The king's more elegant tastes diffused themselves among the finer arts at a time when they were yet strangers in this land; his father's travelled taste had received a tincture of these arts when abroad, in Henry the Eighth they burst into existence with a more robust aptitude. He eagerly invited foreign artists to his court; but the patronage of an English monarch was not yet appreciated by some of the finest geniuses of Italy; we lay yet too far out of their observation and sympathies; and it is recorded of one of the Italian artists, a fiery spirit, who had visited England, that he designated us as _quelle bestie Inglesi_. Raphael and Titian could not be lured from their studios and their blue skies; but, fortunately, a northern genius, whose name is as immortal as their own, was domiciliated by the liberal monarch, the friend of Erasmus and of More--Hans Holbein. Among the musicians of Henry we find French, Italians, and Germans; he was himself a musician, and composed several pieces which I believe are still retained in the service of the Royal Chapel.[3] He had a taste for the gorgeous or grotesque amusements of the Continent, combining them with a display of the fine arts in their scenical effects. One memorable night of the Epiphany, the court was startled by a new glory, where the king and his companions appeared in a scene which the courtiers had never before witnessed. "It was a mask after the manner of Italy, a thing not seen afore in England," saith the chronicler of Henry's court-days. Once, to amaze a foreign embassy, and on a sudden to raise up a banqueting-house, the monarch set to work the right magicians; an architect, and a poet, and his master of the revels, were months inventing and labouring. The regal banqueting-house was adorned by the arts of picture and music, of sculpture and architecture; all was full of illusion and reality; the house itself was a pageant to exhibit a pageant. The magnificent prince was himself so pleased, that he anxiously stopped his visitors at the points of sight most favourable to catch the illusion of the perspective. A monarch of such fine tastes and gorgeous fancies would create the artists who are the true inventors. FOOTNOTES: [1] The manuscript of Henry the Eighth reposes in the Vatican, witnessed by his own hand in this inscription:--"Anglorum Rex, Henricus Leoni X. 'mittit hoc opus et fidei testem et amicitiæ.'"--I found this inscription in one of the notes of Selden to the "Polyolbion" of Drayton. [2] The famous Grammar of Lilly was the work of a learned association, in which it appears that both the king and the cardinal had the honour to co-operate. Sir Thomas Elyot has designated Henry "as the chief author."--Preface to "The Castle of Health." [3] Sir John Hawkins' "History of Music," vol. ii. BOOKS OF THE PEOPLE.