78 ROYAL GARDENS 



years old — and beds of choicest flowers, gave to the grounds 

 a picturesque attraction perhaps unequalled." 



Marlborough House was repaired, decorated and furnished 

 anew in 1837. It was then settled on the dowager Queen 

 Adelaide. During the eleven years of her occupancy she was 

 in the habit of attending the Lutheran Chapel still standing 

 in the grounds. This building, which is such a prominent 

 object on the east side of the roadway between Marlborough 

 House and St. James's Palace, occupies the site of the Chapel 

 of the Friary built for the priest attendants of Catherine of 

 Braganza. Just after it was finished in 1662, Pepys, in his 

 quaint, rather dry way, tells of a visit he paid there, and 

 records his opinion of the " Portuguese musique " and sermon, 

 "which not understanding, I did go away." 



One year after the death of Queen Adelaide, Marlborough 

 House was settled on the Prince of Wales. For some years 

 a large part of it was used for the exhibition of the Vernon 

 collection of pictures until they could be hung in the National 

 Gallery. The upper rooms were set apart for the use of the 

 Department of Practical Art, and included a library, museum 

 of manufactures and lecture rooms, the whole being the 

 nucleus of the present South Kensington Museum. But in 

 1863 the collections were removed, for Marlborough House 

 was required, on their marriage in that year, by the Prince 

 and Princess of Wales. 



It is a curious coincidence that nearly one hundred and fifty 

 years before, the Weekly Post iji^ had announced, "The 

 Duke of Marlborough has ' presented ' his house to the Prince 

 and Princess of Wales ; and it is said that a terrace walk will 

 be erected, to join the same to St. James's Palace." This 

 junction was never effected, but a similar one was carried out 

 at the western end of the old palace. There William IV., 

 when Duke of Clarence, had built a mansion which has been 

 in turn the London residence of the Duchess of Kent — the 

 mother of Queen Victoria — the Duke of Edinburgh, and is 

 now that of H.R.H. the Duke of Connaught. Its garden 

 and that of St. James's Palace have long been thrown into one 



