The other house of which I have spoken is that of Nonesuch. This house was not a reconstruction and an adaptation with much of the ancient work: it was newly built and furnished entirely by Henry VIII. There was no suspicion of battlements, no pretence at a fortification; the house stood open and unprotected save by the order maintained by the strong king. It was not beautiful according to our ideas; nor was it what we now call a Tudor house; it bears upon it every mark of the builder's interference with the architect. The outside walls of Nonesuch were decorated by certain bas-reliefs representing subjects from the heathen mythology. The house was pulled down by the Duchess of Cleveland, to whom Charles II. gave it. Nonesuch, however, has nothing to do with Kennington, and must not detain us. [Illustration: The Ancient Royal Palace at Greenwich] Let us next consider what it means when the king is said to have kept his Christmas at a place. During the festival--for twenty days--he kept open house, nominally. That is to say, all comers received food and drink: his guests, one supposes, were bidden. Every day during the festival the king sat at the feast wearing his crown and his robes of royal state. Richard II., the most prodigal of all princes that ever lived, entertained every day no fewer than ten thousand persons at his palace. What the number was at Christmas no one knows. In addition to the ordinary following of the court--a huge army of chaplains, canons, scribes, secretaries, gentlemen archers, and servants--there were the bishops and abbots, the peers and barons, who came to the Christmas feast, each attended by his own following of knights and esquires and men in livery. For the entertainment of this enormous company what a huge establishment would be needed! The organisation was complete; everything was in departments, each under the yeomen: the chambers, the wardrobe, the kitchens, the stables, the cellars. Yet what an army in each department! Then, since at Christmas time we look for amusement, there was the Master of the Revels, and with him an extensive and variegated following; among them were all those who played on the different instruments of music, those who sang, the buffoons, tumblers, and mummers, the dancing girls. It was in the time of Henry III. that these performances were brought over for the delectation of the English court--perhaps with the pious intention of showing what joys and attractions awaited the Crusaders in the Holy Land itself. Hall's account of the festivities of a Christmas a hundred and fifty years later than the time of Richard II. is as follows:--