about OMDON w.h-. OAVENPOR.T AD/VMS. lltllillii LOKDON STORIES ROMANTIC EPISODES FROM THE HISTORY OF THE GREAT METROPOLIS BY THE SAME AUTHOR A COMPANION VOLUME A BOOK ABOUT LONDON LONDON STREETS : THEIB ASSOCIATIONS, HISTORICAL, LITERARY, ROMANTIC, AND SOCIAL Crown 8vo, SB. 6d. AT ALL LIBRARIES AND BOOKSELLERS A BOOK ABOUT LONDON ITS MEMORABLE PLACES, ITS MEN AND WOMEN, AND ITS HISTORICAL AND LITERAEY ASSOCIATIONS BY W. H. DAVENPORT ADAMS, Author of " Witch, Warlock, an(TMagician t " " The White Sing, "Good Queen Anne," ete. LONDON HENRY AND COMPANY BOUVERIE STREET, B.C. 1890 Printed by Hazel], Watson, & Viney, Ld., London and Aylesbury. (BY PERMISSION) TO H. W. PRESCOTT, ESQ., WITH CORDIAL ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS. PEEFATOEY. TT is hoped that in the voluminous literature which London has gathered around it this Book about London, in its two parts, may find a place of its own. It is not intended as a guide-book, nor as a topographical indicator. It is narrative rather than descriptive. As a rule, people do not care much for minute descriptions of places or buildings ; what they chiefly want to know is, the special interest that attaches to them historical, romantic, literary, or artistic. This I have endeavoured to put forward. From all sources it has been my aim to collect, in the volume en- titled " London Streets," the more interesting associations . of London, its traditions that still possess a lingering life, its memories of notable persons and notable events. Much will be found in this division that former writers have overlooked. The references to the localities where great men, or men worthy to be remembered, have lived and died, are particularly numerous, and generally accompanied with some illustrative anecdote or detail. 8 PREFATORY. Narratives of remarkable scenes, events, and incidents are given in the present volume, under the title of "London Stories;" each of which is distinct in itself, and has been selected with a view to the illustration of different aspects of London life and history. The two volumes form " A Book about London : " not about commercial, or financial, or fashionable, or architectural London ; but about the London of remarkable men and women, the London of history, the London of romance and legend. I can honestly say that I have spared no pains to ensure accuracy by reference to primary authorities, and by careful study of the results of the latest research. Neces- sarily I owe no inconsiderable debt to my predecessors, from some hundred of whom I have borrowed more or less, though not without condensation, abridgement, adaptation, and addition. The arrangement of materials is, of course, my own ; and as to the general conception of the book, I may say, in conclusion, that it is intended to be read, and not shelved among those most useful, but very dreary, Works of Reference," which are the joy of the librarian and the despair of "the general reader." CONTENTS. PART I. of IHgtoric >cene0 anti PAGE THE GREAT PLAGUE ........ 13 THE GREAT FIRE .... ..... 23 THE SOUTH SEA BUBBLE . . . . . . .40 THE GORDON EIOTS ......... 51 THE CATO STREET CONSPIRACY ...... 61 PART II. &torie0 of jfamoug Localities? anfc THE DEVIL TAVERN ....-.. THE COCK LANE GHOST ..... HYDE PARK, AND ALL ABOUT IT DON PANTALEON SA PALL MALL THE STRAND THE SAVOY PALACE BOUND ABOUT ST. PAUL'S The Preaching Cross Paul's Walk Reminiscences FLEET STREET OLD LONDON BRIDGE: The Ferryman's Daughter . . . . . . . 150 The Passage-at-Arms ........ 160 10 CONTENTS. OLD LONDON BRIDOE, continued: The Pageant . ... T .... 168 Edward Osborne ......... 172 Headsiupon London Bridge ...... 173 THE TOWER : Historic Associations ........ 177 The Two Princes ......... 185 Lady Jane Grey ......... 207 Murder of Sir Thomas Overbury ...... 218 Lady Arabella Stuart ........ 220 Sir Walter Kaleigh ........ 225 Strafford and Archbishop Laud ...... 233 Colonel Blood ......... 240 Lady Nithisdale's Devotion ....... 249 Lords Balmerino and Kilmarnock ..... 252 Lord Lovat . ...... 257 Dynamite Explosion ........ 259 TOTHILL FIELDS : A Strange Combat .... ... 261 PART III. of Crime ant Mi BEAT ........... 269 DUKE OF HAMILTON'S DUEL WITH LOBD MOHUN . . 277 THE POOR PLAYER ......... 281 RICHARD SAVAGE ......... 288 LORD CAMELFORD'S FATAL DUEL ...... 292 LORD FERRERS ........... 298 A REMINISCENCE OF DYOT STREET ..... 303 NEWGATE : ITS ASSOCIATIONS : Old Patch .......... 305 Dr. Dodd and Henry Fauntleroy ... .321 A TERRIBLE CRIME ... .... 336 MURDER OF LORD WILLIAM RUSSELL ..... 340 THE ITALIAN BOY . 343 PART I. of %'0tonc feceneg anto tonj uf Angel of Destruction was abroad, and shook -- from his sweeping pinions the infection of the Plague. The month of June, in 1665, came in with a heat like that of a furnace. The previous spring had been remarkable for its want of moisture. The summer followed with a drought not less remarkable. The skies, day after day, were filled with the glory of the sunshine, and the flowers in the gardens and the grass in the meadows withered in the excessive heat. In the winter and spring men's minds had been disturbed by the appearance of strange meteoric phenomena ; and the great comet (as Bishop Burnet says) raised the apprehensions of those who did not enter into just speculations concerning these matters. Gossipping Pepys notes in his Diary that June 7th was the hottest day he had ever felt in his life. And then he adds the words of ill omen: "This day, much against my will, I did in Drury Lane see two or three houses marked with a red cross upon the doors, and ' Lord, have mercy upon us ' writ there ; which was a sad sight for me, being the first of the kind that to my remembrance I ever saw." Not that the red cross was an unfamiliar sign to the people of London. The insanitary conditions of the crowded city, huddled between the Thames and the northern heights, 14 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. and unprovided with any system of drainage, made it the happy hunting-ground of pestilence and disease. In 1 636, the Plague, coming from Europe, had carried off ten thousand victims ; and it continued its devastations annually down to 1647. Then there had been a cessation an interval of comparative immunity; but in 1665 it was destined to reappear with so hideous an intensity that the memory of it lingers to this day. Ask any person to repeat the principal events of Charles II.'s reign, and it is certain that among them he will name the Great Plague. Whatever else he forgets, he will not forget that. The Destroying Angel struck down its first victim in the city in the house of Dr. Barnett, a physician, in Fenchurch Street. With laudable self-sacrifice the doctor hastened to display on his door the red cross, which, as a sign that his house was infected, immediately doomed him to solitariness and isolation, and cut him off from his neighbours and neighbourly acts of kindness. This enforced solitude, in the midst of disease and death, was a frightful punishment. George Withers, the poet, who, during the plague of 1625, had undergone it, describes it with a keen recollection of its pains : " My chamber entertained me all alone, And in the rooms adjoining lodged none. Yet through the darksome silent night did fly Sometime an uncouth noise ; sometime a cry ; And sometime mournful callings pierced my room, Which came, I neither knew from whence, nor whom. And oft, betwixt awaking and asleep, Their voices who did talk, or pray, or weep, Unto my list'ning ears a passage found, And troubled me by their uncertain sound." But the fell disease had appeared some time previously in THE STORY OF THE GREAT PLAGUE. 15 what was then the suburban parish of St. Giles's-in-the- Fields, an Order in Council, dated April 26th, directing certain measures to be taken there for arresting its progress. These, of course, proved futile ; and the contagion extended eastward. While there was yet time to escape, the rich and the idle began to hurry into the country. An evil example was set by the King and his Court, who fled from London in July, and retired to Salisbury, leaving the capital in charge of Monk Duke of Albemarle, who faced the Plague as composedly as he had faced the Dutch. Thereafter a deep despondency settled down upon the inhabitants, whose gloom was increased by the stringent restrictions imposed upon all acts of neighbourliness and good-fellowship. Business was suspended, and nearly all locomotion ; trade and commerce were practically at an end. On June 21st Pepys writes : "I find all the town almost going out of town ; the coaches and waggons being all full of people going into the country," where, I need hardly say, they were by no means welcome, each new-comer being regarded as a possible source of infection. "How fearful," writes Richard Baxter, " people were thirty or forty, if not an hundred, miles from London, of anything that they bought from any mercer's or draper's shop, or of any person that came to their houses ! How they would shut their doors against their friend ; and if a man passed over the fields, how one would avoid another, as we did in the time of wars ; and how every man was a terror to another ! " The selfishness latent in human nature came conspicuously to the surface under these terrible conditions. The sick were left to suffer and die unattended ; even the ministers of religion, with too few exceptions, took fright at the red 16 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. cross. " London," says Defoe, " might well be said to be all in tears; the mourners did not go about the streets, indeed, for nobody put on black, or make a formal dress of mourning for their nearest friends, but the voice of mourning was truly heard in the streets; the shrieks of women and children at the windows and doors of their houses, where their nearest relatives were perhaps dying or just dead, were so frequent to be heard, as we passed the streets, that it was enough to pierce the stoutest heart in the world to hear them. Tears and lamentations were seen in almost every house, especially in the first part of the visitation, for towards the latter end men's hearts were hardened, and death was so always before their eyes that they did not so much concern themselves for the loss of their friends, expecting that themselves should be summoned the next hour." Daniel Defoe's " Journal of the Plague Year " is a terribly realistic narrative. In one sense it is fictitious, for he was a child of four years in 1665, and could not have seen the sights he describes as if from personal observation ; but in substance it may be accepted as authentic, for it is evidently based upon the relations he had gathered from the lips of survivors. Another very striking account is that which we owe to one of the Nonconforming clergy, the Rev. Thomas Vincent, who bravely stuck to the post of duty in the plague-stricken city. Writing in August, when the deaths were four and five thousand a week, he says : " Now people fall as thick as the leaves in autumn when they are shaken by a mighty wind. Now there is a dismal solitude in London streets ; every day looks with the face of a Sabbath Day, observed with a greater solemnity than it used to be in this city. Now shops aie shut in, people rare, THE STORY OF THE GREAT PLAGUE. 17 and very few that walk about, insomuch that the grass begins to spring up in some places, and a deep silence in every place, especially within the walls. No prancing horses, no rattling coaches, no calling in customers or offering wares, no London cries sounding in the ears. If any voice be heard, it is the groans of dying persons breathing forth their last, and the funeral knells of those that are ready to be carried to their graves. Now shutting up of visited houses (there being so many) is at an end, and most of the well are mingled among the sick, which otherwise would have got no help. Now, in some places, where the people did generally stay, not one house in a hundred but what is affected, and in many houses half the family is swept away; in some, from the eldest to the youngest : few escape but with the death of one or two. Never did so many husbands and wives die together ; never did so many parents carry their children with them to the grave, and go together into the same house under the earth, who had lived together in the same house upon it. Now the nights are too short to bury the dead ; the whole day, though at so great a length, is hardly sufficient to light the dead that fall therein into their graves." London, as I have hinted, was virtually put into quaran- tine by the terrified rustics, who, at a distance of even forty and fifty miles from the capital, were afraid to purchase anything that came from its marts, or to allow any of its inhabitants to enter their houses. Even in the city itself, business transactions were conducted with the nicest pre- cautions. Persons who bought a joint of meat in the market would not receive it from the butcher's hands, but took it off the hooks themselves. On the other hand, the butcher would not touch their money, but required them 2 18 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. to drop it into a jar of vinegar which he kept for the purpose. The buyers took care to carry small coins to make up any odd sum, that they!might be under no necessity of taking change. In their hands were bottles filled with scents and perfumes, and every other precaution was em- ployed against infection that ingenuity could invent or money purchase. But as these were not available for the poor, they had to run all hazards as best they could. As is always the case, the grotesque mingled with the terrible, and quacks did a large business in " the only true plague- water " and " the infallible preventive pills." Among those who neglected their duty during this sharp experience were, unfortunately, the national clergy " most of the Conforming ministers," says Baxter, " leaving their flocks in the hour of most urgent need ; " but the Nonconforming clergy remained steadfastly at the post of danger, which was also the post of honour. Though prohibited by a penal law, they made their way into the empty pulpits, preached to the scanty congregations who had the courage to assemble and listen to them, visited the sick, and relieved the distressed. As the fashionable physicians followed the example of the clergy, we may reasonably suppose that the professional classes, like the higher, had been emasculated and degraded by the corrupt influences of the Court. Some of the incidents recorded by Pepys have a peculiarly grim character. On August 2nd, as he went on his way to Deptford, his journey was shortened by a Mr. Mann's narrative of a Mr. John Wright's maid-servant, who, having been smitten with the Plague, was removed to an outhouse, under charge of a nurse, but, during the latter's temporary absence, got out of the window and ran away. " The nurse coming and THE STORY OF THE GREAT PLAGUE. 19 knocking, and having no answer, believed she was dead, and went and told Mr. Wright so; who and his lady were, in a great strait what to do to get her buried. At last, resolved to go to Burntwood [Brentwood] hard by, being in the parish, and there get people to do it. But they would not ; so he went home full of trouble, and in the way met the wench walking over the common, which frighted him worse than before, and was forced to send people to take her, which he did ; and they got one of the pest-coaches, and put her into it, to carry her to a pest-house. And, passing in a narrow lane, Sir Anthony Browne, with his brother and some friends in a coach, met this coach with the curtains drawn close. The brother, being a young man, and believing there might be some lady in it that would not be seen, and the way being narrow, he thrust his head out of his own into her coach, and there saw somebody looking very ill, and in a silk dress, and struck mightily." Is not this a ghastly picture ? On another August evening he goes from Brentford to Queenhithe, for he cannot induce his waterman to take him elsewhere, for fear of the Plague. " Thence," he says, with a lanthorn in great fear of meeting " dead corpses " on their way to the grave pits but happily he meets none, though the glimmer of torchlight, indicating the progress of a funeral party, is visible now and then in the distance. Afterwards he walks to Greenwich. In his path he comes upon a coffin with a dead body in it, a victim of the epidemic, lying in an open door because there is no one to give it burial ; though the parish has set a watch all day and night to prevent any person from approaching it. " This disease," he exclaims, " makes us harder to one another than we are to dogs ! " 20 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. On August 3rd he records that everybody's looks and discourse in the street are of death and nothing else, and that so few people are going up and down that the town is like a place distressed and forsaken. And on the following day he writes that 6,104 persons died of the Plague in London " this week." At least, that is the number reported, but there is reason to believe the actual number was nearly ten thousand ; partly from the poor that could not be taken notice of, and partly from the Quakers and others who would not have any bell rung for them. There can be little doubt that the very precautions taken to prevent the spread of the contagion tended to increase its virulence. The terror-stricken aspect of the city and its appalling gloom, the isolation of sufferers, the conversion of houses into so many little fortresses shut up and barricaded against the invisible enemy, the rattle of the death-carts and the clang of the death-bells and the cry " Bring out your dead ! " the entire extinction of every public interest and amusement, so that the popular mind was incessantly and continuously directed towards the subject of the Plague and its attendant horrors, were just the conditions under which an epidemic flourishes, because they scare the timid and the feeble, and by acting injuriously on their nervous system predispose them to fall under its influence. It is well known that, when cholera has attacked the British army in India, its ravages have immediately been checked by putting the army in motion. The excitement of new duties, new interests, and new scenes has proved an effective prophylactic. Here I may introduce the story of the Drunken Piper, as related by Defoe. He says he heard it from one John Hayward, under-sexton of St. Stephen's, Coleman Street, THE STORY OF THE GEE AT PLAGUE. 21 and as it is told by other authorities with some slight variation, we may accept it, I think, as authentic. " The fellow was not blind," says Defoe (as he is sometimes said to have been), " but an ignorant, weak, poor man, and usually walked his rounds about ten o'clock at night, and went piping along from door to door, and the people usually took him in at the public-houses where they knew him, and would give him drink and victuals, and sometimes farthings ; and he, in return, would pipe and sing and talk simply, which diverted the people, and thus he lived. During the Plague the poor piper went about as usual, but was almost starved; and when anybody asked how he did, he would answer, ' the dead-cart had not taken him yet, but had promised to call for him next week ! ' It happened one night that this poor fellow, having been feasted more bountifully than common, fell fast asleep, and was laid all along upon the top of a bulk or stall, in the street near London Wall, towards Cripplegate, and that upon the same bulk or stall the people of some house hearing a bell, which they always rung before the cart came, had laid a body, really dead of the Plague, just by him, thinking, too, that this poor fellow had been a dead body as the other was, and laid there by some of the neighbours. " Accordingly, when John Hay ward, with his bell and the cart, came along, finding two dead bodies lie upon the stall, they took them up with the instruments they used, and threw them into the cart, and all this while the piper slept soundly. From hence they passed along, and took in other dead bodies, till, as honest John Hayward told me, they almost buried him alive in the cart, yet all this while he slept soundly. At length the cart came to the place where the bodies were to be thrown into the ground, which, as 22 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. I do remember, was at Mount Mill, and as the cart usually stopped some time before they were ready to shoot out the melancholy load they had in it, as soon as the cart stopped the fellow awakened, and struggled a little to get his head out from among the dead bodies, when raising himself up in the cart, he called out ' Hey ! where am I ? ' This frightened the fellow that attended about the work; but, after some pause, John Hayward, recovering himself, said, ' Lord, bless us ! there's somebody in the cart not quite dead.' So another called to him and said, ' Who are you ? ' The fellow answered, ' I am the poor piper. Where am I ? ' ' Where are you ? ' says Hayward ; ' why you are in the dead-cart, and we are a-going to bury you.' ' But I an't dead, though, am I ? ' says the piper, which made them laugh a little, though, as John said, they were heartily frightened at first ; so they helped the poor fellow down, and he went about his business." According to another version of the story, the piper, on coming to himself, " set up his pipes," and so terrified the buriers that they all ran away. As the cold weather approached, the epidemic rapidly decreased. Public confidence revived, shops were opened. The town filled again ; and the king and queen returned. By the end of April 1666 the Plague was virtually extinct, after having carried off upwards of a hundred thousand victims. WHOEVER has climbed the three hundred and forty-five steps of black marble which lead to its summit, and there, from the railed-in balcony or gallery, enjoyed the wonderful prospect it commands of our imperial city, will not readily forget the Monument, the lofty and shapely column erected by the citizens of London "in perpetual remem- brance" of the Great Fire of 1666. It is not, perhaps, a beautiful view ; one can hardly find much attractiveness in a congeries of house-tops, though the lines of many of the church spires and steeples (chiefly Sir Christopher Wren's) which soar above them are full of grace, and the swelling dome of St. Paul's is always an enchantment. It is scarcely sublime or magnificent ; but the mass of buildings so densely packed, and lying half -obscured in a sea of vapour, is, as I have said, wonderful. Looking eastward, our gaze rests, in the first place, on the grey keep of the Tower and the cloud of historic memories that seems to hover above it ; then we observe the Mint, the Custom House, and the throng of masts in the river. Immediately in front of us rises the graceful spire of St. Dunstan-in-the-East ; and beyond are more masts, and far away the green range of the low Kentish hills. Turning more to the south, our eyes run over the chimneys innumerable of Southwark and the lofty warehouses which line Bankside, recently lifted 24 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. into the region of romance by Mr. Walter Besant, and at all times dear to us from its associations with Shakespeare and the. great Elizabethans; while the lofty tower of St. Mary Overies forms a landmark not to be easily overlooked. Still pursuing our survey, we range up the misty Thames to the magnificent pile of Westminster's ancient Abbey, which holds so much honoured dust; we watch the progress of barge and steamer and wherry up and down the stream ; and we linger at the numerous bridges that connect the two vast sections of the world's metropolis. To the westward the great feature is, of course, St. Paul's, with its gracefully proportioned structure, surmounted by cupola and cross, rising apparently to an almost dizzy elevation, and finding a broad-spread foundation in the aggregate of houses crowded round it. On railway terminus and monster hotel and the terraced embankment we cannot tarry ; but com- plete our examination with a rapid glance over roofs and towers and spires to the northward, where the view is bounded by the rising grounds beyond Hampstead and Highgate, and in the north-east by the green breadths of Epping Forest. The Monument, as every schoolboy knows, to use a classic phrase, justified in this instance by its veracity, was the work of Sir Christopher Wren, and is a memorial of the Great Fire. It stands on the east side of New Fish Street Hill, on the site of St. Margaret's Church, which had perished in the conflagration. As it now stands, it does not reproduce Wren's original design, which, if carried, out would have given us a column somewhat inferior in dia- meter, but more appropriate to its purpose. " For, as the Romans expressed in relievo on the pedestals and round the shafts of their columns the history of such accidents and THE STORY OF THE GREAT FIRE. 25 incidents as were intended to be thereby commemorated, so this monument of the conflagration and restoration of the City of London was represented by a pillar in flames ; the flames blazing from the loopholes of the shaft (which were to give light to the stairs within) being figured in brass-work gilt ; and on the top there was a Phoenix rising from her ashes, in brass gilt likewise." Even in Wren's second design the present pillar an alteration was made by the authorities. Wren had intended to place on its summit a colossal statue, in brass gilt, of the King, as founder of the new city; or else the erect figure of a woman crowned with laurels, and holding a sword and cap of maintenance, as symbolical of the wealth and greatness of restored London. But Wren's employers took the flames from the sides of his column, and placed them on its top, in a kind of glorified bunch. The Monument was erected between 1676 and 1677, at an expense of about 14,500, and forms an elegant fluted column of stone, of the Doric order. Its height from the pavement, including the flaming crest, is 202 feet;* the pedestal is 40 feet high and 21 feet square; the plinth, 27 feet square. The greatest diameter of the interior shaft is 15 feet. On the completion of the Monument, Gibber, the sculptor of the two powerful allegorical figures on the gates of old Bedlam, was called in to adorn the west or front of the pedestal with appropriate sculpture ; but in this he was not successful. The design is confused; Charles II. figures in it, and there are three females, representing Liberty, Genius, and Science, and labourers and implements of * The exact distance, it is said, from the house where the Fire first broke out. 26 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. building, and newly-raised houses, and Envy underneath an arched cell blowing flames from his destructive jaws. On the north and south sides are inscriptions by Dr. Thomas Gale, Dean of York, describing the destruction of the city and its restoration ; on the east are the names of the lord mayors who held office during its erection ; underneath which was originally a fourth inscription, attributing the Great Fire to "the treachery and malice of the Popish faction." This was cut away during the reign of James II., and restored in that of William III. ; finally erased (January 26th, 1831), by order of the Corporation. It is to this inscription Pope refers in the well-known line : ..." where London's column, " Like a tall bully, lifts its head and lies." A scarce engraving, in the collection of the Society of Antiquarians, " printed and sold by W. Sherwin, att his shope in Barbican, next doore to y e Green Dragon," bears the following " poetical " inscription : " The Pickture of y most famous City of London, as it appeared in y e night ; in the Hight of its ruinous condition by Fire, Sept 2, 1666. " In Forty-one London was very sick Of Tumult and Disorder ; Lunatick. In Sixty-five (y Fatall Yeare) this City Was Plagued w th Tumours and had few to pity. " In this Prodigious Yeare, a Burning Fever Did seize our Mother and of Breath bereave her : She both in Lechery (and Flames) did Burne ; Her ashes lye in a neglected Vrne, " Till that her Sons doe expiate her Crime By serving King and Country in this time. However, her Scorched Carkas don't dispise ; A Phoenix from her ashes will arise." THE STORY OF THE GREAT FIRE. 27 Melancholy associations cling to the Monument from the number of unhappy persons who at