We left London in a coach, in order to see the remarkable places in its neighbourhood.
The first was Theobalds, belonging to Lord Burleigh, the Treasurer. In the gallery was painted the genealogy of the Kings of England; from this place one goes into the garden, encompassed with a ditch full of water, large enough for one to have the pleasure of going in a boat and rowing between the shrubs; here are great variety of trees and plants, labyrinths made with a great deal of labour, a _jet d’eau_, with its basin of white marble, and columns and pyramids of wood and other materials up and down the garden. After seeing these, we were led by the gardener into the summer-house, in the lower part of which, built semicircularly, are the twelve Roman emperors in white marble, and a table of touchstone; the upper part of it is set round with cisterns of lead, into which the water is conveyed through pipes, so that fish may be kept in them, and in summer-time they are very convenient for bathing. In another room for entertainment, very near this, and joined to it by a little bridge, was an oval table of red marble. We were not admitted to see the apartments of this palace, there being nobody to show it, as the family was in town, attending the funeral of their lord. { 53}
Puckeridge, a village; this was the first place where we observed that the beds at inns were made by the waiters.
Camboritum, Cantabrigium and Cantabrigia, now called Cambridge, a celebrated town, so named from the river Cam, which after washing the western side, playing through islands, turns to the east, and divides the town into two parts, which are joined by a bridge, whence its modern name—formerly it had the Saxon one of Grantbridge. Beyond this bridge is an ancient and large castle, said to be built by the Danes: on this side, where far the greater part of the town stands, all is splendid; the streets fine, the churches numerous, and those seats of the Muses, the colleges, most beautiful; in these a great number of learned men are supported, and the studies of all polite sciences and languages flourish.
I think proper to mention some few things about the foundation of this University and its colleges. Cantaber, a Spaniard, is thought to have first instituted this academy 375 years before Christ, and Sebert, King of the East Angles, to have restored it A.D. 630. It was afterwards subverted in the confusion under the Danes, and lay long neglected, till upon the Norman Conquest everything began to brighten up again: from that time inns and halls for the convenient lodging of students began to be built, but without any revenues annexed to them.