment to this Collation, was full of pleasantness and gaiety of spirits, both in suppertime, and afterwards: among other frolicks, she commanded Whitelocke to teach her ladies the English salutation; which, after some pretty defences, their lips obeyed, and Whitelocke most readily. She highly commended Whitelocke's musick of the trumpets, which sounded all supper-time, and her discourse was all of mirth and drollery, wherein Whitelocke endeavoured to answer her, and the rest of the company did their parts. It was late before she returned to the Castle, whither Whitelocke waited on her; and she discoursed a little with him about his business, and the time of his audience, and gave him many thanks for his noble treatment of her and her company. Our author informs us, that two days after this entertainment, Mons. Woolfeldt, being invited by Whitelocke, told him that the Queen was extremely pleased with his treatment of her. Whitelocke excused the meanness of it for her Majesty. Woolfeldt replied, that both the Queen and all the company esteemed it as the handsomest and noblest that they ever saw; and the Queen, after that, would drink no other wine but Whitelocke's, and kindly accepted the neats' tongues, potted venison, and other cakes, which, upon her commendation of them, Whitelocke sent unto her Majesty. Mr. URBAN, W.R. March 3. N your last volume, p. 495, is an Wilts, in which the judgment and taste 326 Account of the Abbey of Fonthill, Wilts. [April, through the cloister, to the great hall. taste of the late Mr. Wyatt as an architect, are rather severely dealt with. Your Opposite to this a winding staircase conCorrespondent, who signs himself" A Passer-by," might rather be considered a Judious Observer, for he has certainly given an accurate description of the exterior of the building, and exposed its most glaring faults; but I am inclined to believe that Mr. Wyatt is not justly chargeable with these things, having understood that his judgment was not exclusively consulted in the progress of the work. The building has received additions at various times, and tower has been added to tower, without much regard to the structure as a whole. The object of my present address, however, is only to supply what your Correspondent regrets his inability to accomplish, a description of the splendid interior. Mr. Storer the artist was allowed, a few years since, to enter this sanctuary, and he has published the result of his observations in a volume which is enriched with several views of the building. From this work I have made a few extracts, which may be interesting to some of your readers. Having taken a general survey of the mansion, Mr. Storer proceeds thus to describe its interior: "The brown parlour, fifty feet in length, receives its appellation from the dark coloured oak with which it is wainscoted. It is lighted by eight pointed windows. The upper tracery of the windows is enriched with painted glass by Eginton, after the drawings of the late eminent artist R. Hamilton, R. A. representing a series of some of the most historical personages among Mr. Beckford's ancestors. The room is fitted up with splendid simplicity, two large pieces of tapestry adorn its Northern side. Between them, over the chimney, is a whole length portrait of Peter Beckford, Esq. Mr. Beckford's great-grandfather. The windows of the parlour are hung with two suits of curtains, the inner one is of blue damask, bordered with the tressure of Scotland; the other suit is scarlet, which gives the light a rich and sumptuous effect. The ceiling tesselated by a neat moulding, has at each intersection four oak-leaves entwined. tached to this parlour, is a small drawingroom with a groined roof, and an appropriate chimney-piece of purbeck marble. Opposite we remarked, upon a table of curious construction, an antique vase of the purest alabaster. A closet in the little room contains specimens of an almost unequalled collection of ancient china, which is dispersed in the various apartments of the Abbey. This room leads from the parlour, At ducts to the apartments above, and to a small gallery. We now proceed to the small gallery which is above the yellowroom; it contains costly tables, inlaid with oriental alabaster, and many invaluable pieces of china. Adjoining this is an apartment devoted to the use of such artists as are employed in directing the works now carrying on at Fonthill; it contains a collection of the rarest books and prints, illustra tive of ancient costume. A passage now leads to Mr. Beckford's bed-chamber; this room has two closets, filled with curious specimens of carving in ivory, and other rarities. On one side of the apartment is a large glazed cabinet, in which are most exSouth-east extremity of the building, we quisite pieces of japan. This being the return Northward through the dressingis vaulted by an obtuse arch. At the North room, to the upper library or gallery, which end of this gallery is a square room that looks through a tribune into the great octagon; there are two of these beautiful openings opposite to each other. The room of the South tribune contains precious cabinets and valuable pictures. All further progress this way being interrupted by the octagon, we return again through the lobby of the dressing-room, whence a stair-case conducts to the central Eastern tower; here is a bed-chamber hung with the finest Brussells tapestry, an apartment over which terminates this part of the building. The yellow damask room, so called on account of its splendid yellow hangings, has five windows: three of them compose the upper part of the Western oriel, the other two face the South. In this room are some of the finest cabinets of japan, and Buhl work in Europe; one of the latter formerly adorned the apartments