his Villa at Twickenham. Thanet House, Aldersgate Street, is the
residence with which Shaftesbury, the politician, is most generally
associated; but whilst he was Lord Chancellor he occupied Exeter House,
Strand, formerly the abode of Keeper Littleton. Lord Nottingham slept
with the seals under his pillow in Great Queen Street, Lincoln's Inn
Fields, the same street in which his successor, Lord Guildford, had the
establishment so racily described by his brother, Roger North. And Lord
Jeffreys moving westward, gave noisy dinners in Duke Street,
Westminster, where he opened a court-house that was afterwards
consecrated as a place of worship, and is still known as the Duke Street
Chapel. Says Pennant, describing the Chancellor's residence, "It is
easily known by a large flight of stone steps, which his royal master
permitted to be made into the park adjacent for the accommodation of his
lordship. These steps terminate above in a small court, on three sides
of which stands the house." The steps still remain, but their history is
unknown to many of the habitual frequenters of the chapel. After
Jefferys' fall the spacious and imposing mansion, where the
_bon-vivants_ of the bar used to drink inordinately with the wits and
buffoons of the London theatres, was occupied by Government; and there
the Lords of the Admiralty had their offices until they moved to their
quarters opposite Scotland Yard. Narcissus Luttrell's Diary contains the
following entry:--"April 23, 1690. The late Lord Chancellor's house at
Westminster is taken for the Lords of the Admiralty to keep the
Admiralty Office at."

William III., wishing to fix the holders of the Great Seal in a
permanent official home, selected Powis House (more generally known by
the name of Newcastle House), in Lincoln's Inn Fields, as a residence
for Somers and future Chancellors. The Treasury minute books preserve an
entry of September 11, 1696, directing a Privy Seal to "discharge the
process for the apprised value of the house, and to declare the king's
pleasure that the Lord Keeper or Lord Chancellor for the time being
should have and enjoy it for the accommodation of their offices." Soon
after his appointment to the seals, Somers took possession of this
mansion at the north-west corner of the Fields; and after him Lord
Keeper Sir Nathan Wright, Lord Chancellor Cowper, and Lord Chancellor
Harcourt used it as an official residence. But the arrangement was not
acceptable to the leg