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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d7b82bc --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,4 @@ +*.txt text eol=lf +*.htm text eol=lf +*.html text eol=lf +*.md text eol=lf diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..fa24671 --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #66228 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/66228) diff --git a/old/66228-0.txt b/old/66228-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index 1c191fe..0000000 --- a/old/66228-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,6422 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg eBook of Unnoticed London, by Elizabeth (E.) -Montizambert - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and -most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms -of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at -www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you -will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before -using this eBook. - -Title: Unnoticed London - -Author: Elizabeth (E.) Montizambert - -Release Date: September 6, 2021 [eBook #66228] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -Produced by: Chuck Greif and The Online Distributed Proofreading Team at - https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images - generously made available by The Internet Archive/Canadian - Libraries) - -*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK UNNOTICED LONDON *** - - - - - UNNOTICED LONDON - - [Illustration: CHEYNE ROW] - - - - - UNNOTICED - LONDON - - BY - E. MONTIZAMBERT - - [Illustration] - - WITH TWENTY-FOUR - ILLUSTRATIONS - - 1923 - LONDON & TORONTO - J. M. DENT & SONS LTD. - NEW YORK: E. P. DUTTON & CO. - - FIRST EDITION _March 1922_ - REPRINTED _May 1922_, _May 1923_ - - - _All rights reserved_ - - PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN - - - - -PREFACE - - -The following brief account of a few of the things that have interested -me in London is not intended for the use of the inveterate sightseer, -for whom so many admirable and complete fingerposts to the study of old -London have been written, by such experts as Mr. Bell, Mr. Wilfred -Whitten, Mr. E. V. Lucas, Mr. Ordish and Mr. Hare. It is meant for the -people who do not realise one-eighth of the stories packed into the -streets of London, the city which, as Sir Walter Besant, that great -London lover, once said, has an unbroken history of one thousand years -and has never been sacked by an enemy. For, in talking about the -extraordinary beauty of London, I became aware of a vast public who have -eyes and see not, who thoroughly dislike the idea of sight-seeing yet -acknowledge their pleasure in a chance discovery made _en route_ to tea -at the Ritz,--people who are appalled at the very idea of entering a -museum. Then there are the travellers who say vaguely that when they can -find time they really mean to see something of London, but they turn -their backs on the greatest city of the world without having seen much -more than Bond Street, because they are obsessed by the idea that to -see London requires some occult store of knowledge and energy, and their -eyes are sealed to the interest and beauty that lie around their path. -Finally there are people like the old lady who, when she heard I was -writing a book about old London, asked with astonishment, “Is there -anything old left in London?” - -I hasten to add that I have not tried in the following pages to tell of -every interesting place or even of all there is of interest in the -places visited,--only enough, I hope, to make people go and see for -themselves and have the pleasure of discovering the rest. I am not -afraid that if they once go to the Chapter House they will miss any of -its beauties: my dread is lest they fail to go there, from the vision of -a plethora of things they think they have no time to see. For I want -more than anything else to prick the curiosity of the travellers up and -down the streets of the city who miss so much pleasure that they might -have so easily, because they are not alive to all the interesting and -unexpected things that wait for their coming just round the corner. - -A little further afield there are so many other treasures waiting to be -noticed,--Hogarth’s pleasant house in Chiswick, that, like many another -London visitor, I am promising myself to see the first time I have a -free Monday, Wednesday or Saturday;--Eltham, with its sunk garden -surrounding the remains of the old palace of the English kings, where -John of Eltham, Edward II.’s son, was born;--Southwark, with its -cathedral and the remains of the Marshalsea Prison that not everyone -knows how to find;--and Islington, with the Canonbury Tower and the -house in Duncan Street, No. 64, where Lamb lived for four years. But -these I must leave regretfully for another day. - -In conclusion, I should like to express my thanks to the _Montreal -Gazette_ and to the _Daily Express_ for permission to reprint one or two -sketches which originally appeared in their pages, and to all those -friends for whose kindly help and encouragement I am much indebted. - - - To - SIR SQUIRE SPRIGGE - - - - -CONTENTS - - -CHAP. PAGE - -I. CHELSEA 1 - -The Chelsea of Sir Thomas More--Crosby Hall--Cheyne -Walk--Sandford Manor--Chelsea -Hospital--Buns--Chelsea Old Church--The -Physic Garden--Ranelagh. - - -II. KNIGHTSBRIDGE TO SOHO 24 - -Tattersall’s--Ely House--London Museum--St. -James’s Church--The Haymarket Shoppe--A -King in Soho. - - -III. TRAFALGAR SQUARE TO FLEET STREET 38 - -The Strand--Charing Cross--Water Gates--The -Adelphi--St. Clement Danes--Savoy -Chapel--Prince Henry’s Room--The Temple. - - -IV. ROUND ABOUT THE TOWER 68 - -Roman Baths--London Stone--Great Tower -Street--All Hallows, Barking--St. Olave’s--Roman -Wall--Port of London Authority--Trinity -House--The Crooked Billet--The -Tower. - - -V. ROUND ABOUT CHEAPSIDE 84 - -Bow Church--The Old Mansion House--The -Old Watling Restaurant--37, Cheapside--Wood -Street--The City Companies--The Guildhall. - - -VI. ROUND ABOUT HOLBORN 103 - -Tyburn--Staple Inn--Tooks Court--Gray’s -Inn--Hatton Garden--Ely Place--St. Sepulchre’s--Panier -Alley. - - -VII. DOWN CHANCERY LANE 117 - -Lincoln’s Inn Fields--Soane Museum--Lincoln’s -Inn--Record Office--Moravian Chapel--Nevills -Court--Clifford’s Inn. - - -VIII. THE CHARTERHOUSE AND ST. BARTHOLOMEW’S 137 - -Pye Corner--St. Bartholomew’s the Great--St. -John’s Gate--The Charterhouse. - - -IX. A STROLL IN WHITEHALL AND WESTMINSTER 158 - -Whitehall--United Services Museum--The -Abbey Cloisters--The Chapter House--Ashburnham -House--Jerusalem Chamber--St. -Margaret’s. - - -X. MUSEUMS 172 - -British Museum--Foundling Hospital--South -Kensington--Wallace--Geffrye. - - -XI. PARKS 197 - -Hyde Park--Kensington Gardens--Green -Park--St. James’s Park--Regent’s Park--Battersea--Kew. - -INDEX 217 - - - - -LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS - - - PAGE - -CHEYNE ROW _Frontispiece_ -CROSBY HALL 5 -THE OLD SNUFF HOUSE _facing_ 34 -WATER GATE, YORK HOUSE _facing_ 46 -ST. CLEMENT DANES 51 -DR. JOHNSON’S PEW, ST. CLEMENT DANES 54 -THE TEMPLE CHURCH, THE ROUND 61 -LONDON STONE, CANNON STREET 71 -THE TOWER OF LONDON. BYWARD TOWER _facing_ 76 -THE TOWER OF LONDON 79 -TRAITORS’ GATE, TOWER OF LONDON 81 -GUILDHALL _facing_ 96 -STAPLE INN 106 -GRAY’S INN HALL 108 -LINCOLN’S INN _facing_ 117 -LINCOLN’S INN GATEWAY 119 -RAHERE’S TOMB IN ST. BARTHOLOMEW’S CHURCH 142 -CHURCH OF ST. BARTHOLOMEW THE GREAT 145 -ST. JOHN’S GATE, CLERKENWELL 149 -THE CHARTERHOUSE FROM THE SQUARE _facing_ 154 -UNITED SERVICES’ MUSEUM _facing_ 160 -POETS’ CORNER, WESTMINSTER ABBEY 163 -FOUNDLING HOSPITAL 181 -PETER PAN STATUE IN KENSINGTON GARDENS 205 - - “Sir, the happiness of London is not to be conceived but by those - who have been in it.” - - DR. JOHNSON - - - - - - -UNNOTICED LONDON - - - - -CHAPTER I - -CHELSEA - - “I have passed manye landes and manye yles and - contrees, and cherched many full straunge places,.... - Now I am comen home to reste.” - SIR JOHN MAUNDEVILLE. - -If a hurried traveller had only time to roam about one of the London -boroughs I think he should choose Chelsea, because in that small area of -houses built along a mile and a half of the Thames riverside there is -much that is typical of quite different phases of London life, from the -sixteenth century to the present day. - -It lies between the Kings Road and the Embankment, beginning at Lower -Sloane Street--Chelsea Bridge Road, and is reached by the district -railway to Sloane Square Station or by the No. 11 bus passing the -Strand, Trafalgar Square and Victoria: by Nos. 19 or 22 from Hyde Park -Corner, and from Kensington by the 31, with its terminus at Limerston -Street, and by the Nos. 49 and 49a. - -Perhaps the reason why this quarter has always been beloved is because -while other districts have had their moment of fame and now live on -their past in somnolent content, Chelsea has fallen in and out of -fashion with a fine carelessness and has always guarded the creative -gift of dwellers of all ranks, so that the name of the little village -has been famous for such a diversity of things as literature and -custards, art and water-works, china and buns, horticulture and -learning. - -There is something cosy and charming about the name Chelsea, a good old -Anglo-Saxon word that once meant, “The Gravel Isle, Chesel-sey.” It has -not become quite so unrecognisable as its neighbour Battersea, but it -has no more just cause for converting into “sea” the ey that means -island with which it once ended. But you cannot lay down stern rules for -a name that has taken the bit between its teeth like Chelsea. It started -its career in the Domesday Book as Chelched, and by the time it got to -the sixteenth century Sir Thomas More is dating a letter to Henry VIII. -“At my pore howse in Chelcith.” - -Of the two Thomases whose memory pervades Chelsea, Sir Thomas More is -perhaps the most lovable. His son-in-law once said of him: “whom in -sixteen years and more, being in his house conversant with him, I could -never perceive as much as once in a fume.” - -It is in Roper’s _Life_ that you read how his neighbours loved him with -reason. Once, when he had been away on a mission to Cambrai in 1528, he -went to report to the King at Woodstock, and then heard that part of his -house and barns in Chelsea had been burnt. He had no thought of his own -loss, but sent to comfort his wife and tell her to find out the extent -of his neighbours’ loss and indemnify them as far as possible. - -There have been many other saintly men whom one reveres, but surely none -with such wide sympathies. He entertained Erasmus with learned talk, but -he also entertained John Heywood the playwright and Court jester. He was -wise, but he was also witty, and of which modern philosopher could it be -told “that when an interlude was performed, he would make one among the -players, occasionally coming upon them with surprise, and without -rehearsal fall into a character, and support the part by his -extemporaneous invention and acquit himself with credit.” - -Dear Sir Thomas More of delectable memory--it is good to come across -signs that you still live in English hearts, even if they take the form -of stucco decorations on a Lyons tea house in Carey Street. - -It was Sir Thomas More who first made Chelsea the fashion, though an old -Manor house that stood near the church had many lordly owners before -Henry VIII. bought it and, following More’s example, built himself the -big country mansion of which there are still traces in the basements of -the houses on the corner of Cheyne Walk and Oakley Street. The King is -also said to have had a hunting lodge near by and part of it still -exists at the end of Glebe Place in a small rather dilapidated building. - -Sir Thomas More had built his house on the site of the present Beaufort -Street and it stood there till Sir Hans Sloane, the Chelsea Baron -Haussmann of that day, pulled it down in 1740. The lovely gardens went -down to the river. Henry VIII. used to come and dine here, and walk with -his arm round the neck of the friend he afterwards brought to the block, -and here More received his other famous friends, among them Erasmus, and -Holbein, who stayed with him for three years, painting many portraits. - -It is pleasant to think that the spirit of More’s hospitality lived -again during the war and curiously enough at this very place and in one -of his own houses. For though his country home was destroyed, his town -house, Crosby Hall, built as the great town mansion of Sir John Crosby, -a merchant prince, in 1466, was brought from Bishopsgate piece by piece -in 1910, and four years later the marvellous timbered roof looked down -on the groups of Belgian fugitives that were sheltered there. - -If you ask the porter at More’s Gardens, a big block of flats on the -north-east corner of Battersea Bridge, for the key of Crosby Hall, he -will unlock a door in an ugly hoarding facing the embankment, close to -Chelsea Old Church. - -[Illustration: CROSBY HALL] - -You step through it into a remote space where a mediæval building stands -in the midst of the little rock gardens planted by the Belgian refugees -to while away their anxious, tedious hours. Many men have passed through -the old hall since Sir John Crosby built it, for at different times it -had belonged to the Duke of Gloucester (Richard III.), Sir Thomas More, -his son-in-law William Roper, and various ambassadors and nobles. In -1609 it was the home of that Countess of Pembroke whose charms evoked -from William Browne the epitaph so often attributed to Ben Jonson: - - Underneath this sable herse - Lies the subject of all verse; - Sidney’s sister, Pembroke’s mother; - Death! ere thou hast slain another - Fair and learned and good as she, - Time shall throw a dart at thee. - -One wonders what they would all have thought of these latest comers to -the old mansion which carried on the English tradition of hospitality so -well that the poet among the visitors wrote, and you may see his words -on a brass tablet opposite the fireplace: - - Je sens dans l’air que je respire - Un parfum de Liberté, - Un peu de cette terre hospitalière, - - * * * * * - - Le sol de l’Angleterre. - -The reconstitution of Crosby Hall was never finished; first because of -the death of King Edward, who took a great interest in the scheme, and -then owing to the war; but there it stands, its perpendicular lines, -mullioned windows and oriel and the wonderful oaken roof making it one -of the best examples that remain to us of fifteenth-century domestic -architecture. - -Chelsea is full of memories of every period since Sir Thomas More’s day. - -Queen Elizabeth as a child stayed at her father’s manor house here, and -later, as a girl of thirteen, she is said to have lived for a time at -Sir Thomas More’s house, when it had passed into the hands of her -stepmother, Catherine Parr. - -The charming Georgian houses of the Cheyne Walk of to-day carry on the -tradition of the beautiful Chelsea homes of those times, such as -Shrewsbury House which stood on the west side of Oakley Street before it -was pulled down in 1813. It was owned by the husband of the famous Bess -of Hardwicke, the Earl of Shrewsbury, who guarded Mary Queen of Scots in -her captivity. - -The delightful little houses in Paradise Row with their dormer windows -and tiled roofs were pulled down only a few years ago. Pepys said that -one of them was “the prettiest contrived house that ever I saw in my -life.” Ormonde Court now reigns in their stead, so there is no trace -to-day of the little house in Paradise Row that the fair but frail -Duchesse de Mazarin, niece of Anne of Austria’s Cardinal Prime Minister, -rented from Lord Cheyne when she had fallen on such evil days that her -aristocratic guests used to leave money under their plates to pay for -their dinner. She was not the only favourite of Charles II. to have a -summer home in Chelsea. Nell Gwynne lived at the Sandford Manor House -and the route by which the Merry Monarch rode to visit her is still -called the King’s Road. - -I hesitate to tell that Nell Gwynne’s very house is still in existence -for fear of taxing too much the ready courtesy of the occupants, two -members of the staff of The Imperial Gas Works Co., owners of the -property, who divide the house between them. - -My kindly guide had disquieting doubts as to whether Nell ever really -lived there, but he admitted that a thimble, unquestionably hers, and a -masonic jewel belonging to the King, were found in the house when it was -being repaired. Thimbles are not usually associated with the memory of -“pretty witty Nellie,” but the Chelsea air may have moved her to -industry. At all events there is the Jacobean house, shorn now of its -top story to lessen the weight on the bulging walls, and with its brick -carving but faintly seen under successive coats of rough plaster. But -not even the Queen Anne door can destroy the picture any lively -imagination may summon of the nonchalant Nell tripping up and down the -same staircase to be seen to-day, its design of six steps and a door -repeated to the top of the house, belying the legend that Charles once -rode his pony up the stairs. The walnut trees Nell planted have -disappeared, but what is left of the old house stands in a pleasant -green hollow, an oasis in the acrid surroundings of a gas factory, the -paling of which separates it from the outside world not a stone’s throw -from unsuspecting passengers on a No. 11 bus. - -Joseph Addison lived for a time in the old Manor House, and two of his -letters, written to the Lord Warwick whose mother he afterwards married, -describe the bird concerts in the neighbouring woods. - -If anyone wants to know exactly what the place looked like in Nell -Gwynne’s day, a very interesting account of it may be found in a book -written by a French London-lover, called _Fulham Old and New_. It is now -out of print, but may be consulted at the Fulham Public Library, reached -by any of the buses travelling westward along the Fulham Road. - -All this is ancient history, of which there is little trace to-day. The -shades of Sir Robert Walpole, Dean Swift, Fielding and Smollett, and -good Dr. Burney, Fanny’s father, who was organist of Chelsea Hospital -and buried in its now closed cemetery, may still haunt Chelsea; but the -actual homes of the people of living memory make a more vivid appeal. -Chelsea still keeps up the reputation of being the haunt of famous -people. Unlike the inhabitants of the Paris Latin Quarter, artists and -poets who have once breathed her air do not remove to more fashionable -Mayfair streets when they have “arrived.” - -And what a brilliant band of them were found in the Chelsea of the -nineteenth century! Meredith wrote _The Ordeal of Richard Feverel_ at -No. 7 Hobury Street; Charles and Henry Kingsley spent their youth in the -old rectory in Church Street when their father was rector of Chelsea Old -Church; George Eliot moved her household gods to No. 4 Cheyne Walk, the -beautiful house where Daniel Maclise, the early Victorian painter, had -lived, only three short weeks before her death; and Cecil Lawson, the -painter of _The Harvest Moon_ in the Tate Gallery, lived at No. 15. - -A volume might be written about Cheyne Walk alone; those pleasant -red-brick houses with their wrought-iron railings were the homes of some -of the greatest geniuses of the Victorian age. Turner lived at 118 for -the four years before his death in 1851: Rossetti lived at No. 16 with -Swinburne and W. M. Rossetti. Meredith had some idea of joining this -_ménage_, but recoiled at the sight of Rossetti’s oft-quoted poached -eggs “bleeding to death” on cold bacon very late in the morning. He paid -a quarter’s rent and decided to live by himself. The Rev. Mr. Haweis was -a later tenant of this famous house, which, in spite of popular -tradition, has no connection with Catherine of Braganza. Mrs. Gaskell, -the authoress of _Cranford_, was born at No. 93. Whistler spent twelve -years at No. 96, and here he painted the portraits of his mother and -Carlyle. - -The painter had many Chelsea houses, from 101 Cheyne Walk, where he -lived for four years from 1873, to the White House in Tite Street which -he built, and, after his quarrel with the architect, adorned with a -truly Whistlerian inscription, now removed, “Except the Lord build the -house, they labour in vain that build it. This house was built by Mr. -X.” - -William de Morgan and Leigh Hunt lived in Chelsea, but the man whose -memory is the most vivid of all this brilliant group was Thomas Carlyle. -His house at 24 Cheyne Row is a memorial museum open to any visitor on -the payment of one shilling, sixpence on Saturday. The house is kept -exactly as it was in the days which Mr. Blunt has so charmingly -described in his book _The Carlyles’ Chelsea Home_. - -I can tell no more about it except from hearsay, for the terrible -loneliness of Hugo’s house in the Place des Vosges and of Balzac’s in -the Rue Raynouard in Paris dissuaded me from visiting any more houses -turned into museums of their owners’ belongings. - -I would rather go to the Chelsea Hospital, that is very much alive with -the presence of remarkably long-lived old men: one of them lived till he -was 123 years and another to 116. They think nothing there of mere -centenarians--they even tell you of one pensioner who had served for -eighty-five years and married at the age of 100. They think that was a -mistake on the whole, but they are secretly proud of it, and also of the -lady warriors--one of them had the domestic-sounding name of Hannah -Snell--who lie buried in the old churchyard among their comrades. - -Visitors can see the hospital every week-day from 10 till dusk, except -for an hour from 12.45 to 1.45, and they may attend the chapel services -on Sunday at 11 A.M. and 6.30, when the pensioners in their brave -scarlet coats remind one of Herkomer’s picture. My advice to you, if you -want to see Chelsea Hospital really well, is to enlist one of the -pensioners as guide. He will show you the old leather black-jacks, and -Grinling Gibbons’ statue of Charles II. in a toga, and the colonnades of -the old Wren building, so fine in its severe simplicity--and the flags -in the chapel, so filmy now with age that they look as if a breath of -wind would blow them to pieces--and the old portraits and many other -arresting things. But what he will like best to exhibit will be the -fragments of the bomb that hit one of the buildings during an air-raid. -He won’t allow you to hold on to the belief that Nell Gwynne had -anything to do with the foundation, but he will tell you a lot of -interesting details about the regulations of the Hospital--how very -little like an institution it is, and you will leave the building with -an added respect for Charles II. - -After strolling about Chelsea one’s mind turns with insistence to the -thought of buns, “r-r-rare Chelsea buns,” as Swift wrote to Stella. -There is now nothing left but the name of Bunhouse Place, at the corner -of Union Street and the Pimlico Road, of the famous shop where 100,000 -buns used to be sold of a Good Friday Eve one hundred and forty years -ago, and where the Georges and their Queens used to drive to fetch their -buns. It was taken down in 1839, but the fasting sightseer--being in -Chelsea and not in Bloomsbury or Bayswater--can easily find other places -to stay his hunger. If he does not belong to the decorative sex--the -phrase is Mr. Wagner’s, not mine--he will doubtless follow that very -knowledgeable guide and betake him to the “Six Bells,” 195 King’s -Road--a short distance from the Chelsea Town Hall, and there find the -comfort that attracts its artist _clientèle_. - -There are other restaurants that are much frequented by the artists of -the quarter:--the “Blue Cockatoo,” in Cheyne Walk, near Oakley Street, -and the “Good Intent,” 316 King’s Road, and a new and yet more -attractive one on the corner of Arthur Street with the enticing name of -“The Good Humoured Ladies.” - -Chelsea is full of interesting shops. The Chelsea Book Club is on the -Embankment by Church Street--its delights must be sampled to be -realised--and next door there is a queer handmade toy shop called -Pomona--why Pomona? - -Across the road is Chelsea Old Church, with its high -seventeenth-century tower. To me its interior is the most satisfying in -London. The spirit of ancient days dwells there, untouched by modern -currents of unrest, and in the tranquil beauty there is no jarring note. -Sir Thomas More was one of its celebrated parishioners--you may see his -monument and the epitaph he wrote himself. - -What a pleasant, kindly, independent spirit had this great Chancellor, -who donned the humble surplice of a parish clerk and sang in the choir -unperturbed by the remonstrances of even so great a personage as the -Duke of Norfolk. I always liked the tale of how the latter came to dine -with Sir Thomas in Chelsea and “fortuned to find him at the church in -choir with a surplice on his back singing, and as they went home -together arm in arm, the duke said, ‘God’s Body, God’s Body, my Lord -Chancellor, a parish clerk--a parish clerk! You dishonour the King and -his office!’ And Sir Thomas replied mildly that he did not think the -duke’s master and his would be offended with him for serving God his -Master or thereby count his office dishonoured.” - -I love Chelsea Old Church better than any other London church. It has -nothing of the heavy solidity that smacks of broadcloth and thick gold -watch-chains. The congregation on a summer Sunday evening might be met -with in any village in England. The very altar has no pomp of -embroidered frontal and massive ornaments; it looks almost like a -Jacobean dining-room with its simple oaken table and dignified chairs on -either side. - -The church is filled with enchanting old treasures--chained Bibles and -old monuments to the great dead who worshipped there, but I cannot find -it in my heart to catalogue them for you as if it were a museum. Enter -those dim walls and see for yourself, and you will love it as did that -lover of England from across the sea whose epitaph is not the least -among the beautiful things of Chelsea Old Church: - - In memory of Henry James, Novelist - Born in New York, 1843. Died in Chelsea, 1916 - Lover and interpreter of the fine - amenities of brave decisions and generous - loyalties: resident of this parish, who - renounced a cherished citizenship to give his - allegiance to England in the first - year of the Great War. - -In other churches with their solemn balconies and air of chill -emptiness, it is difficult to imagine the things that have happened -there in other days. But in Chelsea Old Church, which somehow always -seems peopled with friendly ghosts and never lonely, one can almost see -Henry VIII. being married secretly to Jane Seymour before the public -ceremony, and hear the cadence of Dr. John Donne’s voice as he preached -the funeral oration of the woman he had immortalised in _The Autumnal -Beauty_. - - No spring nor summer beauty hath such grace - As I have seen in one autumnal face. - -I think of all the great people who lie buried here the most fascinating -is this Lady Danvers, George Herbert’s mother, whose “great and harmless -wit, cheerful gravity and obliging behaviour,” attracted so many friends -and among them Dr. Donne. She must have been an adorable mother. I -sometimes wonder if the care of her ten children ever made her late for -church, and if it were some memory of his boyhood days that made her -saintly son write with the cheerful gravity he may have inherited, - - Oh be drest, - Stay not for the last pin, - Thus hell doth jest away thy blessings and extremely flout thee - Thy clothes being fast but thy soul loose about thee. - -Mrs. Herbert came to live in Chelsea when she married Sir John Danvers, -after she had “brought up her children carefully and put them in good -courses for making their fortunes.” Danvers House, where she and her -husband lived, gave its name to Danvers Street, at the corner of which -Crosby Hall now stands. - - -THE CHELSEA PHYSIC GARDEN - - “God Almighty first planted a garden.” - BACON. - - -One of the things I like best in Chelsea is the old herb garden, the -Chelsea Physic Garden, that makes a home of peace with its base on the -Embankment and the western angle at the beginning of Cheyne Walk and -the end of the Royal Hospital Road, once called the Queen’s Road in -honour of Catherine of Braganza, Charles II.’s Queen. - -My friendship with the garden is based on no intimate acquaintance, for -not to every one is it given to pass the iron gates that guard its -fragrant stillness. If you would do more than gaze through the iron bars -at this enchanted space that dreams away the year round undisturbed, you -must write to the Clerk of the Trustees of the London Parochial -Charities, 3 Temple Gardens, E.C.4, and ask for a ticket of admission to -the most ancient Botanical Garden in England. - -Once you have taken the trouble to secure this card you may stroll along -the paths of the Chelsea Physic Garden that are much as they were when -Evelyn went there on 7th August, 1685, to visit “Mr. Wats, keeper of the -Apothecaries’ Garden of Simples at Chelsea,” and admire the innumerable -rarities there, the “tree bearing Jesuit’s bark, which had done such -wonders in Quartan agues.” - -The Apothecaries’ Society laid out the garden about two hundred and -fifty years ago. They leased the ground at that time, but later on Sir -Hans Sloane gave them the freehold with one of those quaint conditions -attached that lend a refreshing grace to a legal transaction. - -The Apothecaries had to despatch 2000 specimens of distinct plants, -grown in the garden well dried and preserved and sent in batches of 50, -every year to the Royal Society. One would like to know what the Royal -Society did with them, but the most interesting things in history are so -often left out. - -In 1899 the garden was handed over to the Trustees of the London -Parochial Charities, who maintain this delectable if deserted London -corner for the teaching of botany and for providing opportunity and -material for botanical investigation. - -Perhaps it was the attraction of the Physic Garden that influenced the -choice of the Huguenot market gardeners who settled in Chelsea when they -were driven from their own country by the Revocation of the Edict of -Nantes in 1685. It startled me to find that at the time when England was -merry, the Guilds were every bit as dictatorial as the Trades Unions are -to-day. More so, in fact, for while a goodly percentage of our workers -and nearly all our waiters are now said to be foreigners, none of the -foreign workmen of the seventeenth century were allowed to carry on -their trades in London and compete with their English confrères. - -So the hatters went to Wandsworth and the silk mercers to Spitalfields, -and the nurserymen chose the village of Chelsea lying two miles out of -London along the river bank. - -Their spirits may still hover among the perfumed beauty of the annual -Chelsea Flower Show of the Royal Horticultural Society. It is held in -the grounds of the Chelsea Hospital once a year at the end of May or the -beginning of June, when the delicate loveliness of the flowers attracts -an immense number of garden lovers. - -And now to tell you how to reach the Chelsea Hospital, the Flower Show -and Ranelagh Gardens. - -I have never been able to discover whether the extreme reluctance of the -British to give a detailed address is due to a naïve belief that -everyone is born into this world with an intimate knowledge of the -topography of London, or to a malicious delight in puzzling the -ignorant, but I have a deeply-rooted conviction that the maze was an -English invention. So to the stranger bewildered by the laconic -“Chelsea” on the cards of admission to the Flower Show I would say that -it is reached either by the District Railway to Sloane Square station -and then a short walk down Sloane Street to Pimlico Road, or by the 11 -or the 46 bus that stops at the corner of Pimlico Road and Lower Sloane -Street. - -The Flower Show is one of the most charming events of the London season. -In no other city in the world may you see anything like this meeting of -the great brotherhood of gardeners of every social rank gathered to -admire the gorgeous achievements of the grand masters of the art of -growing flowers; where peeresses humbly consult horny-handed experts and -frivolous young men reveal unsuspected enthusiasms for blue aquilegias. - -The adjacent Ranelagh Gardens are often called Chelsea Hospital Gardens, -perhaps to avoid confusion with the grounds of the Ranelagh Club at -Barnes. They are closed to the general public during the three days of -the Flower Show, so if you go to see the flowers you have the added and -unexpected pleasure of wandering through the green glades of Ranelagh -undisturbed by the shouts of the Pimlico children. - -There are no flowers in these gardens, but they have a peculiar charm of -their own. There is none of the flatness of Hyde Park--the undulating -paths and quaint bosquets belong to another day when powdered courtiers -pursued fair ladies in the pleasure gardens that were so much the -fashion. The story of Ranelagh is bound up with the history of the -Georgian period. There is not a book of memoirs but mentions this famous -pleasure resort. Walpole said of it, “Nobody goes anywhere else; -everybody goes there. My Lord Chesterfield is so fond of it that he says -he has ordered all his letters to be directed there.” - -It is quite true that everybody went there. Johnson, whom I find as hard -to keep out of the description of any part of London as Mr. Dick found -it to keep King Charles’s head out of his memorial, was very fond of -going to Ranelagh. Boswell says that, to the remark that there was not -half a guinea’s worth of pleasure in seeing Ranelagh, he answered, “No, -but there is half a guinea’s worth of inferiority to other people in not -having seen it.” - -There is little left of the actual gardens where Johnson, Sir Joshua -Reynolds, Oliver Goldsmith, Walpole, the beautiful Duchess of -Devonshire, the King of Denmark, the Spanish ambassadors and the entire -English Court used to take part in the merry-making, but you may be sure -they all walked up the broad avenue of trees that once shaded the -brilliant scene. In the seventeenth century the property belonged to -Viscount Ranelagh, an Irish nobleman by whose name the gardens are still -called. - -When the estate was bought by a syndicate after his death a huge rotunda -was built with boxes all round. It must have been something like the -Albert Hall, and every night the place was filled with fine ladies and -wits, rubbing shoulders with all classes of society come to gaze at the -attractions and listen to the music. The vogue of Ranelagh lasted many -years and only ended when the rotunda was pulled down at the beginning -of the nineteenth century. - -Every now and then one meets pessimistic creatures, usually artists, who -shake their heads and say that Chelsea is going to the dogs--by which -they mean that all the old studios are being taken by speculators with -the intention of converting them into flats. - -But the Chelsea of to-day is as charming as it ever was. There are just -as many famous inhabitants. Sargent, Derwent Wood, Augustus John, Glyn -Philpot, Wilson Steer and many another well-known genius, all live -within sound of the “Six Bells” and some studios must have been saved -from the speculator judging from the number of Chelsea addresses in this -year’s Academy catalogue. - - - - -CHAPTER II - -KNIGHTSBRIDGE TO SOHO - - -KNIGHTSBRIDGE - - “Go where we may--rest where we will, - Eternal London haunts us still.” - MOORE. - -Few people think of connecting the name of Knightsbridge with anything -less modern than the big departmental shops, the Barracks or the cosy -houses on the fringe of Mayfair and Belgravia. - -Yet there was a town of Knightsbrigg in the fourteenth century, in -Edward the Third’s day, when the Black Prince and his knights must often -have crossed the Westbourne stream by the bridge built just where the -Albert Gate now stands. Mr. Davis in his _History of Knightsbridge_ -gives as the origin of the name the story that “in ancient time certain -knights had occasion to go from London to wage war for some holy -purpose. Light in heart if heavy in arms, they passed through this -district on their way to receive the blessing awarded to the faithful by -the Bishop of London at Fulham. For some cause or other, however, a -quarrel ensued between two of the band, and a combat was determined -upon to decide the dispute. They fought on the bridge which spanned the -stream of the Westbourne, while from its banks the struggle was watched -by their partisans. Both fell, if the legend may be trusted; and the -place was ever after called Knightsbridge in remembrance of their fatal -feud.” - -Walking down the Brompton Road from the Knightsbridge Tube station it is -difficult to realise that not a hundred and fifty years ago “the stream -ran open, the streets were unpaved and unlighted, and a Maypole was -still on the village green.” - -Yes, a few hundred years ago, on that very triangle of green grass you -see to-day outside Mr. Tattersall’s big gateway, diagonally facing the -Knightsbridge Tube station, men and maidens danced round the maypole on -the Knightsbridge village green. - -I have a special weakness for that three-cornered grass plot. People -pass it every day and look scornfully at it--if they look at all. No one -knows that it is all that is left of a piece of Merrie England. Little -by little it has been pared away. The last maypole was taken down at the -end of the eighteenth century, and the watchhouse and pound that Addison -mentions in the _Spectator_ disappeared about a quarter of a century -later. The little bit of green has watched the evolution of the tiny -chapel of the Elizabethan lazar-house that once existed near by into the -stately and uninteresting Holy Trinity Church, and the gradual rise of -the immense departmental shops to take the place of the village silk -mercers of yesterday. - -There is a tradition that part of the green was once used as a burial -ground in the time of the Great Plague, but since there is no record of -this gruesome fact, I refuse to believe it. - - -TATTERSALL’S - - “Satirists may say what they please about the rural - enjoyments of a London citizen on Sunday.” - WASHINGTON IRVING. - -One was brought up to believe in the country Sunday after-dinner -inspection of property, where unlucky week-end visitors are paraded to -admire their host’s corn and cattle, but I have often wondered what the -English nation did with itself when in town of a Sunday afternoon. I -know now. They go to Tattersall’s and look at the horses to be sold next -day. Tattersall’s on a fine Sunday afternoon in the season is like a big -reception by a not too exclusive hostess. Pretty young girls in charming -frocks make the tour of the stables with their menfolk, and very -horsey-looking people try to persuade their neighbours that they know as -much about horses as the more unobtrusive individuals at whose nod -grooms fly to strip their charges for inspection. - -Since Richard Tattersall, the last Duke of Kingston’s training-groom, -opened his auction mart when his patron died in 1773, and founded his -fortunes by buying Highflier for £2500, Tattersall’s has grown into a -national institution with a world-wide reputation. It still belongs to -the same family, but they moved in 1865 from Grosvenor Place to the -present buildings, where every Monday all the year round the auctions -take place, and every Sunday in the season dukes and jockeys, horse -dealers and country squires, society ladies and trainers’ wives, stroll -up and down admiring the horses. - - -ELY HOUSE - - “Queen Bess was Harry’s daughter.” - RUDYARD KIPLING. - -As you come out of the Tube station, the view of Dover Street with its -irregular skyline is a very modern one. It looks a rather dull, -uninteresting place, given over to commerce and clubs, but like most of -the Piccadilly and Pall Mall quarter, it is very reminiscent of the -Stuart period. The history goes back to the respectable date of 1642, -when the Clarendon estate was cut up into Dover, Albemarle, Bond and -Stafford streets. - -Out of Peckham, that haunt of the prosperous City man of those times, -had come Sir Thomas Bond, the forerunner of the Messrs. Cubitt of 1921, -with his syndicate, dealing death to historical associations and -possessing none of the delicacy of feeling that made John Evelyn turn -his head the other way when he drove by with Lord Clarendon the late -owner. - -Evelyn himself lived here, close to the house of Lord Dover, whose name -was given to the street. Pope’s friend, Dr. Arbuthnot, and Lady Byron, -both lodged in Dover Street, but by far the most interesting house is -No. 37, a brick building of unobtrusive, classic simplicity, that has a -story connecting it with the reign of Queen Elizabeth. - -You might pass up and down Dover Street many times without noticing the -significant bishop’s mitre, carved in stone halfway up the middle of the -façade. This was once the distinguishing mark of the town house of the -bishops of Ely that they bought in 1772 from the Government in exchange -for all claim on their Hatton Garden property in Ely Place. Nowadays one -thinks of diamond merchants in connection with Hatton Garden, but in -Elizabeth’s day it was the Naboth’s vineyard that she coveted on behalf -of her handsome Chancellor, Sir Christopher Hatton. The bishops were -forced to grant him a lease for the rent of a red rose, ten loads of -hay, and ten pounds, the right to walk in their rival’s gardens whenever -they chose, and to gather twenty baskets of roses every year. - -The bone of contention brought no luck to anyone. Hatton was imprudent -enough to borrow the money for improvements from his queen. She insisted -on the bishops conveying the property to her till the sum should be -repaid, and when one of them jibbed at carrying out the terms of this -settlement, the Queen wrote him an Elizabethan epistle: - - Proud prelate! I understand you are backward in complying with your - agreement: but I would have you understand that I, who made you - what you are, can unmake you; and if you do not forthwith fulfil - your engagement, by God, I will immediately unfrock you, Elizabeth. - -Sir Christopher Hatton was never able to repay his mistress’s loan. It -broke his heart, says an old chronicler, and though the queen relented -at the end, and came to visit him, “there is no pulley can draw up a -heart once cast down, though a Queen herself should set her hand -thereunto.” He died disconsolate, in his coveted palace of Ely, in 1591. - -After all these vicissitudes, the diocese got back its property at the -Restoration, but in 1772 they gave up all claim to it in exchange for -the mansion in Dover Street. - -The latter is a stately house, with a long marble hall and staircase, -and the bishops of Elizabeth’s day would doubtless be mildly surprised -if they knew that it is now used by the men and women belonging to the -Albemarle Club. - - -LONDON MUSEUM - - “I turned me from that place in humble wise.” - JOHN DRINKWATER. - -Quite near Dover Street, if you only knew it, is the one place where you -may read the story of London spread out before you page by page better -than anywhere else. But very few people can even tell you how to find -it. - -I once saw Lancaster House called the Cinderella of London -museums--perhaps because it is so charming and so neglected. It is near -no bus route nor railway station, yet this London Carnavalet is not so -very far from the Dover Street Tube station and either of the two routes -by which it is reached from that point are delightful walks. You may -enter Green Park and stroll along the Queen’s Walk till you come to a -passage-way to the left--not the first little narrow one where two -people have to walk Indian file into St. James’s Place, but the second, -that leads through a wider gateway, closed at 10 p.m., into Stable Yard. - -Or else you can go down St. James’s Street, past the passage leading -into the quaint little eighteenth-century courtyard of Pickering Place, -towards St. James’s Palace with its beautiful old sixteenth-century -brick gateway in Cleveland Row. Skirt the Palace to the right and you -will come to Stable Yard, and in Stable Yard is Lancaster House. - -It is a stately place. Queen Victoria once said to the Duchess of -Sutherland: “I come from my house to your palace,” but shorn of the -groups of chairs and tables and the stately company moving up and down -the magnificent staircase, the yellow and red marble walls seem -cheerless and repellant. - -Now and then a little white notice is pasted on the door with the -announcement that the museum, which is usually open on summer Fridays -and Sundays from 2 to 6, and all other days from 10 to 6 and till 4 -o’clock in winter, will be closed to the public for an afternoon or -evening. The Government are entertaining distinguished strangers in the -spacious salons, and then Lancaster House lives again for a few hours -the brilliant existence it had in the nineteenth century, when it was -called Stafford House and the Duke of Sutherland dispensed splendid -hospitality there. - -Amusing tales of these political parties, and of the guests, and of many -other things, are told in Mr. Arthur Dasent’s delightful _Story of -Stafford House_, that is sold for a modest sum just inside the door. - -In 1913 Lord Leverhulme bought the remainder of the lease that expires -in 1940, from the Duke of Sutherland, and handed it over to the trustees -of the London Museum to house the collection of London antiquities then -exhibited in Kensington Palace. - -The name of Stafford House was changed to Lancaster House as a -compliment to the King, who is Duke of Lancaster, and in memory of the -generosity of a Lancashire man. - -It is an entrancing place, where you can trace this great city’s history -from the time men used flints to the war that is too near for its -souvenirs to be anything but harrowing. - -One may walk through the ages, from the Prehistoric room, through -Roman, Saxon and Mediæval rooms, on the ground floor, and, then, -going up the grand staircase, see how men lived in London in Tudor, -seventeenth-century, Cromwellian and Charles II.’s days, and so on, -through the seventeenth-and eighteenth-century rooms, to the costume and -Royal rooms, where you pause dumbfounded before the going-away dress of -stiff white silk poplin embroidered with gold that Queen Mary wore the -day of her wedding, 6th July, 1893. - -Down on the ground floor, past the Temple Crusader with the Mestrovic -countenance, in the west corridor, is the Gold and Silver Room, with the -beautiful jewellery that some bygone Jacobean jeweller buried in Wood -Street, perhaps when the menace of the Great Fire was upon him. - -Of what happened to him there is no trace, and the lovely chains and -rings lay buried for two and a half centuries. They may for all we know -have been stolen and buried by thieves who met their end on Tyburn Tree -before they could enjoy their booty. Admirers of Lalique’s work in the -Place Vendôme will see how this unknown Englishman solved the same -problems of the great French artist 250 years ago. The delicate enamel -chains and lovely cameos and carved chalcedony and glass and onyx are -prettier than many a jeweller’s stock to-day, and they must look -disdainfully across at the case of heavy Victorian atrocities which our -grandmothers wore so complacently. - - -ST. JAMES’S CHURCH - -I do not remember ever seeing anyone cross the paved courtyard of St. -James’s Church, Piccadilly, on a week-day, for though it was one of -Wren’s favourites among the churches he built, and inside there is a -font carved by Grinling Gibbons, it has an air of sanctimonious -respectability that is not very alluring, but the font with its carving -of the Fall of Man, etc., is well worth seeing. - - -THE HAYMARKET SHOPPE - - “Only far memories stray - Of a past once lovely, ...” - WALTER DE LA MARE. - -I have asked many people if they know where to find a perfect example of -an eighteenth-century shop, bow windows little flight of steps and all, -a stone’s throw from Piccadilly Circus--and they look at me in blank -astonishment. - -Yet there it stands, at 34 Haymarket, two doors down from Coventry -Street on the left-hand side, its pot-bellied windows filled with quaint -jars and bottles and more modern packages of the upstart cigarette, that -has ousted the honest snuff which was sold there for two hundred years. - -It belongs to another day and generation, and through the old doorway -the 20th-century passer-by can see the oaken shelves with their rows of -old wooden boxes and snuff jars that used to contain the “King’s Morning -Mixture,” as supplied to His Majesty King George IV. - -The old shop has had many royal customers, and going through the -beautiful Adam screen into the back room, one may be shown, if the -courteous proprietor is not too busy, the accounts of Queen Charlotte, -who bought her snuff here for nineteen years of the Dukes of Cumberland -and Sussex and the Princesses Charlotte and Elizabeth, who also indulged -in the best rappee. - -Most of the great names of eighteenth-and nineteenth-century England may -be found in these old ledgers. David Garrick and Inigo Jones were -customers, and so were my Lord Halifax, Lady Shrewsbury and the Duchess -of Grafton. Beau Brummell’s accounts lie, cheek by jowl as he would have -them, with those of the Earl of Dorchester and the Duke of Bedford, and -the long array of famous names of men and women to be found in the -yellowing papers might well have served as a list of guests present at -any brilliant political function of the time. - -The snuff-taking of those days has passed with the lace jabots and the -silk knee-breeches, but the fashion died hard, and so recent a figure as -Lord Russell of Killowen was one of the last of the famous snuff-takers. -The twentieth century turns up its nose at what it calls a disgusting -habit, yet it had its graces and was responsible for the creation of the -beautiful boxes and bottles now treasured as heirlooms. - -The actual owners of this fascinating shop have carried on the business -in their family - -[Illustration: THE OLD SNUFF HOUSE, 34 ST. JAMES’ HAYMARKET] - -since 1780, when the founder, M. Fribourg, retired. One of the present -partners, Mr. George Evans, has written a delightful monograph on the -Old Snuff House of Fribourg and Treyer, “At the Rasp and Crown, at the -upper End of the Haymarket, London.” It is a charming book, filled with -illustrations and reminiscences of the leisurely days before the arrival -of the departmental store, when an old-established firm had time to have -intimate courtly relations with its customers. - -What Lord Petersham could now change his mind and return 216 pounds of -anything and be urbanely credited with £75 12s.; and do grateful -customers now make presents of gold-lined amboyna snuff boxes to mark -their satisfaction? - -If they do, I am as ignorant of the fact as the ordinary pedestrian of -the historical interest of the unnoticed shop he passes daily on his way -to Piccadilly Circus. - - -A KING IN SOHO - - “Man calleth thee his wealth, who made thee rich - And while he digs out thee, falls in the ditch.” - GEORGE HERBERT. - -Few Londoners can tell you where a king lies buried in Soho. Shelley may -have been thinking of him when he gave his mad invitation to the old -lady in the Highgate bus, to “sit upon the ground and tell sad stories -of the deaths of kings,” but if so his knowledge is not shared by many -people. - -If I have made you curious, walk along Coventry Street from Piccadilly -Circus, leaving Leicester Square, that “pouting-place of princes,” on -your right, and turn up Wardour Street past Lisle Street and Gerrard -Street that was fashionable in Charles II.’s day and where Dryden and -Burke and Lord Mohun lived and where Johnson and Reynolds founded the -Literary Club that still exists in another meeting-place. Then, crossing -Shaftesbury Avenue, you will come to the old graveyard at the back of -the church of St. Anne, which is now a playground and only open till -four in the winter months and during the hours of service on Sundays. On -the wall you will find a tablet to the memory of the unlucky Theodore, -King of Corsica, who fled from France, a bankrupt, only to be seized on -his arrival in London and flung into the Fleet prison. “Near this -place,” runs the inscription, “is interred Theodore, King of Corsica, -who died in this neighbourhood Dec. 11, 1756, immediately after leaving -the King’s Bench Prison by the Benefit of the Act of Insolvency. In -consequence of which he registered his Kingdom of Corsica for the use of -his Creditors.” To which Horace Walpole has appended the following -stanza: - - The grave, great Teacher, to a level brings - Heroes and beggars, galley-slaves and kings. - But Theodore this moral learned ere dead; - Fate poured its lessons on his living head. - Bestowed a kingdom, but denied him bread. - -The kindly soul who bailed out fallen Majesty a fortnight before his -death and then gave him decent burial, was, according to the verger of -St. Anne, an Italian candle merchant from Old Compton Street, on the -site of whose shop is now that excellent non-profiteering restaurant -known as Le Dîner Français. But I prefer, with the Blue Book, to think -that the Samaritan was a tailor, grown rich, perhaps, snipping the -embroidered waistcoats of H.R.H. Frederick, Prince of Wales, when the -latter squabbled with his royal parents and removed in a pettish mood to -Leicester House hard by. - -The only other interesting things I could find in this old church were -the tomb of Hazlitt, immediately below King Theodore’s memorial -stone,--the old wooden drain pipes, lately disinterred, that lie on the -Shaftesbury Avenue side of the church, and the tablet within, to the -memory of “The Beloved Mother-in-Law.” - -St. Anne’s was built in 1685, a significant year in the annals of this -neighbourhood. It was the date of the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes, -which sent the Huguenots flocking to London, to take up their residence -here, and of the Battle of Sedgemoor, when the Duke of Monmouth, who had -a mansion in the Square, used as his watchword the cry “So Ho!” and -unconsciously christened the whole district. - - - - -CHAPTER III - -TRAFALGAR SQUARE TO FLEET STREET - - “For such things do go on in Fleet Street as no man has - written yet.” - RICHARD JEFFERIES. - -One of the most enthralling and endearing things about London is the way -the memory of the great people, whose names are so familiar that you -feel you would know their bearers if you met them, pervades the city and -crops up in such very unexpected places. If business ever took you -through that evil-smelling fishy Lower Thames Street, you would discover -that Chaucer lived there for six years when he was Comptroller of the -Petty Customs in the Port of London. You stroll through the little -Cloisters in Westminster Abbey, of all places in the world, and some one -tells you that Lady Hamilton once lived in the Littlington Tower, when -she was servant to Mr. Hare and had no thought that she would ever -inspire a hero to great victories. You think that when you have seen Sir -Thomas More’s tomb in Chelsea Old Church, and Crosby Hall near by, you -have exhausted the souvenirs of his life, but you find him again in -Westminster Hall, where he was condemned to death--in the Deanery where -he spent two months in charge of the Abbot of Westminster,--in Lincoln’s -Inn--in Milk Street in the City, where he was born, “the brightest star -that ever shone in that Via Lactea”--in the church of St. Lawrence -Jewry where he lectured, and in the Tower where he died. - -Dr. Johnson, of course, was ubiquitous. He went everywhere and usually -said something noteworthy about everything. One of the great -difficulties in writing this book has been to refrain from quoting him -too frequently, and Pepys is even worse. The kindly official in the -Clothworkers’ Hall (where I lunched once on a special occasion) said to -me: “Samuel Pepys, Ma’am, Pepys the great Diarist--you may have heard of -him,” and I felt like replying: “My good man, I have been with your -Pepys through Chelsea--and in St. Margaret’s, Westminster, where he was -married--I have seen his portrait at the Royal Society Rooms in -Burlington House and his house in Buckingham Street--the church of St. -Bride, where his birth was registered--St. Lawrence Jewry, where he was -disappointed with Wilkins’ sermon--All Hallows, Barking, that, as he -wrote on the 5th September, 1666, only just escaped the Great Fire--his -parish church of St. Olave’s, where he worshipped, and Hyde Park, where -he used to go driving with his wife.” - - -THE STRAND - - “Through the long Strand together let us stray, - With thee conversing I forget the way.” - GAY. - -Of all delightful places to meet memories of famous bygone people, the -most intriguing is the Strand. A superficial glance at this modern -bustling street shows little of the past still clinging about it. But a -little further on you will discover, if you look for them, a bit of -Roman London, a Renaissance chapel, a statue with a history, a lovely -group of eighteenth-century houses, the water gate of a former fine -mansion on the riverside, and a church that links us to the time of the -Danish invasion. - -The Londoner would probably tell you that Piccadilly Circus is the -centre of his city; the historian, St. Paul’s; but to the foreigner, the -visitor from overseas, or to the Anglo-Indian back from the East, the -centre will always be Charing Cross. - -It has been a starting-point for the traveller from the days when the -little old village of Charing was used as a halting-place on the way to -the City or to the Royal Palace of Westminster. Probably that is the -true derivation of the name; “La Charrynge” meant the Turning, the great -bend where the two roads met, but a prettier tradition derives its name -from Edward I.’s dear queen (“chère Reine”). Another cross to her memory -once stood here, the most beautiful of all those set up by the sorrowing -king wherever her bier rested on its journey from Grantham to -Westminster Abbey. Cromwell’s Parliament, with its passion for -destruction, pulled it down in 1647, and the column which now stands in -the courtyard in front of the station is only a memorial modelled as -far as possible on the original design. It was set up by Barry about -sixty years ago, but it is already so weather-beaten that many people -are under the amiable delusion that it is the very cross erected in -1291. - -The exact position of the old cross is now covered by King Charles I. on -horseback, facing the scene of his death in Whitehall, and this statue -has had an even more adventurous history. - -It was cast originally in 1633 and after the king’s execution it became -so unpopular that Parliament sold it to a brazier to be melted down. -With an eye to the possibilities of the future that a diplomat might -envy, this man cannily buried the statue and did a roaring trade with -the Royalists in relics supposed to have been made from the fragments. -After the Restoration the statue quietly came to light again, and was -set up in its present position in 1674 with popular rejoicings. Its -tribulations were not yet over. The day of the burning of Her Majesty’s -Theatre, the sword, a real one of the period, that hung at the side, was -broken off, and it has never been replaced. - -Another curious thing about this statue lies in the absence of girths to -the saddle or trappings on the horse, and it is said that when this -oversight was pointed out to the sculptor Le Sueur, he was so overcome -with mortification that he committed suicide on the spot. - -In the days when London was no bigger than one of our second-rate -provincial towns, Charing Cross was its market square. Here stood the -pillory, even as late as the beginning of the last century; here were -read the Royal proclamations, and here were the booths of the showmen -who dealt in giants and fat ladies,--it was here, too, that Punch made -his first appearance in England in 1666. Where the railway station now -stands was Hungerford Market, and Trafalgar Square occupies the yard of -what were once the Royal Mews, where the king’s falcons were kept till -they were replaced by the king’s horses. It is rather odd that the word -“mews” is now always associated with stables, for it once meant the pens -or coops in which moulting falcons were kept (from the French _muer_--to -moult). Geoffrey Chaucer, who lodged at Westminster, was in his time -Clerk of the King’s Works and of the Royal Mews. - - -WATER GATES - - “In some parts of London we may go back through the - whole English history, perhaps through the history of man.” - LEIGH HUNT. - -People seem to think that a great deal of time and energy must be spent -if they wish to see anything of historic London, and they pass by, -unnoticed, many of the most interesting reminders of bygone periods, -just because they may see them every day. - -Buckingham Street, leading out of the Strand, is only a stone’s throw -from Trafalgar Square and Charing Cross and it is full of historic -memories. What stories the beautiful old water gate at its foot could -tell of the days when the silver Thames washed up and down its grey -stone steps, and of the famous people who used to take boat there! - -It was built by my Lord Duke of Buckingham, that hated favourite of -James and Charles the First, who cuts such a sorry figure in English -history books and such a romantic one in the pages of Dumas. He was the -father of the extravagant, erratic George Villiers, Duke of Buckingham, -whom Scott describes in _Peveril of the Peak_, and Pope more pungently: - - Who in the course of one revolving moon, - Was chemist, fiddler, statesman and buffoon. - -Lely painted a wonderful portrait of the son. It hangs in the National -Portrait Gallery, but even more interesting is the Vandyck picture of -him with his brother Francis, painted when they were boys, and lately -bought for the National Gallery. - -With his father murdered, and his property confiscated by the -Commonwealth and given to General Fairfax, the duke solved his problem -by marrying the General’s daughter and heiress, a solution for which -Cromwell made him pay by a sojourn in the Tower, where he was an -intermittent resident. But in spite of his wife’s fortune the man who, -“was everything by turns and nothing long” was obliged to sell the -magnificent mansion that his father had re-built in 1625 on the site of -the old York House. - -The earlier mansion had been the home of the Bishop of Norwich in Henry -VIII.’s time, of Charles Brandon, Duke of Suffolk, of the Archbishop of -York, who gave the house its name, and of Sir Francis Bacon who loved -the place and only left it for the Tower. - -In 1672 the second York House was sold for £30,000, with the stipulation -that the streets built on the site were to be given the Duke’s names. -They are quite easy to trace: there is George Court, with the George -Tavern, where you may eat your chop to the sound of an orchestra of -singing birds; hard by are Villiers and Duke Streets; “Of” Lane has been -rechristened York Place,--and now we are back in Buckingham Street. - -The new quarter soon had famous tenants. John Evelyn lived for a year in -Villiers Street, and forty years later Sir Richard Steele had a house -there. No. 14, Buckingham Street, has been much remodelled since Samuel -Pepys lived there and walked down the steps of the water gate on his way -to visit his friend Mr. Cole in Brentford. There is a tablet on the -house to tell the passer-by that the Earl of Oxford, William Etty and -Clarkson Stanfield, the marine painter, also lived here. - -The house opposite looks far more modern, but within the very new outer -walls of the offices of the Royal National Pension Fund for Nurses are -preserved much of the exquisite carving, ceiling paintings, and -elaborate stucco work that belong to the time when Peter the Great, Czar -of all the Russias, came over to England in 1698 and lodged in these -very rooms. David Hume, Rousseau, Fielding and Black all lived at No. -15, now incorporated in No. 16, but the Dickens lover will ignore these -famous names and only remember that the rooms at the top of the house -are the very ones taken by Miss Betsy Trotwood for David Copperfield. - -With the exception perhaps of that Shah of Persia who spent a happy -holiday in England in the reign of the late Queen Victoria, I suppose we -never had a more eccentric royal visitor than Peter the Great. No doubt -that is the reason why the memories of his brief stay here still seem to -cling about so many parts of London. This strange being, half-barbarian, -half-genius, had great ambitions and achieved them. As Voltaire says: -“He gave a polish to his people and was himself a savage; he taught them -the art of war, of which he was himself ignorant; inspired by the sight -of a small boat on the river Moskwa, he erected a powerful fleet and -made himself an expert and active shipwright, pilot, sailor and -commander; he changed the manners, customs and laws of the Russians, and -lives in their memory as the father of his country.” - -Ships and shipbuilding were his passion. He went to Holland and worked -in the yards there as a mechanic, calling himself Pieter Timmermann, -until he had mastered the manual part of his craft. Then he came to -England to study the theory of shipbuilding. King William III. placed -the house in Buckingham Street, so conveniently close to the river, at -his disposal, and invited him to Court when he felt inclined. But Pieter -hated crowds and ceremonies and preferred to spend his days in hard work -and his evenings drinking and smoking with boon companions. - -At the end of a month, finding himself too far from the dockyards, he -moved to Deptford, and put up at Sayes Court, kindly lent to him by John -Evelyn. He was a dreadful tenant. We all know how Evelyn loved his -garden,--but the Czar and his rough crowd trampled the flower-beds and -spoilt the grass-plots, and trundled wheelbarrows through the diarist’s -pet holly-hedge for exercise. “There is a house full of people _right -nasty_!” wrote Evelyn’s indignant servant to his master. They ate and -drank enormously,--eight bottles of sack after dinner were nothing to -Pieter, and listen to this for a breakfast menu for twenty-one persons: -half a sheep, a quarter of lamb, ten pullets, twelve chickens, three -quarts of brandy, six quarts of mulled wine, seven dozen of eggs, with -salad in proportion. - -Much of his time, when he was not gathering - -[Illustration: WATER GATE, YORK HOUSE] - -the vast store of information that he afterwards used to such excellent -advantage, the Czar spent sailing on the river, and in the evening he -would repair with favoured members of his suite to a public-house in -Great Tower Street. The old tavern has been rebuilt, but the name “The -Czar of Muscovy,” and later “The Czar’s Head,” that it adopted as a -compliment to its imperial visitor, is there to this day, and you may -see it close to the city merchant’s house at No. 34 that is noticed in -another chapter. - -The “right nasty” people did not stay long, luckily for Evelyn’s peace -of mind, but returned to London for another month or two. Then saying -good-bye to King William, who had certainly treated him very well, the -Czar pressed into his hand a little twist of brown paper, in which was -found a ruby valued at £10,000, and sailed away home for Russia, taking -with him no fewer than 500 English captains, scientists, pilots, -gunners, surgeons, sail-makers, anchor-smiths, coppersmiths and the -like, all ready for adventure in the unknown, according to the tradition -of their race. - -To come back to the Strand. It is fairly certain that the rather heavy -and unattractive stone archway and steps at the bottom of Essex Street -(at the other end of the Strand) formed the water gate of old Essex -House, once occupied by the Earl of Essex, Queen Elizabeth’s favourite. - -It compares very badly with the water gate in Buckingham Street, which -was designed by Inigo Jones in 1625, and built by Nicholas Stone the -master mason, who carved one of the lions on its frontage. The London -climate has blurred the outline of the arms of the Villiers family on -the south side, and the motto “Fidei Coticula Crux” on the north, and -the raising of the Embankment now prevents the waters of the Thames from -swirling round the old stone steps. No monarch had passed through the -water gate since the days of Charles II. until Queen Alexandra came to -open the new building in Buckingham Street in 1908. Its glory has -departed, but there it stands, useless, unnoticed and forgotten, yet how -beautiful! - - -THE ADELPHI - - “I like the spirit of this great London which I feel - around me.” - C. BRONTË. - - -Retracing your steps up Buckingham Street, turn to the right along Duke -Street and John Street, and you will find yourself in the Adelphi, that -oasis of calm quiet so near the roar of the bustling Strand, where -famous authors of the present day like to pitch their luxurious tents. -Note the steep hill up which you climb. This is the roof of the arches -which the brothers Adam built over the site of old Durham House in order -that they might erect their elegant houses on a level with the Strand. -You can still wander in these vaults, if you are lucky enough to find -an open gate; they are curious, and were once a fine rendezvous for evil -characters. - -The Duke of Buckingham’s names are not the only ones to be perpetuated -here. The architects, Robert, John, James and William Adam, all had -streets named after them, and they called the whole quarter the Adelphi -because they were brothers. - -William Street has lately been rechristened Durham House Street, to -remind us that the Adelphi was built on the site of Durham House, where -Lady Jane Grey was born. - -Probably the Adelphi will have to go some day, when a proper bridge for -Charing Cross is built across the river here, but lovers of this little -bit of unspoiled Georgian London will miss its old-world charm and -dignity. - - -ST. CLEMENT DANES - - “Blith be thy chirches, wele sownyng be thy bellis.” - DUNBAR. - -Nowadays, looking eastward up the Strand, the eye is caught by the two -churches of St. Mary-le-Strand and St. Clement Danes, standing isolated -in the centre of the roadway, whilst the traffic roars past on either -side. In the Middle Ages you would still have seen St. Clement’s, though -half engulfed in a rookery of ill-smelling, crazy old timbered houses, -with so narrow a passage between that coachmen called it the “Straits -of St. Clement’s.” But on the site of St. Mary’s stood a maypole, one -hundred feet high, dear to the heart of the city youth for the -merrymakings that took place around it. Such giddy proceedings vexed the -Puritans, who swept it away in an outburst of righteous indignation, but -old customs die hard, and at the Restoration another and still lordlier -pole was set up with royal approval, and dancing and junketings went on -around it for many a long day. - -The church of St. Clement’s takes us back to very ancient history. Some -say that beneath it lie the bones of King Harold and other Danish -invaders. What is pretty certain is that the original church was built, -after the expulsion of the Danes, by the few settlers who, having -married English wives, chose to remain behind, on condition that they -did not stir out of the strip of land that lay between the Isle of -Thorney, now Westminster, and Caer Lud, now Ludgate. - -Travellers from all over the world who have shared the common traditions -of childhood, feel a queer sense of kinship when they pass along the -Strand and suddenly hear the old bells ringing out the familiar tune of -“Oranges and lemons, say the bells of St. Clement’s.” The bells of the -nursery-rhyme are not those of St. Clement Danes, but of the St. -Clement’s, Eastcheap, which for centuries has been in the centre of the -dried fruit trade. - -[Illustration: ST. CLEMENT DANES] - -The bells were famous even in Shakespeare’s day. “We have heard the -chimes at midnight, Master Shallow,” says Falstaff in _Henry IV_. Those -chimes are gone, but the present peal of ten bells, cast in 1693, is as -famous for its music. - -One might write a whole history of church bells, from the time when -Turketul, Abbot of Croyland in Lincolnshire, in the ninth century, -presented his abbey with the great bell GUTHLAC, and added six others -with the rhythmic names of PEGA, BEGA, BETTELIN, BARTHOMEW, TATWIN and -TURKETUL, to make a peal. - -In the early monkish days they looked upon bells as the voices of good -angels: they were blessed and dedicated: the passing bell was tolled to -keep off evil spirits from the dead. Henry VIII., that ruthless -iconoclast, cared little for superstition, and in the general -destruction of the religious houses hundreds of old bells were sold or -melted down. But the pious people of those days would point out how the -Bishop of Bangor, who sold his Cathedral bells, was shortly afterwards -stricken with blindness, and that Sir Miles Partridge won the Jesus -Bells of St. Paul’s from King Henry at play and, proceeding to remove -them and have them melted down, was hanged soon after on Tower Hill. - -The bells of St. Clement’s were added after the church had been rebuilt -in 1692, under the supervision of Sir Christopher Wren, who gave his -services for nothing in his usual generous-hearted way. - -[Illustration: Dʳ. Johnson’s Pew in Sᵗ. Clement Dane’s Church] - -St. Clement’s is dear to all true Londoners as Dr. Johnson’s church. You -may see the very pew where he sat, and there is something about the -solid, handsome structure that seems to fit the thought of the ponderous -great man who worshipped there Sunday by Sunday, striving “to purify and -fortify his soul and hold real communion with the Highest.” It is a fine -and a prosperous church, and so richly endowed that at one time all the -paupers of the neighbourhood used to flock there for the sake of what -they could get. That they were well looked after, the carefully kept -parish registers bear witness as far back as 1558. There are other -interesting entries in the old registers. You may read of the baptism of -Master Robert Cicill, the sonne of ye L. highe Threasurer of England, -and of the marriage of Sir Thomas Grosvenor with Mary Davies, the child -heiress of Ebury Manor, who brought to her husband all those lands of -Pimlico and Belgravia from whose rents the Dukes of Westminster draw the -bulk of their colossal fortune. Her life story has been published -recently by Mr. Charles T. Gatty in his two-volumed _Mary Davies and the -Manor of Ebury_. - - -CHAPEL ROYAL OF THE SAVOY - - “It is a wonderful place ... this London ... and - what do I know of it?”--LORD BEACONSFIELD. - -From St. Mary’s and St. Clement’s it is but a few minutes’ walk back -along the Strand to the Chapel Royal of the Savoy, that once served all -the district, but it is now perhaps the tiniest parish in London west of -Temple Bar. There it stands in its quiet graveyard, all that is left to -remind us of “the fayrest manor in England.” The old palace of the Savoy -was built by Simon de Montfort, that “Cromwell of the Middle Ages,” on -land granted by Henry III. to his wife’s uncle, Peter of Savoy, for -which the said Peter had to pay the not very exorbitant rent of three -barbed arrows. Afterwards it came into the possession of the Dukes of -Lancaster. Here it was, in 1357, that the Black Prince, riding on a -little black hackney, brought his prisoner King John of France, who -stayed here, with brief intervals, till his death, as nobody seemed able -to raise the money for his ransom. And here lived John of Gaunt, with -his numerous household, not least of whom was Geoffrey Chaucer. Later -came Henry IV., who annexed the manor, and since his time it has always -belonged in a particular manner to the reigning house. - -Nothing is left, though, to tell of it, save the chapel, which was begun -by Henry VII. in place of a more ancient one fallen into decay,--and -that strange judicial survival, the Court Leet with view of Frankpledge -of the Manor and Liberty of the Savoy. Few people know that once a year -the jury of the Court, headed by the Beadle with his silver-topped and -carved staff of office, solemnly makes the round to inspect the boundary -marks of the Manor. One is in Child’s Bank, another on the Lyceum stage, -one in Burleigh Street, one by Cleopatra’s Needle, another in Middle -Temple Lawn, where many scuffles have taken place in the past between -the jurymen and indignant Benchers and officers of the Inns of Court -concerning the question of trespass. The Court itself, which dates back -to Saxon days, sits annually about Easter time, and still does “what is -usually called everybody’s business, and nobody’s business,” as a -former High Bailiff wrote. - -The old Roman Bath in Strand Lane is a little beyond St. Clement Dane’s, -and next to the Tube station. That belongs to a later chapter, but a -short way further, on the same side of the road, is another bit of -unnoticed London. - - -PRINCE HENRY’S ROOM - - “London, thou art the flour of Cities all.”--DUNBAR. - -Prince Henry’s room is one of those charming links with the past that -lie unnoticed in the path of thousands who never stop to heed the story. -At No. 17, Fleet Street, close to the ceaseless traffic of the Law -Courts, is an unobtrusive timbered house. Through a low archway you see -an eighteenth-century oaken stairway that leads to a sedate Jacobean -room, where very few people ever come to disturb the peaceful, dignified -atmosphere. The Council of the Duchy of Cornwall is supposed to have -once met here regularly and I believe that from time to time Prince -Henry’s room is now used for the meetings of various associations, but -if you visit it any day between ten and four you will almost certainly -find no one to disturb the ghosts of bygone cavaliers but the war -veteran who passes his days there ruminating on the delinquencies of -historians. - -The house is one of the oldest in the City. It was built in 1610, the -year that Henry, the elder son of James I. of England, was created -Prince of Wales; and the room is known as Prince Henry’s room. Look at -the lovely Jacobean art of the panelling on the west wall, and the -decorated plaster ceiling, where in the centre you will find the device -of this lamented “prince of promise,” who died at the early age of -eighteen. - -Most people say, “Prince Henry! _who_ was Prince Henry?” and very few -connect the name with that little known prince who steals like a shadow -across the pages of our history books. But his memory deserves to be -kept green if only for the reason that he was a true friend to Sir -Walter Raleigh, that unfortunate Victim of petty-minded James. After one -of his visits to Raleigh in the Garden House of the Tower, Prince Henry -said: “No man but my father would keep such a bird in a cage.” A stained -glass window sets forth his titles in old French, - - Dv. treshavlt. et. trespvissant. Prince. Henry: Filz. Aisne. dv. - Roy. Nre. Seign. Prince. de. Gavles: Duc: de: Cornvaile: et. - Rothsay. Comte: de. Chestre. Chevalier. dv. tresnoble. Ordre. de. - la. Iartierre. enstalle. le. 2. de. Iuliet. 1603. - -He was in many ways the prototype of our own Prince of Wales and held -almost as high a place in the affections of his people. He was -everything that a king’s son should be. He was handsome, well-grown and -athletic; he was scholarly and brilliant, having all James’ love of -learning without his folly and effeminacy. If he was a paragon of -erudition, he also loved the practical side of shipbuilding, and he -liked to give and receive hard knocks in the miniature tournaments that -he organised at Whitehall, when he and his friends would engage the -whole evening in mighty battles with sword and pike. And in addition to -all this he seems to have had the generous mind and temper of the truly -great. It is no wonder that his untimely death evoked a cry of mourning -throughout England. - -He was playing tennis, threw off his coat and caught a mortal chill. -Everything that the doctors of that day could do was done. They even -applied pigeons to his head and a split cock to his feet. Sir Walter -Raleigh, who loved the youth, sent from his prison in the Tower the -recipe of a potent “quintescence”; it did more good than the pigeons or -the split cock, but could not save him. Prince Henry died in 1612, when -not quite nineteen years of age. - -This is what they wrote of him after his death: - - Loe! Where he shineth yonder, - A fixed star in heaven; - Whose motion heere came under - None of your planets seaven. - If that the moone should tender - The sunne her love, and marry, - They both would not engender - So great a star as Harry. - - -THE TEMPLE - - “He didn’t understand the whispers of the Temple - fountain though he passed it every day.”