of Fontainbleau, and is remarkable for a beautiful medallion of Louis the Fourteenth. On the North-west side of the damask-room, in the small octagon tower, is an apartment called the green cabinet room: it contains two frames with alto relievos in ivory, of the time of Edward the First." "We now ascend the staircase that leads to the entrance of the great tower, and come to the suit of rooms that surrounds the octagon. A staircase now winds up to the leads of the circular tower, whence we enter the upper part of the great octagon; ascending by an inclined plane, in a circular direction, we reach the top of this lofty structure, which is two hundred and seventysix feet in height. It would be almost endless to enumerate the interesting objects that are visible from this elevation; some conception, however, may be formed, when it is known that the tower has its base upon an eminence considerably above the level of the top of Salisbury spire, and there is no 1822,] King of Denmark invested with the Garter, 1582. hill in the immediate neighbourhood of sufficient consequence to bound the commanding height of its summit. Descending through the octagon on the North-east side of the Abbey, we observe a tower containing several apartments. The upper one is a bed-chamber lined with hangings of blue, strewed with white mullets (the original arms of the house of Douglas), and drawn together in the form of a tent. Re-entering the octagon, King Edward the Third's gallery presents itself. This contains seven lofty windows; opposite to them are portraits of Henry the Seventh, Edward the Fourth, John of Gaunt, the constable Montmorency, Alphonso King of Naples, and John of Montfort, Duke of Britanny. Facing the centre-window is a fire-place of alabaster, composed of an arch resting upon columns with vine-leaf capitals. Above is a whole-length portrait of Edward the Third, copied by Mr. Matthew Wyatt, from a picture in the vestry of St. George's Chapel, Windsor. The windows of this gallery are hung with curtains of purple and scarlet. Upon a sculptured frieze are the atchievements of seventy-eight knights of the most noble order of the garter, all persons of eminence in English and foreign history, and from whom Mr.Beckford is lineally descended. In continuation of this stately apartment, is a vaulted gallery, wainscoted with oak, and ribbed with deep mouldings, partly gilt and partly coloured; the floor is entirely covered with a Persian carpet of the most extraordinary size and beautiful texture. This gallery receives a glimmering light through six perforated bronze doors, modelled after those of Henry the Fifth's chantry in the Abbey of Westminster. These doors are hung with crimson curtains, which, increasing the solemn gloom, add to the effect of the oratory, which we are now approaching. The oratory is part of an octagon; the roof, which is entirely gilt, terminates at each angle with delicate fan-work resting upon a slender column. From the centre of the ceiling is suspended a golden lamp, elaborately chased. The altar is adorned with a statue of St. Anthony, admirably executed in alabaster by Rossi. On each side are lofty stands, upon which are placed candelabras of massive silver, richly gilt. The effect of this solemn recess must be seen to be conceived, nor can any description convey an idea of the Mr. URBAN, M. Temple, April 9. invested with the Garter, in 1582, "On the eight and twentieth of June, Peregrine Bartie lord Willoughbie of Eresby, appointed ambassador 327 to Frederike the second king of Denmark with the garter, whereunto he had beene elected and chosen a long time before, tooke his leave of the Queenes Majestie at Greenewich; with whome sir Gilbert Dethicke, alias Garter principall king of armes, was joined in commission, for the investing of the said King into the order; and Robert Glover, alias Summerset herald, was also present, and gave his attendance in the same voiage, as likewise did a competent number of gentlemen and yeomen, in all to the number of six and fiftie persons, besides mariners, &c. The said lord ambassador prepared himselfe towards Kingston upon Hull, where he imbarked with his whole traine on the fourteenth daie of Julie, and prosperouslie arrived at Elsenore in Denmarke on the one and twentieth daie of the same moneth, where he was honorablie interteined. On the 13th daie of August he presented himselfe before the King in his castell of Croneborough, and made his first speech unto him in Latine; which speech being ended, the Lord Willoughbie delivered unto the King hir Majesties letters, and withall the commission for the King's investure into that honorable order of the garter Which letters the King opened, and delivered them to Henrie Ramelis, his chancellor for Germanie, whom he commanded to answer my lord's formal oration. From the King my lord was conveied to the Queenes presence, unto whome also he delivered hir Majesties letters with salutations. The next daie, being Thursdaie, the fourteenth of August, the King, roiallie prepared, received the robes of the order with his owne hands, and with great contentment accepted and wore the garter, the collar, and the George, when as my lord concluded the whole dedication with sundrie wel-wishings. In the end wherof, he put the King in mind of the oth, and thankefull acceptation of the order, to be testified by a publike instrument, as was before promised; whereunto the King answered, by his chancellor Nicholas Kaas, with many effectuall words: and immedi in sign of a great was discharged of all the great shot in his castell; and the lord ambassador, with all his traine, was roiallie feasted and rewarded. On Thursdaie the sixteenth daie of August, the King tooke my lord ambassador foorth on hunting two |