different times have committed suicide by throwing themselves from its gallery. The sad list runs as follows : William Green, weaver, June 26th, 1750; John Craddock, baker, July 7th, 1780; Lyon Levy, diamond merchant, January 18th, 1810; and three others at more recent dates. The belief, very generally entertained, that the Fire was the result of a Roman Catholic conspiracy and combination rested upon no satisfactory basis. The statements circulated to the effect that houses widely distant from one another had broken suddenly into flames, from no apparent cause, were unsupported by any credible authority. At the time a very strong feeling existed against Roman Catholics, of which not a few pestilent knaves were prompt to take advantage, some of them going so far as to assert that they had seen men throwing fire-balls into houses. A young man named Robert Herbert, son of a watchmaker of Rouen, who was arrested in Essex and sent to Newgate, confessed that he had begun the Fire, and persisted in his confession to his death for he was hung upon no other evidence, though it is tolerably certain that it sprang from his imagination. Bishop Burnet says he gave so broken an account of the whole matter that he was^^hought mad ; yet he was blindfolded, he says, and carried to several places of the city, and at each, his eyes being set free, he was asked if that were the place, but answered in the negative ; and this reply he repeated until he was brought to the spot where the Fire had actually broken out, when he immediately recognised it. In this there was nothing wonderful. Everybody in London must have been familiar with the whereabouts of the origin of the great Fire that 28 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. had cost them so dear. And, according to Lord Clarendon, neither the judges nor any persons present at the trial believed the man guilty, but that he was a poor distracted wretch, weaiy of his life, who chose to part with it in this way. Yet the jury declared against him, and the king and the judges allowed him to be executed ! A dreadful judicial murder; for it seems to me beyond doubt that the un- fortunate man, who was obviously insane, did not land in England " till two days after the fire." The conclusion is, that there is not only no proof that the Roman Catholics brought about the conflagration, but that the proof is all the other way ; nor is it easy to see what advantage they could have hoped to have derived from the destruction of the capital of their country, in which all their commercial interests centred. In the Diary of John Evelyn, under the date of Sunday, September 2nd, 1666, we read: "This fatal night, about ten, began that deplorable fire near Fish Street, in London." On that same night, or rather at three o'clock next morning, Mr. Pepys was standing in his night-gown at his bedroom window in Seething Lane, and, from the glare and glow of the western sky, judging the fire was some distance off, felt sufficiently relieved to go to bed again and to sleep. " About seven^ rose again to dress myself, and then looked out of the window, and saw the fire not so much as it was, and further off. . . . By-and-bye Jane comes and tells me that she hears that above three hundred houses have been burned down to-night by the fire we saw, and that it is now burning down all Fish Street, by London Bridge. So I made myself ready presently, and walked to the Tower, and there up upon one of the high places, Sir. J. Robinson's little son going up with me ; and there I did see the houses THE STORY OF THE GREAT FIRE. 29 at that end of the bridge all on fire, and an infinite great fire on this and the other side the end of the bridge." The Fire which in so short a period of time had accom- plished such a work of destruction first broke out in the house of Farryner, the king's baker, in Pudding Lane, near the Tower. Impelled by a strong east wind, it made rapid progress, finding ample material in the thatched roofs and timber-built houses, which the long summer heat had dried up like timber ; and facilitated by the narrowness of the streets, where the buildings of the opposite sides were but a few feet apart. During Monday, the 3rd, the raging, roaring flames leaped and bounded voraciously from Tower Street eastward to Middle Temple westward, including Tower Street, Fenchurch Street, Gracechurch Street, Cheap- side, St. Paul's Churchyard, Fleet Street, the Old Bailey, Ludgate Hill, Warwick Lane, Newgate, Paul's Chain, Watling Street, Thames Street, and Billingsgate. By Tuesday, the 4th, they had reached the end of Fetter Lane in Holborn, and the entrance of Smithfield ; but by that time the wind had somewhat abated, and active measures weie taken to stay the conflagration, by blowing up houses, and creating gaps which it was unable to overleap. On the 6th it virtually came to an end at Pye Corner, in Giltspur Street. The total of its work of destruction is thus summed up : " Fjighty-nine churches, the city gates, Guildhall, many public structures, hospitals, schools, libraries, a vast number of stately edifices, thirteen thousand two hundred dwelling- houses, four hundred streets ; of twenty-six wards it utterly destroyed fifteen, and left eight others shattered and half- burnt. The ruins of the city were four hundred and thirty- six acres from the Tower by the Thames side to the Temple Church, and from the north-east gate along the City Wall 30 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. to Holborn Bridge. To the estates and fortunes of the citizens it was merciless, but to their lives very favourable (only eight being lost), that it might in all things resemble the last conflagration of the world." The limits of the devastated area may thus be defined : Temple Church, Holborn Bridge, Pye Corner, Smithfield, Aldersgate, Cripple- gate, near the end of Coleman Street, at the end of Ba sing- hall Street by the Postern, at the upper end of Bishopsgate Street, in Leadenhall Street, by the Standard in Cornhill, at the church in Fenchurch Street, by the Clothworkers' Hall, at the middle of Mark Lane, and at the Tower Dock. The part of the city left standing within the walls contained eleven parishes, occupying an area of seventy-five acres. To such small proportions did the Great Fire reduce our unfortunate city, which, only a few months before, had suffered under the deadly breath of the Plague ! The lurid clouds of flame and smoke driving in thick currents over so wide a tract ; the hissing, groaning, clanging, crackling, seething noises of the fire ; the shivering and splintering of floors and partitions ; the heavy crash of roofs and walls; the dull thud of falling timbers; the spattering of drops of fire in all directions ; the awful glare that took a hundred colours against the shifting background of the vapour-veiled skies, these combined to form a scene of horror and desolation which was never forgotten by those who looked upon it. From the reports of con- temporary spectators we can easily gather up the principal features of this amazing panorama of ruin, and at the same time apprehend the depth of the impression they produced. And first let us accompany Mr. Pepys to gaze at London on Fire. Taking a boat at the Tower Stairs, we proceed slowly up THE STORY OF THE GREAT FIRE. 31 the river, which runs redly in the reflection of the houses burning all along the waterside. Distracted people hurry to get their little property on board the lighters moored to the quays and wharves ; and meanwhile no effort is being made, and perhaps just now none is possible, to check the course of the terror, men's minds being temporarily over- whelmed by the magnitude of such a disaster. By-and-bye, when off Paul's Wharf, we fall in with the royal barge, carrying the King and the Duke of York. Their presence seems to restore the spirits of the people, whom they set to work to demolish a number of houses, but who are soon driven back by the never-ceasing advance of the flames. By this time the river is crowded with boats and barges taking in goods; and we note that one boat in three has always a pair of virginals among its heterogeneous cargo, so great is the Londoner's love of music. 'Tis a fine, warm evening, and, fascinated by the awe and mystery of the swift-sweeping destruction, we linger on the stream until late, though the sparks fall about us like a rain of fire. It is curious to see the flames leap up from a burning house, and then, borne onward by the wind, swoop down upon another, many yards distant, which immediately leaps into a blaze in its turn. As in many streets the houses are all of wood, with thatched roofs, while those in Thames Street are stored with oil and brandy, and pitch and tar, we do not, on reflection, wonder at the immense impetus the fire has obtained. As night comes on, we land at a little alehouse on Bankside, and there sit at the door, and watch the fire growing in corners and upon steeples, and between churches and houses, as far as we can see up the hill of the city, " in a most horrid, malicious, bloody flame, not like the fire-flame of an ordinary fire." 32 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. And now let us listen to Mr. Evelyn's narrative of the sights he saw on the same memorable night : " The fire having continued all this night (if I may call that night which was as light as day for ten miles round about, after a dreadful manner), when co-inspiring with a fierce eastern wind in a very 'dry season, I went on foot to the same place, and saw the whole south part of the city burning from Cheapside to the Thames, and all along Cornhill (for it kindled back against the wind as well as forward), Tower Street, Fenchurch Street, Gracious [Gracechurch] Street, and so along to Baynard's Castle, and was now taking hold of St. Paul's Church, to which the scaffolds contributed exceedingly. The conflagration was so universal, and the people so astonished, that from the beginning, I know not by what despondency or fate, they hardly stirred to quench it, so that there was nothing heard or seen 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 street to street, at great distances one from the other ; for the heat, with a long set of fair and warm weather, had even ignited the air, and prepared the materials to receive the fire, which devoured after an incredible manner houses, furniture, and everything. Here we saw the Thames covered with goods floating, all the barges and boats laden with what some had time and courage to save, as, on the other, the carts, etc., carrying out to the fields, which for many miles were strewed with movables of all sorts, and tents erecting to shelter both THE STORY OF THE GREAT FIRE. 33 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 he outdone till the universal conflagration. All the sky 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, nor seeing above ten thousand houses all in one flame ; the noise and cracking and thunder of the impetuous flames, the shrieking of women and children, the hurry of people, the fall of towers, houses, and churches, was like an hideous storm, and the air all about so hot and inflamed that at last one was not able to approach it, so that they were forced to stand still and let the flames burn on, which they did for near two miles in length and one in breadth. The clouds of smoke were dismal, and reached upon computation near fifty miles in length. Thus I left it this afternoon burning, a resemblance of Sodom of the Last Day. London was, but is no more." The Rev. Thomas Vincent, in his tract entitled " God's Terrible Advice to the City by Plague and Fire," observes that the smoke-cloud was of such extent that travellers at noonday rode six miles at a stretch in the shadow of it. We owe to this writer a very powerful image : " The burning," he says, " was then in fashion of a bow ; a dreadful bow it was, such as mine eyes never before had seen ; a bow which had God's arrow in it with a flaming point." On the 5th the Fire moved towards Whitehall, throwing the Court into a state of great excitement. It is mere justice to admit that the King and the Duke of York on this occasion set an admirable example, visiting the worst 3 34 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. scenes, restoring confidence and courage by their composed behaviour, and expediting the adoption of measures for checking the conflagration. The river authorities, recovering their presence of mind, adopted the advice which some seamen had proffered at the outset, and blew up a number of houses so as to make wide and open spaces which the flames could not overpass. "It now pleased God," says Evelyn, "by abating the wind, and by the industry of the people, infusing a new spirit into them, that the fury of it began sensibly to abate about noon, so as it came no further than the Temple westward, nor than the entrance of Smithfield north ; but continued all this day and night so impetuous towards Cripplegate and the Tower as made us all despair : it also broke out again in the Temple, but the courage of the multitude persisting, and many houses being blown up, such gaps and desolations were soon made, as with the former three days' consumption, the back fire did not so vehemently rage upon the rest as previously. There was yet no standing near the burning and glaring ruins by near a furlong's space." The poor inhabitants were dispersed about St. George's Fields, and Moorfields as far as Highgate; over an area several miles in circle ; some under tents, some under miserable huts and hovels, many without a rug or any necessary utensils, bed or board, who, " from delicateness, riches, and easy accommodations in stately and well-furnished houses, were now reduced to extremest misery and poverty. " In this calamitous condition I returned with a sad heart to my house, blessing and adoring the mercy of God to me and mine, who in the midst of all this ruin was like Lot, in my little Zoar, safe and sound." On the 6th Mr. Pepys was up about five o'clock, and THE STOUT OF THE GREAT FIRE. 35 went with his men to Bishopsgate, which had hitherto escaped, but had at length been invaded by the destroyer. By dint of strenuous exertions, however, the flames were got under. " It was pretty to see how hard the women did work in the cannells [kennels], sweeping of water ; but then they would scold for drink and be as drunk as devils. I saw good butts of sugar broke open in the street, and people give and take handfuls out and put into beer and drink it. And now all being pretty well, I took boat, and over to Southwark, and took boat on the other side of the bridge, and so to Westminster, thinking to shift myself, being all in dirt from top to bottom, but could not then find any place to buy a shirt or a pair of gloves, Westmin- ster Hall being full of people's goods, those in Westminster having removed all their goods, and the Exchequer money put into vessels to carry to Nonsuch ; but to the Swan, and there was trimmed ; and then to Whitehall, but saw nobody, and so home. A sad sight to see how the river looks ; no houses nor church near it, to the Temple, where it (the Fire) stopped." To relieve the privations of the homeless, liberal offerings were made by the King, the nobility, the clergy, and the wealthier citizens. Collections were organised in those parts of the city which had escaped the awful visitation, and a system of daily relief was instituted. At one time there seemed imminent danger of famine; but the Bang issued proclamations calling upon the country people to bring in supplies of provisions; while the victims of the Fire were induced to abandon their ruined tenements by an Order in Council that they should be at liberty to pursue their occupations in all towns and villages, a guarantee being given that this license should entail no material 36 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. burden upon parishes. One would suppose that small temptation was needed to quit a scene so desolate and dispiriting ! Most of us are familiar with the bleak and cheerless aspect of the ruin caused by fire, with the un- utterable sadness of the shattered, blackened walls, the confused masses of wreckage and dilapidation, the silence and gloom where but a few hours before all was life, mirth, and domestic order. Think of this pitiful spectacle extended over so wide an area as was covered by the Great Fire ! " It was a sight," says Richard Baxter, " that might have given any man a lively sense of the vanity of this world, and all the wealth and glory of it, and of the future conflagration of all the world. To see the flames mount up towards heaven, and proceed so furiously without re- straint ; to see the streets filled with people astonished, that had scarce sense left them to lament their own calamity ; to see the fields filled with heaps of goods ; and sumptuous buildings, ruinous rooms, costly furniture, and household stuff, yea, warehouses and furnished shops and libraries, all on a flame, and none durst come near to receive anything; to see the King and nobles ride about the streets, beholding all these desolations, and none could afford the least relief; to see the air as far as could be beheld, so filled with the smoke, that the sun shone through it with a colour like blood ; yea, even when it was setting in the west, it so appeared to them that dwelt on the west side of the city. But the dolefullest sight of all was afterwards, to see what a ruinous confused place the city was, by chimnies and steeples only standing in the midst of cellars and heaps of rubbish ; so that it was hard to know where the streets had been, and dangerous, of a long time, to pass through the ruins, because of vaults and fire THE STORY OF THE GREAT FIRE. 37 in them. No man that seeth not such a thing can have a right apprehension of the dreadfulness of it." In his poem of " Annus Mirabilis," Dryden concludes a vivid, if rhetorical, description of the Great Fire with a reference to the popular superstition which associated and the Plague with the appearance of two comets : " The utmost malice of the stars is past, And two dire comets, which have scourged the town, In their own Plague and Fire have breathed their last. Or dimly in their sinking sockets frown." One great blessing the Fire conferred upon the people of London, it so cleansed and purified their city that it knew the Plague no more. The work of re-building was begun with promptitude and carried on with energy. So rapid was its progress that in four years ten thousand houses were erected. Under the careful direction of a special commission, consisting of the principal judges, the unfortunate citizens evicted by the conflagration were restored as nearly as possible to their proper lands or situations. Funds were provided by the imposition of a tax of one shilling on every chaldron of coals brought into the Port of London. And the direc- tion of operations was entrusted to the genius of Doctor, afterwards Sir Christopher, Wren, who was appointed Surveyor General and Principal Architect for re-building the whole city. Unfortunately his magnificent plan, which would have given us a capital unequalled in the world for conveniency and beauty, was not adopted; though his energy prevailed over official obstruction and private greed to a considerable extent, and the new London was vastly superior to the old. Among the public buildings which illustrate his fertility 38 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. of resource, and justify his claim to be considered the greatest of English architects, must be named St. Paul's Cathedral, the Monument, the Custom House, Temple Bar, Chelsea Hospital, and the following city churches (four and fifty in number) : Allhallows the Great, Upper Thames Street, 1683; All- hallows the Great, Bread Street, 1684; Allhallows the Great, Lombard Street, 1694 ; St. Alban's, Wood Street, 1695; St. Andrew's, Holborn, 1687; St. Andrew's, Black- friars, 1692 ; St. Anne and St. Agnes, Aldersgate, 1680 ; St. Antholin's, Budge Row, 1682 ; St. Augustine and St. Faith, Watling Street, 1682; St. Bartholomew's, Royal Exchange, 1679; St. Bennet, Gracechurch Street, 1685; St. Bennet and St. Peter, Paul's Wharf, 1683; St. Benet Fink, Threadneedle Street, 1673; St. Bride, Fleet Street, 1680; Christ Church, Newgate Street, 1687; St. Christopher-le- Stock, 1671; St. Clement Danes, 1682; St. Clement, Eastcheap, 1686 ; St. Dionis Backchurch, Fenchurch Street, 1674; St. Dunstan-in-the-East, 1668; St. Edmund, Lom- bard Street, 1690; St. George, Botolph Lane, 1677; St. James, Garlickhithe, 1683; St. James, Westminster, 1683; St. Lawrence Jewry, 1677; St. Magnus, London Bridge, 1676; St. Margaret Pattens, Road Lane, 1687; St. Margaret, Lothbury, 1690 ; St. Martin, Ludgate, 1684; St. Mary Abchurch, 1686 ; St. Mary, Aldermanbury, 1677; St. Mary Aldermary, Bow Lane, 1711 ; St. Mary-le- Bow, Cheapside, 1673; St. Mary Magdalen, Old Fish Street, 1685 ; St. Mary Somerset, Thomas Street, 1695 ; St. Mary- at-Hill, Billingsgate, 1672; St. Mary Woolnoth, Lombard Street, 1677 ; St. Matthew, Friday Street, 1685 ; St. Michael Bassishaw, Basinghall Street, 1679 ; St. Michael, Queenhithe, 1677; St. Michael, Cornhill, 1672; St. Michael, Crooked THE STORY OF THE GREAT FIRE. 39 Lane, 1688; St. Michael's, Paternoster Royal, College Hill, 1694; St. Michael, Wood Street, 1675; St. Mildred, Bread Street, 1683; St. Mildred, Poultry, 1676; St. Nicholas Cold Abhey, 1677 ; St. Olave, Old Jewry, 1676 ; St. Peter, Corn- hill, 1681; St. Sepulchre, Snow Hill, 1674; St. Stephen's, Walbrook, 1676; St. Stephen, Coleman Street, 1676; St. Swithin, Cannon Street, 1679; St. Vedast, Foster Lane, Old Fish Street, 1678. aft 4 11 READER," says Charles Lamb, in one of his Essays, "in thy passage from the Bank, where thou hast been receiving thy half-yearly dividends (supposing thou art a lean annuitant like myself), to the Flower Pot,* to secure a place for Dalston or Shacklewell, or some other thy suburban retreat northerly, didst thou never observe a melancholy-looking, handsome brick and stone edifice, to the left, where Threadneedle Street abuts upon Bishopsgate ? I dare say thou hast often admired its magnificent portals, ever gaping wide, and disclosing to view a grave court, with cloisters and pillars, with few or no traces of goers-in or comers-out, a desolation something like Balclutha's.t This was once a house of trade, a centre of busy interests. The throng of merchants was here, the quick pulse of gain, and here some forms of business are still kept up, though the soul be long since fled. There are still to be seen stately porticoes, imposing staircases, offices roomy as the state apartments in palaces, deserted or thinly peopled with a few straggling clerks; the still more sacred interiors of * The Flower Pot, in Bishopsgate Street, was the well-known inn from which started the suburban coaches for the north-eastern suburbs of London. t Ossian sings, "I passed by the walls of Balclutha, and they were desolate." THE STORY OF THE SOUTH SEA BUBBLE. 41 court and committee rooms, with venei'able faces of beadles, doorkeepers, directors seated in form on solemn days (to proclaim a dead dividend), at long worm-eaten tables that have been mahogany, with tarnished gilt -leather coverings, supporting massy silver inkstands long since dry; the oaken wainscots hung with pictures of deceased governors and sub -governors, of Queen Anne and the two first monarchs of the Brunswick dynasty ; huge charts, which subsequent discoveries have antiquated; dusty maps of Mexico, dim as dreams, and soundings of the Bay of Panama ! The long passages hung with buckets, appended in idle rows to walls whose substance might defy any short of the last conflagration ; with vast ranges of cellarage under all, where dollars and pieces of eight once lay, an ' unsummed heap,' for Mammon to have solaced his solitary heart withal long since dissipated or scattered into air at the blast of the breaking of the famous [or infamous] BUBBLE ! " In Doctor Johnson's " Lives of the Poets," those master- pieces of biography and criticism which are now, I venture to say, too little read, we are told that the poet Gay, having been presented with some South Sea Stock, at one time supposed himself to be the happy possessor of .20,000, a sum on which any poet or man of letters nowadays might conceive himself to be " passing rich." His friends urged him to sell his shares while there was a good market for them, but he was involved in golden dreams from which he refused to be awakened. He was importuned to sell at least as much as would secure him an annuity of one hundred a year, " which," said the practical-minded Fenton, " will make you sure of a clean shirt and a shoulder of mutton every day." The prudent counsel was ignored ; both interest and 42 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. principal were lost ; and Gay sank under his calamity so low that even his life was endangered. There is, of course, a moral in this anecdote; there are two morals, perhaps, or three, and always must be in such Alnaschar-like catastrophes ; but I have a great dislike to " drawing morals," which the judicious reader can do for himself, and for the injudicious it would be useless to take the trouble. I pass on, therefore, to tell the story of the disastrous speculation in which Gay's hopes were so rudely shattered, the speculation known in history by the happy designation which the popular judgment applied to it of " the South Sea Bubble ; " the most colossal ever foisted upon a credulous public, with the exception of Law's French Mississippi scheme, until M. de Lesseps projected his Panama Canal. The origin of the South Sea Company may be traced to Harley, Earl of Oxford, who, in 1711, conceived the idea of rehabilitating the national credit by forming a company to take up the floating debts of the nation, amounting to nearly ten millions of money. An association of merchants agreed to become responsible for them, upon the Government undertaking to secure them for a certain period an interest of 6 per cent. ; and, accordingly, the duties upon wines, vinegar, Indian goods, tobacco, and some other articles were made over for this purpose, and declared permanent. The public creditors were induced to throw their claims into the fund by the promise of a monopoly of the trade to the Spanish possessions in America, from which much was expected, but little received, and the Association, being incorporated by Act of Parliament, received the title of the South Sea Company, and began business in the loftiest spirit imaginable. THE STORY OF THE SOUTH SEA BUBBLE. 43 On opening the session of 1717, the King, in his speech from the throne, dwelt emphatically on the necessity of adopting measures to reduce the National Debt, though it was then a trifling affair compared with the enormous burden which now presses on the resources of the people. The South Sea directors, through their leader, Sir John Blunt, immediately laid a proposal before Government to liquidate the entire National Debt in twenty-six years, if all the national funds were consolidated into one, if they obtained certain commercial privileges, and if they were empowered to include by purchase or subscription both the redeemable and irredeemable National Debt. " The National Debt," says Mr. Lecky, " consisted partly of redeemable funds, which might be paid off whenever money could be found for that purpose; and partly of irredeemable ones, which could not be paid without the consent of the proprietors. The directors of the Company proposed, by purchase or subscription, to absorb both kinds of debt, and they anticipated that the advantages they could offer were such that they could make arrangements with the proprietors of the irredeemable annuities for the conversion of these latter into redeemable funds, that they could consolidate the different funds into a single stock, that at the end of seven years they could reduce the interest on the National Debt from 5 to 4 per cent., and that by the profits of a company so greatly enlarged, and so closely connected with the Government, they could establish a large Sinking Fund for paying off the National Debt." It is possible that the project was conceived in perfect good faith, but its radical unsoundness ought to have been clear to any impartial observer. It was based upon entirely conjectural premises ; and the Company proposed to under- 44 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. take vast engagements without any resource to fall back upon in case its anticipations were unfulfilled. At the very time that its directors were making this offer, their books showed only .574,500 worth of stock, and of this not more than ,30,000 was real ; all the remainder being assigned, without any value received, to the directors, to influential personages at Court, and to members of the Government whom it was desirable to bribe. It was, therefore, a gigantic gambling speculation, and open to the strongest moral as well as financial objections. The Bank of England submitted a counter-proposition, whereupon the Company modified and enlarged their terms. A bill was then introduced into the House of Commons in order to give legislative effect to the bargain. Sir Robert Walpole opposed it strongly, on the ground that it would encourage the dangerous practice of stock-jobbing, and divert the genius of the nation from the legitimate pursuits of trade and industry. It held 'out a dangerous lure to decoy the unwary to their ruin, inducing them to part with the earnings of their labour for a prospect of imaginary wealth. And he pointed out that the main principle of the project was dishonest ; since it depended for its success on an artificial value being given to the stock by stimulating the speculative temper of the public, and by promising dividends out of funds which could never be adequate to the purpose. All that Walpole said was very true and forcible ; but the Government was determined on passing the bill in which some of its members, as we have seen, had a large pecuniary interest and carried the third reading in the Commons by 172 votes to 55. In the Lords the minority was only 17. The royal assent was given to it on April 7th, 1720. THE STORY OF THE SOUTH SEA BUBBLE. 