--DICKENS. - -I know of a public school and university man who has lived all his life -in London and protests that he has never seen Westminster Abbey: there -are certainly hundreds of people who have never seen the Temple. - -It would be a marvel to me that anyone should leave London without -having wandered at least once in those courts, if I had not taken so -long to find my own way there. One knows vaguely that it is a charming -place, but going there is postponed for that _fata morgana_, a day of -leisure, that recedes as it is approached, and time passes and the train -whistles and steams slowly out of Euston or Victoria, leaving behind one -of the very loveliest corners in old London,--so easy to reach it one -had but tried. - -You have only to turn through the old gatehouse that Wren built in 1684 -to wander about in another world,--a world where it is possible to -imagine dear Charles Lamb moving among his guests on a Wednesday -evening, with Mary hovering in the background, or Goldsmith giving those -rackety supper parties at No. 2 Brick Court that disturbed his studious -neighbour Blackstone. - -Few places in London are so filled with the memories of brilliant -Englishmen as the Temple. If you want to know all about when and where - -[Illustration: THE TEMPLE CHURCH. THE ROUND] - -they lived, go to the wigmaker who conducts the Temple affairs from his -little shop in Essex Court, and he will provide you with Mr. Bellot’s -fascinating _Story of the Temple_. - -Expert sightseers of course know all about it. They will tell you that -Lamb was born in No. 2, Crown Office Row, and that Thackeray lived at -No. 19; that Goldsmith died at No. 2, Brick Court, Middle Temple Lane, -and that Johnson’s Buildings are on the site of Dr. Johnson’s rooms in -Inner Temple Lane, and if you share their predilections you can go and -peer at the actual bricks that have once sheltered these great men. But -if you want to feel the real spirit of the place, unhampered by gazing -at any particular pile of bricks and mortar, go to the old Temple Church -on a Sunday morning. - -Take any bus along the Strand past Temple Bar, where Dr. Johnson used to -say that if he stationed himself between eleven and four o’clock, every -sixth passer-by was an author,--and go through the second entrance to -the Temple called Inner Temple Lane. Or else take the Underground to the -Temple and, walking along the Embankment, go up the Essex Street steps -and turn into the Temple courts by the first gate you find open, even if -that means going round into Fleet Street. - -The service in the Temple is an unforgettable revelation. There is no -reason why psalms should not be sung in every Anglican church in the -world as they are sung in the Temple, but no one seems to have thought -of it, except the Temple choirmaster, who has trained his choristers to -sing the words as if they had a profound meaning. - -Has anyone ever found fitting phrases to describe the peculiar beauty of -the Temple Church, with its carved Norman porch, that twelfth-century -Round Church, where nine recumbent Crusaders rest in peace, and gleaming -marble pillars support both the choir and the Round? It must be seen to -be believed, but I pity the traveller who leaves London without seeing -it. - -In the courts of the Temple there lie embalmed so many stories of so -many ages, that everyone finds what suits his fancy. You may wander as -Spenser did among - - Those bricky towers, - Where now the studious lawyers have their bowers, - There whilom wont the Templar Knights to bide, - Till they decayed through pride. - -Or you may choose a century later and go to York and Lancastrian times, -and listen to Suffolk saying: - - Within the Temple Hall we were too loud, - The garden here is more convenient; - -and Richard Duke of York’s reply, - - Let him that is a true-born gentleman, - And stands upon the honour of his birth, - If he suppose that I have pleaded truth, - From off this briar pluck a white rose with me: - -and the Duke of Somerset: - - Let him that is no coward nor no flatterer, - But dare maintain the party of the truth, - Pluck a red rose from off this thorn with me. - - * * * * * - - This brawl to-day, - Grown to this faction in the Temple Garden, - Shall send, between the red rose and the white, - A thousand souls to death and deadly night. - -It seems a pity that the Temple authorities do not so far unbend as to -subscribe to the pretty legend by re-planting the gardens with red and -white roses. It would give immense pleasure to countless transatlantic -visitors, whose history books are fairly impartial on York and -Lancastrian questions. - -Then there are all the memories of gallant Elizabethan days, when the -queen came and dined with the benchers in the great Middle Temple Hall -and _Twelfth Night_ was first performed here. It was by his dancing at -one of the famous revels that the handsome youth Christopher Hatton -first attracted the notice of Elizabeth, a moment when as our allies -would say he lost a good chance of remaining quiet. The Hall is shown to -visitors before twelve o’clock and after three on week-days and after -church on Sundays. Peter Cunningham says the roof is the best piece of -Elizabethan architecture in London. - -What feasts they had there in the days when lawyers had time to make -merry. Here is the account of one old chronicler: - - For every feast the steward provided five fat hams with spices and - cakes, and the chief butler seven dozen gilt and silver spoons, - twelve damask table-cloths and twenty candlesticks. The constable - wore gilt armour and a plumed helmet, and bore a pole axe in his - hands. On St. Thomas’s Eve a parliament was held, when the two - youngest brothers, bearing torches, preceded the procession of - benchers, the officers’ names were called and the whole society - passed round the hearth singing a carol. On Christmas Eve the - minstrels, sounding, preceded the dishes, and dinner done, sang a - song at the high table; after dinner the oldest masters of the - revels and other gentlemen sang songs. - -It sounds very cheerful and amiable, but it is difficult to imagine our -modern lawyers passing round the hearth singing a carol. - -I suppose that the three best-loved dwellers in the Temple were Oliver -Goldsmith, Dr. Johnson and Charles Lamb, and none of them were lawyers. -Johnson was living in No. 1 Inner Temple Lane when Topham Beauclerk and -Mr. Langton knocked him up at three in the morning to see if he could be -persuaded to finish the night with them, and he came out with a poker, -and his little black wig on, and said when he understood their errand, -“What, is it you, you dogs, I’ll have a frisk with you.” - -The story of Goldsmith’s tenancy of the Temple reminds one of the tales -told of Balzac, whose tastes and weaknesses he shared. Always in -financial difficulties, as soon as he made a little money he bought -quantities of clothes and furniture and ran into debt to his tailor, -perhaps for the very red velvet coat with lace ruffles that you may see -to-day in the London Museum at Lancaster House. Goldsmith had many -London lodgings and only came to the Temple in 1764. When he died there -ten years later the staircase of this improvident, extravagant genius -was crowded with the poor he had managed to help. No one seems to know -exactly where he lies buried in the Temple churchyard. - -Lamb was a true child of the Temple as he was born there. It may be -heresy, but I have always wished he had not called it “the most elegant -spot in the metropolis”; he loved it more than that, as all readers of -_The Old Benchers of the Inner Temple_ know well. - -No one leaves the Temple without pausing in Fountain Court, where Ruth -Pinch used to meet Tom. It is by far the most charming of all the courts -of the Temple. “I lived in Fountain Court for ten years,” wrote Arthur -Symons, “and I thought then and I think still, that it is the most -beautiful place in London.” - - - - -CHAPTER IV - -ROUND ABOUT THE TOWER - - “I do not like the Tower, of any place.”--_Richard III._ - - -Having amused myself many times in Paris by hunting up the pieces of the -old wall that Philippe Auguste built before he departed to the Holy Land -on one of his Crusades, I set out one day to see how much remains of the -wall the Romans built round London. - -I discovered some bits of it, but I discovered a great many other things -in the process. - -There is very little left of the city that the old Romans called Augusta -and the older Britons Llyn-Din--that some say means “the Lake Fort” and -some “The Hill by the Pool.” In the Guildhall and London museums there -are statues and vases and ornaments and mosaic pavements belonging to -those times, but in the city streets there are hardly any traces to-day -of the Roman occupation. Watling Street, a piece of Roman road that -still bears an Anglo-Saxon name, runs citywards from the back of St. -Paul’s, but that may better be reached from Cheapside. Most of the Roman -wall that remains is now below ground level. The best places to see what -is visible are in St. Olave’s, Hart Street; at Trinity Place, Tower -Hill; at Barber’s bonded warehouses in Cooper’s Row; and at The Roman -Wall House at No. 1, Crutched Friars, a new building whose plans were -altered by the Sadlers’ Company so as to preserve a good specimen of the -old wall in one of the basement rooms. - -I began my search for Roman remains in Strand Lane, which lies next door -to the Strand station on the Holborn tube, and can be reached either by -bus along the Strand or by District train to the Temple, whence you go -uphill up Arundel Street and, turning to your left along the Strand, -find it after two or three minutes’ walk. Half-way down the little -winding passage that once led to the waterside there is on the left a -dingy sign, “The Old Roman Bath.” - -The English reputation for liking cold baths must have been a legacy -from the Romans. Time was when the venerable cold spring bath was used -daily. David Copperfield had many a cold plunge in it when he was living -in Peter the Great’s house at the lower end of Buckingham Street. But -now it is only open from 11 to 12 on Saturday mornings to the very -occasional visitor who turns aside to look at this 2,000-year-old relic -of the London of the past. - -As in the Frigidarium of the Cluny Museum in Paris, it seems as if one -steps back into the world as Julius Cæsar knew it, across the threshold -into the little vaulted chamber where the waters from the spring, once -famed for miraculous cures, flow through the marble walls of the -identical bath used by our Roman conquerors. The Romans contented -themselves with a brick lining that still exists under the marble slabs, -but the latter have an interest of their own, for they came from the -famous bath built in the Earl of Essex’s house near by, which Queen Bess -herself is said to have been the first to use. The spring comes from the -old Holy Well, that gave its name to Holywell Street, on the North side -of the Strand, a street destroyed to make room for Kingsway and Aldwych. - -There is a Roman bath of a different kind underneath the Coal Exchange -in Lower Thames Street, but on your way to this from the Temple station -(or bus 13 from the Strand), get out at Cannon Street, where in a sort -of cage against the wall of St. Swithin’s Church, directly opposite the -station, is the very oldest relic in the whole of the city of -London,--London Stone, the stone that the Romans set up to mark the -centre of the city; the starting point from whence they marked the miles -along their branching highways. As long as history has been written in -this land, there has been mention of London Stone. Do you remember how, -in _Henry VI._, Shakespeare makes Jack Cade proclaim himself King of the -City, striking his staff against the block? Once it was a big pillar and -set on the other side of the way, but famous stones are seldom allowed -to rest in peace, and time, the weather, and clumsy mediæval cart-wheels -have chipped and worn it to its present size. - -[Illustration: LONDON STONE, CANNON STREET] - -Now take the train again, or another 13 bus, and go on to the Monument, -where King William IV. stands on the very spot where Falstaff and Prince -Hal made merry at the “Boar’s Head,” Eastcheap. Going down by the -beautiful column which Sir Christopher Wren built to commemorate the -Great Fire, hard by where it started in Pudding Lane, turn to your left -in Lower Thames Street opposite the church of St. Magnus, and walk along -this unattractive causeway till you come to the Coal Exchange with its -Corinthian porch. You will find the porter through a door up the -side-street of St. Mary-at-Hill. Do not go on Monday, Wednesday or -Friday afternoons, for those are marketdays or whatever the correct term -is on Coal Exchanges, and, as that most agreeable porter explained to -me: “We found it didn’t do, Ma’am; for when the genelmen on the Exchange -see me taking a lady or genelman or it might be a party down below into -the cellar, they naturally says to me ‘What for?’ And when I say ‘Roman -bath,’ they say ‘Roman bath, Jones! Did you say Roman bath? You don’t -mean to say there’s a Roman bath below and me here forty years and never -know it!’ And down they goes with all their friends, all equally -surprised, and business gets neglected. That’s how it is, Ma’am.” - -Business in the coal trade has been too much neglected for anyone to -wish to hinder it further, so go on a Tuesday, Thursday or Saturday -afternoon. It is quite worth the exertion, for this hot-air or sweating -chamber, with its fire-blackened bricks, forming part of an elaborate -system of baths, is even more interesting than the Roman bath in the -Strand. - -The Coal Exchange, with its curious rotunda floor of inlaid wood, was -only built in the middle of the nineteenth century, but it has two more -unexpected links with the past. I am indebted to Messrs. Thornbury and -Walford for pointing out that the black oak used in the woodwork is part -of a tree, four or five centuries old, that was discovered in the River -Tyne, and the blade of a dagger in the shield of the City arms is made -of wood from a mulberry tree that Peter the Great planted when he worked -as a shipwright in Deptford Harbour. - -Turning up St. Mary’s-at-Hill into Great Tower Street, I found, nearly -opposite All Hallows, Barking, a prosperous merchant’s house still -standing practically untouched, as it was built a year or two after the -Great Fire. At No. 34, an ordinary-looking archway leads into a -courtyard fronting a perfect example of the home of a wealthy citizen of -Charles II.’s time. A flight of steps leads up to the doorway, from -which you catch a glimpse of panelled walls and noble staircase. The -counting-house is on the right, and upstairs are the living rooms where -the merchant lived with his wife and family and servants, in the fashion -of those times. They entertained, too, after the day’s work was done, -for amongst the private papers still treasured here is one complaining -of the excessive noise of carriages and coaches turning in the cobbled -courtyard at night. - -It is worth while pushing open the door of the fifteenth-century -perpendicular church of All Hallows, Barking, just opposite, to see the -Norman pillars and the fine brasses. The best one is in front of the -litany desk, and in the corner to the right is a brass to the memory of -William Thynne and his wife. - -This is not the Thynne who has such a gruesome monument in Westminster -Abbey, but a more worthy sixteenth-century ancestor, who was “chefe -clerk of the Kechyn of Henry VIII.,” and who published the first edition -of the entire works of Chaucer. Both of them are descendants of that -John of the Inn whose soubriquet became the name of the Bath family. - -All Hallows gets its surname from the Abbess of Barking, the head of the -seventh-century Benedictine convent of Barking. She was a powerful -lady,--one of the four abbesses who was a baroness _ex officio_, and she -held the lands of the king by a baronage, furnishing her share of -men-at-arms. Only an old gateway of the Chapel of the Holy Rood, eight -miles out of London by the Fenchurch Street railway, is left of the -nunnery, but All Hallows, which was connected with it, survived the -Great Fire and is still intact. - -Turning your back on the old church, and walking up Seething Lane, where -Pepys went to live in 1660 and kept his diary for nine years, you come -to St. Olave’s Church on the corner of Hart Street, where his pretty -young wife was buried. Church manners have vastly changed since Pepys’ -day. When a bomb from an avion fell just outside the Verdun Cathedral -one Sunday morning, two months before the big attack, no one turned his -head except one little acolyte, who couldn’t resist a surreptitious grin -at his comrade in the front pew. But listen to Pepys: - - 6 June, 1666. To our own church, it being the common Fastday, and - it was just before sermon; but Lord! how all the people in the - church stared upon me to see me whisper (the news of the victory - over the Dutch at sea) to Sir John Minnes and my Lady Pen. Anon I - saw people stirring and whispering below, and by and by comes up - the sexton from my Lady Ford to tell me the news, which I had - brought, being now sent into the church by Sir W. Batten in - writing, and passed from pew to pew. - -The church of St. Olave’s has a proud history. There are records of the -parish in Henry I.’s day, and in 1283 of a church dedicated to St. Olaf, -an exiled Norwegian. The present building dates from about 1450. It is -one of the eight existing churches that escaped the Great Fire. - -The mid-Victorian Vandals who filled up the marble crypt, and removed -the old galleries and square pews, with their candlesticks, have -mercifully left the fine roof intact, and St. Olave’s possesses a number -of quaint Elizabethan treasures. On the door there is one of the few -remaining sanctuary knockers used by a fugitive from justice if he -wanted to claim sanctuary protection: on four of the six bells in the -church peal is engraved “Anthony Bartlet made mee 1662.” The crown on -the weather vane is supposed to commemorate the visit of Queen Elizabeth -in 1554 when she gave silken bell-ropes as a thank-offering for her -release from the Tower, and on the front of the organ gallery are the -wrought-iron hat-stands with which the clergy of those days emphasised -their protest against men wearing their hats in church. - -The beautifully wrought iron sword-stands are used to this day when the -Lord Mayor and Sheriffs attend an official service at St. Olave’s. The -old church has been intimately connected with the navy since the days -when the Admiralty lodged in Mark Lane and Crutched Friars, and it is -still the parish church of the Master and Brethren of Trinity House, who -come humbly on foot, _via_ Catherine Court and Seething Lane, to the -annual special service on Trinity Sunday, H.R.H. the Prince of Wales, as -Master, making his pilgrimage like the rest. - -But for the ordinary visitor who has no part in these ceremonial -happenings the great interest of St. Olave’s lies in the memories -connected with its greatest parishioner, Samuel Pepys, Esq., Secretary -to the Admiralty. - -The fame of his _Diary_ has rather obscured Pepys’ well-merited -reputation as an admirable and faithful public servant at a time when -these qualities were rare. He was living at the Navy Office in Seething -Lane in 1666, and it is thanks to his sagacity in ordering all the -workmen from the Royal Dockyards to blow up the intervening houses that -St. Olave’s, Hart Street, Allhallows Staining, and Allhallows Barking -were saved from the Great Fire. - -Pepys and his pretty wife are both buried in their parish church of St. -Olave’s. Mrs. Pepys died when she was only twenty-nine, and though he -had teased the jealousy of “my wife, poor wretch,” Pepys ordered her -bust to be carved, not in the usual profile, but with the lovely head -turned so that he could see - -[Illustration: THE TOWER OF LONDON. BYWARD TOWER] - -it from where he sat in his gallery pew on the other side of the church. - -There are other interesting things to be seen at St. Olave’s: the -doorway to the old churchyard that Dickens-lovers will recognise from -his description in the _Uncommercial Traveller_, the carved pulpit and -quaint vestry and several fine old monuments, and, as I mentioned -before, part of the old Roman wall. - -If you have no passion for discovering bits of ancient walls, there are -other more beautiful things near the bottom of Seething Lane. One of -them is very new, so new that when I saw it all the scaffolding had not -been removed from the buildings at its base--I mean the great tower of -the Port of London Authority. I hear that Sir Joseph E. Broodbank has -just written a fascinating _History of the Port of London_, that will -waken everyone who has three guineas to spare to the interest of -London’s immense docks and the organisation that has power over seventy -miles of the Thames. The beautiful tower of the new buildings, with its -fine groups of statuary, is worth a special pilgrimage to see. It is not -very far from Trinity House, that unique institution that, as Mr. -Cunningham says, has for its object “the increase and encouragement of -navigation, the regulation of lighthouses and sea marks, and the general -management of matters not immediately connected with the Admiralty.” - -The Guild of Trinity House was founded in 1529 by Sir Thomas Spert, -Henry VIII.’s Controller of the Navy and commander of the magnificent -four-master, the _Harry Grace de Dieu_, which took the King to Calais on -his way to the Field of the Cloth of Gold. You can see exactly what it -looked like in the picture of Henry VIII.’s embarkation at Dover that -hangs in Hampton Court Palace. - -One of the delusions I have had when hastening through the streets of -London filled with excitement at the thought of seeing some ancient -place associated with more colourful days than our own, was caused by -Mr. Wagner’s enticing account of the Crooked Billet in his fascinating -book on old London inns. - -Alas, the Crooked Billet, at the eastern extremity of Tower Hill, has -nothing left of its former magnificence. The panelled walls and carved -chimney-pieces have been ruthlessly taken away,--some say to that bourne -overseas whither pass so many treasures of the Old World it affects to -despise. There is nothing left but the sordid dirty rooms of slum -tenements, with here and there the remains of a fine ceiling and a few -wall cupboards. The old building that was once a royal palace, and since -the days of Henry VIII. has been a lordly inn, has fallen into the state -of drab degradation that is the forerunner of the pick and shovel of the -_démolisseur_. Only the rich façade remains to remind the passer-by of -its vanished glories! - - -THE TOWER - -Having wandered so long in its neighbourhood, let me hurriedly make the -shamefaced confession that I share Richard III.’s opinion about the -Tower and that I have never seen it. I have skirted it, I have gazed -into its asphalted moat, I have looked with awe on its battlemented -towers,--but I have never crossed the drawbridge. - -[Illustration: THE TOWER OF LONDON] - -To me it is the storehouse of mistakes--a place redolent with the memory -of bygone blunders--where the great men of the nation, like Sir Thomas -More, Archbishop Cranmer and Sir Walter Raleigh, and innocent, -beautiful things like the little Princes and Lady Jane Grey, were done -to death. There must surely be left something of Lady Jane’s agony when -she saw the headless body of her young husband carried past her on the -morning when she knew that she too was to die--something of the -sickening sense of injustice that great men like Raleigh and More must -have felt as their doom approached. - -Of course, for less squeamish people there is an unending interest in -the historical and architectural features of the Tower. It is open every -week-day from ten to six in summer and ten to five in winter, and on -Saturdays the fees to the White Tower and the Jewel House are not -necessary. It is staffed by a constable, a lieutenant, a resident -governor and about 100 yeomen warders called Beefeaters, all of which -information, as well as the fact that the best way to reach it is from -Mark Lane station on the Underground, is writ large in Mr. Muirhead’s -excellent Blue Book on London. - -Writ more small are tales that almost make me want to go and see for -myself the place where Charles d’Orleans, the royal French poet, who -wrote such haunting songs as “Dieu qu’il la fait bon regarder,” was held -a prisoner for fifteen long years. Other things it seems besides murders -happened in the Tower,--Henry the Eighth made two of his marriages here, -James the First lived here for a time (a fact that does not mitigate my -distaste for the Tower), and - -[Illustration: TRAITOR’S GATE, TOWER OF LONDON - -North or Inside View of Traitor’s Gate being the principal entrance of -the Tower of London from the River and through which stole prisoners of -rank and dignity were formerly conveyed to the Tower] - -Charles the Second slept here the night before his coronation in 1661. -No monarch has done that since his day. Then, if guide-books may be -believed, there are hundreds of things in the armouries and weapon room -and small-arms room, the cloak on which Wolfe died in far-off Quebec, a -Grinling Gibbons carved head of Charles the Second, and armour and -weapons of every period. - -Most of these historic places are sepulchres of bygone crimes, but the -Tower has known tragedy within its walls in these latter hideous years, -for nearly a score of our enemies were put to death there in the Great -War. - -One or two of them were brave men, serving their country even as we -served ours; one likes to think that they were treated as such. The -story of Carl Lody has already been published, but I give it again -because it redeems some of the Tower’s tragic history. - -I believe he had asked to be allowed to testify to the fair and just -treatment he had received, and when the last moment came the German said -to the Provost-Marshal: “I suppose you wouldn’t care to shake hands with -a spy?” The Englishman replied without hesitation, “I am proud to shake -hands with a brave man.” - - - - -CHAPTER V - -ROUND ABOUT CHEAPSIDE - - “O Cheapside! Cheapside! Truly thou art a wonderful - place for hurry, noise and riches.”--GEORGE BORROW. - - -Cheapside and Fleet Street have points of resemblance, for they are both -narrow highways to the City, crowded and bustling and full of history, -but Fleet Street, in spite of its literary associations, has not much -attraction. Something of the mud of the old Fleet Ditch still seems to -cling about it, some taint of disreputable Alsatia in Whitefriars, once -the haven of roystering thieves and cut-throats, very different from the -hive of grandiose newspaper offices that it is now. - -But in Cheapside it is easy to call up memories of noisy apprentices and -busy trafficking. Here is the home of the true Cockney, born within the -sound of those bells of Bow Church that still chime as cheerfully as -when Dick Whittington heard them from Highgate Hill, or when they -summoned dilatory citizens to bed at nine o’clock. The very name evokes -the idea of buying and selling, even if one does not know that the old -word “chepe” means a market. It was once the shopping centre of the City -of London, and the names of the streets branching off on either side, -Bread Street, Milk Street, Honey Lane and the rest, are the names of the -various commodities that were sold there. Friday Street was so called -from the fish to be bought there on a Friday. Round about, in Ironmonger -Lane, Bucklersbury, and most of the streets on the northern side, busy -artisans worked at their trades, and if we think it a noisy thoroughfare -nowadays, what must it have been when it was paved with cobblestones and -thronged all day long with an endless stream of horsemen, carts and -coaches, vociferating porters, citizens cheerful or quarrelling as the -case might be, sellers calling their goods on either hand, and the bells -of innumerable churches, priories and religious houses clanging -incessantly to prayer. Always there was something going on in Chepe--a -tournament to see, with stands set up at the side of Bow Church, or -pageants, cavalcades and processions passing by. The London youth of -those days had a diverting life. Read what Chaucer says of the prentice -in Edward III.’s reign: - - At every bridale would he sing and hoppe; - He loved bet the taverne than the shoppe-- - For when ther eny riding was in Chepe - Out of the shoppe thider wold he lepe, - And til that he had all the sight ysein, - And danced wel, he wold not come agen. - -We have most of us read in our history books of the “beau geste” of -Queen Philippa, wife of Edward III., in saving the lives of the -burghers of Calais; this seems to have been a habit that started early -with her. In 1330, just after the birth of the Black Prince, a -tournament was held in Cheapside to celebrate the event, and a fine -wooden tower erected to accommodate the young queen and her ladies. No -sooner had they mounted than it collapsed. There was much screaming and -a scene of terrible confusion, from which they all emerged, however, -more frightened than hurt. The king was so enraged that he ordered the -instant execution of the careless workmen, but Philippa, who might well -have been even more annoyed, at once flung herself on her knees and -pleaded for their pardon until the king forgave them. - -But “Safety first” was a motto with King Edward, he wanted no more -wooden scaffoldings. A stone platform was built, just in front of the -old church of St. Mary-le-Bow (making it extremely dark on the street -side), from which he and his court could view the tournaments with minds -at peace; for centuries this was the regular royal stand, whenever there -was a procession or other fine doings in the City. Look at Bow Church, -that glory of Cheapside, the work of Sir Christopher Wren, and, in the -stone gallery running round the graceful steeple, you will see how, ever -mindful of tradition, he commemorated this fact when he built his new -tower to flank the pavement adjoining the site of the old grand-stand. - -When I last went into Bow Church I chatted with the lady who was -engaged in scrubbing the floor, and she told me the curious fact that in -this English church in an English city, with its memories stretching -through the ages (for it is built on the site of a much older one and -you may still see the fine old Norman crypt), the Russians in London -were then assembling, Sunday by Sunday, for a service in their own -ritual, St. Mary’s congregation amiably going to another church near by. -The City Churches that were missed so sorely, after the Great Fire, by -the merchants, tradesmen, shopkeepers, apprentices, with their families, -maids and servants, who lived all round about them and dutifully -worshipped there, now stand empty and neglected. Here and there, as in -the tiny fourteenth-century church of St. Ethelburga’s in Bishopsgate -Street, the magnet of eloquent wisdom and sincerity draws men and women -from all over London to worship, so that the seats are never empty, but -in the majority of the City churches, a perfunctory service connotes a -perfunctory congregation of caretakers and their wives, inhabitants of a -quarter that is only populated in the working week-day hours. The best -time to see any of the City churches is at the lunch hour, when they are -sure to be open. In many of them short musical services are then held. I -know few odder sensations than to walk in the City on a Sunday morning -and hear all the sweet bells of the fifty-odd churches calling to prayer -in the silence of the solitary streets. Practical people would pull the -half of them down and devote the money from the sale of their sites to -other much-needed religious purposes. But, even if these little churches -no longer serve their original object, they are still shrines of the -past, each one with some special memory, some special charm, and typical -all together of a great phase of English architecture. - -There is little of this past now actually left in busy Cheapside, except -No. 37, of which I shall speak presently, two tiny houses at the corner -of Wood Street, the handsome seventeenth-century façade (restored, of -course) of the Mercers’ Chapel at the corner of Ironmonger Lane at the -Lower Bank end, and No. 73 opposite, that was built by Wren for Sir -William Turner who was Lord Mayor in 1668. It is still known as the Old -Mansion House. - -Probably it was his own house and he went on living in it till his -death. Where, then, did the lord mayors stay officially during their -term of office from that time till the present Mansion House was built -in 1739? I am indebted to Mr. Leopold Wagner for supplying the answer by -showing me the way to one of the most fascinating spots in the City. -This third old Mansion House still exists, but in a corner so obscure, -so tucked away, that I have passed within a stone’s throw of it a dozen -times and never had the least suspicion of its existence. - -It is at No. 5, Bow Lane, hard by Bow Church, in a narrow passage, with -a sign directing you, if you are fortunate enough to see it, to -Williamson’s Hotel. Follow the passage and you will find yourself remote -from the world, with the quaintest old creeper-clad Restoration house -imaginable surrounding three sides of the courtyard. Yet this quiet spot -was once the hub of civic life,--there is a stone let into the charming -little octagonal-shaped parlour (now called the reading room) that is -supposed to mark the very centre of the City. Here for a few years the -lord mayors after Sir William Turner dwelt in state, and here came -William III. and Mary to dine, and give, as a memento of their visit, -the handsome iron gates, now much corroded and covered with thick green -paint, through which you seek the entrance. - -Later on, in the early seventeen hundreds, the original Williamson -started his hotel. It would have been described as “high-class -residential,” had they known those terms, for in those days, when -country squires and their families came up to town, they found the City -as convenient a centre as anywhere. The forty bedrooms, the long salon, -now a bar, where you may see, still hanging on the wall where it has -been for centuries, an ancient map of London Bridge,--the pleasant -rambling up-and-down passages, with their deep embrasures and -window-seats, the low-ceilinged coffee-room with its only bell-pull -marked “Boots,” and elegant little parlour where now no ladies ever -sit,--all speak of a past of consequence. - -But nowadays, apart from the birds of passage who pass a night in the -huge station caravanserais, does anyone put up in the City? Only a few -“commercials,” such as I saw lunching at Williamson’s, on the very -excellent “ordinary” of lamb, green peas, new potatoes, cauliflower, -cherry tart and cheese, winding up with coffee, liqueur and a fat cigar, -over which they discuss the latest prices, and the latest sporting news. -Williamson’s, in fact, does not cope with modern notions--“Take it or -leave it” is their motto. The all-invading business girl has not yet -dared to put her nose in here--she would probably create a revolution if -she did. But if you want to get right back into the atmosphere of -Dickens, in a place where electric bells, smart waitresses, music, -flappers and foolish ideas of the value of time are not, conscript a -friend and take a meal at the Old Mansion House. - -Coming out into Bow Lane, on the right, at the opposite corner where -Watling Street crosses it, you will find the Old Watling Restaurant, one -of the first houses built in London after the Great Fire: a very -delightful example of its kind, with its dormer windows and heavy-beamed -ceilings. - -In Cheapside, at No. 37 at the corner of Friday Street, where Messrs. -Meakers carry on a business appropriate enough to the shop that -tradition assigns to John Gilpin, is another house that claims, on the -insufficient evidence of an undated cutting from the _Builder_, to have -been standing even before the Fire. - -Everything goes to refute this story. The very beautiful staircase dates -from the Restoration period, the brickwork is similar to that of other -buildings erected at this time, but, more than this, it is quite certain -that the house stands on the site of the older “Nag’s Head,” a tavern -with an overhanging timbered structure, that may be seen in a print of -Cheapside showing the procession to welcome Marie de Medici when she -came in 1638 to visit her daughter Henrietta Maria. The sign on the -frontage now is no Nag’s Head, but a Chained Swan, once the heraldic -badge of King Henry IV., but debased, like so many other noble devices, -to become the sign of a hostelry. Innkeepers were fond of calling their -houses after the swan, for this poor bird has always had an undeserved -reputation for being fond of strong drink; on the other hand, it holds a -special place in English history, for when Edward III., jousting at -Canterbury in 1349, put on his shield the device of a white swan with -the motto: - - Hay, hay, the wythe Swan, - By Gode’s Soule I am thy man, - -this was the very first time that the English tongue was used at Court -since the Conquest, and the White Swan made fashionable a language that -has since spread all over the world. - -At the sign of the “Chained Swan” is certainly the most interesting -house in Cheapside. Quite probably it was really the first to be erected -in the City after the Fire, as it is a four-storied house of some -importance. - -Cross the road to Wood Street, and, if you look through the railings at -the back of the two diminutive shops that are shadowed by the great and -famous plane-tree, you will see that they are built of the same red -brick as No. 37 and bear a tablet with this inscription: - - Erected at ye sole Cost and Charges - of ye Parish of St. Peter’s Cheape - Ao. Dni. 1687. - - WILLIAM } - HOWARD, } - } _Churchwardens_. - JEREMIAH } - TAVERNER,} - -The owners of these little houses are forbidden by their leases to add a -second story, so the tree remains, bringing a breath of the country to -City dwellers, reminding them of Wordsworth’s thrush, whose habit of -continuous singing used to amaze my childhood: - - At the corner of Wood Street, when daylight appears - Hangs a thrush that sings loud, it has sung for three years. - -In Wood Street lived Launcelot Young, that master glazier of peculiar -tastes who, finding the head of James IV., the King of Scots who was -slain at Flodden Field, among a lot of old rubbish in the lumber room -of the Duke of Suffolk’s place at Sheen, took it home with him and kept -it till it lost its novelty. - -When I said that there is little to remind one of the past in Cheapside, -I forgot the churches that crop up round every corner. They have a -wealth of memories clustering about them, and the moment you dive into -the narrow courts and passages off the beaten track, you will lose the -sense of modernity. In the dark, queer little lanes, most of them with a -public-house tucked away in some obscure corner, may be found the London -of Dickens’ day, if of no earlier. And what romance in the odd -names--Gutter Lane, by Wood Street, named after Gutheran the Dane, who -lived here before the time of the Conqueror; Huggin Lane that unites -them farther up, called after one Hugan or Hugh; Addle Street, where -King Adel the Saxon had a mansion; Love Lane of dissolute memory. - - -CITY COMPANIES - - “Thy famous Maire, by pryncely governaunce, with - sword of justice thee ruleth prudently.”--DUNBAR. - -Wandering in Cheapside, I came across some massive emblazoned -coats-of-arms over great doorways, and found they always announced the -halls of the City Companies of London, those great mediæval trade unions -that survive to-day--so taken for granted by the Londoner that few -people remark their amazing existence. - -Yet most of the real history of the old City is bound up with the tale -of the rise to wealth and power of these great companies. They once -numbered a hundred, and about seventy-six still survive. I see that in -one recent guide-book the Pattenmakers are quoted as extinct, but though -this ancient guild, founded in 1300, might be supposed to have received -its deathblow a hundred years ago, when the improvement in the streets -made pattens unnecessary, they are still made for country use and the -company has recently renewed its vitality by association with the rubber -boot and shoe industry. - -I like the quaint names of the companies that are now no more. The -occupation of the Bowyers and the Horners is fairly obvious, but who -would guess that the Fletchers were makers of arrows, or the Lorriners -makers of bridles and bits, and I leave you to discover the lugubrious -meaning of the Worshipful Company of Upholders. - -They were the trade unions of the Middle Ages, but they had this great -difference, that they were a combination of the masters for the benefit -of their particular industry, whereas now the trade unions are composed -of the workmen, who combine for their own benefit even if it ruins the -industry. Comparisons may be odious but they are inevitable. Our -present trade unions, which seem to be growing almost as powerful as -their forerunners, are exclusively concerned with the question of wages, -but the guilds, whilst jealously guarding the privileges of their -members and craftsmen, not only guaranteed a fixed wage, but -administered even-handed justice as between master and men, and, more -important still, insisted on a high standard of workmanship. Nothing but -the best satisfied them, and they built up the tradition of English -excellence which our present distaste for honest work puts us in a fair -way to lose. - -For in this matter we compare badly with our forefathers. Their ruthless -methods might well be copied in this age of the meretricious and shoddy. -In 1311 there was a bonfire in Cheapside (at the instance of the -Hatters’ and Haberdashers’ Company) of forty grey and white and fifteen -black “bad and cheating hats,” which had been seized in the shops of -dishonest traders, and other defective goods were publicly burnt in the -same place from time to time, but so rarely as to show how high was the -usual standard of trade honesty. Nowadays, such seizures would provide -almost enough fuel to tide us through another coal strike. - -The City Companies were an autocracy, but, given the conditions of the -time, they were a benevolent autocracy, and the guilds laid the -foundations of the vast commercial wealth which has made London what -she is. For centuries the Lord Mayor, their civic head, has been chosen -almost always from amongst the members of the twelve great companies, -and enjoys a prestige abroad only second to that of the king, as anyone -who has lived in France can testify. Trade in England has always been -honourable. The merchants of the Middle Ages belonged almost exclusively -to families of good position; often they were younger sons of the landed -gentry, for whom a commercial life, in days when there were no -engineers, journalists, or bankers, was the usual opening if they did -not go into the Church or Law. Whittington was the son of a -Gloucestershire knight: Sir Thomas Gresham, that finest type of City -magnate and honoured friend of Elizabeth, came of a good old stock and -was educated at Cambridge. For centuries our kings and queens have been -pleased to come to banquets in the Guildhall and the halls of the -greater companies, though they might not nowadays look favourably upon -that lord mayor with whom Charles II. dined, who became so drunk that -when the king got up to leave he rushed after him and dragged him back, -good-naturedly protesting, “to finish t’other bottle.” - -The old power of the guilds has gone, but in what other country would -you find bodies of merchants, each with a vast revenue at its disposal -of which it need give account to no man, using that wealth, generation -after generation, - -[Illustration: GUILDHALL] - -for the public good instead of for private profit? They spend it either -in maintaining excellent schools or in generous gifts to various -charitable objects, or in subscriptions for the advancement of science -(the City Companies are responsible for the City and Guilds Institute), -but in whatever they do they uphold the best traditions of integrity and -generosity of the City merchant. - -The centre of all this civic activity is the Guildhall. From Oxford -Circus a tube to the Bank or any bus along Holborn takes you along -Cheapside and past King Street, at the end of which you see the -Guildhall. If you start from the neighbourhood of Charing Cross any -train to the Mansion House brings you to Queen Victoria Street, out of -which Queen Street, a few minutes’ walk to your right, leads through -directly to King Street. - -Of course the great civic event of the year is the well-known and -oft-described procession and the banquet given on the 9th November by -the new lord mayor, chosen on Michaelmas Day, and the sheriffs to the -members of the Cabinet and other distinguished guests. No women are -permitted to be present and to hear the important political speeches -often made at these dinners, but there are other times when their -presence is tolerated. I have seen the big wooden figures of Gog and -Magog in the gallery of the great hall look down on a recruiting meeting -early in the war--on the gathering of one of those organisations that -now and then are the temporary guests of the City Corporation, and on -the ceremony of presenting the Freedom of the City to an overseas Prime -Minister. - -The hall is open to the public at the usual hours, 10-5.30, so go in and -nod to Gog and Magog and look at the fifteenth century two-light window -in the south-west corner--the only old one in the hall. - -Coming out of the Guildhall on the left is the passage leading to the -Museum and the Library. The latter is a fascinating place, with less red -tape about consulting the books than in any other place of the size in -London. You simply write your name and the book you want on a slip of -paper, and the affair is done. If you seek information on a certain -point, and do not know where to find it, the courteous director and his -no less willing staff take the greatest trouble to help. I went there -lately on such a quest, and book after book was produced for me by three -assistants till the director in charge, who had evidently been doing -some private research on my behalf, appeared triumphantly with the -volume that gave the solution to my problem. It is a long, pleasant -room, as indeed all book-lined rooms must be, with seven book-lined bays -on either side. The collection contains about 200,000 volumes, besides -many manuscripts. If you are a Shakespearean enthusiast you will find -there among its rare treasures, the first, second and fourth folios of -Shakespeare’s plays and a document bearing Shakespeare’s signature. - -Naturally the library rather specialises on books about London, and the -museum in the basement beneath (entered from Basinghall Street) is -nearly filled with London relics--Roman antiquities, mediæval -shop-signs, some of the lovely Jacobean jewellery found in Wood Street, -the rest of which is in Lancaster House, instruments of torture from -Newgate, and many other things that tell of the City life in mediæval -days. - -Round about and within a few minutes’ walk of the Guildhall cluster the -halls of the City Companies. The most important in the order of -precedence are the Mercers, Grocers, Drapers, Fishmongers, Goldsmiths, -Skinners, Merchant Taylors, Haberdashers, Salters, Ironmongers, Vintners -and Clothworkers. Their halls are not supposed to be open to the general -public, but it is possible to see most of them on application. - -The history of the guilds is such a long one that their beginning is -lost in Time’s mist. Mr. Muirhead says that “the chief object of their -foundation was to afford religious and temporal and social fellowship, -and trade supervision and help to the members of their fraternity or -mystery,”--but they were not incorporated till the reign of Edward. Most -of their halls date from the days of Henry VIII., when, grown rich and -powerful, they looked about them for a home and were glad to buy from -the avaricious king the houses of fugitive monks or favourites fallen -into disgrace. But property so acquired was doomed to perish, and in the -Great Fire of 1666 the ancient halls, almost without exception, were -burnt to the ground. “Strange it is to see Clothworkers’ Hall on fire, -these three days and nights in one body of flame, it being the cellar -full of oyle,” says Pepys, who was a Master of the company. They have a -fine collection of gold plate only used at state banquets, with a gold -tray presented by Pepys in 1677 and also an immense loving-cup richly -chased, that is now shown in a glass case on the sideboard, as it began -to show signs of much handling. - -The halls were rebuilt afterwards,--some, like the Vintners’ in 68 Upper -Thames Street, and possibly the Haberdashers’ in Gresham Street, by -Wren,--but by the beginning of the eighteen hundreds most of them seem -to have fallen into such disrepair as to require rebuilding again. - -One at least, the Merchant Taylors’, the largest hall of all, which -faces Threadneedle Street, stands as originally erected, with its little -crypt beneath it, in the latter part of the fourteenth century, for -though the roof and walls were damaged by the Great Fire, the main -building is still intact. This is a rich and proud company, with its -income of £60,000 a year, and its fine gallery of royalties and -distinguished personages, numbering many kings among its freemen. Yet -not so proud as the Mercers’, first on the list, which will not admit -visitors to its hall in 87 Cheapside. Whittington and Sir Thomas -Gresham were mercers. Within the walls is kept the famous Legh cup -(1499), always used at City banquets and supposed to be one of the -finest pieces of English mediæval plate in existence. The chapel -adjoining the hall, whose handsome front, erected immediately after the -Great Fire, you may inspect at any rate, is on the site of Thomas à -Becket’s house. - -Close by in Prince’s Street, opposite the Bank of England, is the hall -of the Grocers, once called the Pepperers, a guild with advanced notions -for the Middle Ages, for they apparently believed in the equality of -women. The wives of the Grocers were members as well, and were even -fined if they were absent from the banquets for any avoidable reason. -“Grocer” is one of those words that have grown less honourable with -time, for a grocer formerly meant one who dealt _en gros_ (wholesale). - -The halls of the Goldsmiths’ and the Fishmongers’ Companies have so many -mediæval relics that they well repay a visit, and a card of admission is -usually granted on application. The Goldsmiths are in Foster Lane, -Cheapside, just behind the G.P.O., and amongst their plate you may see -the cup from which Queen Elizabeth is said to have drunk at her -coronation. In the Court Room is an old Roman altar, found when the -present foundations were dug. The Goldsmiths still keep their ancient -privilege of assaying and stamping all articles of gold and silver -manufacture in Great Britain, just as the Fishmongers still have the -less remunerative right to “enter and seize bad fish.” The hall of this -guild is, appropriately enough, on the banks of the river, just at the -north end of London Bridge, and in one of the rooms is a chair made out -of the first pile driven in the construction of Old London Bridge, said -to have been under the water for 650 years. - -The hall of the Stationers’ Company in Paternoster Row was stone-faced a -mere 121 years ago, but the attics still have horn-paned windows and -part of it was built before the Great Fire. Visitors are shown the hall -and the old relics, and every good American likes to see the -compositor’s stick that Benjamin Franklin used when he came to London as -a journeyman printer and lived in Bartholomew Close. - -Stationers’ Hall is the headquarters of the Royal Literary Fund for -assisting Authors in Distress, and among their treasures are the daggers -used by Col. Blood and his accomplice when they tried to steal the crown -jewels in Charles II.’s reign. - -Most of the bare facts about the other chief companies can be found in -any London guide-book, but if a reader wants to know more of these -interesting survivals of the day when the craftsman loved his craft, he -will find a detailed account in Mr. P. H. Ditchfield’s _The City -Companies of London_, 1904, and Mr. George Unwin’s _The Gilds and -Companies of London_. - - - - -CHAPTER VI - -ROUND ABOUT HOLBORN - - “Yet London lacks not poetry, - She has her voices, whose deep tones - Are human laughter and human moans, - And all her beauty, all her glory, - Spring from or blend with man’s strange story.” - MAXWELL GRAY. - - -Take that chilly-sounding gateway, the Marble Arch, as a _point de -départ_ for a walk some idle afternoon, and I will show you what I found -the day I turned my back on it. It looks as bored by its inactivity as -Théophile Gautier’s Obélisque; perhaps it regrets the days when it faced -Buckingham Palace and feels it came down in the world when it was moved -to its present position some seventy years ago. - -And that, too, is another indignity. Very many people ask why the Marble -Arch is stranded all by itself, like a rock from which the flood has -receded. The reason is as simple as most utilitarian things. The press -of traffic at the Marble Arch was so great that the space had to be -widened. It would have been too costly a matter to move the Marble Arch -back, so the park railings were moved and the Arch left high and dry, no -longer a gateway but only an object of interest. - -I grant you that at first sight the Oxford Street and Holborn of to-day -have a blatantly modern look. There is little to remind one in the -kaleidoscopic vista of badly-dressed shop windows, gaudy buildings and -dingy offices, that Roman soldiers once tramped along this very road. It -took about a thousand years from the time that Agricola recalled his -Roman legions from England for the discomfort of the Holborn mudholes to -become unendurable, and for Henry V. to follow in 1417 the earlier -example of his French _confrère_ Philippe Auguste and cause the king’s -highway to be paved at his expense. The paving does not seem to have -been kept in good repair, for the garrulous Pepys says, 250 years later, -that the king’s coach was overturned in Holborn. - -Travellers along Holborn, at the other end of the social scale, shared -in the royal benefit, for from 1196 to 1783 condemned criminals were -brought in carts from Newgate Prison to Tyburn Tree. Everyone has heard -of the famous gallows, but few people know that the exact spot where it -stood is marked to-day by a triangular stone set in the roadway, almost -opposite the beginning of the Edgware Road. A bronze plate on the -railings of the Park, on the other side of the road, commemorates the -fact, but if both stone and plate elude you, the friendly policeman who -is always on duty here will point them out. - -From the Marble Arch to Holborn there is nothing to look at but -interminable shops till you come to the quaint old houses of Staple -Inn, as disdainfully out of keeping with their vulgar surroundings as an -orchid would be in an onion bed. - - -STAPLE INN - - “I went astray in Holborn through an arched entrance, - over which was Staple Inn.”--HAWTHORNE. - -Staple Inn is one of the most delicious things in London. Out of the -roar and hurry of Holborn you pass through the old Jacobean gateway with -the façade of oaken beams into the tranquil old-world court where the -noise suddenly dies away, and you can sit peacefully under the shade of -the plane-trees, as far removed from the bustle and racket without the -gate as if you had been suddenly transported a hundred miles on a -magician’s carpet. From a kindly porter may be bought, for one shilling -and sixpence, a delightful little history of this “fayrest Inne of -Chancerie,” where Johnson lived after finishing his _Rasselas_ in a week -to pay for the expenses of his mother’s funeral. - -When you are tired of sitting quietly in this “veriest home of peace,” -go across the courtyard to the hall of the Inn and look at the carved -oaken roof and the grotesque ornaments, at the Grinling Gibbons -clock-case and the old stained glass windows, and before you leave -Staple Inn go through the second court and look at the old sunk garden -that is so unconcernedly green in the very heart of this big city. At -the back of the Patent Offices that make the southern boundary of -Staple Inn is Took’s Court--the Cook’s Court where Mr. Snagsby of _Bleak -House_ lived--once a place of those curious semi-prisons called -sponging-houses that were like debtors’ boarding-houses with the bailiff -for the landlord. - -[Illustration: Staple Inn] - -Took’s Court is a sordid enough place now, and some of it may soon -disappear, but it has a vicarious interest because Sheridan spent some -of the last years of his life in a sponging-house here. - - -GRAY’S INN - - “Whene’er through Gray’s Inn porch I stray - I meet a spirit by the way; - I roam beneath the ancient trees, - And talk with him of mysteries; - He tells me truly what I am-- - I walk with mighty Verulam.” - -Gray’s Inn, another of the gracious, leisurely London corners that few -of London’s visitors discover, lies to the north of Holborn in the -Gray’s Inn Road. Any of the buses along Holborn will take you there, and -it is only a few minutes’ walk behind Chancery Lane Station on the -Central London Railway. You could once wander in the old gardens more -freely than in the other Inns, and if you slipped his _Essays_ in your -pocket could read what Sir Francis Bacon wrote about gardens in the very -garden that he made. Bacon was once Treasurer of Gray’s Inn and he -interested himself in the laying out of “the purest of human pleasures” -that he found there. Gray’s Inn Gardens used to be as fashionable a -place for a walk as Hyde Park is to-day. Pepys the Chatterer related the -doings of numberless people when he wrote: “When church was done my wife -and I walked to Gray’s Inn to observe fashions of the ladies, because of -my wife’s making some clothes.” Pepys must have gone there very often, -for two months later the frivolous Secretary wrote: “I was very well -pleased with the sight of a fine lady that I have often seen walk in -Gray’s Inn Walks.” - -Times have changed and fine ladies are no longer allowed to walk in -Gray’s Inn Gardens, unless indeed they have relations among the benchers -who are complaisant in the matter of keys. - -[Illustration: GRAY’S INN HALL] - -The Hall is the oldest and most beautiful thing in Gray’s Inn. Queen -Elizabeth once came to a banquet here, and it was here that the _Comedy -of Errors_ was first performed. The old Inn has had many famous names -among its members, the Sydneys, Cecils, Bacons, etc., and a man no less -distinguished in another circle, Jacob Tonson, had his first bookshop -just inside Gray’s Inn Gate. - -The old bookseller and publisher’s name has a very modern interest, even -for the London visitor who never turns the pages of Pope or Walpole, -because his house at Barn Elms is now used as the Ranelagh Club. The -people who go out to Ranelagh of a fine afternoon to drink tea and watch -the polo, are following the footsteps of the members of the famous -Kit-Cat Club founded in 1700, it is popularly supposed as an outcome of -the dinners Tonson offered to his patrons. The club, of which Tonson -became secretary, consisted of thirty-nine members--authors, wits and -noblemen--their portraits hang in the halls of the Ranelagh Club to-day. - -Tonson published for Addison and Pope, and was the first man to print -cheap editions of Shakespeare. He had innumerable friends, and his -portrait shows him as a genial creature who must have merited the -description of him, written in 1714, that I found in _Old and New -London_: - - “While in your early days of reputation, - You for blue garters had not such a passion; - While yet you did not live, as now your trade is, - To drink with noble lords and toast their ladies, - Thou, Jacob Tonson, were to my conceiving, - The cheerfullest, best, honest fellow living.” - -Tonson moved from the Gray’s Inn Gateway in 1712 to his more celebrated -bookshop in the Strand that stood on part of the present site of -Somerset House. I hear that another old landmark connected with this -prince of publishers is doomed to disappear, for the Upper Flask, in -Heath Street, Hampstead, that was known in Tonson’s day as the “Upper -Bowling Green House,” used as the summer quarters of the Kit-Cat Club, -may have to give way to the new buildings of some philanthropic -institution. - -Gray’s Inn takes its name from the Grays of Wilton. There is a document -registering the transferring in 1505 of the “Manor of Portpoole, -otherwise called Gray’s Inn” from Edmund Lord Gray of Wilton to a Mr. -Denny. The public, alas, are never admitted to the Gardens, but any -visitor may see the Hall on a week-day between the hours of 10 and -12.15. - - -HATTON GARDEN - - “My Lord of Ely, when I was last in Holborn, - I saw good strawberries in your garden there.” - _Richard III._ - -Staple Inn and Gray’s Inn are not the only old-world souvenirs to be -found in prosaic Holborn. A little further east, on the left-hand side -as one strolls towards the City, lies another sordid street whose name -is redolent of Elizabethan romance. - -Hatton Garden, named after the queen’s handsome chancellor and now the -haunt of the diamond and pearl merchant, and also of organgrinders and -ice-cream vendors, is built on the site of the gardens of Ely Palace, -the town house of the Bishops of Ely whose story is noted on another -page. Round the corner is Ely Place, the most astonishing little square -in London. - -If you pass this spot on the stroke of the hour after ten o’clock on a -summer’s evening, you may well rub your eyes and wonder if time has been -rolled back and you are suddenly living in the London of two centuries -ago. For the iron gates of the little place are closed, and out of the -tiny porter’s lodge in the middle comes an important person with a -gold-laced hat, who solemnly makes the tour of the square, crying five -or six times, “Past ten o’clock and all’s well!” - -The crying of the hours by the night watchman is not the only custom of -this old-world corner, so carefully guarded by the commissioners in -whose hands the rights of Ely Place are vested. The little square, now -given over to law offices and business premises, was once a “sanctuary,” -a place where law-breakers could take refuge and where the civil -authorities had no right of arrest. To this day the caretakers who form -the bulk of the resident population of Ely Place are inordinately proud -of the fact that they are independent of police protection, having their -own standing army of three porters, who take eight-hour turns in -guarding the tranquillity of their self-contained domain. - -They even have a public-house of their very own, for in the tiny passage -that connects Ely Place with Hatton Garden is a dim little inn of -dubious antiquity, that takes its name of the “Mitre” from the carved -stone mitre set in the façade which once formed part of the old palace -of the bishops of Ely. The innkeeper is very proud of the remains of a -Methuselah of a cherry-tree now incorporated in one corner of the house. -You can see the whitewashed remains of the tree that may have shaded -good Queen Bess if you peer through the left-hand corner window. - -At ten of the clock the iron gate leading into Hatton Garden is duly -fastened, and the “Mitre” is closed to the outside world. - -I have kept the best and most amazing of the treasures of Ely Place -until the last. - -Walk down the left-hand side of the square to the far corner, and you -will find your way into one of the most beautiful things in London,--a -thirteenth century chapel practically intact. It is so beautiful that if -it were necessary to pay a high entrance fee or write for cards of -admission, it would probably be the Mecca of every artist and -antiquarian. But since it is in London, prodigal of such treasures, and -anyone may walk in and look at its beauty undisturbed at any hour, St. -Etheldreda’s Chapel is only known to a few people. - -It was built in the last decade of the thirteenth century by a certain -Bishop de Luda, as the chapel for Ely House, the town residence of the -bishops of Ely. - -John of Gaunt took refuge here and must have heard mass within these -very walls. Shakespeare reminds us, in _Richard II._, of John of Gaunt’s -death in Ely House, and it was in these cloisters that Henry VIII. first -met with Cranmer. Queen Elizabeth’s chancellor, Sir Christopher Hatton, -worshipped here till his unlucky tenancy of Ely House was ended by his -death in 1591, and so did his nephew’s imperious widow, the famous Lady -Hatton who married and flouted Sir Edward Coke, the great lawyer and -rival of Bacon for her hand. - -It was at “Elie House in Holborne” in the reign of James I. that the -last mystery play was represented in England, before the Spanish -Ambassador Gondemar, who was a next-door neighbour to Ely Palace. The -later history of the chapel may be briefly told. When the bishops -finally sold the property to the Crown in 1772 and betook themselves to -Dover Street, it was bought by an architect who preserved the chapel for -the use of the residents of the houses he built in Ely Place. Afterwards -it passed through several hands, being finally bought by the Fathers of -Charity from the Welsh Episcopalians in 1871. When the work of -restoration was finished, St. Etheldreda’s, the only pre-Reformation -place of worship restored to the Roman Catholic Church, was reopened on -St. Etheldreda’s Day, the 23rd of June, 1876. - - -ST. SEPULCHRE’S - - “Here lies one conquered that hath conquered kings.” - Epitaph to Capt. John Smith, 1631. - -A little further along Holborn, in Giltspur Street, you come to the old -Church of St. Sepulchre, where we meet again the Tyburn prisoners. -Everybody who has heard the _Beggar’s Opera_ (and who has not?) will -remember the picture Polly Peachum draws of Macheath on the road to -Tyburn: “Methinks I see him already in the cart, sweeter and more lovely -than the nosegay in his hand.” It was at St. Sepulchre’s that the -amorous highwayman would have got his nosegay, on the steps of the -church, for an old benefactor had left money to provide flowers for -every criminal going to be hanged. It was St. Sepulchre’s bell that -tolled the hour of their hanging, and another legacy provided for an -admonition and prayers for the condemned. - -There are more cheerful memories connected with the old church. There is -a mention of it in the twelfth century records. It was rebuilt in the -middle of the fifteenth century--the south-west porch still remains a -thing of beauty--and after it was nearly destroyed in the Great Fire in -1666, Wren practically rebuilt the church with its four weathercocks, -whose differences of opinion about the wind gave rise to the saying of -Howell: “Unreasonable people are as hard to reconcile as the vanes of -St. Sepulchre’s tower.” - -Two very noteworthy Elizabethans lie buried in St. Sepulchre’s, one a -scholar, the other a brilliant adventurer. The former was Roger Ascham, -the queen’s tutor, and the latter, Captain John Smith, “sometime -Governor of Virginia and Admiral of New England,” of Pocahontas fame. -Captain Smith’s adventures in America have rather overshadowed his -earlier exploits. Mr. Walter Thornbury, in his wonderful _Old and New -London_, tells that he fought in Hungary in 1602, and in three single -combats overcame three Turks and cut off their heads, for which and -other equally brave deeds Sigismund, Duke of Transylvania, gave him his -picture set in gold with a pension of three hundred ducats, and allowed -him to bear three Turks’ heads proper as his shield of arms. Pocahontas, -who you remember found the English climate too much for her, lies buried -in the parish church of St. George, Gravesend. In 1914 the Society of -Virginian Dames placed two stained glass windows to honour her memory. - - -STONE EFFIGIES - -Not the least of the quaint things that the seeing eye may note in -London streets are the small statues and reliefs that give an odd -variety to some of the houses. - -At No. 78, Newgate Street, five minutes’ walk from St. Sepulchre’s, and -on the same side of the road, is a bas-relief (probably an old -shop-sign) of a giant and a dwarf. These were William Evans and Sir -Jeffery Hudson, freaks whom it pleased Charles II. to keep about him at -the Court, as readers of _Peveril of the Peak_ will remember. - -Just opposite is Panier Alley, so called from the basket-makers who once -lived here. On the left, cased in glass in order to preserve it from the -weather, is a somewhat battered effigy of a fat boy sitting upon a -panier, and, underneath, this inscription: - - When ye have sought the citty round, - Yet still this is the highest ground. - August the 27th, 1688. - -It was put up a few years after the Great Fire, that landmark in the -history of the City. I am told its claim is not strictly founded on -fact, and that part of Cannon Street is a few feet higher, but one would -like to believe the cherub. - -Another bas-relief of a fat boy, at the corner of Cock Lane, even nearer -to St. Sepulchre’s, I mention in another chapter, and there is a quaint -old vintner’s sign of an infant Bacchus on a barrel, to be found at the -junction of Liverpool Street and Manchester Street, in the rather -depressing vicinity of King’s Cross. It is believed to be the only one -of its kind left in London. - -[Illustration: LINCOLN’S INN] - - - - -CHAPTER VII - -DOWN CHANCERY LANE - - -LINCOLN’S INN FIELDS - - “London, Michaelmas term lately over, and the Lord - Chancellor sitting in Lincoln’s Inn Hall.”--DICKENS. - -The charming rustic-sounding name of Lincoln’s Inn Fields is known to -everyone--did not Mr. Tulkinghorne live there?--but few people stray -into the old square except those who are at odds with their neighbours -and come to consult the men of law living there, as they did in Dickens’ -day. The habitués come from Kingsway through Great Queen Street or -Sardinia Street--the stranger takes the Piccadilly Tube to Holborn -Station and, turning to the right along High Holborn, follows the first -passage on the south side of the street that almost manages to conceal -itself behind a protruding house. - -This narrow winding Little Turnstile, and the Great Turnstile, a short -distance farther along, are the only entrances from the north to -Lincoln’s Inn Fields. An ugly lane, connecting these two passages and -parallel with Holborn, is dignified by the disconcerting name of -Whetstone Park. To-day it is only a row of stables, but Milton once had -a lodging in one of the houses, that were always squalid and _mal -habitées_, as Dryden’s plays attest. - -Coming out of the tortuous Little Turnstile, you enter the spacious -square of Lincoln’s Inn Fields. The very name is alluring enough to make -anyone want to go there, but there is nothing about the gardens to-day -to show that they are among the oldest in London. They are as trim and -well cared for as if they had been laid out yesterday. “Well cared for” -means that all the pleasant green lawns and shady plane-trees are -jealously railed off from the public, who loll somnolently on the many -benches, their back turned to the lovely green oasis. It does not occur -to any of the Fields’ frequenters to turn some of the seats round, so -that they will have a more refreshing view than the dusty asphalt of the -wide paths or the uninspiring sight of the slumbers of the unemployed, -some of whom look as if they had slipped out of the frames of the -Hogarth pictures in the Soane Museum. - -It must be confessed that the interest of Lincoln’s Inn Fields lies not -so much in the gardens--modernised out of every semblance of their -seventeenth-century appearance--as in the beautiful old houses -surrounding them--noble, dignified mansions some of those on the west -side, built by Inigo Jones and once owned by Milords of Lindsay, Somers -and Erskine. At the South Kensington Museum there is a - -[Illustration: LINCOLN’S INN GATEWAY] - -wonderful panelled staircase, a perfect specimen of its kind, that -formerly graced the hall of No. 35. - -Lindsay House, now Nos. 59 and 60, one of the Inigo Jones houses, was -built for the Earl of Lindsay, who died fighting for Charles I. at -Edgehill. Peter Cunningham says that it was called Ancaster House when -the fourth earl was created Duke of Ancaster, and that he sold it to the -proud Duke of Somerset--I do not know why Mr. Cunningham insists on his -pride in italics--who married the widow of the Mr. Thomas Thynne whose -murder by Count Koenigsmarck is so dramatically portrayed on his tomb in -Westminster Abbey. - -No. 66, at the corner of Great Queen Street, was once occupied by the -Duke of Newcastle, George II.’s prime minister. - -We have travelled far searching for freedom in the last 250 years and -one would like to know how the Wellsian attitude is regarded by the -ghost of the creator of this old house--the Marquis of Powis, who built -it in 1686, before he was outlawed by William and Mary because of his -loyalty to James II. He probably chose the site because it was near the -chapel of the Sardinian Ambassador--the oldest Roman Catholic chapel in -London--where the Roman Catholics used to go when they were deprived of -their churches, and where Fanny Burney was married in 1793. It was -removed, unluckily, in 1910. - -There have been poets, too, in Lincoln’s Inn Fields, before the men of -law took possession. Milton and Thomas Campbell lived at No. 61 and -Lord Tennyson at No. 58, where, you remember, Mr. Tulkinghorne of _Bleak -House_ had his rooms. - -It is a house also haunted with memories of Nell Gwynne, for she had -lodgings here and gave birth to the first Duke of St. Albans, while she -was still acting in the nearby theatre in Portugal Row! - -This Lincoln’s Inn Fields Theatre stood just at the back of the Royal -College of Surgeons, on the south side of the square. Three theatres -called the Duke’s Theatre were successively built on the same spot. The -first one was a pioneer in its way, for it was here that regular stage -scenery was introduced in England and that women’s parts were first -played by women. The ubiquitous Pepys was a regular frequenter of the -theatre, and duly recorded his meeting with Nell Gwynne and that here he -saw _Hamlet_ played for the first time. - -Though it is seventy-three years since the last theatre was taken down -to enlarge the museum of the Royal College of Surgeons, and there is -nothing to be seen of it to-day, I like to keep its memory green because -it was here, on the night of January 29th, 1728, nearly two hundred -years ago, that Lavinia Fenton, the first Polly Peachum, sang herself -into the heart of the Duke of Bolton, when John Rich produced Mr. Gay’s -_Beggar’s Opera_. It ran for sixty-two nights in one season and made -“Gay rich and Rich gay.” - - -SOANE MUSEUM - - “Thus the great city, towered and steepled, - Is doubly peopled, - Haunted by ghosts of the remembered past.” - _London Poems._ - -There is one museum in London that I do not want to call a museum -because in some ways it is so unlike one. Very few people ever go there. -It is like the palace of the Sleeping Beauty. If you shut your eyes at -the south-west corner of Lincoln’s Inn Fields and try not to notice the -tentacular Lyons that unblushingly intrudes its smug modern shopfront -into this old-world square, but stroll through the gardens to the north -side, you will see the Soane Museum at No. 13. This is one of the most -curious and neglected corners I have found in London. There are -priceless things here like Hogarth’s _Rake’s Progress_, but for every -hundred visitors who go to the National Gallery of British Art to see -the _Marriage à la Mode_ only one comes to this quaint caravanserai of -all sorts of objects. - -Sir John Soane must surely have been the most agreeable bricklayer’s son -who ever made his fortune as a great architect and had a pretty taste in -art. You have only to look at his portrait by Lawrence, one of the last -that great painter finished, to see what a kindly, benevolent man he -was. Why, oh why, did he exact that his collection should remain -unaltered! I know that the guide-books all extol the ingenuity with -which so many things have been fitted into a small space, but if only -one could sweep away the superfluous and unnecessary and rearrange the -house like a perfect specimen of a home of the period, with the great -pictures hung to the best advantage in the largest rooms and the -basement reserved for the sarcophagus in its present place, with the -best of the larger treasures that would be incongruous in the upper -rooms! As it is, you must diligently hunt for what you want to see, for -the delightful catalogue is more useful as a souvenir than a present -help in finding anything. - -There are things of human interest, like the watch Queen Anne gave to -Sir Christopher Wren, or the pistol that Peter the Great collared from a -Turkish Bey in 1696, that Alexander I. gave to Napoleon at Tilsit in -1807, and that Sir John Soane provokingly says he purchased under very -peculiar circumstances--or the flamboyant jewel of Charles I. found -among the royal baggage after the battle of Naseby--or Rousseau’s -autograph letter--or those exquisite old books of Hours richly -illuminated and written with such patient skill by some old Flemish monk -five hundred years ago. - -But the jewels of this unnoticed casket are the pictures. The courteous -guardians, who all look like retired librarians, show with a certain -melancholy pride the way to the tiny room where hang Turner’s fine -painting of _Van Tromp’s Barge_ and two of his water-colours, Watteau’s -_Les Noces_, and the greatest treasures of the whole collection, -Hogarth’s pictures of _The Rake’s Progress_ and the four big canvases of -_The Election_. - -Besides all this there are wonderful Flemish wood carvings and -manuscripts, and, in the crypt, the interesting three-thousand-year-old -tomb of Seti I., King of Egypt, whose inscriptions Sir John did not live -to see deciphered. - -There was an air of wistfulness about the place. It had been arranged -with so much loving care, and so few people profit by it though the -reward of going is great. - -Perhaps Sir John Soane did not want anybody but art-lovers to see his -collection, or he would surely not have closed it to the public on -Saturday, Sunday and Monday all the year round and for the entire months -of September, December, January and February. It is true that students -and other visitors may apply to the curator for admission at other -times, and foreigners are admitted on presentation of their visiting -card on any day except Sunday and Bank Holidays, but what Londoner, with -richer collections open every day in the week, could be expected to -remember the capriciousness of the guardians of Sir John Soane’s -treasures, who are like the suburban hostess announcing her reception -days as first and third Tuesdays and fifth Friday? In despair of -remembering when the good lady was at home, you would never call on her. -No, if you want to see the Hogarths, my advice is to wrap yourself in -the cloak of a foreigner and present your card at the door of this -neglected London museum between the hours of ten and five. - - -LINCOLN’S INN - - “The Walks of Lincoln’s Inn - Under the Elms.” - BEN JONSON. - -Lincoln’s Inn Fields are bordered on the east side by Lincoln’s Inn, but -I like better to approach the old squares by the brick gatehouse in -Chancery Lane. It is the oldest part of Lincoln’s Inn, and a very fine -example of Tudor brickwork. The Sir Thomas Lovel who built it in 1518 -put his own arms over the gateway, never dreaming that when his name -would mean nothing to the passer-by, the name of a bricklayer, one Ben -Jonson who worked, with a trowel in one hand and a book in the other, at -the adjoining buildings about a hundred years later, would need no coat -of arms to preserve his memory. People like Mr. Muirhead, who see things -in the light of cold reason, argue that in 1617 Jonson was forty-four -and already famous, so he had probably laid down the trowel,--but I -prefer to believe old Fuller, who said Ben Jonson helped in the building -of the new structure in Lincoln’s Inn. - -There are four of these old Inns of Court, that have lasted since the -thirteenth century--the Inner Temple, the Middle Temple, Lincoln’s Inn -and Gray’s Inn. Few visitors to London go out of their way to stroll in -their shady courtyards, but there are not many corners of London where -you can so easily shake off the oppression of the blare of machinery and -recapture the spirit of a time when the study of the law was not thought -incompatible with many pleasanter, more frivolous things. - -One old chronicler says: “There is both in the Inns of Court and the -Inns of Chancery, a sort of academy or gymnasium where they learn -singing and all kinds of music, and such other accomplishments and -diversions (which are called revels) as are suitable to their quality -and usually practised at court. All vice is discouraged and banished. -The greatest nobility of the kingdom often place their children in those -Inns of Court--not so much as to make the law their study but to form -their manners.” - -I have no predilection for the legal profession, being, like most of my -kind, filled with amazement at the lack of logic and the crass -inconsequences that attend the administration of justice in any country. -In fact I have a fellow-feeling for Peter the Great, who knew his own -mind and had no herd opinions. When he was taken into Westminster Hall, -he inquired who those busy people were in wigs and black gowns. He was -answered, “They are lawyers.” “Lawyers?” said he, with a face of -astonishment. “Why, I have but two in my whole dominions, and I believe -I shall hang one of them the moment I get home.” - -I suppose in no country in the world is the study and practice of the -law surrounded with such debonair amenities as in London. Who would not -be a lawyer, since that profession is the Open Sesame to shady gardens, -lodgings in history-haunted rooms, and a prideful possession in such -rare buildings as the Church of the Knights Templars? - -Lincoln’s Inn takes its name from a thirteenth century Henry de Lacy, -Earl of Lincoln, who had a mansion in Chancery Lane near the first -church of the Knights Templars. His arms are carved over the brick -gateway, separated from those of the builder, Sir Thomas Lovel, by the -royal arms of England. None of the existing old buildings are later than -Tudor times. - -The old Inn has had many illustrious members, lodgers and visitors. -Oliver Cromwell used to come here to see Thurloe, his secretary of -state, who lived at 24 Old Buildings, and there is the story of how he -nearly killed a young clerk he found apparently asleep when he had been -plotting with Thurloe to seize Prince Charles. Thurloe dissuaded him by -passing a lighted candle before the young man’s eyes to prove he was -really asleep, and the clerk lived to warn the prince, who when he -became king paid several visits to Lincoln’s Inn. Both Pepys and Evelyn -record his presence at the “revels,” when learning was encouraged by -indulgence in dancing. In the Admittance Book are the signatures of -Charles II., the Duke of York, Prince Rupert and the Duke of Monmouth, -written in 1671. - -Dr. John Donne and Sir Thomas More were both connected with Lincoln’s -Inn. Dr. Donne laid the foundation-stone and preached the consecration -sermon of the chapel that Inigo Jones designed in 1623, since so -disastrously restored. It is built on arches, so you can walk about -under the Gothic roof, as Pepys said he did “by agreement” on the 27th -of June, 1663, but you will not see the six seventeenth-century windows, -for they were shattered by an explosion in October, 1915. - -Sir Thomas More has a more intimate connection with the Inn, for his -father and grandfather held the office of butler and steward, and for -their long and faithful services were rewarded by admission into the -Society of Lincoln’s Inn and by the much-prized office of Reader. - -The wonderful law library is now housed in the new red-brick hall, -decorated with Watts’ fresco of “The Lawgivers of the World,” but the -old hall built about 400 years ago is still in use, though it, too, has -suffered from the hands of the restorer. - -Only the benchers and members of Lincoln’s Inn may use the elm-shaded -gardens. They not only fulfil Pepys’ prophecy that they would be very -pretty, but they had a useful war record, as a memorial tablet shows. - -I am told that the Curfew is still rung at Lincoln’s Inn. At a quarter -to nine each evening the chief porter climbs to the tower of the chapel -and when the hour has struck he sounds the curfew fifty times. The bell -used was brought from Cadiz by the Earl of Essex in 1596. - - -RECORD OFFICE - - “Dull would he be of soul who could pass by - A sight so touching in its majesty.” - WORDSWORTH. - -Coming out into Chancery Lane once more and turning down towards Fleet -Street, you will see on your left a huge grey building in Tudor style, -where once stood the House of the Converts. - -It was called by that name when Henry III. founded a House in 1232 to -receive converted Jews. I hardly like to tell you that the present name -is the Record Office. It is too pompous and official-sounding, and -perhaps that is why people pass the House of the Converts never -suspecting the presence of the entrancing, memory-evoking things within. - -You enter the enchanted room by descending a short flight of stone -steps, after going through a forbidding portal and along a green sward -into a modern grey building in one of the very busiest of the London -streets. - -You will know why I call it an enchanted room as soon as you see the -beautiful chapel-like precincts named the House of the Converts nearly -700 years ago, before it was used from Edward III.’s time as the Chapel -of the Rolls. - -The stained glass windows give a mellow light to the admirable -Torrigiano monument of a sixteenth century Master of the Rolls and the -delicately carved alabaster tomb of Richard Alington and his wife Jane. -Near by is the recumbent figure of another Master, with the little -figures of his children kneeling below, one of them the little daughter -born on Christmas Day and married when she was only twelve years old, “a -pretty red-headed wench,” to William Cavendish, afterwards Earl of -Devonshire, in the year of grace 1608. - -There are all sorts of other treasures in this mysterious room, that is -open to all comers between the hours of two and four, any day in the -week except, alas, Saturday or Sunday. - -You may look on the handwriting of “Jane the Quene,” in one of the very -few documents signed by Lady Jane Grey during her nine days’ reign, or -read the pathetic letter written by Mary Queen of Scots to Sir William -Cecil, “Mester Cessilles,” she calls him in the queer Scottish-English -sometimes used by “yowr richt asured good friend, Marie R.” - -For here are guarded poignant souvenirs of long-dead men and women, of -whose sorrows and anguish of mind nothing is left but the yellowing -paper covered with the almost illegible writing of their times. You will -find the cry of Sir Philip Sidney to Jaen Wyer the Court surgeon of His -Highness of Cleves, written when he lay dying from his wound at the -battle of Zutphen: “Come, my Weier, come. I am in danger of my life and -I want you here. Neither living or dead shall I be ungrateful. I can -write no more, but I earnestly pray you to make haste. Farewell. At -Arnem. Yours, Ph. Sidney.” And Sir Walter Raleigh’s letter to Queen -Anne, the wife of James the First, where he says: “My extreme shortness -of breath doth grow fast on me, with the dispayre of obtayning so mich -grace to walke with my keeper up the hill within the Tower.” - -The letters are not all sorrowful, but they all have the power to -breathe life into the dry bones of history. Not far from the heart-felt -appeal of the great Cardinal Wolsey to Henry VIII., praying for “grace, -mercy, remissyon and pardon,” and signed “Your Graces moste prostrat -poor chapleyn, creature, and bedisman,” is a letter from ten-year-old -William of Orange, quaint letters from Leicester and Essex to their -fickle queen, and a dignified epistle, lamenting the outbreak of war -between France and England, but renouncing his fealty and homage to -Richard II., from a fourteenth century member of that noble Picardie -family whose proud device was: - - Roy ne suis, - ne prince ne duc, - ne comte aussy: - Je suis sire de Coucy. - -Old letters are not the only treasures in this corner belonging to -another age. There are beautiful fourteenth-century chests, a bulla -carved by Benvenuto Cellini, that prince of goldsmiths and -autobiographers, and indeed the greatest treasure of all, that I have -kept till the last. - -One first hears of the Domesday Book in the days when one has visions of -a vast tome with some vague connection with the Day of Judgment. Not -even _Little Arthur_ could dispel the prodigious respect and awe one -felt for it. I confused it with the book in which one’s manifold sins -are recorded, and even mature age does not prevent a little secret -satisfaction that has nothing historical at the sight of those fat, -brown hundreds-of-years-old books that we owe to William the Conqueror’s -Norman love for exact accounts. - -The Domesday Books used to be kept in the Chapter House at Westminster -and were only moved to the Record Office in 1839. - - -NEVILL’S COURT - - “Sir, if you wish to have a just notion of the magnitude of this - city you must not be satisfied with seeing its great streets and - squares, but must survey the innumerable little lanes and - courts.”