Hampton Court ... Illustrated with forty-three drawings by Herbert ...

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HAMPTON COURT
degrading excess. His want of all sense of fitness
appears as clearly in his teaching Swift, then an enthusiastic
young scholar whose thoughts and hopes
were of religion and of books, how to cut asparagus
in the Dutch fashion and " eat it economically with the
stalks," as in his offering him a captaincy of horse.
Too often has the story of his greedily pouring the
whole dish of peas on to his plate when the Princess
Anne was still unserved been told. And after all, it
may seem petty to dwell on such small matters; nor
is it generally considered in the best taste to admire
and visit a man's house, as we visit Hampton Court,
and then take away his character. But it is high time
that William III. should be judged on his merits; and
when we have considered his most prominent characteristics,
and have remembered that not one single
famous saying has been attributed to him — " he spoke
seldom, and that with a disgusting dryness," as Burnet
says — may we not reasonably ask if he is to be considered
a hero ? There is such a thing as debasing the
moral currency, and it is a fault that historians are very
often guilty of; and it may be well that, when we
examine a man's works, we should form a true estimate
of himself. The character of the Dutch sovereign is
admirably illustrated by the details of the negotiations
for his marriage. When Lord Ossory first suggested
the marriage to him, he gave an undecided answer; a
careful reader of the judicious Von Ranke would discover
the reason. He had recently been told by his
friends in England that they would exclude the Duke