45 Every exertion was then made by the directors and their friends to raise the price of their stock. Extravagant reports were circulated of the dividends that would be earned. Stories of invaluable markets being discovered in that wide and indefinite region, the South Seas ; stories of mines of gold and silver as yet untouched, these were set afloat every day, until a mania for speculation possessed the public mind. Everybody rushed to invest their money in this wonderful Company's shares. Cornhill was blocked with equipages; Exchange Alley echoed with the din of crowds. Peers and peeresses, country squires, farmers, widows with small annuities, tradesmen with small savings, clergymen with small benefices, poets like Pope and Gay, ecclesiastical historians like Bingham, everybody who had too little and wanted enough, everybody who had enough and wanted more, joined in this mad race for wealth. Swift, comparing 'Change Alley to a gulf in the South Seas, says : " Subscribers here by thousands float, And jostle one another down, Each paddling in his leaky boat, And here they fish for gold, and drown. " Now buried in the depths below, Now mounted up to heaven again, They reel and stagger to and fro, At their wits' end, like drunken men. " Meantime secure on Garraway cliffs, A savage race,* by shipwrecks fed, Lie waiting for the foundered skiffs, And strip the bodies of the dead." * At Garraway's Coffee-house the brokers and others were ac- customed to meet and do business. 46 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. And well might it be so, when a company offered to pay dividends of 50 per cent., and sold its stock at a premium of 200 per cent. 200 per cent. ? Why, at one time it was 900 per cent., each 100 share fetching 1,000 in the market. The directors took advantage of the infatuation of the public to treble, and even quadruple, their capital ; and, excited with " the potentiality of wealth," indulged in the most offensive arrogance. " We have made them longs," said a politician, who was much too prudent to share in the general folly, " and they deal with everybody as their subjects ! " Those now living have seen the fatal tendency of specula- tion to multiply itself, like some species of ascidians; so that from the one delusion springs a thousand others. The temporary success of the South Sea scheme led to the initiation of a host of bubble projects, to which lords and dukes, and even the heir-apparent, were notrashamed to lend their countenance. As Pope puts it, " Statesmen and patriot ply alike the stocks, Peeress and butler share alike the box, And judges jib, and bishops bite the town, And mighty dukes pack cards for half-a-crown." At 'Change Alley, to diminish the rush within doors, tables were set up in the streets, and clerks provided to take the names of applicants. It was strange to see how the lust of wealth prevailed over political animosities and sectarian differences : Churchmen fraternised with Dissenters, Whigs hobnobbed with Tories, the gentleman of ancient lineage shook hands with the low-born speculator; every- body raved of shares, premiums, transfers, bills, loans, and subscriptions, the women loudest of all. In an old ballad we read, THE STORY OF THE SOUTH SEA HUBBLE. 47 " There stars and garters do appear Among the meaner rabble ; To buy and sell, to see and hear, The Jews and Gentiles squabble. . . . " Our greatest ladies hither come, And fly in chariot daily ; Oft pawned their jewels for a sum To venture in the Alley." Maitland gives a list of 156 bubble companies started by the ingenuity of the unscrupulous during the prevalence of this epidemic of speculation. Here are the titles of a few : For Making Deal Boards of Sawdust ; For Picking up Wrecks off" the Irish Coast; For Insurance against Losses by Servants [how many housewives would rejoice if such a company were in existence now !] ; For Making Salt Water Fresh ; Building of Hospitals for Bastards ; Building Ships against Pirates; For Extracting Oil from Sunflower Seed; For Improving Malt Liquor; For Recovery of Seamen's Wages; For Transmuting Quicksilver into a Fine Malleable Metal ; For Importing a Large Number of Jackasses from Spain [surely Great Britain already had its share !] ; For Trading in Human Hair ; For Fattening Hogs ; For Extracting Silver from Lead ; For a Wheel for Perpetual Motion ; and, most curious of all, For an Under- taking which shall, in due time, be Revealed ! This last would seem to have been suggested by the old nursery trick : " Open your mouth, and shut your eyes, and see what I will give you ! " For the confiding applicant was required to pay down ten guineas, on the understanding that at some future date (not named) he would receive 100 per annum for each share, and the mystery would then be revealed. One thousand fools were found to part 48 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. each with 2 as deposit money; and the projector, having thus easily collected .2,000, suddenly disappeared, and was heard of nevermore. In my opinion he deserved the money for having gauged so accurately the gullibility and greed of a certain class of his fellow-creatures. This swarming up of bubble companies at length alarmed the Government, and in July no fewer than eighty-six were summarily suppressed. But then, in their turn, the public took alarm. If one company were unsafe and fraudulent, why not another, why not even the great South Sea Company itself? Speculative purchasers, perceiving in what direction the wind was beginning to blow, hastened to sell out. Their example was speedily followed. The market was soon crowded with sellers. And as a necessary con- sequence the stock fell, lower, lower, lower, until, in the first week of September, it had dropped to 700. To restore confidence the directors called a meeting on the 8th, and some brave words were spoken; but when a bladder has once been pricked, " all the king's men " cannot inflate it again. On the following day the stock fell to 540. Negotiations were opened with the Bank of England to come to the help of the Company. At first it consented, but, on learning their real condition, withdrew its consent and positively refused. This was the coup-de-grdce. The stock fell to 135, and the bubble was burst ! The consequent ruin was terrible. Thousands of homes were involved in beggary; and the trouble was, of course, greatest where it was least able to be borne. A storm of indignation swept through the country, striking first and chief est the directors of the bankrupt Company ; but not sparing the Government, or the Royal Family, or even the King himself. In such circumstances the practical English THE STORY OF THE SOUTH SEA BUBBLE. 49 mind is apt to demand a victim wants to see somebody punished; and there were some who endorsed Lord Molesworth's proposal that the directors, like parricides in Ancient Rome, should be tied up in sacks and flung into the Thames. Certainly, when their books came to be examined, and all their falsifications and swindles exposed, the punish- ment did not seem too severe for such monstrous rogues. Their actual punishment, however, was not very severe. They were disqualified from ever silting in Parliament, or holding public office; and their estates, valued at an aggregate of two millions, were confiscated for the benefit of the shareholders. Some high officers of state, who had assisted in forcing up the stock to a fictitious value, were diFnissed from their posts. Aislabie, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, was sent to the Tower; the Postmaster General committed suicide; and the House of Commons expelled two or three of its members who had been implicated in the fraud. The re-establishment of the public credit, and the relief of the Company's victims, were entrusted to Robert Walpole. The course he adopted was to graft eighteen millions of South Sea stock, upon the stocks of the Bank of England and the East India Company (under certain equitable conditions), and to remit a bonus of seven millions which the Company had agreed to pay to the Exchequer. Then he took eight millions more of the Company's stock, re- presenting the profit it had made during its heyday of prosperity, and divided it among the individual proprietors, making a dividend of about .33 Qs. 8d. The two millions realized from the confiscated estates were also divided among them ; but, in spite of these alleviating measures, in hundreds of cases the individual suffering was very severe, and the 4 50 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. memory of the South Sea Bubble, and of the widespread misery it inflicted, did not readily fade from the minds of men. As a legitimate commercial association the Company existed for many years ; and no lover of English literature will forget that Charles Lamb " the gentle Elia " was for a short time a clerk on its establishment, and some- times permitted his thoughts to revert to " the mysteries of that tremendous Hoax, whose extent the petty speculators of our day look back upon with the same expression of incredulous admiration and hopeless ambition of rivalry, as would become the puny faces of modern conspirators con- templating the Titan size of Vaux's superhuman plot." afj ONE of the last prisoners of importance committed to the Tower was Lord George Gordon the half -insane leader of the anti-Popish outbreak known in history as the Gordon Riots. It is no part of my business to dwell on the records of past intolerance, or to repeat the wretched tale of the injustice with which, in the eighteenth century, an ignorant and bigoted Protestantism treated the Roman Catholics of England. Suffice it to say that some of the most odious enactments in the Statute Book were repealed by Parliament in 1778, much to the satisfaction of sensible men of all parties. It was in contemplation to extend a similar measure of wise humanity to Scotland, when the fanaticism of Edinburgh and Glasgow took the alarm. Riots broke out in the grey northern metropolis, and the houses of reputed Papists were attacked and seriously damaged. A Protestant Association was established, whose members chose for their President a crazy-minded nobleman, Lord George', Gordon, whose hatred of Popery had developed into a monomania. Intellectually he was contemptible ; but he acquired a factitious importance as the aristocratic leader of a mob of zealots whose numbers and misdirected enthu- siasm might render them troublesome to the State. Lord George Gordon was a member of the House of 62 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. Commons, and took occasion, in November 1779, to inform the Lower Chamber that the indulgences which the Legis- lature had conceded to Popery had justly alarmed the Protestantism of Great Britain ; adding that he had at his back one hundred and twenty thousand men who shared his sentiments and were prepared to give them active and efficient support. The House laughed at what was supposed to be the rhodomontade of a man with "a twist in his head ; " but fanatics with twists in their heads are apt to become dangerous in times of popular excitement. At all events, Lord George had just sufficient capacity to play the part of a demagogue ; and conceiving the design of overawing Parliament by a display of physical force, he summoned a public meeting at Coachmakers' Hall, on May 29th, 1780, and in the most inflammatory language harangued his hearers on the perils of Papacy, concluding with a resolution that the whole body of the Protestant Association (which had been extended to England) should assemble on the following Friday in St. George's Fields and accompany him to Westminster, to present a petition to the House of Commons. He demanded that not fewer than twenty thousand persons should attend, and proposed that they should form in four divisions, representing (1) the Protestants of London ; (2) the Protestants of Westminster ; (3) the Protestants of Southwark; and (4) the Scottish residents in London. And he directed that each true Protestant should proclaim his faith by wearing a blue cockade. Accordingly, on June 2nd, some fifty to sixty thousand fanatics and desperadoes assembled at St. George's Fields men of all classes and ages, with not a few women, and even children, among them. These were marshalled by THE STORY OF THE GORDON RIOTS. 53 Lord George and his lieutenants in three, instead of four, divisions, which poured, with ever-increasing tumult, over the three bridges, London, Westminster, and Blackfriars, and surged into Palace Yard, blocking up the approaches to the Houses of Parliament, and heaping insult and contumely on every Liberal peer or commoner they re- cognised. It was only the intrepid attitude of the Guards which prevented them from forcing the doors. Lord George Gordon marched into the Commons' Chamber, and having presented a petition with about 120,000 signatures or " marks " attached to it praying for a repeal of the statute recently passed in favour of the Roman Catholics, he moved that it should be referred to a Committee of the whole House. During the debate that ensued a furious crowd filled the lobby, whom Lord George several times addressed in violent language, informing them that their petition was being denounced and derided, and invoking their vengeance on the members who objected to its con- sideration. Some attempts were made to restrain him, but ineffectually, until Colonel Gordon, a near kinsman, ap- proached him, and said, " My Lord George, do you intend to bring your rascally followers into the House of Commons? If you do, the first man of them that enters I will plunge my sword, not into him, but into your body." At length a squadron of dragoons was brought on the scene ; the lobby was cleared, and the rabble began to disperse. Meanwhile, in the House of Lords, a good deal of agitation had been caused by the continual arrival of peers, whose mud-bespattered clothes and dishevelled hair proclaimed the insults they had received in forcing their way through the multitude. It happened, by a strange irony of fortune, that on that very day the Duke 54 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. of Richmond rose to introduce a Bill for extending the franchise to every man of sound mind, and for restoring annual parliaments. He acknowledged the embarrassment he felt in proposing so revolutionary a measure under such inopportune circumstances. The tumult in Palace Yard was, indeed, a refutation of or, at least, a reply to his arguments which at the time was not easily to be overcome ; and Parliamentary Reform was postponed for half a century. The two Houses adjourned without being threatened by any further outbreaks ; but the mob had not retired peacefully. At the instigation, it is said, of Lord George, they had attacked, plundered, and set on fire the private chapels of the Sardinian and Bavarian ambassadors ; and ultimately it had been found necessary again to call out the military. Thirteen of the rioters were then appre- hended and sent to Newgate. The next day, Saturday, passed quietly; but much mischief was being done by secret agents in stimulating the passions of the populace, with the result that on Sunday afternoon clamorous crowds surrounded the Roman Catholic chapels in Moorfields, and wrecked and burned their pulpits and altars. On Monday these outrages were continued. One cannot but be surprised at the supineness of the authorities ; but when a gentleman complained to Lord Mansfield, the Chief Justice, he answered slightingly that the affair was of no importance. He was soon to be undeceived. On Monday some inkling of the danger of the situation seems to have penetrated into the Palace, and the King wrote to Lord North that he had directed the Secretaries of State to take measures for preventing riot on the morrow. " This tumult," he says, " must be got the better of, or it will encourage designing men to use it THE STORY OF THE GORDON RIOTS. 55 as a precedent for assembling the people on other occasions." Whatever measures may have been taken, their utter inade- quacy was quickly proved. About six o'clock on Tuesday evening the mob gathered in greater numbers and in a more reckless spirit than before. The ringleaders contrived to manoeuvre its impact upon Newgate, with a view to the release of the prisoners, and the destruction of a building which was necessarily obnoxious to the criminal classes. On arriving in front of its grim stone walls the rioters demanded of Mr. Akerman, the governor, the release of all confined within them, but he curtly and unhesitatingly refused. By a private way he hurried into the Sessions House to acquaint the magistrates with the position of affairs and to receive their orders. They had none to give; were completely paralysed by a sense at once of responsibility and inca- pacity. Their inaction resulted fatally. Armed with pickaxes and sledge-hammers, the assailants thundered at the gates and walls with incessant blows ; while others dragged the furniture out of the governor's house, piled it up against the prison-doors, poured oil and resin on the heap, and then set the whole on fire. The flames shot up fierce and strong, and, seizing upon the massive door, began slowly ito devour it ; while lighted brands, hurled over the wall, fell |into the wards and yards, to the great terror of the inmates, who could not understand the meaning of this unusual commotion. In his novel of " Barnaby Rudge " Charles Dickens has drawn a picture of this remarkable scene which is not less accurate than vivid : " A shout ! Another ! Another yet, though few know why, or what it meant. But those round the gate had 56 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. seen it slowly yield, and drop from its topmost hinge. It hung on that side by that one, but it was upright still because of the bar, and of having sunk of its own weight into the heap of ashes at its foot. There was now a gap at the top of the doorway, through which could be descried a gloomy passage, cavernous and dark. Pile up the fire ! " It burnt fiercely. The door was red hot, and the gap wider. They vainly tried to shield their faces with their hands, and, standing as if in readiness for a spring, watched the place. Dark figures, some crawling on their hands and knees, some carried in the arms of others, were seen to pass along the roof. It was plain the gate could hold out no longer. The keeper and his officers and their wives and children were escaping. Pile up the fire ! "At length the door gave way, and into the doomed building, which was by this time all ablaze, the rioters rushed pell-mell, yelling and shouting, brandishing their rude implements, and pouring through the vaulted corri- dors; beating at the doors of cells and wards; wrenching off, in their mad haste, bolts and locks and bars ; endeavouring to drag the shrieking felons through impossible apertures ; seizing them by their legs, their arms, their hair, and hauling them through the flames and smoke into the nearest breathing-place ; whooping and wildly laughing, with a half-mad hysterical laughter, and actually dancing in their delirious triumph. Now a score of prisoners ran to and fro who had lost themselves in the intricacies of the prison, and were so bewildered with the noise and the glare that they knew not where to turn or what to do, and still cried out for help as loudly as before. Anon some famished wretch, who.^e theft had been a loaf of bread or a scrap of butcher's meat, came skulking past barefooted, THE STORY OF THE GORDON RIOTS. 57 going slowly away because that gaol, his home, was burning; not because he had another, or had friends to meet, or old haunts to revisit, or any liberty to gain, but liberty to starve and die. [Some afterwards returned and gave themselves up voluntarily ; others, drawn to the scene as by a magnet, were retaken while wandering about the open wards.] And then a knot of highwaymen went trooping by, conducted by the friends they had amongst the crowd, who muffled their fetters as they went along with handkerchiefs and bands of hay, and wrapped them in coats and cloaks, and gave them drink from bottles, and held it to their lips because of their handcuffs, which there was no time to remove. All this was done amidst a noise, a hurry, and distraction like nothing that we know of even in our dreams; which seemed for ever on the rise, and never to decrease for the space of a single instant." A side-light upon this monstrous saturnalia is cast by the poet Crabbe in one of his letters. " As I was standing near Akerman's house," he writes, " there approached another body of men Lord George Gordon, in a coach, drawn by the mob, bowing as he passed along. He is a lively-looking young man in appearance, and nothing more, though just now the popular hero. By eight o'clock Akerman's house was in flames. I went close to it, and never saw anything so dreadful. The prison was a re- markably strong building ; but, determined to force it, they broke the gates with crows and other instruments, and climbed up outside of the cell part, which joins the two great wings of the building, where the felons were confined ; and I stood where I plainly saw their operations. They broke the roof, tore away the rafters, and, having got ladders, they descended. Not Orpheus himself had more 58 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. courage, or better luck. Flames all round them, and a body of soldiers expected, yet they laughed at all opposition. The prisoners escaped. I stood and saw about twelve women and eight men ascend from their confinement to the open air, and they were conducted through the streets in their chains. Three of them were to be hanged on Friday." How overpowering must have been their sensations at their unexpected release ! And they would seem to have made good their escape, for I can find no official record of their re-capture. " You can have no conception," adds Crabbe, " of the frenzy of the multitude. Akerman's house being now a mere shell of brickwork, they kept a store of flame for other purposes. It became red hot, and the doors and windows appeared like the entrances to so many volcanoes. With some difficulty they then fired the debtors' prison, broke the doors, and they too all made their escape. Tired of the scene, I went home, and returned again at eleven o'clock at night. I met large bodies of horse and foot soldiers, coming to guard the Bank and some houses of Roman Catholics near it. Newgate was at this time open to all : anyone might get in, and, what was never the case before, anyone might get out. I did both, for the people were now chiefly lookers-on. The mischief was done, and the doors of it [had] gone to another part of the town." It is evident that by this time the fanatical portion of the mob had been thrust aside and overruled by the criminal or " rough " contingent ; for their destructive efforts were no longer directed against Roman Catholic chapels, but against the metropolitan prisons Cler ken well, the Fleet, the King's Bench, Bridewell, and the Borough Chink, in Tooley Street all of which were set on fire and their THE STORY OF THE GORDON RIOTS. 59 inmates released ; against the houses of active magistrates, like Mr. Justice Hyde and Sir John Fielding ; and against the mansion of Lord Mansfield, the Chief Justice, in Bloomsbury Square, which was gutted from roof to cellar, and all its valuable contents, including a priceless library of books and manuscripts, thrown into the street and made into one colossal bonfire. Lord George Gordon had long ceased to exercise any control over the monster which he had called into existence. It is only fair to say, however, and to an English writer it is pleasant, that the mob was not a murderous one, like the sans-culottes of revolutionary Paris, though it revelled in fire and rapine. On Wednesday night London was in flames in thirty places. " One might see the glare of conflagration fill the sky from many parts," says Johnson ; " the sight was dreadful." In Holborn, where the distillery of Mr. Langdale, a Roman Catholic, was set on fire, a terrible scene occurred, the unrectified spirits, as they poured into the street, being greedily lapped up by numbers of men, women, and children, who, overcome by intoxication, perished miserably amidst the streams of liquid flame, or were mutilated or crushed by falling timbers. An attempt was made against the Bank of England ; but the defence was so firmly maintained by John Wilkes and the military guard that the assailants retreated hurriedly with considerable loss. That London should have been for hours virtually in the possession of an unarmed and undisciplined multitude, without leadership or cohesion, was a scandal to its municipal authorities and a disgrace also to the Government, who, when the first city of the empire was in danger, might have been expected to have shown some promptitude and decision in their councils. A large military force was stationed in and 60 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. around the metropolis ; but instead of employing it swiftly and en masse, the Ministers wasted valuable time in discussing the provisions of the Eiot Act ; and it was not until Wedder- burn, the Attorney General, had given it as his opinion that the military power might lawfully be called into requisition, that they issued orders for the movement of the troops. As if they could not have taken action on their own responsibility, and applied for an indemnity afterwards ! The consequence was that order could not be restored without a good deal of hard fighting, the outbreak having been allowed to assume too large proportions ; the streets ran red with blood, and some five hundred unfor- tunate creatures were killed or wounded. Before morning, however, London was safe ; its citizens could breathe again. There was nothing more to be done but to bury the dead, fill the remaining gaols with prisoners, punish the ring- leaders, and rebuild Newgate. Lord George Gordon was arrested on the 9th and com- mitted to the Tower. His trial was deferred until the following February, when he was indicted before the King's Bench for having unlawfully, maliciously, and traitorously compassed, imagined, and intended to raise and levy war, insurrection, and rebellion "against the majesty of the King.'' He was ably defended by Henry (afterwards Lord) Erskine, then in the zenith of his fame, and as the evidence failed to support the charge of high treason the jury re- turned a verdict of acquittal. But that he richly deserved exemplary punishment everybody will now admit. Of the wretched rioters, for whom he was responsible, one hundred and thirty-five were tried in Middlesex and Surrey, one half of whom were convicted, and twenty-one executed. ate ONE day in November 1819, while Sir Herbert Taylor, a confidential servant of George III., was walking in the High Street at Windsor, he was addressed by a man named Edwards, who kept a small shop at Eton for the sale of plaster casts among which, by the way, the one that found the readiest sale was a little model of Dr. Keate, of flagellating proclivities, then head master of Eton ; the junior members of that famous college purchasing it freely as a mark to be pelted at. This Edwards informed Sir Herbert that he had a story to tell ; and proceeded to furnish details of a desper- ate plot against the King's Ministers, which, he asserted, had nearly reached maturity. Sir Herbert, of course, im- mediately communicated with the Home Secretary, Lord Sidmouth, by whose directions Edwards was employed as a spy, to watch and betray the movements of his former asso- ciates, while he was at the same time engaged in collecting proofs of the veracity of his statements. Other emissaries went up and down the country in search of information, and reported before long that agents of the conspirators had appeared at Middleton, Darwen, and several places in Lancashire, endeavouring to persuade the discontented and high prices, low wages, severe repressive measures, and such terrible " mistakes " as the Manchester or " Peterloo " massacre, had sown discontent broadcast among the labouring 62 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. classes to join in a nefarious but comprehensive plot to assassinate the Ministers, and while the executive power was temporarily paralysed, seize the Bank, the Mansion House, and the Tower, and establish a provisional repub- lican government. But assassination is not popular among Englishmen. The scheme was atrocious in conception, and it was also absurd ; for how could a handful of half-armed men hope to overthrow the settled institutions of the country, defended as they were by an overwhelming force ? It met with little favour, therefore, beyond the small circle of reck- less and ignorant followers whom its author had contrived to gather round him. This author was a man of some ability and of infinite daring Arthur Thistlewood, who had served as a subaltern officer in the militia, and afterwards in the regular army. He had been a resident in France during the worst excesses of the French Revolution, and had imbibed the sanguinary spirit of the Reign of Terror. Having made up his mind that England was suffering from misgovernment, he was prepared to redress its grievances by the strong hand, and to involve the country in all the horrors of insurrection. In 1816 he was concerned in the Spa Fields riots. A Mr. Spence,| a Yorkshire schoolmaster, had broached a notable plan for making everybody rich and happy : the State was to resume all the lands of the country, direct their cultiva- tion, and distribute their produce for the support of the people. His admirers constituted themselves into a " Society of Spencean Philanthropists," for the purpose of realising this ideal socialism. Unfortunately, they were not content with discussions which ignored the elementary principles of social order, but, as wilder spirits gained admission to their meetings, launched into revolutionary projects, in which THE STORY OF THE CATO STREET CONSPIRACY. 