--DR. JOHNSON. - -A stone’s throw from the east end of the Record Office is one of the -most curious unnoticed corners of old London. Go up Fetter Lane, which -is the next turning to Chancery Lane out of Fleet Street, and at No. 34, -close to the Moravian Chapel, you will see a narrow passage called -Nevill’s Court. This passage leads you straight into one of the oldest -bits of London still existing, for here in the very heart of newspaper -land are little ancient seventeenth-century houses with cottage gardens. -They give one the same feeling of unexpectedness as those other queer -little wooden houses with their high gables that you may see in -Collingwood Street, just on the other side of Blackfriars Bridge (I -think it is the third turning to the right). They stand beside the -church, just as they stood nearly three hundred years ago, when the -Thames washed right up to their doorsteps. - -At No. 6 Nevill’s Court, secluded in its walled garden, is a big -seventeenth-century house, which must once have been inhabited by -citizens of wealth and position. It is extraordinary that Time and the -Vandal have left it still intact. I think the reason must be that they -have never been able to find it, like those other old houses in Wardrobe -Court near St. Paul’s, whose whereabouts certainly ought to be set as a -problem in a London taxi-driver’s examination. - -But before seeking the house, there is something to notice in Nevill’s -Court. The main entrance to the Moravian Chapel is in Fetter Lane, at -No. 33. I once went to the service there at three o’clock on a Sunday -afternoon under the influence of the story of the messenger sent while -Bradbury was preaching, to announce Queen Anne’s death and the safety -of the Protestant succession. I hoped to find something to remind me of -the chapel’s great age: it is the oldest place of Protestant worship in -London, going back to Queen Mary’s day, when persecuted Protestants are -supposed to have met in the sawpit of the carpenter’s yard on this site. - -Down the long, narrow passage, I found a bare, uncompromising chapel, -with a high, wooden pulpit, that I looked at with more respect than its -ugliness warranted, remembering that Baxter had preached here in 1672, -and that John Wesley and Whitefield had addressed crowded congregations -during the year Wesley spent with the Moravians between the time that he -left the Church of England and the founding of the Methodist persuasion -in 1740. The boundary line between St. Bride’s, Fleet Street, and St. -Dunstan’s in the West is just in front of the pulpit, so the preacher -and his congregation are in different parishes. - -The chapel has been used by the Moravian sect since 1738, and as their -lease does not expire for about another 250 years, it is not likely to -change ownership, in spite of the dwindling congregation. - -It has been so many times restored and rebuilt that one gets a much -better idea of the antiquity of the building from the back entrance in -Nevill’s Court, for this is the only part that could possibly have -existed before the Great Fire. - - -CLIFFORD’S INN - - “Oh! London! London! our delight, - Great flower that opens but at night.” - R. LE GALLIENNE. - -Between Chancery Lane and Fetter Lane is the entrance to Clifford’s Inn, -the oldest of all the Inns of Chancery. In January, 1921, big flaunting -notice-boards announced that Clifford’s Inn would be sold by auction, -but no immediate purchaser was found, and this quiet corner is still -unmolested, though by the time this book is printed it may have received -its _coup de grâce_ from the pickaxe. - -Go and look at it while you may. It was founded in 1345 and takes its -name from a certain Robert Clifford of Edward II.’s reign. Sir Edward -Coke, the great Elizabethan lawyer, was a member of Clifford’s Inn and -left it for the Middle Temple in 1572. - -Some of the Inn survived the Great Fire, and in the crazy-looking little -old hall the judges sat who decided the many boundary disputes after -that catastrophe. At the moment it is the headquarters of some society -“duquel je ne sçais pas le nom.” - -Samuel Butler lived at No. 15 Clifford’s Inn for thirty-eight years, and -many an admirer of the genius of the man who wrote _Erewhon_ and _The -Way of all Flesh_ has made a pilgrimage to the quiet corner hidden away -a few yards from bustling Fleet Street. - - - - -CHAPTER VIII - -THE CHARTERHOUSE AND ST. BARTHOLOMEW’S - - “At length they all to mery London came, - To mery London my most kyndley nurse.” - SPENSER. - - -In days of old, when London’s present meatmarket was the fashionable -jousting-ground of the time, the knights and squires used to ride to -Smithfield up a road still called Giltspur Street, either from the -armourers who dwelt there, or from the jingling of the champions’ spurs -as they clattered by. - -Any Holborn bus will take you to the corner of St. Sepulchre’s where the -dismal bell tolled the passing to Newgate of the condemned criminals. On -the right side of Giltspur Street is St. Bartholomew’s Hospital, that -survived the Great Fire only to be rebuilt in 1730. The history of this -great London hospital goes back eight hundred years, for it belonged to -the Priory, but Sir Thomas Gresham’s father persuaded Henry VIII. to -refound the institution in 1546. - -There was once a naïve inscription under the statue of the fat boy whose -stone image is still to be seen at the corner where Cock Lane joins -Giltspur Street, on the left. At this point, once known as Pye Corner, -the Fire of London was stopped in 1666 by blowing up the houses, and the -writing underneath the figure of this extremely obese youth reminded the -passer-by that “the Great Fire ... was occasioned by the sin of -gluttony.” I do not know what authority there was for this allegation. -Whoever was responsible for the tablet probably had running in his -muddled head the names of Pye or Pie Corner and Pudding Lane in Thames -Street where the conflagration started. The fact that it was from the -house of a baker that the flames first spread may likewise have -influenced him, though it is unusual to be gluttonous on bread alone. - -The Fire gave the moralist good cause for thought. It was an event so -tremendous, so far-reaching, so overwhelming, that it is strange that -the history books of England do not linger over its significance. For in -less than a week practically every landmark that went to make up the -most interesting old mediæval city in the world was swept away. The -ancient cathedral of St. Paul’s, 89 churches, 4 city gates, 460 streets -and 13,200 houses perished in the flames. With the exception, perhaps, -of the burning of Rome, there has never been so terrible a fire. Pepys -wept to see it. - -A wonderful account has been left us by Evelyn: - - The conflagration was so universal, and the people so astonished, - that from the beginning, I know not by what despondency or fate, - they hardly stirr’d to quench it, so that there was nothing heard - or seene but crying out and lamentation, running about like - distracted creatures, without at all attempting to save even their - goods, such a strange consternation there was upon them, so as it - burned both in breadth and length, the Churches, Public Halls, - Exchange, Hospitals, Monuments, and ornaments, leaping after a - prodigious manner from house to house and streete to streete, at - greate distances one from ye other; for ye heate with a long set of - faire and warme weather, had even ignited the air, and prepar’d the - materials to conceive the fire, which devour’d after an incredible - manner, houses, furniture, and everything. Here we saw the Thames - cover’d with goods floating, all the barges and boates laden with - what some had time and courage to save, as, on ye other, ye carts, - &c., carrying out to the fields, which for many miles were strew’d - with moveables of all sorts, and tents erecting to shelter both - people and what goods they could get away. Oh the miserable and - calamitous spectacle! such as haply the world had not seen the like - since the foundation of it, nor to be outdone till the universale - conflagration. All the skie was of a fiery aspect, like the top of - a burning oven, the light seen above forty miles round about for - many nights. God grant my eyes may never behold the like, now - seeing above 10,000 houses all in one flame; the noise and cracking - and thunder of the impetuous flames, ye shrieking of women and - children, the hurry of people, the fall of Towers, Houses, and - Churches, was like an hideous storme, and the aire all about so hot - and inflam’d that at last one was not able to approach it, so that - they were forc’d to stand still and let ye flames burn on, wch they - did for neere two miles in length and one in bredth. The clouds of - smoke were dismall, and reach’d upon computation neer fifty miles - in length. Thus I left it this afternoone burning, a resemblance of - Sodom, or the last day. London was, but is no more! - -Everyone lent a hand; even King Charles came down from Whitehall and -worked hard beside his meanest subject--doing something useful for once -in a way. But it was a case of saving what one could and fleeing. Some -stacked their treasures in the churches (the booksellers of Paternoster -Row stored their books in St. Paul’s), but of the churches nothing was -left. Some buried their valuables underground and perhaps recovered them -two years afterwards, when the last of the rubbish was cleared away. By -the end of that fatal September the whole of the large district of -Moorfields, north of the city, was one vast camp of the homeless, and -there they stayed in shacks and shelters till the city was rebuilt, much -as the unfortunate people of devastated France were living during the -years of the Great War. - -The trade of London ceased for a time; there were no shops, the -merchants had lost their goods, the warehouses were gutted, all records -of debts and commercial transactions were destroyed, there were no -schools, no almshouses. - -Yet in four short years the English, with the same dogged energy that -they were putting recently into the making of trenches and dugouts, had -practically rebuilt their capital city. The churches, of course, took a -long time to finish; the beautiful and numerous halls of the City -Companies were not replaced in a day, but nearly 10,000 houses were up, -and since those seventeenth-century workmen were just Englishmen, with -no foreigners at hand to tell them to “ca’ canny,” everything was in a -fair way to completion. - -As for Sir Christopher Wren, that amazing architect who stamped the -impress of his genius on the great city as we know it, who shall give -him enough honour? He designed and erected over forty public buildings, -amongst them the lovely and unique cluster of churches that lie around -St. Paul’s, yet for this work he was rewarded by the miserable salary of -£100 a year, with £200 a year for the rebuilding of the great cathedral. - - -ST. BARTHOLOMEW THE GREAT - - “The citye of London that is to me so dere and sweete.” - CHAUCER. - -Opposite St. Bartholomew’s Hospital is Smithfield, new and blatant, and -smelling hideously of raw meat. Take courage and go on northwards, for -in a few minutes you will come to the most wonderful old church in -London--older than any other except the chapel in the White Tower. There -is something about the almost primitive simplicity of its massive stone -pillars that carries one back more directly to the times of the Norman -conquerors than a thousand long descriptions gathered from history -books. - -What you see is only the choir and transept of a much larger church -built for the Priory of St. Bartholomew by the founder Rahere in or -about the year 1102. His tomb is on the left as you enter, and high up -on the right is the lovely oriel window where Prior Bolton, who died in -1532, could sit or kneel at his ease, without even the trouble of coming -downstairs from his house, and look down into the church he did so much -to rebuild and restore. - -[Illustration: RAHERE’S TOMB IN ST. BARTHOLOMEW’S CHURCH] - -St. Bartholomew’s has had a turbulent history. There is the dramatic -story of Archbishop Boniface of Lambeth Palace, a Savoyard who took it -into his crafty head that he would like to annex the offertory of St. -Bartholomew’s. On a certain Sunday morning he set out from Lambeth, with -a train of attendants with mail armour under their robes. The -description of what happened is delicious in Matthew Paris’s words, as -quoted by Stowe: - - Amongst other memorable matters, touching this priorie, one is of - an Archbishop’s Visitation, which Matthew Paris hath thus. Boniface - (sayeth he) Archbishoppe of Canterbury, in his Visitation came to - this priorie, where being received with procession in the most - solemne wise, hee said that hee passed not upon the honor, but came - to visite them, to whom the Canons aunswered that they having a - learned Bishop, ought not in contempt of him to be visited by any - other; which aunswere so much offended the Archbishop that he - forthwithe fell on the Supprior, and smote him on the face, saying, - indeede, indeede, dooth it become you English Traytors so to - aunswere mee, thus raging with oaths not to bee recited, hee rent - in peeces the rich Cope of the Supprior, and trode it under his - feete, and thrust him against a pillar of the Chauncell with such - violence, that hee had almost killed him: but the Canons seeing - their supprior thus almost slayne, came and plucked off the - Archbishoppe with such force that they overthrewe him backwardes, - whereby they might see that he was armed and prepared to fight, the - Archbishoppe’s men seeing theyr master downe, being all strangers - and their master’s countrimen born at Prowence, fell upon the - canons, beat them, tare them, and trod them under feete, at length - the Canons getting away as well as they could, ran bloody and myry, - rent and torne, to the Bishoppe of London to complaine, who had - them goe to the king at Westminster, and tell him thereof, - whereupon some of them went thether, the rest were not able, they - were so sore hurt, but when they came to Westminster, the king - would neither heare nor see them, so they returned without - redresse, in the mean season the whole Citie was in an uprore, and - ready to have rung the Common bell, and to have hewed the - Archbishoppe into small pieces, who was secretly crept to Lambhith, - where they sought him, and not knowing him by sight, sayd to - themselves, where is this Ruffian, that cruell smiter, hee is no - winner of soules, but an exactor of money, whome neyther God, nor - any lawfull or free election, did bring to this promotion, but the - king did unlawfully intrude him, being utterly unlearned, a - stranger borne, and having a wife etc: but the Archbishop conveyed - himselfe over, and went to the king with a great complaint against - the Canons, whereas himself was guilty. - -But in spite of Henry III.’s refusal to see the outraged sub-prior and -his loyal canons they had their revenge in time. - -The final result of that little Sunday morning jaunt of Archbishop -Boniface was that he was obliged to build the chapel of Lambeth Palace -about the year 1247 as a penance for having tried to encroach on the -right of the holy Prior of St. Bartholomew’s. - -The quaint gateway by which one enters the scene of the exploits of -these energetic churchmen adds a special charm to the place. The timbers -of the old Elizabethan house above it were only discovered in 1915, when -some of the tiles that long concealed them were loosened. - -[Illustration: CHURCH OF ST. BARTHOLOMEW THE GREAT] - - -ST. JOHN’S GATE - - “For knighthood is not in the feats of Warre, - As for to fight in quarrel right or wrong. - But in a cause which truth can not defarre.” - STEPHEN HAWES. - -Not very far away, stretching across St. John’s Lane, on the other side -of Smithfield and the Charterhouse Road, is another gate, dating from -1504, with the arms of Prior Docwra, Who built it, above the archway. -This was once the south entrance of the great Priory of the Knights -Hospitallers of the Order of St. John of Jerusalem, one of the richest -and most powerful of the religious houses that spread over London in the -Middle Ages. With the exception of this gate and of the Norman crypt in -the church of St. John adjoining (the keys are at the caretaker’s, 112 -Clerkenwell Road), nothing is left of that great monastery that the -people grew to hate for its pride. When Wat Tyler led his band of -peasants to burn and pillage, they burnt and pillaged with special zest -the manors of the Knights Hospitallers of St. John, wherever they found -them, and particularly the priory in London, incidentally beheading the -Grand Prior. The buildings rose again and lasted till the reign of -Edward VI., when they were blown up and pulled down and some of the -stone used to build the Somerset House of the day. - -But the old gate still stands, austere and turret-crowned, and we may -still “behold it with reverence,” like Dr. Johnson. The modern -representatives of the Order of St. John of Jerusalem, which devotes -itself to ambulance and hospital work and did admirable service in the -war, went back in 1887 to live within its ancient walls. - -There are many things of interest in the gatehouse that make the trouble -of writing to the secretary of the Order for permission to see them -worth while. There are relics from Malta and Rhodes, an Elizabethan -chimneypiece in the chancery, and other souvenirs, but the coffer that -contains these treasures is more interesting than anything it holds, and -that every passer-by may see. - - -THE CHARTERHOUSE - - “I never think of London, which I love, without thinking of that - palace which David built for Bathsheba.”--LOWELL. - -Coming back to Charterhouse Street and turning to the left, five -minutes’ walk will bring you to Charterhouse Square, where you can find -one of the most lovely and gracious things in all London. - -People often bewail the passing of old London without knowing that -within this short distance from Holborn Circus they can see a perfect -specimen of a sixteenth-century nobleman’s house. There it stands, only -needing the addition of a little furniture of the period, that - -[Illustration: Sᵗ. John’s Gate Clerkenwell Residence of Edward Cave] - -would never be missed from South Kensington Museum, and you could see -exactly how my Lord Howard lived when he entertained--and plotted -against--his royal mistress three hundred years ago. - -One does not like to think of the number of people who leave London -without ever having seen the Charterhouse. It is one of the most -beautiful places in all London, and its story is packed with romance, -intrigue, adventure and benevolence. - -The tale falls into three parts. It is begun by that gallant Hainaulter, -Sir Walter de Manny, as the English called Walter, Lord of Mausny near -Valenciennes, who came over to England in the train of Philippa of -Hainault. - -According to Froissart he was a “very gentil parfyte knighte,” and when -he saw the ghastly heaps of dead bodies of plague-stricken people lying -in the streets in 1349, he bought from St. Bartholomew’s Hospital a -piece of land called No Man’s Land and caused the dead to be decently -buried there. Their bodies at rest, he had thought for their souls, and -on March 25, 1349, he laid the foundation-stone of a chapel where the -relations might pray for their dead. Twenty years later Sir Walter Manny -laid another stone, that of the first cell for the Carthusian monks he -brought over from France. The wives and sisters of the dead had prayed -so long in the chapel that the right could not be taken from them, so -for once the strict Carthusian rule was relaxed and a special place was -set apart for the womenkind to come and pray. - -Sir Walter Manny died in 1372. He was buried at the foot of the step of -the great altar in the chapel that may be seen to-day, and in the -Charterhouse his Carthusian monks prayed according to the tenets of -their faith for a hundred and sixty-five years more before the last -prior, John Houghton, having been hung on Tyburn Tree, and many of the -brothers tortured, the rest submitted to the king’s will. The House of -the Salutation of the Mother of God in the Charterhouse near London was -dissolved shortly afterwards. - -The second phase of the Charterhouse story is a very different one. -Twice during the following years it was prepared for the coming of a -fair queen, whose head was bowed on Tower Hill instead of in the old -chapel. - -Charterhouse was granted to that wily old courtier, Sir Edward North, in -1545, and eight years later he “conveyed” it to John Dudley, Earl of -Northumberland, the father-in-law of Lady Jane Grey. The Earl of -Northumberland never wanted it for himself, as he had already Durham -House in the Adelphi, but there was his son Guildford with his fair -young wife to be lodged fittingly. So he brought up much furniture from -Kenilworth and stored it hard by, little dreaming that his bold plans -would miscarry and that he would die on Tower Hill a year before the -children whose home he had planned shared the same fate. - -North was granted the Charterhouse again by Queen Mary, and when -Elizabeth came to the throne in 1558 she stayed six days there before -her coronation. - -Three years later she paid the old house another visit, but North died -in 1564 and Charterhouse passed into the hands of crafty, brilliant, -fickle Thomas Howard, fourth Duke of Norfolk. - - * * * * * - -Once more Charterhouse, now known as Howard House, was to be prepared -for a royal mistress, and in a royal manner. - -The new owner, buoyed with hopes of a marriage with Mary, Queen of -Scots, began to put his new house in order. He added the screen in the -great hall and the “Tarrass Walk,” the lovely tapestry room, the -duchess’s withdrawing-room and the magnificent great staircase. - - * * * * * - -On the 6th of August, 1568, Elizabeth came in state from Hampton Court -to Howard House, to pay a visit to her disloyal servant, already -plotting against her and arranging the duchess’s salon for her rival. -The air was thick with intrigue, and by the autumn the rumour of the -marriage with Mary had reached Elizabeth. Norfolk denied it, but a year -later the truth came out, and he spent some time in the Tower, to be -released, under surveillance, when the Black Death threatened that -district. - -He had learned no lesson. Either a devouring ambition or the attraction -of the most fascinating woman in Europe lured him on. Plots and -counterplots were hatched in the long gallery that now forms part of the -upper-story quarters of the Master and Registrar of Charterhouse. Mary’s -emissaries were seized--one of them, called Bailly, has carved the -lesson these events taught him in the Beauchamp Room in the Tower--and -the luckless queen was betrayed in her turn, even as Elizabeth had been, -by the man who so short a time before had decorated the Charterhouse to -receive her as a bride. - -He told, like a coward, the place where her cipher was hidden under a -tile in the Charterhouse, but nothing could save his own neck, and he -followed his father and his two girl cousins, Anne Boleyn and Katherine -Howard, in June 1572. - - * * * * * - -The next owner of Howard House, Philip Howard, Earl of Arundel, was only -a boy of fifteen when he inherited his father’s property, but he was of -sterner stuff, for he refused to abjure the Roman Catholic faith he had -embraced, even to see his wife and children, before he died, worn out, -and under sentence of death, in 1595. Elizabeth had kept him prisoner in -the Beauchamp Tower for ten years, and it - -[Illustration: THE CHARTERHOUSE FROM THE SQUARE] - -was there, in 1587, that he carved the words, “The more suffering for -Christ in this world, so much the more glory with Christ in the life to -come.” - -He had lived very little at the Charterhouse, and when it passed into -the hands of his half-brother Thomas Howard, Earl of Suffolk, the -fortunes of the old house changed with the advent of the great English -Admiral who could swear with truth “‘Fore God I am no coward,” when he -was admiral of the squadron at Flores in the Azores, “and the little -_Revenge_ ran on right into the heart of the foe.” - -Lord Thomas Howard was one of the honoured, trusted servants of -Elizabeth, and she came once more in 1603, not long before her death, to -pay him a visit in the Charterhouse. - -In a few months James I. came there, even as she had done, to spend the -days before his coronation as the guest of the son of the man who had -been his mother’s false suitor. - -But brave Lord Thomas Howard was building a new house at Audley End, and -needing money he sold Howard House for £13,000 to Sir Thomas Sutton. The -brilliant days of the Charterhouse as a nobleman’s mansion were at an -end--another chapter was concluded and the third phase of the story was -to begin. - -Sir Thomas Sutton, the new owner, was the Lord Rhondda of the sixteenth -century. He was a Lincolnshire man with a wide knowledge of men and -things, whose military profession never prevented his having a keen eye -for business. He made a large fortune before he died in 1611, leaving -the provision to found a hospital for eighty impoverished gentlemen and -a school for forty boys, under the name of the Hospital of King James in -Charterhouse. - -There was much discussion, “about it and about,” before Sir Thomas -Sutton’s chosen trustees could carry out his wishes. James I., true son -of his father Darnley, had to be placated by a _pourboire_ of £10,000, -and even Bacon, jealous at not being among the trustees, tried to -belittle the bequest and advise that the money should be used for his -master’s benefit instead of for the poor. Sir Edward Coke, Lady Hatton’s -husband, steered the hospital through the shoals that surrounded its -launching and the more dangerous peril of the king’s genial idea that -the Charterhouse revenues might fitly be used to pay for his army. The -Charterhouse was founded, and for three hundred years the school has -produced great Englishmen and the hospital harboured men who have found -that in the evening of a working life the stars do not always appear. - -Among the Charterhouse scholars have been the bearers of great names -such as Lovelace and Crashaw, Addison and Steele, John Wesley, Sir Henry -Havelock, Thackeray, Leech, Thomas Lovell Beddoes, Lord Alverstone and -many others. The school was removed in 1872 to Godalming, and the -buildings were taken over by the Merchant Taylors’ Company for their -boys’ school. - -The hospital for the poor brothers no longer harbours eighty men. Their -number is reduced to sixty owing to the depreciation in the value of Sir -Thomas Sutton’s land and the fact that since the Charterhouse has always -been considered a wealthy foundation no further bequests have ever been -made to bring the number once more up to the four score of the founder’s -intention. - -That, briefly told, is the dramatic tale of the Charterhouse. You will -readily believe it all if you take the District Railway to Aldersgate -Street and go and see the Charterhouse for yourself. Its beauty is -unimpaired by time. The Guesten Hall where the poor brethren take their -meals, the great sixteenth century carved staircase, the chapel where -Colonel Newcome sat, the false duke’s arcade, and the old gatehouse--all -are there and many more things to recall the most dramatic pages of -England’s history. - - - - -CHAPTER IX - -A STROLL IN WHITEHALL AND WESTMINSTER - - “And all that passes inter nos, - May be proclaimed at Charing Cross.” - SWIFT. - - -Dr. Johnson once said, “Why, sir, Fleet Street has a very animated -appearance, but I think the full tide of human existence is at Charing -Cross.” - -Certainly Charing Cross is the best of all starting-points for exploring -expeditions, and by Charing Cross I mean the south-east corner of -Trafalgar Square. - -From there you may wander along the Strand, or north into Bloomsbury, or -through Cockspur Street into the realms of Mayfair, or southward to the -Thames, and in every direction there are unnoticed stories to be found. - - -UNITED SERVICES MUSEUM - - “More kindly love have I to that place than to any other in - yerth.”--CHAUCER. - -One day I turned my back on Charing Cross to go to St. Margaret’s _via_ -Whitehall, blissfully unconscious of the fact that it happened to be -Saturday and that the church closes its doors every day at 4 p.m. and -for all day on Saturdays. - -At the corner of the Horse Guards Avenue I paused undecided, having -taken months to summon up courage to pass the giant at the entrance to -the United Services Museum! - -He snorts with such a supercilious sniff at the would-be visitor that -you have to remember it may possibly be only the good-natured contempt -of one service for another, and that the Orion’s figurehead may really -be elevating his nose at the Horse Guards across the way, on which I -notice that Spencer Compton, 8th Duke of Devonshire (b. 1833, d. 1908) -also bends a grave and somewhat disapproving eye from his elevated -statue in the middle of the road. - -Mr. Street, in his delicious _Ghosts of Piccadilly_, says, “There is -ever a Devonshire filling his eminent position, calm, retiring, -imperturbable, and never an amusing thing to tell of any one of them,” -and this statue tells you to believe him. - -To come back to the United Services Museum--a thing that far too few -people do, for it is one of London’s many buried treasures--don’t be -misled by any optimistic guide-book that tells you the admission is -sixpence. That is only true on Saturday afternoon; at other times you -part with a shilling unless you are a soldier or sailor in uniform, or -one of the many troops of schoolchildren that are admitted free every -week. - -There are myriads of things to delight any childish heart--cunningly -contrived models of ships, plans of battles, the actual walking-stick -and snuff-box of Sir Francis Drake, Oliver Cromwell’s sword, the very -bugle that sounded the Charge of the Light Brigade, a room devoted to -souvenirs of Lord Wolseley, and rows of other treasures with heroic -stories of brave men. - -I have yet to find a museum without a Napoleonic souvenir, and here -there is a startling one--“Marengo’s” skeleton. You are so engrossed by -the relics of General Wolfe and Nelson and Wellington and other heroes, -that you almost forget what you came to see--the Old Banqueting Hall -where they are lodged, the beautiful Palladian structure that Inigo -Jones built in 1622--all that is now left of the old palace of -Whitehall. - -The nine ceiling paintings that Rubens did at Charles I.’s request look -as fresh as if they had been painted yesterday, having been restored too -many times. Rubens got £3000 for them, while Wren only received £100 a -year for rebuilding all the City churches and £200 a year for rebuilding -St. Paul’s--but Wren was an Englishman and Rubens a foreigner. - -The Banqueting Hall was all that James I. accomplished of the great -palace he meant to let Inigo Jones build for him in Whitehall, and just -outside the hall Charles I. met his death, a short distance from the -statue where - - Comely and calm he rides - Hard by his own Whitehall. - -A little crowd clusters every morning at - -[Illustration: UNITED SERVICES MUSEUM] - -eleven to see the guard relieved at the Horse Guards, now the office of -the C.I.C. of the Home Forces. - -On the king’s birthday, June 3rd, the Trooping of the Colour at the -Horse Guards is an unforgettable pageant. - -The English have not, like the French, the courteous custom of saluting -their flag, but on this occasion every civilian head is bared as the -drums beat and swords flash, and the uplifted colours are borne slowly -round the parade ground to the strains of _God Save the King_ and the -old regimental marches, played by the band of the Life Guards in their -magnificent uniforms. - -It is a gallant sight, and a goodly thing to see. - - -WESTMINSTER ABBEY - - “It is a wonderful place ... a nation, not a city.” - -Even more than of the British Museum I feel that it would be an -impertinence to speak of Westminster Abbey as a London corner unnoticed -by Londoners,--and yet I have known people who have left London and gone -back across the seas with never a thought for the cloisters nor a -“memorie” of Jane Lister, “dear childe,” who lies buried there, people -who may have perfunctorily “done” the Abbey with a guide but have never -lingered there at the uncrowded hours till the exquisite beauty of its -many corners has become a possession they can carry away with them. - -I can make no attempt to point out the manifold interest of the Abbey, -but there are certain places that I love that I would not willingly let -anyone miss. - -There is no need to write of the interior. No one was ever known to miss -the Poets’ Corner, or the Coronation Chair, or Henry VII.’s Chapel, or -the Chapel of Edward the Confessor, but I have known people who visited -Westminster Abbey and missed seeing the Chapter House. - -To miss seeing that thirteenth-century octagonal room is a calamity. It -is not only very beautiful, with a beauty that reminds you at once of -the Sainte Chapelle, but there is an atmosphere about it that takes you -back through the centuries to the time when Simon de Montfort was laying -the foundations of constitutional government, and the first parliament -of twenty-three barons, one hundred and twenty ecclesiastics, two -knights from each shire and two burghers from each town met in this very -room. - -The House of Commons was born within these grey walls nearly five and a -half centuries ago, when the Commons were told to go to “leur ancienne -place en la maison du Chapitre de l’Abbeye de Westminster.” The members -met here till they moved to the Chapel of St. Stephen, within the walls -of Westminster Palace, in 1547. - -Turn your back on the ugly cases of the seals - -[Illustration: POETS’ CORNER, WESTMINSTER ABBEY] - -and charters that should have been removed to the Record Office with the -rest of the public records that were stored here since Elizabethan days, -and look instead at the faint fourteenth-century mural decoration of -Christ surrounded by the Christian virtues. Even the unsightly cases -cannot destroy the sense of the lovely proportions of the -shaft-supported roof and the arcaded walls with the six noble windows, -filled with glass none the less beautiful because it happens to be -modern, and all the more interesting because it honours the memory of -that great lover of Westminster, Dean Stanley. - -When Edward the Confessor about 1050 built the first round Chapter House -on this spot for his Benedictine monks to transact the business of their -monastery, they little thought to what varied uses it would be put. The -present octagonal room has seen the age-long struggle of the people for -their liberties. It was damaged in the Civil Wars and suffered from -repairs in the eighteenth century. It has had its painted walls -concealed by unsightly cupboards, when the public records were stored -there. It has housed the Domesday Book till it and the records were -removed in 1862, and now that it has been restored as nearly as possible -to its old beauty, it exists, spacious and dignified as ever, to remind -the passing visitor of the value of tradition and the history of a great -nation. - -A few steps farther along the cloister is another less well-known -corner, the Chapel of the Pyx--not so ecclesiastical a chamber as it -sounds, “pyx” meaning only a chest or box where the standard of -references for testing the coins of the realm used to be kept. Nowadays -they make these tests at the hall of the ancient Company of Goldsmiths, -at the corner of Foster Lane and Gresham Street. - -Long ago the king’s treasure was kept here, and only the king and my -Lord Chancellor and the Abbot of Westminster had the keys, a fact that -was very inconvenient when a robbery occurred, as at least one abbot -found to his cost. He and forty of his monks saw the inside of the Tower -in consequence, but punishment was not always so light, as the pieces of -human skin still to be seen nailed to the door will show. - -Inside the seven-locked door with its gruesome lining, that is only -opened to visitors on Tuesdays and Fridays, you find a low vaulted room -supported by rounded Romanesque arches on thick short pillars, and a -stone altar--the earliest in the Abbey. - -After leaving the Chapel of the Pyx, stroll along the Norman cloister to -the left, past the Norman undercroft, where, if you have a mind to pay a -small fee to the verger in the Poets’ Corner, you can see any day in the -week the quaint effigies that used to be carried at royal funerals. -Through the dark entry you come to the Little Cloister, a part of the -old monastery, that ought only to be seen on a hot summer’s day, for in -the winter-time it is dreary and your thoughts tend to turn to the smug -ingratitude that allowed the woman Nelson loved to die in poverty,--for -she once lived in the tower built by Abbot Littlington and originally -the bell tower of the church. - -Turn back through the south walk of the Great Cloister and come into the -Deanery Yard. - -It is customary to write to the dean for permission to see the Jerusalem -Chamber, but, if you go without this formality and he happens to be -absent, the caretaker will show it to you and tell quite unique stories -which I will not steal his thunder by repeating. - -You go through the sixteenth-century Jericho Room first, and it too is -interesting, with its linenfold deal panelling. It is the ante-room to -the Jerusalem Chamber, and is now used as a sort of vestry room for the -cathedral. In the Jerusalem Chamber, as every schoolboy knows, King -Henry IV. died in 1413. I refuse to quote Shakespeare on this occasion. -It is a fine fourteenth-century cedar-panelled room, and the light -through fragments of very ancient glass in the windows shines on early -seventeenth-century tapestries and a very old mediæval portrait of -Richard II. It is a gracious place, but when the authors of the Revised -Version of the Bible worked here in 1870, it failed to inspire them with -the same sense of the beauty of words that made their predecessors -produce the finest literature in the world. - -Many famous men have lain in state in the Jerusalem Room before their -interment in the Abbey--Congreve and Addison were both honoured in this -way, and that seventeenth-century poet-diplomatist, Matthew Prior, who -was so esteemed by Louis XIV. that he sent him a bust by the great -Coysevox. With one of those piquant inconsistencies that enliven -history, Nance Oldfield, Mrs. Bracegirdle’s rival, also lay in state in -the Jerusalem Chamber before she was buried in the Abbey. Mrs. -Bracegirdle lies in front of the entrance to the Chapter House, but -Nance Oldfield was the only actress honoured by burial within the Abbey -walls. - -The Jerusalem Chamber was originally the drawing-room of the Abbot of -Westminster, and in James the First’s day a banquet was given here to -the French Ambassadors who came over to arrange the marriage of Prince -Charles and the daughter of Henri IV. - - -ASHBURNHAM HOUSE - - “If ever princess put all princes down, - For temperance, prowess, prudence, equity; - This, this was she, that, in despite of death, - Lives still admired, adored, Elizabeth!” - ANON. - -Coming out of Dean’s Court and passing through the gateway in the east -side of Dean’s Yard, you find another enticing and little-known corner -in Westminster School in Little Dean’s Yard. - -Every monastery had to have its school, so the monks of St. Peter’s -started theirs--the forerunner of the Westminster School or St. Peter’s -College founded by Queen Elizabeth in 1560. Ben Jonson went to school -here, and so did George Herbert and Dryden and Cowper and Southey, -Hakluyt of _Voyages_ fame, and Wren and Locke and Warren Hastings and -many other famous men I do not know, including Prior. - -The school sergeant at the lodge will show the Edward III. College Hall, -with its minstrel gallery and oaken tables made from the beams of the -Spanish Armada. Forty years ago the school annexed Ashburnham House, -another interesting unnoticed corner that can be seen any Saturday -afternoon, on application to the hall porter. This charming house was -built in the seventeenth century by Webb, a famous disciple of Inigo -Jones. Alas, his celebrated staircase is given over to dust and spiders, -and only restored to a semblance of its former beauty on state -occasions, such as Founders’ Day in November or at Christmas, when the -boys perform their well-known Latin plays. - -There are many interesting things about the school and the buildings -that I leave untold, so go and see for yourself this quiet backwater of -London. - - -ST. MARGARET’S CHURCH - - “That, if I chance to hold my peace, - These stones to praise Thee may not cease.” - GEORGE HERBERT. - -St. Margaret’s Church, open till four except on a Saturday, is -interesting not only for its architectural beauty, but for its many -associations, and since 1916 it has had a deepened interest for the -British Dominions beyond the Seas, as it was then created their parish -church. - -Pepys, who simply refuses to be left out of anything, was married here -to his pretty wife, of whom he was so proud that she need not have been -jealous of Mrs. Knipp. - -In the chancel lies Sir Walter Raleigh, buried in St. Margaret’s after -his execution in front of Westminster Palace in 1618. Admiral Blake lies -in the churchyard, and there is a fine window in his honour on the north -side. - -The celebrated east window has had a career that is not without its -comic side. It was originally sent over to England by Ferdinand and -Isabella of Spain as a betrothal gift to Prince Arthur, the eldest son -of Henry VII., with whom they had arranged the marriage of their -daughter Catherine. - -Before the window arrived the bridegroom had died, and Henry VIII., who -married the bride, did not want a window with a portrait of Prince -Arthur and Catherine. He sent it to Waltham Abbey, and from that time -its history is a moving one. - -At the dissolution of the monasteries, the last abbot sent the window to -New Hall in Essex, later bought by the Villiers family, who buried it. -At the Restoration General Monk set it up again till its next owner took -it down, and had the window packed away in a case till he found a -purchaser for fifteen guineas. In 1758 the churchwardens of St. -Margaret’s bought back the window for four hundred guineas, but its -troubles were not ended. - -The Dean and Chapter of Westminster thought the window a superstitious -image, and it was only after a lawsuit lasting seven years that the -churchwardens were allowed to keep their window. - -As usual, I have not told of half the beauty and interest of this -fifteenth-century parish church, only of enough, I hope, to make a -reader go and discover the rest for himself, but let him take thought to -go before four o’clock and not on a Saturday. - - - - -CHAPTER X - -MUSEUMS - - -BRITISH MUSEUM - - “O place! O people! Manners! framed to please - All nations, customs, kindreds, languages!” - HERRICK. - -I am rather diffident about putting any name on this chapter, for no one -would ever think of calling the British Museum an unnoticed place. It -has what the newspapers call a world-wide reputation. Its very name -smacks of solid worth with nothing unexpected about it. It is an -institution looming large and august, its massive masonry dominating -Bloomsbury as its reputation does the universe, and absorbing an -unending queue of earnest-minded people intent on storing their minds -with knowledge. - -And yet, every time my frivolous feet have strayed through that solemn -portico, I have longed to tell the thousands of people who never dream -of coming so far north as Great Russell Street, W.C. 1, of unexpected -things they could find there if they would. I remember as a small person -being made to recite the names of the seven wonders of the world, and I -used to repeat solemnly, “The Temple of Mausolaus at Halicarnassus--the -Pyramid of Cheops--the Lighthouse of Alexandria--the Colossus of -Rhodes--the Hanging Gardens of Semiramis--the Statue of Jupiter at -Olympus, and the Temple of Diana at Ephesus”--with a considerable amount -of annoyance that I could never hope to see these ancient splendours. -When I found the remains of two of them in the British Museum, I felt, -like the Queen of Sheba, that the half had not been told to me, and -since that first moment of delighted surprise how many unexpected things -I have found there which make me long to say to all the unwitting London -visitors, “Don’t be put off by the solemnity of its name and the -distance from Bond Street, but go, only go, and you will be rewarded.” - -The proper way to make friends with a museum, as with people, is to get -to know it slowly, or its very excellences will give you a surfeited -memory. I once avoided the beautiful old Cluny Museum in Paris for many -years, because I had been oppressed by the fact that it contained 11,000 -objects of interest. No one had shown me how to ignore their number and -get to love the very walls of Cardinal Jacques d’Amboise’s stately -house, by never crossing the sunny courtyard to see more than one sort -of exhibit at a time. - -I think this plan is even more applicable to the British Museum, that -great collection, partly bequeathed by Sir Hans Sloane and opened to the -public in 1759. There are two things the hurried visitor can do so as to -carry away the possession of a definite memory of one phase of the -treasures contained in the vast building in Great Russell Street. He may -choose to go there at the hours of 12 or 3 P.M. and follow one of the -two expert lecturers who conduct people each day to see a different -group of exhibits and listen to their story. (Lists of these lectures -are given at the door.) Or he may choose for himself the sort of thing -he finds most interesting and sternly traverse the other rooms intent -only on the objects of his choice. In either case he is luckier than the -visitors in the early days of the museum’s existence, who were herded in -companies of only fifteen for a two hours’ visit. - -To-day one is diffident about directing any choice; as the old guardian -said, “Most people ’as their fancies!” They may lie in the direction of -the mummy rooms, where the prehistoric man, so startlingly like a -modern, crouches in his grave, with his stone flints within reach, or in -the room of gold ornaments and gems, where lie the necklaces that rose -and fell on breasts dead these thousand years, necklaces that differ -nowise from the amethyst and jade trinkets to be seen in Bond Street -to-day. - -Or you may like best to stroll in that pleasant place the King’s -Library--a long, gracious apartment where the sunlight gilds the warm -brown of the lovely tooled bindings of George III.’s books. - -Into this spacious room come all sorts of people--small boys in -knickerbockers anxious to consult the postage stamp collections, -artists to pore over delicately illuminated pages of fifteenth-century -manuscripts, students to worship at the shrine of first editions of -Shakespeare and Spenser, and people who are touched with the human -interest of poignant letters like that of Mary Queen of Scots to “ma -bonne sœur et cousine Elizabeth.” - -But when I am fancy-free, and come to the British Museum, perhaps with -only an hour to spare and no very definite idea about what I want to -see, I choose one of two courses. Either I spend the entire hour in -walking briskly through the galleries and taking a sort of bird’s-eye -view of the different kinds of treasures that the museum guards, without -making an attempt at intimacy with any one of them--or I turn to the -left of the big entrance hall, pass through the Roman and Greco-Roman -rooms and spend the whole time in the western wing, because there I can -see the art of three great nations of the ancient world and the greatest -of all the museum’s treasures--the Elgin Marbles. In the galleries -surrounding them are the stupendous sculptures of Egypt and Assyria; -statues of the Egyptian kings who lived 3000 years ago; colossal bulls, -human-headed, that once guarded the gate of the palace that belonged to -the father of one Sennacherib, King of Assyria, who “came up against all -the defenced cities of Judah and took them,” and fragments from his own -great palace of Nineveh. - -Théophile Gautier’s words: - - Tout passe.--L’art robuste - Seul a l’étérnité: - Le buste - Survit à la cité, - -come into one’s mind, for the bas-reliefs show the effect of the fire of -the Babylonians and Medes when they destroyed “Nineveh that great city” -in 609 B.C., yet they survived and the city is as dust! What a people -they must have been, the folk who built the Lycian tombs, you can see -best when you are half-way down the steps into the Mausoleum room, where -lie the tremendous fragments of one of the seven wonders of the ancient -world--the tomb that his wife and sister built for Mausolos, Prince of -Caria, in a little town in Asia Minor some 2275 years ago. - -Traces of another of the seven wonders are in the Ephesus room, where -remains of the vast Temple of Artemis, “Diana of the Ephesians,” are -gathered, and this room leads to the greatest wonder of them all, the -pediment groups of statues from the Parthenon at Athens, that most of us -call _tout court_ the Elgin Marbles. - -I believe that a great many people have a vague idea that Thomas Bruce, -seventh Earl of Elgin, did a little “scrounging” when he was British -ambassador to the Porte in 1801, and that our possession of these -sculptures is due to a mixture of luck and audacity. - -It is really due to the common sense, artistic perception and -generosity of a statesman who at great inconvenience and a cost to -himself of £70,000, only half of which sum he later received from the -English Government, removed the treasures that were daily being -destroyed by the Turkish bombardment and that, but for his action, would -have been irretrievably lost to the world. - -One does not need to be an artist nor learned in artistic lore to feel -the peculiar charm of the Elgin Marbles. I have seen quite ignorant -people approach them with unseeing eyes and some flippancy about their -mutilation on the lips, but after a few minutes’ contemplation, -something of the calm beauty of the pose, the benignant sweep of the -drapery, damp with the sea-spray, the mystery of those nostalgic -figures, penetrates the onlooker and the work of Pheidias and his -craftsmen has wrought its spell. - -Now and then the official lecturer tells the story of what they had in -their minds when they carved those noble statues, carved every inch of -them, even the parts they thought would never again be seen by any human -eye once they were placed on the pediment of the Great Temple, and you -come away feeling that your eyes have been opened to a great beauty and -the truth of it sinks into the soul. - -It is not possible in these brief notes to mention more than a very few -of the unnoticed treasures in the British Museum. As the old porter -said, there is something to interest everyone. - -If you search you may come across the manuscript of Rupert Brooke’s -immortal sonnet, the toys small children played with 2000 years ago, -Mrs. Delany’s curious paper flowers in the students’ room of the print -collection and many, many other things to draw you there. - - -FOUNDLING HOSPITAL - - “O what a multitude they seemed, these flowers of London town, - Seated in companies they sit, with radiance all their own!” - BLAKE. - -Not far from the British Museum is the Foundling Hospital in Guilford -Street. One hears of it vaguely as an orphan asylum where the children -wear quaint costumes that may be seen at the service in the chapel on -Sunday mornings, when the singing attracts many visitors. - -But there are more reasons than that to take you to this corner off the -beaten track of the West End. For one thing, it may not be there very -long. Already there are rumours that the Foundling Hospital may be moved -to the country and one more link with eighteenth-century London be -snapped. - -Institutions as a rule are about as dull to see as to live in, but the -Foundling Hospital is an exception. Handel, Hogarth and Dickens all gave -tangible proof that they loved the place, and people from all over the -world come to see it, attracted either by the reputation of the choir, -the fame of the pictures in the museum, or the pathetic interest of the -children, who indeed look merry, healthy little creatures. - -Its story is almost too well known to need repetition: A -seventeenth-century sea-captain, living during the latter half of his -life in Rotherhithe, was distressed by the sight of deserted children he -saw on his way to and from the city. It took good Captain Thomas Coram -seventeen years of hard work to turn his dream of a well-endowed -hospital for deserted children into a reality, but in 1739 he got a -royal charter and a house was opened for them in Hatton Garden. The -Foundling Hospital, as we know it, was begun in 1742. - -Hogarth has painted a wonderful portrait of the founder, and looking at -the cheerful benevolent face one can understand why he wrote, “The -portrait I painted with the utmost pleasure and in which I particularly -wished to excel was that of Captain Coram for the Foundling Hospital.” -The kindly eyes that Hogarth drew were forever seeing something to be -done for his fellow men, for the Foundling Hospital was only one of the -old sea-captain’s philanthropies, to which he literally gave away all he -had. In his old age, when he was asked if he would mind accepting a -pension collected from his friends, he said quite simply, “I have not -wasted the little wealth of which I was formerly possessed in -self-indulgence or vain expenses, and am not ashamed to confess that in -this my old age I am poor.” He accepted a pension of a little more than -£100, and is buried in the vaults under the Foundling Hospital Chapel. -That is the story of Thomas Coram, whose statue is at the entrance gate -and whose name is remembered in Great Coram Street and Little Coram -Street. - -The best time to see the hospital is at the Sunday morning service at -eleven o’clock, and the easiest way to reach it is by the tube to -Russell Square. Turn to the right on leaving the tube and walk down -Grenville Street and Guilford Street, and the Foundling Hospital will be -seen to the left. - -Go up to the gallery if you want to see the children seated on each side -of the organ, dressed in the quaint costume that has never altered since -it was decreed by the founder. - -Dickens, who loved the hospital and had a seat in the chapel during the -ten years he lived in Bloomsbury, makes Mrs. Meagles say in _Little -Dorrit_: - - Oh, dear, dear, ... when I saw all those children ranged tier above - tier, and appealing from the father none of them has ever known on - earth, to the great Father of us all in Heaven, I thought, does any - wretched mother ever come here, and look among those young faces, - wondering which is the poor child she brought into this forlorn - world. - -But the rules of the Foundling Hospital have changed since Thomas -Coram’s time. Only the children of known mothers are now received, and - -[Illustration: FOUNDLING HOSPITAL] - -if later in life the mother marries and can prove that she is able to -support her child, she can claim it again. The children are never -allowed to be adopted. They are sent to foster-mothers in the country -when first received, and only come to the hospital when they are six. -The girls with few exceptions are trained for domestic service and the -boys as regimental bandsmen, if they show talent, or they are -apprenticed to different trades when they are fourteen. - -There is something infinitely touching in the sight of these rows of -small creatures, chanting with their trained treble voices, “Let me -never be confounded,” when life had confounded them at its very gates. -But seeing them later on, as every Sunday morning visitor is allowed to -do, happily eating their dinners in their pleasant rooms, it is obvious -that the life of the little brown-coated boy or white-capped girl in -Thomas Coram’s Foundling Hospital has many things in its favour. One may -compare their lot with that of more sophisticated children in the London -slums, for whom it is necessary to have a society for their protection -from the parents who have ill-treated over 100,000 in England in the -last year. - -One does not ordinarily associate a foundling hospital with the fine -arts, but, as I said before, this is an exception. Hogarth not only -painted the founder’s portrait and one or two other pictures that he -gave to the hospital, but he persuaded his friends to do likewise. Sir -Joshua Reynolds gave a portrait of Lord Dartmouth, Gainsborough a view -of Charterhouse, Kneller a portrait of Handel, and the exhibition of -these gifts, including a beautiful cartoon of Raphael’s _Massacre of the -Innocents_, was a forerunner of the exhibitions of the Royal Academy. -The pictures alone are worth going to Guilford Street to see. Some of -them are in the picture gallery with the cases holding tokens that in -the old days before 1760 used to be left to identify the foundling. In -the board-room, which is supposed to be one of the most beautiful rooms -in London, hangs Hogarth’s _March to Finchley_, of which I believe there -is a copy in the ugly “Adam and Eve” public-house, built on the site of -the “Adam and Eve” Inn of the picture, at the corner of the Tottenham -Court Road and Euston Road. - -The tale of how the hospital came to get the picture is rather quaint. -Hogarth painted soldiers marching to Finchley in a state that their -French _confrères_ would call “_débraillés_.” He then asked George II. -to buy it, but that monarch--the last English king to go into -battle--was so enraged at this presentation of his soldiers, that he -indignantly refused, and Hogarth, not being able to dispose of the -picture elsewhere, issued lottery tickets for it. About sixty tickets -were left on his hands, so he gave them to his favourite hospital, which -won the picture, and there it is to-day. - -The careful training of the child choir, and the choice of a musical -career for the boys whenever possible, is only carrying on one of the -earliest traditions, for Handel rivalled Hogarth in his interest and his -gifts to the Foundling Hospital. He used to conduct performances of the -_Messiah_ in the chapel to crowded audiences, and as he induced the -performers to give their services, the proceeds that he handed over -sometimes amounted to nearly £1,000. In a glass case is carefully -preserved the gift the great master bestowed on the hospital of the MS. -of his oratorio, and near by is the autograph copy of the number of -_Good Words_ containing the story Dickens wrote about the Foundling -Hospital. - -In the secretary’s room is a fine old Jacobean oak table but lately -retrieved from the kitchen premises where it had been in use for -centuries. - - -SOUTH KENSINGTON MUSEUM - - “Were I a physician I would prescribe nothing but Recipe, - CCCLXV drachm. Londin.”--WALPOLE. - -One of the nicest things about the South Kensington Museum is the lively -way it keeps in touch with what happens to be interesting Londoners at -the moment. - -Is there a loan exhibition of Spanish pictures at Burlington House, at -once everything Spanish that the Museum possesses is gathered together -so that the different phases of Spanish art may be conveniently noted, -and there is nearly always some extra little exhibition of special -interest, either in celebration of the centenary of some great artist or -to introduce the work of some foreigner of outstanding merit like -Mestrovic. - -The lectures given here daily by expert guides at 12 and 3 p.m. would -probably be crowded if they cost a guinea. With that curious apathy -towards what is not expensive that is one of our less pleasing -attributes, only a few people take advantage of these pleasant scholarly -talks. If they were known to be very exclusive and costly, the thousands -of excellent people with modest incomes and no occupation who live in -Bloomsbury and Earl’s Court boarding-houses, would sigh for the -privilege of sharing these hour-long strolls through the museum, when -the lecturer gives no disconnected account of individual objects but -deftly traces the development of the art of different countries and -ages, illustrating his teaching by the treasures under his care. - -I think this apathy is largely due to lack of initiative and -imagination, as well as to the aforesaid deeply-rooted idea that what -costs nothing cannot be worth much. I have found so many people who have -never heard of these lectures that another cause of the small attendance -may be that the news of their existence is not sufficiently widely -spread. - -There is, alas, no one at Claridge’s or the Ritz or the Savoy to tell -mothers who bring their girls over here to buy clothes and do the -theatres, that there is also a way open to them to gain something that -will still be theirs when the memory of the play has faded--in most -cases let us hope so--and the clothes have been cast aside--since no one -nowadays wears clothes long enough to wear them out. - -The South Kensington Museum is the finest museum of applied art in the -world. That is why it is the Mecca of students who come here to study -and draw inspiration from the lovely things fashioned by our forefathers -in gold and silver and bronze and leather, in silk and lace and precious -stones, in the furnishings and decorations of the houses and persons of -other times and other nations. There are paintings and sculpture as -well: the Raphael cartoons are one of the glories of the place. - -There is something, indeed, to appeal to everyone’s taste in this most -marvellous museum. For the little schoolgirls who seem to throng the -place in cohorts, in the charge of apathetic teachers, there are the -dolls and dolls’ houses that their great-grandmothers played with--the -former as delicately waxen and elegantly dressed as any to be found -to-day. Furniture lovers may study here the finest specimens of every -period, from the handsome Jacobean chairs and settles that harmonise so -well with the background of panelled walls and decorated ceilings taken -from old English houses, to the marvellous ornate escritoires, toilet -tables and gilt couches of French royal palaces. There is less -formality about the English furniture, but it was not more comfortable; -and the heavy projecting carvings even on the back of the little -children’s chairs may well have been the reason for the erect bearings -used for odious comparisons in one’s youth. They say that the beds of -our forefathers were comfortable. That may be true, but they were -certainly depressing, and the state bed from Boughton House, -Northampton, in which William III. slept, with its dingy hangings and -horrible hearse-like plumes, reaching into the lofty roof, makes you -thankful for the airier ideas of to-day. - -For book-lovers there are upstairs the old, old missals and books of -hours, illuminated with such skill and patience by monks in mediæval -monasteries--some with colours almost as perfect, the ink as black, the -paper as white as when they were first executed in the twelfth and -thirteenth centuries. As marvellous, and perhaps even more exquisite as -works of art, are the slender Persian volumes, love-poems and prayers, -inscribed in delicate characters of the East, with pictures of shahs and -houris, and leather covers, so wonderfully embossed and inlaid and -beautifully coloured that no description could give the faintest idea of -their perfection. - -Even people who are not musicians love the gallery where musical -instruments of the past stand silent in their cases: guitars that -troubadours in parti-coloured hose twanged dolorously to their -lady-loves; virginals belonging to Queen Elizabeth and that other -Elizabeth, Queen of Bohemia, who was a daughter of James I.; the -harpsichord that Handel bequeathed to George II.; the great harp of the -famous blind Welsh harper. Zithers are there, and other instruments of -cunning workmanship, lovely to see and with names as melodious as the -sounds they once gave forth: dulcimers and clavicords, lutes and -ceteras, pandores and clavecins. Here are the spinets of our -grandmothers, and what must be the veritable father of the hurdy-gurdy, -and a little pianino made by Chappell more than one hundred years ago, -so small that you could carry it about from place to place. - -Then there is the jewellery--bracelets, girdles, necklaces, earrings, -rings chosen and worn by “Flora la Belle Rommaine” and her sisters of -other ages and countries, but so like, both in design and execution, the -work of the modern goldsmith. - -There is an interesting and beautiful collection of the peasant -jewellery of continental countries--wonderful gilt crowns of Russian and -Norwegian brides and curious rings of gigantic size and significant -names, charm rings, motto rings, incantation rings, iconigraphic rings, -Gnostic rings and rings with all sorts of devices. - -These are only a tithe of the treasures in the Victoria and Albert -Museum that can easily be reached by District Railway and Inner Circle -to South Kensington Station or by the Piccadilly Tube and the Brompton -Road. - - -WALLACE COLLECTION - - “Ce qui nous a tous profondément touchés, c’est moins la grandeur - de vos largesses, qui ont été immenses, que la bonne grâce - spirituelle avec laquelle vous les avez faites.” - - SARCEY. - - - -People say vaguely, “The Wallace Collection? Oh, yes, I really must go -some day; I’ve heard of it so many times,” and the “some day” recedes -and London is left behind and that most delightful place remains unseen. - -And yet this treasure-house is so easy to reach. The shopper at Debenham -and Freebody’s need only turn up Duke Street at the corner where Wigmore -Street embraces Lower Seymour Street, and there is Manchester House at -the far side of Manchester Square. - -If you have only a short time to spend there, give it all to the French -pictures. They are the _pièce de résistance_ of the Wallace Collection, -gathered by two men who loved France and spent most of their lives -there. The story of the Hertfords who made the Wallace Collection is -almost as interesting as anything in their house. The first Marquess of -Hertford had thirteen children, and the portraits he asked Reynolds to -paint of two of his daughters (Nos. 31 and 33) were the nucleus of the -collection. The second marquess only added Reynolds’ “Nelly O’Brien” and -the Romney “Perdita.” - -His son was the celebrated Marquess of Hertford whose meteoric career -enlivened the first half of the last century--the original of both -Thackeray’s Marquis of Steyne and Lord Beaconsfield’s Coningsby, whose -wealth, wit and reckless egoism provided food for gossip for many a -year. It was for him that Decimus Burton built St. Dunstan’s in Regent’s -Park, and he filled it with _objets d’art_ of all kinds, and a number of -pictures, chiefly of the Dutch school. - -His son, Richard Seymour-Conway, fourth Marquess of Hertford, spent his -life in amassing, with the help of Sir Richard Wallace, the collection -that is now the property of the British nation. M. Yriarte, a French art -expert who knew this eccentric nobleman well, published an account of -his curious life in the _Pall Mall Magazine_ for September 1900, but it -is not possible to give the details now. - -Sir Richard Wallace inherited his wealth and his pictures. His name is -legendary here in England, but in Paris it is a household word, for -every thirsty street urchin calls the graceful bronze drinking fountains -he put all over the city “un Vallace.” - -M. Francisque Sarcey, who never met Sir Richard Wallace, has expressed -in the dedication of his _Le Siège de Paris_ something of the feeling -Parisians had for this Englishman who stayed in the city, sharing their -perils and discomforts and proving his sympathy by immense gifts. -Luckily for us, his friendship did not induce him to leave the Hertford -Collection to France. He had always shared his father’s passion for -collecting, and began to buy pictures as a young man. The Corot, -Rousseau’s lovely _Forest Glade_, and the enchanting fresco on plaster -of a _Boy Reading_ by the Milanese artist Foppa, are among the works he -bought. - -To come back to the French pictures: there is no example of Chardin’s -work (to see “Le Bénédicité” you must go to the Louvre), but there are -eight pictures by his pupil Fragonard, and if the Louvre has “The Music -Lesson,” Hertford House has the “Gardens of the Villa d’Este.” - -I think the Fragonards must be seen if there is time for nothing else; -not because Fragonard is a greater artist than the others, but because -his work may be better studied here than in his own country. - -There is a lovely interior of Fragonard’s in the National Gallery, and a -“Lady with a Dog” in the Tennant Collection, 34 Queen Anne’s Gate, but I -am informed that the present occupiers of the Glenconner mansion do not -follow the generous custom of the owners in admitting the public on -Wednesdays and Saturdays from two to six. - -The eccentric Marquess’s statement, “I only like pleasing pictures,” -perhaps accounts for the number of Greuze canvases--over a score; but -the collection is particularly rich in eighteenth-century French -painters--Largillière, Watteau, Nattier, Lancret, Vernet, Van Loo, -Boucher, etc. - -If you have time for two visits, spend the second with the Dutch -pictures, where the Rembrandt portraits almost console me for the -absence of Vermeer’s. One must go to the National Gallery to see the -“Lady at the Virginal.” - -Among the fifty-seven artists represented, there are many old friends, -Frans Hals, Brouwer, Van Ostade, Gerard Dou, Terborch, Wouverman with -his inevitable white horse, six of the excellent Ruysdaels--that somehow -never give me as much pleasure as Metsu’s charming pictures--Hobbema, -the Flemish Teniers, and eight Rubens (he is more likeable here than in -the Louvre). - -Of course there are numberless other treasures. A very complete -catalogue will tell you all about them, but I hope I have made you want -to go and buy that catalogue. - - -GEFFRYE MUSEUM - - “So I set out on my walk to see the wonders of the big city, and, - as chance would have it, I directed my course to the East.”