History of the Keiv Observatory, 



41 



Crisp sajs fuither : "It was in the year 1770* that the village or 

 hamlet of West Sheen with the ancient gateway forming the entrance 

 to, or rather part of, the priory, and eighteen houses with large pieces 

 of ground attached, were pulled down, and the entire site converted 

 into park or pasture land, as we now see it ; but the antiquary to 

 whom the records of such institutions as this ' House of Jesus of 

 Bethlehem ' are so dear, while pondering over the changes which have 

 taken place in Richmond, and observing how little we now retain 

 of so much which has once existed here as the work of our Norman, 

 Plantagenet, and Tudor kings, can but cherish a feeling of the deepest 

 regret at the total annihilation of the ancient priory buildings of 

 Henry V at Sheen." 



Richmond Lodge, or House (once occupied by Cardinal Wolsey), 

 which stood at no great distance from the present Observatory, had 

 been granted in 1707 by Queen Anne to the Duke of Ormonde, and 

 partly rebuilt by him, in the year 1708-9, on the site of an old 

 building which had likewise borne the name of the Lodge for a long 

 period of years. On the impeachment of the duke in 1715, he hastily 

 left the country, and resided at Paris. Ormonde House was ap- 

 parently unfinished at the time. The Earl of Arran, his brother, who 

 purchased the property, then leased for the term of about ninety 

 years, sold the lease to the Prince of Wales, afterwards George II, 

 of whom, both before and after his succession to the throne, it was 

 a favourite place of residence, and even more particularly so of his 

 queen (Caroline). From this cause a numerous circle gathered in 

 and about the village and neighbourhood of Richmond, forming here 

 the court of the reigning monarch. 



Here, in the garden appertaining to this lodge, took place the 

 interview between Queen Caroline and Jeannie Deans, after her 

 journey on foot from Edinburgh to plead for the life of her sister 

 Effie, which has been so graphically and so touchingly described by 

 Sir Walter Scott in his " Heart of Midlothian." 



There is one passage in the dialogue which has a connection with 

 the site of the Observatory, and that is Jeannie 's reply to the Queen 

 when addressed in the following words : — 



" Stand up, young woman, and tell me what sort of a barbarous 

 people your countryfolk are, where child murder is become so common 

 as to require the restraint of laws like yours." 



"If your Leddyship pleases, there are many places besides Scotland 

 where mithers are unkind to their ain flesh and blood." 



For as Crisp says, " It cannot be denied that the behaviour of 

 Caroline had been unnatural towards her son : she seems to have 



England quarterly. The inscription round, when read at length, is — Sigillum Domus 

 Jhesu Christi de Bethlem Ordinis Cartusiensis de Skene.'" 

 * 1769, Evans. 