63 dangerous course they were artfully encouraged by Govern- ment spies and paid informers. According to the dubious evidence of a man named Carm, they babbled about the construction of strange machines for destroying cavalry, and the manufacture of asphyxiating compounds for suffocating soldiers in their barracks (as schoolboys destroy wasps' nests) ; of seizing the Tower, and barricading London Bridge to prevent the passage of artillery from Woolwich. All these formidable operations were to be conducted under five dis- tinguished commanders, of whom Arthur Thistlewood was one. On December 2nd, 1816, the fanatics assembled in Spa Fields, with trice-loured flags, sashes, and similar appur- tenances, as if a powerful government could be overthrown by frippery ! marched to attack the Tower, paraded along Cheapside, and at the Royal Exchange were gallantly en- countered and put to flight by the Lord Mayor, a couple of aldermen, and five constables. For the parts they had played in this grotesque farce which, however, if they had had their way would have been converted into a shameful tragedy Thistlewood and his confederates were put on their trial, the charge being high treason ; but the jury refused to take so serious a view of their sayings and doings as this implied, and acquitted them. Thistlewood, however, instead of being sobered by his escape, sent a challenge to Lord Sidmouth ; whereupon he was arrested, convicted of a misdemeanour, and im- prisoned for a twelvemonth. He came out of prison with a personal grievance to inflame his resentment at the public wrongs. Just at this time occurred the deplorable " Peter- loo " outrage, when a quiet assembly of citizens was ridden down by a body of yeomanry, and Thistlewood at once resolved, in mysteriously magniloquent language, that " the 64 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. lives of the instigators should be the requiem of the souls of the murdered innocents ! " He was in this mood of gloom and ferocity when he met with George Edwards, the plaster, cast vendor, who professed to sympathise with all his views, and concerted with him and others the details of a projected insurrection, while preparing to betray them. At first Thistlewood would seem to have aimed only at the life of Lord Sidmouth, on whom, as Home Secretary, he laid the onus of the wrong-doing he had sworn to avenge ; and he and his comrades had planned to attempt his assassination in the autumn of 1819. A series of accidents, however, delayed the enterprise ; and the delay enabled Edwards to urge him on to more desperate and comprehensive action. Tt was then that Thistlewood determined upon sweeping away the whole Cabinet at one fell blow, and hoped to find an opportunity at a Cabinet dinner at Lord Westmoreland's, but for some reason was unable to do so. The deaths of George III. and the Duke of Kent, with their funeral pageants, followed ; and so the conspirators drifted on into the month of February 1820, when their poverty compelled them to take immediate action, and on Saturday, the 19th, they came to the resolution of murdering each Minister at his own house. On the following Tuesday, however, so they were apprised by Edwards, Lord Harrowby was to give a Cabinet dinner at his mansion in Grosvenor Square. Thistlewood sent out for a newspaper to satisfy himself that the information was correct, and, finding it to be so, ex- claimed : " As there has not been a dinner so long there will, no doubt, be fourteen or sixteen there, and it will be a rare haul to murder them all together." It was then arranged that some of their number should THE STORY OF THE CATO STREET CONSPIRACY. 65 keep watch over Lord Harrowby's Louse, to see that no police or soldiers were stationed there. Then, while the Ministers were at dinner, one of them was to call with a note ; and, the door being opened, his comrades were to rush in and commit the murders, carrying bags in which to bring away as trophies the heads of the two Ministers most generally detested, Lords Sidmouth and Castlereagh ; there- after the gang were to fire the cavalry barracks by flinging fireballs into the straw-sheds, when it was hoped that " the people" would rise simultaneously, and capture without arms or ammunition the Bank and the Tower ! A wilder dream of plunder and murder was never concocted by the fevered brains of madmen and revolutionary enthusiasts. In some continental capitals it might possibly have been feasible, but in London it could never have had a chance even of temporary success. Straight from the conference at which this wholesale assassination was settled went one Thomas Hidon, a cow- keeper, to warn Lord Harrowby, whom he found riding in the Mall. By appointment with his lordship he met him again on the following morning in the Ring at Hyde Park, and revealed the grim secret of which he had become possessed, adding that the Ministers were to be destroyed by hand-grenades thrown under the table, and by the sword if any escaped the explosion. Meanwhile, another traitor, an Irishman named Dwyer, was making similar disclosures at the Home Office ; and as the statements of these two men tallied with the particulars previously furnished by Edwards, the Government proceeded to act upon them. They determined not to dine at Lord Harrowby's, but that the preparations for the dinner should be continued lest the conspirators should suspect that their designs were known. 5 66 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. No guests, however, put in an appearance ; but it so happened that the Archbishop of York, who lived next door to Lord Harrowby, was giving a dinner-party on the same evening ; and the arrival of the carriages de- ceived those of the conspirators who were on the watch in the square, until it was too late to give notice to their comrades. These comrades were amusing themselves, until the time for action arrived, in a loft above a stable in Cato (now called Homer) Street, near the Edgware Road, when Mr. Birnie, the police magistrate, with a strong body of constables broke in upon them. A detachment of foot- guards had been ordered to accompany and support the police, but through some mismanagement did not arrive in time. A constable named Smithers was the first to enter the loft and confront the conspirators. Thistlewood immediately stabbed him to the heart, and blew out the one or two tallow candles which dimly lighted the room. Three other constables were shot or stabbed, and in the darkness and confusion Thistlewood and some of his associates escaped. Nine were made prisoners; and a reward of .1,000 being immediately offered for Thistle- wood's apprehension, he, too, was arrested before eight o'clock the next morning, while in bed at a friend's house in Moorfields. On the following Sunday, February 27th, the Ministers publicly returned thanks for their preservation in the Chapel Royal, St. James's. Not until April 18th was Thistlewood (with four of his lieutenants) brought to trial. There was, of course, no possibility of successful defence. As for Thistlewood himself, he had been caught red-handed, and the most obstinate humanitarian must admit that he THE STORY OF THE CATO STREET CONSPIRACY. 67 had fully deserved the fate which overtook him. To the last he displayed a fortitude worthy of a better cause. Five of the conspirators who pleaded guilty had their punishment commuted to transportation for life ; and one who, though present at the Cato Street meeting, seems to have been ignorant of its object, received a free pardon. On the whole, I do not think the Ministry can be said to have acted in a vindictive spirit. It may here be noted that when the information first reached them some difference of opinion arose as to the best method of procedure. A few members of the Cabinet proposed that the dinner should take place, that Guards should be stationed near Lord Harrowby's house, and the conspirators arrested the moment they attempted to enter it. But the conspirators, as was afterwards known, had been prepared for this, and their scouts would have informed them of the presence of the soldiers. Others advised and one could wish their advice had been acted upon that as the Cabinet possessed sufficient evidence to satisfy impartial men, it ought to interfere before the conspirators fell deep*er into crime. The course finally adopted was suggested by the Duke of Wellington. What became of Edwards, the informer, is not definitely known. It is curious that the Ministry did not bring him forward on the trials of the conspirators as a witness. Perhaps his examination would have shown that he was to no small extent the cause of the magnitude of their atrocious design; that their schemes had expanded under his evil influence. A vague report has floated down the current of history that he found a retreat in Ireland or on the Continent, and lived comfortably on the liberal rewards he had received from the Government. But I am convinced 68 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. he must often have experienced the stings of conscience, and tasted the bitterness of bread purchased by the wage of treachery. While criminals continue to conspire, justice, I suppose, must employ spies and informers to track them to their secret lairs; but society instinctively condemns the treachery by which it profits. PART II. >ton'e0 of famous localities* anti famous hostelry was situated in Fleet Street, nearly opposite St. Dunstan's Church, between the site of Temple Bar and the Middle Temple Gate. It owed its startling designation to its sign, which represented St. Dunstan pulling the devil by the nose ; and its ancient reputation to the circumstance that in its " Apollo " room Ben Jonson loved to assemble his literary " sons " and boon companions, ruling with a genial despotism over the club for which he had drawn up his " Leges Conviviales " in his purest Latin. It long retained its fame, and in our literature it may be said to hold a recognised place. It was here that the dramatist Shadwell, Dryden's Mac- Flecknoe, but a man of some ability and scholarship, obtained admission into the company of Ben Jonson's youngsters. It was here that Tom Killigrew has laid an amusing scene in his not too decent comedy of The Parson's Wedding. A witness in a case in which, in 1682, the notorious Jeffreys was concerned as prosecuting counsel, is described as having been " a waiter at the Devil tavern " and a fanatical Puritan, who, some years before, had been caught on his knees praying against the Cavaliers " Scatter them, good Lord, scatter them ! " and had thereby acquired 72 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. the nickname of " Scatter'em." In cross-examination by Jeffreys he chanced to say, " I don't care to give evidence of anything but the truth. T was never on my knees before Parliament for anything." Sharp upon him came Jeffreys' retort : " Nor I neither for much, yet you were once on your knees when you cried, Scatter them, good Lord ! Was it not so, Mr. Scatter'em 1 " The splendid Buckingham George Villiers, second Duke of that ilk frequently dined in public at this tavern (1667). And here were sold, on March 18th, 1703, the jewels of the beautiful Frances Stewart, Duchess of Richmond, who so long figured as Britannia on the reverse of our English coins. Here were rehearsed the courtly odes and birthday verses of the Poets Laureate. Says an epigrammatist " When Laureates make odes, do you ask of what sort ? Do you ask if they're good or are evil 1 You may judge. From the Devil they come to the Court, And go from the Court to the Devil." Here, on October 12th, 1711, Swift dined with Addison and Dr. Garth, the latter acting as host. Sir Richard Steele, too, was a frequent visitor ; and it is at this tavern that, after the wedding of Miss Jenny Distaff, he represents The Taller as entertaining the company with a dinner suitable to the occasion, being " a place," he says, " sacred to mirth tempered with discretion, where Ben Jonson and his sons used to make their liberal meetings." ..." As soon as the company were come into that ample room [the Apollo], Lepidus Wagstaffe began to make me compliments for choosing that place, and fell into a discourse upon the subject of pleasure and entertainment, drawn from the ALL ABOUT THE DEVIL TAVERN. 73 rules of Ben's Club, which are [that is, were] in gold letters over the chimney." Here took place the meetings of a shilling whist-club to which Oliver Goldsmith belonged. Its members seem to have been partial to practical jokes, of which simple-hearted " Goldy " was the frequent victim. One night, when he had come to the club in a hackney-coach, he gave the driver a guinea instead of a shilling a blunder of which he could ill afford to be guilty. The next club-night he was told that a person wanted to see him ; to his surprise and gratification it was the coachman with the guinea. To reward such honesty he collected a small sum among the members, added to it from his own purse, and sent away the coachman with the honorarium. On his return one of the club asked to look at the guinea. It turned out to be a counterfeit ; and amid general laughter Goldsmith was informed that the honest coachman was a counterfeit also in short, that he had been victimised. But one cannot help asking, What became of the members' contributions ? Were these repaid ? If not, one can hardly say that Goldsmith had the worst of the joke. The publication, in 1751, of Mrs. Charlotte Lenox's first book, " The Life of Harriet Stuart," was celebrated here, at Dr. Johnson's suggestion, by "a whole night spent in festivity." Mrs. Lenox, her husband, and also the members of the Ivy Lane club and their friends, twenty in all, were present. The chief article of the menu was a magnificent apple pie, stuck with bay leaves in compliment to the authoress, for whom Johnson had likewise prepared a crown of laurel. " The night passed," says Hawkins, " as must be imagined, in pleasant conversation and harmless mirth, intermingled at different periods with the refresh- 74 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. ments of coffee and tea. About five a.m. Johnson's face shone with meridian splendour, though his drink had been only lemonade." Hither, in 1788, came the noble army of bricklayers, demolishing this historic tavern, and erecting on its site Child's Place now Child's Bank Fleet Street. IN Cock Lane, a narrow thoroughfare in West Smithfield, lived, in 1760, a Mr, Parsons, clerk of St. Sepulchre's Church, who, to eke out his small income, let lodgings. It came to pass that among his tenants was a Miss Fanny, the chere amie of a certain Mr. Kent. She was his deceased wife's sister, and the law, of course, prevented him from marrying her, as he would gladly have done if it had been possible. During her pseudo-husband's absence in the country Miss Fanny took as her bed-fellow Mr. Parsons' little eleven-years-old daughter an unfortunate arrange- ment, for, from that moment, she began to be kept awake all night by violent knockings. As they were thought to resemble the hammering of a shoemaker on his lap-stone, a neighbouring cobbler was pitched upon as the disturbing cause. But this explanation failed when the noises were repeated on the Sunday, during the cobbler's hours of rest. Friends, acquaintances, and neighbours flocked to hear the mysterious sounds, and all came to the conclusion that a ghost must lie perdu behind the wainscoting. Application was therefore made to the parochial clergyman to exorcise the unquiet spirit ; but being no believer in spiritualism he declined to interfere, and besides, the Church of England has made no provision for meeting this kind of difficulty. At length Miss Fanny grew disgusted at the publicity in which 76 A SO OX AS OUT LONDON. it had involved her, and removed to Clerkenwell, where, in February 1762, she died. Immediately after her death the knockings, which had ceased for eighteen months, were recommenced, Mr. Parsons' daughter being the victim. In whatever room she was placed the noises followed her, and the poor girl was thrown (apparently) into convulsions. Her father then took up the matter energetically, with an eye, as we shall see, to pecuniary profit, and undertook to question the noisy ghost, on the principle that a certain number of knocks should signify an affirmative and so many a nega- tive. The result was that this supernatural visitant announced herself to be Miss Fanny, and explained that she had been poisoned by Mr. Kent in a bowl of punch. This strange story, with its fine flavour of scandal, soon spread all over London, and an unceasing throng of fashion- able ladies and gentlemen poured from the West End to the scene of the mysterious occurrence. Among them of course went Horace Walpole, whom one meets always and everywhere in the London of the second and third Georges. Writing to a friend in 1762 he says: "The reigning fashion is a ghost a ghost that would not pass muster in the paltriest convent in the Apennine. It only knocks and scratches ; does not pretend to appear or to speak. A drunken parish clerk set it on foot, out of revenge ; the Methodists have adopted it ; and the whole town think of nothing else. ... I went to hear it," he writes again, " for it is not an apparition but an audition. We set out from the opera, changed our clothes at Northum- berland House, the Duke of York, Lady Northumberland, Lady Mary Coke, Lord Hertford, and I, all in one hackney coach, and drove to the spot : it rained in torrents ; yet the THE STORY OF THE COCK LANE GHOST. 77 lane was full of mob, and the house so full we could not get in ; at last they discovered it was the Duke of York, and the company squeezed themselves in one another's pockets to make room for us. The house, which is borrowed, and to which the ghost has adjourned, is wretchedly small and miserable; when we opened the chamber, in which were fifty people, with no light but one tallow candle at the end, we tumbled over the bed of the child to whom the ghost comes, and whom they are murdering by inches in such insufferable heat and stench. At the top of the room are ropes to dry clothes. I asked if we were to have rope-dancing between the acts 1 We heard nothing ; they told us, as they would at a puppet show, that it would not come that night till seven in the morning ; that is, when there are only 'prentices and old women. We stayed, however, till half-an-hour after one. The Methodists have promised their contributions, provisions are sent in like forage, and all the taverns and alehouses in the neighbour- hood make fortunes. The most diverting part is to hear people wondering when it will be found out, as if there was anything to find out as if the actors would make their noises when they can be discovered." The object of these noises being, it was said, the detection of a great crime, the Rev. Stephen Aldrich, of Clerkenwell, invited a number of men of eminence to investigate their origin and meaning; especially as the mysterious visitant had promised, by an affirmative knock, to attend any gentleman into the vault under St. John's, Clerkenwell, where her body was interred, and to indicate her presence by a knock upon her coffin. Accordingly, on January 31st, three gentlemen among whom was Dr. Johnson assembled at Mr. Aldrich's house, whither the girl had 78 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. been removed. After a while " they were summoned into the girl's chamber by some ladies who were near the bed, and had heard knocks and scratches." When the gentlemen entered the girl declared that she felt the spirit like a mouse upon her back ; but being required to hold her hands out of bed, from that time, though the spirit was solemnly adjured to manifest its presence, no evidence of any preternatural power was exhibited. The spirit was then seriously informed that the person to whom the promise was made of striking the coffin was about to visit the vault, and that the performance of the promise was now claimed. The company, at one in the morning, went into the church, and the gentleman to whom the promise was made with one companion entered the vault; the spirit was solemnly required to perform her promise ; but silence alone ensued. Mr. Kent himself went down with several others. Upon their return they examined the girl, but could draw no confession from her. Between two and three she desired to go home with her father, and was permitted to do so. And the whole assembly came to the sage conclusion that "the child had some art of making or counterfeiting particular noises, and that there was no agency of any higher cause." The result of this inquiry was solemnly communicated to the newspapers by Dr. Johnson. Ultimately, Mr. Kent took legal steps to vindicate his character ; and on July 10th the father and mother of the child and two or three others were tried at Guildhall before Lord Mansfield and a special jury, and convicted of conspiracy. Parsons was ordered to be set in the pillory three times in one month (once at the end of Cock Lane), and after that to be im- prisoned for two years, and his wife for one year. THE STORY OF THE COCK LANE GHOST. 