--G. - BORROW. - -I have never met anyone who knew of this Benjamin among museums--it was -only opened the year the war came upon us--except the man of learning -who told me that, tucked away in the heart of the manufacturing district -of Shoreditch, there was a wonderful collection of period furniture -arranged in an old almshouse. So one day I climbed into a 22 bus at -Piccadilly Circus and asked the conductor to discard me at the Geffrye -Museum in the Kingsland Road. We travelled for miles along streets where -every second shop seemed to be a cabinet-maker’s, and then stopped -conveniently at the very gate of the quiet, spacious courtyard where -elderly people were taking the air on the old oak benches. It was past -six of the clock on a warm evening in June, but a misguided guide-book -had said the museum was open till eight in summer. - -That halcyon arrangement disappeared with the fashion of the eight-hour -day, and the museum now closes at six o’clock like its older -_confrères_. It is also closed on Sunday morning and all Monday. - -The people who used to live in the fourteen quaint little brick -almshouses have been transferred to a building in the country, and the -London County Council has bought this property for their museum from the -Ironmongers’ Company, from whose seventeenth-century “Master,” Sir -Robert Geffrye, it takes its name. It is a fascinating place; like a -rather badly arranged old curiosity shop. There are old staircases--one -from Boswell’s house in Queen Street is the most beautiful--and lovely -panelled rooms and all sorts of things that demonstrate how beautiful -interior decoration was before the age of machine-made furniture. - -There is a charming room from New Court, Lincoln’s Inn, and many other -interesting exhibits including a beautiful lacquered Chinese palanquin, -but what I liked best were the fragile, unbelievable wood carvings of -Grinling Gibbons. - -If there were nothing else to see in the Geffrye Museum, it would be -worth while to go to look at what a master hand can do with a block of -wood. Evelyn thought Grinling Gibbons “the greatest master both of -invention and rarenesse of work that the world ever had in any age.” - -I had cherished the mistaken belief that Gibbons was an Englishman for -so long that it was with regret I found that this great artist was born -in Rotterdam and only came to England in 1667 when he was twenty-four -years old. - -It is many long years since I was first shown some of Grinling Gibbons’ -marvellous work--so many that only the effect it had on me remains, -while the date and place have gone from me. I never willingly miss -seeing what his hand has carved, and if any reader of these pages is in -the habit of coming to London often and making friends on each trip with -another of the men of genius who have given the city its proud record, I -can tell them where they may study the wizardlike work of this master -craftsman and great artist. - -The most magnificent piece of work he carved is in the choir of St. -Paul’s, but there are long festoons of flowers in St. Mary Abchurch, in -Abchurch Yard, off Abchurch Lane, a turning out of Cannon Street. In -old St. Mary Abchurch you will also find a wonderful painted dome by Sir -James Thornhill, Hogarth’s father-in-law, whose house in Dean Street, -Soho, has only lately been pulled down. St. James’s, Piccadilly, that -suave building that breathes mid-Victorian portliness, broadcloth and -self-satisfaction, has a lovely marble font carved by Grinling Gibbons, -but the cover was stolen. Later research has destroyed the widely-spread -belief that Grinling Gibbons carved the pedestal for King Charles I.’s -statue in Trafalgar Square, but over the mantelpiece in the vestry of -St. Dunstan’s-in-the-East, between Great Tower Street and Lower Thames -Street, you will find another carving. - -The rest I will leave you to hunt out for yourself. Some of it is in -unlikely places, one of them not a hundred miles from Clifford’s Inn. I -do not know if there is any trace of the pot of flowers Grinling Gibbons -carved when he lived in Belle Sauvage Court on Ludgate Hill, and which -Walpole said “shook surprisingly with the motion of the coaches that -passed by.” - -He lived for forty-three years in Bow Street, Covent Garden. The house -fell down, says an old record, in 1701, “but by a genial providence none -of the family were killed,” and they seem to have propped up their -house, for they went on living there till Grinling Gibbons died in -1721. - - - - -CHAPTER XI - -PARKS - - -HYDE PARK - - “Is there a more gay and graceful spectacle in the world than Hyde - Park ... in the merry month of May or June?”--BEACONSFIELD. - -The London parks certainly do not deserve the epithet “unnoticed,” but I -have met few people who knew anything about their story. Foreigners -coming to London for the first time always exclaim at their beauty, but -the Londoners take them as a matter of course, and hardly anyone stops -to inquire their history or even the reason for their names. Yet much of -the city’s history is bound up with that of the parks, and their story -is a mirror of the changing fashions of London. - -Hyde Park, for instance--that vast space of 390 acres in the very heart -of the city, enjoyed by prince and plutocrat and pauper with equal -freedom so long as they keep on their feet, for the rule of the roadway -is not so democratic--what a tale it could tell of the brave sights it -has seen since it was first enclosed in 1592! Before Charles I.’s time -the park, that took its name from the Manor of Hyde, was only to be -enjoyed by the king and court, who hunted and hawked there; but in -Stuart days there were foot and horse races and drives and merry-making. -It has always been a favourite haunt of Mayfair. Evelyn used to “take -the aire in Hide Park,” very annoyed at having to pay one shilling and -sixpence for the privilege, and so did Pepys, obviously gratified that -his wife attracted attention. De Gramont, the witty observer of Charles -II.’s court, is quoted as saying: “Hyde Park everyone knows is the -promenade of London--the promenade of beauty and fashion.” - -In the days of Charles II. all the world went to the Ring, a circular -course of about 350 yards laid out by the Merry Monarch, between the -Ranger’s Cottage and the present tea-house. How fashionable the drive -was Pepys tells us when he says: “Took up my wife and Deb and to the -park, where being in a hackney and they undressed, was ashamed to go -into the Tour but went round the park and so with pleasure home.” - -In those days there was a cake-house, where cheese-cakes, syllabub and -tarts were sold--refreshments probably more attractive than those of -to-day. - -Places of refreshment might so easily add enormously to the amenities of -the London parks and gardens if good food, attractively and quickly -provided, could be obtained. Nature has furnished an exquisite -background for a sylvan meal, but anyone who has ordered tea at one of -these places carries away a regret for what might have been. Perhaps -that is why it has never been fashionable to take tea in the park since -the Georgian days when people stood on chairs to see the beautiful Miss -Gunnings pass by. - -The latest fashions were always worn first in Hyde Park. The daring of -any Paris _mannequin_ at the Grand Prix pales before the effect made by -the Lady Caroline Campbell of George III.’s reign, who “displayed in -Hyde Park the other day a feather four feet higher than her bonnet.” - -In Victorian days the smart world strolled on the south walk between -Hyde Park Corner and Alexandra Gate, but to-day that is given over to -the curious strata of society, vomited up from a volcanic war, that now -fill the stalls in the theatres and the restaurants that used to call -themselves exclusive. - -Fashion is slowly retiring--first to the part of the park opposite Park -Lane and then to the northern side opposite Lancaster Gate. Perhaps it -is making the tour, and when the profiteer and his family have -discovered that they are in sole possession of this south-east part of -the park, they will move off and the wheel will turn once more. - -Why the big statue close to Hyde Park Corner is called the Achilles -Statue is one of London’s mysteries for which there is no more reason -than the nursemaid had when she familiarly designated Watts’ “Physical -Energy” in Kensington Gardens as “The Galloping Major.” “Achilles” is a -copy of one of the horse trainers of the Monte Cavallo in Rome. The Pope -gave the cast, the Ordnance Department gave the metal of the cannon -taken in the battles of Salamanca, Vittoria, Toulouse and Waterloo, and -the women of England subscribed £10,000 to this memorial of the Iron -Duke and his comrades-in-arms. Where Achilles comes in, I do not know. - -Each of the great London parks is associated with some special English -sovereign. Charles II. is the godfather of St. James’s Park; Regent’s -Park, like Regent Street, was planned for the glorification of the man -who was afterwards George IV.; Battersea is associated with Prince -Albert the Good, and we owe Kew to the Princess Augusta, mother of -George III. - -Hyde Park and Kensington Gardens owe their allegiance to Queen Caroline, -George II.’s queen. It was she who converted the ponds and the -Westbourne stream into the fifty acres of water of the Serpentine which, -now derived from the Thames, feeds the ornamental water in Buckingham -Palace Gardens and St. James’s Park. The king thought she was doing it -all out of her own purse and smiled at all her schemes, little dreaming -that with Walpole’s aid she was letting him in for some £20,000--a fact -he only discovered after her death. - -Unfortunate Parisians, who are obliged to skirt the Tuileries gardens, -closed inexorably at seven o’clock on a summer evening, envy the -Londoner who may enjoy the leafy cool of his parks till long after dark, -the carriage entrances not being closed till midnight. - -You may see an extraordinary number of quite different phases of English -life in Hyde Park. There are the loafers, including the errand boys and -that mysterious class of people who seem to have nothing to do in life -but “invite their soul” at eleven o’clock of a fine morning. Unless they -are content with a bench, the peace has made this feat more expensive -than it used to be, for when the price of everything else was happily -falling, the rusty individual who was wont to interrupt true lovers’ -conversations by heartlessly demanding a penny, was suddenly inspired to -double the price of the chairs that have been hired in the park for the -last hundred years. - -Then there is the gallant sight of Rotten Row, named from the Route du -Roi that William III. used when he rode from Whitehall to Kensington. -The present Rotten Row was made by George I. when he wanted a shorter -cut through the park. The best time to see the riders is the early -morning, and the bathers have to get up still earlier if they want to -plunge into the Serpentine, for the bathing is over at 8.30 a.m. - -In the afternoon the Hyde Park orator comes into his own and the whole -of the Marble Arch corner turns into a factory for letting off steam. It -is let off by the partisans of different religions who vociferate side -by side, each demonstrating that his particular set of tenets is the -only means to salvation. It is let off by socialists and communists and -bolsheviks, and everyone who fancies he can alter the existing -conditions to his own advantage,--and behind all these fiery-tongued -speechmakers stand the placid good-natured policemen who look on with -all the indulgence of a kindly nurse towards a fractious child, -answering an amused inquiry with a paternal: “It don’t ’urt anyone and -it does them a power of good to get it off their chests!” - -Among the phases to be noticed are the picnic parties who come to the -park prepared to make a day of it, and the children of every class of -society, and the nursemaids whose very name reminds one of his Majesty’s -forces both military and naval, who are also ardent patrons of the park. - -There are many minor points of interest,--the queer little dogs’ -cemetery near the Victoria Gate on the north side, the dell, a -sub-tropical garden near the east end of the Serpentine not far from the -fountain with the charming Artemis statue--but the most delightful way -to see the park at its very best is to go there in the early morning -carrying a picnic breakfast and take a boat at the boathouse south of -the rangers’ lodge. I have always envied the park ranger who lives in -this mansion. The first of his race was appointed by Henry VIII. at the -princely salary of sixpence a day, but when this was objected to by the -Government economy enthusiasts of that time, it was reduced to -fourpence. - -The tiny stone cottages of the keepers, with the classic architecture -that makes them look so ridiculously important, are not really the -smallest houses in London. I think that honour must surely belong to the -porter’s lodge at the Fetter Lane entrance to the Record Office, unless -you count as a house No. 10, Hyde Park Place. Though it certainly has a -street door all to itself, it has only one room. - -The park authority, so careless when it is a matter of eating and -drinking, is careful to provide more artistic pleasures for the Hyde -Park crowds. Bands play there on many summer evenings--the announcements -are made in the Press--and now and then the League of Arts arranges an -entertainment, when thousands of people flock to see the Morris dancing -or some old play performed with a background of green trees. - - -KENSINGTON GARDENS - - “Sometimes a child will cross the glade.” - MATTHEW ARNOLD. - -Henry James once expressed the opinion that the view from the bridge -that crosses the Serpentine where Hyde Park joins Kensington Gardens has -an “extraordinary nobleness,” and there is something indescribably -beautiful and unexpected about it. The grey buildings in the distance -look like some palace of the _fata morgana_ over the shimmering water. -I do not know if Sir James Barrie is responsible for the feeling that -you would not be surprised at anything that might happen in Kensington -Gardens. Who would be bold enough to assert that when the last child has -left the Peter Pan statue the squirrels do not come and play with their -stone brothers? Kensington Gardens are the paradise of the child and the -flower lover. There are ugly things in it, of course, like the Albert -Memorial, though everyone does not think it ugly: I was once startled at -hearing that souvenir of Victorian taste fervently admired by some -fellow bus passengers. But the Serpentine, and the Round Pond on a sunny -morning when the fleet is engaged in serious manœuvres--and the Broad -Walk: Wren’s orangery--the lovely sunk garden with its pleached walk of -lime trees with the avenue Queen Caroline planted--and above all, the -Flower Walk in the sunlit air after a shower,--if visitors to London -have time for nothing else they should carry away a memory of Kensington -Gardens. - - -GREEN PARK AND ST. JAMES’S - - “Satirists may say what they please about the rural enjoyments of a - London citizen on Sunday.”--W. IRVING. - -Walking along Piccadilly from Hyde Park Corner on the “sulky” side, as -Mr. Street calls it in his charming _Ghosts of Piccadilly_, many - -[Illustration: PETER PAN STATUE IN KENSINGTON GARDENS] - -people wonder at the meaning of the ledge on the curb of the pavement -nearly opposite the entrance to 128, Piccadilly. It owes its existence -to a benevolent old clubman who, from his comfortable window armchair, -noticed the porters bearing heavy burdens on their backs and toiling up -the slope of Piccadilly. The ledge was fixed at the right height, so -that they might rest their burdens without unfastening them. - -Green Park was once much larger than its present sixty acres or so, but -George III. took some of it in 1767 to enlarge the gardens of old -Buckingham House. It is now the happy hunting-ground of the gentlemen -who love to lie full length on the grass--the not inconsiderable army of -people who would dread communism if they ever thought about anything, -and would bitterly regret under any other régime the halcyon days when -the out-of-work dole of a benevolent government of bourgeois permitted -these free Britons to lounge at peace. - -Their presence is perhaps the reason why the Green Park is not a -fashionable rendezvous, like Hyde Park, although some of the great -London houses, Stafford House, Bridgewater House, Spencer House, etc., -border it on the east side. The wrought iron and gilded gates bearing -the Cavendish crest and motto that were formerly used as the entrance to -Devonshire House have now been placed in Green Park opposite the -building they guarded so long. These beautiful old gates have had a -chequered history. Seven generations ago, in the eighteenth century, -they began their existence at Turnham Green, where they guarded the -approach to the house of the second Lord Egmont and bore the arms of the -Perceval family. The house changed owners and was pulled down, and in -1838 the gates were bought by the sixth Duke of Devonshire for his -Chiswick house. They stayed there for fifty-nine years, before they came -to spend a brief quarter of a century watching the ebb and flow of -Piccadilly. - -The Duke of Devonshire already had beautiful gates at Chiswick when he -bought these, for the Earl of Burlington who got the house in 1727 and -whose daughter and sole heiress married a Duke of Devonshire, was also a -connoisseur in gates, and had begged a beautiful pair of Inigo Jones -design from Sir Hans Sloane, who did not appreciate them. When they were -being moved, Pope wrote: - - _Passenger._ Oh Gate! how cam’st thou here? - _Gate._ I was brought from Chelsea last year, - Battered with wind and weather; - Inigo Jones put me together, - Sir Hans Sloane - Let me alone, - So Burlington brought me hither. - -Green Park has another gate, part of which I am sure is unnoticed, for -how many people know that in the Wellington Arch at the top of -Constitution Hill, at the upper end of the Green Park, sixteen -policemen and an inspector have their happy home. Their special task is -to direct the traffic at Hyde Park Corner, no easy matter in the season -or when the king and queen and other notabilities come driving out to -take the air. From their bedroom in the Arch they can climb on to the -wide flat top, and under the shadow of the splendid group of Peace in -her flying chariot, look over a wonderful vista of park and palace and -highway. - - -ST. JAMES’S PARK - - “La beauté de Londres n’est pas dans ses monuments mais dans son - immensité.”--ZOLA. - -What would old Lenôtre, Louis XIV.’s court gardener, who laid out St. -James’s Park, think if he could see his handiwork to-day? He would make -a witty jest of it, perhaps, for he was a charming old man of a -guileless simplicity that made him beloved of everyone, even in the most -artificial court in Europe. Charles II. invited the famous French -landscape gardener, who had created Versailles out of a sandhill, to -come and transform the swampy meadow that adjoined the palace Henry -VIII. had fashioned out of the twelfth-century Lepers Hospital, -dedicated to St. James the Less, which has given its name to the palace -and park. - -St. James’s has always been a very royal park since the days when the -young Princess Elizabeth rode through it from her father’s new palace -to the court at Whitehall, attended “with a very honourable confluence -of noble and worshipful persons of both sexes.” Charles I. took his last -walk through it on his way to the scaffold in Whitehall. Charles II. -spent much of his time playing with his dogs and feeding his ducks -there, and he planted some of the oaks from the acorns of the royal oak -at Boscobel. His aviary on the south side is still remembered in the -name of Birdcage Walk, and the tradition is carried on by the aquatic -birds that again haunt the ornamental water as before the war. - -Walpole in his reminiscences quotes George I. as saying: - - This is a strange country. The first morning after my arrival at - St. James’s, I looked out of the window, and saw a park with walls, - canal, etc., which they told me were mine. The next day, Lord - Chetwynd the Ranger of _my_ Park, sent me a fine brace of carp out - of _my_ canal; and I was told I must give five guineas to Lord - Chetwynd’s servant for bringing me _my own_ carp out of _my own_ - canal _in my own garden_. - -I always loved, too, the reply of Walpole’s father to Queen Caroline -when she asked how much it would cost to close St. James’s Park for the -royal use and he answered, “only three crowns, Madam.” - - -REGENT’S PARK - - “London is before all things an incomparable background.”--F. M. - HUEFFER. - -Regent’s Park to most people spells the Zoo, the place where one may see -the best menagerie in the world. It is the successor of Marylebone Park, -a royal hunting-ground until Cromwell’s day. It was laid out in its -present style after 1812 by Nash, the man who designed Regent Street, -and named after the Prince Regent, who thought he would build a country -house here. - -It is so far removed from Mayfair that its glories have been neglected, -but now that fashion has drifted north of Hyde Park and even Bloomsbury -is having its recrudescence, Regent’s Park may wake up any day and find -itself famous. It is beautifully laid out and tended, and garden lovers -from other lands will like it immensely if they take a tube to Baker -Street and spend an hour or so there, either boating on the lovely lake -or walking in the gardens. - -The Royal Botanic Gardens, enclosed by a circular walk, are reached from -York Street by a road running north between Bedford Women’s College and -the Toxophilite Society (which ordinary people are content to call the -Archery Club). It is only open to the general public on Mondays and -Saturdays on payment of one shilling. - -On this west side of the park is St. Dunstan’s Lodge, the home of Mr. -and Mrs. Otto Kahn, who gave their house for some years to the late Sir -Arthur Pearson for his hostel for the education of the blind. - -It was once the home of the Marquess of Hertford, who was the original -of Thackeray’s Marquis of Steyne in _Vanity Fair_ - - -BATTERSEA PARK - - “It takes London of all cities to give you such an impression of - the country.”--HENRY JAMES. - -Battersea Park is another of London’s lovely gardens. It takes its name -from the old parish and manor of Battersea, a gradual corruption of the -Patricesy or Peter’s Isle, by which it was known in Domesday Book as -belonging to the Abbey of St. Peter at Westminster. - -There is nothing very interesting historically about the park, as it was -only laid out in 1852, on Battersea Fields, the scene of a duel in 1829 -between the Duke of Wellington and the Marquis of Winchelsea, but it is -one of the favourite parks of London and the only one that fringes the -borders of the Thames. It has a lovely sunk garden, that is a dream of -beauty in the summer time, and letters are always appearing in the -papers about the birds that nest among its trees. Four of the 188 acres -are laid out as a sub-tropical garden. There is a lake with rowing -boats to hire, and arrangements are made for cricket and other sports. - -If the park has no history, one can find curious bits of old London -quite close to it by turning out of the west gate and asking the way to -Church Road, off the Battersea Bridge Road, and near the river. First -there is the old church of St. Mary’s, ugly enough in itself, but it was -where William Blake was married, and where Turner used to sketch the -wonderful effects on the Thames. Lovers of quaint epitaphs will find a -delicious one composed by himself to the famous Henry St. John, Lord -Bolingbroke, who “was Secretary of State under Queen Anne and in the -days of King George I. and King George II. something more and better.” - -Lord Bolingbroke was a true Battersea man, for he was born there in 1678 -and died in 1751. His second wife, who shares the honour of his -monument, was a niece of Madame de Maintenon. Battersea has been closely -connected with the St. John family for four hundred years, though they -sold their manor to the Spencers in 1763. A bit of it may still be seen -in the adjoining flour mills, where, I believe, it is possible to see -the wonderful ceiling and staircase, and the lovely cedar-panelled room -overlooking the river, where Pope wrote his _Essay on Man_. - - -KEW GARDENS - - “Go down to Kew in lilac-time (it isn’t far from London).” - ALFRED NOYES. - -Kew is too far afield to be called unnoticed London, but it is the most -wonderful of all the London gardens and so easy to reach that to miss it -would be a matter for perpetual regret. - -Anyone can tell you the way to get there: either from Waterloo to Kew -Bridge, when you will have to walk across the bridge to get to the main -entrance of the gardens, or by the District Railway to Kew Gardens -station, or by tram from Hammersmith. - -There is so much to see there that over-much direction destroys the -greatest pleasure of finding out what you like best, and everyone has -his own opinion as to what time of the year the gardens are most -beautiful. The poet loves “Kew in lilac-time,” the lover of gorgeous -colour goes down to see the regiments of tulips, massed as they are -nowhere else outside Holland. Kew in rhododendron and azalea time ought -not to be missed, but I think the loveliest sight of all is Kew in -bluebell time, when it looks as if a bit of the sky had fallen -earthwards on either side of the Queen’s Walk, and in the middle of the -wilderness you come across the deserted little ivy-clad cottage, the sea -of blue sweeping up to the very door to which no pathway now leads. - -It was once the Queen’s Cottage, built by George III. for Queen -Charlotte, in the days when they led the domestic existence that Fanny -Burney described in her _Diary_; but no one now uses it and it stands -there with a mute air of resignation at its fallen fortunes, little -dreaming how much its unexpected beauty adds to the pleasure of the -discoverer of this lovely corner. - -Kew, like the other parks, had its royal origin. Its founder was the -Princess Augusta of Saxe-Gotha, the wife of Frederick Prince of Wales, -who, eight years after her husband’s death, interested herself in the -laying out of the exotic garden at Kew that was the nucleus of the vast -collection of 24,000 different varieties of plants. - -Kew has always been beloved by artists. Sir Peter Lely had a house at -Kew Green and Johann Zoffany the painter, whose fame has so lately been -augmented by the publication of his life and memoirs, lived in Zoffany -House at Strand-on-the-Green, a delightful old-world riverside village -close to Kew Bridge. He is buried in the early eighteenth-century church -of St. Ann, where Gainsborough also lies. - -And now come back to London and I will show you a Lilliputian park I am -sure you have never noticed. It is so tiny; long ago it was the -churchyard of St. Botolph without Aldersgate, dedicated to that kindly -patron of all travellers, but now it is a charming retreat with an -additional attraction that I leave you to discover, and because it is so -close to the General Post Office it is always called The Postman’s -Park. - -There are other lovely unnoticed oases of green round about London town; -Brockwell Park with its fine old walled garden, and Dulwich and -Southwark. Their tales must wait for another time, for now it only -remains for me to say with Pope: - - Dear, damn’d, distracting town, farewell. - - - - -INDEX - - -“Achilles” Statue, 199, 200 - -“Adam and Eve” public-house, 184 - -Adam, the brothers, 48, 49 - -Addison, 10, 25, 109, 156, 168 - -Adelphi, 48, 49 - -Admiralty, old home of, 76 - -Albert Memorial, 204 - -Albert, Prince, 200 - -All Hallows, Barking, 73, 74 - -Anne, Queen, 124, 135 - -Apothecaries’ Society, 18 - -Ascham, Roger, 115 - -Ashburnham House, 169 - -Augusta, Princess, 200, 215 - - -Bacon, Sir Francis, 107, 113, 156 - -Barking, Convent of, 74 - -Battersea Manor, 213 - -Baxter, 135 - -Bedford, Duke of, 34 - -_Beggar’s Opera_, 114, 122 - -Bells of St. Clement’s, 50, 53, 54 - -Bess of Hardwicke, 8 - -Bible, revisers of, 167 - -Birdcage Walk, 210 - -Black Prince, 24, 56, 86 - -Blackstone, 60 - -Blake, Admiral, 170 - -Blake, William, 213 - -Bolingbroke, Lord, 213 - -Bond, Sir Thomas, 27 - -Boniface, Archbishop, 142, 144 - -Botanic Gardens, Royal, 211 - -Bracegirdle, Mrs., 168 - -Brompton Road, 25 - -Brooke, Rupert, MS. of, 178 - -Browne, William, 7 - -Brummell, Beau, 34 - -Buckingham, Dukes of, 43, 44 - -Buckingham Street, 42-46 - -Buns and Bunhill Place, 14 - -Burke, 36 - -Burney, Dr., 10 - -Burney, Fanny, 10, 121, 215 - -Butler, Samuel, 136 - - -Campbell, Lady Caroline, 199 - -Campbell, Thomas, 122 - -Caroline, Queen, 200, 204, 210 - -Carthusian Monks, 151, 152 - -Catherine of Braganza, 11, 18 - -Cellini, Benvenuto, 133 - -Charing Cross, 40-42, 158 - -Charles I., 210; - statue of, 41, 160, 196 - -Charles II., 9, 13, 83, 96, 116, 128, 129, 139, 198, 200, 209, 210 - -Charlotte, Queen, 34, 215 - -Charterhouse: - as mansion, 148, 151-5; - as school and hospital, 155-7; - features, 157 - -Charterhouse scholars, 156 - -Chaucer, 38, 42, 56, 73, 85 - -Cheapside, 84, 85, 90-93 - -Chelsea: - Belgian refugees, 4, 7; - buns, 14; - Burney, Dr., 10; - Carlyle’s house, 12; - Charles II., 9, 11; - Cheyne Walk, 8, 11, 12; - communications, 1, 20; - Crosby Hall, 4, 7, 8, 17; - Danvers, Lady, 17; - famous inhabitants, 10-12, 22, 23; - Flower Show, 19, 20; - Gwynne, Nell, 8-10, 13; - Hospital and pensioners, 10, 12; - James, Henry, 13, 16; - King’s Road, 9; - More’s Gardens, 4; - More, Sir Thomas, 2-4, 7, 8, 15; - Old Church, 14-17; - Paradise Row, 8; - Physic Garden, 17-19; - Ranelagh Gardens, 21, 22; - restaurants, 14; - Sandford Manor House, 9, 10; - shops, 14; - studios, 23 - -Chesterfield, Lord, 21 - -Church bells, lore of, 53, 75, 84 - -Churches: - All Hallows, Barking, 73, 74; - Bow, 84-87; - Chelsea Old Church, 14-17; - Holy Trinity, Knightsbridge, 26; - Moravian Chapel, Nevill’s Court, 134, 135; - St. Anne’s, Soho, 36, 37; - St. Bartholomew’s, Smithfield, 141-4; - St. Clement Danes, 49, 50, 53-55; - St. Clement’s, Eastcheap, 50; - St. Ethelburga’s, 87; - St. Etheldreda’s Chapel, 112-14; - St. James’s, Piccadilly, 33; - St. Margaret’s, Westminster, 170, 171; - St. Mary-le-Strand, 46; - St. Mary’s, Battersea, 213; - St. Olave’s, 74-77; - St. Supulchre’s, Holborn, 114, 115, 137; - Temple, 63, 64 - -Cicill, Master Robert, 55 - -City churches, 87, 88, 93 - -City Companies, 93-102: - Bowyers, 94; - Clothworkers, 99, 100; - Drapers, 99; - Fishmongers, 99, 101, 102; - Fletchers, 94; - Goldsmiths, 99, 101, 102, 166; - Grocers, 99, 101; - Hatters and Haberdashers, 95, 99, 100; - Horners, 94; - Ironmongers, 99, 194; - Lorriners, 94; - Mercers, 99, 100, 101; - Merchant Taylors, 99, 100, 157; - Pattenmakers, 94; - Salters, 99; - Skinners, 99; - Stationers, 102; - Upholders, 94; - Vintners, 99, 100 - -City Guilds and their halls, 99-102 - -Clifford’s Inn, 136 - -Coal Exchange, 71, 72 - -Cockney, true home of, 84 - -Coke, Sir Edward, 113, 136, 156 - -Collingwood Street, 134 - -Commons, first meeting-place of, 162 - -Congreve, 168 - -Coram, Captain Thomas, 179-80 - -Court Leet, 56, 57 - -Cranmer, Archbishop, 79, 113 - -Cromwell, Oliver, 128, 160 - -“Crooked Billet” inn, 78 - -Curfew at Lincoln’s Inn, 130 - -“Czar’s Head” tavern, 47 - - -Davies, Mary, 55 - -Delaney, Mrs., 178 - -De Montfort, Simon, 162 - -De Morgan, William, 12 - -Devonshire, Duchess of, 22 - -Devonshire House gates, 207, 208 - -Dickens, 178, 180, 185 - -Dickensian London, 45, 67, 69, 77, 93, 106, 117, 122 - -Domesday Book, 2, 133, 165 - -Donne, Dr. 16, 17, 129 - -Dorchester, Earl of, 34 - -Dover Street, 27, 28, 29 - -Dryden, 36, 169 - -Durham House, 48, 49, 152 - -Dutch pictures, 191, 193 - - -Ebury, Manor of, 55 - -Edward III., 85, 86, 91 - -Elgin Marbles, 175-7 - -Eliot, George, 11 - -Elizabeth, Queen, 8, 28, 29, 65, 70, 75, 101, 108, 153-5, 209 - -Ely, Bishops of, 28, 29 - -Ely Place, an old-world corner, 111, 112 - -Erasmus, 4 - -Essex, Earl of, 47, 132 - -Evans, William, 116 - -Evelyn, John, 18, 27, 28, 44, 46, 47, 128, 198 - - -Felton, Lavinia, 122 - -Fielding, 10, 45 - -Fire, the Great: - devastating effects, 138, 140; - Evelyn’s account, 138, 139; - origin, 138; - Pepys and, 76, 100, 138; - rapid reconstruction, 140, 101 - -Fleet Street, 57, 58, 84 - -Flemish carvings, 125; - MSS., 124, 125; - pictures, 193 - -Flowers for criminals, 114 - -Foundling Hospital, 178-80, 183-85 - -Fragonard, pictures by, 192 - -Franklin, Benjamin, 102 - -French pictures, 192 - -Furniture, 187, 188, 193, 194 - - -Gainsborough, 184, 215 - -Garrick, David, 34 - -Gaskell, Mrs., 11 - -Gaunt, John of, 56, 113 - -Geffrye, Sir Robert, 194 - -George I., 210 - -George II., 184, 189 - -George III., 207, 215 - -George IV., 33, 200 - -Gibbons, Grinling, carvings by, 13, 33, 83, 105, 160, 195, 196 - -Giltspur Street, 114, 137 - -Gog and Magog, 97, 98 - -Goldsmith, Oliver, 22, 60, 63, 66, 67 - -Grafton, Duchess of, 34 - -Gray’s Inn, 107-10 - -Gresham, Sir Thomas, 94, 101 - -Greuze, pictures by, 192 - -Grey, Lady Jane, 49, 80, 131, 138, 152 - -Grosvenor, Sir Thomas, 55 - -Guildhall, 97, 98; - Library, 98, 99; - Museum, 99 - -Gwynne, Nell, 9, 10, 13, 122 - - -Halifax, Lord, 34 - -Hamilton, Lady, 38 - -Handel, 178, 184, 185, 189 - -Hatton, Christopher, 28, 29, 65, 113 - -Hatton Garden, 28, 29, 110, 111, 179 - -Haweis, Rev. H. R., 11 - -Haymarket Shoppe, 33, 35 - -Hazlitt, 37 - -Henry III., 130, 144 - -Henry IV., 91, 167 - -Henry VIII., 3, 4, 16, 53, 77, 78, 80, 99, 100, 113, 132, 170, 209 - -Henry, Prince of Wales, 58, 59 - -Herbert, George, 17, 169 - -Hertford, Marquesses of, 190, 191, 212 - -Heywood, John, 3 - -Hobbema, pictures by, 193 - -Hogarth, 123, 125, 178, 179, 183, 184 - -Holbein, 4 - -Holywell Street, 70 - -Horse Guards, 159, 161 - -House of the Converts, 130, 131 - -Howard, Lord Thomas, 155 - -Howard, Philip, 154, 155 - -Howard, Thomas, 153 - -Hudson, Sir Jeffrey, 116 - -Huguenots, 19, 37 - -Hume, David, 45 - -Hungerford Market, 42 - -Hunt, Leigh, 12 - -Hyde Park orators, 201, 202 - - -Inns of Court, 126, 127 - - -James I., 58, 80, 155, 156, 160 - -Jewellery collections, 189 - -Jewellery, Jacobean, 32, 99 - -Johnson, Dr., 21, 22, 36, 39, 54, 63, 66, 105, 148, 158 - -Jones, Inigo, 34, 48, 118, 121, 129, 160, 169, 208 - -Jonson, Ben, 7, 126, 169 - - -Kew Gardens, seasons of, 214 - -Kingsland Road, 194 - -Kingsley, Charles and Henry, 11 - -Kit-Cat Club, 109, 110 - -Kneller, 184 - -Knights Hospitallers of St. John, 147, 148 - -Knightsbridge, 24-26 - -Knockers, sanctuary, 75 - - -Lamb, Charles, 60, 63, 66, 67 - -Lambeth Palace, 144 - -Lancaster House (London Museum), 29-32 - -Lawson, Cecil, 11 - -Lectures, museum, 174; - their value, 186 - -Legh Cup, 101 - -Leicester House, 37 - -Lely, Sir Peter, 215 - -Lenôtre, 209 - -Leverhulme, Lord, 31 - -Libraries: - Guildhall, 98, 99; - King’s, 174, 175; - Lincoln’s Inn, 129 - -Lincoln’s Inn: - entrance, 126; - history and features, 128-30 - -Lincoln’s Inn Fields: - gardens, 117, 118; - houses, 118, 121, 122; - theatre, 122 - -Lindsay House, 121 - -Loafers, park, 201, 207 - -Lody, Charles, 83 - -London Bridge, relics of, 89, 102 - -London Parochial Charities, 18, 19 - -London Stone, 70 - -Lord Mayor, prestige of, 96; - procession and banquet, 97 - -Lovel, Sir Thomas, 126, 128 - - -Maclise, David, 11 - -Manny, Sir Walter, 151, 152 - -Mansion Houses, 88-90 - -MSS., illuminated, 124, 188 - -Marble Arch, 103 - -Mary, Queen, going-away dress of, 32 - -Mary Queen of Scots, 8, 131, 153, 154, 175 - -Maypoles, 25, 50 - -Mazarin, Duchess de, 8, 9 - -Medici, Marie de, 91 - -Mercers’ Chapel, 88 - -Merchant’s House, seventeenth century, 73 - -Meredith, George, 11 - -Mews, Royal, 42 - -Milton, 118, 122 - -“Mitre” Inn, 112 - -Mohun, Lord, 36 - -Monmouth, Duke of, 37, 129 - -Monument, 71 - -More, Sir Thomas, 2-4, 7, 15, 38, 79, 80, 129 - -Museum houses, 12 - -Museum, how to see, 173 - -Museums: - British, 172-178; - Geffrye, 193-96; - Guildhall, 99; - London, 29-32; - Royal College of Surgeons, 122; - Soane, 123-26; - South Kensington, 118, 185-89; - United Services’, 158-60; - Wallace Collection, 190-93 - -Musical instruments, 188, 189 - - -Napoleonic souvenirs, 124, 160 - -Nash, 211 - -Nevill’s Court, 133-35 - -Norfolk, Duke of, 15 - -North, Sir Edward, 152, 153 - - -Oldfield, Nance, 168 - -Old Watling Restaurant, 90 - -Orleans, Charles d’, 80 - - -Panier Alley, 116 - -Parish registers, 55 - -Parks: - Battersea, 212, 213; - Brockwell, 216; - Green, 207-9; - Hyde: - dogs’ cemetery, 202; - life, 199, 201, 202; - lodges, 202, 203; - music and dancing, 203; - mysterious statues, 199, 200; - past and present, 197-99; - Serpentine, 200, 201; - Kensington Gardens, 203, 204; - Kew Gardens, 214, 215; - Postman’s, 215; - Regent’s, 211, 212; - St. James’s, 209, 210 - -Paving of London, 104 - -Pearson, Sir Arthur, 212 - -Pembroke, Countess of, 7 - -Pepys, 8, 39, 44, 74, 75, 76, 77, 100, 104, 107, 122, 128, 129, 170, 198 - -Persian MSS., 188 - -Peter Pan Statue, 204 - -Peter the Great, 45-7, 72, 124, 127, 128 - -Petersham, Lord, 35 - -Philippa, Queen, 85, 86 - -Pickering Place, 30 - -Plane tree, Wood Street, 92 - -Pope, 28, 109, 208, 213, 216 - -Port of London Authority’s tower, 77 - -Prince Henry’s Room, 57, 58 - -Princes, the Little, 80 - -Prior, Matthew, 168, 169 - -Punch, 42 - -Pye Corner, 138 - - -Queen’s Cottage, Kew, 214, 215 - - -Raleigh, Sir Walter, 58, 59, 79, 80, 132, 170 - -Ranelagh Club, 21, 109 - -Ranelagh Gardens, 21, 22 - -Raphael cartoons, 184, 187 - -Record Office treasures, 130-33 - -Refreshments, park, 198, 199 - -Reynolds, Sir Joshua, 22, 36, 183, 184, 190 - -Richard II., 132, 167 - -Roman baths, 57, 66, 69, 70, 72 - -Roman London, 68-70, 72, 77 - -Romney, 190 - -Roper, William, 2, 7 - -Roses, York and Lancaster, 64, 65 - -Rossetti, the brothers, 11 - -Rotten Row, 201 - -Rousseau, 45, 124 - -Royalty and parks, 200 - -Rubens, paintings by, 160, 193 - -Russell, Lord, of Killowen, 34 - -Russians in Bow Church, 87 - - -St. Bartholomew’s Hospital, 137 - -St. Dunstan’s Lodge, 212 - -St. James’s Palace, 30 - -St. John’s Gate, 147, 148 - -Savoy Chapel Royal and Manor, 55, 56 - -Sayes Court, Deptford, 46 - -Sculpture in British Museum, 175-7 - -Seething Lane, 74, 76, 77 - -Serpentine bathers, 201 - -Shakespearean London, 53, 64, 65, 70, 71, 110, 113, 167 - -Shrewsbury, Lady, 34 - -Sidney, Sir Philip, 132 - -Sloane, Sir Hans, 4, 18, 173, 208 - -Smith, Captain John, 115 - -Smithfield, 137, 141 - -Snuff-takers, 33, 34 - -Soane Museum, peculiarities of, 123-26 - -Soane, Sir John, 123-25 - -Soho, a king’s grave in, 35, 37 - -Spenser, 64 - -Stanley, Dean, 165 - -Staple Inn, Holborn, 105, 106 - -Steele, Sir Richard, 44, 156 - -Stone effigies, 115, 116, 137, 138 - -Strand, 40, 42, 47, 49 - -Strand Lane, 57, 69 - -Street names, lore of, 85, 93 - -Sutherland, Duke of, 31 - -Sutton, Sir Thomas, 155, 156 - -Swan, device and sign, 91, 92 - -Swift, 14 - -Symons, Arthur, 67 - - -Tattersall’s, 26, 27 - -Temple: - Church, 63, 64; - entrances, 60, 63; - Fountain Court, 67; - Hall, 65; - memories, 60, 63, 64-67 - -Tennant Collection, 192 - -Tennyson, Lord, 122 - -Thackeray, 63, 156, 191, 212 - -Thornhill, Sir James, 196 - -Thynne, Thomas, 121 - -Thynne, William, 73, 74 - -Tonson, Jacob, publisher, 109, 110 - -Took’s Court, 106 - -Tower of London, 79, 80, 83 - -Trade unions, past and present, 94, 95 - -Trafalgar Square, 42 - -Trinity House, 76-78 - -Turner, 11, 124, 213 - -Turner, Sir William, 88, 89 - -Tyburn, 104, 114, 152 - -Tyler, Wat, 147 - - -Wallace, Sir Richard, 191 - -Walpole, Horace, 10, 21, 22, 36, 109, 196, 200, 210 - -War relics of the services, 160 - -Wardrobe Court, 134 - -Water Gates: - Buckingham Street, 43, 48; - Essex House, 47 - -Watling Street, 68, 90 - -Watteau, 125 - -Watts’s “Lawgivers” fresco, 129; - “Physical Energy” statue, 200 - -Webb, 169 - -Wellington Arch, 208, 209 - -Wesley and Whitefield, 135 - -Westbourne Stream, 24, 25, 200 - -Westminster Abbey: - Chapel of the Pyx, 165, 166; - Chapter House, 162, 165; - funeral effigies, 166; - Jericho Room, 167; - Jerusalem Chamber, 167, 168; - Little Cloister, 166, 167 - -Westminster, Dukes of, 55 - -Westminster School, 168, 169 - -Whistler, 11, 12 - -Whitehall Palace, remains of, 160 - -Whittington, 84, 96, 101 - -William III., 46, 89, 121, 188 - -Williamson’s Hotel, 89, 90 - -Window, east, of St. Margaret’s, 170, 171 - -Wolsey, Cardinal, 132 - -Wonders, World’s, in British Museum, 176 - -Wood Street, 32, 92, 93 - -Woodwork, old, 72 - -Wren, Sir Christopher, 33, 53, 54, 60, 71, 86, 88, - 100, 114, 124, 141, 160, 169, 204 - - -York House and its tenants, 44 - -Young, Launcelot, 92, 93 - - -Zoffany, Johann, 215 - -Zoological Gardens, 211 - - - CAMBRIDGE: PRINTED BY THE SYNDICS OF THE PRESS - AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS - -*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK UNNOTICED LONDON *** - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the -United States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. 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Montizambert</div> - -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and -most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms -of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online -at <a href="https://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a>. If you -are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the -country where you are located before using this eBook. -</div> - -<p style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Title: Unnoticed London</p> - -<div style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Author: Elizabeth (E.) Montizambert</div> - -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Release Date: September 6, 2021 [eBook #66228]</div> - -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Language: English</div> - -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Character set encoding: UTF-8</div> - -<div style='display:block; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Produced by: Chuck Greif and The Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive/Canadian Libraries)</div> - -<div style='margin-top:2em; margin-bottom:4em'>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK UNNOTICED LONDON ***</div> -<hr class="full" /> - -<p class="figcenter"> -<a href="images/cover.jpg"> -<img src="images/cover.jpg" -height="550" alt="[Image of -the book's cover unavailable.]" /></a> -</p> - -<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" summary="" -style="border: 2px black solid;margin:auto auto;max-width:50%; -padding:1%;"> -<tr><td> - -<p class="c"><a href="#CONTENTS">Contents.</a><br /> -<a href="#INDEX">Index.</a></p> -<p class="c"><a href="#LIST_OF_ILLUSTRATIONS">List of Illustrations</a><br /> <span class="nonvis">(In certain versions of this etext [in certain browsers] -clicking on the image will bring up a larger version.)</span></p> - -<p class="c">(etext transcriber's note)</p></td></tr> -</table> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_i" id="page_i">{i}</a></span> </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_ii" id="page_ii">{ii}</a></span> </p> - -<p class="c">UNNOTICED LONDON</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_iii" id="page_iii">{iii}</a></span> </p> - -<div class="figcenter" id="ill_001" style="width: 440px;"> -<a href="images/i_frontis.jpg"> -<img src="images/i_frontis.jpg" width="440" height="600" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p>CHEYNE ROW</p></div> -</div> - -<div class="bbox"> -<table border="1" cellpadding="5" cellspacing="0"> - -<tr><td class="pddd"> </td><td class="bb"><h1>UNNOTICED<br /> -LONDON</h1></td><td class="pddd"> </td></tr> - -<tr class="c"><td class="pddd"> </td><td>BY<br /> -E. MONTIZAMBERT<br /> -<br /> -<img src="images/colophon.png" -width="65" -alt="" -/> -<br /> -<br /> -WITH TWENTY-FOUR<br /> -ILLUSTRATIONS<br /> -</td><td class="pdd"> </td></tr> - -<tr class="c"><td class="pddd"> </td><td> -1923<br /> -LONDON & TORONTO<br /> -J. M. DENT & SONS LTD.<br /> - -NEW YORK: E. P. DUTTON & CO.</td><td class="pddd"> </td></tr> -</table> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_iv" id="page_iv">{iv}</a></span> </p> - -<table border="0" cellpadding="2" cellspacing="0" summary=""> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">First Edition</span></td> -<td class="pddd"></td> -<td align="left"><i>March 1922</i></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">Reprinted</span></td> -<td class="pddd"></td> -<td align="left"><i>May 1922</i>, <i>May 1923</i></td></tr> -</table> - -<p class="c"> -<i>All rights reserved</i><br /> -<br /> -PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN<br /></p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_v" id="page_v">{v}</a></span> </p> - -<h2><a name="PREFACE" id="PREFACE"></a>PREFACE</h2> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">The</span> following brief account of a few of the things that have interested -me in London is not intended for the use of the inveterate sightseer, -for whom so many admirable and complete fingerposts to the study of old -London have been written, by such experts as Mr. Bell, Mr. Wilfred -Whitten, Mr. E. V. Lucas, Mr. Ordish and Mr. Hare. It is meant for the -people who do not realise one-eighth of the stories packed into the -streets of London, the city which, as Sir Walter Besant, that great -London lover, once said, has an unbroken history of one thousand years -and has never been sacked by an enemy. For, in talking about the -extraordinary beauty of London, I became aware of a vast public who have -eyes and see not, who thoroughly dislike the idea of sight-seeing yet -acknowledge their pleasure in a chance discovery made <i>en route</i> to tea -at the Ritz,—people who are appalled at the very idea of entering a -museum. Then there are the travellers who say vaguely that when they can -find time they really mean to see something of London, but they turn -their backs on the greatest city of the world without having seen much -more than<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_vi" id="page_vi">{vi}</a></span> Bond Street, because they are obsessed by the idea that to -see London requires some occult store of knowledge and energy, and their -eyes are sealed to the interest and beauty that lie around their path. -Finally there are people like the old lady who, when she heard I was -writing a book about old London, asked with astonishment, “Is there -anything old left in London?”</p> - -<p>I hasten to add that I have not tried in the following pages to tell of -every interesting place or even of all there is of interest in the -places visited,—only enough, I hope, to make people go and see for -themselves and have the pleasure of discovering the rest. I am not -afraid that if they once go to the Chapter House they will miss any of -its beauties: my dread is lest they fail to go there, from the vision of -a plethora of things they think they have no time to see. For I want -more than anything else to prick the curiosity of the travellers up and -down the streets of the city who miss so much pleasure that they might -have so easily, because they are not alive to all the interesting and -unexpected things that wait for their coming just round the corner.</p> - -<p>A little further afield there are so many other treasures waiting to be -noticed,—Hogarth’s pleasant house in Chiswick, that, like many another -London visitor, I am promising myself to see the first time I have a -free Monday, Wednesday or Saturday;—Eltham, with its<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_vii" id="page_vii">{vii}</a></span> sunk garden -surrounding the remains of the old palace of the English kings, where -John of Eltham, Edward II.’s son, was born;—Southwark, with its -cathedral and the remains of the Marshalsea Prison that not everyone -knows how to find;—and Islington, with the Canonbury Tower and the -house in Duncan Street, No. 64, where Lamb lived for four years. But -these I must leave regretfully for another day.</p> - -<p>In conclusion, I should like to express my thanks to the <i>Montreal -Gazette</i> and to the <i>Daily Express</i> for permission to reprint one or two -sketches which originally appeared in their pages, and to all those -friends for whose kindly help and encouragement I am much indebted.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_viii" id="page_viii">{viii}</a></span></p> - -<p class="c" style="margin:3em auto;"> -To<br /> -S I R S Q U I R E S P R I G G E</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_ix" id="page_ix">{ix}</a></span> </p> - -<h2><a name="CONTENTS" id="CONTENTS"></a>CONTENTS</h2> - -<table border="0" cellpadding="2" cellspacing="0" summary=""> -<tr><td><small>CHAP.</small></td> -<td> </td> -<td><small>PAGE</small></td></tr> - -<tr valign="top"><td rowspan="2" class="rt"><a href="#CHAPTER_I">I.</a></td><td><span class="smcap">Chelsea</span></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_1">1</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td>The Chelsea of Sir Thomas More—Crosby Hall—Cheyne<br /> -Walk—Sandford Manor—Chelsea<br /> -Hospital—Buns—Chelsea Old Church—The<br /> -Physic Garden—Ranelagh.<br /></td></tr> - -<tr valign="top"><td rowspan="2" class="rt"><a href="#CHAPTER_II">II.</a></td><td><span class="smcap">Knightsbridge to Soho</span></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_24">24</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td>Tattersall’s—Ely House—London Museum—St.<br /> -James’s Church—The Haymarket Shoppe—A<br /> -King in Soho.<br /></td></tr> - -<tr valign="top"><td rowspan="2" class="rt"><a href="#CHAPTER_III">III.</a></td><td><span class="smcap">Trafalgar Square to Fleet Street</span></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_38">38</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td>The Strand—Charing Cross—Water Gates—The<br /> -Adelphi—St. Clement Danes—Savoy<br /> -Chapel—Prince Henry’s Room—The Temple.<br /></td></tr> - -<tr valign="top"><td rowspan="2" class="rt"><a href="#CHAPTER_IV">IV.</a></td><td><span class="smcap">Round about the Tower</span></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_68">68</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td>Roman Baths—London Stone—Great Tower<br /> -Street—All Hallows, Barking—St. Olave’s—Roman<br /> -Wall—Port of London Authority—Trinity<br /> -House—The Crooked Billet—The<br /> -Tower.<br /></td></tr> - -<tr valign="top"><td rowspan="2" class="rt"><a href="#CHAPTER_V">V.</a></td><td><span class="smcap">Round about Cheapside</span></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_84">84</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td>Bow Church—The Old Mansion House—The<br /> -Old Watling Restaurant—37, Cheapside—Wood<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_x" id="page_x">{x}</a></span> -Street—The City Companies—The Guildhall.<br /></td></tr> - -<tr valign="top"><td rowspan="2" class="rt"><a href="#CHAPTER_VI">VI.</a></td><td><span class="smcap">Round about Holborn</span></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_103">103</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td>Tyburn—Staple Inn—Tooks Court—Gray’s<br /> -Inn—Hatton Garden—Ely Place—St. Sepulchre’s—Panier<br /> -Alley.<br /></td></tr> - -<tr valign="top"><td rowspan="2" class="rt"><a href="#CHAPTER_VII">VII.</a></td><td><span class="smcap">Down Chancery Lane</span></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_117">117</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td>Lincoln’s Inn Fields—Soane Museum—Lincoln’s<br /> -Inn—Record Office—Moravian Chapel—Nevills<br /> -Court—Clifford’s Inn.<br /></td></tr> - -<tr valign="top"><td rowspan="2" class="rt"><a href="#CHAPTER_VIII">VIII.</a> -</td><td><span class="smcap">The Charterhouse and St. Bartholomew’s</span></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_137">137</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td>Pye Corner—St. Bartholomew’s the Great—St.<br /> -John’s Gate—The Charterhouse.<br /></td></tr> - -<tr valign="top"><td rowspan="2" class="rt"><a href="#CHAPTER_IX">IX.</a></td> -<td><span class="smcap">A Stroll in Whitehall and Westminster</span></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_158">158</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td>Whitehall—United Services Museum—The<br /> -Abbey Cloisters—The Chapter House—Ashburnham<br /> -House—Jerusalem Chamber—St.<br /> -Margaret’s.<br /></td></tr> - -<tr valign="top"><td rowspan="2" class="rt"><a href="#CHAPTER_X">X.</a></td><td><span class="smcap">Museums</span></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_172">172</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td>British Museum—Foundling Hospital—South<br /> -Kensington—Wallace—Geffrye.<br /> -</td></tr> -<tr valign="top"><td rowspan="3" class="rt"><a href="#CHAPTER_XI">XI.</a></td><td><span class="smcap">Parks</span></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_197">197</a></td></tr> - -<tr><td>Hyde Park—Kensington Gardens—Green<br /> -Park—St. James’s Park—Regent’s Park—Battersea—Kew.<br /> -</td></tr> - -<tr><td><span class="smcap"><a href="#INDEX">Index</a></span></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#INDEX">217</a></td></tr> -</table> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_xi" id="page_xi">{xi}</a></span></p> - -<h2><a name="LIST_OF_ILLUSTRATIONS" id="LIST_OF_ILLUSTRATIONS"></a>LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS</h2> - -<table border="0" cellpadding="2" cellspacing="0" summary=""> -<tr><td> </td><td class="rt"><small>PAGE</small></td></tr> -<tr><td class="pdd"><a href="#ill_001">Cheyne Row</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#ill_001"><i>Frontispiece</i>5</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class="pdd"><a href="#ill_002">Crosby Hall</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_5">5</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class="pdd"><a href="#ill_003">The Old Snuff House</a> </td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_34"><i>facing</i> 34</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class="pdd"><a href="#ill_004">Water Gate, York House</a> </td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_46"><i>facing</i> 46</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class="pdd"><a href="#ill_005">St. Clement Danes</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_51">51</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class="pdd"><a href="#ill_006">Dr. Johnson’s Pew, St. Clement Danes</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_54">54</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class="pdd"><a href="#ill_007">The Temple Church, The Round</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_61">61</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class="pdd"><a href="#ill_008">London Stone, Cannon Street</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_71">71</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class="pdd"><a href="#ill_009">The Tower of London. Byward Tower</a> </td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_76"><i>facing</i> 76</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class="pdd"><a href="#ill_010">The Tower of London</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_79">79</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class="pdd"><a href="#ill_011">Traitors’ Gate, Tower of London</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_81">81</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class="pdd"><a href="#ill_012">Guildhall</a> </td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_96"><i>facing</i> 96</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class="pdd"><a href="#ill_013">Staple Inn</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_106">106</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class="pdd"><a href="#ill_014">Gray’s Inn Hall</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_108">108</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class="pdd"><a href="#ill_015">Lincoln’s Inn</a> </td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_117"><i>facing</i> 117</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class="pdd"><a href="#ill_016">Lincoln’s Inn Gateway</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_119">119</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class="pdd"><a href="#ill_017">Rahere’s Tomb in St. Bartholomew’s Church</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_142">142</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class="pdd"><a href="#ill_018">Church of St. Bartholomew the Great</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_145">145</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class="pdd"><a href="#ill_019">St. John’s Gate, Clerkenwell</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_149">149</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class="pdd"><a href="#ill_020">The Charterhouse from the Square</a> </td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_154"><i>facing</i> 154</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class="pdd"><a href="#ill_021">United Services’ Museum</a> </td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_160"><i>facing</i> 160</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class="pdd"><a href="#ill_022">Poets’ Corner, Westminster Abbey</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_163">163</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class="pdd"><a href="#ill_023">Foundling Hospital</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_181">181</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class="pdd"><a href="#ill_024">Peter Pan Statue in Kensington Gardens</a></td><td class="rt" valign="bottom"><a href="#page_205">205</a></td></tr> -</table> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_xii" id="page_xii">{xii}</a></span> </p> - -<div class="blockquot"><p class="c">“Sir, the happiness of London is not to be conceived but by those -who have been in it.”</p> - -<p class="r"> -<span class="smcap">Dr. Johnson</span><br /> -</p></div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_1" id="page_1">{1}</a></span></p> - -<h1>UNNOTICED LONDON</h1> - -<h2><a name="CHAPTER_I" id="CHAPTER_I"></a><span class="chspc">CHAPTER</span> I<br /><br /> -CHELSEA</h2> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i2">“I have passed manye landes and manye yles and<br /></span> -<span class="i0">contrees, and cherched many full straunge places,....<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Now I am comen home to reste.”<br /></span> -<span class="i12"><span class="smcap">Sir John Maundeville.</span><br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">If</span> a hurried traveller had only time to roam about one of the London -boroughs I think he should choose Chelsea, because in that small area of -houses built along a mile and a half of the Thames riverside there is -much that is typical of quite different phases of London life, from the -sixteenth century to the present day.</p> - -<p>It lies between the Kings Road and the Embankment, beginning at Lower -Sloane Street—Chelsea Bridge Road, and is reached by the district -railway to Sloane Square Station or by the No. 11 bus passing the -Strand, Trafalgar Square and Victoria: by Nos. 19 or 22 from Hyde Park -Corner, and from Kensington by the 31, with its terminus at Limerston -Street, and by the Nos. 49 and 49a.</p> - -<p>Perhaps the reason why this quarter has always been beloved is because -while other districts<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_2" id="page_2">{2}</a></span> have had their moment of fame and now live on -their past in somnolent content, Chelsea has fallen in and out of -fashion with a fine carelessness and has always guarded the creative -gift of dwellers of all ranks, so that the name of the little village -has been famous for such a diversity of things as literature and -custards, art and water-works, china and buns, horticulture and -learning.</p> - -<p>There is something cosy and charming about the name Chelsea, a good old -Anglo-Saxon word that once meant, “The Gravel Isle, Chesel-sey.” It has -not become quite so unrecognisable as its neighbour Battersea, but it -has no more just cause for converting into “sea” the ey that means -island with which it once ended. But you cannot lay down stern rules for -a name that has taken the bit between its teeth like Chelsea. It started -its career in the Domesday Book as Chelched, and by the time it got to -the sixteenth century Sir Thomas More is dating a letter to Henry VIII. -“At my pore howse in Chelcith.”</p> - -<p>Of the two Thomases whose memory pervades Chelsea, Sir Thomas More is -perhaps the most lovable. His son-in-law once said of him: “whom in -sixteen years and more, being in his house conversant with him, I could -never perceive as much as once in a fume.”</p> - -<p>It is in Roper’s <i>Life</i> that you read how his neighbours loved him with -reason. Once, when he had been away on a mission to Cambrai in<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_3" id="page_3">{3}</a></span> 1528, he -went to report to the King at Woodstock, and then heard that part of his -house and barns in Chelsea had been burnt. He had no thought of his own -loss, but sent to comfort his wife and tell her to find out the extent -of his neighbours’ loss and indemnify them as far as possible.</p> - -<p>There have been many other saintly men whom one reveres, but surely none -with such wide sympathies. He entertained Erasmus with learned talk, but -he also entertained John Heywood the playwright and Court jester. He was -wise, but he was also witty, and of which modern philosopher could it be -told “that when an interlude was performed, he would make one among the -players, occasionally coming upon them with surprise, and without -rehearsal fall into a character, and support the part by his -extemporaneous invention and acquit himself with credit.”</p> - -<p>Dear Sir Thomas More of delectable memory—it is good to come across -signs that you still live in English hearts, even if they take the form -of stucco decorations on a Lyons tea house in Carey Street.</p> - -<p>It was Sir Thomas More who first made Chelsea the fashion, though an old -Manor house that stood near the church had many lordly owners before -Henry VIII. bought it and, following More’s example, built himself the -big country mansion of which there are still traces in the basements of -the houses on the corner of<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_4" id="page_4">{4}</a></span> Cheyne Walk and Oakley Street. The King is -also said to have had a hunting lodge near by and part of it still -exists at the end of Glebe Place in a small rather dilapidated building.</p> - -<p>Sir Thomas More had built his house on the site of the present Beaufort -Street and it stood there till Sir Hans Sloane, the Chelsea Baron -Haussmann of that day, pulled it down in 1740. The lovely gardens went -down to the river. Henry VIII. used to come and dine here, and walk with -his arm round the neck of the friend he afterwards brought to the block, -and here More received his other famous friends, among them Erasmus, and -Holbein, who stayed with him for three years, painting many portraits.</p> - -<p>It is pleasant to think that the spirit of More’s hospitality lived -again during the war and curiously enough at this very place and in one -of his own houses. For though his country home was destroyed, his town -house, Crosby Hall, built as the great town mansion of Sir John Crosby, -a merchant prince, in 1466, was brought from Bishopsgate piece by piece -in 1910, and four years later the marvellous timbered roof looked down -on the groups of Belgian fugitives that were sheltered there.</p> - -<p>If you ask the porter at More’s Gardens, a big block of flats on the -north-east corner of Battersea Bridge, for the key of Crosby Hall, he -will unlock a door in an ugly hoarding facing the embankment, close to -Chelsea Old Church.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_5" id="page_5">{5}</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter" id="ill_002" style="width: 493px;"> -<a href="images/i_005.jpg"> -<img src="images/i_005.jpg" width="493" height="600" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p>CROSBY HALL</p></div> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_6" id="page_6">{6}</a></span> </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_7" id="page_7">{7}</a></span> </p> - -<p>You step through it into a remote space where a mediæval building stands -in the midst of the little rock gardens planted by the Belgian refugees -to while away their anxious, tedious hours. Many men have passed through -the old hall since Sir John Crosby built it, for at different times it -had belonged to the Duke of Gloucester (Richard III.), Sir Thomas More, -his son-in-law William Roper, and various ambassadors and nobles. In -1609 it was the home of that Countess of Pembroke whose charms evoked -from William Browne the epitaph so often attributed to Ben Jonson:</p> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Underneath this sable herse<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Lies the subject of all verse;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Sidney’s sister, Pembroke’s mother;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Death! ere thou hast slain another<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Fair and learned and good as she,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Time shall throw a dart at thee.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind">One wonders what they would all have thought of these latest comers to -the old mansion which carried on the English tradition of hospitality so -well that the poet among the visitors wrote, and you may see his words -on a brass tablet opposite the fireplace:</p> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Je sens dans l’air que je respire<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Un parfum de Liberté,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Un peu de cette terre hospitalière,<br /></span> -<span class="i4a">. . . . .<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Le sol de l’Angleterre.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p>The reconstitution of Crosby Hall was never finished; first because of -the death of King Edward, who took a great interest in the<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_8" id="page_8">{8}</a></span> scheme, and -then owing to the war; but there it stands, its perpendicular lines, -mullioned windows and oriel and the wonderful oaken roof making it one -of the best examples that remain to us of fifteenth-century domestic -architecture.</p> - -<p>Chelsea is full of memories of every period since Sir Thomas More’s day.</p> - -<p>Queen Elizabeth as a child stayed at her father’s manor house here, and -later, as a girl of thirteen, she is said to have lived for a time at -Sir Thomas More’s house, when it had passed into the hands of her -stepmother, Catherine Parr.</p> - -<p>The charming Georgian houses of the Cheyne Walk of to-day carry on the -tradition of the beautiful Chelsea homes of those times, such as -Shrewsbury House which stood on the west side of Oakley Street before it -was pulled down in 1813. It was owned by the husband of the famous Bess -of Hardwicke, the Earl of Shrewsbury, who guarded Mary Queen of Scots in -her captivity.</p> - -<p>The delightful little houses in Paradise Row with their dormer windows -and tiled roofs were pulled down only a few years ago. Pepys said that -one of them was “the prettiest contrived house that ever I saw in my -life.” Ormonde Court now reigns in their stead, so there is no trace -to-day of the little house in Paradise Row that the fair but frail -Duchesse de Mazarin, niece of Anne of Austria’s Cardinal Prime Minister, -rented from Lord Cheyne when she had fallen on such evil days that her -aristocratic<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_9" id="page_9">{9}</a></span> guests used to leave money under their plates to pay for -their dinner. She was not the only favourite of Charles II. to have a -summer home in Chelsea. Nell Gwynne lived at the Sandford Manor House -and the route by which the Merry Monarch rode to visit her is still -called the King’s Road.</p> - -<p>I hesitate to tell that Nell Gwynne’s very house is still in existence -for fear of taxing too much the ready courtesy of the occupants, two -members of the staff of The Imperial Gas Works Co., owners of the -property, who divide the house between them.</p> - -<p>My kindly guide had disquieting doubts as to whether Nell ever really -lived there, but he admitted that a thimble, unquestionably hers, and a -masonic jewel belonging to the King, were found in the house when it was -being repaired. Thimbles are not usually associated with the memory of -“pretty witty Nellie,” but the Chelsea air may have moved her to -industry. At all events there is the Jacobean house, shorn now of its -top story to lessen the weight on the bulging walls, and with its brick -carving but faintly seen under successive coats of rough plaster. But -not even the Queen Anne door can destroy the picture any lively -imagination may summon of the nonchalant Nell tripping up and down the -same staircase to be seen to-day, its design of six steps and a door -repeated to the top of the house, belying the legend that Charles once -rode his pony up the stairs. The<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_10" id="page_10">{10}</a></span> walnut trees Nell planted have -disappeared, but what is left of the old house stands in a pleasant -green hollow, an oasis in the acrid surroundings of a gas factory, the -paling of which separates it from the outside world not a stone’s throw -from unsuspecting passengers on a No. 11 bus.</p> - -<p>Joseph Addison lived for a time in the old Manor House, and two of his -letters, written to the Lord Warwick whose mother he afterwards married, -describe the bird concerts in the neighbouring woods.</p> - -<p>If anyone wants to know exactly what the place looked like in Nell -Gwynne’s day, a very interesting account of it may be found in a book -written by a French London-lover, called <i>Fulham Old and New</i>. It is now -out of print, but may be consulted at the Fulham Public Library, reached -by any of the buses travelling westward along the Fulham Road.</p> - -<p>All this is ancient history, of which there is little trace to-day. The -shades of Sir Robert Walpole, Dean Swift, Fielding and Smollett, and -good Dr. Burney, Fanny’s father, who was organist of Chelsea Hospital -and buried in its now closed cemetery, may still haunt Chelsea; but the -actual homes of the people of living memory make a more vivid appeal. -Chelsea still keeps up the reputation of being the haunt of famous -people. Unlike the inhabitants of the Paris Latin Quarter, artists and -poets who have once breathed her air do not remove to more<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_11" id="page_11">{11}</a></span> fashionable -Mayfair streets when they have “arrived.”</p> - -<p>And what a brilliant band of them were found in the Chelsea of the -nineteenth century! Meredith wrote <i>The Ordeal of Richard Feverel</i> at -No. 7 Hobury Street; Charles and Henry Kingsley spent their youth in the -old rectory in Church Street when their father was rector of Chelsea Old -Church; George Eliot moved her household gods to No. 4 Cheyne Walk, the -beautiful house where Daniel Maclise, the early Victorian painter, had -lived, only three short weeks before her death; and Cecil Lawson, the -painter of <i>The Harvest Moon</i> in the Tate Gallery, lived at No. 15.</p> - -<p>A volume might be written about Cheyne Walk alone; those pleasant -red-brick houses with their wrought-iron railings were the homes of some -of the greatest geniuses of the Victorian age. Turner lived at 118 for -the four years before his death in 1851: Rossetti lived at No. 16 with -Swinburne and W. M. Rossetti. Meredith had some idea of joining this -<i>ménage</i>, but recoiled at the sight of Rossetti’s oft-quoted poached -eggs “bleeding to death” on cold bacon very late in the morning. He paid -a quarter’s rent and decided to live by himself. The Rev. Mr. Haweis was -a later tenant of this famous house, which, in spite of popular -tradition, has no connection with Catherine of Braganza. Mrs. Gaskell, -the authoress of <i>Cranford</i>, was born at No. 93. Whistler spent<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_12" id="page_12">{12}</a></span> twelve -years at No. 96, and here he painted the portraits of his mother and -Carlyle.</p> - -<p>The painter had many Chelsea houses, from 101 Cheyne Walk, where he -lived for four years from 1873, to the White House in Tite Street which -he built, and, after his quarrel with the architect, adorned with a -truly Whistlerian inscription, now removed, “Except the Lord build the -house, they labour in vain that build it. This house was built by Mr. -X.”</p> - -<p>William de Morgan and Leigh Hunt lived in Chelsea, but the man whose -memory is the most vivid of all this brilliant group was Thomas Carlyle. -His house at 24 Cheyne Row is a memorial museum open to any visitor on -the payment of one shilling, sixpence on Saturday. The house is kept -exactly as it was in the days which Mr. Blunt has so charmingly -described in his book <i>The Carlyles’ Chelsea Home</i>.</p> - -<p>I can tell no more about it except from hearsay, for the terrible -loneliness of Hugo’s house in the Place des Vosges and of Balzac’s in -the Rue Raynouard in Paris dissuaded me from visiting any more houses -turned into museums of their owners’ belongings.</p> - -<p>I would rather go to the Chelsea Hospital, that is very much alive with -the presence of remarkably long-lived old men: one of them lived till he -was 123 years and another to 116. They think nothing there of mere -centenarians—they even tell you of one pensioner who had served for -eighty-five years and married at the<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_13" id="page_13">{13}</a></span> age of 100. They think that was a -mistake on the whole, but they are secretly proud of it, and also of the -lady warriors—one of them had the domestic-sounding name of Hannah -Snell—who lie buried in the old churchyard among their comrades.</p> - -<p>Visitors can see the hospital every week-day from 10 till dusk, except -for an hour from 12.45 to 1.45, and they may attend the chapel services -on Sunday at 11 <small>A.M.</small> and 6.30, when the pensioners in their brave -scarlet coats remind one of Herkomer’s picture. My advice to you, if you -want to see Chelsea Hospital really well, is to enlist one of the -pensioners as guide. He will show you the old leather black-jacks, and -Grinling Gibbons’ statue of Charles II. in a toga, and the colonnades of -the old Wren building, so fine in its severe simplicity—and the flags -in the chapel, so filmy now with age that they look as if a breath of -wind would blow them to pieces—and the old portraits and many other -arresting things. But what he will like best to exhibit will be the -fragments of the bomb that hit one of the buildings during an air-raid. -He won’t allow you to hold on to the belief that Nell Gwynne had -anything to do with the foundation, but he will tell you a lot of -interesting details about the regulations of the Hospital—how very -little like an institution it is, and you will leave the building with -an added respect for Charles II.</p> - -<p>After strolling about Chelsea one’s mind<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_14" id="page_14">{14}</a></span> turns with insistence to the -thought of buns, “r-r-rare Chelsea buns,” as Swift wrote to Stella. -There is now nothing left but the name of Bunhouse Place, at the corner -of Union Street and the Pimlico Road, of the famous shop where 100,000 -buns used to be sold of a Good Friday Eve one hundred and forty years -ago, and where the Georges and their Queens used to drive to fetch their -buns. It was taken down in 1839, but the fasting sightseer—being in -Chelsea and not in Bloomsbury or Bayswater—can easily find other places -to stay his hunger. If he does not belong to the decorative sex—the -phrase is Mr. Wagner’s, not mine—he will doubtless follow that very -knowledgeable guide and betake him to the “Six Bells,” 195 King’s -Road—a short distance from the Chelsea Town Hall, and there find the -comfort that attracts its artist <i>clientèle</i>.</p> - -<p>There are other restaurants that are much frequented by the artists of -the quarter:—the “Blue Cockatoo,” in Cheyne Walk, near Oakley Street, -and the “Good Intent,” 316 King’s Road, and a new and yet more -attractive one on the corner of Arthur Street with the enticing name of -“The Good Humoured Ladies.”</p> - -<p>Chelsea is full of interesting shops. The Chelsea Book Club is on the -Embankment by Church Street—its delights must be sampled to be -realised—and next door there is a queer handmade toy shop called -Pomona—why Pomona?</p> - -<p>Across the road is Chelsea Old Church, with<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_15" id="page_15">{15}</a></span> its high -seventeenth-century tower. To me its interior is the most satisfying in -London. The spirit of ancient days dwells there, untouched by modern -currents of unrest, and in the tranquil beauty there is no jarring note. -Sir Thomas More was one of its celebrated parishioners—you may see his -monument and the epitaph he wrote himself.</p> - -<p>What a pleasant, kindly, independent spirit had this great Chancellor, -who donned the humble surplice of a parish clerk and sang in the choir -unperturbed by the remonstrances of even so great a personage as the -Duke of Norfolk. I always liked the tale of how the latter came to dine -with Sir Thomas in Chelsea and “fortuned to find him at the church in -choir with a surplice on his back singing, and as they went home -together arm in arm, the duke said, ‘God’s Body, God’s Body, my Lord -Chancellor, a parish clerk—a parish clerk! You dishonour the King and -his office!’ And Sir Thomas replied mildly that he did not think the -duke’s master and his would be offended with him for serving God his -Master or thereby count his office dishonoured.”</p> - -<p>I love Chelsea Old Church better than any other London church. It has -nothing of the heavy solidity that smacks of broadcloth and thick gold -watch-chains. The congregation on a summer Sunday evening might be met -with in any village in England. The very altar has no pomp of -embroidered frontal and massive<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_16" id="page_16">{16}</a></span> ornaments; it looks almost like a -Jacobean dining-room with its simple oaken table and dignified chairs on -either side.</p> - -<p>The church is filled with enchanting old treasures—chained Bibles and -old monuments to the great dead who worshipped there, but I cannot find -it in my heart to catalogue them for you as if it were a museum. Enter -those dim walls and see for yourself, and you will love it as did that -lover of England from across the sea whose epitaph is not the least -among the beautiful things of Chelsea Old Church:</p> - -<p class="c"> -In memory of Henry James, Novelist<br /> -Born in New York, 1843. Died in Chelsea, 1916<br /> -Lover and interpreter of the fine<br /> -amenities of brave decisions and generous<br /> -loyalties: resident of this parish, who<br /> -renounced a cherished citizenship to give his<br /> -allegiance to England in the first<br /> -year of the Great War.<br /> -</p> - -<p>In other churches with their solemn balconies and air of chill -emptiness, it is difficult to imagine the things that have happened -there in other days. But in Chelsea Old Church, which somehow always -seems peopled with friendly ghosts and never lonely, one can almost see -Henry VIII. being married secretly to Jane Seymour before the public -ceremony, and hear the cadence of Dr. John Donne’s voice as he preached -the funeral oration of the woman he had immortalised in <i>The Autumnal -Beauty</i>.</p> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">No spring nor summer beauty hath such grace<br /></span> -<span class="i0">As I have seen in one autumnal face.<br /></span> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_17" id="page_17">{17}</a></span></div></div> -</div> - -<p>I think of all the great people who lie buried here the most fascinating -is this Lady Danvers, George Herbert’s mother, whose “great and harmless -wit, cheerful gravity and obliging behaviour,” attracted so many friends -and among them Dr. Donne. She must have been an adorable mother. I -sometimes wonder if the care of her ten children ever made her late for -church, and if it were some memory of his boyhood days that made her -saintly son write with the cheerful gravity he may have inherited,</p> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i10">Oh be drest,<br /></span> -<span class="i8">Stay not for the last pin,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Thus hell doth jest away thy blessings and extremely flout thee<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Thy clothes being fast but thy soul loose about thee.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p>Mrs. Herbert came to live in Chelsea when she married Sir John Danvers, -after she had “brought up her children carefully and put them in good -courses for making their fortunes.” Danvers House, where she and her -husband lived, gave its name to Danvers Street, at the corner of which -Crosby Hall now stands.</p> - -<h3>The Chelsea Physic Garden</h3> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">“God Almighty first planted a garden.”<br /></span> -<span class="i12"><span class="smcap">Bacon.</span><br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p>One of the things I like best in Chelsea is the old herb garden, the -Chelsea Physic Garden, that makes a home of peace with its base on the -Embankment and the western angle at the<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_18" id="page_18">{18}</a></span> beginning of Cheyne Walk and -the end of the Royal Hospital Road, once called the Queen’s Road in -honour of Catherine of Braganza, Charles II.’s Queen.