In the beginning of 1649 came the culminating tragedy and two years later the manor of Hampton Court was sold to one John Phelps. The Palace itself was presumably not included in the transaction, for shortly afterwards it was occupied by Oliver Cromwell. During the troubles between King and Parliament some damage was done at Hampton Court--damage which may well be deplored, but which will always be done by the least thoughtful in any such conflict. We may, to-day particularly, regret the destruction of the stained glass in the windows of the Great Hall, but in defence of the iconoclasts it must be remembered that stained glass was associated by them with those aspects of religion which they were banded together to overthrow. Destruction is one of the most persistent of primitive instincts, and should such an outbreak as that of the sixteenth century occur again--there would again be wanton destruction. Under the Commonwealth Hampton Court of course saw none of the pageantry to which kings and queens had accustomed it, but on 18 November, 1657, it was here that Oliver Cromwell's daughter, Mary, was married to Lord Falconbridge, and the nuptials were honoured with "Two Songs" from the pen of Andrew Marvell, in one of which the poet used the courtly conceit applicable to a November marriage of: "They have chosen such an hour When she is the only flower." In August of the following year the Protector's other daughter, his favourite one, it is said, Mrs. Elizabeth Claypole, died at Hampton Court, and the grieved father was taken ill of the malady of which less than a month later he died at Whitehall. In the _Journal_ of Fox the Quaker occurs the following striking passage about a meeting with Cromwell. "I met him riding into Hampton Court Park, and before I came to him, as he rode at the head of his life guard, I saw and felt a waft of death go forth against him, and when I came to him he looked like a dead man." [Illustration: MASTER CARPENTER'S COURT]