Tea at Trianon: A Secret Tunnel at the Palace of Westminster

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Tuesday, March 10, 2020

A Secret Tunnel at the Palace of Westminster

From Tatler:

A secret doorway built during the reign of Charles II has just been uncovered by architects during the restoration of the Houses of Parliament. The previously unknown passage was reportedly built for the procession to the King's coronation banquet in the 17th century and was used afterward to access parliament by political luminaries including Robert Walpole and William Pitt, before being bricked up and later covered by wood paneling. During the ongoing restoration work of the Houses of Parliament, the passage was rediscovered, as was some 169-year-old graffiti left by stonemasons and bricklayers with a rather humorous memento. The message, written in pencil reads, ‘This room was enclosed by Tom Porter who was very fond of Ould Ale.’ (Read more.)