</p> - -<p>My friendship with the garden is based on no intimate acquaintance, for -not to every one is it given to pass the iron gates that guard its -fragrant stillness. If you would do more than gaze through the iron bars -at this enchanted space that dreams away the year round undisturbed, you -must write to the Clerk of the Trustees of the London Parochial -Charities, 3 Temple Gardens, E.C.4, and ask for a ticket of admission to -the most ancient Botanical Garden in England.</p> - -<p>Once you have taken the trouble to secure this card you may stroll along -the paths of the Chelsea Physic Garden that are much as they were when -Evelyn went there on 7th August, 1685, to visit “Mr. Wats, keeper of the -Apothecaries’ Garden of Simples at Chelsea,” and admire the innumerable -rarities there, the “tree bearing Jesuit’s bark, which had done such -wonders in Quartan agues.”</p> - -<p>The Apothecaries’ Society laid out the garden about two hundred and -fifty years ago. They leased the ground at that time, but later on Sir -Hans Sloane gave them the freehold with one of those quaint conditions -attached that lend a refreshing grace to a legal transaction.</p> - -<p>The Apothecaries had to despatch 2000 specimens of distinct plants, -grown in the garden<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_19" id="page_19">{19}</a></span> well dried and preserved and sent in batches of 50, -every year to the Royal Society. One would like to know what the Royal -Society did with them, but the most interesting things in history are so -often left out.</p> - -<p>In 1899 the garden was handed over to the Trustees of the London -Parochial Charities, who maintain this delectable if deserted London -corner for the teaching of botany and for providing opportunity and -material for botanical investigation.</p> - -<p>Perhaps it was the attraction of the Physic Garden that influenced the -choice of the Huguenot market gardeners who settled in Chelsea when they -were driven from their own country by the Revocation of the Edict of -Nantes in 1685. It startled me to find that at the time when England was -merry, the Guilds were every bit as dictatorial as the Trades Unions are -to-day. More so, in fact, for while a goodly percentage of our workers -and nearly all our waiters are now said to be foreigners, none of the -foreign workmen of the seventeenth century were allowed to carry on -their trades in London and compete with their English confrères.</p> - -<p>So the hatters went to Wandsworth and the silk mercers to Spitalfields, -and the nurserymen chose the village of Chelsea lying two miles out of -London along the river bank.</p> - -<p>Their spirits may still hover among the perfumed beauty of the annual -Chelsea Flower Show of the Royal Horticultural Society. It is<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_20" id="page_20">{20}</a></span> held in -the grounds of the Chelsea Hospital once a year at the end of May or the -beginning of June, when the delicate loveliness of the flowers attracts -an immense number of garden lovers.</p> - -<p>And now to tell you how to reach the Chelsea Hospital, the Flower Show -and Ranelagh Gardens.</p> - -<p>I have never been able to discover whether the extreme reluctance of the -British to give a detailed address is due to a naïve belief that -everyone is born into this world with an intimate knowledge of the -topography of London, or to a malicious delight in puzzling the -ignorant, but I have a deeply-rooted conviction that the maze was an -English invention. So to the stranger bewildered by the laconic -“Chelsea” on the cards of admission to the Flower Show I would say that -it is reached either by the District Railway to Sloane Square station -and then a short walk down Sloane Street to Pimlico Road, or by the 11 -or the 46 bus that stops at the corner of Pimlico Road and Lower Sloane -Street.</p> - -<p>The Flower Show is one of the most charming events of the London season. -In no other city in the world may you see anything like this meeting of -the great brotherhood of gardeners of every social rank gathered to -admire the gorgeous achievements of the grand masters of the art of -growing flowers; where peeresses humbly consult horny-handed experts and -frivolous young men reveal unsuspected enthusiasms for blue aquilegias.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_21" id="page_21">{21}</a></span></p> - -<p>The adjacent Ranelagh Gardens are often called Chelsea Hospital Gardens, -perhaps to avoid confusion with the grounds of the Ranelagh Club at -Barnes. They are closed to the general public during the three days of -the Flower Show, so if you go to see the flowers you have the added and -unexpected pleasure of wandering through the green glades of Ranelagh -undisturbed by the shouts of the Pimlico children.</p> - -<p>There are no flowers in these gardens, but they have a peculiar charm of -their own. There is none of the flatness of Hyde Park—the undulating -paths and quaint bosquets belong to another day when powdered courtiers -pursued fair ladies in the pleasure gardens that were so much the -fashion. The story of Ranelagh is bound up with the history of the -Georgian period. There is not a book of memoirs but mentions this famous -pleasure resort. Walpole said of it, “Nobody goes anywhere else; -everybody goes there. My Lord Chesterfield is so fond of it that he says -he has ordered all his letters to be directed there.”</p> - -<p>It is quite true that everybody went there. Johnson, whom I find as hard -to keep out of the description of any part of London as Mr. Dick found -it to keep King Charles’s head out of his memorial, was very fond of -going to Ranelagh. Boswell says that, to the remark that there was not -half a guinea’s worth of pleasure in seeing Ranelagh, he answered, “No,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_22" id="page_22">{22}</a></span> -but there is half a guinea’s worth of inferiority to other people in not -having seen it.”</p> - -<p>There is little left of the actual gardens where Johnson, Sir Joshua -Reynolds, Oliver Goldsmith, Walpole, the beautiful Duchess of -Devonshire, the King of Denmark, the Spanish ambassadors and the entire -English Court used to take part in the merry-making, but you may be sure -they all walked up the broad avenue of trees that once shaded the -brilliant scene. In the seventeenth century the property belonged to -Viscount Ranelagh, an Irish nobleman by whose name the gardens are still -called.</p> - -<p>When the estate was bought by a syndicate after his death a huge rotunda -was built with boxes all round. It must have been something like the -Albert Hall, and every night the place was filled with fine ladies and -wits, rubbing shoulders with all classes of society come to gaze at the -attractions and listen to the music. The vogue of Ranelagh lasted many -years and only ended when the rotunda was pulled down at the beginning -of the nineteenth century.</p> - -<p>Every now and then one meets pessimistic creatures, usually artists, who -shake their heads and say that Chelsea is going to the dogs—by which -they mean that all the old studios are being taken by speculators with -the intention of converting them into flats.</p> - -<p>But the Chelsea of to-day is as charming as it ever was. There are just -as many famous inhabitants. Sargent, Derwent Wood, Augustus<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_23" id="page_23">{23}</a></span> John, Glyn -Philpot, Wilson Steer and many another well-known genius, all live -within sound of the “Six Bells” and some studios must have been saved -from the speculator judging from the number of Chelsea addresses in this -year’s Academy catalogue.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_24" id="page_24">{24}</a></span></p> - -<h2><a name="CHAPTER_II" id="CHAPTER_II"></a><span class="chspc">CHAPTER</span> II<br /><br /> -KNIGHTSBRIDGE TO SOHO</h2> - -<h3>Knightsbridge</h3> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">“Go where we may—rest where we will,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Eternal London haunts us still.”<br /></span> -<span class="i14"><span class="smcap">Moore.</span><br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">Few</span> people think of connecting the name of Knightsbridge with anything -less modern than the big departmental shops, the Barracks or the cosy -houses on the fringe of Mayfair and Belgravia.</p> - -<p>Yet there was a town of Knightsbrigg in the fourteenth century, in -Edward the Third’s day, when the Black Prince and his knights must often -have crossed the Westbourne stream by the bridge built just where the -Albert Gate now stands. Mr. Davis in his <i>History of Knightsbridge</i> -gives as the origin of the name the story that “in ancient time certain -knights had occasion to go from London to wage war for some holy -purpose. Light in heart if heavy in arms, they passed through this -district on their way to receive the blessing awarded to the faithful by -the Bishop of London at Fulham. For some cause or other, however, a -quarrel ensued between two of the band, and a combat<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_25" id="page_25">{25}</a></span> was determined -upon to decide the dispute. They fought on the bridge which spanned the -stream of the Westbourne, while from its banks the struggle was watched -by their partisans. Both fell, if the legend may be trusted; and the -place was ever after called Knightsbridge in remembrance of their fatal -feud.”</p> - -<p>Walking down the Brompton Road from the Knightsbridge Tube station it is -difficult to realise that not a hundred and fifty years ago “the stream -ran open, the streets were unpaved and unlighted, and a Maypole was -still on the village green.”</p> - -<p>Yes, a few hundred years ago, on that very triangle of green grass you -see to-day outside Mr. Tattersall’s big gateway, diagonally facing the -Knightsbridge Tube station, men and maidens danced round the maypole on -the Knightsbridge village green.</p> - -<p>I have a special weakness for that three-cornered grass plot. People -pass it every day and look scornfully at it—if they look at all. No one -knows that it is all that is left of a piece of Merrie England. Little -by little it has been pared away. The last maypole was taken down at the -end of the eighteenth century, and the watchhouse and pound that Addison -mentions in the <i>Spectator</i> disappeared about a quarter of a century -later. The little bit of green has watched the evolution of the tiny -chapel of the Elizabethan lazar-house that once existed near by into the -stately and uninteresting<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_26" id="page_26">{26}</a></span> Holy Trinity Church, and the gradual rise of -the immense departmental shops to take the place of the village silk -mercers of yesterday.</p> - -<p>There is a tradition that part of the green was once used as a burial -ground in the time of the Great Plague, but since there is no record of -this gruesome fact, I refuse to believe it.</p> - -<h3>Tattersall’s</h3> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i1">“Satirists may say what they please about the rural<br /></span> -<span class="i0">enjoyments of a London citizen on Sunday.”<br /></span> -<span class="i11"><span class="smcap">Washington Irving.</span><br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p>One was brought up to believe in the country Sunday after-dinner -inspection of property, where unlucky week-end visitors are paraded to -admire their host’s corn and cattle, but I have often wondered what the -English nation did with itself when in town of a Sunday afternoon. I -know now. They go to Tattersall’s and look at the horses to be sold next -day. Tattersall’s on a fine Sunday afternoon in the season is like a big -reception by a not too exclusive hostess. Pretty young girls in charming -frocks make the tour of the stables with their menfolk, and very -horsey-looking people try to persuade their neighbours that they know as -much about horses as the more unobtrusive individuals at whose nod -grooms fly to strip their charges for inspection.</p> - -<p>Since Richard Tattersall, the last Duke of Kingston’s training-groom, -opened his auction mart when his patron died in 1773, and founded<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_27" id="page_27">{27}</a></span> his -fortunes by buying Highflier for £2500, Tattersall’s has grown into a -national institution with a world-wide reputation. It still belongs to -the same family, but they moved in 1865 from Grosvenor Place to the -present buildings, where every Monday all the year round the auctions -take place, and every Sunday in the season dukes and jockeys, horse -dealers and country squires, society ladies and trainers’ wives, stroll -up and down admiring the horses.</p> - -<h3>Ely House</h3> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">“Queen Bess was Harry’s daughter.”<br /></span> -<span class="i11"><span class="smcap">Rudyard Kipling.</span><br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p>As you come out of the Tube station, the view of Dover Street with its -irregular skyline is a very modern one. It looks a rather dull, -uninteresting place, given over to commerce and clubs, but like most of -the Piccadilly and Pall Mall quarter, it is very reminiscent of the -Stuart period. The history goes back to the respectable date of 1642, -when the Clarendon estate was cut up into Dover, Albemarle, Bond and -Stafford streets.</p> - -<p>Out of Peckham, that haunt of the prosperous City man of those times, -had come Sir Thomas Bond, the forerunner of the Messrs. Cubitt of 1921, -with his syndicate, dealing death to historical associations and -possessing none of the delicacy of feeling that made John Evelyn turn -his head the other way when he drove by with Lord Clarendon the late -owner.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_28" id="page_28">{28}</a></span></p> - -<p>Evelyn himself lived here, close to the house of Lord Dover, whose name -was given to the street. Pope’s friend, Dr. Arbuthnot, and Lady Byron, -both lodged in Dover Street, but by far the most interesting house is -No. 37, a brick building of unobtrusive, classic simplicity, that has a -story connecting it with the reign of Queen Elizabeth.</p> - -<p>You might pass up and down Dover Street many times without noticing the -significant bishop’s mitre, carved in stone halfway up the middle of the -façade. This was once the distinguishing mark of the town house of the -bishops of Ely that they bought in 1772 from the Government in exchange -for all claim on their Hatton Garden property in Ely Place. Nowadays one -thinks of diamond merchants in connection with Hatton Garden, but in -Elizabeth’s day it was the Naboth’s vineyard that she coveted on behalf -of her handsome Chancellor, Sir Christopher Hatton. The bishops were -forced to grant him a lease for the rent of a red rose, ten loads of -hay, and ten pounds, the right to walk in their rival’s gardens whenever -they chose, and to gather twenty baskets of roses every year.</p> - -<p>The bone of contention brought no luck to anyone. Hatton was imprudent -enough to borrow the money for improvements from his queen. She insisted -on the bishops conveying the property to her till the sum should be -repaid, and when one of them jibbed at carrying out the<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_29" id="page_29">{29}</a></span> terms of this -settlement, the Queen wrote him an Elizabethan epistle:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"><p>Proud prelate! I understand you are backward in complying with your -agreement: but I would have you understand that I, who made you -what you are, can unmake you; and if you do not forthwith fulfil -your engagement, by God, I will immediately unfrock you, Elizabeth.</p></div> - -<p>Sir Christopher Hatton was never able to repay his mistress’s loan. It -broke his heart, says an old chronicler, and though the queen relented -at the end, and came to visit him, “there is no pulley can draw up a -heart once cast down, though a Queen herself should set her hand -thereunto.” He died disconsolate, in his coveted palace of Ely, in 1591.</p> - -<p>After all these vicissitudes, the diocese got back its property at the -Restoration, but in 1772 they gave up all claim to it in exchange for -the mansion in Dover Street.</p> - -<p>The latter is a stately house, with a long marble hall and staircase, -and the bishops of Elizabeth’s day would doubtless be mildly surprised -if they knew that it is now used by the men and women belonging to the -Albemarle Club.</p> - -<h3>London Museum</h3> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">“I turned me from that place in humble wise.”<br /></span> -<span class="i12"><span class="smcap">John Drinkwater.</span><br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p>Quite near Dover Street, if you only knew it, is the one place where you -may read the story of London spread out before you page by page better -than anywhere else. But very few people can even tell you how to find -it.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_30" id="page_30">{30}</a></span></p> - -<p>I once saw Lancaster House called the Cinderella of London -museums—perhaps because it is so charming and so neglected. It is near -no bus route nor railway station, yet this London Carnavalet is not so -very far from the Dover Street Tube station and either of the two routes -by which it is reached from that point are delightful walks. You may -enter Green Park and stroll along the Queen’s Walk till you come to a -passage-way to the left—not the first little narrow one where two -people have to walk Indian file into St. James’s Place, but the second, -that leads through a wider gateway, closed at 10 p.m., into Stable Yard.</p> - -<p>Or else you can go down St. James’s Street, past the passage leading -into the quaint little eighteenth-century courtyard of Pickering Place, -towards St. James’s Palace with its beautiful old sixteenth-century -brick gateway in Cleveland Row. Skirt the Palace to the right and you -will come to Stable Yard, and in Stable Yard is Lancaster House.</p> - -<p>It is a stately place. Queen Victoria once said to the Duchess of -Sutherland: “I come from my house to your palace,” but shorn of the -groups of chairs and tables and the stately company moving up and down -the magnificent staircase, the yellow and red marble walls seem -cheerless and repellant.</p> - -<p>Now and then a little white notice is pasted on the door with the -announcement that the museum, which is usually open on summer<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_31" id="page_31">{31}</a></span> Fridays -and Sundays from 2 to 6, and all other days from 10 to 6 and till 4 -o’clock in winter, will be closed to the public for an afternoon or -evening. The Government are entertaining distinguished strangers in the -spacious salons, and then Lancaster House lives again for a few hours -the brilliant existence it had in the nineteenth century, when it was -called Stafford House and the Duke of Sutherland dispensed splendid -hospitality there.</p> - -<p>Amusing tales of these political parties, and of the guests, and of many -other things, are told in Mr. Arthur Dasent’s delightful <i>Story of -Stafford House</i>, that is sold for a modest sum just inside the door.</p> - -<p>In 1913 Lord Leverhulme bought the remainder of the lease that expires -in 1940, from the Duke of Sutherland, and handed it over to the trustees -of the London Museum to house the collection of London antiquities then -exhibited in Kensington Palace.</p> - -<p>The name of Stafford House was changed to Lancaster House as a -compliment to the King, who is Duke of Lancaster, and in memory of the -generosity of a Lancashire man.</p> - -<p>It is an entrancing place, where you can trace this great city’s history -from the time men used flints to the war that is too near for its -souvenirs to be anything but harrowing.</p> - -<p>One may walk through the ages, from the Prehistoric room, through Roman, -Saxon and Mediæval rooms, on the ground floor, and, then,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_32" id="page_32">{32}</a></span> going up the -grand staircase, see how men lived in London in Tudor, -seventeenth-century, Cromwellian and Charles II.’s days, and so on, -through the seventeenth-and eighteenth-century rooms, to the costume and -Royal rooms, where you pause dumbfounded before the going-away dress of -stiff white silk poplin embroidered with gold that Queen Mary wore the -day of her wedding, 6th July, 1893.</p> - -<p>Down on the ground floor, past the Temple Crusader with the Mestrovic -countenance, in the west corridor, is the Gold and Silver Room, with the -beautiful jewellery that some bygone Jacobean jeweller buried in Wood -Street, perhaps when the menace of the Great Fire was upon him.</p> - -<p>Of what happened to him there is no trace, and the lovely chains and -rings lay buried for two and a half centuries. They may for all we know -have been stolen and buried by thieves who met their end on Tyburn Tree -before they could enjoy their booty. Admirers of Lalique’s work in the -Place Vendôme will see how this unknown Englishman solved the same -problems of the great French artist 250 years ago. The delicate enamel -chains and lovely cameos and carved chalcedony and glass and onyx are -prettier than many a jeweller’s stock to-day, and they must look -disdainfully across at the case of heavy Victorian atrocities which our -grandmothers wore so complacently.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_33" id="page_33">{33}</a></span></p> - -<h3>St. James’s Church</h3> - -<p>I do not remember ever seeing anyone cross the paved courtyard of St. -James’s Church, Piccadilly, on a week-day, for though it was one of -Wren’s favourites among the churches he built, and inside there is a -font carved by Grinling Gibbons, it has an air of sanctimonious -respectability that is not very alluring, but the font with its carving -of the Fall of Man, etc., is well worth seeing.</p> - -<h3>The Haymarket Shoppe</h3> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">“Only far memories stray<br /></span> -<span class="i1">Of a past once lovely, ...”<br /></span> -<span class="i8"><span class="smcap">Walter de la Mare.</span><br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p>I have asked many people if they know where to find a perfect example of -an eighteenth-century shop, bow windows little flight of steps and all, -a stone’s throw from Piccadilly Circus—and they look at me in blank -astonishment.</p> - -<p>Yet there it stands, at 34 Haymarket, two doors down from Coventry -Street on the left-hand side, its pot-bellied windows filled with quaint -jars and bottles and more modern packages of the upstart cigarette, that -has ousted the honest snuff which was sold there for two hundred years.</p> - -<p>It belongs to another day and generation, and through the old doorway -the 20th-century passer-by can see the oaken shelves with their rows of -old wooden boxes and snuff jars that used to contain the “King’s Morning -Mixture,” as supplied to His Majesty King George IV.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_34" id="page_34">{34}</a></span></p> - -<p>The old shop has had many royal customers, and going through the -beautiful Adam screen into the back room, one may be shown, if the -courteous proprietor is not too busy, the accounts of Queen Charlotte, -who bought her snuff here for nineteen years of the Dukes of Cumberland -and Sussex and the Princesses Charlotte and Elizabeth, who also indulged -in the best rappee.</p> - -<p>Most of the great names of eighteenth-and nineteenth-century England may -be found in these old ledgers. David Garrick and Inigo Jones were -customers, and so were my Lord Halifax, Lady Shrewsbury and the Duchess -of Grafton. Beau Brummell’s accounts lie, cheek by jowl as he would have -them, with those of the Earl of Dorchester and the Duke of Bedford, and -the long array of famous names of men and women to be found in the -yellowing papers might well have served as a list of guests present at -any brilliant political function of the time.</p> - -<p>The snuff-taking of those days has passed with the lace jabots and the -silk knee-breeches, but the fashion died hard, and so recent a figure as -Lord Russell of Killowen was one of the last of the famous snuff-takers. -The twentieth century turns up its nose at what it calls a disgusting -habit, yet it had its graces and was responsible for the creation of the -beautiful boxes and bottles now treasured as heirlooms.</p> - -<p>The actual owners of this fascinating shop have carried on the business -in their family</p> - -<div class="figcenter" id="ill_003" style="width: 448px;"> -<a href="images/i_034_fp.jpg"> -<img src="images/i_034_fp.jpg" width="448" height="600" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p>THE OLD SNUFF HOUSE, 34 ST. JAMES’ HAYMARKET</p></div> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_35" id="page_35">{35}</a></span></p> - -<p class="nind">since 1780, when the founder, M. Fribourg, retired. One of the present -partners, Mr. George Evans, has written a delightful monograph on the -Old Snuff House of Fribourg and Treyer, “At the Rasp and Crown, at the -upper End of the Haymarket, London.” It is a charming book, filled with -illustrations and reminiscences of the leisurely days before the arrival -of the departmental store, when an old-established firm had time to have -intimate courtly relations with its customers.</p> - -<p>What Lord Petersham could now change his mind and return 216 pounds of -anything and be urbanely credited with £75 12s.; and do grateful -customers now make presents of gold-lined amboyna snuff boxes to mark -their satisfaction?</p> - -<p>If they do, I am as ignorant of the fact as the ordinary pedestrian of -the historical interest of the unnoticed shop he passes daily on his way -to Piccadilly Circus.</p> - -<h3>A King in Soho</h3> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i2">“Man calleth thee his wealth, who made thee rich<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And while he digs out thee, falls in the ditch.”<br /></span> -<span class="i12"><span class="smcap">George Herbert.</span><br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p>Few Londoners can tell you where a king lies buried in Soho. Shelley may -have been thinking of him when he gave his mad invitation to the old -lady in the Highgate bus, to “sit upon the ground and tell sad stories -of the deaths of kings,” but if so his knowledge is not shared by many -people.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_36" id="page_36">{36}</a></span></p> - -<p>If I have made you curious, walk along Coventry Street from Piccadilly -Circus, leaving Leicester Square, that “pouting-place of princes,” on -your right, and turn up Wardour Street past Lisle Street and Gerrard -Street that was fashionable in Charles II.’s day and where Dryden and -Burke and Lord Mohun lived and where Johnson and Reynolds founded the -Literary Club that still exists in another meeting-place. Then, crossing -Shaftesbury Avenue, you will come to the old graveyard at the back of -the church of St. Anne, which is now a playground and only open till -four in the winter months and during the hours of service on Sundays. On -the wall you will find a tablet to the memory of the unlucky Theodore, -King of Corsica, who fled from France, a bankrupt, only to be seized on -his arrival in London and flung into the Fleet prison. “Near this -place,” runs the inscription, “is interred Theodore, King of Corsica, -who died in this neighbourhood Dec. 11, 1756, immediately after leaving -the King’s Bench Prison by the Benefit of the Act of Insolvency. In -consequence of which he registered his Kingdom of Corsica for the use of -his Creditors.” To which Horace Walpole has appended the following -stanza:</p> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">The grave, great Teacher, to a level brings<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Heroes and beggars, galley-slaves and kings.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">But Theodore this moral learned ere dead;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Fate poured its lessons on his living head.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Bestowed a kingdom, but denied him bread.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind">The kindly soul who bailed out fallen Majesty<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_37" id="page_37">{37}</a></span> a fortnight before his -death and then gave him decent burial, was, according to the verger of -St. Anne, an Italian candle merchant from Old Compton Street, on the -site of whose shop is now that excellent non-profiteering restaurant -known as Le Dîner Français. But I prefer, with the Blue Book, to think -that the Samaritan was a tailor, grown rich, perhaps, snipping the -embroidered waistcoats of H.R.H. Frederick, Prince of Wales, when the -latter squabbled with his royal parents and removed in a pettish mood to -Leicester House hard by.</p> - -<p>The only other interesting things I could find in this old church were -the tomb of Hazlitt, immediately below King Theodore’s memorial -stone,—the old wooden drain pipes, lately disinterred, that lie on the -Shaftesbury Avenue side of the church, and the tablet within, to the -memory of “The Beloved Mother-in-Law.”</p> - -<p>St. Anne’s was built in 1685, a significant year in the annals of this -neighbourhood. It was the date of the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes, -which sent the Huguenots flocking to London, to take up their residence -here, and of the Battle of Sedgemoor, when the Duke of Monmouth, who had -a mansion in the Square, used as his watchword the cry “So Ho!” and -unconsciously christened the whole district.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_38" id="page_38">{38}</a></span></p> - -<h2><a name="CHAPTER_III" id="CHAPTER_III"></a><span class="chspc">CHAPTER</span> III<br /><br /> -TRAFALGAR SQUARE TO FLEET STREET</h2> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i2">“For such things do go on in Fleet Street as no man has<br /></span> -<span class="i0">written yet.”<br /></span> -<span class="i12"><span class="smcap">Richard Jefferies.</span><br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">One</span> of the most enthralling and endearing things about London is the way -the memory of the great people, whose names are so familiar that you -feel you would know their bearers if you met them, pervades the city and -crops up in such very unexpected places. If business ever took you -through that evil-smelling fishy Lower Thames Street, you would discover -that Chaucer lived there for six years when he was Comptroller of the -Petty Customs in the Port of London. You stroll through the little -Cloisters in Westminster Abbey, of all places in the world, and some one -tells you that Lady Hamilton once lived in the Littlington Tower, when -she was servant to Mr. Hare and had no thought that she would ever -inspire a hero to great victories. You think that when you have seen Sir -Thomas More’s tomb in Chelsea Old Church, and Crosby Hall near by, you -have exhausted the souvenirs of his life, but you find him again in -Westminster Hall, where he was condemned to death—in the Deanery where -he spent two months in charge of the Abbot of Westminster,—in Lincoln’s -Inn—in Milk Street in the City, where he was born, “the brightest star -that ever shone in that Via Lactea”—in the church<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_39" id="page_39">{39}</a></span> of St. Lawrence -Jewry where he lectured, and in the Tower where he died.</p> - -<p>Dr. Johnson, of course, was ubiquitous. He went everywhere and usually -said something noteworthy about everything. One of the great -difficulties in writing this book has been to refrain from quoting him -too frequently, and Pepys is even worse. The kindly official in the -Clothworkers’ Hall (where I lunched once on a special occasion) said to -me: “Samuel Pepys, Ma’am, Pepys the great Diarist—you may have heard of -him,” and I felt like replying: “My good man, I have been with your -Pepys through Chelsea—and in St. Margaret’s, Westminster, where he was -married—I have seen his portrait at the Royal Society Rooms in -Burlington House and his house in Buckingham Street—the church of St. -Bride, where his birth was registered—St. Lawrence Jewry, where he was -disappointed with Wilkins’ sermon—All Hallows, Barking, that, as he -wrote on the 5th September, 1666, only just escaped the Great Fire—his -parish church of St. Olave’s, where he worshipped, and Hyde Park, where -he used to go driving with his wife.”</p> - -<h3>The Strand</h3> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i2">“Through the long Strand together let us stray,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">With thee conversing I forget the way.”<br /></span> -<span class="i12"><span class="smcap">Gay.</span><br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p>Of all delightful places to meet memories of famous bygone people, the -most intriguing is<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_40" id="page_40">{40}</a></span> the Strand. A superficial glance at this modern -bustling street shows little of the past still clinging about it. But a -little further on you will discover, if you look for them, a bit of -Roman London, a Renaissance chapel, a statue with a history, a lovely -group of eighteenth-century houses, the water gate of a former fine -mansion on the riverside, and a church that links us to the time of the -Danish invasion.</p> - -<p>The Londoner would probably tell you that Piccadilly Circus is the -centre of his city; the historian, St. Paul’s; but to the foreigner, the -visitor from overseas, or to the Anglo-Indian back from the East, the -centre will always be Charing Cross.</p> - -<p>It has been a starting-point for the traveller from the days when the -little old village of Charing was used as a halting-place on the way to -the City or to the Royal Palace of Westminster. Probably that is the -true derivation of the name; “La Charrynge” meant the Turning, the great -bend where the two roads met, but a prettier tradition derives its name -from Edward I.’s dear queen (“chère Reine”). Another cross to her memory -once stood here, the most beautiful of all those set up by the sorrowing -king wherever her bier rested on its journey from Grantham to -Westminster Abbey. Cromwell’s Parliament, with its passion for -destruction, pulled it down in 1647, and the column which now stands in -the courtyard in front of the station is only a memorial modelled<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_41" id="page_41">{41}</a></span> as -far as possible on the original design. It was set up by Barry about -sixty years ago, but it is already so weather-beaten that many people -are under the amiable delusion that it is the very cross erected in -1291.</p> - -<p>The exact position of the old cross is now covered by King Charles I. on -horseback, facing the scene of his death in Whitehall, and this statue -has had an even more adventurous history.</p> - -<p>It was cast originally in 1633 and after the king’s execution it became -so unpopular that Parliament sold it to a brazier to be melted down. -With an eye to the possibilities of the future that a diplomat might -envy, this man cannily buried the statue and did a roaring trade with -the Royalists in relics supposed to have been made from the fragments. -After the Restoration the statue quietly came to light again, and was -set up in its present position in 1674 with popular rejoicings. Its -tribulations were not yet over. The day of the burning of Her Majesty’s -Theatre, the sword, a real one of the period, that hung at the side, was -broken off, and it has never been replaced.</p> - -<p>Another curious thing about this statue lies in the absence of girths to -the saddle or trappings on the horse, and it is said that when this -oversight was pointed out to the sculptor Le Sueur, he was so overcome -with mortification that he committed suicide on the spot.</p> - -<p>In the days when London was no bigger than<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_42" id="page_42">{42}</a></span> one of our second-rate -provincial towns, Charing Cross was its market square. Here stood the -pillory, even as late as the beginning of the last century; here were -read the Royal proclamations, and here were the booths of the showmen -who dealt in giants and fat ladies,—it was here, too, that Punch made -his first appearance in England in 1666. Where the railway station now -stands was Hungerford Market, and Trafalgar Square occupies the yard of -what were once the Royal Mews, where the king’s falcons were kept till -they were replaced by the king’s horses. It is rather odd that the word -“mews” is now always associated with stables, for it once meant the pens -or coops in which moulting falcons were kept (from the French <i>muer</i>—to -moult). Geoffrey Chaucer, who lodged at Westminster, was in his time -Clerk of the King’s Works and of the Royal Mews.</p> - -<h3>Water Gates</h3> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i2">“In some parts of London we may go back through the<br /></span> -<span class="i0">whole English history, perhaps through the history of man.”<br /></span> -<span class="i12"><span class="smcap">Leigh Hunt.</span><br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p>People seem to think that a great deal of time and energy must be spent -if they wish to see anything of historic London, and they pass by, -unnoticed, many of the most interesting reminders of bygone periods, -just because they may see them every day.</p> - -<p>Buckingham Street, leading out of the Strand,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_43" id="page_43">{43}</a></span> is only a stone’s throw -from Trafalgar Square and Charing Cross and it is full of historic -memories. What stories the beautiful old water gate at its foot could -tell of the days when the silver Thames washed up and down its grey -stone steps, and of the famous people who used to take boat there!</p> - -<p>It was built by my Lord Duke of Buckingham, that hated favourite of -James and Charles the First, who cuts such a sorry figure in English -history books and such a romantic one in the pages of Dumas. He was the -father of the extravagant, erratic George Villiers, Duke of Buckingham, -whom Scott describes in <i>Peveril of the Peak</i>, and Pope more pungently:</p> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Who in the course of one revolving moon,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Was chemist, fiddler, statesman and buffoon.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind">Lely painted a wonderful portrait of the son. It hangs in the National -Portrait Gallery, but even more interesting is the Vandyck picture of -him with his brother Francis, painted when they were boys, and lately -bought for the National Gallery.</p> - -<p>With his father murdered, and his property confiscated by the -Commonwealth and given to General Fairfax, the duke solved his problem -by marrying the General’s daughter and heiress, a solution for which -Cromwell made him pay by a sojourn in the Tower, where he was an -intermittent resident. But in spite of his wife’s fortune the man who, -“was everything by<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_44" id="page_44">{44}</a></span> turns and nothing long” was obliged to sell the -magnificent mansion that his father had re-built in 1625 on the site of -the old York House.</p> - -<p>The earlier mansion had been the home of the Bishop of Norwich in Henry -VIII.’s time, of Charles Brandon, Duke of Suffolk, of the Archbishop of -York, who gave the house its name, and of Sir Francis Bacon who loved -the place and only left it for the Tower.</p> - -<p>In 1672 the second York House was sold for £30,000, with the stipulation -that the streets built on the site were to be given the Duke’s names. -They are quite easy to trace: there is George Court, with the George -Tavern, where you may eat your chop to the sound of an orchestra of -singing birds; hard by are Villiers and Duke Streets; “Of” Lane has been -rechristened York Place,—and now we are back in Buckingham Street.</p> - -<p>The new quarter soon had famous tenants. John Evelyn lived for a year in -Villiers Street, and forty years later Sir Richard Steele had a house -there. No. 14, Buckingham Street, has been much remodelled since Samuel -Pepys lived there and walked down the steps of the water gate on his way -to visit his friend Mr. Cole in Brentford. There is a tablet on the -house to tell the passer-by that the Earl of Oxford, William Etty and -Clarkson Stanfield, the marine painter, also lived here.</p> - -<p>The house opposite looks far more modern,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_45" id="page_45">{45}</a></span> but within the very new outer -walls of the offices of the Royal National Pension Fund for Nurses are -preserved much of the exquisite carving, ceiling paintings, and -elaborate stucco work that belong to the time when Peter the Great, Czar -of all the Russias, came over to England in 1698 and lodged in these -very rooms. David Hume, Rousseau, Fielding and Black all lived at No. -15, now incorporated in No. 16, but the Dickens lover will ignore these -famous names and only remember that the rooms at the top of the house -are the very ones taken by Miss Betsy Trotwood for David Copperfield.</p> - -<p>With the exception perhaps of that Shah of Persia who spent a happy -holiday in England in the reign of the late Queen Victoria, I suppose we -never had a more eccentric royal visitor than Peter the Great. No doubt -that is the reason why the memories of his brief stay here still seem to -cling about so many parts of London. This strange being, half-barbarian, -half-genius, had great ambitions and achieved them. As Voltaire says: -“He gave a polish to his people and was himself a savage; he taught them -the art of war, of which he was himself ignorant; inspired by the sight -of a small boat on the river Moskwa, he erected a powerful fleet and -made himself an expert and active shipwright, pilot, sailor and -commander; he changed the manners, customs and laws of the Russians, and -lives in their memory as the father of his country.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_46" id="page_46">{46}</a></span>”</p> - -<p>Ships and shipbuilding were his passion. He went to Holland and worked -in the yards there as a mechanic, calling himself Pieter Timmermann, -until he had mastered the manual part of his craft. Then he came to -England to study the theory of shipbuilding. King William III. placed -the house in Buckingham Street, so conveniently close to the river, at -his disposal, and invited him to Court when he felt inclined. But Pieter -hated crowds and ceremonies and preferred to spend his days in hard work -and his evenings drinking and smoking with boon companions.</p> - -<p>At the end of a month, finding himself too far from the dockyards, he -moved to Deptford, and put up at Sayes Court, kindly lent to him by John -Evelyn. He was a dreadful tenant. We all know how Evelyn loved his -garden,—but the Czar and his rough crowd trampled the flower-beds and -spoilt the grass-plots, and trundled wheelbarrows through the diarist’s -pet holly-hedge for exercise. “There is a house full of people <i>right -nasty</i>!” wrote Evelyn’s indignant servant to his master. They ate and -drank enormously,—eight bottles of sack after dinner were nothing to -Pieter, and listen to this for a breakfast menu for twenty-one persons: -half a sheep, a quarter of lamb, ten pullets, twelve chickens, three -quarts of brandy, six quarts of mulled wine, seven dozen of eggs, with -salad in proportion.</p> - -<p>Much of his time, when he was not gathering</p> - -<div class="figcenter" id="ill_004" style="width: 421px;"> -<a href="images/i_046_fp.jpg"> -<img src="images/i_046_fp.jpg" width="421" height="600" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p>WATER GATE, YORK HOUSE</p></div> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_47" id="page_47">{47}</a></span></p> - -<p class="nind">the vast store of information that he afterwards used to such excellent -advantage, the Czar spent sailing on the river, and in the evening he -would repair with favoured members of his suite to a public-house in -Great Tower Street. The old tavern has been rebuilt, but the name “The -Czar of Muscovy,” and later “The Czar’s Head,” that it adopted as a -compliment to its imperial visitor, is there to this day, and you may -see it close to the city merchant’s house at No. 34 that is noticed in -another chapter.</p> - -<p>The “right nasty” people did not stay long, luckily for Evelyn’s peace -of mind, but returned to London for another month or two. Then saying -good-bye to King William, who had certainly treated him very well, the -Czar pressed into his hand a little twist of brown paper, in which was -found a ruby valued at £10,000, and sailed away home for Russia, taking -with him no fewer than 500 English captains, scientists, pilots, -gunners, surgeons, sail-makers, anchor-smiths, coppersmiths and the -like, all ready for adventure in the unknown, according to the tradition -of their race.</p> - -<p>To come back to the Strand. It is fairly certain that the rather heavy -and unattractive stone archway and steps at the bottom of Essex Street -(at the other end of the Strand) formed the water gate of old Essex -House, once occupied by the Earl of Essex, Queen Elizabeth’s favourite.</p> - -<p>It compares very badly with the water gate<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_48" id="page_48">{48}</a></span> in Buckingham Street, which -was designed by Inigo Jones in 1625, and built by Nicholas Stone the -master mason, who carved one of the lions on its frontage. The London -climate has blurred the outline of the arms of the Villiers family on -the south side, and the motto “Fidei Coticula Crux” on the north, and -the raising of the Embankment now prevents the waters of the Thames from -swirling round the old stone steps. No monarch had passed through the -water gate since the days of Charles II. until Queen Alexandra came to -open the new building in Buckingham Street in 1908. Its glory has -departed, but there it stands, useless, unnoticed and forgotten, yet how -beautiful!</p> - -<h3>The Adelphi</h3> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i2">“I like the spirit of this great London which I feel<br /></span> -<span class="i0">around me.”<br /></span> -<span class="i12"><span class="smcap">C. Brontë.</span><br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p>Retracing your steps up Buckingham Street, turn to the right along Duke -Street and John Street, and you will find yourself in the Adelphi, that -oasis of calm quiet so near the roar of the bustling Strand, where -famous authors of the present day like to pitch their luxurious tents. -Note the steep hill up which you climb. This is the roof of the arches -which the brothers Adam built over the site of old Durham House in order -that they might erect their elegant houses on a level with the Strand. -You can still wander<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_49" id="page_49">{49}</a></span> in these vaults, if you are lucky enough to find -an open gate; they are curious, and were once a fine rendezvous for evil -characters.</p> - -<p>The Duke of Buckingham’s names are not the only ones to be perpetuated -here. The architects, Robert, John, James and William Adam, all had -streets named after them, and they called the whole quarter the Adelphi -because they were brothers.</p> - -<p>William Street has lately been rechristened Durham House Street, to -remind us that the Adelphi was built on the site of Durham House, where -Lady Jane Grey was born.</p> - -<p>Probably the Adelphi will have to go some day, when a proper bridge for -Charing Cross is built across the river here, but lovers of this little -bit of unspoiled Georgian London will miss its old-world charm and -dignity.</p> - -<h3>St. Clement Danes</h3> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">“Blith be thy chirches, wele sownyng be thy bellis.”<br /></span> -<span class="i12"><span class="smcap">Dunbar.</span><br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p>Nowadays, looking eastward up the Strand, the eye is caught by the two -churches of St. Mary-le-Strand and St. Clement Danes, standing isolated -in the centre of the roadway, whilst the traffic roars past on either -side. In the Middle Ages you would still have seen St. Clement’s, though -half engulfed in a rookery of ill-smelling, crazy old timbered houses, -with so narrow a passage between that coachmen<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_50" id="page_50">{50}</a></span> called it the “Straits -of St. Clement’s.” But on the site of St. Mary’s stood a maypole, one -hundred feet high, dear to the heart of the city youth for the -merrymakings that took place around it. Such giddy proceedings vexed the -Puritans, who swept it away in an outburst of righteous indignation, but -old customs die hard, and at the Restoration another and still lordlier -pole was set up with royal approval, and dancing and junketings went on -around it for many a long day.</p> - -<p>The church of St. Clement’s takes us back to very ancient history. Some -say that beneath it lie the bones of King Harold and other Danish -invaders. What is pretty certain is that the original church was built, -after the expulsion of the Danes, by the few settlers who, having -married English wives, chose to remain behind, on condition that they -did not stir out of the strip of land that lay between the Isle of -Thorney, now Westminster, and Caer Lud, now Ludgate.</p> - -<p>Travellers from all over the world who have shared the common traditions -of childhood, feel a queer sense of kinship when they pass along the -Strand and suddenly hear the old bells ringing out the familiar tune of -“Oranges and lemons, say the bells of St. Clement’s.” The bells of the -nursery-rhyme are not those of St. Clement Danes, but of the St. -Clement’s, Eastcheap, which for centuries has been in the centre of the -dried fruit trade.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_51" id="page_51">{51}</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter" id="ill_005" style="width: 521px;"> -<a href="images/i_051.jpg"> -<img src="images/i_051.jpg" width="521" height="600" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p>ST. CLEMENT DANES</p></div> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_52" id="page_52">{52}</a></span> </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_53" id="page_53">{53}</a></span> </p> - -<p>The bells were famous even in Shakespeare’s day. “We have heard the -chimes at midnight, Master Shallow,” says Falstaff in <i>Henry IV</i>. Those -chimes are gone, but the present peal of ten bells, cast in 1693, is as -famous for its music.</p> - -<p>One might write a whole history of church bells, from the time when -Turketul, Abbot of Croyland in Lincolnshire, in the ninth century, -presented his abbey with the great bell <span class="smcap">Guthlac</span>, and added six others -with the rhythmic names of <span class="smcap">Pega</span>, <span class="smcap">Bega</span>, <span class="smcap">Bettelin</span>, <span class="smcap">Barthomew</span>, <span class="smcap">Tatwin</span> and -<span class="smcap">Turketul</span>, to make a peal.</p> - -<p>In the early monkish days they looked upon bells as the voices of good -angels: they were blessed and dedicated: the passing bell was tolled to -keep off evil spirits from the dead. Henry VIII., that ruthless -iconoclast, cared little for superstition, and in the general -destruction of the religious houses hundreds of old bells were sold or -melted down. But the pious people of those days would point out how the -Bishop of Bangor, who sold his Cathedral bells, was shortly afterwards -stricken with blindness, and that Sir Miles Partridge won the Jesus -Bells of St. Paul’s from King Henry at play and, proceeding to remove -them and have them melted down, was hanged soon after on Tower Hill.</p> - -<p>The bells of St. Clement’s were added after the church had been rebuilt -in 1692, under the supervision of Sir Christopher Wren, who gave<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_54" id="page_54">{54}</a></span> his -services for nothing in his usual generous-hearted way.</p> - -<div class="figcenter" id="ill_006" style="width: 443px;"> -<a href="images/i_054.jpg"> -<img src="images/i_054.jpg" width="443" height="567" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p>Dʳ. Johnson’s Pew in Sᵗ. Clement Dane’s Church</p></div> -</div> - -<p>St. Clement’s is dear to all true Londoners as Dr. Johnson’s church. You -may see the very pew where he sat, and there is something about the -solid, handsome structure that seems to fit the thought of the ponderous -great man who worshipped there Sunday by Sunday, striving “to purify and -fortify his soul and hold real communion with the Highest.” It is a fine -and a prosperous church, and so richly endowed that at one time all the -paupers of the neighbourhood used to flock there for the sake of<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_55" id="page_55">{55}</a></span> what -they could get. That they were well looked after, the carefully kept -parish registers bear witness as far back as 1558. There are other -interesting entries in the old registers. You may read of the baptism of -Master Robert Cicill, the sonne of ye L. highe Threasurer of England, -and of the marriage of Sir Thomas Grosvenor with Mary Davies, the child -heiress of Ebury Manor, who brought to her husband all those lands of -Pimlico and Belgravia from whose rents the Dukes of Westminster draw the -bulk of their colossal fortune. Her life story has been published -recently by Mr. Charles T. Gatty in his two-volumed <i>Mary Davies and the -Manor of Ebury</i>.</p> - -<h3>Chapel Royal of the Savoy</h3> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i2">“It is a wonderful place ... this London ... and<br /></span> -<span class="i0">what do I know of it?”—<span class="smcap">Lord Beaconsfield.</span><br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p>From St. Mary’s and St. Clement’s it is but a few minutes’ walk back -along the Strand to the Chapel Royal of the Savoy, that once served all -the district, but it is now perhaps the tiniest parish in London west of -Temple Bar. There it stands in its quiet graveyard, all that is left to -remind us of “the fayrest manor in England.” The old palace of the Savoy -was built by Simon de Montfort, that “Cromwell of the Middle Ages,” on -land granted by Henry III. to his wife’s uncle, Peter of Savoy, for -which the said Peter had to pay the not very exorbitant rent<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_56" id="page_56">{56}</a></span> of three -barbed arrows. Afterwards it came into the possession of the Dukes of -Lancaster. Here it was, in 1357, that the Black Prince, riding on a -little black hackney, brought his prisoner King John of France, who -stayed here, with brief intervals, till his death, as nobody seemed able -to raise the money for his ransom. And here lived John of Gaunt, with -his numerous household, not least of whom was Geoffrey Chaucer. Later -came Henry IV., who annexed the manor, and since his time it has always -belonged in a particular manner to the reigning house.</p> - -<p>Nothing is left, though, to tell of it, save the chapel, which was begun -by Henry VII. in place of a more ancient one fallen into decay,—and -that strange judicial survival, the Court Leet with view of Frankpledge -of the Manor and Liberty of the Savoy. Few people know that once a year -the jury of the Court, headed by the Beadle with his silver-topped and -carved staff of office, solemnly makes the round to inspect the boundary -marks of the Manor. One is in Child’s Bank, another on the Lyceum stage, -one in Burleigh Street, one by Cleopatra’s Needle, another in Middle -Temple Lawn, where many scuffles have taken place in the past between -the jurymen and indignant Benchers and officers of the Inns of Court -concerning the question of trespass. The Court itself, which dates back -to Saxon days, sits annually about Easter time, and still does “what is -usually<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_57" id="page_57">{57}</a></span> called everybody’s business, and nobody’s business,” as a -former High Bailiff wrote.</p> - -<p>The old Roman Bath in Strand Lane is a little beyond St. Clement Dane’s, -and next to the Tube station. That belongs to a later chapter, but a -short way further, on the same side of the road, is another bit of -unnoticed London.</p> - -<h3>Prince Henry’s Room</h3> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">“London, thou art the flour of Cities all.”—<span class="smcap">Dunbar.</span><br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p>Prince Henry’s room is one of those charming links with the past that -lie unnoticed in the path of thousands who never stop to heed the story. -At No. 17, Fleet Street, close to the ceaseless traffic of the Law -Courts, is an unobtrusive timbered house. Through a low archway you see -an eighteenth-century oaken stairway that leads to a sedate Jacobean -room, where very few people ever come to disturb the peaceful, dignified -atmosphere. The Council of the Duchy of Cornwall is supposed to have -once met here regularly and I believe that from time to time Prince -Henry’s room is now used for the meetings of various associations, but -if you visit it any day between ten and four you will almost certainly -find no one to disturb the ghosts of bygone cavaliers but the war -veteran who passes his days there ruminating on the delinquencies of -historians.</p> - -<p>The house is one of the oldest in the City. It<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_58" id="page_58">{58}</a></span> was built in 1610, the -year that Henry, the elder son of James I. of England, was created -Prince of Wales; and the room is known as Prince Henry’s room. Look at -the lovely Jacobean art of the panelling on the west wall, and the -decorated plaster ceiling, where in the centre you will find the device -of this lamented “prince of promise,” who died at the early age of -eighteen.</p> - -<p>Most people say, “Prince Henry! <i>who</i> was Prince Henry?” and very few -connect the name with that little known prince who steals like a shadow -across the pages of our history books. But his memory deserves to be -kept green if only for the reason that he was a true friend to Sir -Walter Raleigh, that unfortunate Victim of petty-minded James. After one -of his visits to Raleigh in the Garden House of the Tower, Prince Henry -said: “No man but my father would keep such a bird in a cage.” A stained -glass window sets forth his titles in old French,</p> - -<div class="blockquot"><p>Dv. treshavlt. et. trespvissant. Prince. Henry: Filz. Aisne. dv. -Roy. Nre. Seign. Prince. de. Gavles: Duc: de: Cornvaile: et. -Rothsay. Comte: de. Chestre. Chevalier. dv. tresnoble. Ordre. de. -la. Iartierre. enstalle. le. 2. de. Iuliet. 1603.</p></div> - -<p class="nind">He was in many ways the prototype of our own Prince of Wales and held -almost as high a place in the affections of his people. He was -everything that a king’s son should be. He was handsome, well-grown and -athletic; he was scholarly<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_59" id="page_59">{59}</a></span> and brilliant, having all James’ love of -learning without his folly and effeminacy. If he was a paragon of -erudition, he also loved the practical side of shipbuilding, and he -liked to give and receive hard knocks in the miniature tournaments that -he organised at Whitehall, when he and his friends would engage the -whole evening in mighty battles with sword and pike. And in addition to -all this he seems to have had the generous mind and temper of the truly -great. It is no wonder that his untimely death evoked a cry of mourning -throughout England.</p> - -<p>He was playing tennis, threw off his coat and caught a mortal chill. -Everything that the doctors of that day could do was done. They even -applied pigeons to his head and a split cock to his feet. Sir Walter -Raleigh, who loved the youth, sent from his prison in the Tower the -recipe of a potent “quintescence”; it did more good than the pigeons or -the split cock, but could not save him. Prince Henry died in 1612, when -not quite nineteen years of age.</p> - -<p>This is what they wrote of him after his death:</p> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Loe! Where he shineth yonder,<br /></span> -<span class="i2">A fixed star in heaven;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Whose motion heere came under<br /></span> -<span class="i2">None of your planets seaven.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">If that the moone should tender<br /></span> -<span class="i2">The sunne her love, and marry,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">They both would not engender<br /></span> -<span class="i2">So great a star as Harry.<br /></span> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_60" id="page_60">{60}</a></span></div></div> -</div> - -<h3>The Temple</h3> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i2">“He didn’t understand the whispers of the Temple<br /></span> -<span class="i0">fountain though he passed it every day.”—<span class="smcap">Dickens.</span><br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind">I know of a public school and university man who has lived all his life -in London and protests that he has never seen Westminster Abbey: there -are certainly hundreds of people who have never seen the Temple.</p> - -<p>It would be a marvel to me that anyone should leave London without -having wandered at least once in those courts, if I had not taken so -long to find my own way there. One knows vaguely that it is a charming -place, but going there is postponed for that <i>fata morgana</i>, a day of -leisure, that recedes as it is approached, and time passes and the train -whistles and steams slowly out of Euston or Victoria, leaving behind one -of the very loveliest corners in old London,—so easy to reach it one -had but tried.</p> - -<p>You have only to turn through the old gatehouse that Wren built in 1684 -to wander about in another world,—a world where it is possible to -imagine dear Charles Lamb moving among his guests on a Wednesday -evening, with Mary hovering in the background, or Goldsmith giving those -rackety supper parties at No. 2 Brick Court that disturbed his studious -neighbour Blackstone.</p> - -<p>Few places in London are so filled with the memories of brilliant -Englishmen as the Temple. If you want to know all about when and where<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_61" id="page_61">{61}</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter" id="ill_007" style="width: 411px;"> -<a href="images/i_061.jpg"> -<img src="images/i_061.jpg" width="411" height="600" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p>THE TEMPLE CHURCH. THE ROUND</p></div> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_62" id="page_62">{62}</a></span> </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_63" id="page_63">{63}</a></span> </p> - -<p class="nind">they lived, go to the wigmaker who conducts the Temple affairs from his -little shop in Essex Court, and he will provide you with Mr. Bellot’s -fascinating <i>Story of the Temple</i>.</p> - -<p>Expert sightseers of course know all about it. They will tell you that -Lamb was born in No. 2, Crown Office Row, and that Thackeray lived at -No. 19; that Goldsmith died at No. 2, Brick Court, Middle Temple Lane, -and that Johnson’s Buildings are on the site of Dr. Johnson’s rooms in -Inner Temple Lane, and if you share their predilections you can go and -peer at the actual bricks that have once sheltered these great men. But -if you want to feel the real spirit of the place, unhampered by gazing -at any particular pile of bricks and mortar, go to the old Temple Church -on a Sunday morning.</p> - -<p>Take any bus along the Strand past Temple Bar, where Dr. Johnson used to -say that if he stationed himself between eleven and four o’clock, every -sixth passer-by was an author,—and go through the second entrance to -the Temple called Inner Temple Lane. Or else take the Underground to the -Temple and, walking along the Embankment, go up the Essex Street steps -and turn into the Temple courts by the first gate you find open, even if -that means going round into Fleet Street.</p> - -<p>The service in the Temple is an unforgettable revelation. There is no -reason why psalms should not be sung in every Anglican church<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_64" id="page_64">{64}</a></span> in the -world as they are sung in the Temple, but no one seems to have thought -of it, except the Temple choirmaster, who has trained his choristers to -sing the words as if they had a profound meaning.</p> - -<p>Has anyone ever found fitting phrases to describe the peculiar beauty of -the Temple Church, with its carved Norman porch, that twelfth-century -Round Church, where nine recumbent Crusaders rest in peace, and gleaming -marble pillars support both the choir and the Round? It must be seen to -be believed, but I pity the traveller who leaves London without seeing -it.</p> - -<p>In the courts of the Temple there lie embalmed so many stories of so -many ages, that everyone finds what suits his fancy. You may wander as -Spenser did among</p> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i10">Those bricky towers,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Where now the studious lawyers have their bowers,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">There whilom wont the Templar Knights to bide,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Till they decayed through pride.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p>Or you may choose a century later and go to York and Lancastrian times, -and listen to Suffolk saying:</p> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Within the Temple Hall we were too loud,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The garden here is more convenient;<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind">and Richard Duke of York’s reply,</p> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Let him that is a true-born gentleman,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And stands upon the honour of his birth,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">If he suppose that I have pleaded truth,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">From off this briar pluck a white rose with me:<br /></span> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_65" id="page_65">{65}</a></span></div></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind">and the Duke of Somerset:</p> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Let him that is no coward nor no flatterer,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">But dare maintain the party of the truth,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Pluck a red rose from off this thorn with me.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">. . . . . . . <br /></span> -<span class="i10">This brawl to-day,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Grown to this faction in the Temple Garden,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Shall send, between the red rose and the white,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">A thousand souls to death and deadly night.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p>It seems a pity that the Temple authorities do not so far unbend as to -subscribe to the pretty legend by re-planting the gardens with red and -white roses. It would give immense pleasure to countless transatlantic -visitors, whose history books are fairly impartial on York and -Lancastrian questions.</p> - -<p>Then there are all the memories of gallant Elizabethan days, when the -queen came and dined with the benchers in the great Middle Temple Hall -and <i>Twelfth Night</i> was first performed here. It was by his dancing at -one of the famous revels that the handsome youth Christopher Hatton -first attracted the notice of Elizabeth, a moment when as our allies -would say he lost a good chance of remaining quiet. The Hall is shown to -visitors before twelve o’clock and after three on week-days and after -church on Sundays. Peter Cunningham says the roof is the best piece of -Elizabethan architecture in London.</p> - -<p>What feasts they had there in the days when lawyers had time to make -merry. Here is the account of one old chronicler:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"><p>For every feast the steward provided five fat hams with spices and -cakes, and the chief butler seven dozen<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_66" id="page_66">{66}</a></span> gilt and silver spoons, -twelve damask table-cloths and twenty candlesticks. The constable -wore gilt armour and a plumed helmet, and bore a pole axe in his -hands. On St. Thomas’s Eve a parliament was held, when the two -youngest brothers, bearing torches, preceded the procession of -benchers, the officers’ names were called and the whole society -passed round the hearth singing a carol. On Christmas Eve the -minstrels, sounding, preceded the dishes, and dinner done, sang a -song at the high table; after dinner the oldest masters of the -revels and other gentlemen sang songs.</p></div> - -<p>It sounds very cheerful and amiable, but it is difficult to imagine our -modern lawyers passing round the hearth singing a carol.</p> - -<p>I suppose that the three best-loved dwellers in the Temple were Oliver -Goldsmith, Dr. Johnson and Charles Lamb, and none of them were lawyers. -Johnson was living in No. 1 Inner Temple Lane when Topham Beauclerk and -Mr. Langton knocked him up at three in the morning to see if he could be -persuaded to finish the night with them, and he came out with a poker, -and his little black wig on, and said when he understood their errand, -“What, is it you, you dogs, I’ll have a frisk with you.”</p> - -<p>The story of Goldsmith’s tenancy of the Temple reminds one of the tales -told of Balzac, whose tastes and weaknesses he shared. Always in -financial difficulties, as soon as he made a little money he bought -quantities of clothes and furniture and ran into debt to his tailor, -perhaps for the very red velvet coat with lace ruffles that you may see -to-day in the London Museum at Lancaster House. Goldsmith had many<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_67" id="page_67">{67}</a></span> -London lodgings and only came to the Temple in 1764. When he died there -ten years later the staircase of this improvident, extravagant genius -was crowded with the poor he had managed to help. No one seems to know -exactly where he lies buried in the Temple churchyard.</p> - -<p>Lamb was a true child of the Temple as he was born there. It may be -heresy, but I have always wished he had not called it “the most elegant -spot in the metropolis”; he loved it more than that, as all readers of -<i>The Old Benchers of the Inner Temple</i> know well.</p> - -<p>No one leaves the Temple without pausing in Fountain Court, where Ruth -Pinch used to meet Tom. It is by far the most charming of all the courts -of the Temple. “I lived in Fountain Court for ten years,” wrote Arthur -Symons, “and I thought then and I think still, that it is the most -beautiful place in London.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_68" id="page_68">{68}</a></span>”</p> - -<h2><a name="CHAPTER_IV" id="CHAPTER_IV"></a><span class="chspc">CHAPTER</span> IV<br /><br /> -ROUND ABOUT THE TOWER</h2> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">“I do not like the Tower, of any place.”—<i>Richard III.</i><br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">Having</span> amused myself many times in Paris by hunting up the pieces of the -old wall that Philippe Auguste built before he departed to the Holy Land -on one of his Crusades, I set out one day to see how much remains of the -wall the Romans built round London.</p> - -<p>I discovered some bits of it, but I discovered a great many other things -in the process.</p> - -<p>There is very little left of the city that the old Romans called Augusta -and the older Britons Llyn-Din—that some say means “the Lake Fort” and -some “The Hill by the Pool.” In the Guildhall and London museums there -are statues and vases and ornaments and mosaic pavements belonging to -those times, but in the city streets there are hardly any traces to-day -of the Roman occupation. Watling Street, a piece of Roman road that -still bears an Anglo-Saxon name, runs citywards from the back of St. -Paul’s, but that may better be reached from Cheapside. Most of the Roman -wall that remains is now below ground level. The best places to see what -is visible are in St. Olave’s, Hart Street; at Trinity Place, Tower -Hill; at<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_69" id="page_69">{69}</a></span> Barber’s bonded warehouses in Cooper’s Row; and at The Roman -Wall House at No. 1, Crutched Friars, a new building whose plans were -altered by the Sadlers’ Company so as to preserve a good specimen of the -old wall in one of the basement rooms.</p> - -<p>I began my search for Roman remains in Strand Lane, which lies next door -to the Strand station on the Holborn tube, and can be reached either by -bus along the Strand or by District train to the Temple, whence you go -uphill up Arundel Street and, turning to your left along the Strand, -find it after two or three minutes’ walk. Half-way down the little -winding passage that once led to the waterside there is on the left a -dingy sign, “The Old Roman Bath.”</p> - -<p>The English reputation for liking cold baths must have been a legacy -from the Romans. Time was when the venerable cold spring bath was used -daily. David Copperfield had many a cold plunge in it when he was living -in Peter the Great’s house at the lower end of Buckingham Street. But -now it is only open from 11 to 12 on Saturday mornings to the very -occasional visitor who turns aside to look at this 2,000-year-old relic -of the London of the past.</p> - -<p>As in the Frigidarium of the Cluny Museum in Paris, it seems as if one -steps back into the world as Julius Cæsar knew it, across the threshold -into the little vaulted chamber where the waters from the spring, once -famed for miraculous cures, flow through the marble walls<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_70" id="page_70">{70}</a></span> of the -identical bath used by our Roman conquerors. The Romans contented -themselves with a brick lining that still exists under the marble slabs, -but the latter have an interest of their own, for they came from the -famous bath built in the Earl of Essex’s house near by, which Queen Bess -herself is said to have been the first to use. The spring comes from the -old Holy Well, that gave its name to Holywell Street, on the North side -of the Strand, a street destroyed to make room for Kingsway and Aldwych.</p> - -<p>There is a Roman bath of a different kind underneath the Coal Exchange -in Lower Thames Street, but on your way to this from the Temple station -(or bus 13 from the Strand), get out at Cannon Street, where in a sort -of cage against the wall of St. Swithin’s Church, directly opposite the -station, is the very oldest relic in the whole of the city of -London,—London Stone, the stone that the Romans set up to mark the -centre of the city; the starting point from whence they marked the miles -along their branching highways. As long as history has been written in -this land, there has been mention of London Stone. Do you remember how, -in <i>Henry VI.</i>, Shakespeare makes Jack Cade proclaim himself King of the -City, striking his staff against the block? Once it was a big pillar and -set on the other side of the way, but famous stones are seldom allowed -to rest in peace, and time, the weather, and clumsy mediæval cart-wheels -have chipped and worn it to its present size.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_71" id="page_71">{71}</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter" id="ill_008" style="width: 379px;"> -<a href="images/i_071.jpg"> -<img src="images/i_071.jpg" width="379" height="413" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p>LONDON STONE, CANNON STREET</p></div> -</div> - -<p>Now take the train again, or another 13 bus, and go on to the Monument, -where King William IV. stands on the very spot where Falstaff and Prince -Hal made merry at the “Boar’s Head,” Eastcheap. Going down by the -beautiful column which Sir Christopher Wren built to commemorate the -Great Fire, hard by where it started in Pudding Lane, turn to your left -in Lower Thames Street opposite the church of St. Magnus, and walk along -this unattractive causeway till you come to the Coal Exchange with its -Corinthian porch. You will find the porter through a door up the -side-street of St. Mary-at-Hill. Do not go on Monday, Wednesday or -Friday afternoons, for those are marketdays or whatever the correct term -is on Coal Exchanges, and, as that most agreeable porter<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_72" id="page_72">{72}</a></span> explained to -me: “We found it didn’t do, Ma’am; for when the genelmen on the Exchange -see me taking a lady or genelman or it might be a party down below into -the cellar, they naturally says to me ‘What for?’ And when I say ‘Roman -bath,’ they say ‘Roman bath, Jones! Did you say Roman bath? You don’t -mean to say there’s a Roman bath below and me here forty years and never -know it!’ And down they goes with all their friends, all equally -surprised, and business gets neglected. That’s how it is, Ma’am.”</p> - -<p>Business in the coal trade has been too much neglected for anyone to -wish to hinder it further, so go on a Tuesday, Thursday or Saturday -afternoon. It is quite worth the exertion, for this hot-air or sweating -chamber, with its fire-blackened bricks, forming part of an elaborate -system of baths, is even more interesting than the Roman bath in the -Strand.</p> - -<p>The Coal Exchange, with its curious rotunda floor of inlaid wood, was -only built in the middle of the nineteenth century, but it has two more -unexpected links with the past. I am indebted to Messrs. Thornbury and -Walford for pointing out that the black oak used in the woodwork is part -of a tree, four or five centuries old, that was discovered in the River -Tyne, and the blade of a dagger in the shield of the City arms is made -of wood from a mulberry tree that Peter the Great planted when he worked -as a shipwright in Deptford Harbour.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_73" id="page_73">{73}</a></span></p> - -<p>Turning up St. Mary’s-at-Hill into Great Tower Street, I found, nearly -opposite All Hallows, Barking, a prosperous merchant’s house still -standing practically untouched, as it was built a year or two after the -Great Fire. At No. 34, an ordinary-looking archway leads into a -courtyard fronting a perfect example of the home of a wealthy citizen of -Charles II.’s time. A flight of steps leads up to the doorway, from -which you catch a glimpse of panelled walls and noble staircase. The -counting-house is on the right, and upstairs are the living rooms where -the merchant lived with his wife and family and servants, in the fashion -of those times. They entertained, too, after the day’s work was done, -for amongst the private papers still treasured here is one complaining -of the excessive noise of carriages and coaches turning in the cobbled -courtyard at night.</p> - -<p>It is worth while pushing open the door of the fifteenth-century -perpendicular church of All Hallows, Barking, just opposite, to see the -Norman pillars and the fine brasses. The best one is in front of the -litany desk, and in the corner to the right is a brass to the memory of -William Thynne and his wife.</p> - -<p>This is not the Thynne who has such a gruesome monument in Westminster -Abbey, but a more worthy sixteenth-century ancestor, who was “chefe -clerk of the Kechyn of Henry VIII.,” and who published the first edition -of the entire works of Chaucer. Both of them are<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_74" id="page_74">{74}</a></span> descendants of that -John of the Inn whose soubriquet became the name of the Bath family.</p> - -<p>All Hallows gets its surname from the Abbess of Barking, the head of the -seventh-century Benedictine convent of Barking. She was a powerful -lady,—one of the four abbesses who was a baroness <i>ex officio</i>, and she -held the lands of the king by a baronage, furnishing her share of -men-at-arms. Only an old gateway of the Chapel of the Holy Rood, eight -miles out of London by the Fenchurch Street railway, is left of the -nunnery, but All Hallows, which was connected with it, survived the -Great Fire and is still intact.