68 LONDON PARKS © GARDENS 
how, they managed frequently to escape their master’s 
vigilance, and fell a prey to the unscrupulous thief, and 
descriptions of the missing dogs were published in the 
Gazette. One, answering to the name Towser, was 
“ liver colour’d and white spotted ” ; and a “ dogg of 
His Majestie’s, full of blew spots, with a white cross on 
his forehead about the bigness of a tumbler,” was lost on 
another occasion. 
Charles with his dogs, his ducks, his wit, his engaging 
manners, his doubtful morals, is the central figure of many 
a picture in St. James’s Park, but it does not often form 
a background to his Queen. One scene described by 
Pepys has much charm. The party, returning from Hyde 
Park on horseback with a great crowd of gallants, pass 
down the Mall; the Queen, riding hand in hand with 
the King, looking “ mighty pretty ” in her white laced 
coat and crimson petticoat. Again, on another occasion, 
the Queen forms an attractive vision, as she walks with 
her ladies from Whitehall to St. James’s dressed from 
head to foot in silver lace, each holding an immense 
green fan to shade themselves from the fierce rays of the 
June sun, while a delighted crowd throng round them. 
The popularity of the Mall as the rendezvous of all 
classes lasted for over a century. Through the reigns 
of Queen Anne and George I. and II. all the fashionable 
world of London congregated there twice daily. In the 
morning the promenade took them there from twelve 
to two, and after dinner in full dress they thronged 
thither again, not to play the game of paille-maille, which 
was then out of fashion, but simply to walk about under 
the trees and be amused with races, wrestlings, or an 
impromptu dance. Every well-known person—courtiers, 
wits, beaux, writers, poets, artists, soldiers—and all the 
