After the King’s execution, the fine collections of art which once decorated the walls of Hampton Court were scattered abroad, and now form the choicest treasures of foreign and private galleries, and the honour[#] of Hampton Court and the palace were sold in 1651 to a Mr. John Phelps, a member of the House of Commons, for the sum of £10,765 19s. 9d.; but in 1656 Oliver Cromwell, enriched by the wreck of the State, again acquired possession of the palace, for which he had a great predilection, and consequently made it his chief residence. The marriage ceremonies of Elizabeth, daughter of Cromwell, with Lord Falconberg were performed here on November 18, 1657, and in the following year the Protector’s favourite daughter, Mrs. Claypole, who disapproved of her father’s doings, here breathed her last. Hither Cromwell would repair, when Lord Protector of the realm, to dine with his officers. Thurloe thus records the fact: ’Sometimes, as the fit takes him, he dines with the officers of his army at Hampton Court, and shows a hundred antic tricks, as throwing cushions at them, and putting hot coals into their pockets and boots. At others, before he has half dined, he gives orders for a drum to beat, and calls in his foot-guards to snatch off the meat from the table and tear it in pieces, with many other unaccountable whimsies.... Now he calls for his guards, with whom he rides out, encompassed behind and before ... and at his return at night shifts from bed to bed for fear of surprise.’ He was constantly attended by a dog, who guarded his bedroom door. One morning he found the dog dead. He then remembered the prediction a gipsy had made to Charles I., that on the death of a dog in a room the King was then in, the kingdom he was about to lose would be restored to his family. ’The kingdom is departed from me!’ cried Cromwell, and he died soon after. [#] Hampton Court had been erected into an honour when it became the property of Henry VIII. An honour in law is a lordship, on which inferior lordships and manors depend by performance of customs and services. But no lordships were honours but such as belonged to the King.