</p> - -<p>Turning your back on the old church, and walking up Seething Lane, where -Pepys went to live in 1660 and kept his diary for nine years, you come -to St. Olave’s Church on the corner of Hart Street, where his pretty -young wife was buried. Church manners have vastly changed since Pepys’ -day. When a bomb from an avion fell just outside the Verdun Cathedral -one Sunday morning, two months before the big attack, no one turned his -head except one little acolyte, who couldn’t resist a surreptitious grin -at his comrade in the front pew. But listen to Pepys:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"><p>6 June, 1666. To our own church, it being the common Fastday, and -it was just before sermon; but Lord! how all the people in the -church stared upon me to see me whisper (the news of the victory -over the Dutch at sea) to Sir John Minnes and my Lady Pen. Anon I -saw people stirring and whispering<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_75" id="page_75">{75}</a></span> below, and by and by comes up -the sexton from my Lady Ford to tell me the news, which I had -brought, being now sent into the church by Sir W. Batten in -writing, and passed from pew to pew.</p></div> - -<p>The church of St. Olave’s has a proud history. There are records of the -parish in Henry I.’s day, and in 1283 of a church dedicated to St. Olaf, -an exiled Norwegian. The present building dates from about 1450. It is -one of the eight existing churches that escaped the Great Fire.</p> - -<p>The mid-Victorian Vandals who filled up the marble crypt, and removed -the old galleries and square pews, with their candlesticks, have -mercifully left the fine roof intact, and St. Olave’s possesses a number -of quaint Elizabethan treasures. On the door there is one of the few -remaining sanctuary knockers used by a fugitive from justice if he -wanted to claim sanctuary protection: on four of the six bells in the -church peal is engraved “Anthony Bartlet made mee 1662.” The crown on -the weather vane is supposed to commemorate the visit of Queen Elizabeth -in 1554 when she gave silken bell-ropes as a thank-offering for her -release from the Tower, and on the front of the organ gallery are the -wrought-iron hat-stands with which the clergy of those days emphasised -their protest against men wearing their hats in church.</p> - -<p>The beautifully wrought iron sword-stands are used to this day when the -Lord Mayor and Sheriffs attend an official service at St. Olave’s.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_76" id="page_76">{76}</a></span> The -old church has been intimately connected with the navy since the days -when the Admiralty lodged in Mark Lane and Crutched Friars, and it is -still the parish church of the Master and Brethren of Trinity House, who -come humbly on foot, <i>via</i> Catherine Court and Seething Lane, to the -annual special service on Trinity Sunday, H.R.H. the Prince of Wales, as -Master, making his pilgrimage like the rest.</p> - -<p>But for the ordinary visitor who has no part in these ceremonial -happenings the great interest of St. Olave’s lies in the memories -connected with its greatest parishioner, Samuel Pepys, Esq., Secretary -to the Admiralty.</p> - -<p>The fame of his <i>Diary</i> has rather obscured Pepys’ well-merited -reputation as an admirable and faithful public servant at a time when -these qualities were rare. He was living at the Navy Office in Seething -Lane in 1666, and it is thanks to his sagacity in ordering all the -workmen from the Royal Dockyards to blow up the intervening houses that -St. Olave’s, Hart Street, Allhallows Staining, and Allhallows Barking -were saved from the Great Fire.</p> - -<p>Pepys and his pretty wife are both buried in their parish church of St. -Olave’s. Mrs. Pepys died when she was only twenty-nine, and though he -had teased the jealousy of “my wife, poor wretch,” Pepys ordered her -bust to be carved, not in the usual profile, but with the lovely head -turned so that he could see</p> - -<div class="figcenter" id="ill_009" style="width: 600px;"> -<a href="images/i_076_fp.jpg"> -<img src="images/i_076_fp.jpg" width="600" height="433" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p>THE TOWER OF LONDON. BYWARD TOWER</p></div> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_77" id="page_77">{77}</a></span></p> - -<p class="nind">it from where he sat in his gallery pew on the other side of the church.</p> - -<p>There are other interesting things to be seen at St. Olave’s: the -doorway to the old churchyard that Dickens-lovers will recognise from -his description in the <i>Uncommercial Traveller</i>, the carved pulpit and -quaint vestry and several fine old monuments, and, as I mentioned -before, part of the old Roman wall.</p> - -<p>If you have no passion for discovering bits of ancient walls, there are -other more beautiful things near the bottom of Seething Lane. One of -them is very new, so new that when I saw it all the scaffolding had not -been removed from the buildings at its base—I mean the great tower of -the Port of London Authority. I hear that Sir Joseph E. Broodbank has -just written a fascinating <i>History of the Port of London</i>, that will -waken everyone who has three guineas to spare to the interest of -London’s immense docks and the organisation that has power over seventy -miles of the Thames. The beautiful tower of the new buildings, with its -fine groups of statuary, is worth a special pilgrimage to see. It is not -very far from Trinity House, that unique institution that, as Mr. -Cunningham says, has for its object “the increase and encouragement of -navigation, the regulation of lighthouses and sea marks, and the general -management of matters not immediately connected with the Admiralty.”</p> - -<p>The Guild of Trinity House was founded in 1529 by Sir Thomas Spert, -Henry VIII.’s<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_78" id="page_78">{78}</a></span> Controller of the Navy and commander of the magnificent -four-master, the <i>Harry Grace de Dieu</i>, which took the King to Calais on -his way to the Field of the Cloth of Gold. You can see exactly what it -looked like in the picture of Henry VIII.’s embarkation at Dover that -hangs in Hampton Court Palace.</p> - -<p>One of the delusions I have had when hastening through the streets of -London filled with excitement at the thought of seeing some ancient -place associated with more colourful days than our own, was caused by -Mr. Wagner’s enticing account of the Crooked Billet in his fascinating -book on old London inns.</p> - -<p>Alas, the Crooked Billet, at the eastern extremity of Tower Hill, has -nothing left of its former magnificence. The panelled walls and carved -chimney-pieces have been ruthlessly taken away,—some say to that bourne -overseas whither pass so many treasures of the Old World it affects to -despise. There is nothing left but the sordid dirty rooms of slum -tenements, with here and there the remains of a fine ceiling and a few -wall cupboards. The old building that was once a royal palace, and since -the days of Henry VIII. has been a lordly inn, has fallen into the state -of drab degradation that is the forerunner of the pick and shovel of the -<i>démolisseur</i>. Only the rich façade remains to remind the passer-by of -its vanished glories!<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_79" id="page_79">{79}</a></span></p> - -<h3>The Tower</h3> - -<p>Having wandered so long in its neighbourhood, let me hurriedly make the -shamefaced confession that I share Richard III.’s opinion about the -Tower and that I have never seen it. I have skirted it, I have gazed -into its asphalted moat, I have looked with awe on its battlemented -towers,—but I have never crossed the drawbridge.</p> - -<div class="figcenter" id="ill_010" style="width: 600px;"> -<a href="images/i_079.jpg"> -<img src="images/i_079.jpg" width="600" height="435" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p>THE TOWER OF LONDON</p></div> -</div> - -<p>To me it is the storehouse of mistakes—a place redolent with the memory -of bygone blunders—where the great men of the nation, like Sir Thomas -More, Archbishop Cranmer and Sir Walter Raleigh, and innocent, -beautiful<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_80" id="page_80">{80}</a></span> things like the little Princes and Lady Jane Grey, were done -to death. There must surely be left something of Lady Jane’s agony when -she saw the headless body of her young husband carried past her on the -morning when she knew that she too was to die—something of the -sickening sense of injustice that great men like Raleigh and More must -have felt as their doom approached.</p> - -<p>Of course, for less squeamish people there is an unending interest in -the historical and architectural features of the Tower. It is open every -week-day from ten to six in summer and ten to five in winter, and on -Saturdays the fees to the White Tower and the Jewel House are not -necessary. It is staffed by a constable, a lieutenant, a resident -governor and about 100 yeomen warders called Beefeaters, all of which -information, as well as the fact that the best way to reach it is from -Mark Lane station on the Underground, is writ large in Mr. Muirhead’s -excellent Blue Book on London.</p> - -<p>Writ more small are tales that almost make me want to go and see for -myself the place where Charles d’Orleans, the royal French poet, who -wrote such haunting songs as “Dieu qu’il la fait bon regarder,” was held -a prisoner for fifteen long years. Other things it seems besides murders -happened in the Tower,—Henry the Eighth made two of his marriages here, -James the First lived here for a time (a fact that does not mitigate my -distaste for the Tower), and<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_81" id="page_81">{81}</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter" id="ill_011" style="width: 421px;"> -<a href="images/i_081.jpg"> -<img src="images/i_081.jpg" width="421" height="600" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p>TRAITOR’S GATE, TOWER OF LONDON</p> - -<p>North or Inside View of Traitor’s Gate being the principal entrance of -the Tower of London from the River and through which stole prisoners of -rank and dignity were formerly conveyed to the Tower</p></div> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_82" id="page_82">{82}</a></span> </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_83" id="page_83">{83}</a></span> </p> - -<p>Charles the Second slept here the night before his coronation in 1661. -No monarch has done that since his day. Then, if guide-books may be -believed, there are hundreds of things in the armouries and weapon room -and small-arms room, the cloak on which Wolfe died in far-off Quebec, a -Grinling Gibbons carved head of Charles the Second, and armour and -weapons of every period.</p> - -<p>Most of these historic places are sepulchres of bygone crimes, but the -Tower has known tragedy within its walls in these latter hideous years, -for nearly a score of our enemies were put to death there in the Great -War.</p> - -<p>One or two of them were brave men, serving their country even as we -served ours; one likes to think that they were treated as such. The -story of Carl Lody has already been published, but I give it again -because it redeems some of the Tower’s tragic history.</p> - -<p>I believe he had asked to be allowed to testify to the fair and just -treatment he had received, and when the last moment came the German said -to the Provost-Marshal: “I suppose you wouldn’t care to shake hands with -a spy?” The Englishman replied without hesitation, “I am proud to shake -hands with a brave man.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_84" id="page_84">{84}</a></span>”</p> - -<h2><a name="CHAPTER_V" id="CHAPTER_V"></a><span class="chspc">CHAPTER</span> V<br /><br /> -ROUND ABOUT CHEAPSIDE</h2> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i2">“O Cheapside! Cheapside! Truly thou art a wonderful<br /></span> -<span class="i0">place for hurry, noise and riches.”—<span class="smcap">George Borrow.</span><br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">Cheapside</span> and Fleet Street have points of resemblance, for they are both -narrow highways to the City, crowded and bustling and full of history, -but Fleet Street, in spite of its literary associations, has not much -attraction. Something of the mud of the old Fleet Ditch still seems to -cling about it, some taint of disreputable Alsatia in Whitefriars, once -the haven of roystering thieves and cut-throats, very different from the -hive of grandiose newspaper offices that it is now.</p> - -<p>But in Cheapside it is easy to call up memories of noisy apprentices and -busy trafficking. Here is the home of the true Cockney, born within the -sound of those bells of Bow Church that still chime as cheerfully as -when Dick Whittington heard them from Highgate Hill, or when they -summoned dilatory citizens to bed at nine o’clock. The very name evokes -the idea of buying and selling, even if one does not know that the old -word “chepe” means a market. It was once the shopping centre of the City -of London, and the names of the streets branching<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_85" id="page_85">{85}</a></span> off on either side, -Bread Street, Milk Street, Honey Lane and the rest, are the names of the -various commodities that were sold there. Friday Street was so called -from the fish to be bought there on a Friday. Round about, in Ironmonger -Lane, Bucklersbury, and most of the streets on the northern side, busy -artisans worked at their trades, and if we think it a noisy thoroughfare -nowadays, what must it have been when it was paved with cobblestones and -thronged all day long with an endless stream of horsemen, carts and -coaches, vociferating porters, citizens cheerful or quarrelling as the -case might be, sellers calling their goods on either hand, and the bells -of innumerable churches, priories and religious houses clanging -incessantly to prayer. Always there was something going on in Chepe—a -tournament to see, with stands set up at the side of Bow Church, or -pageants, cavalcades and processions passing by. The London youth of -those days had a diverting life. Read what Chaucer says of the prentice -in Edward III.’s reign:</p> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">At every bridale would he sing and hoppe;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">He loved bet the taverne than the shoppe—<br /></span> -<span class="i0">For when ther eny riding was in Chepe<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Out of the shoppe thider wold he lepe,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And til that he had all the sight ysein,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And danced wel, he wold not come agen.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p>We have most of us read in our history books of the “beau geste” of -Queen Philippa, wife of Edward III., in saving the lives of the -burghers<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_86" id="page_86">{86}</a></span> of Calais; this seems to have been a habit that started early -with her. In 1330, just after the birth of the Black Prince, a -tournament was held in Cheapside to celebrate the event, and a fine -wooden tower erected to accommodate the young queen and her ladies. No -sooner had they mounted than it collapsed. There was much screaming and -a scene of terrible confusion, from which they all emerged, however, -more frightened than hurt. The king was so enraged that he ordered the -instant execution of the careless workmen, but Philippa, who might well -have been even more annoyed, at once flung herself on her knees and -pleaded for their pardon until the king forgave them.</p> - -<p>But “Safety first” was a motto with King Edward, he wanted no more -wooden scaffoldings. A stone platform was built, just in front of the -old church of St. Mary-le-Bow (making it extremely dark on the street -side), from which he and his court could view the tournaments with minds -at peace; for centuries this was the regular royal stand, whenever there -was a procession or other fine doings in the City. Look at Bow Church, -that glory of Cheapside, the work of Sir Christopher Wren, and, in the -stone gallery running round the graceful steeple, you will see how, ever -mindful of tradition, he commemorated this fact when he built his new -tower to flank the pavement adjoining the site of the old grand-stand.</p> - -<p>When I last went into Bow Church I chatted<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_87" id="page_87">{87}</a></span> with the lady who was -engaged in scrubbing the floor, and she told me the curious fact that in -this English church in an English city, with its memories stretching -through the ages (for it is built on the site of a much older one and -you may still see the fine old Norman crypt), the Russians in London -were then assembling, Sunday by Sunday, for a service in their own -ritual, St. Mary’s congregation amiably going to another church near by. -The City Churches that were missed so sorely, after the Great Fire, by -the merchants, tradesmen, shopkeepers, apprentices, with their families, -maids and servants, who lived all round about them and dutifully -worshipped there, now stand empty and neglected. Here and there, as in -the tiny fourteenth-century church of St. Ethelburga’s in Bishopsgate -Street, the magnet of eloquent wisdom and sincerity draws men and women -from all over London to worship, so that the seats are never empty, but -in the majority of the City churches, a perfunctory service connotes a -perfunctory congregation of caretakers and their wives, inhabitants of a -quarter that is only populated in the working week-day hours. The best -time to see any of the City churches is at the lunch hour, when they are -sure to be open. In many of them short musical services are then held. I -know few odder sensations than to walk in the City on a Sunday morning -and hear all the sweet bells of the fifty-odd churches calling to prayer -in the<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_88" id="page_88">{88}</a></span> silence of the solitary streets. Practical people would pull the -half of them down and devote the money from the sale of their sites to -other much-needed religious purposes. But, even if these little churches -no longer serve their original object, they are still shrines of the -past, each one with some special memory, some special charm, and typical -all together of a great phase of English architecture.</p> - -<p>There is little of this past now actually left in busy Cheapside, except -No. 37, of which I shall speak presently, two tiny houses at the corner -of Wood Street, the handsome seventeenth-century façade (restored, of -course) of the Mercers’ Chapel at the corner of Ironmonger Lane at the -Lower Bank end, and No. 73 opposite, that was built by Wren for Sir -William Turner who was Lord Mayor in 1668. It is still known as the Old -Mansion House.</p> - -<p>Probably it was his own house and he went on living in it till his -death. Where, then, did the lord mayors stay officially during their -term of office from that time till the present Mansion House was built -in 1739? I am indebted to Mr. Leopold Wagner for supplying the answer by -showing me the way to one of the most fascinating spots in the City. -This third old Mansion House still exists, but in a corner so obscure, -so tucked away, that I have passed within a stone’s throw of it a dozen -times and never had the least suspicion of its existence.</p> - -<p>It is at No. 5, Bow Lane, hard by Bow Church,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_89" id="page_89">{89}</a></span> in a narrow passage, with -a sign directing you, if you are fortunate enough to see it, to -Williamson’s Hotel. Follow the passage and you will find yourself remote -from the world, with the quaintest old creeper-clad Restoration house -imaginable surrounding three sides of the courtyard. Yet this quiet spot -was once the hub of civic life,—there is a stone let into the charming -little octagonal-shaped parlour (now called the reading room) that is -supposed to mark the very centre of the City. Here for a few years the -lord mayors after Sir William Turner dwelt in state, and here came -William III. and Mary to dine, and give, as a memento of their visit, -the handsome iron gates, now much corroded and covered with thick green -paint, through which you seek the entrance.</p> - -<p>Later on, in the early seventeen hundreds, the original Williamson -started his hotel. It would have been described as “high-class -residential,” had they known those terms, for in those days, when -country squires and their families came up to town, they found the City -as convenient a centre as anywhere. The forty bedrooms, the long salon, -now a bar, where you may see, still hanging on the wall where it has -been for centuries, an ancient map of London Bridge,—the pleasant -rambling up-and-down passages, with their deep embrasures and -window-seats, the low-ceilinged coffee-room with its only bell-pull -marked “Boots,” and<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_90" id="page_90">{90}</a></span> elegant little parlour where now no ladies ever -sit,—all speak of a past of consequence.</p> - -<p>But nowadays, apart from the birds of passage who pass a night in the -huge station caravanserais, does anyone put up in the City? Only a few -“commercials,” such as I saw lunching at Williamson’s, on the very -excellent “ordinary” of lamb, green peas, new potatoes, cauliflower, -cherry tart and cheese, winding up with coffee, liqueur and a fat cigar, -over which they discuss the latest prices, and the latest sporting news. -Williamson’s, in fact, does not cope with modern notions—“Take it or -leave it” is their motto. The all-invading business girl has not yet -dared to put her nose in here—she would probably create a revolution if -she did. But if you want to get right back into the atmosphere of -Dickens, in a place where electric bells, smart waitresses, music, -flappers and foolish ideas of the value of time are not, conscript a -friend and take a meal at the Old Mansion House.</p> - -<p>Coming out into Bow Lane, on the right, at the opposite corner where -Watling Street crosses it, you will find the Old Watling Restaurant, one -of the first houses built in London after the Great Fire: a very -delightful example of its kind, with its dormer windows and heavy-beamed -ceilings.</p> - -<p>In Cheapside, at No. 37 at the corner of Friday Street, where Messrs. -Meakers carry on a business appropriate enough to the shop that -tradition<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_91" id="page_91">{91}</a></span> assigns to John Gilpin, is another house that claims, on the -insufficient evidence of an undated cutting from the <i>Builder</i>, to have -been standing even before the Fire.</p> - -<p>Everything goes to refute this story. The very beautiful staircase dates -from the Restoration period, the brickwork is similar to that of other -buildings erected at this time, but, more than this, it is quite certain -that the house stands on the site of the older “Nag’s Head,” a tavern -with an overhanging timbered structure, that may be seen in a print of -Cheapside showing the procession to welcome Marie de Medici when she -came in 1638 to visit her daughter Henrietta Maria. The sign on the -frontage now is no Nag’s Head, but a Chained Swan, once the heraldic -badge of King Henry IV., but debased, like so many other noble devices, -to become the sign of a hostelry. Innkeepers were fond of calling their -houses after the swan, for this poor bird has always had an undeserved -reputation for being fond of strong drink; on the other hand, it holds a -special place in English history, for when Edward III., jousting at -Canterbury in 1349, put on his shield the device of a white swan with -the motto:</p> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Hay, hay, the wythe Swan,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">By Gode’s Soule I am thy man,<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind">this was the very first time that the English tongue was used at Court -since the Conquest, and the White Swan made fashionable a<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_92" id="page_92">{92}</a></span> language that -has since spread all over the world.</p> - -<p>At the sign of the “Chained Swan” is certainly the most interesting -house in Cheapside. Quite probably it was really the first to be erected -in the City after the Fire, as it is a four-storied house of some -importance.</p> - -<p>Cross the road to Wood Street, and, if you look through the railings at -the back of the two diminutive shops that are shadowed by the great and -famous plane-tree, you will see that they are built of the same red -brick as No. 37 and bear a tablet with this inscription:</p> - -<p class="c"> -Erected at ye sole Cost and Charges<br /> -of ye Parish of St. Peter’s Cheape<br /> -Ao. Dni. 1687.<br /> -</p> - -<table border="0" cellpadding="2" cellspacing="0" summary=""> -<tr><td align="left">William Howard, </td> -<td rowspan="2" valign="middle" style="border-left:1px solid black;">—<i>Churchwardens</i>.</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Jeremiah Taverner, </td></tr> -</table> - -<p>The owners of these little houses are forbidden by their leases to add a -second story, so the tree remains, bringing a breath of the country to -City dwellers, reminding them of Wordsworth’s thrush, whose habit of -continuous singing used to amaze my childhood:</p> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">At the corner of Wood Street, when daylight appears<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Hangs a thrush that sings loud, it has sung for three years.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p>In Wood Street lived Launcelot Young, that master glazier of peculiar -tastes who, finding the head of James IV., the King of Scots who was -slain at Flodden Field, among a lot of old<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_93" id="page_93">{93}</a></span> rubbish in the lumber room -of the Duke of Suffolk’s place at Sheen, took it home with him and kept -it till it lost its novelty.</p> - -<p>When I said that there is little to remind one of the past in Cheapside, -I forgot the churches that crop up round every corner. They have a -wealth of memories clustering about them, and the moment you dive into -the narrow courts and passages off the beaten track, you will lose the -sense of modernity. In the dark, queer little lanes, most of them with a -public-house tucked away in some obscure corner, may be found the London -of Dickens’ day, if of no earlier. And what romance in the odd -names—Gutter Lane, by Wood Street, named after Gutheran the Dane, who -lived here before the time of the Conqueror; Huggin Lane that unites -them farther up, called after one Hugan or Hugh; Addle Street, where -King Adel the Saxon had a mansion; Love Lane of dissolute memory.</p> - -<h3>City Companies</h3> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i2">“Thy famous Maire, by pryncely governaunce, with<br /></span> -<span class="i0">sword of justice thee ruleth prudently.”—<span class="smcap">Dunbar.</span><br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p>Wandering in Cheapside, I came across some massive emblazoned -coats-of-arms over great doorways, and found they always announced the -halls of the City Companies of London, those great mediæval trade unions -that survive to-day—so taken for granted by the<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_94" id="page_94">{94}</a></span> Londoner that few -people remark their amazing existence.</p> - -<p>Yet most of the real history of the old City is bound up with the tale -of the rise to wealth and power of these great companies. They once -numbered a hundred, and about seventy-six still survive. I see that in -one recent guide-book the Pattenmakers are quoted as extinct, but though -this ancient guild, founded in 1300, might be supposed to have received -its deathblow a hundred years ago, when the improvement in the streets -made pattens unnecessary, they are still made for country use and the -company has recently renewed its vitality by association with the rubber -boot and shoe industry.</p> - -<p>I like the quaint names of the companies that are now no more. The -occupation of the Bowyers and the Horners is fairly obvious, but who -would guess that the Fletchers were makers of arrows, or the Lorriners -makers of bridles and bits, and I leave you to discover the lugubrious -meaning of the Worshipful Company of Upholders.</p> - -<p>They were the trade unions of the Middle Ages, but they had this great -difference, that they were a combination of the masters for the benefit -of their particular industry, whereas now the trade unions are composed -of the workmen, who combine for their own benefit even if it ruins the -industry. Comparisons may be odious but they are inevitable. Our -present<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_95" id="page_95">{95}</a></span> trade unions, which seem to be growing almost as powerful as -their forerunners, are exclusively concerned with the question of wages, -but the guilds, whilst jealously guarding the privileges of their -members and craftsmen, not only guaranteed a fixed wage, but -administered even-handed justice as between master and men, and, more -important still, insisted on a high standard of workmanship. Nothing but -the best satisfied them, and they built up the tradition of English -excellence which our present distaste for honest work puts us in a fair -way to lose.</p> - -<p>For in this matter we compare badly with our forefathers. Their ruthless -methods might well be copied in this age of the meretricious and shoddy. -In 1311 there was a bonfire in Cheapside (at the instance of the -Hatters’ and Haberdashers’ Company) of forty grey and white and fifteen -black “bad and cheating hats,” which had been seized in the shops of -dishonest traders, and other defective goods were publicly burnt in the -same place from time to time, but so rarely as to show how high was the -usual standard of trade honesty. Nowadays, such seizures would provide -almost enough fuel to tide us through another coal strike.</p> - -<p>The City Companies were an autocracy, but, given the conditions of the -time, they were a benevolent autocracy, and the guilds laid the -foundations of the vast commercial wealth<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_96" id="page_96">{96}</a></span> which has made London what -she is. For centuries the Lord Mayor, their civic head, has been chosen -almost always from amongst the members of the twelve great companies, -and enjoys a prestige abroad only second to that of the king, as anyone -who has lived in France can testify. Trade in England has always been -honourable. The merchants of the Middle Ages belonged almost exclusively -to families of good position; often they were younger sons of the landed -gentry, for whom a commercial life, in days when there were no -engineers, journalists, or bankers, was the usual opening if they did -not go into the Church or Law. Whittington was the son of a -Gloucestershire knight: Sir Thomas Gresham, that finest type of City -magnate and honoured friend of Elizabeth, came of a good old stock and -was educated at Cambridge. For centuries our kings and queens have been -pleased to come to banquets in the Guildhall and the halls of the -greater companies, though they might not nowadays look favourably upon -that lord mayor with whom Charles II. dined, who became so drunk that -when the king got up to leave he rushed after him and dragged him back, -good-naturedly protesting, “to finish t’other bottle.”</p> - -<p>The old power of the guilds has gone, but in what other country would -you find bodies of merchants, each with a vast revenue at its disposal -of which it need give account to no man, using that wealth, generation -after generation,</p> - -<div class="figcenter" id="ill_012" style="width: 447px;"> -<a href="images/i_096_fp.jpg"> -<img src="images/i_096_fp.jpg" width="447" height="600" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p>GUILDHALL</p></div> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_97" id="page_97">{97}</a></span></p> - -<p class="nind">for the public good instead of for private profit? They spend it either -in maintaining excellent schools or in generous gifts to various -charitable objects, or in subscriptions for the advancement of science -(the City Companies are responsible for the City and Guilds Institute), -but in whatever they do they uphold the best traditions of integrity and -generosity of the City merchant.</p> - -<p>The centre of all this civic activity is the Guildhall. From Oxford -Circus a tube to the Bank or any bus along Holborn takes you along -Cheapside and past King Street, at the end of which you see the -Guildhall. If you start from the neighbourhood of Charing Cross any -train to the Mansion House brings you to Queen Victoria Street, out of -which Queen Street, a few minutes’ walk to your right, leads through -directly to King Street.</p> - -<p>Of course the great civic event of the year is the well-known and -oft-described procession and the banquet given on the 9th November by -the new lord mayor, chosen on Michaelmas Day, and the sheriffs to the -members of the Cabinet and other distinguished guests. No women are -permitted to be present and to hear the important political speeches -often made at these dinners, but there are other times when their -presence is tolerated. I have seen the big wooden figures of Gog and -Magog in the gallery of the great hall look down on a recruiting meeting -early in the war—on the gathering<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_98" id="page_98">{98}</a></span> of one of those organisations that -now and then are the temporary guests of the City Corporation, and on -the ceremony of presenting the Freedom of the City to an overseas Prime -Minister.</p> - -<p>The hall is open to the public at the usual hours, 10-5.30, so go in and -nod to Gog and Magog and look at the fifteenth century two-light window -in the south-west corner—the only old one in the hall.</p> - -<p>Coming out of the Guildhall on the left is the passage leading to the -Museum and the Library. The latter is a fascinating place, with less red -tape about consulting the books than in any other place of the size in -London. You simply write your name and the book you want on a slip of -paper, and the affair is done. If you seek information on a certain -point, and do not know where to find it, the courteous director and his -no less willing staff take the greatest trouble to help. I went there -lately on such a quest, and book after book was produced for me by three -assistants till the director in charge, who had evidently been doing -some private research on my behalf, appeared triumphantly with the -volume that gave the solution to my problem. It is a long, pleasant -room, as indeed all book-lined rooms must be, with seven book-lined bays -on either side. The collection contains about 200,000 volumes, besides -many manuscripts. If you are a Shakespearean enthusiast you will find -there among its rare treasures, the first, second and<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_99" id="page_99">{99}</a></span> fourth folios of -Shakespeare’s plays and a document bearing Shakespeare’s signature.</p> - -<p>Naturally the library rather specialises on books about London, and the -museum in the basement beneath (entered from Basinghall Street) is -nearly filled with London relics—Roman antiquities, mediæval -shop-signs, some of the lovely Jacobean jewellery found in Wood Street, -the rest of which is in Lancaster House, instruments of torture from -Newgate, and many other things that tell of the City life in mediæval -days.</p> - -<p>Round about and within a few minutes’ walk of the Guildhall cluster the -halls of the City Companies. The most important in the order of -precedence are the Mercers, Grocers, Drapers, Fishmongers, Goldsmiths, -Skinners, Merchant Taylors, Haberdashers, Salters, Ironmongers, Vintners -and Clothworkers. Their halls are not supposed to be open to the general -public, but it is possible to see most of them on application.</p> - -<p>The history of the guilds is such a long one that their beginning is -lost in Time’s mist. Mr. Muirhead says that “the chief object of their -foundation was to afford religious and temporal and social fellowship, -and trade supervision and help to the members of their fraternity or -mystery,”—but they were not incorporated till the reign of Edward. Most -of their halls date from the days of Henry VIII., when, grown rich and -powerful, they looked about them for a home and were glad to buy from -the avaricious<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_100" id="page_100">{100}</a></span> king the houses of fugitive monks or favourites fallen -into disgrace. But property so acquired was doomed to perish, and in the -Great Fire of 1666 the ancient halls, almost without exception, were -burnt to the ground. “Strange it is to see Clothworkers’ Hall on fire, -these three days and nights in one body of flame, it being the cellar -full of oyle,” says Pepys, who was a Master of the company. They have a -fine collection of gold plate only used at state banquets, with a gold -tray presented by Pepys in 1677 and also an immense loving-cup richly -chased, that is now shown in a glass case on the sideboard, as it began -to show signs of much handling.</p> - -<p>The halls were rebuilt afterwards,—some, like the Vintners’ in 68 Upper -Thames Street, and possibly the Haberdashers’ in Gresham Street, by -Wren,—but by the beginning of the eighteen hundreds most of them seem -to have fallen into such disrepair as to require rebuilding again.</p> - -<p>One at least, the Merchant Taylors’, the largest hall of all, which -faces Threadneedle Street, stands as originally erected, with its little -crypt beneath it, in the latter part of the fourteenth century, for -though the roof and walls were damaged by the Great Fire, the main -building is still intact. This is a rich and proud company, with its -income of £60,000 a year, and its fine gallery of royalties and -distinguished personages, numbering many kings among its freemen. Yet -not so proud as the Mercers’, first on the list, which will not admit -visitors to its<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_101" id="page_101">{101}</a></span> hall in 87 Cheapside. Whittington and Sir Thomas -Gresham were mercers. Within the walls is kept the famous Legh cup -(1499), always used at City banquets and supposed to be one of the -finest pieces of English mediæval plate in existence. The chapel -adjoining the hall, whose handsome front, erected immediately after the -Great Fire, you may inspect at any rate, is on the site of Thomas à -Becket’s house.</p> - -<p>Close by in Prince’s Street, opposite the Bank of England, is the hall -of the Grocers, once called the Pepperers, a guild with advanced notions -for the Middle Ages, for they apparently believed in the equality of -women. The wives of the Grocers were members as well, and were even -fined if they were absent from the banquets for any avoidable reason. -“Grocer” is one of those words that have grown less honourable with -time, for a grocer formerly meant one who dealt <i>en gros</i> (wholesale).</p> - -<p>The halls of the Goldsmiths’ and the Fishmongers’ Companies have so many -mediæval relics that they well repay a visit, and a card of admission is -usually granted on application. The Goldsmiths are in Foster Lane, -Cheapside, just behind the G.P.O., and amongst their plate you may see -the cup from which Queen Elizabeth is said to have drunk at her -coronation. In the Court Room is an old Roman altar, found when the -present foundations were dug. The Goldsmiths still keep their ancient -privilege of assaying and stamping all articles of gold<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_102" id="page_102">{102}</a></span> and silver -manufacture in Great Britain, just as the Fishmongers still have the -less remunerative right to “enter and seize bad fish.” The hall of this -guild is, appropriately enough, on the banks of the river, just at the -north end of London Bridge, and in one of the rooms is a chair made out -of the first pile driven in the construction of Old London Bridge, said -to have been under the water for 650 years.</p> - -<p>The hall of the Stationers’ Company in Paternoster Row was stone-faced a -mere 121 years ago, but the attics still have horn-paned windows and -part of it was built before the Great Fire. Visitors are shown the hall -and the old relics, and every good American likes to see the -compositor’s stick that Benjamin Franklin used when he came to London as -a journeyman printer and lived in Bartholomew Close.</p> - -<p>Stationers’ Hall is the headquarters of the Royal Literary Fund for -assisting Authors in Distress, and among their treasures are the daggers -used by Col. Blood and his accomplice when they tried to steal the crown -jewels in Charles II.’s reign.</p> - -<p>Most of the bare facts about the other chief companies can be found in -any London guide-book, but if a reader wants to know more of these -interesting survivals of the day when the craftsman loved his craft, he -will find a detailed account in Mr. P. H. Ditchfield’s <i>The City -Companies of London</i>, 1904, and Mr. George Unwin’s <i>The Gilds and -Companies of London</i>.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_103" id="page_103">{103}</a></span></p> - -<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VI" id="CHAPTER_VI"></a><span class="chspc">CHAPTER</span> VI<br /><br /> -ROUND ABOUT HOLBORN</h2> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">“Yet London lacks not poetry,<br /></span> -<span class="i1">She has her voices, whose deep tones<br /></span> -<span class="i1">Are human laughter and human moans,<br /></span> -<span class="i1">And all her beauty, all her glory,<br /></span> -<span class="i1">Spring from or blend with man’s strange story.”<br /></span> -<span class="i15"><span class="smcap">Maxwell Gray.</span><br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">Take</span> that chilly-sounding gateway, the Marble Arch, as a <i>point de -départ</i> for a walk some idle afternoon, and I will show you what I found -the day I turned my back on it. It looks as bored by its inactivity as -Théophile Gautier’s Obélisque; perhaps it regrets the days when it faced -Buckingham Palace and feels it came down in the world when it was moved -to its present position some seventy years ago.</p> - -<p>And that, too, is another indignity. Very many people ask why the Marble -Arch is stranded all by itself, like a rock from which the flood has -receded. The reason is as simple as most utilitarian things. The press -of traffic at the Marble Arch was so great that the space had to be -widened. It would have been too costly a matter to move the Marble Arch -back, so the park railings were moved and the Arch left high and dry, no -longer a gateway but only an object of interest.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_104" id="page_104">{104}</a></span></p> - -<p>I grant you that at first sight the Oxford Street and Holborn of to-day -have a blatantly modern look. There is little to remind one in the -kaleidoscopic vista of badly-dressed shop windows, gaudy buildings and -dingy offices, that Roman soldiers once tramped along this very road. It -took about a thousand years from the time that Agricola recalled his -Roman legions from England for the discomfort of the Holborn mudholes to -become unendurable, and for Henry V. to follow in 1417 the earlier -example of his French <i>confrère</i> Philippe Auguste and cause the king’s -highway to be paved at his expense. The paving does not seem to have -been kept in good repair, for the garrulous Pepys says, 250 years later, -that the king’s coach was overturned in Holborn.</p> - -<p>Travellers along Holborn, at the other end of the social scale, shared -in the royal benefit, for from 1196 to 1783 condemned criminals were -brought in carts from Newgate Prison to Tyburn Tree. Everyone has heard -of the famous gallows, but few people know that the exact spot where it -stood is marked to-day by a triangular stone set in the roadway, almost -opposite the beginning of the Edgware Road. A bronze plate on the -railings of the Park, on the other side of the road, commemorates the -fact, but if both stone and plate elude you, the friendly policeman who -is always on duty here will point them out.</p> - -<p>From the Marble Arch to Holborn there is nothing to look at but -interminable shops till<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_105" id="page_105">{105}</a></span> you come to the quaint old houses of Staple -Inn, as disdainfully out of keeping with their vulgar surroundings as an -orchid would be in an onion bed.</p> - -<h3>Staple Inn</h3> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i2">“I went astray in Holborn through an arched entrance,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">over which was Staple Inn.”—<span class="smcap">Hawthorne.</span><br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p>Staple Inn is one of the most delicious things in London. Out of the -roar and hurry of Holborn you pass through the old Jacobean gateway with -the façade of oaken beams into the tranquil old-world court where the -noise suddenly dies away, and you can sit peacefully under the shade of -the plane-trees, as far removed from the bustle and racket without the -gate as if you had been suddenly transported a hundred miles on a -magician’s carpet. From a kindly porter may be bought, for one shilling -and sixpence, a delightful little history of this “fayrest Inne of -Chancerie,” where Johnson lived after finishing his <i>Rasselas</i> in a week -to pay for the expenses of his mother’s funeral.</p> - -<p>When you are tired of sitting quietly in this “veriest home of peace,” -go across the courtyard to the hall of the Inn and look at the carved -oaken roof and the grotesque ornaments, at the Grinling Gibbons -clock-case and the old stained glass windows, and before you leave -Staple Inn go through the second court and look at the old sunk garden -that is so unconcernedly green in the very heart of this big city. At -the back of the<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_106" id="page_106">{106}</a></span> Patent Offices that make the southern boundary of -Staple Inn is Took’s Court—the Cook’s Court where Mr. Snagsby of <i>Bleak -House</i> lived—once a place of those curious semi-prisons called -sponging-houses that were like debtors’ boarding-houses with the bailiff -for the landlord.</p> - -<div class="figcenter" id="ill_013" style="width: 600px;"> -<a href="images/i_106.jpg"> -<img src="images/i_106.jpg" width="600" height="574" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p>Staple Inn</p></div> -</div> - -<p>Took’s Court is a sordid enough place now, and some of it may soon -disappear, but it has a vicarious interest because Sheridan spent some -of the last years of his life in a sponging-house here.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_107" id="page_107">{107}</a></span></p> - -<h3>Gray’s Inn</h3> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">“Whene’er through Gray’s Inn porch I stray<br /></span> -<span class="i1">I meet a spirit by the way;<br /></span> -<span class="i1">I roam beneath the ancient trees,<br /></span> -<span class="i1">And talk with him of mysteries;<br /></span> -<span class="i1">He tells me truly what I am—<br /></span> -<span class="i1">I walk with mighty Verulam.”<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p>Gray’s Inn, another of the gracious, leisurely London corners that few -of London’s visitors discover, lies to the north of Holborn in the -Gray’s Inn Road. Any of the buses along Holborn will take you there, and -it is only a few minutes’ walk behind Chancery Lane Station on the -Central London Railway. You could once wander in the old gardens more -freely than in the other Inns, and if you slipped his <i>Essays</i> in your -pocket could read what Sir Francis Bacon wrote about gardens in the very -garden that he made. Bacon was once Treasurer of Gray’s Inn and he -interested himself in the laying out of “the purest of human pleasures” -that he found there. Gray’s Inn Gardens used to be as fashionable a -place for a walk as Hyde Park is to-day. Pepys the Chatterer related the -doings of numberless people when he wrote: “When church was done my wife -and I walked to Gray’s Inn to observe fashions of the ladies, because of -my wife’s making some clothes.” Pepys must have gone there very often, -for two months later the frivolous Secretary wrote: “I was very well -pleased with the sight of a fine lady that I have often seen walk in -Gray’s Inn Walks.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_108" id="page_108">{108}</a></span>”</p> - -<p>Times have changed and fine ladies are no longer allowed to walk in -Gray’s Inn Gardens, unless indeed they have relations among the benchers -who are complaisant in the matter of keys.</p> - -<div class="figcenter" id="ill_014" style="width: 572px;"> -<a href="images/i_108.jpg"> -<img src="images/i_108.jpg" width="572" height="600" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p>GRAY’S INN HALL</p></div> -</div> - -<p>The Hall is the oldest and most beautiful thing in Gray’s Inn. Queen -Elizabeth once came to a banquet here, and it was here that the <i>Comedy -of Errors</i> was first performed. The old Inn has<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_109" id="page_109">{109}</a></span> had many famous names -among its members, the Sydneys, Cecils, Bacons, etc., and a man no less -distinguished in another circle, Jacob Tonson, had his first bookshop -just inside Gray’s Inn Gate.</p> - -<p>The old bookseller and publisher’s name has a very modern interest, even -for the London visitor who never turns the pages of Pope or Walpole, -because his house at Barn Elms is now used as the Ranelagh Club. The -people who go out to Ranelagh of a fine afternoon to drink tea and watch -the polo, are following the footsteps of the members of the famous -Kit-Cat Club founded in 1700, it is popularly supposed as an outcome of -the dinners Tonson offered to his patrons. The club, of which Tonson -became secretary, consisted of thirty-nine members—authors, wits and -noblemen—their portraits hang in the halls of the Ranelagh Club to-day.</p> - -<p>Tonson published for Addison and Pope, and was the first man to print -cheap editions of Shakespeare. He had innumerable friends, and his -portrait shows him as a genial creature who must have merited the -description of him, written in 1714, that I found in <i>Old and New -London</i>:</p> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">“While in your early days of reputation,<br /></span> -<span class="i1">You for blue garters had not such a passion;<br /></span> -<span class="i1">While yet you did not live, as now your trade is,<br /></span> -<span class="i1">To drink with noble lords and toast their ladies,<br /></span> -<span class="i1">Thou, Jacob Tonson, were to my conceiving,<br /></span> -<span class="i1">The cheerfullest, best, honest fellow living.”<br /></span> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_110" id="page_110">{110}</a></span></div></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind">Tonson moved from the Gray’s Inn Gateway in 1712 to his more celebrated -bookshop in the Strand that stood on part of the present site of -Somerset House. I hear that another old landmark connected with this -prince of publishers is doomed to disappear, for the Upper Flask, in -Heath Street, Hampstead, that was known in Tonson’s day as the “Upper -Bowling Green House,” used as the summer quarters of the Kit-Cat Club, -may have to give way to the new buildings of some philanthropic -institution.</p> - -<p>Gray’s Inn takes its name from the Grays of Wilton. There is a document -registering the transferring in 1505 of the “Manor of Portpoole, -otherwise called Gray’s Inn” from Edmund Lord Gray of Wilton to a Mr. -Denny. The public, alas, are never admitted to the Gardens, but any -visitor may see the Hall on a week-day between the hours of 10 and -12.15.</p> - -<h3>Hatton Garden</h3> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i2">“My Lord of Ely, when I was last in Holborn,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">I saw good strawberries in your garden there.”<br /></span> -<span class="i12"><i>Richard III.</i><br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p>Staple Inn and Gray’s Inn are not the only old-world souvenirs to be -found in prosaic Holborn. A little further east, on the left-hand side -as one strolls towards the City, lies another sordid street whose name -is redolent of Elizabethan romance.</p> - -<p>Hatton Garden, named after the quee<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_111" id="page_111">{111}</a></span>n’s handsome chancellor and now the -haunt of the diamond and pearl merchant, and also of organgrinders and -ice-cream vendors, is built on the site of the gardens of Ely Palace, -the town house of the Bishops of Ely whose story is noted on another -page. Round the corner is Ely Place, the most astonishing little square -in London.</p> - -<p>If you pass this spot on the stroke of the hour after ten o’clock on a -summer’s evening, you may well rub your eyes and wonder if time has been -rolled back and you are suddenly living in the London of two centuries -ago. For the iron gates of the little place are closed, and out of the -tiny porter’s lodge in the middle comes an important person with a -gold-laced hat, who solemnly makes the tour of the square, crying five -or six times, “Past ten o’clock and all’s well!”</p> - -<p>The crying of the hours by the night watchman is not the only custom of -this old-world corner, so carefully guarded by the commissioners in -whose hands the rights of Ely Place are vested. The little square, now -given over to law offices and business premises, was once a “sanctuary,” -a place where law-breakers could take refuge and where the civil -authorities had no right of arrest. To this day the caretakers who form -the bulk of the resident population of Ely Place are inordinately proud -of the fact that they are independent of police protection, having their -own standing army of three porters,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_112" id="page_112">{112}</a></span> who take eight-hour turns in -guarding the tranquillity of their self-contained domain.</p> - -<p>They even have a public-house of their very own, for in the tiny passage -that connects Ely Place with Hatton Garden is a dim little inn of -dubious antiquity, that takes its name of the “Mitre” from the carved -stone mitre set in the façade which once formed part of the old palace -of the bishops of Ely. The innkeeper is very proud of the remains of a -Methuselah of a cherry-tree now incorporated in one corner of the house. -You can see the whitewashed remains of the tree that may have shaded -good Queen Bess if you peer through the left-hand corner window.</p> - -<p>At ten of the clock the iron gate leading into Hatton Garden is duly -fastened, and the “Mitre” is closed to the outside world.</p> - -<p>I have kept the best and most amazing of the treasures of Ely Place -until the last.</p> - -<p>Walk down the left-hand side of the square to the far corner, and you -will find your way into one of the most beautiful things in London,—a -thirteenth century chapel practically intact. It is so beautiful that if -it were necessary to pay a high entrance fee or write for cards of -admission, it would probably be the Mecca of every artist and -antiquarian. But since it is in London, prodigal of such treasures, and -anyone may walk in and look at its beauty undisturbed at any hour, St. -Etheldreda’s Chapel is only known to a few people.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_113" id="page_113">{113}</a></span></p> - -<p>It was built in the last decade of the thirteenth century by a certain -Bishop de Luda, as the chapel for Ely House, the town residence of the -bishops of Ely.</p> - -<p>John of Gaunt took refuge here and must have heard mass within these -very walls. Shakespeare reminds us, in <i>Richard II.</i>, of John of Gaunt’s -death in Ely House, and it was in these cloisters that Henry VIII. first -met with Cranmer. Queen Elizabeth’s chancellor, Sir Christopher Hatton, -worshipped here till his unlucky tenancy of Ely House was ended by his -death in 1591, and so did his nephew’s imperious widow, the famous Lady -Hatton who married and flouted Sir Edward Coke, the great lawyer and -rival of Bacon for her hand.</p> - -<p>It was at “Elie House in Holborne” in the reign of James I. that the -last mystery play was represented in England, before the Spanish -Ambassador Gondemar, who was a next-door neighbour to Ely Palace. The -later history of the chapel may be briefly told. When the bishops -finally sold the property to the Crown in 1772 and betook themselves to -Dover Street, it was bought by an architect who preserved the chapel for -the use of the residents of the houses he built in Ely Place. Afterwards -it passed through several hands, being finally bought by the Fathers of -Charity from the Welsh Episcopalians in 1871. When the work of -restoration was finished, St. Etheldreda’s, the only pre-Reformation -place of worship restored to the<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_114" id="page_114">{114}</a></span> Roman Catholic Church, was reopened on -St. Etheldreda’s Day, the 23rd of June, 1876.</p> - -<h3>St. Sepulchre’s</h3> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">“Here lies one conquered that hath conquered kings.”<br /></span> -<span class="i15">Epitaph to Capt. John Smith, 1631.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p>A little further along Holborn, in Giltspur Street, you come to the old -Church of St. Sepulchre, where we meet again the Tyburn prisoners. -Everybody who has heard the <i>Beggar’s Opera</i> (and who has not?) will -remember the picture Polly Peachum draws of Macheath on the road to -Tyburn: “Methinks I see him already in the cart, sweeter and more lovely -than the nosegay in his hand.” It was at St. Sepulchre’s that the -amorous highwayman would have got his nosegay, on the steps of the -church, for an old benefactor had left money to provide flowers for -every criminal going to be hanged. It was St. Sepulchre’s bell that -tolled the hour of their hanging, and another legacy provided for an -admonition and prayers for the condemned.</p> - -<p>There are more cheerful memories connected with the old church. There is -a mention of it in the twelfth century records. It was rebuilt in the -middle of the fifteenth century—the south-west porch still remains a -thing of beauty—and after it was nearly destroyed in the Great Fire in -1666, Wren practically rebuilt the church with its four weathercocks, -whose<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_115" id="page_115">{115}</a></span> differences of opinion about the wind gave rise to the saying of -Howell: “Unreasonable people are as hard to reconcile as the vanes of -St. Sepulchre’s tower.”</p> - -<p>Two very noteworthy Elizabethans lie buried in St. Sepulchre’s, one a -scholar, the other a brilliant adventurer. The former was Roger Ascham, -the queen’s tutor, and the latter, Captain John Smith, “sometime -Governor of Virginia and Admiral of New England,” of Pocahontas fame. -Captain Smith’s adventures in America have rather overshadowed his -earlier exploits. Mr. Walter Thornbury, in his wonderful <i>Old and New -London</i>, tells that he fought in Hungary in 1602, and in three single -combats overcame three Turks and cut off their heads, for which and -other equally brave deeds Sigismund, Duke of Transylvania, gave him his -picture set in gold with a pension of three hundred ducats, and allowed -him to bear three Turks’ heads proper as his shield of arms. Pocahontas, -who you remember found the English climate too much for her, lies buried -in the parish church of St. George, Gravesend. In 1914 the Society of -Virginian Dames placed two stained glass windows to honour her memory.</p> - -<h3>Stone Effigies</h3> - -<p>Not the least of the quaint things that the seeing eye may note in -London streets are the small statues and reliefs that give an odd -variety to some of the houses.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_116" id="page_116">{116}</a></span></p> - -<p>At No. 78, Newgate Street, five minutes’ walk from St. Sepulchre’s, and -on the same side of the road, is a bas-relief (probably an old -shop-sign) of a giant and a dwarf. These were William Evans and Sir -Jeffery Hudson, freaks whom it pleased Charles II. to keep about him at -the Court, as readers of <i>Peveril of the Peak</i> will remember.</p> - -<p>Just opposite is Panier Alley, so called from the basket-makers who once -lived here. On the left, cased in glass in order to preserve it from the -weather, is a somewhat battered effigy of a fat boy sitting upon a -panier, and, underneath, this inscription:</p> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">When ye have sought the citty round,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Yet still this is the highest ground.<br /></span> -<span class="i10">August the 27th, 1688.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind">It was put up a few years after the Great Fire, that landmark in the -history of the City. I am told its claim is not strictly founded on -fact, and that part of Cannon Street is a few feet higher, but one would -like to believe the cherub.</p> - -<p>Another bas-relief of a fat boy, at the corner of Cock Lane, even nearer -to St. Sepulchre’s, I mention in another chapter, and there is a quaint -old vintner’s sign of an infant Bacchus on a barrel, to be found at the -junction of Liverpool Street and Manchester Street, in the rather -depressing vicinity of King’s Cross. It is believed to be the only one -of its kind left in London.</p> - -<div class="figcenter" id="ill_015" style="width: 600px;"> -<a href="images/i_117_fp.jpg"> -<img src="images/i_117_fp.jpg" width="600" height="431" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p>LINCOLN’S INN</p></div> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_117" id="page_117">{117}</a></span></p> - -<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VII" id="CHAPTER_VII"></a><span class="chspc">CHAPTER</span> VII<br /><br /> -DOWN CHANCERY LANE</h2> - -<h3>Lincoln’s Inn Fields</h3> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i2">“London, Michaelmas term lately over, and the Lord<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Chancellor sitting in Lincoln’s Inn Hall.”—<span class="smcap">Dickens.</span><br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">The</span> charming rustic-sounding name of Lincoln’s Inn Fields is known to -everyone—did not Mr. Tulkinghorne live there?—but few people stray -into the old square except those who are at odds with their neighbours -and come to consult the men of law living there, as they did in Dickens’ -day. The habitués come from Kingsway through Great Queen Street or -Sardinia Street—the stranger takes the Piccadilly Tube to Holborn -Station and, turning to the right along High Holborn, follows the first -passage on the south side of the street that almost manages to conceal -itself behind a protruding house.</p> - -<p>This narrow winding Little Turnstile, and the Great Turnstile, a short -distance farther along, are the only entrances from the north to -Lincoln’s Inn Fields. An ugly lane, connecting these two passages and -parallel with Holborn, is dignified by the disconcerting name of -Whetstone Park. To-day it is only a row of stables,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_118" id="page_118">{118}</a></span> but Milton once had -a lodging in one of the houses, that were always squalid and <i>mal -habitées</i>, as Dryden’s plays attest.</p> - -<p>Coming out of the tortuous Little Turnstile, you enter the spacious -square of Lincoln’s Inn Fields. The very name is alluring enough to make -anyone want to go there, but there is nothing about the gardens to-day -to show that they are among the oldest in London. They are as trim and -well cared for as if they had been laid out yesterday. “Well cared for” -means that all the pleasant green lawns and shady plane-trees are -jealously railed off from the public, who loll somnolently on the many -benches, their back turned to the lovely green oasis. It does not occur -to any of the Fields’ frequenters to turn some of the seats round, so -that they will have a more refreshing view than the dusty asphalt of the -wide paths or the uninspiring sight of the slumbers of the unemployed, -some of whom look as if they had slipped out of the frames of the -Hogarth pictures in the Soane Museum.</p> - -<p>It must be confessed that the interest of Lincoln’s Inn Fields lies not -so much in the gardens—modernised out of every semblance of their -seventeenth-century appearance—as in the beautiful old houses -surrounding them—noble, dignified mansions some of those on the west -side, built by Inigo Jones and once owned by Milords of Lindsay, Somers -and Erskine. At the South Kensington Museum there is a<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_119" id="page_119">{119}</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter" id="ill_016" style="width: 342px;"> -<a href="images/i_119.jpg"> -<img src="images/i_119.jpg" width="342" height="600" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p>LINCOLN’S INN GATEWAY</p></div> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_120" id="page_120">{120}</a></span> </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_121" id="page_121">{121}</a></span> </p> - -<p class="nind">wonderful panelled staircase, a perfect specimen of its kind, that -formerly graced the hall of No. 35.</p> - -<p>Lindsay House, now Nos. 59 and 60, one of the Inigo Jones houses, was -built for the Earl of Lindsay, who died fighting for Charles I. at -Edgehill. Peter Cunningham says that it was called Ancaster House when -the fourth earl was created Duke of Ancaster, and that he sold it to the -proud Duke of Somerset—I do not know why Mr. Cunningham insists on his -pride in italics—who married the widow of the Mr. Thomas Thynne whose -murder by Count Koenigsmarck is so dramatically portrayed on his tomb in -Westminster Abbey.</p> - -<p>No. 66, at the corner of Great Queen Street, was once occupied by the -Duke of Newcastle, George II.’s prime minister.</p> - -<p>We have travelled far searching for freedom in the last 250 years and -one would like to know how the Wellsian attitude is regarded by the -ghost of the creator of this old house—the Marquis of Powis, who built -it in 1686, before he was outlawed by William and Mary because of his -loyalty to James II. He probably chose the site because it was near the -chapel of the Sardinian Ambassador—the oldest Roman Catholic chapel in -London—where the Roman Catholics used to go when they were deprived of -their churches, and where Fanny Burney was married in 1793. It was -removed, unluckily, in 1910.</p> - -<p>There have been poets, too, in Lincoln’s Inn Fields, before the men of -law took possession.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_122" id="page_122">{122}</a></span> Milton and Thomas Campbell lived at No. 61 and -Lord Tennyson at No. 58, where, you remember, Mr. Tulkinghorne of <i>Bleak -House</i> had his rooms.</p> - -<p>It is a house also haunted with memories of Nell Gwynne, for she had -lodgings here and gave birth to the first Duke of St. Albans, while she -was still acting in the nearby theatre in Portugal Row!</p> - -<p>This Lincoln’s Inn Fields Theatre stood just at the back of the Royal -College of Surgeons, on the south side of the square. Three theatres -called the Duke’s Theatre were successively built on the same spot. The -first one was a pioneer in its way, for it was here that regular stage -scenery was introduced in England and that women’s parts were first -played by women. The ubiquitous Pepys was a regular frequenter of the -theatre, and duly recorded his meeting with Nell Gwynne and that here he -saw <i>Hamlet</i> played for the first time.</p> - -<p>Though it is seventy-three years since the last theatre was taken down -to enlarge the museum of the Royal College of Surgeons, and there is -nothing to be seen of it to-day, I like to keep its memory green because -it was here, on the night of January 29th, 1728, nearly two hundred -years ago, that Lavinia Fenton, the first Polly Peachum, sang herself -into the heart of the Duke of Bolton, when John Rich produced Mr. Gay’s -<i>Beggar’s Opera</i>. It ran for sixty-two nights in one season and made -“Gay rich and Rich gay.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_123" id="page_123">{123}</a></span>”</p> - -<h3>Soane Museum</h3> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">“Thus the great city, towered and steepled,<br /></span> -<span class="i10">Is doubly peopled,<br /></span> -<span class="i1">Haunted by ghosts of the remembered past.”<br /></span> -<span class="i12"><i>London Poems.</i><br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p>There is one museum in London that I do not want to call a museum -because in some ways it is so unlike one. Very few people ever go there. -It is like the palace of the Sleeping Beauty. If you shut your eyes at -the south-west corner of Lincoln’s Inn Fields and try not to notice the -tentacular Lyons that unblushingly intrudes its smug modern shopfront -into this old-world square, but stroll through the gardens to the north -side, you will see the Soane Museum at No. 13. This is one of the most -curious and neglected corners I have found in London. There are -priceless things here like Hogarth’s <i>Rake’s Progress</i>, but for every -hundred visitors who go to the National Gallery of British Art to see -the <i>Marriage à la Mode</i> only one comes to this quaint caravanserai of -all sorts of objects.</p> - -<p>Sir John Soane must surely have been the most agreeable bricklayer’s son -who ever made his fortune as a great architect and had a pretty taste in -art. You have only to look at his portrait by Lawrence, one of the last -that great painter finished, to see what a kindly, benevolent man he -was. Why, oh why, did he exact that his collection should remain -unaltered! I know that the guide-books all extol the ingenuity<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_124" id="page_124">{124}</a></span> with -which so many things have been fitted into a small space, but if only -one could sweep away the superfluous and unnecessary and rearrange the -house like a perfect specimen of a home of the period, with the great -pictures hung to the best advantage in the largest rooms and the -basement reserved for the sarcophagus in its present place, with the -best of the larger treasures that would be incongruous in the upper -rooms! As it is, you must diligently hunt for what you want to see, for -the delightful catalogue is more useful as a souvenir than a present -help in finding anything.</p> - -<p>There are things of human interest, like the watch Queen Anne gave to -Sir Christopher Wren, or the pistol that Peter the Great collared from a -Turkish Bey in 1696, that Alexander I. gave to Napoleon at Tilsit in -1807, and that Sir John Soane provokingly says he purchased under very -peculiar circumstances—or the flamboyant jewel of Charles I. found -among the royal baggage after the battle of Naseby—or Rousseau’s -autograph letter—or those exquisite old books of Hours richly -illuminated and written with such patient skill by some old Flemish monk -five hundred years ago.</p> - -<p>But the jewels of this unnoticed casket are the pictures. The courteous -guardians, who all look like retired librarians, show with a certain -melancholy pride the way to the tiny room where hang Turner’s fine -painting of <i>Van Tromp’s Barge</i> and two of his water-colours,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_125" id="page_125">{125}</a></span> Watteau’s -<i>Les Noces</i>, and the greatest treasures of the whole collection, -Hogarth’s pictures of <i>The Rake’s Progress</i> and the four big canvases of -<i>The Election</i>.</p> - -<p>Besides all this there are wonderful Flemish wood carvings and -manuscripts, and, in the crypt, the interesting three-thousand-year-old -tomb of Seti I., King of Egypt, whose inscriptions Sir John did not live -to see deciphered.</p> - -<p>There was an air of wistfulness about the place. It had been arranged -with so much loving care, and so few people profit by it though the -reward of going is great.</p> - -<p>Perhaps Sir John Soane did not want anybody but art-lovers to see his -collection, or he would surely not have closed it to the public on -Saturday, Sunday and Monday all the year round and for the entire months -of September, December, January and February. It is true that students -and other visitors may apply to the curator for admission at other -times, and foreigners are admitted on presentation of their visiting -card on any day except Sunday and Bank Holidays, but what Londoner, with -richer collections open every day in the week, could be expected to -remember the capriciousness of the guardians of Sir John Soane’s -treasures, who are like the suburban hostess announcing her reception -days as first and third Tuesdays and fifth Friday? In despair of -remembering when the good lady was at home, you would never call on her. -No, if you want to see the Hogarths,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_126" id="page_126">{126}</a></span> my advice is to wrap yourself in -the cloak of a foreigner and present your card at the door of this -neglected London museum between the hours of ten and five.</p> - -<h3>Lincoln’s Inn</h3> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">“The Walks of Lincoln’s Inn<br /></span> -<span class="i1">Under the Elms.”<br /></span> -<span class="i8"><span class="smcap">Ben Jonson.</span><br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p>Lincoln’s Inn Fields are bordered on the east side by Lincoln’s Inn, but -I like better to approach the old squares by the brick gatehouse in -Chancery Lane. It is the oldest part of Lincoln’s Inn, and a very fine -example of Tudor brickwork. The Sir Thomas Lovel who built it in 1518 -put his own arms over the gateway, never dreaming that when his name -would mean nothing to the passer-by, the name of a bricklayer, one Ben -Jonson who worked, with a trowel in one hand and a book in the other, at -the adjoining buildings about a hundred years later, would need no coat -of arms to preserve his memory. People like Mr. Muirhead, who see things -in the light of cold reason, argue that in 1617 Jonson was forty-four -and already famous, so he had probably laid down the trowel,—but I -prefer to believe old Fuller, who said Ben Jonson helped in the building -of the new structure in Lincoln’s Inn.</p> - -<p>There are four of these old Inns of Court, that have lasted since the -thirteenth century<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_127" id="page_127">{127}</a></span>—the Inner Temple, the Middle Temple, Lincoln’s Inn -and Gray’s Inn. Few visitors to London go out of their way to stroll in -their shady courtyards, but there are not many corners of London where -you can so easily shake off the oppression of the blare of machinery and -recapture the spirit of a time when the study of the law was not thought -incompatible with many pleasanter, more frivolous things.</p> - -<p>One old chronicler says: “There is both in the Inns of Court and the -Inns of Chancery, a sort of academy or gymnasium where they learn -singing and all kinds of music, and such other accomplishments and -diversions (which are called revels) as are suitable to their quality -and usually practised at court. All vice is discouraged and banished. -The greatest nobility of the kingdom often place their children in those -Inns of Court—not so much as to make the law their study but to form -their manners.”</p> - -<p>I have no predilection for the legal profession, being, like most of my -kind, filled with amazement at the lack of logic and the crass -inconsequences that attend the administration of justice in any country. -In fact I have a fellow-feeling for Peter the Great, who knew his own -mind and had no herd opinions. When he was taken into Westminster Hall, -he inquired who those busy people were in wigs and black gowns. He was -answered, “They are lawyers.” “Lawyers?” said he, with a face of -astonishment. “Why, I have but two in my whole dominions,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_128" id="page_128">{128}</a></span> and I believe -I shall hang one of them the moment I get home.”</p> - -<p>I suppose in no country in the world is the study and practice of the -law surrounded with such debonair amenities as in London. Who would not -be a lawyer, since that profession is the Open Sesame to shady gardens, -lodgings in history-haunted rooms, and a prideful possession in such -rare buildings as the Church of the Knights Templars?</p> - -<p>Lincoln’s Inn takes its name from a thirteenth century Henry de Lacy, -Earl of Lincoln, who had a mansion in Chancery Lane near the first -church of the Knights Templars. His arms are carved over the brick -gateway, separated from those of the builder, Sir Thomas Lovel, by the -royal arms of England. None of the existing old buildings are later than -Tudor times.</p> - -<p>The old Inn has had many illustrious members, lodgers and visitors. -Oliver Cromwell used to come here to see Thurloe, his secretary of -state, who lived at 24 Old Buildings, and there is the story of how he -nearly killed a young clerk he found apparently asleep when he had been -plotting with Thurloe to seize Prince Charles. Thurloe dissuaded him by -passing a lighted candle before the young man’s eyes to prove he was -really asleep, and the clerk lived to warn the prince, who when he -became king paid several visits to Lincoln’s Inn. Both Pepys and Evelyn -record his presence at the “revels,” when learning was encouraged by<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_129" id="page_129">{129}</a></span> -indulgence in dancing. In the Admittance Book are the signatures of -Charles II., the Duke of York, Prince Rupert and the Duke of Monmouth, -written in 1671.</p> - -<p>Dr. John Donne and Sir Thomas More were both connected with Lincoln’s -Inn. Dr. Donne laid the foundation-stone and preached the consecration -sermon of the chapel that Inigo Jones designed in 1623, since so -disastrously restored. It is built on arches, so you can walk about -under the Gothic roof, as Pepys said he did “by agreement” on the 27th -of June, 1663, but you will not see the six seventeenth-century windows, -for they were shattered by an explosion in October, 1915.</p> - -<p>Sir Thomas More has a more intimate connection with the Inn, for his -father and grandfather held the office of butler and steward, and for -their long and faithful services were rewarded by admission into the -Society of Lincoln’s Inn and by the much-prized office of Reader.</p> - -<p>The wonderful law library is now housed in the new red-brick hall, -decorated with Watts’ fresco of “The Lawgivers of the World,” but the -old hall built about 400 years ago is still in use, though it, too, has -suffered from the hands of the restorer.</p> - -<p>Only the benchers and members of Lincoln’s Inn may use the elm-shaded -gardens. They not only fulfil Pepys’ prophecy that they would be very -pretty, but they had a useful war record, as a memorial tablet shows.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_130" id="page_130">{130}</a></span></p> - -<p>I am told that the Curfew is still rung at Lincoln’s Inn. At a quarter -to nine each evening the chief porter climbs to the tower of the chapel -and when the hour has struck he sounds the curfew fifty times. The bell -used was brought from Cadiz by the Earl of Essex in 1596.</p> - -<h3>Record Office</h3> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">“Dull would he be of soul who could pass by<br /></span> -<span class="i1">A sight so touching in its majesty.”<br /></span> -<span class="i12"><span class="smcap">Wordsworth.</span><br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p>Coming out into Chancery Lane once more and turning down towards Fleet -Street, you will see on your left a huge grey building in Tudor style, -where once stood the House of the Converts.</p> - -<p>It was called by that name when Henry III. founded a House in 1232 to -receive converted Jews. I hardly like to tell you that the present name -is the Record Office. It is too pompous and official-sounding, and -perhaps that is why people pass the House of the Converts never -suspecting the presence of the entrancing, memory-evoking things within.