79 The girl afterwards acknowledged that she had carried on this deception by means of ventriloquism. In literature it is commemorated by Churchill's satire of " The Ghost," in which the character of Pomposo is intended for Johnson. Says the poet : " Give us an entertaining sprite, Gentle, familiar, and polite, . . . Who will not to the eye appear, But pays her visits to the ear, And knocks so gently, 'twould not fright A lady in the darkest night. Such is our Fanny, whose good will, Which cannot in the grave lie still, Brings her on earth to entertain Her friends and lovers in Cock Lane." $9** Jfcrfc; nit* Jill jltot ft. THE manor of Hyde, which came into the possession of the Crown in 1535, consequent upon the general confiscation of ecclesiastical property, constitutes Hyde Park. As a park it was first walled in with brick temp. Charles II., and first enclosed by iron railings temp. George IV. Its ornamental piece of water, oddly named the Serpentine, was formed in 1730-33. Of late years its aspect has been improved very considerably by a judicious expenditure of taste and money; and it is now as bright and attractive a public garden and park as any European city possesses. A curious historical incident is connected with this Park. In October 1654 the Protector Cromwell was driving here a team of six fine horses, which had recently been presented to him by the Duke of Oldenburg. Using the whip too freely, he provoked them into a headlong gallop, and was flung from the coach-box upon the pole, whence he fell to the ground. His foot caught in the harness, and he was dragged along " a good while in this dangerous position, a pistol going off in his pocket ; " but at last he freed himself, and the coach swept by without injuring him. Being conveyed home to Whitehall, he was "let blood," and after resting recovered rapidly. In the bad old duelling days, the park was the scene of HYDE PARK; AND ALL ABOUT IT. 81 numerous " affairs of honour : " between the Duke of Hamilton and Lord Mohun (both killed), November 5th, 1712 ; John Wilkes and Samuel Martin (the former wounded), November 16th, 1763; George Garrick and the actor Baddeley, November 17th, 1770; Earl of Shelbourne and Colonel Fullerton (the former wounded), March 22nd, 1780 ; Colonel the Hon. Cosmo Gordon and Lieutenant- Colonel Thomas (the latter killed), September 19th, 1783 ; Colonel Fitzgerald and Colonel King, 1797. Its broad open spaces have been made use of for public meetings and reviews on several important occasions. The high price of bread induced riotous demonstrations in October 1855 ; Garibaldi's admirers were violently attacked by the Irish, and many persons wounded, October 5th, 1862 ; and on July 21st, 1884, a very large meeting was held here in support of the Reform Bill brought in by the Gladstone Ministry. As for reviews, it will suffice to mention the Queen's first review of the Volunteers (of whom 18,450 were present), June 23rd, 1860. The first Crystal Palace, designed by Sir Joseph Paxton for the first groat International Exhibition, was erected here (near the Kensington end), in 1851, and opened by the Queen and H.R.H. the Prince Consort. The colossal statue of Achilles, opposite Apsley House, was cast from cannon taken in the battles of Salamanca, Vittoria, Toulouse, and Waterloo ; the cost being defrayed by a public subscription of " the women of England." It was inscribed to "Arthur, Duke of Wellington, and his brave companions in arms," and erected on June 18th, 1822. From its earliest formation Hyde Park has been the rendezvous of fashionable society, and the great "open air " 6 82 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. resort of the Londoners. Celebrated in the time of Charles I. for its foot and horse races round the Ring, which always drew a large concourse of the better class, Ben Jonson, in the prologue to one of his comedies, asks, " How many coaches in Hyde Park did show last spring ? " and a con- temporary balladist avers that " Of all parts of England Hyde Park hath the name For coaches and horses and persons of fame," in Charles II.'s merry days it attained renown for its drives and promenades, a reputation which it certainly has not lost in the reign of Victoria. What De Grammont said of it in the latter years of the seventeenth century is just as applic- able in the closing decade of the nineteenth : " Hyde Park every one knows is the promenade of London ; nothing was so much the fashion, during the fine weather, as this promenade, which was the rendezvous of fashion and beauty. Everyone, therefore, who had either sparkling eyes or a splendid equipago constantly repaired thither." Of its kind there is no finer sight in the world than that which the Park presents on a fine afternoon in the season, when carriage follows carriage in apparently endless succession, each one more beautifully appointed than the other, and filled with the beauty, rank, and wealth of West End London. Not less animated is the scene on the Lady's Mile which has given a title to one of Miss Braddon's novels; and, on Sundays, the Church Parade. A lively writer describes it as a scene which may well tax all your powers of reasoning and of philosophy. " And you must know the Park very well, this large open drawing- room which in the season London daily holds, before you HYDE PARK; AND ALL ABOUT IT. 83 can sufficiently temper your senses to be critical and analytical ; before you can eliminate the lower world, the would-be fashionable element, from the most affluent and highest kind of metropolitan life ; before you can judge of the splendid mounts and the splendid caparisons, between fine carriages and fine horses fine carriages where perhaps the cattle are lean and poor, or fine horses where the car- riages are old and worn ; the carriages and horses absolutely gorgeous, but with too great a display ; and again, when the perfection is absolute, but with as much quietude as possible, the style that chiefly invites admiration by the apparent desire to elude it. In St. James's Park you may lounge and be listless if you like; but in Hyde Park, though you may lounge, you must still be alert. Very pleasant is the lounge to the outer man, but in the inner mind you must be observant, prepared to enjoy either the solitude of the crowd, or to catch the quick glance, the silvery music of momentary merriment, then have a few seconds of rapid acute dialogue, or perhaps be beckoned by a friend with space to spare." Here is the graphic picture drawn by Mr. Alfred Austin in his satirical poem of " The Season : " " I sing the Season, Muse ! whose sway extends Where Hyde begins beyond where Tyburn ends ; Gone the broad glare, save where with borrowed bays Some female Phaeton sets the Drive ablaze . . . Incongruous groups, they come : the judge's hack, With knees as broken as its rider's back ; The counsel's courser, stumbling through the throng, With wind e'en shorter than its lord's is long ; The foreign marquis's accomplished colt, Sharing its owner's tendency to bolt. Come, let us back, and while the Park's alive, Lean o'er the railings and inspect the Drive 84 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. Still sweeps the long procession, whose array Gives to the lounger's gaze, as wanes the day, Its rich reclining and reposeful forms, Still as bright sunsets after mists or storms ; Who sit and smile their morning wrangles o'er, Or drag or dawdle through one dull day more, As though the life of widow, wife, and girl Were one long lapsing and voluptuous whirl." The artificial sheet of water, the Serpentine, was formed by Queen Caroline, wife of George II. It was originally supplied by the West Bourne, but is now fed from the Thames. To the amenity of the park it adds considerably. The principal gates are Cumberland and Victoria, on the north ; on the south, Kensington and Queen's, in Kensington, and Prince's and Albert in Knightsbridge ; Hyde Park Corner at the west end of Piccadilly ; and on the east, Stanhope and Grosvenor. The Marble Arch, originally erected by George IV., at a cost of .80,000, as an entrance to Buckingham Palace, is situated at the north-east corner. The Hyde Park Corner gateway was designed by Decimus Burton, and built in 1828. Rotten Row (Route du Hoi) was parallel to the drive on the north, and stretches along the south side of the Serpen- tine from Hyde Park Corner to Kensington Gate. This is exclusively reserved for equestrian display. l>|e jltarij af Jan THE old Royal Excliange was founded, as everybody knows, by that distinguished London citizen, banker, merchant, and diplomatist, Sir Thomas Gresham, who, in many delicate missions, financial and otherwise, justified Elizabeth's con- fidence by his tact, discretion, and good fortune. I lay special stress on this last qualification, for a prince's servant ought to be successful that is, he should not only deserve success (which any of us can do), but command it. Gresham was as lucky in his individual transactions as in his sovereign's affairs, and acquired immense wealth, which he knew how to use royally. He had his civic residence in Lombard Street, and his country residences at Mayfield, in Surrey, formerly a palace of the Archbishops of Canterbury, and at Osterley, in Middlesex. Great man that he was, and high in his sovereign's favour, he stuck close to his business, and might regularly be seen at his shop in Lombard Street, with the grasshopper over the door as his sign. Thence he betook himself to one or other of his country seats to dispense a lavish hospitality, and entertain, when it so pleased her, his royal mistress. At Osterley, he employed the poet Churchyard to write and produce a play and pageant for her pleasure. He paid her a still more notable compliment. "Her Majesty," says Fuller, "found fault with the court of the house as too great ; affirming that it 86 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. would appear more handsome if divided with a wall in the middle. What doth Sir Thomas but in the night time send for workmen to London (money commands all things), who so speedily and silently apply their business that the next morning discovered that court double which the night had left single before?" Happy was the sovereign in such a subject ! The courtiers were not so well pleased as was their Queen, some avowing it was no wonder he could so soon change a building, who could build a 'Change; others (reflecting on some known differences in this knight's family) affirming that any house is easier divided than united speeches which show that Elizabeth's courtiers were rather ill-natured than witty ! This visit occurred in 1571 ; and eight years later (on Saturday, November 21st, 1579), "between six and seven of the clock in the evening, coming from the Exchange to his new house, which he had sumptuously builded in Bishopsgate Street, he suddenly fell down in his kitchen; and being taken up was found speechless, and presently dead." Thus was Gresham as happy in his death as he had been prosperous in his life ! He lies in the church of St. Helen's, Bishopsgate Street, near the tomb of Sir John Crosby, of Crosby Place, beneath a costly but not pre- tentious memorial, which he had caused to be erected during his lifetime. The procession which bore him to the grave was one of almost unexampled magnificence, and included two hundred poor men and women, who benefited by his posthumous charity. The tomb bears no other inscription than " Sir Thomas Gresham, Knight, buried December 15th, 1579," and even this was not added until 1736, for it was thought that "so great a name needed not the proclamation of an epitaph." Gresham 's first move in the direction of an Exchange was THE STORY OF DON PANTALEON SA. 87 made in the year of his son's death, 1564. Probably the loss of the natural heir to his great fortune inclined him to devote a portion of it to a work of public utility; and he who had trafficked in the prosperous continental cities, Amsterdam, Antwerp, and the like, could not fail to have seen how greatly the London merchants stood in need of such a meeting-place as these cities provided for their men of commerce. They had no other convenience than the narrow thoroughfare of Lombard Street afforded. Gresham accordingly offered to erect at his own expense a Bourse or Exchange, if a site were provided. A site was found in Cornhill, purchased for .3,532, and made over to Gresham, by certain aldermen, in the name of the citizens generally ; Gresham, on his part, promising that, within a month after the Bourse should be fully finished, he would present it in equal moieties to the City and the Mercers' Company a promise which was duly kept. The first stone was laid in June 1566, and in November 1567 the entire structure was completed The architect was a Fleming named Henrick. and the design was a rather close imitation of the great Antwerp Bourse. The principal feature of its exterior view was a lofty square tower, with two balconied galleries, and a grasshopper surmounting the ball at its top, which stood on one side the entrance, and formed a campanile or bell-tower, whence rang out at noon and at six in the evening " the merchants' call to 'Change." The building consisted in the main of an upper and lower section, the former being laid out in a century of shops, and the latter in walks and rooms for the merchants, with shops on the exterior. The crown and consummation was put to the work by a visit from Elizabeth. " The Queen's Majesty, attended by 88 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. her nobility, came from her house at the Strand, called Somerset House, and entered the city by Temple Bar, through Fleet Street, Cheap, and so by the north side of the Bourse to Sir Thomas Gresham's house in Bishopsgate Street, where she dined. After dinner, Her Majesty, re- turning through Cornhill, entered the Bourse on the south side, and after that she had viewed every part thereof above the ground, especially the Pawn, which was richly furnished with all sorts of the finest wares in the city, she caused the same Bourse, by a herald and trumpet, to be proclaimed The Royal Exchange, and so to be called from henceforth, and not otherwise." Thus was Sir Thomas Gresham's work stamped and sealed, as it were, with the sign-mark of the great Queen's approval. Not the least interesting portion of the story of the Old Exchange is its literature, though most of the contributors to it belong to the great unknown. One of them, a pious Divine, the Rev. Samuel Rolle, breaks out into the following rhapsody : " How full of riches was that Royal Exchange! rich men in the midst of it, rich goods above and beneath ! There men walked upon the top of a wealthy mine ; con- sidering about eastern treasures, costly spices, and such-like things were laid up in the bowels (I mean the cellars) of that place. As for the upper part of it, was it not the great storehouse whence the nobility and gentry of England were furnished with most of those costly things wherewith they did adorn either their closets or themselves ? Here, if anywhere, might a man have seen the glory of the world in a moment." There are numerous allusions to the Exchange in the drama of the period ; and in one of Thomas Hey wood's random plays, " The Building of the Exchange " THE STORY OF DON PANTALEON SA. 89 forms quite a prominent feature. And, finally, its moral characteristics are smartly hit off in Daniel Lupton's satire (1632), entitled London and Country Carbonadoed and Quartered into Several Characters. As, for example : " Conscience is sold here for nought, because it is as old sermons a dead commodity. They will dissemble with and cozen one another, though all the kings that ever were since the Conquest overlooked them. Here are usually more coaches attendant than at church -doors. The mer- chants should keep their wives from visiting the upper rooms too often, lest they tire their purses by attiring themselves. Rough seas, rocks and pirates, treacherous factors, and leaking ships affright them. They are strange politicians ; for they bring Turkey and Spain into London, and carry London thither." In the reign of James I. was founded, under His Majesty's patronage, a " New Exchange," on the south side of the Strand, and the site of the stables of Durham House, which imitated on a small scale the great mart of finance and commerce in the city. There was an open walk above, with cellars beneath ; and some rows of shops were principally occupied by sempstresses and milliners, who dealt in caps and ribbons, furs, handkerchiefs, gloves, scents, and " washes for the complexion." Among the gay crowd that sauntered to and fro on the afternoon of November 23rd, 1653, was a young Royal- ist gentleman, a Major Gerard. About the same time the place was visited by the brother of the Portuguese Ambassador, then recently arrived in England, one Don Pantaleon Sa, a knight of Malta, and a cavalier of an arrogant and imperious temper. How the two men came into collision is not very clearly set forth ; but it would 90 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. seem that Gerard accused Don Pantaleon and his friends of speaking in French some calumnies against England ; that one of the Portuguese gave Gerard the lie ; that thereupon rapiers flew from their sheaths, and some sharp cut-and- thrust work took place, in which Gerard got stabbed in the shoulder. Some of the English frequenters of the 'Change then interposed, separated the combatants, and jostled the Portuguese out of the Exchange, one with a slash upon his cheek. Breathing revenge and fury, Don Pantaleon hurried home to the Portuguese Embassy ; armed some twenty of his followers in headpiece, breastpiece, sword, and pistol ; loaded two or three coaches with powder, bullets, and hand- grenades, and returned to the Exchange, bent upon slaying every Englishman he should find there. In rushed the Portuguese with swords drawn ; the people fled to the shops for shelter ; but in the stampede four were severely wounded. A Mr. Greenaway was walking with his sister and his fiancee. He hastened to place them in a shop for safety, and proceeded to inquire into the meaning of the affray. The Portuguese mistook him for Gerard, and shot him dead with a bullet in the brain. By this time a crowd had gathered, and, enraged at the murder of their country- man, pressed the Portuguese so hotly that they retreated in all haste to the Embassy, barred its gates, and prepared to defend it. Meantime, some of the Horse Guards had ridden up, under Colonel Whalley, with orders from Cromwell to seize all implicated in Mr. Greenaway's murder. The Ambassador stoutly insisted that by the law of nations his house was a sanctuary for all his countrymen ; but finding Whalley unshaken in his purpose, pleaded for time to send to the Lord General Cromwell. This was granted ; but all THE STORY OF DON PANTALEON SA. 91 the reply vouchsafed by Cromwell to his messenger was, that one man had been killed and several wounded, and that unless the criminals were surrendered he would withdraw the soldiers and leave the people " to pull down the house, and execute justice themselves." The threat was sufficient : Don Pantaleon, three " Portugals," and an English boy, the Don's servant, were given up, were confined in the guard-house for the night, and next day sent prisoners to Newgate, whence, some few days later, Don Pantaleon effected his escape, only to be speedily recaptured. Owing to the intervention of the Portuguese merchants the trial was postponed until the following July, when on the 6th the prisoners were arraigned in the " Upper Bench Court " on a charge of murder. One half the jury were foreigners. At first Don Pantaleon refused to plead, on the ground that he held a commission to act as ambassador in the event of his brother's death or absence from England. But being threatened with the peine forte et dure, he pleaded not guilty. The evidence against him and his fellow- prisoners was, of course, irresistible; the jury returned an unanimous verdict of guilty, and sentence of death was passed upon the five prisoners. Great exertions were made to save Don Pantaleon's life, but Cromwell remained in- exorable. " Blood," he said, " had been shed, and justice must be satisfied." The only concession he could be induced to make was that the Don should suffer by the axe instead of by the hangman's rope. By a strange coincidence, Don Pantaleon and Gerard suffered on the same day. While the former lay in Newgate the latter involved himself with Vowel and Somerset Fox in a loyalist plot, was detected, arrested, tried by the High 92 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. Court of Justice, found guilty of high treason, and sentenced to death. He was beheaded on Tower Hill on the evening of July 10th, 1654. When brought to the scaffold he was not allowed to address the people, but, being pressed to reveal the secrets of the conspiracy for which he suffered, he replied, that " if he had a thousand ives he would lose them all to do the king any service, and was now willing to die upon that suspicion ; but that he was innocent of what was now charged against him." He died with great forti- tude. About an hour later, on the same scaffold stood Don Pantaleon, having been conveyed thither in a mourning coach with six horses, attended by a number of his brother's suite. After spending some time in devout exercises, the Don, who showed a good deal of discomposure, handed to his confessor his beads and crucifix, and then laid his head upon the block. At the executioner's second stroke it was severed from his body. " Don Pantaleon's brother," says Carlyle, " all sorrow and solicitation being fruitless, signed the Portuguese treaty that very day, and instantly departed for his own country, with such thoughts as we may figure." We may dismiss the later history of the New or Exeter 'Change in a few paragraphs. It was here, at the sign of the Three Spanish Gipsies, that Nan Clarges, or rather Ratsford, sold her husband's wash-balls, fans, gloves, and perfumery, and traded as a milliner. Among her customers was Colonel George Monk, and while he lay a prisoner in the Tower from 1694 to 1696 she undertook to look after his house. "She was neither pretty nor well-bred," says Mr. Julian Corbett ; " she had a sharp tongue, and manners that were not refined. But the colonel was soft-hearted, and THE STORY OF DON PANTALEON SA. 93 she was very kind ; the colonel was so handsome and had such a soldierly air, and then all his friends had forgotten him, and the perfumer was detestable. So the gloomy walls of the Tower were brightened with an unholy idyll, and thus began the intrigue which was to make a duchess of plain Nan Clarges, the farrier's daughter of the Savoy." She quarrelled with her husband, and separated from him in 1648. In 1652 she was married to General George Monk in the church of St. George, Southwark, and in the following year was delivered of a son, afterwards second Duke of Albemarle. It was generally credited that this second marriage took place while her first husband was alive ; but all authentic evidence seems to point to the con- trary. What cannot be denied is that she was a woman of coarse speech and coarse manners. Clarendon says: " She was a woman nihil muliebris prceter corpus gerens ; " and Burnet describes her as " a ravenous, mean, and contemptible creature, who thought of nothing but getting and spending." Pepys says she was " a plain, homely, and ill-looked dowdy; " and, referring to his dining with the Duke, remarks that the " Duke had sorry company, dirty dishes, bad meat, and a nasty wife at table." The Duke was dining one day with one Troutbeck, a " drunken sot," when he chanced to ex- press his surprise that Nan Hyde, as he called Clarendon's daughter, should have become Duchess of York. " If you will give me another bottle," says Troutbeck, " I will tell you as great, if not a greater, miracle ; and that is, that our dirty Nan should come to be Duchess of Albemarle." I give the story as generally told ; but very much doubt whether Monk was the man to have suffered such an insolence. Douglas Jerrold's pretty little comedy of The White 94 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. Milliner is founded on a tradition connected with the New Exchange, for which Pennant is responsible : " Above stairs sat, in the character of a milliner, the reduced Duchess of Tyrconnel, wife of Richard Talbot, Lord Deputy of Ireland under James II. The female suspected to be his Duchess, after his death (1691) supported herself for a few days, till she was known and otherwise provided for, by the little trade of the place ; she had delicacy enough not to wish to be detected ; she sat in a white mask and a white dress, and was known by the name of the White Milliner." For this story there seems not to be the slightest foundation. In the early part of the present century a Mr. Cross kept a menagerie at the 'Change, the great attraction of which was an elephant named Chundah, originally purchased for a sum of 900 guineas. It was almost as great a favourite with the London public in those days as Jumbo of immortal memory was in our own. Unfor- tunately he showed symptoms of insanity, and in March 1826 it became necessary to destroy him, under circum- stances which Hone has described with much prolixity in his " Every Day Book." Poison having no effect upon him, musketry was resorted to; but a whole storm of musket balls was rained upon the poor brute before he was mortally hit. It is estimated that he received upwards of one hundred and fifty bullets. His skeleton is preserved in the museum of the Royal College of Surgeons. I may note that the body of the poet Gay lay in state in the upper room of Exeter 'Change (1732), prior to its removal to Westminster Abbey (December 23rd). Exeter 'Change was taken down in 1829. ufj Jnll f|afi THE spacious and handsome thoroughfare which stretches from the foot of St. James's Street to that of the Haymarket, containing some of the stateliest buildings London has to boast of, is called PALL MALL from a game of that name introduced into England from France in the reign of Charles I. It was known, however, in the preceding reign, for in his " Basilicon Doron " (or Royal Gift) James I. recommends it to his son, Prince Henry, as a game he should practise for health and amusement's sake. This game in Blount's " Glossographia " is thus defined : Pale Maelle (Fr.), a game wherein a round bowle is with a mallet struck through a high arch of iron (standing at either end of an alley), which he that can do it at the fewest blows, or at the number agreed on, wins. The game was used heretofore in the long alley near St. James's, and vulgarly called Pell Mell." Charles II. was passionately fond of it, and for its more private enjoyment laid down the Mall in St. James's Park. As Waller says : " Here a well-polished Mall gives us the joy To see our Prince his matchless form employ : His manly posture and his graceful mien, Vigour and youth in all his motions seen ; No sooner has he touched the flying ball, But 'tis already more than half the Mall, And such a fury from his arm has got, As from a smoking culverin 'twere shot 1 " 96 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. A prince might well play at Pall Mall, when he could get a poet like Waller to make such exquisite flattery out of it! Wycherley lays one of the scenes in his comedy of Love in a Wood in the old Pall Mall. The first mention of it in Pepys' immortal Diary occurs under the date of July 26th, 1660, where he records that "we went to Wood's at the Pall Mall (our old house for clubbing), and there we spent till ten at night." This, as Cunningham remarks, is not only one of the earliest references to Pall Mall as an in- habited locality, but one of the earliest uses of the word " clubbing " in its modern signification, and additionally interesting from the fact that the street still main- tains what Johnson would have called its " clubable " character. Wycherley's composition of the comedy to which I have referred Love in a Wood introduced him, after a somewhat peculiar fashion, to that most notorious of royal courtesans, the Duchess of Cleveland. When driving in Pall Mall she caught sight of him in a crowd of beaux and fine gentlemen, and, putting her head out of her chariot- window, she shouted, " Sir, you are a rascal, you are a villain ! " adding a coarse epithet which reflected on the fail- fame of the mother who bore him.* On the following day Wycherley called upon her, and humbly begged to know how he had been so unfortunate as to offend her. This * The Duchess probably intended a kind of oblique compliment, her allusion being to the stanza of a song in the above-mentioned play : " When parents are slaves Their brats cannot be any other ; Great wits and great braves Have always a punk to their mother." THE STORY OF PALL MALL. 97 began an intimacy which placed the young wit within the most private circle of the court. It was while sauntering in the Mall, with his hat slouched over his dark saturnine countenance, and a bevy of his favourite dogs following at his heels, that Charles II. gave Dryden the hint for his poem of " The Medal." " If I was a poet," said the King, " and I think I am poor enough to be one, I would write a poem on such a subject in the following manner." And he then sketched out the plan. Dryden acted on the suggestion, carried the poem as soon as it was finished to the King, and received for it (lucky poet !) a hundred broad pieces. King Charles seems to have held a kind of levee in the Mall. On one occasion Hobbes, the author of " The Leviathan," met him there ; told him that he had been assailed in a book newly writ by the Dean of Christ Church ; and asked His Majesty's leave to vindicate himself. The King, appear- ing " troubled at the dealing of the Dean, gave Mr. Hobbes leave, conditionally that he touched nobody but him who had abused him." Nell Gwynn was at this time a resident in Pall Mall ; in 1670 on the " east end, north side," next to Lady Mary Howard's; from 1676 to her death in 1687 in a house on the " south side," with a garden towards the Park. We hear of this garden through the decorous Evelyn, who records his attendance on Charles II. in a walk through St. James's (March 2nd, 1671), when he both saw and heard " a discussion between the King and Miss Nelly, as they called an impudent comedian, she looking out of her garden on a terrace at the top of the wall, the King standing on the green walk under it." Of this curious scene, by the way, E. W. Ward, tte artist, has made an effective picture. 