“The Park shone brighter than the Skyes,
Sing tan tara rara tantivee:
With jewels and gold, and Ladies’ eyes,
That sparkled and cry’d come see me:
Of all parts of England, Hide-park hath the name,
For Coaches and Horses, and Persons of fame,
It looked at first sight, like a field full of flame,
Which made me ride up tan-tivee.
“There hath not been seen such a sight since Adam’s
For Perriwig, Ribbon and Feather,
Hide-park may be term’d the Market of Madams,
Or Lady-Fair, chuse you whether;
Their gowns were a yard too long for their legs,
They shew’d like the Rainbow cut into rags,
A Garden of Flowers, or a Navy of Flags,
When they all did mingle together.
“We talke away time until it grew dark,
The place did begin to grow privee;
The Gallants began to draw out of the Park:
Their horses did gallop tantivee,
But, finding my courage a little to come,
I sent my bay Gelding away by my Groom,
And proffered my service to wait on her home.
In her coach we went both tantivee.”
CHAPTER VII.
Rotten Row, the King’s Old Road—The New King’s Road made and lighted—The Allied Sovereigns in the Park—The Park after the Peninsular War—The Duke of Wellington in the Park—The Queen and Royal Family in the Park.
If we look at the old map of Hyde Park, we shall find that what is now called Rotten Row was then termed The King’s Old Road and The King’s New Road, whence the generally accepted derivation of Rotten Row, from Route du Roi. Soon after the accession of William III., and his purchase of Kensington Palace, his route from St. James’s Palace to his residence lay through the Green Park and the King’s Road in Hyde Park, and, finding it dark at night, he had it lit by three hundred lamps, which, for the time, rendered it a fairyland of brilliancy; so much so, that Thoresby, in his diary (June 15, 1712), “could not but observe that all the way, quite through Hyde Park to the Queen’s Palace at Kensington, has lanterns for illuminating the road in the dark nights, for the Coaches.”