</p> - -<p>You enter the enchanted room by descending a short flight of stone -steps, after going through a forbidding portal and along a green sward -into a modern grey building in one of the very busiest of the London -streets.</p> - -<p>You will know why I call it an enchanted room as soon as you see the -beautiful chapel-<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_131" id="page_131">{131}</a></span>like precincts named the House of the Converts nearly -700 years ago, before it was used from Edward III.’s time as the Chapel -of the Rolls.</p> - -<p>The stained glass windows give a mellow light to the admirable -Torrigiano monument of a sixteenth century Master of the Rolls and the -delicately carved alabaster tomb of Richard Alington and his wife Jane. -Near by is the recumbent figure of another Master, with the little -figures of his children kneeling below, one of them the little daughter -born on Christmas Day and married when she was only twelve years old, “a -pretty red-headed wench,” to William Cavendish, afterwards Earl of -Devonshire, in the year of grace 1608.</p> - -<p>There are all sorts of other treasures in this mysterious room, that is -open to all comers between the hours of two and four, any day in the -week except, alas, Saturday or Sunday.</p> - -<p>You may look on the handwriting of “Jane the Quene,” in one of the very -few documents signed by Lady Jane Grey during her nine days’ reign, or -read the pathetic letter written by Mary Queen of Scots to Sir William -Cecil, “Mester Cessilles,” she calls him in the queer Scottish-English -sometimes used by “yowr richt asured good friend, Marie R.”</p> - -<p>For here are guarded poignant souvenirs of long-dead men and women, of -whose sorrows and anguish of mind nothing is left but the yellowing -paper covered with the almost illegible writing of their times. You will -find the cry of<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_132" id="page_132">{132}</a></span> Sir Philip Sidney to Jaen Wyer the Court surgeon of His -Highness of Cleves, written when he lay dying from his wound at the -battle of Zutphen: “Come, my Weier, come. I am in danger of my life and -I want you here. Neither living or dead shall I be ungrateful. I can -write no more, but I earnestly pray you to make haste. Farewell. At -Arnem. Yours, Ph. Sidney.” And Sir Walter Raleigh’s letter to Queen -Anne, the wife of James the First, where he says: “My extreme shortness -of breath doth grow fast on me, with the dispayre of obtayning so mich -grace to walke with my keeper up the hill within the Tower.”</p> - -<p>The letters are not all sorrowful, but they all have the power to -breathe life into the dry bones of history. Not far from the heart-felt -appeal of the great Cardinal Wolsey to Henry VIII., praying for “grace, -mercy, remissyon and pardon,” and signed “Your Graces moste prostrat -poor chapleyn, creature, and bedisman,” is a letter from ten-year-old -William of Orange, quaint letters from Leicester and Essex to their -fickle queen, and a dignified epistle, lamenting the outbreak of war -between France and England, but renouncing his fealty and homage to -Richard II., from a fourteenth century member of that noble Picardie -family whose proud device was:</p> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Roy ne suis,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">ne prince ne duc,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">ne comte aussy:<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Je suis sire de Coucy.<br /></span> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_133" id="page_133">{133}</a></span></div></div> -</div> - -<p>Old letters are not the only treasures in this corner belonging to -another age. There are beautiful fourteenth-century chests, a bulla -carved by Benvenuto Cellini, that prince of goldsmiths and -autobiographers, and indeed the greatest treasure of all, that I have -kept till the last.</p> - -<p>One first hears of the Domesday Book in the days when one has visions of -a vast tome with some vague connection with the Day of Judgment. Not -even <i>Little Arthur</i> could dispel the prodigious respect and awe one -felt for it. I confused it with the book in which one’s manifold sins -are recorded, and even mature age does not prevent a little secret -satisfaction that has nothing historical at the sight of those fat, -brown hundreds-of-years-old books that we owe to William the Conqueror’s -Norman love for exact accounts.</p> - -<p>The Domesday Books used to be kept in the Chapter House at Westminster -and were only moved to the Record Office in 1839.</p> - -<h3>Nevill’s Court</h3> - -<div class="blockquot"><p>“Sir, if you wish to have a just notion of the magnitude of this -city you must not be satisfied with seeing its great streets and -squares, but must survey the innumerable little lanes and -courts.”—<span class="smcap">Dr. Johnson.</span></p></div> - -<p>A stone’s throw from the east end of the Record Office is one of the -most curious unnoticed corners of old London. Go up Fetter Lane, which -is the next turning to Chancery Lane out of Fleet Street, and at No. 34, -close<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_134" id="page_134">{134}</a></span> to the Moravian Chapel, you will see a narrow passage called -Nevill’s Court. This passage leads you straight into one of the oldest -bits of London still existing, for here in the very heart of newspaper -land are little ancient seventeenth-century houses with cottage gardens. -They give one the same feeling of unexpectedness as those other queer -little wooden houses with their high gables that you may see in -Collingwood Street, just on the other side of Blackfriars Bridge (I -think it is the third turning to the right). They stand beside the -church, just as they stood nearly three hundred years ago, when the -Thames washed right up to their doorsteps.</p> - -<p>At No. 6 Nevill’s Court, secluded in its walled garden, is a big -seventeenth-century house, which must once have been inhabited by -citizens of wealth and position. It is extraordinary that Time and the -Vandal have left it still intact. I think the reason must be that they -have never been able to find it, like those other old houses in Wardrobe -Court near St. Paul’s, whose whereabouts certainly ought to be set as a -problem in a London taxi-driver’s examination.</p> - -<p>But before seeking the house, there is something to notice in Nevill’s -Court. The main entrance to the Moravian Chapel is in Fetter Lane, at -No. 33. I once went to the service there at three o’clock on a Sunday -afternoon under the influence of the story of the messenger sent while -Bradbury was preaching, to announce<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_135" id="page_135">{135}</a></span> Queen Anne’s death and the safety -of the Protestant succession. I hoped to find something to remind me of -the chapel’s great age: it is the oldest place of Protestant worship in -London, going back to Queen Mary’s day, when persecuted Protestants are -supposed to have met in the sawpit of the carpenter’s yard on this site.</p> - -<p>Down the long, narrow passage, I found a bare, uncompromising chapel, -with a high, wooden pulpit, that I looked at with more respect than its -ugliness warranted, remembering that Baxter had preached here in 1672, -and that John Wesley and Whitefield had addressed crowded congregations -during the year Wesley spent with the Moravians between the time that he -left the Church of England and the founding of the Methodist persuasion -in 1740. The boundary line between St. Bride’s, Fleet Street, and St. -Dunstan’s in the West is just in front of the pulpit, so the preacher -and his congregation are in different parishes.</p> - -<p>The chapel has been used by the Moravian sect since 1738, and as their -lease does not expire for about another 250 years, it is not likely to -change ownership, in spite of the dwindling congregation.</p> - -<p>It has been so many times restored and rebuilt that one gets a much -better idea of the antiquity of the building from the back entrance in -Nevill’s Court, for this is the only part that could possibly have -existed before the Great Fire.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_136" id="page_136">{136}</a></span></p> - -<h3>Clifford’s Inn</h3> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">“Oh! London! London! our delight,<br /></span> -<span class="i1">Great flower that opens but at night.”<br /></span> -<span class="i10"><span class="smcap">R. le Gallienne.</span><br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p>Between Chancery Lane and Fetter Lane is the entrance to Clifford’s Inn, -the oldest of all the Inns of Chancery. In January, 1921, big flaunting -notice-boards announced that Clifford’s Inn would be sold by auction, -but no immediate purchaser was found, and this quiet corner is still -unmolested, though by the time this book is printed it may have received -its <i>coup de grâce</i> from the pickaxe.</p> - -<p>Go and look at it while you may. It was founded in 1345 and takes its -name from a certain Robert Clifford of Edward II.’s reign. Sir Edward -Coke, the great Elizabethan lawyer, was a member of Clifford’s Inn and -left it for the Middle Temple in 1572.</p> - -<p>Some of the Inn survived the Great Fire, and in the crazy-looking little -old hall the judges sat who decided the many boundary disputes after -that catastrophe. At the moment it is the headquarters of some society -“duquel je ne sçais pas le nom.”</p> - -<p>Samuel Butler lived at No. 15 Clifford’s Inn for thirty-eight years, and -many an admirer of the genius of the man who wrote <i>Erewhon</i> and <i>The -Way of all Flesh</i> has made a pilgrimage to the quiet corner hidden away -a few yards from bustling Fleet Street.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_137" id="page_137">{137}</a></span></p> - -<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VIII" id="CHAPTER_VIII"></a><span class="chspc">CHAPTER</span> VIII<br /><br /> -THE CHARTERHOUSE AND ST. BARTHOLOMEW’S</h2> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">“At length they all to mery London came,<br /></span> -<span class="i1">To mery London my most kyndley nurse.”<br /></span> -<span class="i12"><span class="smcap">Spenser.</span><br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">In</span> days of old, when London’s present meatmarket was the fashionable -jousting-ground of the time, the knights and squires used to ride to -Smithfield up a road still called Giltspur Street, either from the -armourers who dwelt there, or from the jingling of the champions’ spurs -as they clattered by.</p> - -<p>Any Holborn bus will take you to the corner of St. Sepulchre’s where the -dismal bell tolled the passing to Newgate of the condemned criminals. On -the right side of Giltspur Street is St. Bartholomew’s Hospital, that -survived the Great Fire only to be rebuilt in 1730. The history of this -great London hospital goes back eight hundred years, for it belonged to -the Priory, but Sir Thomas Gresham’s father persuaded Henry VIII. to -refound the institution in 1546.</p> - -<p>There was once a naïve inscription under the statue of the fat boy whose -stone image is still to be seen at the corner where Cock Lane joins -Giltspur Street, on the left. At this point, once<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_138" id="page_138">{138}</a></span> known as Pye Corner, -the Fire of London was stopped in 1666 by blowing up the houses, and the -writing underneath the figure of this extremely obese youth reminded the -passer-by that “the Great Fire ... was occasioned by the sin of -gluttony.” I do not know what authority there was for this allegation. -Whoever was responsible for the tablet probably had running in his -muddled head the names of Pye or Pie Corner and Pudding Lane in Thames -Street where the conflagration started. The fact that it was from the -house of a baker that the flames first spread may likewise have -influenced him, though it is unusual to be gluttonous on bread alone.</p> - -<p>The Fire gave the moralist good cause for thought. It was an event so -tremendous, so far-reaching, so overwhelming, that it is strange that -the history books of England do not linger over its significance. For in -less than a week practically every landmark that went to make up the -most interesting old mediæval city in the world was swept away. The -ancient cathedral of St. Paul’s, 89 churches, 4 city gates, 460 streets -and 13,200 houses perished in the flames. With the exception, perhaps, -of the burning of Rome, there has never been so terrible a fire. Pepys -wept to see it.</p> - -<p>A wonderful account has been left us by Evelyn:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"><p>The conflagration was so universal, and the people so astonished, -that from the beginning, I know not by what despondency or fate, -they hardly stirr’d to<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_139" id="page_139">{139}</a></span> quench it, so that there was nothing heard -or seene but crying out and lamentation, running about like -distracted creatures, without at all attempting to save even their -goods, such a strange consternation there was upon them, so as it -burned both in breadth and length, the Churches, Public Halls, -Exchange, Hospitals, Monuments, and ornaments, leaping after a -prodigious manner from house to house and streete to streete, at -greate distances one from ye other; for ye heate with a long set of -faire and warme weather, had even ignited the air, and prepar’d the -materials to conceive the fire, which devour’d after an incredible -manner, houses, furniture, and everything. Here we saw the Thames -cover’d with goods floating, all the barges and boates laden with -what some had time and courage to save, as, on ye other, ye carts, -&c., carrying out to the fields, which for many miles were strew’d -with moveables of all sorts, and tents erecting to shelter both -people and what goods they could get away. Oh the miserable and -calamitous spectacle! such as haply the world had not seen the like -since the foundation of it, nor to be outdone till the universale -conflagration. All the skie was of a fiery aspect, like the top of -a burning oven, the light seen above forty miles round about for -many nights. God grant my eyes may never behold the like, now -seeing above 10,000 houses all in one flame; the noise and cracking -and thunder of the impetuous flames, ye shrieking of women and -children, the hurry of people, the fall of Towers, Houses, and -Churches, was like an hideous storme, and the aire all about so hot -and inflam’d that at last one was not able to approach it, so that -they were forc’d to stand still and let ye flames burn on, wch they -did for neere two miles in length and one in bredth. The clouds of -smoke were dismall, and reach’d upon computation neer fifty miles -in length. Thus I left it this afternoone burning, a resemblance of -Sodom, or the last day. London was, but is no more!</p></div> - -<p>Everyone lent a hand; even King Charles came down from Whitehall and -worked hard<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_140" id="page_140">{140}</a></span> beside his meanest subject—doing something useful for once -in a way. But it was a case of saving what one could and fleeing. Some -stacked their treasures in the churches (the booksellers of Paternoster -Row stored their books in St. Paul’s), but of the churches nothing was -left. Some buried their valuables underground and perhaps recovered them -two years afterwards, when the last of the rubbish was cleared away. By -the end of that fatal September the whole of the large district of -Moorfields, north of the city, was one vast camp of the homeless, and -there they stayed in shacks and shelters till the city was rebuilt, much -as the unfortunate people of devastated France were living during the -years of the Great War.</p> - -<p>The trade of London ceased for a time; there were no shops, the -merchants had lost their goods, the warehouses were gutted, all records -of debts and commercial transactions were destroyed, there were no -schools, no almshouses.</p> - -<p>Yet in four short years the English, with the same dogged energy that -they were putting recently into the making of trenches and dugouts, had -practically rebuilt their capital city. The churches, of course, took a -long time to finish; the beautiful and numerous halls of the City -Companies were not replaced in a day, but nearly 10,000 houses were up, -and since those seventeenth-century workmen were just Englishmen, with -no foreigners at hand to tell them to<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_141" id="page_141">{141}</a></span> “ca’ canny,” everything was in a -fair way to completion.</p> - -<p>As for Sir Christopher Wren, that amazing architect who stamped the -impress of his genius on the great city as we know it, who shall give -him enough honour? He designed and erected over forty public buildings, -amongst them the lovely and unique cluster of churches that lie around -St. Paul’s, yet for this work he was rewarded by the miserable salary of -£100 a year, with £200 a year for the rebuilding of the great cathedral.</p> - -<h3>St. Bartholomew the Great</h3> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">“The citye of London that is to me so dere and sweete.”<br /></span> -<span class="i20"><span class="smcap">Chaucer.</span><br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p>Opposite St. Bartholomew’s Hospital is Smithfield, new and blatant, and -smelling hideously of raw meat. Take courage and go on northwards, for -in a few minutes you will come to the most wonderful old church in -London—older than any other except the chapel in the White Tower. There -is something about the almost primitive simplicity of its massive stone -pillars that carries one back more directly to the times of the Norman -conquerors than a thousand long descriptions gathered from history -books.</p> - -<p>What you see is only the choir and transept of a much larger church -built for the Priory of St. Bartholomew by the founder Rahere in or -about the year 1102. His tomb is on the left<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_142" id="page_142">{142}</a></span> as you enter, and high up -on the right is the lovely oriel window where Prior Bolton, who died in -1532, could sit or kneel at his ease, without even the trouble of coming -downstairs from his house, and look down into the church he did so much -to rebuild and restore.</p> - -<div class="figcenter" id="ill_017" style="width: 600px;"> -<a href="images/i_142.jpg"> -<img src="images/i_142.jpg" width="600" height="593" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p>RAHERE’S TOMB IN ST. BARTHOLOMEW’S CHURCH</p></div> -</div> - -<p>St. Bartholomew’s has had a turbulent history. There is the dramatic -story of Archbishop Boniface of Lambeth Palace, a Savoyard who took it -into his crafty head that he would like<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_143" id="page_143">{143}</a></span> to annex the offertory of St. -Bartholomew’s. On a certain Sunday morning he set out from Lambeth, with -a train of attendants with mail armour under their robes. The -description of what happened is delicious in Matthew Paris’s words, as -quoted by Stowe:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"><p>Amongst other memorable matters, touching this priorie, one is of -an Archbishop’s Visitation, which Matthew Paris hath thus. Boniface -(sayeth he) Archbishoppe of Canterbury, in his Visitation came to -this priorie, where being received with procession in the most -solemne wise, hee said that hee passed not upon the honor, but came -to visite them, to whom the Canons aunswered that they having a -learned Bishop, ought not in contempt of him to be visited by any -other; which aunswere so much offended the Archbishop that he -forthwithe fell on the Supprior, and smote him on the face, saying, -indeede, indeede, dooth it become you English Traytors so to -aunswere mee, thus raging with oaths not to bee recited, hee rent -in peeces the rich Cope of the Supprior, and trode it under his -feete, and thrust him against a pillar of the Chauncell with such -violence, that hee had almost killed him: but the Canons seeing -their supprior thus almost slayne, came and plucked off the -Archbishoppe with such force that they overthrewe him backwardes, -whereby they might see that he was armed and prepared to fight, the -Archbishoppe’s men seeing theyr master downe, being all strangers -and their master’s countrimen born at Prowence, fell upon the -canons, beat them, tare them, and trod them under feete, at length -the Canons getting away as well as they could, ran bloody and myry, -rent and torne, to the Bishoppe of London to complaine, who had -them goe to the king at Westminster, and tell him thereof, -whereupon some of them went thether, the rest were not able, they -were so sore hurt, but when they came to Westminster, the king -would neither heare nor see them, so they returned without -redresse, in the<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_144" id="page_144">{144}</a></span> mean season the whole Citie was in an uprore, and -ready to have rung the Common bell, and to have hewed the -Archbishoppe into small pieces, who was secretly crept to Lambhith, -where they sought him, and not knowing him by sight, sayd to -themselves, where is this Ruffian, that cruell smiter, hee is no -winner of soules, but an exactor of money, whome neyther God, nor -any lawfull or free election, did bring to this promotion, but the -king did unlawfully intrude him, being utterly unlearned, a -stranger borne, and having a wife etc: but the Archbishop conveyed -himselfe over, and went to the king with a great complaint against -the Canons, whereas himself was guilty.</p></div> - -<p>But in spite of Henry III.’s refusal to see the outraged sub-prior and -his loyal canons they had their revenge in time.</p> - -<p>The final result of that little Sunday morning jaunt of Archbishop -Boniface was that he was obliged to build the chapel of Lambeth Palace -about the year 1247 as a penance for having tried to encroach on the -right of the holy Prior of St. Bartholomew’s.</p> - -<p>The quaint gateway by which one enters the scene of the exploits of -these energetic churchmen adds a special charm to the place. The timbers -of the old Elizabethan house above it were only discovered in 1915, when -some of the tiles that long concealed them were loosened.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_145" id="page_145">{145}</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter" id="ill_018" style="width: 477px;"> -<a href="images/i_145.jpg"> -<img src="images/i_145.jpg" width="477" height="600" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p>CHURCH OF ST. BARTHOLOMEW THE GREAT</p></div> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_146" id="page_146">{146}</a></span> </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_147" id="page_147">{147}</a></span> </p> - -<h3>St. John’s Gate</h3> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">“For knighthood is not in the feats of Warre,<br /></span> -<span class="i1">As for to fight in quarrel right or wrong.<br /></span> -<span class="i1">But in a cause which truth can not defarre.”<br /></span> -<span class="i12"><span class="smcap">Stephen Hawes.</span><br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p>Not very far away, stretching across St. John’s Lane, on the other side -of Smithfield and the Charterhouse Road, is another gate, dating from -1504, with the arms of Prior Docwra, Who built it, above the archway. -This was once the south entrance of the great Priory of the Knights -Hospitallers of the Order of St. John of Jerusalem, one of the richest -and most powerful of the religious houses that spread over London in the -Middle Ages. With the exception of this gate and of the Norman crypt in -the church of St. John adjoining (the keys are at the caretaker’s, 112 -Clerkenwell Road), nothing is left of that great monastery that the -people grew to hate for its pride. When Wat Tyler led his band of -peasants to burn and pillage, they burnt and pillaged with special zest -the manors of the Knights Hospitallers of St. John, wherever they found -them, and particularly the priory in London, incidentally beheading the -Grand Prior. The buildings rose again and lasted till the reign of -Edward VI., when they were blown up and pulled down and some of the -stone used to build the Somerset House of the day.</p> - -<p>But the old gate still stands, austere and<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_148" id="page_148">{148}</a></span> turret-crowned, and we may -still “behold it with reverence,” like Dr. Johnson. The modern -representatives of the Order of St. John of Jerusalem, which devotes -itself to ambulance and hospital work and did admirable service in the -war, went back in 1887 to live within its ancient walls.</p> - -<p>There are many things of interest in the gatehouse that make the trouble -of writing to the secretary of the Order for permission to see them -worth while. There are relics from Malta and Rhodes, an Elizabethan -chimneypiece in the chancery, and other souvenirs, but the coffer that -contains these treasures is more interesting than anything it holds, and -that every passer-by may see.</p> - -<h3>The Charterhouse</h3> - -<div class="blockquot"><p>“I never think of London, which I love, without thinking of that -palace which David built for Bathsheba.”—<span class="smcap">Lowell.</span></p></div> - -<p>Coming back to Charterhouse Street and turning to the left, five -minutes’ walk will bring you to Charterhouse Square, where you can find -one of the most lovely and gracious things in all London.</p> - -<p>People often bewail the passing of old London without knowing that -within this short distance from Holborn Circus they can see a perfect -specimen of a sixteenth-century nobleman’s house. There it stands, only -needing the addition of a little furniture of the period, that<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_149" id="page_149">{149}</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter" id="ill_019" style="width: 424px;"> -<a href="images/i_149.jpg"> -<img src="images/i_149.jpg" width="424" height="600" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p>Sᵗ. John’s Gate Clerkenwell Residence of Edward Cave</p></div> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_150" id="page_150">{150}</a></span> </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_151" id="page_151">{151}</a></span> </p> - -<p class="nind">would never be missed from South Kensington Museum, and you could see -exactly how my Lord Howard lived when he entertained—and plotted -against—his royal mistress three hundred years ago.</p> - -<p>One does not like to think of the number of people who leave London -without ever having seen the Charterhouse. It is one of the most -beautiful places in all London, and its story is packed with romance, -intrigue, adventure and benevolence.</p> - -<p>The tale falls into three parts. It is begun by that gallant Hainaulter, -Sir Walter de Manny, as the English called Walter, Lord of Mausny near -Valenciennes, who came over to England in the train of Philippa of -Hainault.</p> - -<p>According to Froissart he was a “very gentil parfyte knighte,” and when -he saw the ghastly heaps of dead bodies of plague-stricken people lying -in the streets in 1349, he bought from St. Bartholomew’s Hospital a -piece of land called No Man’s Land and caused the dead to be decently -buried there. Their bodies at rest, he had thought for their souls, and -on March 25, 1349, he laid the foundation-stone of a chapel where the -relations might pray for their dead. Twenty years later Sir Walter Manny -laid another stone, that of the first cell for the Carthusian monks he -brought over from France. The wives and sisters of the dead had prayed -so long in the chapel that the right could not be taken from them, so -for once the strict<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_152" id="page_152">{152}</a></span> Carthusian rule was relaxed and a special place was -set apart for the womenkind to come and pray.</p> - -<p>Sir Walter Manny died in 1372. He was buried at the foot of the step of -the great altar in the chapel that may be seen to-day, and in the -Charterhouse his Carthusian monks prayed according to the tenets of -their faith for a hundred and sixty-five years more before the last -prior, John Houghton, having been hung on Tyburn Tree, and many of the -brothers tortured, the rest submitted to the king’s will. The House of -the Salutation of the Mother of God in the Charterhouse near London was -dissolved shortly afterwards.</p> - -<p>The second phase of the Charterhouse story is a very different one. -Twice during the following years it was prepared for the coming of a -fair queen, whose head was bowed on Tower Hill instead of in the old -chapel.</p> - -<p>Charterhouse was granted to that wily old courtier, Sir Edward North, in -1545, and eight years later he “conveyed” it to John Dudley, Earl of -Northumberland, the father-in-law of Lady Jane Grey. The Earl of -Northumberland never wanted it for himself, as he had already Durham -House in the Adelphi, but there was his son Guildford with his fair -young wife to be lodged fittingly. So he brought up much furniture from -Kenilworth and stored it hard by, little dreaming that his bold plans -would miscarry and that he would die on Tower Hill a<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_153" id="page_153">{153}</a></span> year before the -children whose home he had planned shared the same fate.</p> - -<p>North was granted the Charterhouse again by Queen Mary, and when -Elizabeth came to the throne in 1558 she stayed six days there before -her coronation.</p> - -<p>Three years later she paid the old house another visit, but North died -in 1564 and Charterhouse passed into the hands of crafty, brilliant, -fickle Thomas Howard, fourth Duke of Norfolk.</p> - -<p> </p> - -<p>Once more Charterhouse, now known as Howard House, was to be prepared -for a royal mistress, and in a royal manner.</p> - -<p>The new owner, buoyed with hopes of a marriage with Mary, Queen of -Scots, began to put his new house in order. He added the screen in the -great hall and the “Tarrass Walk,” the lovely tapestry room, the -duchess’s withdrawing-room and the magnificent great staircase.</p> - -<p> </p> - -<p>On the 6th of August, 1568, Elizabeth came in state from Hampton Court -to Howard House, to pay a visit to her disloyal servant, already -plotting against her and arranging the duchess’s salon for her rival. -The air was thick with intrigue, and by the autumn the rumour of the -marriage with Mary had reached Elizabeth. Norfolk denied it, but a year -later the truth came out, and he spent some time in the Tower,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_154" id="page_154">{154}</a></span> to be -released, under surveillance, when the Black Death threatened that -district.</p> - -<p>He had learned no lesson. Either a devouring ambition or the attraction -of the most fascinating woman in Europe lured him on. Plots and -counterplots were hatched in the long gallery that now forms part of the -upper-story quarters of the Master and Registrar of Charterhouse. Mary’s -emissaries were seized—one of them, called Bailly, has carved the -lesson these events taught him in the Beauchamp Room in the Tower—and -the luckless queen was betrayed in her turn, even as Elizabeth had been, -by the man who so short a time before had decorated the Charterhouse to -receive her as a bride.</p> - -<p>He told, like a coward, the place where her cipher was hidden under a -tile in the Charterhouse, but nothing could save his own neck, and he -followed his father and his two girl cousins, Anne Boleyn and Katherine -Howard, in June 1572.</p> - -<p> </p> - -<p>The next owner of Howard House, Philip Howard, Earl of Arundel, was only -a boy of fifteen when he inherited his father’s property, but he was of -sterner stuff, for he refused to abjure the Roman Catholic faith he had -embraced, even to see his wife and children, before he died, worn out, -and under sentence of death, in 1595. Elizabeth had kept him prisoner in -the Beauchamp Tower for ten years, and it</p> - -<div class="figcenter" id="ill_020" style="width: 600px;"> -<a href="images/i_154_fp.jpg"> -<img src="images/i_154_fp.jpg" width="600" height="442" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p>THE CHARTERHOUSE FROM THE SQUARE</p></div> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_155" id="page_155">{155}</a></span></p> - -<p class="nind">was there, in 1587, that he carved the words, “The more suffering for -Christ in this world, so much the more glory with Christ in the life to -come.”</p> - -<p>He had lived very little at the Charterhouse, and when it passed into -the hands of his half-brother Thomas Howard, Earl of Suffolk, the -fortunes of the old house changed with the advent of the great English -Admiral who could swear with truth “<span class="lftspc">’</span>Fore God I am no coward,” when he -was admiral of the squadron at Flores in the Azores, “and the little -<i>Revenge</i> ran on right into the heart of the foe.”</p> - -<p>Lord Thomas Howard was one of the honoured, trusted servants of -Elizabeth, and she came once more in 1603, not long before her death, to -pay him a visit in the Charterhouse.</p> - -<p>In a few months James I. came there, even as she had done, to spend the -days before his coronation as the guest of the son of the man who had -been his mother’s false suitor.</p> - -<p>But brave Lord Thomas Howard was building a new house at Audley End, and -needing money he sold Howard House for £13,000 to Sir Thomas Sutton. The -brilliant days of the Charterhouse as a nobleman’s mansion were at an -end—another chapter was concluded and the third phase of the story was -to begin.</p> - -<p>Sir Thomas Sutton, the new owner, was the Lord Rhondda of the sixteenth -century. He was a Lincolnshire man with a wide knowledge of men and -things, whose military profession<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_156" id="page_156">{156}</a></span> never prevented his having a keen eye -for business. He made a large fortune before he died in 1611, leaving -the provision to found a hospital for eighty impoverished gentlemen and -a school for forty boys, under the name of the Hospital of King James in -Charterhouse.</p> - -<p>There was much discussion, “about it and about,” before Sir Thomas -Sutton’s chosen trustees could carry out his wishes. James I., true son -of his father Darnley, had to be placated by a <i>pourboire</i> of £10,000, -and even Bacon, jealous at not being among the trustees, tried to -belittle the bequest and advise that the money should be used for his -master’s benefit instead of for the poor. Sir Edward Coke, Lady Hatton’s -husband, steered the hospital through the shoals that surrounded its -launching and the more dangerous peril of the king’s genial idea that -the Charterhouse revenues might fitly be used to pay for his army. The -Charterhouse was founded, and for three hundred years the school has -produced great Englishmen and the hospital harboured men who have found -that in the evening of a working life the stars do not always appear.</p> - -<p>Among the Charterhouse scholars have been the bearers of great names -such as Lovelace and Crashaw, Addison and Steele, John Wesley, Sir Henry -Havelock, Thackeray, Leech, Thomas Lovell Beddoes, Lord Alverstone and -many others. The school was removed in 1872 to Godalming, and the -buildings were taken over<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_157" id="page_157">{157}</a></span> by the Merchant Taylors’ Company for their -boys’ school.</p> - -<p>The hospital for the poor brothers no longer harbours eighty men. Their -number is reduced to sixty owing to the depreciation in the value of Sir -Thomas Sutton’s land and the fact that since the Charterhouse has always -been considered a wealthy foundation no further bequests have ever been -made to bring the number once more up to the four score of the founder’s -intention.</p> - -<p>That, briefly told, is the dramatic tale of the Charterhouse. You will -readily believe it all if you take the District Railway to Aldersgate -Street and go and see the Charterhouse for yourself. Its beauty is -unimpaired by time. The Guesten Hall where the poor brethren take their -meals, the great sixteenth century carved staircase, the chapel where -Colonel Newcome sat, the false duke’s arcade, and the old gatehouse—all -are there and many more things to recall the most dramatic pages of -England’s history.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_158" id="page_158">{158}</a></span></p> - -<h2><a name="CHAPTER_IX" id="CHAPTER_IX"></a><span class="chspc">CHAPTER</span> IX<br /><br /> -A STROLL IN WHITEHALL AND WESTMINSTER</h2> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">“And all that passes inter nos,<br /></span> -<span class="i1">May be proclaimed at Charing Cross.”<br /></span> -<span class="i12"><span class="smcap">Swift.</span><br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">Dr. Johnson </span>once said, “Why, sir, Fleet Street has a very animated -appearance, but I think the full tide of human existence is at Charing -Cross.”</p> - -<p>Certainly Charing Cross is the best of all starting-points for exploring -expeditions, and by Charing Cross I mean the south-east corner of -Trafalgar Square.</p> - -<p>From there you may wander along the Strand, or north into Bloomsbury, or -through Cockspur Street into the realms of Mayfair, or southward to the -Thames, and in every direction there are unnoticed stories to be found.</p> - -<h3>United Services Museum</h3> - -<div class="blockquot"><p class="c">“More kindly love have I to that place than to any other in -yerth.”—<span class="smcap">Chaucer.</span></p></div> - -<p>One day I turned my back on Charing Cross to go to St. Margaret’s <i>via</i> -Whitehall, blissfully unconscious of the fact that it happened to be -Saturday and that the church closes its doors every day at 4 p.m. and -for all day on Saturdays.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_159" id="page_159">{159}</a></span></p> - -<p>At the corner of the Horse Guards Avenue I paused undecided, having -taken months to summon up courage to pass the giant at the entrance to -the United Services Museum!</p> - -<p>He snorts with such a supercilious sniff at the would-be visitor that -you have to remember it may possibly be only the good-natured contempt -of one service for another, and that the Orion’s figurehead may really -be elevating his nose at the Horse Guards across the way, on which I -notice that Spencer Compton, 8th Duke of Devonshire (b. 1833, d. 1908) -also bends a grave and somewhat disapproving eye from his elevated -statue in the middle of the road.</p> - -<p>Mr. Street, in his delicious <i>Ghosts of Piccadilly</i>, says, “There is -ever a Devonshire filling his eminent position, calm, retiring, -imperturbable, and never an amusing thing to tell of any one of them,” -and this statue tells you to believe him.</p> - -<p>To come back to the United Services Museum—a thing that far too few -people do, for it is one of London’s many buried treasures—don’t be -misled by any optimistic guide-book that tells you the admission is -sixpence. That is only true on Saturday afternoon; at other times you -part with a shilling unless you are a soldier or sailor in uniform, or -one of the many troops of schoolchildren that are admitted free every -week.</p> - -<p>There are myriads of things to delight any childish heart—cunningly -contrived models of ships, plans of battles, the actual walking-stick<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_160" id="page_160">{160}</a></span> -and snuff-box of Sir Francis Drake, Oliver Cromwell’s sword, the very -bugle that sounded the Charge of the Light Brigade, a room devoted to -souvenirs of Lord Wolseley, and rows of other treasures with heroic -stories of brave men.</p> - -<p>I have yet to find a museum without a Napoleonic souvenir, and here -there is a startling one—“Marengo’s” skeleton. You are so engrossed by -the relics of General Wolfe and Nelson and Wellington and other heroes, -that you almost forget what you came to see—the Old Banqueting Hall -where they are lodged, the beautiful Palladian structure that Inigo -Jones built in 1622—all that is now left of the old palace of -Whitehall.</p> - -<p>The nine ceiling paintings that Rubens did at Charles I.’s request look -as fresh as if they had been painted yesterday, having been restored too -many times. Rubens got £3000 for them, while Wren only received £100 a -year for rebuilding all the City churches and £200 a year for rebuilding -St. Paul’s—but Wren was an Englishman and Rubens a foreigner.</p> - -<p>The Banqueting Hall was all that James I. accomplished of the great -palace he meant to let Inigo Jones build for him in Whitehall, and just -outside the hall Charles I. met his death, a short distance from the -statue where</p> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Comely and calm he rides<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Hard by his own Whitehall.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p>A little crowd clusters every morning at</p> - -<div class="figcenter" id="ill_021" style="width: 411px;"> -<a href="images/i_160_fp.jpg"> -<img src="images/i_160_fp.jpg" width="411" height="600" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p>UNITED SERVICES MUSEUM</p></div> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_161" id="page_161">{161}</a></span></p> - -<p class="nind">eleven to see the guard relieved at the Horse Guards, now the office of -the C.I.C. of the Home Forces.</p> - -<p>On the king’s birthday, June 3rd, the Trooping of the Colour at the -Horse Guards is an unforgettable pageant.</p> - -<p>The English have not, like the French, the courteous custom of saluting -their flag, but on this occasion every civilian head is bared as the -drums beat and swords flash, and the uplifted colours are borne slowly -round the parade ground to the strains of <i>God Save the King</i> and the -old regimental marches, played by the band of the Life Guards in their -magnificent uniforms.</p> - -<p>It is a gallant sight, and a goodly thing to see.</p> - -<h3>Westminster Abbey</h3> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">“It is a wonderful place ... a nation, not a city.”<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p>Even more than of the British Museum I feel that it would be an -impertinence to speak of Westminster Abbey as a London corner unnoticed -by Londoners,—and yet I have known people who have left London and gone -back across the seas with never a thought for the cloisters nor a -“memorie” of Jane Lister, “dear childe,” who lies buried there, people -who may have perfunctorily “done” the Abbey with a guide but have never -lingered there at the uncrowded hours till the exquisite beauty<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_162" id="page_162">{162}</a></span> of its -many corners has become a possession they can carry away with them.</p> - -<p>I can make no attempt to point out the manifold interest of the Abbey, -but there are certain places that I love that I would not willingly let -anyone miss.</p> - -<p>There is no need to write of the interior. No one was ever known to miss -the Poets’ Corner, or the Coronation Chair, or Henry VII.’s Chapel, or -the Chapel of Edward the Confessor, but I have known people who visited -Westminster Abbey and missed seeing the Chapter House.</p> - -<p>To miss seeing that thirteenth-century octagonal room is a calamity. It -is not only very beautiful, with a beauty that reminds you at once of -the Sainte Chapelle, but there is an atmosphere about it that takes you -back through the centuries to the time when Simon de Montfort was laying -the foundations of constitutional government, and the first parliament -of twenty-three barons, one hundred and twenty ecclesiastics, two -knights from each shire and two burghers from each town met in this very -room.</p> - -<p>The House of Commons was born within these grey walls nearly five and a -half centuries ago, when the Commons were told to go to “leur ancienne -place en la maison du Chapitre de l’Abbeye de Westminster.” The members -met here till they moved to the Chapel of St. Stephen, within the walls -of Westminster Palace, in 1547.</p> - -<p>Turn your back on the ugly cases of the seals<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_163" id="page_163">{163}</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter" id="ill_022" style="width: 367px;"> -<a href="images/i_163.jpg"> -<img src="images/i_163.jpg" width="367" height="600" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p>POETS’ CORNER, WESTMINSTER ABBEY</p></div> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_164" id="page_164">{164}</a></span> </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_165" id="page_165">{165}</a></span> </p> - -<p class="nind">and charters that should have been removed to the Record Office with the -rest of the public records that were stored here since Elizabethan days, -and look instead at the faint fourteenth-century mural decoration of -Christ surrounded by the Christian virtues. Even the unsightly cases -cannot destroy the sense of the lovely proportions of the -shaft-supported roof and the arcaded walls with the six noble windows, -filled with glass none the less beautiful because it happens to be -modern, and all the more interesting because it honours the memory of -that great lover of Westminster, Dean Stanley.</p> - -<p>When Edward the Confessor about 1050 built the first round Chapter House -on this spot for his Benedictine monks to transact the business of their -monastery, they little thought to what varied uses it would be put. The -present octagonal room has seen the age-long struggle of the people for -their liberties. It was damaged in the Civil Wars and suffered from -repairs in the eighteenth century. It has had its painted walls -concealed by unsightly cupboards, when the public records were stored -there. It has housed the Domesday Book till it and the records were -removed in 1862, and now that it has been restored as nearly as possible -to its old beauty, it exists, spacious and dignified as ever, to remind -the passing visitor of the value of tradition and the history of a great -nation.</p> - -<p>A few steps farther along the cloister is another less well-known -corner, the Chapel of<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_166" id="page_166">{166}</a></span> the Pyx—not so ecclesiastical a chamber as it -sounds, “pyx” meaning only a chest or box where the standard of -references for testing the coins of the realm used to be kept. Nowadays -they make these tests at the hall of the ancient Company of Goldsmiths, -at the corner of Foster Lane and Gresham Street.</p> - -<p>Long ago the king’s treasure was kept here, and only the king and my -Lord Chancellor and the Abbot of Westminster had the keys, a fact that -was very inconvenient when a robbery occurred, as at least one abbot -found to his cost. He and forty of his monks saw the inside of the Tower -in consequence, but punishment was not always so light, as the pieces of -human skin still to be seen nailed to the door will show.</p> - -<p>Inside the seven-locked door with its gruesome lining, that is only -opened to visitors on Tuesdays and Fridays, you find a low vaulted room -supported by rounded Romanesque arches on thick short pillars, and a -stone altar—the earliest in the Abbey.</p> - -<p>After leaving the Chapel of the Pyx, stroll along the Norman cloister to -the left, past the Norman undercroft, where, if you have a mind to pay a -small fee to the verger in the Poets’ Corner, you can see any day in the -week the quaint effigies that used to be carried at royal funerals. -Through the dark entry you come to the Little Cloister, a part of the -old monastery, that ought only to be seen on a hot summer’s day, for in -the winter-time it is dreary and<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_167" id="page_167">{167}</a></span> your thoughts tend to turn to the smug -ingratitude that allowed the woman Nelson loved to die in poverty,—for -she once lived in the tower built by Abbot Littlington and originally -the bell tower of the church.</p> - -<p>Turn back through the south walk of the Great Cloister and come into the -Deanery Yard.</p> - -<p>It is customary to write to the dean for permission to see the Jerusalem -Chamber, but, if you go without this formality and he happens to be -absent, the caretaker will show it to you and tell quite unique stories -which I will not steal his thunder by repeating.</p> - -<p>You go through the sixteenth-century Jericho Room first, and it too is -interesting, with its linenfold deal panelling. It is the ante-room to -the Jerusalem Chamber, and is now used as a sort of vestry room for the -cathedral. In the Jerusalem Chamber, as every schoolboy knows, King -Henry IV. died in 1413. I refuse to quote Shakespeare on this occasion. -It is a fine fourteenth-century cedar-panelled room, and the light -through fragments of very ancient glass in the windows shines on early -seventeenth-century tapestries and a very old mediæval portrait of -Richard II. It is a gracious place, but when the authors of the Revised -Version of the Bible worked here in 1870, it failed to inspire them with -the same sense of the beauty of words that made their predecessors -produce the finest literature in the world.</p> - -<p>Many famous men have lain in state in the<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_168" id="page_168">{168}</a></span> Jerusalem Room before their -interment in the Abbey—Congreve and Addison were both honoured in this -way, and that seventeenth-century poet-diplomatist, Matthew Prior, who -was so esteemed by Louis XIV. that he sent him a bust by the great -Coysevox. With one of those piquant inconsistencies that enliven -history, Nance Oldfield, Mrs. Bracegirdle’s rival, also lay in state in -the Jerusalem Chamber before she was buried in the Abbey. Mrs. -Bracegirdle lies in front of the entrance to the Chapter House, but -Nance Oldfield was the only actress honoured by burial within the Abbey -walls.</p> - -<p>The Jerusalem Chamber was originally the drawing-room of the Abbot of -Westminster, and in James the First’s day a banquet was given here to -the French Ambassadors who came over to arrange the marriage of Prince -Charles and the daughter of Henri IV.</p> - -<h3>Ashburnham House</h3> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">“If ever princess put all princes down,<br /></span> -<span class="i1">For temperance, prowess, prudence, equity;<br /></span> -<span class="i1">This, this was she, that, in despite of death,<br /></span> -<span class="i1">Lives still admired, adored, Elizabeth!”<br /></span> -<span class="i12"><span class="smcap">Anon.</span><br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p>Coming out of Dean’s Court and passing through the gateway in the east -side of Dean’s Yard, you find another enticing and little-known corner -in Westminster School in Little Dean’s Yard.</p> - -<p>Every monastery had to have its school, so<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_169" id="page_169">{169}</a></span> the monks of St. Peter’s -started theirs—the forerunner of the Westminster School or St. Peter’s -College founded by Queen Elizabeth in 1560. Ben Jonson went to school -here, and so did George Herbert and Dryden and Cowper and Southey, -Hakluyt of <i>Voyages</i> fame, and Wren and Locke and Warren Hastings and -many other famous men I do not know, including Prior.</p> - -<p>The school sergeant at the lodge will show the Edward III. College Hall, -with its minstrel gallery and oaken tables made from the beams of the -Spanish Armada. Forty years ago the school annexed Ashburnham House, -another interesting unnoticed corner that can be seen any Saturday -afternoon, on application to the hall porter. This charming house was -built in the seventeenth century by Webb, a famous disciple of Inigo -Jones. Alas, his celebrated staircase is given over to dust and spiders, -and only restored to a semblance of its former beauty on state -occasions, such as Founders’ Day in November or at Christmas, when the -boys perform their well-known Latin plays.</p> - -<p>There are many interesting things about the school and the buildings -that I leave untold, so go and see for yourself this quiet backwater of -London.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_170" id="page_170">{170}</a></span></p> - -<h3>St. Margaret’s Church</h3> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i2">“That, if I chance to hold my peace,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">These stones to praise Thee may not cease.”<br /></span> -<span class="i11"><span class="smcap">George Herbert.</span><br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p>St. Margaret’s Church, open till four except on a Saturday, is -interesting not only for its architectural beauty, but for its many -associations, and since 1916 it has had a deepened interest for the -British Dominions beyond the Seas, as it was then created their parish -church.</p> - -<p>Pepys, who simply refuses to be left out of anything, was married here -to his pretty wife, of whom he was so proud that she need not have been -jealous of Mrs. Knipp.</p> - -<p>In the chancel lies Sir Walter Raleigh, buried in St. Margaret’s after -his execution in front of Westminster Palace in 1618. Admiral Blake lies -in the churchyard, and there is a fine window in his honour on the north -side.</p> - -<p>The celebrated east window has had a career that is not without its -comic side. It was originally sent over to England by Ferdinand and -Isabella of Spain as a betrothal gift to Prince Arthur, the eldest son -of Henry VII., with whom they had arranged the marriage of their -daughter Catherine.</p> - -<p>Before the window arrived the bridegroom had died, and Henry VIII., who -married the bride, did not want a window with a portrait of Prince -Arthur and Catherine. He sent it to<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_171" id="page_171">{171}</a></span> Waltham Abbey, and from that time -its history is a moving one.</p> - -<p>At the dissolution of the monasteries, the last abbot sent the window to -New Hall in Essex, later bought by the Villiers family, who buried it. -At the Restoration General Monk set it up again till its next owner took -it down, and had the window packed away in a case till he found a -purchaser for fifteen guineas. In 1758 the churchwardens of St. -Margaret’s bought back the window for four hundred guineas, but its -troubles were not ended.</p> - -<p>The Dean and Chapter of Westminster thought the window a superstitious -image, and it was only after a lawsuit lasting seven years that the -churchwardens were allowed to keep their window.</p> - -<p>As usual, I have not told of half the beauty and interest of this -fifteenth-century parish church, only of enough, I hope, to make a -reader go and discover the rest for himself, but let him take thought to -go before four o’clock and not on a Saturday.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_172" id="page_172">{172}</a></span></p> - -<h2><a name="CHAPTER_X" id="CHAPTER_X"></a><span class="chspc">CHAPTER</span> X<br /><br /> -MUSEUMS</h2> - -<h3>British Museum</h3> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">“O place! O people! Manners! framed to please<br /></span> -<span class="i1">All nations, customs, kindreds, languages!”<br /></span> -<span class="i12"><span class="smcap">Herrick.</span><br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind">I <span class="smcap">am</span> rather diffident about putting any name on this chapter, for no one -would ever think of calling the British Museum an unnoticed place. It -has what the newspapers call a world-wide reputation. Its very name -smacks of solid worth with nothing unexpected about it. It is an -institution looming large and august, its massive masonry dominating -Bloomsbury as its reputation does the universe, and absorbing an -unending queue of earnest-minded people intent on storing their minds -with knowledge.</p> - -<p>And yet, every time my frivolous feet have strayed through that solemn -portico, I have longed to tell the thousands of people who never dream -of coming so far north as Great Russell Street, W.C. 1, of unexpected -things they could find there if they would. I remember as a small person -being made to recite the names of the seven wonders of the world, and I -used to repeat solemnly, “The Temple of Mausolaus at Halicarnassus—the -Pyramid of Cheops<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_173" id="page_173">{173}</a></span>—the Lighthouse of Alexandria—the Colossus of -Rhodes—the Hanging Gardens of Semiramis—the Statue of Jupiter at -Olympus, and the Temple of Diana at Ephesus”—with a considerable amount -of annoyance that I could never hope to see these ancient splendours. -When I found the remains of two of them in the British Museum, I felt, -like the Queen of Sheba, that the half had not been told to me, and -since that first moment of delighted surprise how many unexpected things -I have found there which make me long to say to all the unwitting London -visitors, “Don’t be put off by the solemnity of its name and the -distance from Bond Street, but go, only go, and you will be rewarded.”</p> - -<p>The proper way to make friends with a museum, as with people, is to get -to know it slowly, or its very excellences will give you a surfeited -memory. I once avoided the beautiful old Cluny Museum in Paris for many -years, because I had been oppressed by the fact that it contained 11,000 -objects of interest. No one had shown me how to ignore their number and -get to love the very walls of Cardinal Jacques d’Amboise’s stately -house, by never crossing the sunny courtyard to see more than one sort -of exhibit at a time.</p> - -<p>I think this plan is even more applicable to the British Museum, that -great collection, partly bequeathed by Sir Hans Sloane and opened to the -public in 1759. There are two things the hurried visitor can do so as to -carry<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_174" id="page_174">{174}</a></span> away the possession of a definite memory of one phase of the -treasures contained in the vast building in Great Russell Street. He may -choose to go there at the hours of 12 or 3 <small>P.M.</small> and follow one of the -two expert lecturers who conduct people each day to see a different -group of exhibits and listen to their story. (Lists of these lectures -are given at the door.) Or he may choose for himself the sort of thing -he finds most interesting and sternly traverse the other rooms intent -only on the objects of his choice. In either case he is luckier than the -visitors in the early days of the museum’s existence, who were herded in -companies of only fifteen for a two hours’ visit.</p> - -<p>To-day one is diffident about directing any choice; as the old guardian -said, “Most people ’as their fancies!” They may lie in the direction of -the mummy rooms, where the prehistoric man, so startlingly like a -modern, crouches in his grave, with his stone flints within reach, or in -the room of gold ornaments and gems, where lie the necklaces that rose -and fell on breasts dead these thousand years, necklaces that differ -nowise from the amethyst and jade trinkets to be seen in Bond Street -to-day.</p> - -<p>Or you may like best to stroll in that pleasant place the King’s -Library—a long, gracious apartment where the sunlight gilds the warm -brown of the lovely tooled bindings of George III.’s books.</p> - -<p>Into this spacious room come all sorts of people—small boys in -knickerbockers anxious<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_175" id="page_175">{175}</a></span> to consult the postage stamp collections, -artists to pore over delicately illuminated pages of fifteenth-century -manuscripts, students to worship at the shrine of first editions of -Shakespeare and Spenser, and people who are touched with the human -interest of poignant letters like that of Mary Queen of Scots to “ma -bonne sœur et cousine Elizabeth.”</p> - -<p>But when I am fancy-free, and come to the British Museum, perhaps with -only an hour to spare and no very definite idea about what I want to -see, I choose one of two courses. Either I spend the entire hour in -walking briskly through the galleries and taking a sort of bird’s-eye -view of the different kinds of treasures that the museum guards, without -making an attempt at intimacy with any one of them—or I turn to the -left of the big entrance hall, pass through the Roman and Greco-Roman -rooms and spend the whole time in the western wing, because there I can -see the art of three great nations of the ancient world and the greatest -of all the museum’s treasures—the Elgin Marbles. In the galleries -surrounding them are the stupendous sculptures of Egypt and Assyria; -statues of the Egyptian kings who lived 3000 years ago; colossal bulls, -human-headed, that once guarded the gate of the palace that belonged to -the father of one Sennacherib, King of Assyria, who “came up against all -the defenced cities of Judah and took them,” and fragments from his own -great palace of Nineveh.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_176" id="page_176">{176}</a></span></p> - -<p>Théophile Gautier’s words:</p> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Tout passe.—L’art robuste<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Seul a l’étérnité:<br /></span> -<span class="i3">Le buste<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Survit à la cité,<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind">come into one’s mind, for the bas-reliefs show the effect of the fire of -the Babylonians and Medes when they destroyed “Nineveh that great city” -in 609 <small>B.C.</small>, yet they survived and the city is as dust! What a people -they must have been, the folk who built the Lycian tombs, you can see -best when you are half-way down the steps into the Mausoleum room, where -lie the tremendous fragments of one of the seven wonders of the ancient -world—the tomb that his wife and sister built for Mausolos, Prince of -Caria, in a little town in Asia Minor some 2275 years ago.</p> - -<p>Traces of another of the seven wonders are in the Ephesus room, where -remains of the vast Temple of Artemis, “Diana of the Ephesians,” are -gathered, and this room leads to the greatest wonder of them all, the -pediment groups of statues from the Parthenon at Athens, that most of us -call <i>tout court</i> the Elgin Marbles.</p> - -<p>I believe that a great many people have a vague idea that Thomas Bruce, -seventh Earl of Elgin, did a little “scrounging” when he was British -ambassador to the Porte in 1801, and that our possession of these -sculptures is due to a mixture of luck and audacity.</p> - -<p>It is really due to the common sense, artistic<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_177" id="page_177">{177}</a></span> perception and -generosity of a statesman who at great inconvenience and a cost to -himself of £70,000, only half of which sum he later received from the -English Government, removed the treasures that were daily being -destroyed by the Turkish bombardment and that, but for his action, would -have been irretrievably lost to the world.</p> - -<p>One does not need to be an artist nor learned in artistic lore to feel -the peculiar charm of the Elgin Marbles. I have seen quite ignorant -people approach them with unseeing eyes and some flippancy about their -mutilation on the lips, but after a few minutes’ contemplation, -something of the calm beauty of the pose, the benignant sweep of the -drapery, damp with the sea-spray, the mystery of those nostalgic -figures, penetrates the onlooker and the work of Pheidias and his -craftsmen has wrought its spell.</p> - -<p>Now and then the official lecturer tells the story of what they had in -their minds when they carved those noble statues, carved every inch of -them, even the parts they thought would never again be seen by any human -eye once they were placed on the pediment of the Great Temple, and you -come away feeling that your eyes have been opened to a great beauty and -the truth of it sinks into the soul.</p> - -<p>It is not possible in these brief notes to mention more than a very few -of the unnoticed treasures in the British Museum. As the old porter -said, there is something to interest everyone.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_178" id="page_178">{178}</a></span></p> - -<p>If you search you may come across the manuscript of Rupert Brooke’s -immortal sonnet, the toys small children played with 2000 years ago, -Mrs. Delany’s curious paper flowers in the students’ room of the print -collection and many, many other things to draw you there.</p> - -<h3>Foundling Hospital</h3> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">“O what a multitude they seemed, these flowers of London town,<br /></span> -<span class="i1">Seated in companies they sit, with radiance all their own!”<br /></span> -<span class="i20"><span class="smcap">Blake.</span><br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p>Not far from the British Museum is the Foundling Hospital in Guilford -Street. One hears of it vaguely as an orphan asylum where the children -wear quaint costumes that may be seen at the service in the chapel on -Sunday mornings, when the singing attracts many visitors.</p> - -<p>But there are more reasons than that to take you to this corner off the -beaten track of the West End. For one thing, it may not be there very -long. Already there are rumours that the Foundling Hospital may be moved -to the country and one more link with eighteenth-century London be -snapped.</p> - -<p>Institutions as a rule are about as dull to see as to live in, but the -Foundling Hospital is an exception. Handel, Hogarth and Dickens all gave -tangible proof that they loved the place, and people from all over the -world come to see<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_179" id="page_179">{179}</a></span> it, attracted either by the reputation of the choir, -the fame of the pictures in the museum, or the pathetic interest of the -children, who indeed look merry, healthy little creatures.</p> - -<p>Its story is almost too well known to need repetition: A -seventeenth-century sea-captain, living during the latter half of his -life in Rotherhithe, was distressed by the sight of deserted children he -saw on his way to and from the city. It took good Captain Thomas Coram -seventeen years of hard work to turn his dream of a well-endowed -hospital for deserted children into a reality, but in 1739 he got a -royal charter and a house was opened for them in Hatton Garden. The -Foundling Hospital, as we know it, was begun in 1742.</p> - -<p>Hogarth has painted a wonderful portrait of the founder, and looking at -the cheerful benevolent face one can understand why he wrote, “The -portrait I painted with the utmost pleasure and in which I particularly -wished to excel was that of Captain Coram for the Foundling Hospital.” -The kindly eyes that Hogarth drew were forever seeing something to be -done for his fellow men, for the Foundling Hospital was only one of the -old sea-captain’s philanthropies, to which he literally gave away all he -had. In his old age, when he was asked if he would mind accepting a -pension collected from his friends, he said quite simply, “I have not -wasted the little wealth of which I was formerly possessed in -self-indulgence or vain expenses, and am not<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_180" id="page_180">{180}</a></span> ashamed to confess that in -this my old age I am poor.” He accepted a pension of a little more than -£100, and is buried in the vaults under the Foundling Hospital Chapel. -That is the story of Thomas Coram, whose statue is at the entrance gate -and whose name is remembered in Great Coram Street and Little Coram -Street.</p> - -<p>The best time to see the hospital is at the Sunday morning service at -eleven o’clock, and the easiest way to reach it is by the tube to -Russell Square. Turn to the right on leaving the tube and walk down -Grenville Street and Guilford Street, and the Foundling Hospital will be -seen to the left.</p> - -<p>Go up to the gallery if you want to see the children seated on each side -of the organ, dressed in the quaint costume that has never altered since -it was decreed by the founder.</p> - -<p>Dickens, who loved the hospital and had a seat in the chapel during the -ten years he lived in Bloomsbury, makes Mrs. Meagles say in <i>Little -Dorrit</i>:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"><p>Oh, dear, dear, ... when I saw all those children ranged tier above -tier, and appealing from the father none of them has ever known on -earth, to the great Father of us all in Heaven, I thought, does any -wretched mother ever come here, and look among those young faces, -wondering which is the poor child she brought into this forlorn -world.</p></div> - -<p>But the rules of the Foundling Hospital have changed since Thomas -Coram’s time. Only the children of known mothers are now received, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_181" id="page_181">{181}</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter" id="ill_023" style="width: 600px;"> -<a href="images/i_181.jpg"> -<img src="images/i_181.jpg" width="600" height="406" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p>FOUNDLING HOSPITAL</p></div> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_182" id="page_182">{182}</a></span> </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_183" id="page_183">{183}</a></span> </p> - -<p class="nind">if later in life the mother marries and can prove that she is able to -support her child, she can claim it again. The children are never -allowed to be adopted. They are sent to foster-mothers in the country -when first received, and only come to the hospital when they are six. -The girls with few exceptions are trained for domestic service and the -boys as regimental bandsmen, if they show talent, or they are -apprenticed to different trades when they are fourteen.</p> - -<p>There is something infinitely touching in the sight of these rows of -small creatures, chanting with their trained treble voices, “Let me -never be confounded,” when life had confounded them at its very gates. -But seeing them later on, as every Sunday morning visitor is allowed to -do, happily eating their dinners in their pleasant rooms, it is obvious -that the life of the little brown-coated boy or white-capped girl in -Thomas Coram’s Foundling Hospital has many things in its favour. One may -compare their lot with that of more sophisticated children in the London -slums, for whom it is necessary to have a society for their protection -from the parents who have ill-treated over 100,000 in England in the -last year.</p> - -<p>One does not ordinarily associate a foundling hospital with the fine -arts, but, as I said before, this is an exception. Hogarth not only -painted the founder’s portrait and one or two other pictures that he -gave to the hospital, but he persuaded his friends to do likewise. Sir -Joshua<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_184" id="page_184">{184}</a></span> Reynolds gave a portrait of Lord Dartmouth, Gainsborough a view -of Charterhouse, Kneller a portrait of Handel, and the exhibition of -these gifts, including a beautiful cartoon of Raphael’s <i>Massacre of the -Innocents</i>, was a forerunner of the exhibitions of the Royal Academy. -The pictures alone are worth going to Guilford Street to see. Some of -them are in the picture gallery with the cases holding tokens that in -the old days before 1760 used to be left to identify the foundling. In -the board-room, which is supposed to be one of the most beautiful rooms -in London, hangs Hogarth’s <i>March to Finchley</i>, of which I believe there -is a copy in the ugly “Adam and Eve” public-house, built on the site of -the “Adam and Eve” Inn of the picture, at the corner of the Tottenham -Court Road and Euston Road.</p> - -<p>The tale of how the hospital came to get the picture is rather quaint. -Hogarth painted soldiers marching to Finchley in a state that their -French <i>confrères</i> would call “<i>débraillés</i>.” He then asked George II. -to buy it, but that monarch—the last English king to go into -battle—was so enraged at this presentation of his soldiers, that he -indignantly refused, and Hogarth, not being able to dispose of the -picture elsewhere, issued lottery tickets for it. About sixty tickets -were left on his hands, so he gave them to his favourite hospital, which -won the picture, and there it is to-day.</p> - -<p>The careful training of the child choir, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_185" id="page_185">{185}</a></span> the choice of a musical -career for the boys whenever possible, is only carrying on one of the -earliest traditions, for Handel rivalled Hogarth in his interest and his -gifts to the Foundling Hospital. He used to conduct performances of the -<i>Messiah</i> in the chapel to crowded audiences, and as he induced the -performers to give their services, the proceeds that he handed over -sometimes amounted to nearly £1,000. In a glass case is carefully -preserved the gift the great master bestowed on the hospital of the MS. -of his oratorio, and near by is the autograph copy of the number of -<i>Good Words</i> containing the story Dickens wrote about the Foundling -Hospital.</p> - -<p>In the secretary’s room is a fine old Jacobean oak table but lately -retrieved from the kitchen premises where it had been in use for -centuries.</p> - -<h3>South Kensington Museum</h3> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i2">“Were I a physician I would prescribe nothing but Recipe,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">CCCLXV drachm. Londin.”—<span class="smcap">Walpole.</span><br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p>One of the nicest things about the South Kensington Museum is the lively -way it keeps in touch with what happens to be interesting Londoners at -the moment.</p> - -<p>Is there a loan exhibition of Spanish pictures at Burlington House, at -once everything Spanish that the Museum possesses is gathered together -so that the different phases of Spanish art may be conveniently noted, -and there is nearly<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_186" id="page_186">{186}</a></span> always some extra little exhibition of special -interest, either in celebration of the centenary of some great artist or -to introduce the work of some foreigner of outstanding merit like -Mestrovic.</p> - -<p>The lectures given here daily by expert guides at 12 and 3 p.m. would -probably be crowded if they cost a guinea. With that curious apathy -towards what is not expensive that is one of our less pleasing -attributes, only a few people take advantage of these pleasant scholarly -talks. If they were known to be very exclusive and costly, the thousands -of excellent people with modest incomes and no occupation who live in -Bloomsbury and Earl’s Court boarding-houses, would sigh for the -privilege of sharing these hour-long strolls through the museum, when -the lecturer gives no disconnected account of individual objects but -deftly traces the development of the art of different countries and -ages, illustrating his teaching by the treasures under his care.</p> - -<p>I think this apathy is largely due to lack of initiative and -imagination, as well as to the aforesaid deeply-rooted idea that what -costs nothing cannot be worth much. I have found so many people who have -never heard of these lectures that another cause of the small attendance -may be that the news of their existence is not sufficiently widely -spread.</p> - -<p>There is, alas, no one at Claridge’s or the Ritz or the Savoy to tell -mothers who bring their girls over here to buy clothes and do the<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_187" id="page_187">{187}</a></span> -theatres, that there is also a way open to them to gain something that -will still be theirs when the memory of the play has faded—in most -cases let us hope so—and the clothes have been cast aside—since no one -nowadays wears clothes long enough to wear them out.</p> - -<p>The South Kensington Museum is the finest museum of applied art in the -world. That is why it is the Mecca of students who come here to study -and draw inspiration from the lovely things fashioned by our forefathers -in gold and silver and bronze and leather, in silk and lace and precious -stones, in the furnishings and decorations of the houses and persons of -other times and other nations. There are paintings and sculpture as -well: the Raphael cartoons are one of the glories of the place.</p> - -<p>There is something, indeed, to appeal to everyone’s taste in this most -marvellous museum. For the little schoolgirls who seem to throng the -place in cohorts, in the charge of apathetic teachers, there are the -dolls and dolls’ houses that their great-grandmothers played with—the -former as delicately waxen and elegantly dressed as any to be found -to-day. Furniture lovers may study here the finest specimens of every -period, from the handsome Jacobean chairs and settles that harmonise so -well with the background of panelled walls and decorated ceilings taken -from old English houses, to the marvellous ornate escritoires, toilet -tables and gilt couches of French royal palaces. There is<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_188" id="page_188">{188}</a></span> less -formality about the English furniture, but it was not more comfortable; -and the heavy projecting carvings even on the back of the little -children’s chairs may well have been the reason for the erect bearings -used for odious comparisons in one’s youth. They say that the beds of -our forefathers were comfortable. That may be true, but they were -certainly depressing, and the state bed from Boughton House, -Northampton, in which William III. slept, with its dingy hangings and -horrible hearse-like plumes, reaching into the lofty roof, makes you -thankful for the airier ideas of to-day.</p> - -<p>For book-lovers there are upstairs the old, old missals and books of -hours, illuminated with such skill and patience by monks in mediæval -monasteries—some with colours almost as perfect, the ink as black, the -paper as white as when they were first executed in the twelfth and -thirteenth centuries. As marvellous, and perhaps even more exquisite as -works of art, are the slender Persian volumes, love-poems and prayers, -inscribed in delicate characters of the East, with pictures of shahs and -houris, and leather covers, so wonderfully embossed and inlaid and -beautifully coloured that no description could give the faintest idea of -their perfection.</p> - -<p>Even people who are not musicians love the gallery where musical -instruments of the past stand silent in their cases: guitars that -troubadours in parti-coloured hose twanged dolorously to their -lady-loves; virginals belonging to Queen<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_189" id="page_189">{189}</a></span> Elizabeth and that other -Elizabeth, Queen of Bohemia, who was a daughter of James I.; the -harpsichord that Handel bequeathed to George II.; the great harp of the -famous blind Welsh harper. Zithers are there, and other instruments of -cunning workmanship, lovely to see and with names as melodious as the -sounds they once gave forth: dulcimers and clavicords, lutes and -ceteras, pandores and clavecins. Here are the spinets of our -grandmothers, and what must be the veritable father of the hurdy-gurdy, -and a little pianino made by Chappell more than one hundred years ago, -so small that you could carry it about from place to place.</p> - -<p>Then there is the jewellery—bracelets, girdles, necklaces, earrings, -rings chosen and worn by “Flora la Belle Rommaine” and her sisters of -other ages and countries, but so like, both in design and execution, the -work of the modern goldsmith.</p> - -<p>There is an interesting and beautiful collection of the peasant -jewellery of continental countries—wonderful gilt crowns of Russian and -Norwegian brides and curious rings of gigantic size and significant -names, charm rings, motto rings, incantation rings, iconigraphic rings, -Gnostic rings and rings with all sorts of devices.</p> - -<p>These are only a tithe of the treasures in the Victoria and Albert -Museum that can easily be reached by District Railway and Inner Circle -to South Kensington Station or by the Piccadilly Tube and the Brompton -Road.