7 98 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. The story runs that Charles gave her this house under a long lease ; and that, on her discovering it to be only a lease under the Crown, she returned him the lease and conveyances, saying she had always conveyed free under the Crown and always would ; and that she would not accept it till it was conveyed free to her by an Act of Parliament made on or for that purpose. Here was born her second son, christened James in compliment to the Duke of York ; and here, perhaps, the following incident may be located. Bowman, the actor, then a young man, famous for his fine voice, was engaged to take part in a concert at her house, at which the King, his brother, and two or three courtiers were present. At the close of the performance Charles expressed -himself highly pleased. " Then, Sir," said Nelly, " to show you don't speak like a courtier, I hope you will make the performers a handsome present." The King said he had no money about him, and asked the Duke if he had any. " I believe, Sir," said the Duke, " not above a guinea or two." Then, with her delightful laugh, Nell turned to the people about her, and boldly adopting the King's favourite oath " Ods fish ! " she cried, " what company have I got into ! " Nell's aged mother lodged with her at one time in Pall Mall ; and an apothecary's bill has been discovered, in which are charges for cordial juleps with pearls for " Master Charles," her eldest son, afterwards Duke of St. Albans, and a cordial for " old Mrs. Gwynne." There are also extant the bills for a French coach, blazoned with her name in a great cipher ; for a bedstead, with silver ornaments ; for large mirrors ; for cleansing and burnishing her warming-pan, which is still in existence ; for the hire of sedan-chairs ; for THE STORY OF PALL MALL. 99 articles of dress and furniture ; for table items ; for white satin petticoats and white and red satin night-gowns ; for kilderkins of strong ale, ordinary ale, and " a barrel of eights ; " for a fine landscape fan ; for scarlet satin shoes covered with silver lace, and a pair of satin shoes laced over with gold, for Master Charles. Evidently Nelly loved good housekeeping, and everything nice about her, and knew how to deck her pretty person to advantage. It is said that she had a remarkably small foot ; one wishes that a pair of her scarlet satin shoes covered with silver lace had come down to us, or that, at all events, we had been told whether she wore two's or three's ! Nell Gwynn died in 1687. Her house was afterwards occupied by the celebrated physician Dr. Heberden, and then by the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel. It has been rebuilt, however, since Nell inhabited it. Pall Mall can boast of a long list of distinguished residents. Schomberg House, on the south side (Nos. 81 and 82) was so called after the octogenarian warrior, Frederick de Schomberg, Duke of Schomberg, killed at the Battle of the Boyne in 1690. It was built by his son, the third and last Duke, died 1719. A party of disbanded soldiers drew themselves up before it in 1699, and threatened to pull down every stone ; but it escaped their violence, and still retains many of its original characteristics. John Astley, the painter, died 1787, divided the house into three sections, fitting up the central in a most whimsical style for his own, accommodation. He was succeeded as a resident by Cosway the painter. The west wing was inhabited by a greater than either of them Thomas Gainsborough (1778-88), who painted here his famous " Blue Boy," as a reply (not wholly successful, perhaps) to Sir Joshua Reynolds' objection 100 A SO OX ABOUT LONDON. to blue in the mass. The great artist died here, and Reynolds stood by his deathbed as he murmured, " We are all going to heaven, and Vandyck is of the company." Gainsborough was passionately fond of music. The author of " Nollekens and his Times " says : " Upon our arrival at Mr. Gainsborough's the artist was listening to a violin, and held up his fingers as a request for silence. Colonel Hamilton was playing to him in so exquisite a manner that Gainsborough exclaimed, ' Now, my dear Colonel, if you will but go on I will give you that picture of The Boy at the Stile which you have so often wished to purchase of me ! ' " Surely it is not often that a musician is so bountifully rewarded ! Sir William Temple, the diplomatist, and Swift's early patron, lived, in 1681, two doors eastward of Nell Gwynn ; and the Hon. Robert Boyle, one of the founders of the Royal Society, and associated with Temple in the Battle of the Books, lived next door. On the south side, in 1671, the Countess of Southesk, who figures, not too decently, in De Grammont's Memoirs. Marlborough House, now so well known as the residence of the Prince and Princess of Wales, belonged to the great Duke, the hero of Blenheim and Ramillies. Schomberg House was at one time the residence of a hero of a very different capacity William, Duke of Cumberland, the " hero of Culloden." Pope's "Bubo" the fribble Bubb Dodington, Lord Melcombe lived next door to Marlborough House. Robert Dodsley, the footman who became a publisher, why does one never see the reverse ? kept shop here at the Tully's Head. THE STORY OF PALL MALL. 101 In 1826 Sir Walter Scott was lodging at No. 25, which has been rebuilt. On October 23rd he writes in his diary : " Sam Rogers and Moore breakfasted here, and we were very merry fellows." The Smyrna Coffee House, which was so celebrated a resort of politicians and men of letters in the reign of Queen Anne, was located in Pall Mall, but its very site has been forgotten. Swift writes : " Prior and I came away at nine, and sat at the Smyrna till eleven receiving acquaintance." And Defoe : " If it is fine weather we take a turn in the Park till two, when we go to dinner ; and if it be dirty, you are entertained at picket or basset at White's, or you may talk politics at the Smyrna and St. James's." It was here that Thomson received subscriptions for his " Seasons." At the Star and Garter, William, fifth Lord Byron, in 1765, killed his neighbour and friend, Mr. Cha worth, in a sudden brawl the two having gotten to hot words over the question whether Lord Byron, who did not " preserve," or Mr. Cha worth, who did, had the most game on his lands. Mr. Chaworth insisted that poachers ought to be treated with unsparing rigour; Lord Byron held to a different opinion. Chaworth maintained that but for the care taken by himself and Sir Charles Sedley, another neighbour, Lord Byron would not have a hare on his estate. With a smile his lordship asked what Sir Charles Sedley's manors were. " Nuttall and Bulwell," was the reply. " No !" exclaimed his lordship ; " Nuttall may be his, but Bulwell is mine." " If you want information," angrily answered Chaworth, " as to Sir Charles's manors, he lives at Mr. Cooper's in Dean Street, and, I doubt not, will be ready to give you satis- faction ; and as to myself, your lordship knows where to find me, in Berkeley Row." 102 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. Little more was said, and Chaworth called the host to settle the reckoning; after which, appearing somewhat excited, he went out, followed by a Mr. Donston. " Was I too abrupt in what I said 1 " inquired Chaworth. " No," said Donston; "you have gone too far for a point so trifling, but I do not believe that Lord Byron or the company will think any more of it." Donston then returned to the club- room. Unfortunately Lord Byron at this moment came out, and found Chaworth lingering on the stairs. What happened next no one knows ; but, going down to the first landing-place, they called on a waiter to show them an empty room, which he hastened to do, opening the door and placing on the table a small tallow candle. As he retired the two gentlemen passed in and shut the door after them. In a few minutes the bell rang the waiter answered it, but perceiving what had happened ran downstairs in a panic of alarm and told his master, who, in his turn, repaired to the apartment, where he found the two madmen standing close together : Chaworth with his sword in his left hand, had his right hand round Byron's neck ; and Byron's left hand was round Chaworth, while he held his sword in his right. Both delivered up their swords to the landlord ; assistance was summoned, and a surgeon sent for, who arrived immediately. Meanwhile, five or six of their friends entered the room, and Chaworth made to them a voluntary statement. " He could not live many hours," he said ; "he forgave Lord Byron, and hoped the world would; the affair had passed in the dark, only a small tallow candle burning in the room. That Lord Byron asked him, if he addressed the observation on the game to Sir Charles Sedley or to him ? To which he (Chaworth) THE STORY OF PALL MALL. 103 replied, ' If you have anything to say we had better shut the door.' While he was thus engaged Lord Byron bid him draw, and turning, he saw his lordship's sword half drawn, on which he whipped out his own sword and made the first pass; that his sword running through my lord's waistcoat, he thought he had killed him, and asking whether he was not mortally wounded, Lord Byron, while he was speaking, shortened his sword and stabbed him in the belly." By this time Hawkins, the surgeon, had arrived. Chaworth was sitting by the fire, with the lower part of his waistcoat opened, his shirt drenched with blood, and his hand upon his stomach. A brief examination compelled the surgeon to inform his patient that the wound was mortal. Chaworth then desired that his uncle Mr. Leving, might be sent for, and proceeded to give his account of what had taken place to Hawkins. In addition to his previous statement, he said that he felt Lord Byron's sword enter his body and go deep through his back ; that he struggled, and being the stronger man, disarmed his lordship, and expressed his fear that he had mortally wounded him ; that Lord Byron, in reply, said something to the same effect, and added that he hoped now he would allow him to be as brave a man as any in England. Hawkins, in his evidence, remarked that, pained and distressed as Chaworth was, and with the certainty of death before him, he repeated what he had already asserted to his friends before ; that he would rather be in his present situation than live under the misfortune of having killed another person. An edifying statement; but then why did he provoke the scuffle or duel which had terminated so disas- trously ? It is evident, too, from liis own statement, that 104 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. he did his best to kill Lord Byron ; so that his expression of satisfaction seems a little unreal. After a while the unfortunate Chaworth was removed to his own house, more medical assistance arrived, but nothing could be done for him, and in a few hours he expired. His last words, as committed to writing by his attorney, were as follows : " Sunday morning, the 27th of January, about three of the clock, Mr. Chaworth said that my lord's sword was half drawn, and that he, knowing the man, immediately, or as quick as he could, whipped out his sword, and had the first thrust ; that then my lord wounded him, and he disarmed my lord, who then said, ' By G d, I have as much courage as any man in England.' " Lord Byron was committed to the Tower, and tried before his peers in Westminster Hall on April 16th and 17th, 1765. He was attended to the bar by the Deputy Governor of the Tower, the axe with its edge turned away from him being borne on his left hand by the gentleman- gaoler. Having pleaded " not guilty," he put in a written defence, which was read by the clerk. It contained nothing absolutely inconsistent with Mr. Chaworth's statements, but its drift was to show what seems, indeed, to have been the case that Chaworth was the aggressor, and that Byron acted simply on the defensive. The peers, after brief deliberation, then pronounced him, on their honour, guilty not of murder, but of manslaughter; though four were in favour of an absolute acquittal. Being asked why judg- ment should not be recorded against him, he replied by claiming the benefit of the 1st Edward VI., cap. 12, a statute which provided that any peer convicted of a felony for which a commoner might have benefit of clergy should THE STORY OF PALL MALL. 105 always be discharged without burning in the hand or under- going other penal consequences. Thereupon his lordship was set at liberty. The statute which served him so oppor- tunely was repealed by the 4th & 5th Victoria, cap. 22. This strange catastrophe had an indirect influence on the life of the poet Byron, who was the grand-nephew of Mr. Chaworth's adversary, and fell passionately but hopelessly in love with Chaworth's grand-niece, the beau- tiful Mary Chaworth, heroine of his exquisite poem of " The Dream." He had a fancy that their marriage would have blotted out the dark memory that stood between the two families. Lord Byron survived the affair thirty-three years, dying in 1798, when his title devolved on the poet, who afterwards wrote, in reference to his predecessor : " As to the Lord Byron who killed Mr. Chaworth in a duel, so far from retiring from the world he made the tour of Europe, and was appointed Master of the Staghounds, after that event, and did not give up society until his son had offended him by marrying in a manner contrary to his duty. So far from feeling any remorse for having killed Mr. Chaworth, who was a ' spadassin,' and celebrated for his quarrelsome disposition, he always kept the sword which he used on that occasion in his bedchamber, and there it still was when he died." The truth would seem to be that he was not gifted with personal courage, but having been forced into a situa- tion in which he had borne himself with some degree of credit, he was ever afterwards anxious to found upon it a reputation for bravery which he knew he had not deserved. In 1682 Pall Mall was the scene of an atrocious crime the murder of Thomas Thynne, of Longleat, in Wiltshire, who, a few months before, had secured, against a crowd 106 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. of competitors, the hand of the beautiful young widow, Lady Elizabeth Ogle, the heiress of the house of Northum- berland. Amongst the rejected was a certain Count Koningsmarck, a handsome but unprincipled adventurer, whose rage against Thynne knew no bounds. Thynne, or, as in allusion to his wealth he was familiarly called, " Tom of Ten Thousand," moved in the highest social circles. In politics he was a Whig, and a warm adherent of the Duke of Monmouth. He had represented Wiltshire in four Parliaments ; and at Longleat lived on a scale of almost princely magnificence. There, on more than one occasion, he entertained Monmouth right royally, as Dryden commemorates in his poem of " Absalom and Ahithophel," in which Thynne figures as Issachar : " Each house receives him as a guardian god, And consecrates the place of his abode ; But hospitable treats did most commend Wise Issachar, his wealthy Western friend." Thynne's marriage took place in the summer of 1681. As his bride was not yet fifteen, he separated from her after the ceremony, and she went to spend a year on the Continent. She was fated again to be a widow before she was a wife. On Sunday night, February 12th, 1682, a report spread through the fashionable world of London that Thynne of Longleat had been shot while driving in his coach towards the east end of Pall Mall. Suspicion at once rested on Count Koningsmarck as the instigator of the crime ; and through the activity of the Duke of Mon- mouth, Lord Cavendish, Sir John Reresby, and others, he was tracked down to Gravesend, and apprehended there on Sunday evening the 19th, exactly a week after the THE STORY OF PALL MALL. 107 commission of the murder. Brought up to London, he was lodged in Newgate, together with three accomplices or tools, who had previously been arrested; and on Monday, the 27th, the four prisoners were arraigned at the Old Bailey Charles George Boroski or Boratzi, Christopher Yratz, and John Stern as principals, and Charles John Count Koningsmarck as an accessory before the fact. The evidence against the three principals was complete ; and, indeed, their guilt was established by their own confession. As to Koningsmarck, it was proved that he had used menaces against Thynne that in London he had lain concealed in an humble quarter of the town and that he had been in communication with the murderers imme- diately before their perpetration of the murder. To this he answered that the accused were his servants and followers, and necessarily in constant intercourse with him ; and that he had retired into mean lodgings in order to be cured of a disease which compelled him to live privately. The defence was in every way unsatisfactory ; but Chief Justice Pemberton summed up strongly in his favour, and there is good reason to believe that the jurors had been heavily bribed. He was, at any rate, acquitted, while his instruments were found guilty and sentenced to be hanged. The sentence was carried out at the place of the murder on March 16th. "This day," writes Evelyn, "was exe- cuted Colonel Vratz and some of his accomplices, for the execrable murder of Mr. Thynne, set on by the principal, Koningsmarck ; he went to execution like an undaunted hero, as one that had done a friendly office for that base coward, Count Koningsmarck, who had hopes to marry his [Thynne's] widow, the rich Lady Ogle, and was 108 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. acquitted by a corrupt jury, and so got away. Vratz told a friend of mine, who accompanied him to the gallows, and gave him some advice, that he did not value dying a rush, and hoped and believed God would deal with him like a gentleman." Kb'ningsmarck made haste to leave England, and in 1 686 died in the Morea while fighting against the Turks. Lady Ogle found a third husband in Charles Seymour, Duke of Somerset, to whom she bore thirteen children. She died in November 1722. In Westminster Abbey will be found a memorial sculpture to Thomas Thynne, on which is carved a representation of his murder. At No. 62, in this thoroughfare, lived and died Mrs. Abington, the original Lady Teazle in Sheridan's School for Scandal. It is said that in order to keep up her card- parties here, which were attended by many ladies of the highest rank, and to which she was exceedingly partial, she at times withdrew from Pall Mall, and lived incog, in a small house in one of the passages leading out of Stafford Row, Pimlico, " where plants are so placed at the windows as nearly to shut out the light, or at all events to render the apartments impervious to the inquisitive eye." Which means, I suppose, that the plants prevented people from looking in at the windows. Occasionally she took up her quarters in a house at the end of Mount Street, and lived with her servant in the kitchen until it was time for her to reappear ; when some of her friends would compliment her on the good effects of her summer's excursion in the country. Pall Mall has strange associations with impostors and impostures. Here dwelt George Psalmanazar, who professed to be a THE STORY OF PALL MALL. 109 native of Formosa, and invented a Formosan language, which for a time imposed upon the best European philo- logists. He repented of his frauds in later life, and became an industrious literary hack. A less respectable character was the notorious quack Dr. Graham, who fitted up part of Schomberg House as a Temple of Hygeia, or Health, the goddess being represented (without much aid from drapery) by the beautiful and unscrupulous Emma Lyons, afterwards the wife of Sir William Hamilton, and the mistress of Lord Nelson. Under lier eyes, as it were, Graham delivered lectures upon risqite subjects, charging at first an admission fee of two guineas, which was rapidly reduced to a guinea, half-a- guinea, five shillings, and half-a-crown. Horace Walpole, who went to see everybody and everything, paid a visit to the quack in August 1780. "It is the most impudent puppet-show of imposition," he writes, " I ever saw, and the mountebank himself the dullest of his profession, except that he makes the spectators pay a crown apiece. We were eighteen. A young officer of the Guards affected humour, and tired me still more. A woman, invisible, warbled to clarionets on the stairs. The decorations are pretty and odd ; and the apothecary, who comes up a trapdoor for no purpose, since he might as well come upstairs, is a novelty. The electrical experiments are nothing at all singular; and a poor air-pump, that only bursts a bladder, pieces out the farce." One of the man's most glaring offences against public decency was his parade of what he called the Electrical Bed. It was mounted on legs of glass and covered with costly tapestry ; and the arch-quack pretended that married couples whom Heaven had not blessed with children nrght 110 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. realise their wishes by sleeping in this hed, which he let out at 1 00 per night. So great is the force of human credulity that several persons of rank and wealth paid this enormous fee. The Elixir of Life and Earth-bathing were two later dodges. But the London public wearying of his quackery he withdrew to Edinburgh, where he died in comparative poverty in June 1794. He was a good deal of the fanatic and more of the cheat, with a touch of the madman ; and his character was extraordinary enough to merit a partial analysis. 1^ $tunj of THE Strand, as its name implies, was formerly the long, low, sloping shore covered with reeds and water-plants, and echoing with the hoarse cry of the bittern of the tidal lagoon or lake formed by the wide-spreading courses of the Thames, before human industry and skill had made any effort to restrain them within permanent limits. It is probable that little was done in this direction before Sebert, King of the East Saxons, in the seventh century began, on the small island known as Thorney, the erection of West- minster Abbey. The necessity of frequent recourse to the river would gradually lead to various improvements ; and after London Bridge was built a thoroughfare must soon have been established between it and the Abbey. Then came the re-building of the Abbey, and the foundation in succession of Rufus's noble Hall, of the stately palace of the Savoy, and of the first church of St. Mary ; while, before the end of the thirteenth century, the village of Charing rose into existence. Its facility of access to the waterside induced many great nobles to plant their town- houses along the line of the Strand ; and in the reign of Edward III. the spacious embattled piles of Essex House, Durham Place, and the Inn or Palace of the Bishops of Norwich (afterwards York House), with their fair terraced gardens and water-gates, reared on high their masonry. At 112 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. this time the highway was kept in no very stable condition ; and there were at least three bridges across the small water- courses which came winding down from the northern heights. The sites of two of these were preserved by the names of Ivybridge Lane and Strandbridge Lane ; a third was situated somewhat to the eastward of St. Clement's Church. Another feature of the ancient Strand was a stone cross, which stood in front of the spot now occupied by St. Mary's, and was afterwards replaced by the celebrated Maypole. In the reign of Edward VI. the line of the Strand had few blanks left in it on either side ; for on the south ran the almost continuous walls of the mansions of nobles and prelates, while on the north stretched a continuous row of houses. Holywell Street and Butcher Row, extending close to Temple Bar, had already a flavour of antiquity about them. No doubt the Elizabethan Strand, in point of picturesqueness, must have borne off the palm from its predecessors ; for it was constantly the scene of procession and pageant, and the resort of gaily dressed cavaliers with their attendants, hastening to embark in the gay barges that plied to and fro with flutter of pennons and sounds of music. Spenser, in his " Prothalamion," describes one of the spectacles which at times might have been seen there. On the occasion of " the Double Marriage of the two Honourable and Virtuous Ladies, the Ladie Elizabeth and the Ladie Katherine Somerset, Daughters to the Right Honorable the Earle of Worcester, and espoused to the two worthie Gentlemen, Mr. Henry Gilford and Mr. William Peter, Esquyers," he walked forth " Along the shore of silver-streaming Thames," THE STORY OF THE STRAND. 113 until he came to "a house of ancient fame," close to the site of "... those bricky towers The which on Thames' broad aged back do ride, Where now the studious lawyers have their bowers." This was the stately mansion of Lord Worcester, from whose gates issued a glorious train a bridal procession lords and ladies, knights, squires, and pages, among whom conspicuous shone the two bridegrooms " of lovely face and fashion." And these, too, quick pacing to the river's side " Received those two fair Brides, their Love's delight." Or the idler in the Strand might peradventure behold the Great Queen herself. " In the year 1588 " (the year of the Armada), writes a contemporary, " I did live at the upper end of the Strand near St. Clement's Church, when suddenly there came a report to us (it was in December, much about five of the clock, very dark) that the Queen was gone to Council, ' and if you will see the Queen you must come quickly.' There we all ran, when the Court gates were set open, and no man did hinder us from coming in. There we came, where there was a far greater company than was usually at Lenten sermons ; and when we had staid there an hour, and that the yard was full, there being a number of torches, the Queen came out in great state. Then we cried, ' God save your Majesty ! God bless your Majesty ! ' Then the Queen said again to us, ' You may well have a greater prince, but you shall never have a more loving Prince.' And so, looking one upon another for awhile, the Queen departed. This wrought such an impression on us, for shows and pageantry are ever best seen by torchlight, 8 114 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. that all the way long we did nothing but talk what an admirable Queen she was, and how we would adventure our lives to do her service." At York House, in the Strand, was born Francis Bacon. It had formerly been occupied by the Bishops of Norwich as their " inn" or town residence; but, reverting to the Crown, was bestowed by Henry VIII. on Charles Brandon, Duke of Suffolk, second husband of Mary Tudor, ex-queen of France. Queen Mary, of persecuting notoriety, granted it in her time to her Lord Chancellor, Nicholas Heath, Archbishop of York, from whom it parsed by lease to his successor in the Chancellorship, Sir Nicholas Bacon, the father of our great philosopher. It was here that Sir Nicholas died. The winter of 1579 was sharp and severe, but a bitter frost having suddenly been succeeded by a genial thaw, the portly Sir Nicholas, at all times hard of breathing, seated himself by an open window, while his barber trimmed his hair and beard. Meanwhile he fell asleep. Waking with a chill and a fit of shivering, he inquired of his servant, " Why did you let me sleep 1 " " Why, my lord," was the answer, " I durst not wake your lordship." " Then," re- torted the asthmatic judge, " you have killed me with kindness." It was at Essex House, in the Strand, one Sunday morning in February 1601, that the Earls of Rutland and Southampton, the Lords Sandys and Monteagle, with about three hundred gentlemen, fully armed, assembled, having been summoned by Essex with the information that his life was threatened by Raleigh and Lord Cobham. As soon as she was apprised of this strange conclave, the Queen despatched some of her high officials to demand its object. They were admitted by the wicket, without their servants, THE STORY OF THE STRAND. 115 into a court crowded with armed men. To the Queen's message Essex hotly replied that his life was sought, and that he had treacherously been dealt with. The Lord Keeper assured him that he should have honourable and equal justice. Then a great clamour arose among the multitude : " Away, my lord, they abuse you, they betray you, they undo you, you lose time ! " Whereupon the Lord Keeper covered himself, and said, " My lord, let us speak with you privately, and understand your griefs." Turning to the company, " I command you all upon your allegiance," he cried, " to lay down your weapons and to depart ; which you all ought to do, being thus commanded, if you be good subjects and owe that duty to the Queen's Majesty which you profess." But they unanimously broke into a loud shout : " All, all, all ! " And while the Lord Keeper was speaking, the Earl of Essex and most of the company put on their hats. The upshot of it was that Essex detained the Lord Keeper and his companions in custody, and then sallied forth into the Strand, followed by a large number of his adherents, hoping to raise the people. As he rode along the citizens stared at him in surprise. The dashing young noble was popular amongst them, but it was no thought of theirs to assist in overthrowing the Queen's Government, and he rode along, shouting, " For the Queen ! for the Queen ! A plot is laid for my life ! " without a cap or a voice being raised in sympathy. Dismayed by the failure, Essex and his partisans would have retraced their steps along the Strand, but found that the streets had been barricaded with empty carriages. They attempted to push forward; but at Ludgate the chains were drawn, and a company of soldiers stood with loaded arquebuses. At length Essex made his way down to the riverside, and, 116 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. taking boat, escaped to his own house, which he attempted to defend against the Queen's guards. No assistance coming to him from the city, he was soon overpowered, and that night he and Southampton were removed to the Tower. As the commercial activity of London increased, and the capital put forth new streets in every direction, it became impossible for so important a thoroughfare as the Strand to remain occupied by the mansions and gardens of its aristo- cratic owners. Durham Place changed its stables into an Exchange in 1608. Later in the century the site of York House was covered with the streets which in their names perpetuated the name and title of its latest proprietor, George Street, Villiers Street, Duke Street, Of Place, Buckingham Street. A similar fate befell Essex House and Arundel House ; and in the present century the Savoy, though for a while it had staved off destruction by becoming a garrison in one part and a prison in another, was swept away, with the exception of its beautiful chapel, on the erection of Waterloo Bridge. To some of these changes Gay alludes in his " Trivia : " " Through the long Strand together let us stray. . . . Behold that narrow street which steep descends, Whose building to the slimy shore extends ; Here Arundel's famed structure reared its frame : The street alone retains the empty name. Where Titian's glowing paint the canvas warm'd, And Eaphael's fair design with judgment charm'd, Now hangs the Bellman's song, and pasted here The coloured prints of Overton appear. Where statues breath'd, the works of Phidias' hands, A wooden pump or lonely watch-house stands. There Essex' stately pile adorned the shore, There Cecil's, Bedford's, Villiers' now no more." Still greater alterations have occurred of recent years, THE STORY OF THE STRAND. 