When Wolsey made his first progress to the Court of Chancery in
Westminster Hall, a progress already alluded to in these pages, he
started from the archiepiscopal palace, York House or Place--an official
residence sold by the cardinal to Henry VIII. some years later; and when
the same superb ecclesiastic, towards the close of his career, went on
the memorable embassy to France, he set out from his palace at
Westminster, "passing through all London over London Bridge, having
before him of gentlemen a great number, three in rank in black velvet
livery coats, and the most of them with great chains of gold about their
necks."
At later dates Gardyner, whilst he held the seals, kept his numerous
household at Winchester House in Southwark; and Williams, the last
clerical Lord Keeper, lived at the Deanery, Westminster.
The lay Chancellors also maintained costly and pompous establishments,
apart from the Inns of Court. Sir Thomas More's house stood in the
country, flanked by a garden and farm, in the cultivation of which
ground the Chancellor found one of his chief sources of amusement. In
Aldgate, Lord Chancellor Audley built his town mansion, on the site of
the Priory of the Canons of the Holy Trinity of Christ Church.
Wriothesley dwelt in Holborn at the height of his unsteady fortunes, and
at the time of his death. The infamous but singularly lucky Rich lived
in Great St. Bartholomew's, and from his mansion there wrote to the Duke
of Northumberland, imploring that messengers might be sent to him to
relieve him of the perilous trust of the Great Seal. Christopher Hatton
wrested from the see of Ely the site of Holborn, whereon he built his
magnificent palace. The reluctance with which the Bishop of Ely
surrendered the ground, and the imperious letter by which Elizabeth
compelled the prelate to comply with the wish of her favorite courtier,
form one of the humorous episodes of that queen's reign. Hatton House
rose over the soil which had yielded strawberries to Morton; and of that
house--where the dancing Chancellor received Elizabeth as a visitor, and
in which he died of "diabetes _and_ grief of mind"--the memory is
preserved by Hatton Garden, the name of the street where some of our
wealthiest jewelers and gold assayers have places of business.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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