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_190" id="page_190">{190}</a></span></p> - -<h3>Wallace Collection</h3> - -<div class="blockquot"><p>“Ce qui nous a tous profondément touchés, c’est moins la grandeur -de vos largesses, qui ont été immenses, que la bonne grâce -spirituelle avec laquelle vous les avez faites.”</p> - -<p class="r"> -<span class="smcap">Sarcey.</span><br /> -</p></div> - -<p>People say vaguely, “The Wallace Collection? Oh, yes, I really must go -some day; I’ve heard of it so many times,” and the “some day” recedes -and London is left behind and that most delightful place remains unseen.</p> - -<p>And yet this treasure-house is so easy to reach. The shopper at Debenham -and Freebody’s need only turn up Duke Street at the corner where Wigmore -Street embraces Lower Seymour Street, and there is Manchester House at -the far side of Manchester Square.</p> - -<p>If you have only a short time to spend there, give it all to the French -pictures. They are the <i>pièce de résistance</i> of the Wallace Collection, -gathered by two men who loved France and spent most of their lives -there. The story of the Hertfords who made the Wallace Collection is -almost as interesting as anything in their house. The first Marquess of -Hertford had thirteen children, and the portraits he asked Reynolds to -paint of two of his daughters (Nos. 31 and 33) were the nucleus of the -collection. The second marquess only added Reynolds’ “Nelly O’Brien” and -the Romney “Perdita.”</p> - -<p>His son was the celebrated Marquess of Hertford whose meteoric career -enlivened the first half of the last century—the original of both<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_191" id="page_191">{191}</a></span> -Thackeray’s Marquis of Steyne and Lord Beaconsfield’s Coningsby, whose -wealth, wit and reckless egoism provided food for gossip for many a -year. It was for him that Decimus Burton built St. Dunstan’s in Regent’s -Park, and he filled it with <i>objets d’art</i> of all kinds, and a number of -pictures, chiefly of the Dutch school.</p> - -<p>His son, Richard Seymour-Conway, fourth Marquess of Hertford, spent his -life in amassing, with the help of Sir Richard Wallace, the collection -that is now the property of the British nation. M. Yriarte, a French art -expert who knew this eccentric nobleman well, published an account of -his curious life in the <i>Pall Mall Magazine</i> for September 1900, but it -is not possible to give the details now.</p> - -<p>Sir Richard Wallace inherited his wealth and his pictures. His name is -legendary here in England, but in Paris it is a household word, for -every thirsty street urchin calls the graceful bronze drinking fountains -he put all over the city “un Vallace.”</p> - -<p>M. Francisque Sarcey, who never met Sir Richard Wallace, has expressed -in the dedication of his <i>Le Siège de Paris</i> something of the feeling -Parisians had for this Englishman who stayed in the city, sharing their -perils and discomforts and proving his sympathy by immense gifts. -Luckily for us, his friendship did not induce him to leave the Hertford -Collection to France. He had always shared his fathe<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_192" id="page_192">{192}</a></span>r’s passion for -collecting, and began to buy pictures as a young man. The Corot, -Rousseau’s lovely <i>Forest Glade</i>, and the enchanting fresco on plaster -of a <i>Boy Reading</i> by the Milanese artist Foppa, are among the works he -bought.</p> - -<p>To come back to the French pictures: there is no example of Chardin’s -work (to see “Le Bénédicité” you must go to the Louvre), but there are -eight pictures by his pupil Fragonard, and if the Louvre has “The Music -Lesson,” Hertford House has the “Gardens of the Villa d’Este.”</p> - -<p>I think the Fragonards must be seen if there is time for nothing else; -not because Fragonard is a greater artist than the others, but because -his work may be better studied here than in his own country.</p> - -<p>There is a lovely interior of Fragonard’s in the National Gallery, and a -“Lady with a Dog” in the Tennant Collection, 34 Queen Anne’s Gate, but I -am informed that the present occupiers of the Glenconner mansion do not -follow the generous custom of the owners in admitting the public on -Wednesdays and Saturdays from two to six.</p> - -<p>The eccentric Marquess’s statement, “I only like pleasing pictures,” -perhaps accounts for the number of Greuze canvases—over a score; but -the collection is particularly rich in eighteenth-century French -painters—Largillière, Watteau, Nattier, Lancret, Vernet, Van Loo, -Boucher, etc.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_193" id="page_193">{193}</a></span></p> - -<p>If you have time for two visits, spend the second with the Dutch -pictures, where the Rembrandt portraits almost console me for the -absence of Vermeer’s. One must go to the National Gallery to see the -“Lady at the Virginal.”</p> - -<p>Among the fifty-seven artists represented, there are many old friends, -Frans Hals, Brouwer, Van Ostade, Gerard Dou, Terborch, Wouverman with -his inevitable white horse, six of the excellent Ruysdaels—that somehow -never give me as much pleasure as Metsu’s charming pictures—Hobbema, -the Flemish Teniers, and eight Rubens (he is more likeable here than in -the Louvre).</p> - -<p>Of course there are numberless other treasures. A very complete -catalogue will tell you all about them, but I hope I have made you want -to go and buy that catalogue.</p> - -<h3>Geffrye Museum</h3> - -<div class="blockquot"><p>“So I set out on my walk to see the wonders of the big city, and, -as chance would have it, I directed my course to the East.”—<span class="smcap">G. -Borrow.</span></p></div> - -<p>I have never met anyone who knew of this Benjamin among museums—it was -only opened the year the war came upon us—except the man of learning -who told me that, tucked away in the heart of the manufacturing district -of Shoreditch, there was a wonderful collection of period furniture -arranged in an old almshouse.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_194" id="page_194">{194}</a></span> So one day I climbed into a 22 bus at -Piccadilly Circus and asked the conductor to discard me at the Geffrye -Museum in the Kingsland Road. We travelled for miles along streets where -every second shop seemed to be a cabinet-maker’s, and then stopped -conveniently at the very gate of the quiet, spacious courtyard where -elderly people were taking the air on the old oak benches. It was past -six of the clock on a warm evening in June, but a misguided guide-book -had said the museum was open till eight in summer.</p> - -<p>That halcyon arrangement disappeared with the fashion of the eight-hour -day, and the museum now closes at six o’clock like its older -<i>confrères</i>. It is also closed on Sunday morning and all Monday.</p> - -<p>The people who used to live in the fourteen quaint little brick -almshouses have been transferred to a building in the country, and the -London County Council has bought this property for their museum from the -Ironmongers’ Company, from whose seventeenth-century “Master,” Sir -Robert Geffrye, it takes its name. It is a fascinating place; like a -rather badly arranged old curiosity shop. There are old staircases—one -from Boswell’s house in Queen Street is the most beautiful—and lovely -panelled rooms and all sorts of things that demonstrate how beautiful -interior decoration was before the age of machine-made furniture.</p> - -<p>There is a charming room from New Court, Lincoln’s Inn, and many other -interesting<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_195" id="page_195">{195}</a></span> exhibits including a beautiful lacquered Chinese palanquin, -but what I liked best were the fragile, unbelievable wood carvings of -Grinling Gibbons.</p> - -<p>If there were nothing else to see in the Geffrye Museum, it would be -worth while to go to look at what a master hand can do with a block of -wood. Evelyn thought Grinling Gibbons “the greatest master both of -invention and rarenesse of work that the world ever had in any age.”</p> - -<p>I had cherished the mistaken belief that Gibbons was an Englishman for -so long that it was with regret I found that this great artist was born -in Rotterdam and only came to England in 1667 when he was twenty-four -years old.</p> - -<p>It is many long years since I was first shown some of Grinling Gibbons’ -marvellous work—so many that only the effect it had on me remains, -while the date and place have gone from me. I never willingly miss -seeing what his hand has carved, and if any reader of these pages is in -the habit of coming to London often and making friends on each trip with -another of the men of genius who have given the city its proud record, I -can tell them where they may study the wizardlike work of this master -craftsman and great artist.</p> - -<p>The most magnificent piece of work he carved is in the choir of St. -Paul’s, but there are long festoons of flowers in St. Mary Abchurch, in -Abchurch Yard, off Abchurch Lane, a turning<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_196" id="page_196">{196}</a></span> out of Cannon Street. In -old St. Mary Abchurch you will also find a wonderful painted dome by Sir -James Thornhill, Hogarth’s father-in-law, whose house in Dean Street, -Soho, has only lately been pulled down. St. James’s, Piccadilly, that -suave building that breathes mid-Victorian portliness, broadcloth and -self-satisfaction, has a lovely marble font carved by Grinling Gibbons, -but the cover was stolen. Later research has destroyed the widely-spread -belief that Grinling Gibbons carved the pedestal for King Charles I.’s -statue in Trafalgar Square, but over the mantelpiece in the vestry of -St. Dunstan’s-in-the-East, between Great Tower Street and Lower Thames -Street, you will find another carving.</p> - -<p>The rest I will leave you to hunt out for yourself. Some of it is in -unlikely places, one of them not a hundred miles from Clifford’s Inn. I -do not know if there is any trace of the pot of flowers Grinling Gibbons -carved when he lived in Belle Sauvage Court on Ludgate Hill, and which -Walpole said “shook surprisingly with the motion of the coaches that -passed by.”</p> - -<p>He lived for forty-three years in Bow Street, Covent Garden. The house -fell down, says an old record, in 1701, “but by a genial providence none -of the family were killed,” and they seem to have propped up their -house, for they went on living there till Grinling Gibbons died in -1721.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_197" id="page_197">{197}</a></span></p> - -<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XI" id="CHAPTER_XI"></a><span class="chspc">CHAPTER</span> XI<br /><br /> -PARKS</h2> - -<h3>Hyde Park</h3> - -<div class="blockquot"><p>“Is there a more gay and graceful spectacle in the world than Hyde -Park ... in the merry month of May or June?”—<span class="smcap">Beaconsfield.</span></p></div> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">The</span> London parks certainly do not deserve the epithet “unnoticed,” but I -have met few people who knew anything about their story. Foreigners -coming to London for the first time always exclaim at their beauty, but -the Londoners take them as a matter of course, and hardly anyone stops -to inquire their history or even the reason for their names. Yet much of -the city’s history is bound up with that of the parks, and their story -is a mirror of the changing fashions of London.</p> - -<p>Hyde Park, for instance—that vast space of 390 acres in the very heart -of the city, enjoyed by prince and plutocrat and pauper with equal -freedom so long as they keep on their feet, for the rule of the roadway -is not so democratic—what a tale it could tell of the brave sights it -has seen since it was first enclosed in 1592! Before Charles I.’s time -the park, that took its name from the Manor of Hyde, was only to be<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_198" id="page_198">{198}</a></span> -enjoyed by the king and court, who hunted and hawked there; but in -Stuart days there were foot and horse races and drives and merry-making. -It has always been a favourite haunt of Mayfair. Evelyn used to “take -the aire in Hide Park,” very annoyed at having to pay one shilling and -sixpence for the privilege, and so did Pepys, obviously gratified that -his wife attracted attention. De Gramont, the witty observer of Charles -II.’s court, is quoted as saying: “Hyde Park everyone knows is the -promenade of London—the promenade of beauty and fashion.”</p> - -<p>In the days of Charles II. all the world went to the Ring, a circular -course of about 350 yards laid out by the Merry Monarch, between the -Ranger’s Cottage and the present tea-house. How fashionable the drive -was Pepys tells us when he says: “Took up my wife and Deb and to the -park, where being in a hackney and they undressed, was ashamed to go -into the Tour but went round the park and so with pleasure home.”</p> - -<p>In those days there was a cake-house, where cheese-cakes, syllabub and -tarts were sold—refreshments probably more attractive than those of -to-day.</p> - -<p>Places of refreshment might so easily add enormously to the amenities of -the London parks and gardens if good food, attractively and quickly -provided, could be obtained. Nature has furnished an exquisite -background for a<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_199" id="page_199">{199}</a></span> sylvan meal, but anyone who has ordered tea at one of -these places carries away a regret for what might have been. Perhaps -that is why it has never been fashionable to take tea in the park since -the Georgian days when people stood on chairs to see the beautiful Miss -Gunnings pass by.</p> - -<p>The latest fashions were always worn first in Hyde Park. The daring of -any Paris <i>mannequin</i> at the Grand Prix pales before the effect made by -the Lady Caroline Campbell of George III.’s reign, who “displayed in -Hyde Park the other day a feather four feet higher than her bonnet.”</p> - -<p>In Victorian days the smart world strolled on the south walk between -Hyde Park Corner and Alexandra Gate, but to-day that is given over to -the curious strata of society, vomited up from a volcanic war, that now -fill the stalls in the theatres and the restaurants that used to call -themselves exclusive.</p> - -<p>Fashion is slowly retiring—first to the part of the park opposite Park -Lane and then to the northern side opposite Lancaster Gate. Perhaps it -is making the tour, and when the profiteer and his family have -discovered that they are in sole possession of this south-east part of -the park, they will move off and the wheel will turn once more.</p> - -<p>Why the big statue close to Hyde Park Corner is called the Achilles -Statue is one of London’s mysteries for which there is no more reason -than the nursemaid had when she familiarly desig<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_200" id="page_200">{200}</a></span>nated Watts’ “Physical -Energy” in Kensington Gardens as “The Galloping Major.” “Achilles” is a -copy of one of the horse trainers of the Monte Cavallo in Rome. The Pope -gave the cast, the Ordnance Department gave the metal of the cannon -taken in the battles of Salamanca, Vittoria, Toulouse and Waterloo, and -the women of England subscribed £10,000 to this memorial of the Iron -Duke and his comrades-in-arms. Where Achilles comes in, I do not know.</p> - -<p>Each of the great London parks is associated with some special English -sovereign. Charles II. is the godfather of St. James’s Park; Regent’s -Park, like Regent Street, was planned for the glorification of the man -who was afterwards George IV.; Battersea is associated with Prince -Albert the Good, and we owe Kew to the Princess Augusta, mother of -George III.</p> - -<p>Hyde Park and Kensington Gardens owe their allegiance to Queen Caroline, -George II.’s queen. It was she who converted the ponds and the -Westbourne stream into the fifty acres of water of the Serpentine which, -now derived from the Thames, feeds the ornamental water in Buckingham -Palace Gardens and St. James’s Park. The king thought she was doing it -all out of her own purse and smiled at all her schemes, little dreaming -that with Walpole’s aid she was letting him in for some £20,000—a fact -he only discovered after her death.</p> - -<p>Unfortunate Parisians, who are obliged to skirt the Tuileries gardens, -closed inexorably at<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_201" id="page_201">{201}</a></span> seven o’clock on a summer evening, envy the -Londoner who may enjoy the leafy cool of his parks till long after dark, -the carriage entrances not being closed till midnight.</p> - -<p>You may see an extraordinary number of quite different phases of English -life in Hyde Park. There are the loafers, including the errand boys and -that mysterious class of people who seem to have nothing to do in life -but “invite their soul” at eleven o’clock of a fine morning. Unless they -are content with a bench, the peace has made this feat more expensive -than it used to be, for when the price of everything else was happily -falling, the rusty individual who was wont to interrupt true lovers’ -conversations by heartlessly demanding a penny, was suddenly inspired to -double the price of the chairs that have been hired in the park for the -last hundred years.</p> - -<p>Then there is the gallant sight of Rotten Row, named from the Route du -Roi that William III. used when he rode from Whitehall to Kensington. -The present Rotten Row was made by George I. when he wanted a shorter -cut through the park. The best time to see the riders is the early -morning, and the bathers have to get up still earlier if they want to -plunge into the Serpentine, for the bathing is over at 8.30 a.m.</p> - -<p>In the afternoon the Hyde Park orator comes into his own and the whole -of the Marble Arch corner turns into a factory for letting off steam. It -is let off by the partisans of different religions<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_202" id="page_202">{202}</a></span> who vociferate side -by side, each demonstrating that his particular set of tenets is the -only means to salvation. It is let off by socialists and communists and -bolsheviks, and everyone who fancies he can alter the existing -conditions to his own advantage,—and behind all these fiery-tongued -speechmakers stand the placid good-natured policemen who look on with -all the indulgence of a kindly nurse towards a fractious child, -answering an amused inquiry with a paternal: “It don’t ’urt anyone and -it does them a power of good to get it off their chests!”</p> - -<p>Among the phases to be noticed are the picnic parties who come to the -park prepared to make a day of it, and the children of every class of -society, and the nursemaids whose very name reminds one of his Majesty’s -forces both military and naval, who are also ardent patrons of the park.</p> - -<p>There are many minor points of interest,—the queer little dogs’ -cemetery near the Victoria Gate on the north side, the dell, a -sub-tropical garden near the east end of the Serpentine not far from the -fountain with the charming Artemis statue—but the most delightful way -to see the park at its very best is to go there in the early morning -carrying a picnic breakfast and take a boat at the boathouse south of -the rangers’ lodge. I have always envied the park ranger who lives in -this mansion. The first of his race was appointed by Henry VIII. at the -princely salary of sixpence a day, but when this was<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_203" id="page_203">{203}</a></span> objected to by the -Government economy enthusiasts of that time, it was reduced to -fourpence.</p> - -<p>The tiny stone cottages of the keepers, with the classic architecture -that makes them look so ridiculously important, are not really the -smallest houses in London. I think that honour must surely belong to the -porter’s lodge at the Fetter Lane entrance to the Record Office, unless -you count as a house No. 10, Hyde Park Place. Though it certainly has a -street door all to itself, it has only one room.</p> - -<p>The park authority, so careless when it is a matter of eating and -drinking, is careful to provide more artistic pleasures for the Hyde -Park crowds. Bands play there on many summer evenings—the announcements -are made in the Press—and now and then the League of Arts arranges an -entertainment, when thousands of people flock to see the Morris dancing -or some old play performed with a background of green trees.</p> - -<h3>Kensington Gardens</h3> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">“Sometimes a child will cross the glade.”<br /></span> -<span class="i14"><span class="smcap">Matthew Arnold.</span><br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p>Henry James once expressed the opinion that the view from the bridge -that crosses the Serpentine where Hyde Park joins Kensington Gardens has -an “extraordinary nobleness,” and there is something indescribably -beautiful and unexpected about it. The grey buildings in the distance -look like some palace of the<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_204" id="page_204">{204}</a></span> <i>fata morgana</i> over the shimmering water. -I do not know if Sir James Barrie is responsible for the feeling that -you would not be surprised at anything that might happen in Kensington -Gardens. Who would be bold enough to assert that when the last child has -left the Peter Pan statue the squirrels do not come and play with their -stone brothers? Kensington Gardens are the paradise of the child and the -flower lover. There are ugly things in it, of course, like the Albert -Memorial, though everyone does not think it ugly: I was once startled at -hearing that souvenir of Victorian taste fervently admired by some -fellow bus passengers. But the Serpentine, and the Round Pond on a sunny -morning when the fleet is engaged in serious manœuvres—and the Broad -Walk: Wren’s orangery—the lovely sunk garden with its pleached walk of -lime trees with the avenue Queen Caroline planted—and above all, the -Flower Walk in the sunlit air after a shower,—if visitors to London -have time for nothing else they should carry away a memory of Kensington -Gardens.</p> - -<h3>Green Park and St. James’s</h3> - -<div class="blockquot"><p>“Satirists may say what they please about the rural enjoyments of a -London citizen on Sunday.”—<span class="smcap">W. Irving.</span></p></div> - -<p>Walking along Piccadilly from Hyde Park Corner on the “sulky” side, as -Mr. Street calls it in his charming <i>Ghosts of Piccadilly</i>, many<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_205" id="page_205">{205}</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter" id="ill_024" style="width: 346px;"> -<a href="images/i_205.jpg"> -<img src="images/i_205.jpg" width="346" height="600" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -<div class="caption"><p>PETER PAN STATUE IN KENSINGTON GARDENS</p></div> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_206" id="page_206">{206}</a></span> </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_207" id="page_207">{207}</a></span> </p> - -<p class="nind">people wonder at the meaning of the ledge on the curb of the pavement -nearly opposite the entrance to 128, Piccadilly. It owes its existence -to a benevolent old clubman who, from his comfortable window armchair, -noticed the porters bearing heavy burdens on their backs and toiling up -the slope of Piccadilly. The ledge was fixed at the right height, so -that they might rest their burdens without unfastening them.</p> - -<p>Green Park was once much larger than its present sixty acres or so, but -George III. took some of it in 1767 to enlarge the gardens of old -Buckingham House. It is now the happy hunting-ground of the gentlemen -who love to lie full length on the grass—the not inconsiderable army of -people who would dread communism if they ever thought about anything, -and would bitterly regret under any other régime the halcyon days when -the out-of-work dole of a benevolent government of bourgeois permitted -these free Britons to lounge at peace.</p> - -<p>Their presence is perhaps the reason why the Green Park is not a -fashionable rendezvous, like Hyde Park, although some of the great -London houses, Stafford House, Bridgewater House, Spencer House, etc., -border it on the east side. The wrought iron and gilded gates bearing -the Cavendish crest and motto that were formerly used as the entrance to -Devonshire House have now been placed in Green<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_208" id="page_208">{208}</a></span> Park opposite the -building they guarded so long. These beautiful old gates have had a -chequered history. Seven generations ago, in the eighteenth century, -they began their existence at Turnham Green, where they guarded the -approach to the house of the second Lord Egmont and bore the arms of the -Perceval family. The house changed owners and was pulled down, and in -1838 the gates were bought by the sixth Duke of Devonshire for his -Chiswick house. They stayed there for fifty-nine years, before they came -to spend a brief quarter of a century watching the ebb and flow of -Piccadilly.</p> - -<p>The Duke of Devonshire already had beautiful gates at Chiswick when he -bought these, for the Earl of Burlington who got the house in 1727 and -whose daughter and sole heiress married a Duke of Devonshire, was also a -connoisseur in gates, and had begged a beautiful pair of Inigo Jones -design from Sir Hans Sloane, who did not appreciate them. When they were -being moved, Pope wrote:</p> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0"><i>Passenger.</i> Oh Gate! how cam’st thou here?<br /></span> -<span class="i0"><i>Gate.</i> I was brought from Chelsea last year,<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Battered with wind and weather;<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Inigo Jones put me together,<br /></span> -<span class="i6">Sir Hans Sloane<br /></span> -<span class="i6">Let me alone,<br /></span> -<span class="i2">So Burlington brought me hither.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind">Green Park has another gate, part of which I am sure is unnoticed, for -how many people know that in the Wellington Arch at the top of -Constitution Hill, at the upper end of the<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_209" id="page_209">{209}</a></span> Green Park, sixteen -policemen and an inspector have their happy home. Their special task is -to direct the traffic at Hyde Park Corner, no easy matter in the season -or when the king and queen and other notabilities come driving out to -take the air. From their bedroom in the Arch they can climb on to the -wide flat top, and under the shadow of the splendid group of Peace in -her flying chariot, look over a wonderful vista of park and palace and -highway.</p> - -<h3>St. James’s Park</h3> - -<div class="blockquot"><p>“La beauté de Londres n’est pas dans ses monuments mais dans son -immensité.”—<span class="smcap">Zola.</span></p></div> - -<p>What would old Lenôtre, Louis XIV.’s court gardener, who laid out St. -James’s Park, think if he could see his handiwork to-day? He would make -a witty jest of it, perhaps, for he was a charming old man of a -guileless simplicity that made him beloved of everyone, even in the most -artificial court in Europe. Charles II. invited the famous French -landscape gardener, who had created Versailles out of a sandhill, to -come and transform the swampy meadow that adjoined the palace Henry -VIII. had fashioned out of the twelfth-century Lepers Hospital, -dedicated to St. James the Less, which has given its name to the palace -and park.</p> - -<p>St. James’s has always been a very royal park since the days when the -young Princess<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_210" id="page_210">{210}</a></span> Elizabeth rode through it from her father’s new palace -to the court at Whitehall, attended “with a very honourable confluence -of noble and worshipful persons of both sexes.” Charles I. took his last -walk through it on his way to the scaffold in Whitehall. Charles II. -spent much of his time playing with his dogs and feeding his ducks -there, and he planted some of the oaks from the acorns of the royal oak -at Boscobel. His aviary on the south side is still remembered in the -name of Birdcage Walk, and the tradition is carried on by the aquatic -birds that again haunt the ornamental water as before the war.</p> - -<p>Walpole in his reminiscences quotes George I. as saying:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"><p>This is a strange country. The first morning after my arrival at -St. James’s, I looked out of the window, and saw a park with walls, -canal, etc., which they told me were mine. The next day, Lord -Chetwynd the Ranger of <i>my</i> Park, sent me a fine brace of carp out -of <i>my</i> canal; and I was told I must give five guineas to Lord -Chetwynd’s servant for bringing me <i>my own</i> carp out of <i>my own</i> -canal <i>in my own garden</i>.</p></div> - -<p>I always loved, too, the reply of Walpole’s father to Queen Caroline -when she asked how much it would cost to close St. James’s Park for the -royal use and he answered, “only three crowns, Madam.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_211" id="page_211">{211}</a></span>”</p> - -<h3>Regent’s Park</h3> - -<div class="blockquot"><p>“London is before all things an incomparable background.”—<span class="smcap">F. M. -Hueffer.</span></p></div> - -<p>Regent’s Park to most people spells the Zoo, the place where one may see -the best menagerie in the world. It is the successor of Marylebone Park, -a royal hunting-ground until Cromwell’s day. It was laid out in its -present style after 1812 by Nash, the man who designed Regent Street, -and named after the Prince Regent, who thought he would build a country -house here.</p> - -<p>It is so far removed from Mayfair that its glories have been neglected, -but now that fashion has drifted north of Hyde Park and even Bloomsbury -is having its recrudescence, Regent’s Park may wake up any day and find -itself famous. It is beautifully laid out and tended, and garden lovers -from other lands will like it immensely if they take a tube to Baker -Street and spend an hour or so there, either boating on the lovely lake -or walking in the gardens.</p> - -<p>The Royal Botanic Gardens, enclosed by a circular walk, are reached from -York Street by a road running north between Bedford Women’s College and -the Toxophilite Society (which ordinary people are content to call the -Archery Club). It is only open to the general public on Mondays and -Saturdays on payment of one shilling.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_212" id="page_212">{212}</a></span></p> - -<p>On this west side of the park is St. Dunstan’s Lodge, the home of Mr. -and Mrs. Otto Kahn, who gave their house for some years to the late Sir -Arthur Pearson for his hostel for the education of the blind.</p> - -<p>It was once the home of the Marquess of Hertford, who was the original -of Thackeray’s Marquis of Steyne in <i>Vanity Fair</i></p> - -<h3>Battersea Park</h3> - -<div class="blockquot"><p class="c">“It takes London of all cities to give you such an impression of -the country.”—<span class="smcap">Henry James.</span></p></div> - -<p>Battersea Park is another of London’s lovely gardens. It takes its name -from the old parish and manor of Battersea, a gradual corruption of the -Patricesy or Peter’s Isle, by which it was known in Domesday Book as -belonging to the Abbey of St. Peter at Westminster.</p> - -<p>There is nothing very interesting historically about the park, as it was -only laid out in 1852, on Battersea Fields, the scene of a duel in 1829 -between the Duke of Wellington and the Marquis of Winchelsea, but it is -one of the favourite parks of London and the only one that fringes the -borders of the Thames. It has a lovely sunk garden, that is a dream of -beauty in the summer time, and letters are always appearing in the -papers about the birds that nest among its trees. Four of the 188 acres -are laid out as a sub-tropical garden. There is a lake with<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_213" id="page_213">{213}</a></span> rowing -boats to hire, and arrangements are made for cricket and other sports.</p> - -<p>If the park has no history, one can find curious bits of old London -quite close to it by turning out of the west gate and asking the way to -Church Road, off the Battersea Bridge Road, and near the river. First -there is the old church of St. Mary’s, ugly enough in itself, but it was -where William Blake was married, and where Turner used to sketch the -wonderful effects on the Thames. Lovers of quaint epitaphs will find a -delicious one composed by himself to the famous Henry St. John, Lord -Bolingbroke, who “was Secretary of State under Queen Anne and in the -days of King George I. and King George II. something more and better.”</p> - -<p>Lord Bolingbroke was a true Battersea man, for he was born there in 1678 -and died in 1751. His second wife, who shares the honour of his -monument, was a niece of Madame de Maintenon. Battersea has been closely -connected with the St. John family for four hundred years, though they -sold their manor to the Spencers in 1763. A bit of it may still be seen -in the adjoining flour mills, where, I believe, it is possible to see -the wonderful ceiling and staircase, and the lovely cedar-panelled room -overlooking the river, where Pope wrote his <i>Essay on Man</i>.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_214" id="page_214">{214}</a></span></p> - -<h3>Kew Gardens</h3> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">“Go down to Kew in lilac-time (it isn’t far from London).”<br /></span> -<span class="i20"><span class="smcap">Alfred Noyes.</span><br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p>Kew is too far afield to be called unnoticed London, but it is the most -wonderful of all the London gardens and so easy to reach that to miss it -would be a matter for perpetual regret.</p> - -<p>Anyone can tell you the way to get there: either from Waterloo to Kew -Bridge, when you will have to walk across the bridge to get to the main -entrance of the gardens, or by the District Railway to Kew Gardens -station, or by tram from Hammersmith.</p> - -<p>There is so much to see there that over-much direction destroys the -greatest pleasure of finding out what you like best, and everyone has -his own opinion as to what time of the year the gardens are most -beautiful. The poet loves “Kew in lilac-time,” the lover of gorgeous -colour goes down to see the regiments of tulips, massed as they are -nowhere else outside Holland. Kew in rhododendron and azalea time ought -not to be missed, but I think the loveliest sight of all is Kew in -bluebell time, when it looks as if a bit of the sky had fallen -earthwards on either side of the Queen’s Walk, and in the middle of the -wilderness you come across the deserted little ivy-clad cottage, the sea -of blue sweeping up to the very door to which no pathway now leads.</p> - -<p>It was once the Queen’s Cottage, built by<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_215" id="page_215">{215}</a></span> George III. for Queen -Charlotte, in the days when they led the domestic existence that Fanny -Burney described in her <i>Diary</i>; but no one now uses it and it stands -there with a mute air of resignation at its fallen fortunes, little -dreaming how much its unexpected beauty adds to the pleasure of the -discoverer of this lovely corner.</p> - -<p>Kew, like the other parks, had its royal origin. Its founder was the -Princess Augusta of Saxe-Gotha, the wife of Frederick Prince of Wales, -who, eight years after her husband’s death, interested herself in the -laying out of the exotic garden at Kew that was the nucleus of the vast -collection of 24,000 different varieties of plants.</p> - -<p>Kew has always been beloved by artists. Sir Peter Lely had a house at -Kew Green and Johann Zoffany the painter, whose fame has so lately been -augmented by the publication of his life and memoirs, lived in Zoffany -House at Strand-on-the-Green, a delightful old-world riverside village -close to Kew Bridge. He is buried in the early eighteenth-century church -of St. Ann, where Gainsborough also lies.</p> - -<p>And now come back to London and I will show you a Lilliputian park I am -sure you have never noticed. It is so tiny; long ago it was the -churchyard of St. Botolph without Aldersgate, dedicated to that kindly -patron of all travellers, but now it is a charming retreat with an -additional attraction that I leave you to discover, and because it is so -close to the General Post Office it is always called The Postman’s -Park.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_216" id="page_216">{216}</a></span></p> - -<p>There are other lovely unnoticed oases of green round about London town; -Brockwell Park with its fine old walled garden, and Dulwich and -Southwark. Their tales must wait for another time, for now it only -remains for me to say with Pope:</p> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Dear, damn’d, distracting town, farewell.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<h2><a name="INDEX" id="INDEX"></a>INDEX</h2> - -<p class="c"><a href="#A">A</a>, -<a href="#B">B</a>, -<a href="#C">C</a>, -<a href="#D">D</a>, -<a href="#E">E</a>, -<a href="#F">F</a>, -<a href="#G">G</a>, -<a href="#H">H</a>, -<a href="#I">I</a>, -<a href="#J">J</a>, -<a href="#K">K</a>, -<a href="#L">L</a>, -<a href="#M">M</a>, -<a href="#N">N</a>, -<a href="#O">O</a>, -<a href="#P">P</a>, -<a href="#Q">Q</a>, -<a href="#R">R</a>, -<a href="#S">S</a>, -<a href="#T">T</a>, -<a href="#Y">Y</a>, -<a href="#Z">Z</a>, -<a href="#W">W</a>.</p> - -<p class="nind"> -“<a name="A" id="A"></a>Achilles” Statue, <a href="#page_199">199</a>, <a href="#page_200">200</a><br /> - -“Adam and Eve” public-house, <a href="#page_184">184</a><br /> - -Adam, the brothers, <a href="#page_48">48</a>, <a href="#page_49">49</a><br /> - -Addison, <a href="#page_10">10</a>, <a href="#page_25">25</a>, <a href="#page_109">109</a>, <a href="#page_156">156</a>, <a href="#page_168">168</a><br /> - -Adelphi, <a href="#page_48">48</a>, <a href="#page_49">49</a><br /> - -Admiralty, old home of, <a href="#page_76">76</a><br /> - -Albert Memorial, <a href="#page_204">204</a><br /> - -Albert, Prince, <a href="#page_200">200</a><br /> - -All Hallows, Barking, <a href="#page_73">73</a>, <a href="#page_74">74</a><br /> - -Anne, Queen, <a href="#page_124">124</a>, <a href="#page_135">135</a><br /> - -Apothecaries’ Society, <a href="#page_18">18</a><br /> - -Ascham, Roger, <a href="#page_115">115</a><br /> - -Ashburnham House, <a href="#page_169">169</a><br /> - -Augusta, Princess, <a href="#page_200">200</a>, <a href="#page_215">215</a><br /> - -<br /><a name="B" id="B"></a>Bacon, Sir Francis, <a href="#page_107">107</a>, <a href="#page_113">113</a>, <a href="#page_156">156</a><br /> - -Barking, Convent of, <a href="#page_74">74</a><br /> - -Battersea Manor, <a href="#page_213">213</a><br /> - -Baxter, <a href="#page_135">135</a><br /> - -Bedford, Duke of, <a href="#page_34">34</a><br /> - -<i>Beggar’s Opera</i>, <a href="#page_114">114</a>, <a href="#page_122">122</a><br /> - -Bells of St. Clement’s, <a href="#page_50">50</a>, <a href="#page_53">53</a>, <a href="#page_54">54</a><br /> - -Bess of Hardwicke, <a href="#page_8">8</a><br /> - -Bible, revisers of, <a href="#page_167">167</a><br /> - -Birdcage Walk, <a href="#page_210">210</a><br /> - -Black Prince, <a href="#page_24">24</a>, <a href="#page_56">56</a>, <a href="#page_86">86</a><br /> - -Blackstone, <a href="#page_60">60</a><br /> - -Blake, Admiral, <a href="#page_170">170</a><br /> - -Blake, William, <a href="#page_213">213</a><br /> - -Bolingbroke, Lord, <a href="#page_213">213</a><br /> - -Bond, Sir Thomas, <a href="#page_27">27</a><br /> - -Boniface, Archbishop, <a href="#page_142">142</a>, <a href="#page_144">144</a><br /> - -Botanic Gardens, Royal, <a href="#page_211">211</a><br /> - -Bracegirdle, Mrs., <a href="#page_168">168</a><br /> - -Brompton Road, <a href="#page_25">25</a><br /> - -Brooke, Rupert, MS. of, <a href="#page_178">178</a><br /> - -Browne, William, <a href="#page_7">7</a><br /> - -Brummell, Beau, <a href="#page_34">34</a><br /> - -Buckingham, Dukes of, <a href="#page_43">43</a>, <a href="#page_44">44</a><br /> - -Buckingham Street, <a href="#page_42">42-46</a><br /> - -Buns and Bunhill Place, <a href="#page_14">14</a><br /> - -Burke, <a href="#page_36">36</a><br /> - -Burney, Dr., <a href="#page_10">10</a><br /> - -Burney, Fanny, <a href="#page_10">10</a>, <a href="#page_121">121</a>, <a href="#page_215">215</a><br /> - -Butler, Samuel, <a href="#page_136">136</a><br /> - -<br /><a name="C" id="C"></a>Campbell, Lady Caroline, <a href="#page_199">199</a><br /> - -Campbell, Thomas, <a href="#page_122">122</a><br /> - -Caroline, Queen, <a href="#page_200">200</a>, <a href="#page_204">204</a>, <a href="#page_210">210</a><br /> - -Carthusian Monks, <a href="#page_151">151</a>, <a href="#page_152">152</a><br /> - -Catherine of Braganza, <a href="#page_11">11</a>, <a href="#page_18">18</a><br /> - -Cellini, Benvenuto, <a href="#page_133">133</a><br /> - -Charing Cross, <a href="#page_40">40-42</a>, <a href="#page_158">158</a><br /> - -Charles I., <a href="#page_210">210</a>;<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">statue of, <a href="#page_41">41</a>, <a href="#page_160">160</a>, <a href="#page_196">196</a></span><br /> - -Charles II., <a href="#page_9">9</a>, <a href="#page_13">13</a>, <a href="#page_83">83</a>, <a href="#page_96">96</a>, <a href="#page_116">116</a>, <a href="#page_128">128</a>, <a href="#page_129">129</a>, <a href="#page_139">139</a>, <a href="#page_198">198</a>, <a href="#page_200">200</a>, <a href="#page_209">209</a>, <a href="#page_210">210</a><br /> - -Charlotte, Queen, <a href="#page_34">34</a>, <a href="#page_215">215</a><br /> - -Charterhouse:<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">as mansion, <a href="#page_148">148</a>, <a href="#page_151">151-5</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">as school and hospital, <a href="#page_155">155-7</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">features, <a href="#page_157">157</a></span><br /> - -Charterhouse scholars, <a href="#page_156">156</a><br /> - -Chaucer, <a href="#page_38">38</a>, <a href="#page_42">42</a>, <a href="#page_56">56</a>, <a href="#page_73">73</a>, <a href="#page_85">85</a><br /> - -Cheapside, <a href="#page_84">84</a>, <a href="#page_85">85</a>, <a href="#page_90">90-93</a><br /> - -Chelsea:<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Belgian refugees, <a href="#page_4">4</a>, <a href="#page_7">7</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">buns, <a href="#page_14">14</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Burney, Dr., <a href="#page_10">10</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Carlyle’s house, <a href="#page_12">12</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Charles II., <a href="#page_9">9</a>, <a href="#page_11">11</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Cheyne Walk, <a href="#page_8">8</a>, <a href="#page_11">11</a>, <a href="#page_12">12</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">communications, <a href="#page_1">1</a>, <a href="#page_20">20</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Crosby Hall, <a href="#page_4">4</a>, <a href="#page_7">7</a>, <a href="#page_8">8</a>, <a href="#page_17">17</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Danvers, Lady, <a href="#page_17">17</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">famous inhabitants, <a href="#page_10">10-12</a>, <a href="#page_22">22</a>, <a href="#page_23">23</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Flower Show, <a href="#page_19">19</a>, <a href="#page_20">20</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Gwynne, Nell, <a href="#page_8">8-10</a>, <a href="#page_13">13</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Hospital and pensioners, <a href="#page_10">10</a>, <a href="#page_12">12</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">James, Henry, <a href="#page_13">13</a>, <a href="#page_16">16</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">King’s Road, <a href="#page_9">9</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">More’s Gardens, <a href="#page_4">4</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">More, Sir Thomas, <a href="#page_2">2-4</a>, <a href="#page_7">7</a>, <a href="#page_8">8</a>, <a href="#page_15">15</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Old Church, <a href="#page_14">14-17</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Paradise Row, <a href="#page_8">8</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Physic Garden, <a href="#page_17">17-19</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Ranelagh Gardens, <a href="#page_21">21</a>, <a href="#page_22">22</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">restaurants, <a href="#page_14">14</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Sandford Manor House, <a href="#page_9">9</a>, <a href="#page_10">10</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">shops, <a href="#page_14">14</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">studios, <a href="#page_23">23</a></span><br /> - -Chesterfield, Lord, <a href="#page_21">21</a><br /> - -Church bells, lore of, <a href="#page_53">53</a>, <a href="#page_75">75</a>, <a href="#page_84">84</a><br /> - -Churches:<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">All Hallows, Barking, <a href="#page_73">73</a>, <a href="#page_74">74</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Bow, <a href="#page_84">84-87</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Chelsea Old Church, <a href="#page_14">14-17</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Holy Trinity, Knightsbridge, <a href="#page_26">26</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Moravian Chapel, Nevill’s Court, <a href="#page_134">134</a>, <a href="#page_135">135</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">St. Anne’s, Soho, <a href="#page_36">36</a>, <a href="#page_37">37</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">St. Bartholomew’s, Smithfield, <a href="#page_141">141-4</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">St. Clement Danes, <a href="#page_49">49</a>, <a href="#page_50">50</a>, <a href="#page_53">53-55</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">St. Clement’s, Eastcheap, <a href="#page_50">50</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">St. Ethelburga’s, <a href="#page_87">87</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">St. Etheldreda’s Chapel, <a href="#page_112">112-14</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">St. James’s, Piccadilly, <a href="#page_33">33</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">St. Margaret’s, Westminster, <a href="#page_170">170</a>, <a href="#page_171">171</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">St. Mary-le-Strand, <a href="#page_46">46</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">St. Mary’s, Battersea, <a href="#page_213">213</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">St. Olave’s, <a href="#page_74">74-77</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">St. Supulchre’s, Holborn, <a href="#page_114">114</a>, <a href="#page_115">115</a>, <a href="#page_137">137</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Temple, <a href="#page_63">63</a>, <a href="#page_64">64</a></span><br /> - -Cicill, Master Robert, <a href="#page_55">55</a><br /> - -City churches, <a href="#page_87">87</a>, <a href="#page_88">88</a>, <a href="#page_93">93</a><br /> - -City Companies, <a href="#page_93">93-102</a>:<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Bowyers, <a href="#page_94">94</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Clothworkers, <a href="#page_99">99</a>, <a href="#page_100">100</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Drapers, <a href="#page_99">99</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Fishmongers, <a href="#page_99">99</a>, <a href="#page_101">101</a>, <a href="#page_102">102</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Fletchers, <a href="#page_94">94</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Goldsmiths, <a href="#page_99">99</a>, <a href="#page_101">101</a>, <a href="#page_102">102</a>, <a href="#page_166">166</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Grocers, <a href="#page_99">99</a>, <a href="#page_101">101</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Hatters and Haberdashers, <a href="#page_95">95</a>, <a href="#page_99">99</a>, <a href="#page_100">100</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Horners, <a href="#page_94">94</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Ironmongers, <a href="#page_99">99</a>, <a href="#page_194">194</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Lorriners, <a href="#page_94">94</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Mercers, <a href="#page_99">99</a>, <a href="#page_100">100</a>, <a href="#page_101">101</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Merchant Taylors, <a href="#page_99">99</a>, <a href="#page_100">100</a>, <a href="#page_157">157</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Pattenmakers, <a href="#page_94">94</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Salters, <a href="#page_99">99</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Skinners, <a href="#page_99">99</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Stationers, <a href="#page_102">102</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Upholders, <a href="#page_94">94</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Vintners, <a href="#page_99">99</a>, <a href="#page_100">100</a></span><br /> - -City Guilds and their halls, <a href="#page_99">99-102</a><br /> - -Clifford’s Inn, <a href="#page_136">136</a><br /> - -Coal Exchange, <a href="#page_71">71</a>, <a href="#page_72">72</a><br /> - -Cockney, true home of, <a href="#page_84">84</a><br /> - -Coke, Sir Edward, <a href="#page_113">113</a>, <a href="#page_136">136</a>, <a href="#page_156">156</a><br /> - -Collingwood Street, <a href="#page_134">134</a><br /> - -Commons, first meeting-place of, <a href="#page_162">162</a><br /> - -Congreve, <a href="#page_168">168</a><br /> - -Coram, Captain Thomas, <a href="#page_179">179-80</a><br /> - -Court Leet, <a href="#page_56">56</a>, <a href="#page_57">57</a><br /> - -Cranmer, Archbishop, <a href="#page_79">79</a>, <a href="#page_113">113</a><br /> - -Cromwell, Oliver, <a href="#page_128">128</a>, <a href="#page_160">160</a><br /> - -“Crooked Billet” inn, <a href="#page_78">78</a><br /> - -Curfew at Lincoln’s Inn, <a href="#page_130">130</a><br /> - -“Czar’s Head” tavern, <a href="#page_47">47</a><br /> - -<br /><a name="D" id="D"></a>Davies, Mary, <a href="#page_55">55</a><br /> - -Delaney, Mrs., <a href="#page_178">178</a><br /> - -De Montfort, Simon, <a href="#page_162">162</a><br /> - -De Morgan, William, <a href="#page_12">12</a><br /> - -Devonshire, Duchess of, <a href="#page_22">22</a><br /> - -Devonshire House gates, <a href="#page_207">207</a>, <a href="#page_208">208</a><br /> - -Dickens, <a href="#page_178">178</a>, <a href="#page_180">180</a>, <a href="#page_185">185</a><br /> - -Dickensian London, <a href="#page_45">45</a>, <a href="#page_67">67</a>, <a href="#page_69">69</a>, <a href="#page_77">77</a>, <a href="#page_93">93</a>, <a href="#page_106">106</a>, <a href="#page_117">117</a>, <a href="#page_122">122</a><br /> - -Domesday Book, <a href="#page_2">2</a>, <a href="#page_133">133</a>, <a href="#page_165">165</a><br /> - -Donne, Dr. <a href="#page_16">16</a>, <a href="#page_17">17</a>, <a href="#page_129">129</a><br /> - -Dorchester, Earl of, <a href="#page_34">34</a><br /> - -Dover Street, <a href="#page_27">27</a>, <a href="#page_28">28</a>, <a href="#page_29">29</a><br /> - -Dryden, <a href="#page_36">36</a>, <a href="#page_169">169</a><br /> - -Durham House, <a href="#page_48">48</a>, <a href="#page_49">49</a>, <a href="#page_152">152</a><br /> - -Dutch pictures, <a href="#page_191">191</a>, <a href="#page_193">193</a><br /> - -<br /><a name="E" id="E"></a>Ebury, Manor of, <a href="#page_55">55</a><br /> - -Edward III., <a href="#page_85">85</a>, <a href="#page_86">86</a>, <a href="#page_91">91</a><br /> - -Elgin Marbles, <a href="#page_175">175-7</a><br /> - -Eliot, George, <a href="#page_11">11</a><br /> - -Elizabeth, Queen, <a href="#page_8">8</a>, <a href="#page_28">28</a>, <a href="#page_29">29</a>, <a href="#page_65">65</a>, <a href="#page_70">70</a>, <a href="#page_75">75</a>, <a href="#page_101">101</a>, <a href="#page_108">108</a>, <a href="#page_153">153-5</a>, <a href="#page_209">209</a><br /> - -Ely, Bishops of, <a href="#page_28">28</a>, <a href="#page_29">29</a><br /> - -Ely Place, an old-world corner, <a href="#page_111">111</a>, <a href="#page_112">112</a><br /> - -Erasmus, <a href="#page_4">4</a><br /> - -Essex, Earl of, <a href="#page_47">47</a>, <a href="#page_132">132</a><br /> - -Evans, William, <a href="#page_116">116</a><br /> - -Evelyn, John, <a href="#page_18">18</a>, <a href="#page_27">27</a>, <a href="#page_28">28</a>, <a href="#page_44">44</a>, <a href="#page_46">46</a>, <a href="#page_47">47</a>, <a href="#page_128">128</a>, <a href="#page_198">198</a><br /> - -<br /><a name="F" id="F"></a>Felton, Lavinia, <a href="#page_122">122</a><br /> - -Fielding, <a href="#page_10">10</a>, <a href="#page_45">45</a><br /> - -Fire, the Great:<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">devastating effects, <a href="#page_138">138</a>, <a href="#page_140">140</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Evelyn’s account, <a href="#page_138">138</a>, <a href="#page_139">139</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">origin, <a href="#page_138">138</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Pepys and, <a href="#page_76">76</a>, <a href="#page_100">100</a>, <a href="#page_138">138</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">rapid reconstruction, <a href="#page_140">140</a>, <a href="#page_101">101</a></span><br /> - -Fleet Street, <a href="#page_57">57</a>, <a href="#page_58">58</a>, <a href="#page_84">84</a><br /> - -Flemish carvings, <a href="#page_125">125</a>;<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">MSS., <a href="#page_124">124</a>, <a href="#page_125">125</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">pictures, <a href="#page_193">193</a></span><br /> - -Flowers for criminals, <a href="#page_114">114</a><br /> - -Foundling Hospital, <a href="#page_178">178-80</a>, <a href="#page_183">183-85</a><br /> - -Fragonard, pictures by, <a href="#page_192">192</a><br /> - -Franklin, Benjamin, <a href="#page_102">102</a><br /> - -French pictures, <a href="#page_192">192</a><br /> - -Furniture, <a href="#page_187">187</a>, <a href="#page_188">188</a>, <a href="#page_193">193</a>, <a href="#page_194">194</a><br /> - -<br /><a name="G" id="G"></a>Gainsborough, <a href="#page_184">184</a>, <a href="#page_215">215</a><br /> - -Garrick, David, <a href="#page_34">34</a><br /> - -Gaskell, Mrs., <a href="#page_11">11</a><br /> - -Gaunt, John of, <a href="#page_56">56</a>, <a href="#page_113">113</a><br /> - -Geffrye, Sir Robert, <a href="#page_194">194</a><br /> - -George I., <a href="#page_210">210</a><br /> - -George II., <a href="#page_184">184</a>, <a href="#page_189">189</a><br /> - -George III., <a href="#page_207">207</a>, <a href="#page_215">215</a><br /> - -George IV., <a href="#page_33">33</a>, <a href="#page_200">200</a><br /> - -Gibbons, Grinling, carvings by, <a href="#page_13">13</a>, <a href="#page_33">33</a>, <a href="#page_83">83</a>, <a href="#page_105">105</a>, <a href="#page_160">160</a>, <a href="#page_195">195</a>, <a href="#page_196">196</a><br /> - -Giltspur Street, <a href="#page_114">114</a>, <a href="#page_137">137</a><br /> - -Gog and Magog, <a href="#page_97">97</a>, <a href="#page_98">98</a><br /> - -Goldsmith, Oliver, <a href="#page_22">22</a>, <a href="#page_60">60</a>, <a href="#page_63">63</a>, <a href="#page_66">66</a>, <a href="#page_67">67</a><br /> - -Grafton, Duchess of, <a href="#page_34">34</a><br /> - -Gray’s Inn, <a href="#page_107">107-10</a><br /> - -Gresham, Sir Thomas, <a href="#page_94">94</a>, <a href="#page_101">101</a><br /> - -Greuze, pictures by, <a href="#page_192">192</a><br /> - -Grey, Lady Jane, <a href="#page_49">49</a>, <a href="#page_80">80</a>, <a href="#page_131">131</a>, <a href="#page_138">138</a>, <a href="#page_152">152</a><br /> - -Grosvenor, Sir Thomas, <a href="#page_55">55</a><br /> - -Guildhall, <a href="#page_97">97</a>, <a href="#page_98">98</a>;<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Library, <a href="#page_98">98</a>, <a href="#page_99">99</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Museum, <a href="#page_99">99</a></span><br /> - -Gwynne, Nell, <a href="#page_9">9</a>, <a href="#page_10">10</a>, <a href="#page_13">13</a>, <a href="#page_122">122</a><br /> - -<br /><a name="H" id="H"></a>Halifax, Lord, <a href="#page_34">34</a><br /> - -Hamilton, Lady, <a href="#page_38">38</a><br /> - -Handel, <a href="#page_178">178</a>, <a href="#page_184">184</a>, <a href="#page_185">185</a>, <a href="#page_189">189</a><br /> - -Hatton, Christopher, <a href="#page_28">28</a>, <a href="#page_29">29</a>, <a href="#page_65">65</a>, <a href="#page_113">113</a><br /> - -Hatton Garden, <a href="#page_28">28</a>, <a href="#page_29">29</a>, <a href="#page_110">110</a>, <a href="#page_111">111</a>, <a href="#page_179">179</a><br /> - -Haweis, Rev. H. R., <a href="#page_11">11</a><br /> - -Haymarket Shoppe, <a href="#page_33">33</a>, <a href="#page_35">35</a><br /> - -Hazlitt, <a href="#page_37">37</a><br /> - -Henry III., <a href="#page_130">130</a>, <a href="#page_144">144</a><br /> - -Henry IV., <a href="#page_91">91</a>, <a href="#page_167">167</a><br /> - -Henry VIII., <a href="#page_3">3</a>, <a href="#page_4">4</a>, <a href="#page_16">16</a>, <a href="#page_53">53</a>, <a href="#page_77">77</a>, <a href="#page_78">78</a>, <a href="#page_80">80</a>, <a href="#page_99">99</a>, <a href="#page_100">100</a>, <a href="#page_113">113</a>, <a href="#page_132">132</a>, <a href="#page_170">170</a>, <a href="#page_209">209</a><br /> - -Henry, Prince of Wales, <a href="#page_58">58</a>, <a href="#page_59">59</a><br /> - -Herbert, George, <a href="#page_17">17</a>, <a href="#page_169">169</a><br /> - -Hertford, Marquesses of, <a href="#page_190">190</a>, <a href="#page_191">191</a>, <a href="#page_212">212</a><br /> - -Heywood, John, <a href="#page_3">3</a><br /> - -Hobbema, pictures by, <a href="#page_193">193</a><br /> - -Hogarth, <a href="#page_123">123</a>, <a href="#page_125">125</a>, <a href="#page_178">178</a>, <a href="#page_179">179</a>, <a href="#page_183">183</a>, <a href="#page_184">184</a><br /> - -Holbein, <a href="#page_4">4</a><br /> - -Holywell Street, <a href="#page_70">70</a><br /> - -Horse Guards, <a href="#page_159">159</a>, <a href="#page_161">161</a><br /> - -House of the Converts, <a href="#page_130">130</a>, <a href="#page_131">131</a><br /> - -Howard, Lord Thomas, <a href="#page_155">155</a><br /> - -Howard, Philip, <a href="#page_154">154</a>, <a href="#page_155">155</a><br /> - -Howard, Thomas, <a href="#page_153">153</a><br /> - -Hudson, Sir Jeffrey, <a href="#page_116">116</a><br /> - -Huguenots, <a href="#page_19">19</a>, <a href="#page_37">37</a><br /> - -Hume, David, <a href="#page_45">45</a><br /> - -Hungerford Market, <a href="#page_42">42</a><br /> - -Hunt, Leigh, <a href="#page_12">12</a><br /> - -Hyde Park orators, <a href="#page_201">201</a>, <a href="#page_202">202</a><br /> - -<br /><a name="I" id="I"></a>Inns of Court, <a href="#page_126">126</a>, <a href="#page_127">127</a><br /> - -<br /><a name="J" id="J"></a>James I., <a href="#page_58">58</a>, <a href="#page_80">80</a>, <a href="#page_155">155</a>, <a href="#page_156">156</a>, <a href="#page_160">160</a><br /> - -Jewellery collections, <a href="#page_189">189</a><br /> - -Jewellery, Jacobean, <a href="#page_32">32</a>, <a href="#page_99">99</a><br /> - -Johnson, Dr., <a href="#page_21">21</a>, <a href="#page_22">22</a>, <a href="#page_36">36</a>, <a href="#page_39">39</a>, <a href="#page_54">54</a>, <a href="#page_63">63</a>, <a href="#page_66">66</a>, <a href="#page_105">105</a>, <a href="#page_148">148</a>, <a href="#page_158">158</a><br /> - -Jones, Inigo, <a href="#page_34">34</a>, <a href="#page_48">48</a>, <a href="#page_118">118</a>, <a href="#page_121">121</a>, <a href="#page_129">129</a>, <a href="#page_160">160</a>, <a href="#page_169">169</a>, <a href="#page_208">208</a><br /> - -Jonson, Ben, <a href="#page_7">7</a>, <a href="#page_126">126</a>, <a href="#page_169">169</a><br /> - -<br /><a name="K" id="K"></a>Kew Gardens, seasons of, <a href="#page_214">214</a><br /> - -Kingsland Road, <a href="#page_194">194</a><br /> - -Kingsley, Charles and Henry, <a href="#page_11">11</a><br /> - -Kit-Cat Club, <a href="#page_109">109</a>, <a href="#page_110">110</a><br /> - -Kneller, <a href="#page_184">184</a><br /> - -Knights Hospitallers of St. John, <a href="#page_147">147</a>, <a href="#page_148">148</a><br /> - -Knightsbridge, <a href="#page_24">24-26</a><br /> - -Knockers, sanctuary, <a href="#page_75">75</a><br /> - -<br /><a name="L" id="L"></a>Lamb, Charles, <a href="#page_60">60</a>, <a href="#page_63">63</a>, <a href="#page_66">66</a>, <a href="#page_67">67</a><br /> - -Lambeth Palace, <a href="#page_144">144</a><br /> - -Lancaster House (London Museum), <a href="#page_29">29-32</a><br /> - -Lawson, Cecil, <a href="#page_11">11</a><br /> - -Lectures, museum, <a href="#page_174">174</a>;<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">their value, <a href="#page_186">186</a></span><br /> - -Legh Cup, <a href="#page_101">101</a><br /> - -Leicester House, <a href="#page_37">37</a><br /> - -Lely, Sir Peter, <a href="#page_215">215</a><br /> - -Lenôtre, <a href="#page_209">209</a><br /> - -Leverhulme, Lord, <a href="#page_31">31</a><br /> - -Libraries:<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Guildhall, <a href="#page_98">98</a>, <a href="#page_99">99</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">King’s, <a href="#page_174">174</a>, <a href="#page_175">175</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Lincoln’s Inn, <a href="#page_129">129</a></span><br /> - -Lincoln’s Inn:<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">entrance, <a href="#page_126">126</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">history and features, <a href="#page_128">128-30</a></span><br /> - -Lincoln’s Inn Fields:<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">gardens, <a href="#page_117">117</a>, <a href="#page_118">118</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">houses, <a href="#page_118">118</a>, <a href="#page_121">121</a>, <a href="#page_122">122</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">theatre, <a href="#page_122">122</a></span><br /> - -Lindsay House, <a href="#page_121">121</a><br /> - -Loafers, park, <a href="#page_201">201</a>, <a href="#page_207">207</a><br /> - -Lody, Charles, <a href="#page_83">83</a><br /> - -London Bridge, relics of, <a href="#page_89">89</a>, <a href="#page_102">102</a><br /> - -London Parochial Charities, <a href="#page_18">18</a>, <a href="#page_19">19</a><br /> - -London Stone, <a href="#page_70">70</a><br /> - -Lord Mayor, prestige of, <a href="#page_96">96</a>;<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">procession and banquet, <a href="#page_97">97</a></span><br /> - -Lovel, Sir Thomas, <a href="#page_126">126</a>, <a href="#page_128">128</a><br /> - -<br /><a name="M" id="M"></a>Maclise, David, <a href="#page_11">11</a><br /> - -Manny, Sir Walter, <a href="#page_151">151</a>, <a href="#page_152">152</a><br /> - -Mansion Houses, <a href="#page_88">88-90</a><br /> - -MSS., illuminated, <a href="#page_124">124</a>, <a href="#page_188">188</a><br /> - -Marble Arch, <a href="#page_103">103</a><br /> - -Mary, Queen, going-away dress of, <a href="#page_32">32</a><br /> - -Mary Queen of Scots, <a href="#page_8">8</a>, <a href="#page_131">131</a>, <a href="#page_153">153</a>, <a href="#page_154">154</a>, <a href="#page_175">175</a><br /> - -Maypoles, <a href="#page_25">25</a>, <a href="#page_50">50</a><br /> - -Mazarin, Duchess de, <a href="#page_8">8</a>, <a href="#page_9">9</a><br /> - -Medici, Marie de, <a href="#page_91">91</a><br /> - -Mercers’ Chapel, <a href="#page_88">88</a><br /> - -Merchant’s House, seventeenth century, <a href="#page_73">73</a><br /> - -Meredith, George, <a href="#page_11">11</a><br /> - -Mews, Royal, <a href="#page_42">42</a><br /> - -Milton, <a href="#page_118">118</a>, <a href="#page_122">122</a><br /> - -“Mitre” Inn, <a href="#page_112">112</a><br /> - -Mohun, Lord, <a href="#page_36">36</a><br /> - -Monmouth, Duke of, <a href="#page_37">37</a>, <a href="#page_129">129</a><br /> - -Monument, <a href="#page_71">71</a><br /> - -More, Sir Thomas, <a href="#page_2">2-4</a>, <a href="#page_7">7</a>, <a href="#page_15">15</a>, <a href="#page_38">38</a>, <a href="#page_79">79</a>, <a href="#page_80">80</a>, <a href="#page_129">129</a><br /> - -Museum houses, <a href="#page_12">12</a><br /> - -Museum, how to see, <a href="#page_173">173</a><br /> - -Museums:<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">British, <a href="#page_172">172-178</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Geffrye, <a href="#page_193">193-96</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Guildhall, <a href="#page_99">99</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">London, <a href="#page_29">29-32</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Royal College of Surgeons, <a href="#page_122">122</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Soane, <a href="#page_123">123-26</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">South Kensington, <a href="#page_118">118</a>, <a href="#page_185">185-89</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">United Services’, <a href="#page_158">158-60</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Wallace Collection, <a href="#page_190">190-93</a></span><br /> - -Musical instruments, <a href="#page_188">188</a>, <a href="#page_189">189</a><br /> - -<br /><a name="N" id="N"></a>Napoleonic souvenirs, <a href="#page_124">124</a>, <a href="#page_160">160</a><br /> - -Nash, <a href="#page_211">211</a><br /> - -Nevill’s Court, <a href="#page_133">133-35</a><br /> - -Norfolk, Duke of, <a href="#page_15">15</a><br /> - -North, Sir Edward, <a href="#page_152">152</a>, <a href="#page_153">153</a><br /> - -<br /><a name="O" id="O"></a>Oldfield, Nance, <a href="#page_168">168</a><br /> - -Old Watling Restaurant, <a href="#page_90">90</a><br /> - -Orleans, Charles d’, <a href="#page_80">80</a><br /> - -<br /><a name="P" id="P"></a>Panier Alley, <a href="#page_116">116</a><br /> - -Parish registers, <a href="#page_55">55</a><br /> - -Parks:<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Battersea, <a href="#page_212">212</a>, <a href="#page_213">213</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Brockwell, <a href="#page_216">216</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Green, <a href="#page_207">207-9</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Hyde:</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 2em;">dogs’ cemetery, <a href="#page_202">202</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 2em;">life, <a href="#page_199">199</a>, <a href="#page_201">201</a>, <a href="#page_202">202</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 2em;">lodges, <a href="#page_202">202</a>, <a href="#page_203">203</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 2em;">music and dancing, <a href="#page_203">203</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 2em;">mysterious statues, <a href="#page_199">199</a>, <a href="#page_200">200</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 2em;">past and present, <a href="#page_197">197-99</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Serpentine, <a href="#page_200">200</a>, <a href="#page_201">201</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Kensington Gardens, <a href="#page_203">203</a>, <a href="#page_204">204</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Kew Gardens, <a href="#page_214">214</a>, <a href="#page_215">215</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Postman’s, <a href="#page_215">215</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Regent’s, <a href="#page_211">211</a>, <a href="#page_212">212</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">St. James’s, <a href="#page_209">209</a>, <a href="#page_210">210</a></span><br /> - -Paving of London, <a href="#page_104">104</a><br /> - -Pearson, Sir Arthur, <a href="#page_212">212</a><br /> - -Pembroke, Countess of, <a href="#page_7">7</a><br /> - -Pepys, <a href="#page_8">8</a>, <a href="#page_39">39</a>, <a href="#page_44">44</a>, <a href="#page_74">74</a>, <a href="#page_75">75</a>, <a href="#page_76">76</a>, <a href="#page_77">77</a>, <a href="#page_100">100</a>, <a href="#page_104">104</a>, <a href="#page_107">107</a>, <a href="#page_122">122</a>, <a href="#page_128">128</a>, <a href="#page_129">129</a>, <a href="#page_170">170</a>, <a href="#page_198">198</a><br /> - -Persian MSS., <a href="#page_188">188</a><br /> - -Peter Pan Statue, <a href="#page_204">204</a><br /> - -Peter the Great, <a href="#page_45">45-7</a>, <a href="#page_72">72</a>, <a href="#page_124">124</a>, <a href="#page_127">127</a>, <a href="#page_128">128</a><br /> - -Petersham, Lord, <a href="#page_35">35</a><br /> - -Philippa, Queen, <a href="#page_85">85</a>, <a href="#page_86">86</a><br /> - -Pickering Place, <a href="#page_30">30</a><br /> - -Plane tree, Wood Street, <a href="#page_92">92</a><br /> - -Pope, <a href="#page_28">28</a>, <a href="#page_109">109</a>, <a href="#page_208">208</a>, <a href="#page_213">213</a>, <a href="#page_216">216</a><br /> - -Port of London Authority’s tower, <a href="#page_77">77</a><br /> - -Prince Henry’s Room, <a href="#page_57">57</a>, <a href="#page_58">58</a><br /> - -Princes, the Little, <a href="#page_80">80</a><br /> - -Prior, Matthew, <a href="#page_168">168</a>, <a href="#page_169">169</a><br /> - -Punch, <a href="#page_42">42</a><br /> - -Pye Corner, <a href="#page_138">138</a><br /> - -<br /><a name="Q" id="Q"></a>Queen’s Cottage, Kew, <a href="#page_214">214</a>, <a href="#page_215">215</a><br /> - -<br /><a name="R" id="R"></a>Raleigh, Sir Walter, <a href="#page_58">58</a>, <a href="#page_59">59</a>, <a href="#page_79">79</a>, <a href="#page_80">80</a>, <a href="#page_132">132</a>, <a href="#page_170">170</a><br /> - -Ranelagh Club, <a href="#page_21">21</a>, <a href="#page_109">109</a><br /> - -Ranelagh Gardens, <a href="#page_21">21</a>, <a href="#page_22">22</a><br /> - -Raphael cartoons, <a href="#page_184">184</a>, <a href="#page_187">187</a><br /> - -Record Office treasures, <a href="#page_130">130-33</a><br /> - -Refreshments, park, <a href="#page_198">198</a>, <a href="#page_199">199</a><br /> - -Reynolds, Sir Joshua, <a href="#page_22">22</a>, <a href="#page_36">36</a>, <a href="#page_183">183</a>, <a href="#page_184">184</a>, <a href="#page_190">190</a><br /> - -Richard II., <a href="#page_132">132</a>, <a href="#page_167">167</a><br /> - -Roman baths, <a href="#page_57">57</a>, <a href="#page_66">66</a>, <a href="#page_69">69</a>, <a href="#page_70">70</a>, <a href="#page_72">72</a><br /> - -Roman London, <a href="#page_68">68-70</a>, <a href="#page_72">72</a>, <a href="#page_77">77</a><br /> - -Romney, <a href="#page_190">190</a><br /> - -Roper, William, <a href="#page_2">2</a>, <a href="#page_7">7</a><br /> - -Roses, York and Lancaster, <a href="#page_64">64</a>, <a href="#page_65">65</a><br /> - -Rossetti, the brothers, <a href="#page_11">11</a><br /> - -Rotten Row, <a href="#page_201">201</a><br /> - -Rousseau, <a href="#page_45">45</a>, <a href="#page_124">124</a><br /> - -Royalty and parks, <a href="#page_200">200</a><br /> - -Rubens, paintings by, <a href="#page_160">160</a>, <a href="#page_193">193</a><br /> - -Russell, Lord, of Killowen, <a href="#page_34">34</a><br /> - -Russians in Bow Church, <a href="#page_87">87</a><br /> - -<br /><a name="S" id="S"></a>St. Bartholomew’s Hospital, <a href="#page_137">137</a><br /> - -St. Dunstan’s Lodge, <a href="#page_212">212</a><br /> - -St. James’s Palace, <a href="#page_30">30</a><br /> - -St. John’s Gate, <a href="#page_147">147</a>, <a href="#page_148">148</a><br /> - -Savoy Chapel Royal and Manor, <a href="#page_55">55</a>, <a href="#page_56">56</a><br /> - -Sayes Court, Deptford, <a href="#page_46">46</a><br /> - -Sculpture in British Museum, <a href="#page_175">175-7</a><br /> - -Seething Lane, <a href="#page_74">74</a>, <a href="#page_76">76</a>, <a href="#page_77">77</a><br /> - -Serpentine bathers, <a href="#page_201">201</a><br /> - -Shakespearean London, <a href="#page_53">53</a>, <a href="#page_64">64</a>, <a href="#page_65">65</a>, <a href="#page_70">70</a>, <a href="#page_71">71</a>, <a href="#page_110">110</a>, <a href="#page_113">113</a>, <a href="#page_167">167</a><br /> - -Shrewsbury, Lady, <a href="#page_34">34</a><br /> - -Sidney, Sir Philip, <a href="#page_132">132</a><br /> - -Sloane, Sir Hans, <a href="#page_4">4</a>, <a href="#page_18">18</a>, <a href="#page_173">173</a>, <a href="#page_208">208</a><br /> - -Smith, Captain John, <a href="#page_115">115</a><br /> - -Smithfield, <a href="#page_137">137</a>, <a href="#page_141">141</a><br /> - -Snuff-takers, <a href="#page_33">33</a>, <a href="#page_34">34</a><br /> - -Soane Museum, peculiarities of, <a href="#page_123">123-26</a><br /> - -Soane, Sir John, <a href="#page_123">123-25</a><br /> - -Soho, a king’s grave in, <a href="#page_35">35</a>, <a href="#page_37">37</a><br /> - -Spenser, <a href="#page_64">64</a><br /> - -Stanley, Dean, <a href="#page_165">165</a><br /> - -Staple Inn, Holborn, <a href="#page_105">105</a>, <a href="#page_106">106</a><br /> - -Steele, Sir Richard, <a href="#page_44">44</a>, <a href="#page_156">156</a><br /> - -Stone effigies, <a href="#page_115">115</a>, <a href="#page_116">116</a>, <a href="#page_137">137</a>, <a href="#page_138">138</a><br /> - -Strand, <a href="#page_40">40</a>, <a href="#page_42">42</a>, <a href="#page_47">47</a>, <a href="#page_49">49</a><br /> - -Strand Lane, <a href="#page_57">57</a>, <a href="#page_69">69</a><br /> - -Street names, lore of, <a href="#page_85">85</a>, <a href="#page_93">93</a><br /> - -Sutherland, Duke of, <a href="#page_31">31</a><br /> - -Sutton, Sir Thomas, <a href="#page_155">155</a>, <a href="#page_156">156</a><br /> - -Swan, device and sign, <a href="#page_91">91</a>, <a href="#page_92">92</a><br /> - -Swift, <a href="#page_14">14</a><br /> - -Symons, Arthur, <a href="#page_67">67</a><br /> - -<br /><a name="T" id="T"></a>Tattersall’s, <a href="#page_26">26</a>, <a href="#page_27">27</a><br /> - -Temple:<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Church, <a href="#page_63">63</a>, <a href="#page_64">64</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">entrances, <a href="#page_60">60</a>, <a href="#page_63">63</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Fountain Court, <a href="#page_67">67</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Hall, <a href="#page_65">65</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">memories, <a href="#page_60">60</a>, <a href="#page_63">63</a>, <a href="#page_64">64-67</a></span><br /> - -Tennant Collection, <a href="#page_192">192</a><br /> - -Tennyson, Lord, <a href="#page_122">122</a><br /> - -Thackeray, <a href="#page_63">63</a>, <a href="#page_156">156</a>, <a href="#page_191">191</a>, <a href="#page_212">212</a><br /> - -Thornhill, Sir James, <a href="#page_196">196</a><br /> - -Thynne, Thomas, <a href="#page_121">121</a><br /> - -Thynne, William, <a href="#page_73">73</a>, <a href="#page_74">74</a><br /> - -Tonson, Jacob, publisher, <a href="#page_109">109</a>, <a href="#page_110">110</a><br /> - -Took’s Court, <a href="#page_106">106</a><br /> - -Tower of London, <a href="#page_79">79</a>, <a href="#page_80">80</a>, <a href="#page_83">83</a><br /> - -Trade unions, past and present, <a href="#page_94">94</a>, <a href="#page_95">95</a><br /> - -Trafalgar Square, <a href="#page_42">42</a><br /> - -Trinity House, <a href="#page_76">76-78</a><br /> - -Turner, <a href="#page_11">11</a>, <a href="#page_124">124</a>, <a href="#page_213">213</a><br /> - -Turner, Sir William, <a href="#page_88">88</a>, <a href="#page_89">89</a><br /> - -Tyburn, <a href="#page_104">104</a>, <a href="#page_114">114</a>, <a href="#page_152">152</a><br /> - -Tyler, Wat, <a href="#page_147">147</a><br /> - -<br /><a name="W" id="W"></a>Wallace, Sir Richard, <a href="#page_191">191</a><br /> - -Walpole, Horace, <a href="#page_10">10</a>, <a href="#page_21">21</a>, <a href="#page_22">22</a>, <a href="#page_36">36</a>, <a href="#page_109">109</a>, <a href="#page_196">196</a>, <a href="#page_200">200</a>, <a href="#page_210">210</a><br /> - -War relics of the services, <a href="#page_160">160</a><br /> - -Wardrobe Court, <a href="#page_134">134</a><br /> - -Water Gates:<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Buckingham Street, <a href="#page_43">43</a>, <a href="#page_48">48</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Essex House, <a href="#page_47">47</a></span><br /> - -Watling Street, <a href="#page_68">68</a>, <a href="#page_90">90</a><br /> - -Watteau, <a href="#page_125">125</a><br /> - -Watts’s “Lawgivers” fresco, <a href="#page_129">129</a>;<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">“Physical Energy” statue, <a href="#page_200">200</a></span><br /> - -Webb, <a href="#page_169">169</a><br /> - -Wellington Arch, <a href="#page_208">208</a>, <a href="#page_209">209</a><br /> - -Wesley and Whitefield, <a href="#page_135">135</a><br /> - -Westbourne Stream, <a href="#page_24">24</a>, <a href="#page_25">25</a>, <a href="#page_200">200</a><br /> - -Westminster Abbey:<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Chapel of the Pyx, <a href="#page_165">165</a>, <a href="#page_166">166</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Chapter House, <a href="#page_162">162</a>, <a href="#page_165">165</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">funeral effigies, <a href="#page_166">166</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Jericho Room, <a href="#page_167">167</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Jerusalem Chamber, <a href="#page_167">167</a>, <a href="#page_168">168</a>;</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Little Cloister, <a href="#page_166">166</a>, <a href="#page_167">167</a></span><br /> - -Westminster, Dukes of, <a href="#page_55">55</a><br /> - -Westminster School, <a href="#page_168">168</a>, <a href="#page_169">169</a><br /> - -Whistler, <a href="#page_11">11</a>, <a href="#page_12">12</a><br /> - -Whitehall Palace, remains of, <a href="#page_160">160</a><br /> - -Whittington, <a href="#page_84">84</a>, <a href="#page_96">96</a>, <a href="#page_101">101</a><br /> - -William III., <a href="#page_46">46</a>, <a href="#page_89">89</a>, <a href="#page_121">121</a>, <a href="#page_188">188</a><br /> - -Williamson’s Hotel, <a href="#page_89">89</a>, <a href="#page_90">90</a><br /> - -Window, east, of St. Margaret’s, <a href="#page_170">170</a>, <a href="#page_171">171</a><br /> - -Wolsey, Cardinal, <a href="#page_132">132</a><br /> - -Wonders, World’s, in British Museum, <a href="#page_176">176</a><br /> - -Wood Street, <a href="#page_32">32</a>, <a href="#page_92">92</a>, <a href="#page_93">93</a><br /> - -Woodwork, old, <a href="#page_72">72</a><br /> - -Wren, Sir Christopher, <a href="#page_33">33</a>, <a href="#page_53">53</a>, <a href="#page_54">54</a>, <a href="#page_60">60</a>, <a href="#page_71">71</a>, <a href="#page_86">86</a>, <a href="#page_88">88</a>, <a href="#page_100">100</a>, <a href="#page_114">114</a>, <a href="#page_124">124</a>, <a href="#page_141">141</a>, <a href="#page_160">160</a>, <a href="#page_169">169</a>, <a href="#page_204">204</a><br /> - -<br /><a name="Y" id="Y"></a>York House and its tenants, <a href="#page_44">44</a><br /> - -Young, Launcelot, <a href="#page_92">92</a>, <a href="#page_93">93</a><br /> - -<br /><a name="Z" id="Z"></a>Zoffany, Johann, <a href="#page_215">215</a><br /> - -Zoological Gardens, <a href="#page_211">211</a><br /> -</p> - -<p class="fint"> -CAMBRIDGE: PRINTED BY THE SYNDICS OF THE PRESS<br /> -AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS<br /> -</p> - -<hr class="full" /> -<div style='display:block; margin-top:4em'>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK UNNOTICED LONDON ***</div> -<div style='text-align:left'> - -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> -Updated editions will replace the previous one—the old editions will -be renamed. -</div> - -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. 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