The history of which abounds with incidents of the most important nature, and of the highest interest.

The old hall was built by William Rufus, in the year and , at which place, on his--return from Normandy, the year following its completion,

he kept his feast of Whitsuntide very royally.

In the year , Henry III. on New Years' Day, caused poor men, women, and children, to be entertained in this hall, and in the other rooms of his palace. This was on the occasion of queen Eleanor's coronation. The king and queen had been married at Canterbury; and on the day of this great feast they made their public entry into London.

Stowe informs us, that

the citizens rode to meet the king and queen, being clothed in long garments, embroidered about wyth golde and silke of diverse couloures, their horses finely trapped in array to the number of three hundred and sixty, every man bearing golde or silver cups in their hands, and the king's trumpeters before them sounding. The cities was adorned with silk and in the night with lamps, cressets, and other lights without number, besides many pageants and strange devices which were shewn.

To this coronation resorted so great a number of all estates, that the citie of London was scarce able to receive them. The archbishop of Canterbury did execute the office of coronation: the citizens did minister wine as butlers. The citizens of Winchester tooke charge of the kitchen; and other citizens attended their charges.

In the year , (the year before the king having caused the citizens to swear fealty to the young prince Edward, born at ), the same monarch entertained in this hall and the adjoining palace, his principal nobility, and the pope's legate, then in London. On this occasion Henry is described as having dishonoured himself by placing the legate at the head of the table, seating himself on his right hand, and the archbishop of York on his left. This political or superstitious partiality gave great offence to the nobility, both spiritual and temporal.

But,

of all the royal entertainments that ever were given in this hall, or perhaps in any other, that (if a certain monk may be credited) given by the same king, at the nuptials of his brother Richard, earl of Cornwall, anno

1243

, was the most sumptuous; for, according to my author, the number of dishes at that feast amounted to above

thirty thousand

. If we admit the dishes to have been each but a foot in diameter. the present hall, which is much bigger than that in the time of Henry III. would (exclusive of the company), only contain

fifteen thousand and forty-eight

dishes.

Without meaning to confirm the monk's statement, it may be remarked, that it does not follow that all those dishes were upon the table at the same time, nor is it necessary to allow so much as inches for each dish; neither is it probable, that all the dishes were placed in the hall, as it was customary to make use of the other rooms belonging to the adjacent palace: there is, therefore, nothing impossible in the monk's statement.

In , Edward I. a fire destroyed or very much injured this ancient palace, and many houses adjoining, indeed it received so much damage that the parliament in the ensuing year was held at the house of the archbishop York.

Thomas Walsingham mentions a royal entertainment given in

, by Edward III. in the hall of this palace, at Whitsuntide, to his court and nobility, when a woman, in a fantastical dress, representing that of a comedian, entered the hall on horseback, where, with an uncommon assurance, after having ridden round the several tables below, ascended the steps to that of the king, and throwing down a letter, she immediately retired.

This letter Edward commanded to be opened and read; the contents were to the following effect:

Our lord the king may take notice, that he has not kindly regarded those knights who faithfully served his father and himself with their lives and fortunes; but has too much enriched others, who never performed any thing considerable.

The woman being pursued and apprehended, readily acknowledged that she was employed and paid by a certain knight for that service; who being thereupon arrested, boldly declared, that he had done it with no other view than that to the king's honour, which being taken into consideration, together with the contents of the letter, which were incontestible facts, both the knight and the woman were soon discharged from custody.

Richard II. ordered the whole building to be pulled down, and, in the year the present edifice was erected. About years afterwards this monarch kept his Christmas festival in the new hall, accompanied with all that splendour and magnificence for which his court was so conspicuous. It is said on this occasion oxen, sheep, and fowls without number were consumed. The number of guests on each day of the feast, amounted to ; and cooks employed.

The same author says, the great hall

was begunne to be repayred in the yeere

1397

by Richard the

Second

, who caused the wals, windowes and roofe to be taken downe and newe made, with a stately porch, and divers lodgings of a marvellous worke and with 'great costs.

great summis of monney,

this hall being finished in the yeere

1399

, the same king kept a most royal Christmas there

The hall received but little attention from government, except

The plan is parrallelogramatic, having square towers and a porch at the north end. The principal front consists of a centre, between wings or towers considerably in advance of it. The former is made in height into stories, the towers into , both towers are alike, the story is a highly decorated basement entirely filled with beautiful niches, with semi-hexagonal canopies, and the wall behind is occupied with cinquefoil headed pannels; in the story an arched window divided by a mullion and transom into lights, between canopied niches, and in the upper story a similar window only, the elevation finishes with a block cornice surmounted by an embattled parapet, at of the angles of each tower, an octagon staircase turret. The central division consists of a porch with a bold and handsome pointed arch in the centre between niches similar to the towers, the whole surmounted by a gallery fronted by a parapet peirced with quarterfoils, the spandrils of the arch of the porch bear shields, charged with the arms of Edward the Confessor held by angels, below each the white hart, the well-known badge of Richard II; the side walls of the porch have traceried windows in blank; the ceiling is groined and ribbed; the inner entrance is by a small pointed arch filled with oak doors; the upper story of the main elevation is principally occupied by a magnificent window, made by perpendicular mullions into divisions, subdivided horizontally by a transom stone; every compartment thus formed has an arched head enclosing sweeps; the head of the arch is filled with minute compartments, corresponding in form and dimensions with the larger ones; the weather cornice of this window rests on the white hart; the elevation finishes with a well proportioned gable, the cornice enriched with crockets raking up to a triangular niche in the centre, crowned with a pinnacle; the side walls are strengthened by buttresses, composed of a massive insulated pier, situated opposite to the piers between the windows, at about eighteen feet distance, from which flying arches spring and abut against the walls of the hall; but of these buttresses can be seen, which is in the speaker's court yard; the others are hid and concealed in the new courts, and other adjacent excrescencies, which hide the exterior view of the building, it being much to be lamented that there was not taste enough in the directors of the public works, to have ordered the complete insulation of the hall. The southern end has a similar window to the north, and on the point of the gable is an octagon turret, which ends in a modern cupola. The interiore surprizes every spectator by the grandeur and vastness of the whole; it is covered by the most splendid timber roof ever witnessed; there are in all ribs,

The dimensions are as follow :

Over the door leading into the receipt of the Exchequer, is a sculptured head covered with a hood: beneath is this inscription:

Ingraediens Idni rediture

Sis emulus Argi.---

Of the old palace some few remains exist, though perhaps much altered, but before the present century, when the board of works with their surveyors and attached architects, were not so anxious to destroy or mutilate our ancient architecture, numerous ancient apartments existed, even within the memory of many inhabitants, which have been swept away, and mean, and nationally considered, disgraceful brick erections formed in their place.

From the present appearance of some of the buildings, and the known age of others, it should seem, that originally the palace of formed sides of a square, and was all comprehended in Old , of which it constituted the east and south sides. Its east side consisted of the Court of Requests, the Painted Chamber, and several other nameless old rooms adjoining them.

False Heaven at the end of the Hall.

[] Stowe's Annals, p. 182, and Hen. Hunt. Hist. who calls it the festival of Christmas.

[] Stowe's Annals, p. 271--2.

[] Hist. Lond. ii. 1340.

[] Historia Brevis.

[] Stow apud Maitland. ii. 1341.

[] Survey, p. 887.

[] Smith's Westminster, p. 53.

[] See Fig. 2 in the annexed plate.Ground Plan of the ancient Palace of Westminster

[] Part III. line 24.