"Tempora mutantur, et nos mutamur in illis." Marlborough House was originally built by Sir Christopher Wren for the great Duke of Marlborough, on a portion of St. James's Park given by Queen Anne for that purpose. Here died the Duke, and his famous Duchess Sarah. The house was bought by the Crown for the Princess Charlotte in 1817, and was settled on the Prince of Wales in 1850. There are still a number of interesting pictures in the grand salon of the victories of the Duke of Marlborough by Laguerre. The garden covers the space formerly occupied by the Great Yard of old St. James's Palace. Altogether, it is quite clear from the above brief account that St. James's is the most important of the royal palaces of London, and more closely connected than any other with the long history of English Royalty. From the days of Henry VIII. to the present time there has always been a close personal connection with the reigning Sovereign of the British Empire. The Palace of _Whitehall_ presents a long and strange history. Hubert de Burgh, Earl of Kent, Chief Minister of King Henry III., became possessed of the land by purchase from the monks of Westminster for 140 marks of silver and the annual tribute of a wax taper. Hubert bequeathed the property by his will to the Black Friars of Holborn, who sold it in 1248 to Walter de Grey, Archbishop of York, for his Grace's town residence. When Cardinal Wolsey became possessed of the northern archiepiscopal See, he found York House too small for his taste, and he set to work to rebuild the greater part of this palace on a larger and more magnificent scale. On the completion of the works he took up his abode here with a household of 800 persons, and lived with more than regal splendour, from time to time entertaining the King himself to gorgeous banquets, followed by masked balls. At one of these grand entertainments they say King Henry first met Anne Boleyn. A chronicler says the Cardinal was "sweet as summer to all that sought him." When the great Cardinal fell into disgrace, and the Duke of Suffolk came to Whitehall to bid him resign the Great Seal of England, his Eminence left his palace by the privy stair and "took barge" to Putney, and thence to Esher; and Henry VIII. at once took possession of the vacant property, and began to erect new buildings, a vast courtyard, tennis court, and picture gallery, and two great gateways, all of which are now totally destroyed. It was in this palace that he died, January 28, 1547.