Five years previously, the King had granted to Henry Earl of Arlington, "that whole piece or parcel of ground called the Mulberry Gardens, together with eight houses, with their appurtenances thereon," at a rent of twenty shillings per annum. Goring House, in which Mr Secretary Bennet, afterwards Earl of Arlington, resided, was probably one of these eight houses. Two years subsequently to the grant, it was burnt down, and the earl removed to Arlington House, which stood on the site of Buckingham Palace. Sheffield, Duke of Buckingham, bought the former, pulled it down in 1703, and erected a new mansion, which was sold to the crown by his son, and allotted, in 1775, as a residence for the Queen, instead of Somerset House. [4] It was by the Duchess of Newcastle, according to Pepys, that this play was written. In his Diary he says, under date of the 11th April 1667:--"To Whitehall, thinking there to have seen the Duchess of Newcastle coming this night to court to make a visit to the Queen. The whole story of this lady is a romance, and all she does is romantic. Her footmen in velvet coats, and herself in an antique dress, as they say; and was the other day at her own play, _The Humorous Lovers_, the most ridiculous thing that ever was wrote, but yet she and her lord mightily pleased with it; and she at the end made her respects to the players from her box, and did give them thanks." This was the eccentric dame who kept a maid of honour sitting up all night, to write down any bright idea or happy inspiration by which she might be visited.