r88 COACHING DAYS AND COACHING WAYS 



landed here in iioi,bent on an argument with his 

 brother Henry as to who should wear the crown. Henry 

 however elected to wear the crown and avoid the argu- 

 ment, in which I think he was wise. Richard the First 

 gave the town its first charter ; and at Portsmouth in 

 1290 the first oranges were landed in England by a 

 Spanish vessel as a present for the Castilian wife of 

 Edward the First. 



Besides these royalties already mentioned, Henry the 

 Eighth was at Portsmouth once or twice. Edw^ard the 

 Sixth came here in 1552, not in the best of moods, and 

 remarked that the bulwarks of the town were " charge- 

 able, massy, and ramparted " (whatever that may mean), 

 "but ill-fashioned, ill-flanked, and set in remote places" 

 (which is more clear) ; after which he left for London ; 

 and left Elizabeth to correct the faults he had pointed 

 out ; and James the Second to inclose Gosport within 

 its present lines. 



I have described enough scenes of blood in the seventy- 

 one miles seven furlongs from London, it seems to me, to 

 suit the most sanguinary taste, and a great deal more than 

 suits my own. But still I cannot leave Portsmouth, the 

 terminus even of the road, without reminding my readers 

 that at what was in 1628 the Spotted Dog Inn, and what 

 is now a gabled house known as 12 High Street, Villiers, 

 Duke of Buckingham, the Steenie of King James, was 

 assassinated by John P^elton, a discontented half-pay 

 officer, just as the Duke was about to sail to the relief of 

 La Rochelle, then being besieged by Richelieu. Lingard 

 has written the history of the episode ; and the great 

 Dumas, in the Three Ahisketeers, has written its romance ; 

 and the subject has been too well treated by both writers 

 in their different styles to make a subject for me. It 

 remains for me to remark that the journey of P'elton to 

 London, where he was hanged, drawn, and quartered at 

 Tyburn, was accomplished amid scenes of extraordinary 

 and many-sided excitement ; and coming, as it does, 

 before a similarly mournful expedition over the same 



