sented six of her scholars to the King, as challengers in the combat. To this redoubtable personage was opposed one equally sublime—the goddess Diana—in whose behoof appeared a troop of foresters, who, breathing from their horns a sylvan strain, ushered in the appropriate pageant of a park, within whose pales of green were living deer ; but these poor victims to pleasure were no sooner allowed to escape from their enclosure, than they were chased by hounds, and attacked and killed before the eyes of the Queen. Such was the refinement—such the humanity of our forefathers. The death of the King's grandmother, Margaret, Countess of Richmond, on the twenty-ninth of June, brought these festivities to an abrupt termination ; and the outburst of an alarming pestilence drove the court to Richmond, where the King and Queen kept Christmas with pomp and splendour. Henry greatly delighted in tilts, pageants, disguises, and other similar diversions, then so popular throughout Europe. Not a festival occurred but was celebrated at court according to primitive usage ; and nothing so delighted tbe frolic-loving King as stealing from the tilt or tournay, and astonishing the Queen and the company by suddenly returning in the garb of a friar, an outlaw, or a foreign knight. On one occasion, the King assumed the garb of Robin Hood, and in that character surprised Katherine and her ladies, who, for the moment, were struck with terror and confusion. Another time, when the foreign ambassadors were being entertained at Westminster, in the spring of 1510, he suddenly absented himself, and presently returned disguised as a Turkish pasha. Katherine, although of a serious, retiring disposition, took pleasure in humouring her husband's tastes for frolics, disguises, and public fetes and processions. Whenever he unexpectedly appeared before her in the guise of a stranger, she affected surprise and delight; and she always obeyed with cheerfulness the summons to witness his proficiency in the martial exercises. It was in this year that the King took Katherine to behold the grand cavalcade called the Marching Watch of the City of London. This marching watch was in addition to the stun ding watchers. The men were all dressed " in bright harness," and traversed the principal streets to the extent of " three thousand two hundred taylors' yards." ''On Midsummer eve," says Stowe, "King Henry the Eighth, disguised in the livery of a yeoman of the guard, w nt into West Cheap, and there beheld the watch, unknown to all save his attendants, who were also disguised; but, on the following night, being that of St. Peter's, he and the Queen came royally riding to the said place, and there, with their nobles, beheld the marching watch of the city set out with its accustomed goodly shows, and did not return again till after the sun was up the next morning." In compliance with the custom established by the I. ountess of Richmond, the Queen, being in a situation which promised an heir to the throne, publicly withdrew to her chamber at Richmond, in December. On New Year's day she gave birth to a Prince, who, from the moment of his birth, became an object of almost idolatrous love and homage. The royal babe was christened Henry, with great pomp; the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Earl of Surrey, and the Countess of Devonshire stood as sponsors, and, after the Queen's churching, tournaments and pageants were held, in honour to her, at Westminster. " On the morrow, after dinner," says the chronicler, " the company assembled in the Hall, when, at the sound of the trumpet, many a nobleman and gentleman vaulted on their steeds, after whom followed certain lords, mounted on palfreys, trapped in cloth of gold; many gentlemen on foot, clad in russet satin, and yeomen in russet damask, scarlet hose, and yellow caps ; then issued the King from his pavilion of cloth of gold, his mettled courser loaded with the same gorgeous drapery, and on his gilded chafrons nodded a graceful plume, spangled with gold. Behind the King came his three aids, each armed cap-apie, and seated beneath a crimson pavilion. Presently entered from the oppo