117 through the construction the Embankment and the formation of new streets. Butcher Row was so called because granted by Edward I. to Walter de Barbiere for the residence of " foreign butchers," that is, of butchers who came in from the country with their meat in carts, and offered it for sale just outside the Lord Mayor's jurisdiction. It was pulled down in the last years of the eighteenth century, in pursuance of a plan of improvement suggested by one Alderman Pickett. Though a block of miserable tenements in the days of its decline, it was not without its dignifying associations. Here was the residence of the French Ambassador, which Henri TV.'s great minister, the Due de Sully, occupied for a single night on the occasion of his visit to London, while Arundel House was being got ready for him. " Like most of those fine picturesque-looking mansions which characterised ancient London, the house consisted generally of low and small rooms, many of them on the same floor. The ceilings were traversed by large rude beams, and a well-staircase, lighted by a skylight from the top, extended from the ground to the roof. Roses, crowns, fleurs-de-lis, dragons, etc., formed the ornaments of its front." It was afterwards converted into an inn, " The Bear and Harrow," which became a favourite resort of the half- mad, half -inspired poet Nat Lee. " Returning thence one night," says the antiquary Oldys, " through Clare Market to his lodgings in Duke Street, overladen with wine, Lee fell down on the ground as some say, according to others on a bulk, and was killed or stifled in the snow" (1692). He was buried in the church of St. Clement Danes. The church of St. Clement Danes has quite a history of its own. If we turn to the pages of painstaking Stow 118 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. we read : " Harold, whom King Canute had by a concubine, reigned three years, and was buried at Westminster; but afterwards Hardicanute, the lawful son of Canute, in revenge of a displeasure done to his mother, by expelling her out of the realm, and of the murder of his brother Alured, commanded the body of Harold to be digged out of the earth and to be thrown into the Thames, when it was by a fisherman taken up and buried in this churchyard. But out of a fair ' League Book,' some time belonging to the Abbey of Chertsey, is noted, after this sort : In the reign of King Ethelred the monastery of Chertsey was destroyed ; ninety monks of that house were slain by the Danes, whose bodies were buried in a place near to the old monastery. William Malmesbury saith : They burnt the church, to- gether with the monks and abbot ; but the Danes, desirous, at last, to return home into Denmark, were (by the just judgment of God), all slain at London, at a place which is called the church of the Danes." Thus we have two guesses to account for the affix Danes St. Clement Danes. Let us try a third, which we owe to the antiquary Fleet wood, Recorder of London temp. Elizabeth. He affirms that when our Alfred the Great drove so many of the Danes out of the kingdom in 886, he benevolently allowed those who had English wives, and were residing in London, to settle down between Westminster and Ludgate ; and that they built there a temple, which was afterwards consecrated and called by its present designation. Neither of these etymological speculations seems to me very probable ; but the reader may take which he will an he will. The church was granted to the Knights Templars by Henry II. The present building, which is not without THE STORY OF THE STRAND. 119 some merit, was built by Edward Pierce, under the super- vision of Sir Christopher Wren, in the closing years of the seventeenth century. The steeple was erected by Gibbs. The dramatist Otway lies in an unknown grave in the churchyard. In the north vestry-room is preserved a painting by Kent, painter and landscape gardener, which formerly served as the altar-piece. In 1725 Bishop Gibson ordered its removal, because it was supposed to contain portraits of the Pretender's wife and children though it is certain that Kent never contrived to paint tbe likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or in the earth beneath, or in the water under the earth. The parish rose up in its wrath at the episcopal mandate, for the picture had cost much money, and was so bad as to have many admirers. But it was forced to obey, and Kent's chef d'ceuvre was trans- ferred to the coffee-room of the neighbouring tavern, " The Crown and Anchor." Afterwards it found its way to its present repository. Hogarth has introduced a burlesque of it into his " Man of Taste." Fabyan, the historian, was once a dweller in St. Clement's parish,* and, in connection with a plot of ground included in the parish, originated the quaint custom still observed by the Sheriff of London on being sworn into office before Her Majesty's judges. In 1235 Walter de Bruin, a farrier, purchased ground for the erection of a forge, on condition of paying six horse-shoes and the nails requisite to fasten them into the Exchequer annually. The noble archway on the northern side of the church belongs to St. Clement's Inn (circa 1478), where Master * Dryden was also a parishioner at the time of his marriage to Lady Elizabeth Howard. 120 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. Shallow heard the midnight chimes in the days of his gay teinplarhood. Samuel Johnson was for many years a worshipper in this church, as a brass plate on his pew, No. 18 in the North Gallery, duly records. Boswell writes : " On the 9th of April (1773), being Good Friday, I breakfasted with Johnson on tea and cross-buns. He carried me to the Church of St. Clement Danes, where he had his seat, and his behaviour was, as I had imagined to myself, solemn and devout. I never shall forget the tremulous earnestness with which he pronounced the awful petition of the Litany, In the hour of death, and at the day of judgment, Good Lord, deliver us." William Godwin, the novelist, lived (after 1823) at 195, Strand, opposite St. Clement's. Clifton's, a tavern in Butcher Row, was one of the great Cham of Literature's frequent resorts. In St. Clement's Lane, adjoining, lived Sir John Trevor, twice Sneaker of the House of Commons, and cousin to the notorious Jeffreys. He had the courage to reprove the judge for his cruelty, and the judge's sovereign for his unconstitutional conduct. Unfortunately, he was not so honest as he was bold, and the House of Commons finding him guilty of corrupt practices, his was the unpleasant experience, as Speaker, of first putting the question whether he ought not to be expelled the House, and next of declaring it carried in the affirmative. St. Mary's Church was the first of the fifty London churches ordered to be built in the reign of Anne. Its architect was Gibbs. The Strand Maypole stood in front of this church, on the site of an old stone cross. Tradition relates that it THE STORY OF THE STRAND. 121 was set up by John Clarges, blacksmith, whose daughter Nan married Monk, Duke of Albemarle. It was swept away, with the rest of the maypoles, by order of the Long Parliament in 1644; but on the Restoration it rose again with more than its old pride of place a stately cedar, 134 feet long. It was brought in two pieces up to Scotland Yard, and thence conveyed to the Strand, with a streamer flourishing before it, drums blaring all around, and merry music setting men's hearts atune. The Duke of York sent twelve Jack Tars, with cables, pulleys, and half-a-dozen great anchors, to assist in raising it; after whom came three men, bare-headed, carrying three crowns. The sections were then joined together, and bolted with hoops of iron ; the crowns, with the Royal arms, richly gilt, were set upon the top ; the trumpets blared ; the men wrought with lusty arms and hearts ; and in four hours' time it was raised upright and solidly planted in the ground. Then the drums and tabors beat again, and the crowds redoubled their acclamations, while a company of morris-dancers, in their quaint costumes, danced gaily round the maypole. In 1713 it had to be replaced; and this third maypole in its turn was despoiled of its glory and presented by the parish to Sir Isaac Newton, who sent it to the Rector of Wanstead, and that gentleman caused it to be raised in Wanstead Park, to support what was then the largest telescope in Europe. It is this maypole which figures in Pope's " Dunciad : " " Amidst the area wide they took their stand, Where the tall maypole once o'erlooked the Strand ; But now, as Anne and piety ordain, A church collects the saints of Drury Lane." Stretching from Fleet Street as far as the present Essex 122 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. Street and Devereux Court was anciently an Outer Temple, which, with the Middle and the Inner Temples, constituted the London quarters of the Knights Templars. On the suppression of that famous Order by Edward II. it passed into the possession of the Bishops of Exeter, one of whom, Bishop Miles Stapleton, was seized by the mob as one of Edward II.'s friends, beheaded in Cheapside, and then buried in a heap of rubbish at his own door. It was successively held, after the reign of Henry VI., by Lord Paget, who called it Paget Place ; the Duke of Norfolk, Elizabeth's Earl of Leicester, and the unfortunate Earl of Essex. In 1667 the famous Earl of Shaftesbury (then Lord Ashley) occupied Essex House, and John Ixx;ke was residing there with him. In the Robin Hood Tavern, Essex Street, a debating club used to assemble, at which Edmund Burke first aired the graces of his oratory. Not long before his death Johnson established one of his favourite clubs in the Essex Head Tavern (No. 40, Essex Street), which was kept by an old servant of his friends the Thrales. It was a modest little affair. "The terms are low," writes Johnson, " and the expenses light. We meet thrice a week, and he who misses forfeits twopence." Here are some of the rules : " The Club shall consist of four-and- twenty. Every member is at liberty to introduce a friend once a week, but not oftener. Every member present at the Club shall spend at least sixpence, and every member who stays away shall forfeit threepence (sic). There shall be no general reckoning, but every man shall adjust his own expenses. One penny shall be left by each member for the waiter." The celebrated club known as " The Grecian " met at the THE STORY OF THE STRAND. 123 Grecian Coffee-house in Devereux Court, Essex Street. Eldon Chambers now occupy a portion of its site. In Howard Street, Strand, Congreve, the dramatist, was at one time a resident ; and the beautiful Mistress Brace- girdle, the actress, was his neighbour. Spence mentions that the author of Love for Love was for years very intimate with her ; that he " lived in the same street, his house very near hers, until his acquaintance with the young Duchess of Marlborough. He then quitted that house." Here Mountford, the player, was killed by Captain Hill and Lord Mohun, under circumstances which cast a vivid side-light on the social conditions of the age (see post). Arundel Street, together with Howard, Norfolk, and Surrey Streets, marks the area once occupied by the noble mansion and sumptuous gardens of Arundel House. Under the title of Bath's Inn, or Hampton Place, this was originally the London residence of the Bishops of Bath and Wells. At the general confiscation of Church property in the reign of Henry VIII. it was seized by the Crown ; and Edward VI. sold it to his uncle, the arrogant, ambitious, and handsome Lord Admiral, Lord Thomas Seymour, who " new builded " it on a splendid scale, and named it Seymour Place. He contrived to get the Princess Elizabeth into his charge here, and involved her in some dubious intrigues and imprudent rompings, from which she did not escape without some soilure of her maidenly reputation. No doubt his object was so to compromise her that she would be compelled to marry him in self-defence ; and he neai-ly succeeded. However, his " treasonable practices " being detected, the headsman's axe speedily cut short the projects of his restless and unscrupulous brain. 124 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. Seymour Place was afterwards sold to the Earl of Arundel, the collector of the famous Arundel marbles, whose portrait Clarendon has not failed to include in his celebrated gallery. " This Earl seemed," he says, " to live, as it were, in another nation, his house being a place to which all people resorted who resorted to no other place strangers, or such as affected to look like strangers, and dressed themselves ac- cordingly. He was willing to be thought a scholar, and to understand the most mysterious parts of antiquity, because he made a wonderful and costly purchase of excellent statues whilst in Italy and in Rome (some whereof he could never obtain permission to remove out of Rome, though he had paid for them), and had a rare collection of medals. As to all parts of learning, he was almost illiterate, and thought no other part of history so considerable as what related to his own family ; in which, no doubt, there had been some very memorable persons. It cannot be denied that he had in his own person, in his aspect and countenance, the appearance of a great man, which he preserved in his gait and motion. He wore and affected a habit very different from that of the time, such as men had only beheld in pictures of the most considerable men ; all which drew the eyes of most, and the reverence of many, towards him, as the image and represent- ative of the ancient nobility and native gravity of the nobles when they had been most venerable ; but this was only his outside, his nature and true humour being much disposed to levity and delights which indeed were very despicable and childish." From this grave and dignified noble the house passed by marriage into the hands of the Howard family, and under the name of Norfolk House became the seat of the Dukes of Norfolk. Here, in 1603, died the Countess of Netting- THE STOPT OF THE STRAND. 125 ham, whom tradition associates so tragically with the sad fate of the young Earl of Essex. "The following curious story was frequently told by Lady Elizabeth Spelman, great-granddaughter of Sir Robert Carey, brother of Lady Nottingham, and afterwards Earl of Monmouth. . . . When Catharine Countess of Notting- ham was dying (as she did, according to his lordship's own account, about a fortnight before Queen Elizabeth), she sent to her Majesty to desire that she might see her, in order to reveal something to her Majesty, without the discovery of which she could not die in peace. Upon the Queen's coming, Lady Nottingham told her that, while the Earl of Essex lay under sentence of death, he was desirous of asking her Majesty's mercy in the manner pre- scribed by herself during the height of his favour ; the Queen having given him a ring which, being sent to her as a token of his distress, might entitle him to her protection. But the Earl, jealous of those about him, and not caring to trust any of them with it, as he was looking out of his window one morning, saw a boy with whose appearance he was pleased; and, engaging him by money and promises, directed him to carry the ring, which he took from his finger and threw down, to Lady Scroope, a sister of the Countess of Nottingham, and a friend of his lordship, who attended upon the Queen ; and to beg of her that she would present it to her Majesty. The boy, by mistake, carried it to Lady Nottingham, who showed it to her husband, the admiral [better known to us in history as Lord Howard of Effingham], an enemy of Lord Essex, in order to take his advice. The admiral forbade her to carry it, or to return any answer to the message ; but insisted upon her keeping the ring. The Countess of Nottingham, having made this J26 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. discovery, begged the Queen's forgiveness ; but her Majesty answered, ' God may forgive you, but I never can ! ' and left the room with great emotion. Her mind was so struck with the story that she never went into bed nor took any sustenance from that instant; for Camden is of opinion that her chief reason for suffering the Earl to be executed was his supposed obstinacy in not applying to her for mercy." Notwithstanding the circumstantiality of this romantic story, it meets with no credence among historians. Passing King's College and Somerset House which recalls the memory of the Protector Duke of Somerset, beheaded in the reign of Edward VI. we come to the precincts of the ancient palace of the Savoy, to which we must devote a separate chapter. No. 149, in 1782, was a lodging-house, and among the lodgers was no less a person than Mrs. Sarah Siddons, who made her first appearance on the London stage on Decem- ber 29th, 1775, as Portia, with a success which she and her husband and her father celebrated by a quiet little supper. At No. 342, Benjamin Robert Haydon, the artist, lodged when, a youth of eighteen (in 1794), he came up from Plymouth to seek fame and fortune in London city, which gave him, instead, a suicide's grave. On the morning of his arrival he hastened, in his young enthusiasm, to view the Exhibition at Somerset House, but blundered into " the new church in the Strand, and offered his shilling to the beadle." xrf IT was about 1240 when Peter of Savoy, brother of Boniface, Archbishop of Canterbury, and uncle to Queen Eleanor, wife of Henry III., made his appearance at his brother-in- law's court, in the hope of obtaining some fat English manor or comfortable sinecure. He was not disappointed, nor was his patience put to any severe test. The title of Earl of Savoy and Richmond was bestowed upon him as a kind of firstfruits; afterwards he was knighted with all due chivalrous ceremonial in Westminster Abbey; and finally he was presented with a good slice of land, sloping to Thames-side, on which he made haste to erect the stately palace of the Savoy. When at the summons of death he bade farewell to all his pomp and circumstance, he seems to have made over his palace to the Friars of Montjoie, from whom it was purchased by Queen Eleanor for her son Edmund, afterwards Earl of Lancaster. His son Thomas, the second earl, lost his head in the reign of Edward II. , and the Savoy then passed to his brother Henry, who so richly embellished and amply enlarged it, in 1321, at a cost of 52,000 marks, that it excelled any other mansion in the realm, according to Knighton, in majesty and magnificence. After the death of the earl's son, the first Duke of Lancas- ter, in 1351, one of his daughters married the famous John of Gaunt, and carried the Savoy to hi as part of her dowry. 128 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. Six years later an interesting historical association attached to it. At Poictiers, in 1356, King John of France was taken prisoner by the Black Prince, who, in the following spring, sailed for England with his royal captive, landing at Sandwich on April 26th. He entered London on the 27th, and all the city flocked to see the splendid pageant. A thousand Londoners, attired in the costumes of their respective guilds, and headed by the Lord Mayor and Alder- men, joined the martial cavalcade at Southwark, whence it defiled across London Bridge, and, through streets spanned by triumphal arches, and shining with trophies of war, with shields, swords, and lances in the windows, passed on to Westminster. The French king was mounted, we are told, on a white war-horse, richly caparisoned ; at his side, with what must be called an affectation of humility, rode the Prince of Wales on a little black hackney. The palace of the Savoy was set apart as a residence for the royal prisoner ; " and thither," says Froissart, " the King and Queen came to see him oftentimes, and made him great feast and cheer." The negotiations for his ransom lingered over three years, when, by the Treaty of Bretigny, it was fixed at three million crowns of gold. The Black Prince and John of Gaunt then escorted him to Paris, where the treaty was solemnly ratified; both Edward and John kneeling before the altar, receiving in their hands the consecrated Host, and swearing on " the Body of Christ " that they would faithfully keep the peace. Next day King John was liberated, and set out for Paris. But he found himself unable to fulfil the conditions to which he had sworn; and, to increase his mortification, his son, Charles of Anjou, broke his parole, in violation of all the obligations of honour and chivalry. In his shame he resolved on a THE STORY OF THE SAVOY PALACE. 129 fine act of quixotism, and, suddenly returning to England, voluntarily resumed his position as a prisoner. Edward III. received him with a kingly welcome, and lodged him again in the Savoy, where he died on April 9th, 1364. Some few years later, during the troubles excited by the preaching of Wyclif of whom John of Gaunt, Shakespeare's "time-honoured Lancaster," had constituted himself the patron the Londoners, who were anti-Wyclifites, took up arms, gathering in great numbers, and with menacing shouts, in front of the Duke's palace. It was only through the intervention of the Bishop of London that they were prevented from proceeding to acts of violence. In 1381 the popular fury again broke upon it. It was the year of Wat Tyler's formidable insurrection ; and he and a hundred thousand desperate partisans had reached Blackheath. On June 12th, while one division marched along the sunny bank of the Thames, and wrought havoc upon Lambeth Palace, another division crossed the river, and poured tumultuously upon the Savoy. Then " they set fire on it round about, and made proclamation that none, on pain to lose his head, should convert to his own use anything that there was ; but that they should break such plate and vessel of gold and silver as was found in that house (which was in great plenty) into small pieces, and throw the same into the river of Thames. Precious stones they should bruise in mortars, that the same might be to no use ; and so it was done by them. One of their companions they burned in the fire, because he minded to have reserved one goodly piece of plate. They found there certain barrels of gunpowder, which they thought had been gold or silver, and, throwing them into the fire more suddenly than they thought, the Hall was blown up, the houses destroyed, and 9 130 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. themselves very hardly escaped alive." Stow, whom we are quoting, adds : " To the number of two and thirty of these rebels entered a cellar of the Savoy, where they drank so much of sweet wines, that they were not able to come out in time, but were shut in with wood and stones, that mured up the door, where they were heard crying and calling seven days after, but none came to help them out till they were dead." Thenceforward, for something like a hundred and fifty years, the Savoy remained a heap of ruins ; until Henry VII. began to erect an hospital on its site, and at his death bequeathed ten thousand marks to the Dean and Chapter of St. Paul's, to provide for its completion. As it had become a place of harbourage for idlers, vagabonds, and strumpets, it was suppressed in the reign of Edward VI., but in the following reign was re-established, and lingered on until the reign of Anne. In ecclesiastical history the Savoy is famous for two great religious conferences. One was held shortly before the death of Cromwell, when the Independents, after twelve days' discussion, drew up their well-known Declaration of Faith, consisting in all of thirty-three chapters and nearly two hundred distinct articles of doctrine and practice. It is curious, however, that they made no deliverance on such subjects as the power of synods, church censures, marriage and divorce, and the power of the civil magistrate in matters of religion. Of greater historic importance was the Savoy Conference of 1661, when twelve bishops, with nine assisting clergymen, met an equal number of Presbyterian divines, with the hopeless object of laying down a possible basis of comprehension and re-union. The deliberations were extended over several weeks, but, as might have been expected, led to no satisfactory results. THE STOET OF THE SAVOY PALACE. 