creased wealth. He was not unmindful of the vow he had made in the desert, but, without delay, proceeded to carry it into effect. To different charities he distributed considerable alms, but particularly to the poor of his own parish, and among other donations, he bequeathed 2007. to the church of St. Catherine Cree, to be laid out in the purchase of an estate, the profits of which were to be applied to the poor, on condition that a sermon should be occasionally preached in that church, to commemorate his deliverance from the paws of the lion.

The following account of the service on one of those occasions was given in a newspaper of October 19th, 1805: "Wednesday, the 16th, was the day appointed for the celebration of the event above related. The church-bell of St. Catherine Cree tolled, as usual, for divine service, and when the congregation were assembled, the morning prayers were read. The first lesson for the day was appropriately taken from Daniel vi., where it is recorded that after the prophet was cast into the lions' den, the Lord shut their mouths so that they did not hurt him. The verses of Psalm xxxiv., inferring that those that fear the Lord shall walk in safety, though hungry lions roar around them, was sung by the charity-children. After the service, the rector of the parish pronounced what is aptly called the Lion Sermon,' taking for his text 1 Peter v. 8, 'Be sober, be vigilant, because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour.' After descanting upon the necessity of giving heed to the admonitory council of the Apostle, the preacher concluded his discourse by representing the virtue, charity, piety, and unshaken constancy of Sir John Gayor, as examples every way worthy of imitation.”

ESCAPE OF THE DUKE OF YORK FROM ST. JAMES'S

PALACE.

During the Civil War, St. James's became the prison-house, for nearly three years, of the Duke of York, the Duke of Gloucester, and the Princess Elizabeth. On April 20th, 1648, the Duke of York, who had been taken prisoner when Fairfax entered Oxford, thus effected his escape from St. James's, as narrated in the Stuart Papers, he being then in his fifteenth year: "All things being in readiness on the night of the beforementioned day, the Duke went to supper at his usual hour, which was about seven, in the company of his brother and sister; and when supper was ended they went to play at hide-and-seek with the rest of the young people in the house. At this childish sport the Duke had accustomed himself to play for a fortnight together every night, and used to hide himself in places so difficult to find, that most commonly they were half an hour in searching for him, at the end of which time he most commonly came out of his own accord. This blind he laid for his design, that they might be accustomed to miss him before he really intended his escape; by which means, when he came to practise it in earnest, he was secure of gaining that half-hour before they could reasonably suspect he was gone. His intentions had all the effect he could desire; for that night, so soon as they began their play, he pretended, according to his custom, to hide himself; but instead of doing so, he went first into his sister's chamber, and there locked up a little dog that used to follow him, that he might not be discovered by him; then slipping down by a pair of back stairs which led into the inmost garden, having found means beforehand to furnish himself with a key of a

back door from the said garden into the Park, he there found Bamfield, who was ready to receive him, and waited there with a footman, who brought a cloak, which he threw over him, and put on a periwig. From thence they went through the Spring Garden, where one Tripp was ready with a hackney-coach."

It is needless to pursue the adventure further in detail; suffice it to say that the Duke, in female attire, succeeded in reaching a distant vessel, which was waiting for him below Gravesend. Thus the graybeards were outwitted by a mere boy. James himself has recorded, with a natural feeling of triumph, the pottering search set on foot as soon as the Prince was missed:

"He had not gone," he says, "above an hour, before they began to miss him and search for him in every room in the house, where not finding him, they sent immediate notice of it to Whitehall, and to the General, Sir Thomas Fairfax. Hereupon there were orders issued out that all the passages about London, especially the Northern road, and those towards Wales, should be watched―imagining that he had either taken that way or towards Scotland." Orders were also issued to guard all ports; out James had left Gravesend before the despatch arrived. The pursuit was not relinquished till news had been received of his landing in Holland.

SPORTING IN ST. JAMES'S.

Little more than a century and a half ago the parish of St. James's was described as "all the houses and grounds comprehended in a place heretofore called St. James's-fields, and the confines thereof."

The Park and the Palace appear to be of contem

poraneous date. Henry VIII. gave Chattisham, and other estates in the county of Suffolk, in exchange for the site of the hospital and grounds; and he proceeded to demolish the greater part of the old fabric and construct the present palace, which Stow calls "a goodly manor," it having formed part of the manor of Hyde, the property of the abbot and monastery of St. Peter at Westminster. At the same time Henry enclosed the fields in the immediate neighbourhood, which now form St. James's Park, with the apparent intention of converting it into a royal chase; within which the parks were to be appropriated as nurseries for the deer.

In a proclamation, dated July 1546, he declares, "Forasmuch as the King's most royal majesty is much desirous to have the games of hare, partridge, pheasant, and heron, preserved in and about his manor of the Palace of Westminster for his own disport and pastime;" and with a conveniently large latitude of definition as to what he considered the neighbourhood of his palace, he proceeds to mark out the boundaries of his royal preserve as being "from his said Palace of Westminster to St. Giles-in-the-Fields, and from thence to Islington, to Our Lady of the Oak, to Highgate, to Hornsey Park, to Hampstead Heath, and from thence to his said Palace of Westminster, to be preserved and kept for his own disport and pleasure and recreation: his highness therefore straitly chargeth and commandeth all and singular his subjects, of what estate, degree, or condition soever they be, that they nor any of them do presume or attempt to hunt or hawk, or in any means to take or kill any of the said game within the precincts aforesaid, as they tender his favour, and will eschew the imprisonment of their bodies, and further punishment at his majesty's will and pleasure."

Thus would have been formed a belt of royal hunting-ground. But Henry did not long survive: the plan broke down, and the City corporation continued to hunt the hare at the head of the conduit, where Conduitstreet now stands, and kill the fox at the end of St. Giles's. A century later we have record of this rural and sporting character. Mr. Fox told Mr. Rogers that Dr. Sydenham, the celebrated physician, was sitting at his window, looking on Pall Mall, with his pipe in his mouth, and a silver tankard before him, when a fellow made a snatch at the tankard, and made off with it. Nor was he overtaken, said Fox, before he got among the bushes in Bond-street, where they lost him. Then Pennant tells us that the late Carew Mildmay, Esq., used to say that he remembered killing a woodcock on the site of Conduit-street, at that time an open country. Mr. Coke, in 1833, told Haydon, the painter, that he remembered a fox being killed in Cavendish-square; and that where Berkeley-square now is was an excellent place for snipes.

GEORGE I. AND II. AT ST. JAMES'S PALACE.

George I., who "could speak no English, and was past the learning of it," lived in St. James's Palace like a quiet private gentleman of independent fortune. His evening parties consisted of the Germans who formed his familiar society, a few English ladies, and fewer Englishmen, who amused themselves at cards, under the presidency of the Duchess of Kendal (Mademoiselle Schulemberg), the King's German mistress, who had apartments in the palace, as had also Miss Brett, the