which have given great celebrity to Wilton House.
Aubrey dedicated the present work to that nobleman, soon after he
succeeded to the title, and was honoured with his personal friendship.
The Earl survived him many years, and was succeeded by Henry, the
second of that name, in 1733. Of the latter nobleman and his works
at Wilton, Horace Walpole wrote as follows:- "The towers, the
chambers, the scenes which Holbein, Jones, and Vandyke had decorated,
and which Earl Thomas had enriched with the spoils of the best ages,
received the best touches of beauty from Earl Henry's hand. He removed
all that obstructed the views to or from his palace, and threw
Palladium's theatric bridge over his river. The present Earl has
crowned the summit of the hill with the equestrian statue of Marcus
Aurelius, and a handsome arch designed by Sir William Chambers.* No
man had a purer taste in building than Earl Henry, of which he gave a
few specimens besides his works at Wilton." (Anecdotes of Painting,
&c.) The nobleman thus commended for his architectural taste, was
succeeded as Earl of Pembroke, in 1751, by his son Henry, who employed
Sir William Chambers as mentioned by Walpole; and George, who
succeeded to the Earldom in 1794, caused other extensive additions and
alterations to be made at Wilton, by the late James Wyatt. - J. B.]
*[I have in my possession a drawing of this arch by the architect.
- J. B.]
THE old building of the Earl of Pembroke's house at WILTON was
designed by an architect (Hans Holbein) in King Edward the Sixth's
time.
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