234 COACHING DAYS AND COACHING WAYS 



tion with one of his six wives whose appearance he from 

 the first particularly abhorred. I refer to Anne of 

 Cleves, whose sad fate should be a lasting warning to 

 young ladies about to marry, of the danger of flattering 

 portraits. It was here on Blackheath that the already 

 muchly married king publicly received his fourth wife, 

 with all due decency and decorum, having already made 

 up his royal mind to put her away privately. For Henry 

 on this occasion did not play fair ; and though he pre- 

 tended to Anne of Cleves herself that it was at this 

 meeting on Blackheath that he had first seen her — in 

 saying so, he said that which was not ; for he had already 

 privately inspected her at the Crown Inn at Rochester. 

 It was on this occasion, it may be remembered, that the 

 bluff Tudor gave way to a regrettable license of speech 

 at first sight of the goods the gods had provided for him, 

 and said many things unfit for publication ; which shocked 

 the onlookers, and made Cromwell put his hands to his 

 head to feel if it was still on his shoulders. 



It was not there long after. The match-maker ex- 

 piated his unfortunate choice on Tower Hill ; and Anne 

 of Cleves was content to forego the dubious joys of 

 married life for the possession of the several manors in 

 Kent and Sussex that her grateful late lord bestowed up- 

 on her. The number of these manors exceeds belief, and 

 at the same time gracefully gauges Henry's conception 

 of the magnitude of the matrimonial peril past. Indeed, 

 it seems to me that the king's brain must have been 

 quite turned with delight at the retiring attitude of the 

 Flanders lady ; and that whenever he had nothing 

 villainous on hand, and was disinclined for tennis, he 

 gave Anne of Cleves a manor or two simply to while 

 away the time. 



But though on either of these great occasions that I 

 have named, Blackheath must have been a sight worth 

 seeing, it was in 1660 no doubt that the grandest of its 

 historical pageants was to be seen : when the long reac- 

 tion against Puritanism had suddenly triumphed, and all 



