HAMPSTEAD, a pleasant village in Middlesex, situated near the top of a hill about four miles on the north west side of London. On the summit of this hill is a heath, which is adorned with many gentlemen’s houses, and extends about a mile every way, affording a most extensive and delightful prospect over the city as far as Shooter’s Hill, and into the counties all around it. This village used to be formerly resorted to for its mineral waters; and there is here a fine assembly room for dancing. Its old ruinous church, which was a chapel belonging to the Lord of the manor, has been lately pulled down, and a new one is just erected in its room. There is besides a handsome chapel near the wells, built by the contribution of the inhabitants, who are chiefly citizens and merchants of London; and also a meeting house. HAMPSTEAD WATER OFFICE, in Denmark street, St. Giles’s. To this office belong two main pipes of a seven inch bore, which bring water from the ponds at Highgate and Hampstead to supply that neighbourhood. HAMPSTEAD _yard_, Gray’s Inn lane. HAM’S _corner_, Old street.† HAM’S _rents_, Ratcliff highway.† HAM’S _yard_, 1. Brook street.† 2. Great Windmill street.† [Illustration: _Hampton Court from the Garden._ _S. Wale delin._ _J. Green sc Oxon._ ] HAMPTON COURT, is delightfully situated on the north bank of the river Thames, about two miles from Kingston, and at a small distance from a village called Hampton. This palace was magnificently built with brick by Cardinal Wolsey, who here set up two hundred and eighty silk beds for strangers only, and richly stored it with gold and silver plate; but it raised so much envy against him, that to screen himself from its effects, he gave it to King Henry VIII. who, in return, suffered him to live in his palace of Richmond. King Henry greatly enlarged it, and it had then five spacious courts adorned with buildings, which in that age were so greatly admired by all foreigners as well as the natives, that the learned Grotius says of this place: Si quis opes nescit (sed quis tamen ille?) Britannus, Hampton Curia, tuos consultat ille Lares; Contulerit toto cum sparsa palatia mundo, Dicet, Ibi Reges, hic habitare Deos. That is, _If e’er a Briton what is wealth don’t know; let him repair to Hampton Court, and then view all the palaces of the earth, when he will say, Those are the residence of Kings, but this of the Gods._ In order to give a more perfect idea of this grandeur, we shall give a description of the ornaments of this palace, as they appeared in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, from an author who describes what he himself saw.