“It is as noble and uniform a pile as Gothic architecture can make it.  There is incomparable furniture in it, especially hangings designed by Raphael, very rich with gold.  Of the tapestries I believe the world can show nothing nobler of the kind than the stories of Abraham and Tobit.[11] ...  The Queen’s bed was an embroidery of silver on crimson velvet, and cost L8,000, being a present made by the States of Holland when his majesty returned.  The great looking-glass and toilet of beaten massive gold were given by the Queen Mother.  The Queen brought over with her from Portugal such Indian cabinets as had never before been seen here.”

Evelyn wrote of course before Wren made his Renaissance additions to the Palace.

After the great fire which occurred in 1666, and destroyed some 13,000 houses and no less than 80 churches, Sir Christopher Wren was given an opportunity, unprecedented in history, of displaying his power of design and reconstruction.  Writing of this great architect, Macaulay says, “The austere beauty of the Athenian portico, the gloomy sublimity of the Gothic arcade, he was, like most of his contemporaries, incapable of emulating, and perhaps incapable of appreciating; but no man born on our side of the Alps has imitated with so much success the magnificence of the palace churches of Italy.  Even the superb Louis XIV. has left to posterity no work which can bear a comparison with St. Paul’s.”

[Illustration: 

    Sedes, ecce tibi? quae tot produxit alumnos
      Quot gremio nutrit Granta, quot.  Isis habet.

From the Original by Sir Peter Lely, presented to Dr. Busby by King Charles “Sedes Busbiana” From a Print in the possession of J. C. THYNNE, Esq.  Period:  Charles II.]

Wren’s great masterpiece was commenced in 1675, and completed in 1710, and its building therefore covers a period of 35 years, carrying us through the reigns of James II., William III. and Mary, and well on to the end of Anne’s.  The admirable work which he did during this time, and which has effected so much for the adornment of our Metropolis, had a marked influence on the ornamental woodwork of the second half of the seventeenth century:  in the additions which he made to Hampton Court Palace, in Bow Church, in the hospitals of Greenwich and of Chelsea, there is a sumptuousness of ornament in stone and marble, which shew the influence exercised on his mind by the desire to rival the grandeur of Louis XIV.; the Fountain Court at Hampton being in direct imitation of the Palace of Versailles.  The carved woodwork of the choir of St. Paul’s, with fluted columns supporting a carved frieze; the richly carved panels, and the beautiful figure work on both organ lofts, afford evidence that the oak enrichments followed the marble and stone ornament.  The swags of fruit and flowers, the cherubs’ heads with folded wings, and other details in Wren’s work, closely resemble the designs executed by Gibbons, whose carving is referred to later on.