Note 48 — Chapter VIII

Rushworth Abr. iii. 123; Whitelock, p. 35; Strafford Letters, i. 374, et alibi. See what Clarendon says, p. 293 (ii. 151, edit. 1826). The second of these tells us, that the city offered to build for the king a palace in St. James's park by way of composition, which was refused. If this be true, it must allude to the palace already projected by him, the magnificent designs for which by Inigo Jones are well known. Had they been executed, the metropolis would have possessed a splendid monument of Palladian architecture; and the reproach sometimes thrown on England, of wanting a fit mansion for its monarchs, would have been prevented. But the exchequer of Charles the First had never been in such a state as to render it at all probable that he could undertake so costly a work.