28 HISTORY AND TRADITIONS OF 



was the breeder of much good : it was the mark of one particular stage 

 of civilisation, but would be as foreign to our present habits as the 

 spruce shopmen of the day would be to the cry of Clubs, clubs!' of 

 a former period ; and yet it is sometimes a source of surprise, that 

 the tournament is not revived to a limited extent amongst us. It was 

 a noble sport for gay and gallant spirits, and the tilt-yard would 

 surely be a finer field for manly exercise than lounging at Tattersall's 

 or in the Park. The motto 



' La guerre est ma patrie, 

 IVIon harnois ma maison ; 

 Et en toutc saison, 

 Combattre c'est ma vie,' 



is lost amidst modern refinement, and we are glad that it is so." 



" True and it is perhaps well at all events it is inevitable. How 

 is it that 'bluff Harry 7 is so mingled up with our recollections of 

 almost every spot in the metropolis famous for ' gentle deedes? ' He 

 it was who headed the gallant train that assembled in Durham- 

 place, accompanied by ' the Flander's mare/ as the polite monarch 

 called Anne of Cleves.'' 



" Henry's reign marks a transition both in our social and political 

 history. Like other men who have been distinguished for despotic 

 rule, he appears to have been born for accomplishing a particular 

 purpose : this purpose in him was the final abolition of feudalism and 

 monachism. His father had laid the train; but what the Seventh Henry 

 did by petty juggling or nice balancing of personal interest, his son 

 accomplished by daring boldness. In the tyrannous and haughty 

 Henry, the elements of good and evil were so curiously mingled, that 

 he ruled despotically with perfect impunity. His character has been 

 but imperfectly delineated. We permit our just hatred of his cruel 

 and salacious disposition to lower our opinion of his talents and his 

 wisdom. The man who set at defiance long recognised rights of 

 property, and who made that property available to his own private pur- 

 poses, who held back, by his sceptre, the spiritual director of the most 

 powerful and wealthy of his subjects, must have had talents of no 

 common order even if we call his firmness despotism, and his aliena- 

 tion of church-property rapacity. But pass we on ; and the next pa- 

 geant held in Durham-place was one nearly displacing the crown 

 from the heads of the immediate descendants of ' bluff King Hal,' 

 the marriage of Guildford Dudley and the young, the beautiful, and 

 the accomplished Lady Jane Grey, victims both, and unwilling ones, 

 to the folly and ambition of their respective parents the Dukes of 

 Northumberland and Suffolk." 



" Most true, and a brilliant and heart- touching bridal-day that must 

 have been; but what an amount of personal misery was the speedy 

 result! What bright eyes dimmed ! What young hopes crushed! 

 What noble hearts quenched on the scaffold! Dudley, Her- 

 bert, and Hastings, Jane Grey, her sister Catherine Grey, and 

 Catherine Dudley met together in all the glow and enthusiasm of 

 plighted love, and a few brief clays, and lo ! death was on their traces." 



Our friend turned away from the modern building, we believe, 