131 The Savoy was afterwards used as a naval and military hospital, and subsequently as a garrison. All that now remains of it is the chapel, which contains some monuments of interest as, for instance, that of Sir Robert Douglas and his wife ; a tablet to the African explorer, Richard Lander ; and one to Mistress Anne Killigrew, daughter of a former Master of the Savoy, whom Dryden has celebrated in one of his finest odes. Gawain Douglas, Bishop of Dunkeld, translator of Virgil, and a poet of no mean powers, is buried here. He died of the plague in 1521, while residing in the Savoy. BEFORE the Great Fire, St. Paul's Churchyard was in- habited chiefly by stationers and booksellers, who, as was then the custom, distinguished their places of business by more or less inappropriate signs. " At the sign of the White Greyhound," says Cunningham, " the first editions of Shakespeare's Venus and Adonis and Rape of Lucrece were published by John Harrison ; at the Flower de Luce and the Crown appeared the first edition of The Merry Wives of Windsor; at the Green Dragon, the first edition of The Merchant of Venice ; at the Fox, the first edition of Richard II. ; at the Angel, the first edition of Richard III. ; at the Spread Fjagle, the first edition of Troilus and Cressida; at the Gun, the first edition of Titus Andronicus ; and at the Red Bull the first edition of Lear" At No. 65, the corner of St. Paul's Churchyard and Ludgate Hill, John Newbery published " Little Goody Two Shoes," written for him by Oliver Goldsmith. Newbery was the first publisher who catered for the juvenile mind. He was succeeded by Harris; Harris by Grant and Griffith; Grant and Griffith merged into Griffith and Farran, who developed into the well-known firm of Griffith, Farran, Okeden, and Welsh, now established in Charing Cross Road. On the south side, over against Paul's Chain, nourished ROUND ABOUT ST. PAUL'S. 133 Edward Cocker, teacher of arithmetic and writing, whose memory has been kept green by the well-known " Treatise of Arithmetic " which bears his name, though it appears he was not its author. In the vacant space at the north-east corner of the Churchyard formerly stood the famous Preaching Cross. THE PREACHING CROSS. This was a pulpit cross, built of timber, mounted upon steps of stone, and covered with a conical roof of Jead. From this prominent structure " painful and godly ministers " were wont to hold forth every Sunday forenoon ; except in unfavourable weather, when they retired with their hearers to a roofed-in place of shelter by the side of the Cathedral called the Shrouds. In a great storm of thunder and lightning, in 1382, the Cross was much defaced. It was restored by Bishop Kempe, who held the see of London from 1448 to 1489. But in 1643, by order of the Long Parliament, it was taken down ; and thenceforth " Paul's Cross Sermons " were preached in the Cathedral until it was destroyed by the Great Fire. They were afterwards delivered at St. Catherine Cross, at the Guildhall Chapel, and in 1689 and 1690 at St. Mary-le-Bow. At the Cross royal marriages and the victories of our arms were proclaimed, and the political sympathies of the people tested. As, in 1483, when Richard, Duke of Gloucester, was preparing to seize the crown ; and on Sunday, June 22nd, Dr. Shaw, brother of the then Lord Mayor, and a preacher of good repute, was ordered to hint at the Protector's purpose in a sermon at the Cross. He 134 A BOOS ABOUT LONDON. chose for his text the 2nd verse of the 4th chapter of the Book of Wisdom : " Bastard slips shall not take root," and endeavoured to prove the illegitimacy of Edward V. and his brother, alleging that when Edward IV. married their mother, Elizabeth Woodville, he was already the husband of Lady Eleanor Boteler of Sudeley. He then expressed a doubt whether Edward himself was in reality the son of Richard, Duke of York, and, therefore, lawful King of England. No likeness had existed between him and his reputed father. " But my Lord Protector," he continued, " that very noble Prince, the pattern of all heroic deeds, represented the very face and mind of the great Duke his father ; he is the perfect image of his father; his features are the same, and the veiy express likeness of that noble Duke." According to Sir Thomas More, it had been arranged that, as these words were spoken, the Protector should have passed in among the people, " to the end that these words, reciting with his presence, might have been taken by the hearers as though the Holy Ghost had put them in the preacher's mouth, and should have moved the people even then to cry, ' King Richard ! King Richard ! ' that it might have been after said that he was specially chosen by God, and in manner by miracle. But the device failed, either by the Protector's negligence, or the preacher's over-much diligence." There is no evidence, by the way, that the device was ever contemplated, and we may reasonably doubt whether the preacher's sermon is correctly reported. Would Richard have sanctioned an aspersion on the chastity of his own mother ? In front of the Cross, on Shrove Tuesday, 1527, William Tyndale's translation of the Bible was publicly burned. ROUND ABOUT ST. PAUL'S. 135 Cardinal Wolsey sat enthroned in the midst of bishops, mitred abbots, and princes, and attended by a large con- course of chaplains and spiritual doctors. Opposite, on a platform, knelt six heretics, clothed in penitential garb one holding a lighted taper of five pounds weight, the others carrying symbolic faggots, signifying the fate they had deserved, though, this time, mercifully allowed to escape it. After they had made confession of their errors, and begged pardon of God and the Holy Catholic Church, Bishop Fisher preached a sermon. The penitents were then conducted to a great fire which had been kindled in front of the north door of the cathedral, and led round it thrice, casting in their faggots as they went. Finally, the sinful books, Testaments and Tracts, were heaped contume- liously upon the blazing pile. A strange ceremony which did not check, however, the circulation of " the Word " ! On August 13th, 1553, in the first year of Queen Mary's reign, a tumult broke out at the Cross. Bourne, Queen Mary's chaplain, was the preacher. A crowd of refugees and English fanatics had assembled, and when he said something in praise of Bonner, and declared he had unjustly been imprisoned, they assailed him with cries of " Papist, Papist ! Tear him down ! " A dagger was hurled at him swords were drawn, and men's tempers got heated. Luckily for Bourne, some leading Protestants interfered, and he escaped. On Ash Wednesday, 1565, the preacher, Dean Nowell much to his discomfiture had a royal listener, Queen Elizabeth being present. A great multitude was present more, the Queen thought, to see her than to hear the sermon. The Dean began; but unluckily touching on the subject of images, was interrupted by his imperious 136 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. sovereign. " Leave that alone ! " cried she. Not hearing, the Dean continued his invectives. " To your text, Mr. Dean," she shouted, raising her voice ; "to your text ! leave that ; we have heard enough of that ! To your subject ! " The unfortunate preacher coloured, stammered a few in- coherent words, and came to a stop. The Queen rose in her wrath and departed. After a while, the congregation most of whom were in tears, for they were Protestants followed her example. James I. was present at a Paul's Cross sermon, where a movement was on foot for the reparation of the Cathedral ; and Charles I. on the occasion of the birth of his son Charles, afterwards " the Merry Monarch." It is pleasant to recall the story told by Izaak Walton of Richard Hooker's appearance in London to preach at the Cross soon after he had taken his degree (1581). Wet, and worn, and weary he arrived at the Shunamite's House 1 in Watling Street (then kept by John Churchman, a well- to-do draper). A severe cold seized upon him, of which he was cured by Mrs. Churchman's timely treatment. The crafty dame then impressed upon him that he had a weakly constitution, and advised him to marry that he might always have some one to take care of him. The young and guile- less scholar assented to the prudent proposition, and had not moral courage enough to refuse when Mrs. Churchman recommended her daughter Joan. He married her and alas ! they did not live happy ever afterwards ; but, on the contrary, Hooker had good reason to regret his visit to London to preach at Paul's Cross. There was a notable assemblage here on Mid-Lent Sunday 1 So called because the preacher, besides his fee for the sermon, had free board and lodgings here for three (afterwards four) days. ROUND ABOUT ST. PAUL'S. 137 March 26th, 1620. The Cathedral, for fifty years or more, had lain in a grievous condition of decay, when, in 1612, an enthusiast named Henry Farley took up the idea of its restoration, and in order to realise his idea appealed to the king and his courtiers, to the corporation and the citizens, with such persistency, such zeal, and such directness that at length (in 1633) the work was undertaken. To give it his public sanction, and stir up the munificence of the London merchants, James I., on the above occasion, attended the Cross sermon, accompanied by the Queen and the Prince of Wales and many lords and ladies, and the Lord Mayor and Aldermen were also present. But the funds which eventually enabled Inigo Jones to tack on a Greek portico to a " Gothic " structure were raised chiefly through the action of Charles I. and Archbishop Laud (1631-33). PAUL'S WALK. REMINISCENCES. The central aisle of St. Paul's the Parvyse of St. Paul's was commonly known as Duke Humphry's Walk (from its sole ornament, the so-called tomb of Humphry, Duke of Gloucester, which was really that of Sir John Beauchamp, Constable of Dover Castle, died 1358), or Paul's Walk. From the middle of the fifteenth to the middle of the seventeenth century this was the great public rendezvous the promenade of all the idlers of the town the favourite resort of wits and gallants, of courtiers and lawyers the head-quarters of news and gossip. " It was the fashion of those times," says Osborn, " for the principal gentry, and men of all professions not merely mechanic, to meet in the Church by eleven, and walk in the Middle Aisle till twelve ; and after dinner from three to six; some discoursing of 138 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. business, others of news. And, in regard of the universal commerce, there happened little that did not first or last arrive here." It was " in Paul's " that Falstaff secured the services of Bardolph. The first scene in the third act of Ben Jonson's Every Man out of His Humour is laid in the Walk, and gives us a vivid notion of the company that frequented it. Advertisements or " bills " were put up in insula Paulina, and Ben Jonson gives us a taste of their quality. Bargains were made ; serving-men hired ; assigna- tions contrived. Lawyers stood at their pillars and advised their clients for a consideration. The young gallants aired their bravery, and took their " four turns " for that purpose, as Dekker, in " The Gull's Horn-book," ironically recommends. " To the men of the reigns of James I. and Charles I. ' the Walk' was all that the coffee-houses became to the men of the reigns of Charles II. and James II. , and all that the club-houses are to the men of the reign of Victoria. There were to be heard the latest rumours of the day. There men told how some fresh victory had been achieved by Gustavus, or whispered how Laud had sold himself to the Pope, and how Portland had sold himself to the King of Spain. There, too, was to be heard the latest scandal affecting the credit of some merchant of repute or the good name of some lady of title. When the gay world had moved away, children took the place of their elders, making the old arches ring with their merry laughter. The clergy within the choir com- plained that their voices were drowned by the uproar, and that neither prayer nor sermon reached the ears of the con- gregation " (Gardiner). With this unseemly state of things Charles I. happily interfered, and in 1633 issued orders that no one should ROUND ABOUT ST. PAUL'S. 139 walk in the nave in time of service, that burdens should not be carried in the church at all, and that the children must find a playground elsewhere. For the accommodation of the loungers shut out of their time-honoured resort he set apart ,500 a-year for the building of a portico at the west end of the cathedral ; and in this way Paul's Walk became a memory of the past. xtf FLEET STREET, so called from the Fleet Ditch, arched over in 1737 and 1765, as part of the great line of traffic from Westminster to St. Paul's, figures conspicuously in civic history. Like the Strand, it has been the scene of many a brave show and gorgeous procession, and is associated with many incidents of importance and interest. Among the principal processions which have passed under Temple Bar and streamed along Fleet Street I may par- ticularise the following : that which escorted Queen Anne Boleyn in 1533, on the occasion of her coronation; that which attended the boy-king, Edward VI., on February 19th, 1547 ; Queen Mary's ride through the city, the day before she was crowned; Queen Elizabeth's triumphal march from the Tower to Westminster, January 1558-9 ; the grand passage of King James and his Queen, with Prince Henry, in 1643 ; Charles II.'s entry into London in 1660 ; James II.'s visit to the city in 1687, when he attended the Lord Mayor's banquet ; William III.'s celebration, in 1697, of the Treaty of Ryswick; the procession in 1805 after the battle of Waterloo ; the Queen's visit to the Guildhall in 1837 ; the entry of the Princess Alexandra March 1863 ; and the Prince of Wales's procession on his attending the thanks- giving service in St. Paul's Cathedral for his restoration to health, February 1872. The Fleet Prison, demolished in 1844-6, was situated on the east side of Farringdon Street. Originally used for the THE STORY OF FLEET STREET. 141 reception of Star Chamber prisoners, it was made about 1640 a prison for debtors, bankrupts, and persons charged with contempt of court, and gradually sank into a deplorable condition of social administration. A Committee of the House of Commons, appointed in 1727, brought to light a series of atrocities and extortions practised by the jailers on the unfortunates placed in their power which it is difficult even now to read of without a flush of indignation. Hogarth, in a well-known picture, has shown us the examination of the acting Warden, Thomas Bambridge, and has placed in the foreground a wretched prisoner, explaining the mode in which his hands and neck were fastened together by iron clamps; while some members of the Committee are examining other instruments of torture used for screwing up the heads and necks of prisoners. At the same time, it was proved that where money was forthcoming the Warden and his satellites allowed the utmost licence, even permitting the escape of fraudulent debtors. Every prisoner on entering was compelled to pay six shillings to the tipstaff towards a bowl of punch, to bring his own bedding, or hire it of the Warden, else he lay on the floor. Prisoners were frequently detained long after their period of imprisonment had expired, and almost incredible cruelties were inflicted upon them. The Com- missioners found a Sir William Rich confined in a loathsome dungeon and loaded with irons, because he had given some slight offence to Bambridge. And such was the terror he excited that a Portuguese pauper, who had lain in fetters in a damp, dark cell for months, on being examined before the Commissioners, and wrongly supposing that Bambridge would resume his authority, fainted, and the blood started out of his mouth and nose. 142 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. The reforms introduced by the Committee rendered the perpetration of these cruelties impossible ; but a great deal of licence and disorder still existed, and the debtors, if able to pay the turnkeys, enjoyed ample means of lightening the tedium of captivity. Though spirituous liquors were not allowed by the regulations to be brought into the prison, there were " tape-shops " in the prison itself, at which any quantity of gin, rum, or brandy (sold .as " white or red tape ") could be obtained. Betting and gambling went on unchecked ; rackets was a daily amusement ; the evenings were spent at billiards, backgammon, or whist. The rules for living outside were relaxed with the utmost freedom for the benefit of anybody prepared to pay for the indulgence. In a word, the Fleet Prison was a disgrace to our civilisation, and public opinion entirely sanctioned its suppression in 1844. Some of its aspects in the palmy days of its mis- government are graphically depicted in Mr. Walter Besant's " Chaplain of the Fleet." Many illustrious persons, nevertheless, were at different times included within its company of prisoners. As, for instance, the first Earl of Surrey ; Bishop Hooper, the martyr ; Dr. Donne, for clandestinely marrying Sir George More's daughter ; the Countess of Dorset, for importuning James I. ; Lord Falkland, for sending a challenge ; William Prynne, for writing his " Histrio-mastix ; " John Lilburne ; Wycherley, the dramatist ; William Penn j and Richard Savage. Sir Richard Baker, author of the " Chronicle " which Sir Roger de Coverley found such good reading, died here, February 18th, 1645 ; and James Howell, author of the "Epistolse Ho-Elianse" wrote in this prison some of those celebrated letters. Among its involuntary inmates we also find : Richard THE STORY OF FLEET STREET. 143 Oastler, a strenuous advocate of the Ten Hours' Factory Bill, was imprisoned here in 1843 at the suit of a Mr. Thornhill, Fixby Hall, Yorkshire, whose steward he had been, and published every week his Fleet Papers : a Weekly Epistle on Public Matters, ironically dedicated to the said Mr. Thornhill. A public subscription was raised to secure Oastler 's release, and he was discharged on February 12th, 1844. The Fleet Prison, in its latter days, when Captain Shandon was an involuntary resident within its borders, is described by Thackeray in " Pendennis." The Fleet Marriages. These irregular marriages seem to have begun in 1616, when clerical prisoners living within " the Rules of the Fleet " prostituted their sacred profession in the service of the vicious and opulent. Mr. Burn, in his " History of Fleet Marriages," registers the names of eighty- nine of these " Chaplains of the Fleet," of whom Mie most notorious were John Gainham, Edward Ashwell, Walter Wyatt, Dan, Symson, Starkey, and Lando. Here is a specimen of the manner in which the last-named announced his vocation : " Marriages with a license, certificate, and crown-stamp, at a guinea, at the New Chapel, next-door to the China-shop, near Fleet Bridge, London, by a regular-bred clergyman, and not by a Fleet parson, as is insinuated in the public papers ; and that the town may be freed mistakes, no clergyman being a prisoner within the Rules of the Fleet, dare marry j and to obviate all doubts, the chapel is not on the verge of the Fleet, but kept by a gentleman who was lately chaplain on board one of His Majesty's men-of-war, and likewise has gloriously distinguished himself in defence of his king and country, and is above committing those little mean actions that some men impose on people, being deter- mined to have everything conducted with the utmost decorum 144 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. and regularity, such as shall always be supported on law and equity." Some of these men carried on business at their own lodgings, but most of them were employed by the keepers of marriage -houses, who were usually tavern-keepers also. The Swan, the Bishop Blaise, the Red Hand and Mitre, the Hand and Pen, and the Two Sawyers with the Bell and Garter, and the King's Head, kept by warders of the prison were places of this description. The parson and landlord (who generally acted as clerk) divided the fees* after giving a small gratuity to the plyer, or tout, who brought in the customers. The marriages were recorded in the parson's pocket-book, and, on payment of a small fee, copied into the regular register of the house, unless the parties wished the affair kept secret. The Grub Street Journal of January 1735 says: "There are a set of drunken, swearing parsons, with their myrmi- dons, who wear black coats, and pretend to be clerks and registers of the Fleet, and to ply about Ludgate Hill, pulling and forcing people to some peddling ale-house or brandy-shop to be married ; even on a Sunday, stopping them as they go to church, and almost tearing their clothes off their backs." And the writer proceeds to give a case or two, which he says lately happened. " Since Midsummer last, a young lady of birth and fortune was deluded and forced from her friends, and by the assistance of a wry-necked, swearing parson, married to an atheistical wretch, whose life is a continued practice of all manner of vice and debauchery. And since the ruin of my relative, another lady of my acquaintance had like to have been trepanned in the following manner. This lady had ap- pointed to meet a gentlewoman at the Old Play House, THE STORY OF FLEET STREET. 145 in Drury Lane ; but extraordinary business prevented her coming. Being alone when the play was done, she bade a boy call a coach for the city. One dressed like a gentleman helps her into it, and jumps in after her. ' Madam,' says he, ' this coach was called for me, and since the weather is so bad, and there is no other, I beg leave to bear you company. I am going into the city, and will set you down wherever you please ! ' The lady begged to be excused, but he bade the coachman drive on. Being come to Lud- gate Hill, he told her his sister, who waited his coming but five doors up the Court, would go with her in two minutes. He went, and returned with his pretended sister, who asked her to step in one minute, and she would wait upon her in the coach. The poor lady foolishly followed her into the house, when instantly the sister vanished, and a tawny fellow, in a black coat and a black wig, appeared. ' Madam, you are come in good time, the doctor was just a-going.' ' The doctor ! ' says she, horribly frighted, fearing it was a madhouse, ' what has the doctor to do with me 1 ' 'To marry you to that gentleman. The doctor has waited for you these three hours, and will be paid by you or that gentleman before you go ! ' ' That gentleman,' said she, recovering herself, ' is worthy a better fortune than mine ; ' and begged hard to be gone. But Dr. Wryneck swore she should be married ; or, if she would not, he would still have his fee, and register the marriage for that night. The lady, finding she could not escape without money or a pledge, told them she liked the gentleman so well, she would certainly meet him to-morrow night, and gave them a ring as a pledge, ' which,' says she, ' was my mother's gift on her deathbed, enjoining that if ever I married, it should be my wedding-ring ; ' by which cunning contrivance 10 146 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. she was delivered from the black doctor and his tawny crew." This story has a very doubtful air about it ; but it is true that, in 1719, Mistress Annie Leigh, a Buckinghamshire heiress, was decoyed from her friends, married by a Fleet chaplain against her consent, and cruelly ill-treated by her abductors. These wretches for a consideration would provide bride- groom or bride to carry out some nefarious scheme or intrigue ; would antedate marriages ; and give certificates even where no marriage took place. They were patronised, unfortunately, by all classes, from the millionaire to the pauper, from the peer to the shoeblack. It would be easy to give a long list of aristocratic customers ; but I must be content with mentioning Henry Fox (afterwards Lord Hol- land), who ran away with Lady Caroline Lennox, the eldest daughter of the Duke of Richmond, in May 1744. It was this affair which effected a reform in our marriage laws, and suppressed the Fleet chaplain. "In the reign of George II.," says Sir George Trevelyan, " the scandal of the old marriage laws had come to a head. . . . The vision of a broken-down parson, ready, without asking questions, to marry any man to any woman for a crown and a bottle, was an ever-present terror to guardians and parents. Numerous were the cases in which boys of rank had become the prey of infamous harpies, and girls with money or beauty had found that the services of a clergy- man were employed as a cloak for plunder or seduction. A sham marriage enters into the plot of half the novels of that period; and the fate which in fiction poor Olivia Primrose suffered, and the future Lady Grandison narrowly escaped, became a terrible reality to many of their sex. THE STORY OF FLEET STREET. 147 Nor were the miseries entailed by such practices confined to a single generation. The succession to property was rendered doubtful and insecure ; every day in term-time produced hearings in Chancery, or appeals in the Lords, concerning the validity of a marriage which had been solemnised thirty years before in the back parlour of a public-house, or in some still more degraded haunt of vice ; and the children might be ruined by an act of momentary folly, committed when the father was a midshipman on leave from Sheerness, or a Westminster boy out for a half -holiday." The result was, that in 1753, Lord Chancellor Hardwicke introduced a measure which made the solemnisation of matrimony in any other but a church or chapel, and without banns or licence, felony punishable by transportation, and declaring all such marriages null and void. Thus, after Lady Day 1754, the matrimonial market in the Fleet was closed for ever. Tt should be noted that at least one poet's name is associated with it, that of Charles Churchill, the satirist who at the age of eighteen was inveigled into an imprudent intimacy, and married within the Rules of the Fleet (1749). The match turned out an unhappy one, and blighted Churchill's prospects from the beginning. I turn now to the association of men of eminence with Fleet Street. Sir Symonds D'Ewes, the antiquary and diarist, lived near the Inner Temple Gate in Fleet Street- Michael Drayton, author of "The Poly-Olbion," at the bay-window house near the east end of St. Dunstan's Church. James Shirley, the last of the long procession of dramatists belonging to the Elizabethan School, near the Inner Temple Gate. 148 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. Izaak Walton, the " Compleat Angler," kept a " sempster's" or linen-draper's shop between Temple Bar and Chancery Lane. Milton had lodgings, in 1639, in the house of one Russell, a tailor, in St. Bride's Churchyard. Abraham Cowley was the son of a grocer who resided close to Serjeants' Inn. Edmund Burke, in 1750, was lodging at the Pope's Head, over the shop of Robinson, another tailor, afterwards No. 16. Addison and Steele, and, later, Cowper, frequented Dick's Coffee House at No. 8 ; and Oliver Goldsmith patronised a club at the Globe Tavern, No. 134. Its taverns have long been a special feature of Fleet Street, though some of the most famous have passed away. What pleasant memories are suggested by such names as the Devil, where Ben Jonson lorded it over wits and versifiers; the Ship, so named in honour of Sir Francis Drake ; and the Palsgrave Head, so named in honour of Frederick Palsgrave of the Rhine, and afterwards King of Bohemia. The Mitre is an old-world house, having been established directly after the Great Fire ; the Rainbow was the first coffee-house opened in London ; and the Cock, which was flourishing in the last century, has been immortalised by Tennyson in his "Will Waterproof's Monologue." On Dr. Johnson's connection with Fleet Street it is unnecessary to dwell. Bolt Court, Gough Square, Johnson Court, these were his dwelling-places, and the crowded thoroughfare was his favourite promenade. Then we have the Temple, and all its associations with our legal history ; and the Temple Church, with its tombs of the old knights, whose bones are dust, while their swords are rust, and their names forgotten, is in this neighbourhood, too. The THE STORY OF FLEET STREET. 149 shades of Goldsmith in his " bloom-coloured coat," and the half -pensive, half -humorous Elia, do not fail to greet us. Three of the great publishers of the Augustan Age, Bernard Lintot, Edmund Curll, and Jacob Robinson, were located in Fleet Street. l|i$tamirf Jfesatmtimts, THE STORY OP THE FERRYMAN'S DAUGHTER. LONG, very long ago, before William the Norman had seated himself on the throne of the Norman Kings, the only means of communication between London and South- wark was by means of a ferry, which crossed the Thames at the point now marked by London Bridge. This ferry was rented from the Corporation by one John Overs, who worked it for many years in succession to his great ad- vantage ; for it is to be imagined (says an old writer) that no small benefit would arise from the transit of footmen, horsemen, all manner of cattle, all market folk that brought provisions to the City, " and others." The ferryman, however, though he had several servants and apprentices in his pay, was of a soul so covetous that, notwithstanding he possessed an estate equal to that of the best alderman in London, acquired by unceasing labour, frugality, and usury, in his house and person he exhibited the direst poverty. Yet had he a jewel of the rarest kind in an only daughter " of a beautiful aspect and a pious disposition ; whom he had care to see well and liberally educated, though at the cheapast rate ; and yet so, that when she grew up, and mature for marriage, he would suffer no man of what condition or quality soever, by his LONDON BRIDGE (6>ZZ>). 151 good will, to have any sight of, much less access unto her." Bees, however and sometimes drones always find their way to a flower ; and a young gallant, attracted by the fame of her beauty and her father's wealth, contrived to make her acquaintance while her father was engaged at the ferry. The first interview, says our authority, pleased well ; the second better ; but the third concluded the match between them which was certainly rapid work. Mean- while, " the poor silly rich old ferryman, not dreaming ot any such passages, but thinking all things to be as secure by land as he knew they were by water," maintained unaltered his penurious mode of living. It is needless to give examples of the man's avarice, or of the disgusting extremes to which it degraded him ; but, at length, to save the expense of a day's food in his household, he hit upon the expedient of feigning himself dead for twenty-four hours, supposing that his servants would, as a concession to the proprieties, fast until after his funeral. His daughter having reluctantly consented to the scheme, he wrapped himself in his shroud, and stretched himself on his bed, with a taper burning at his feet and another at his head, according to the custom of the Roman Church. But alas for the vanity of mortal expectations ! His servants, when informed of his decease, instead of lament- ing broke out into extravagant expressions of joy; and after hilariously dancing round the supposed corpse, rifled the larder which was not too well provided and fell-to lustily. The self-control of the ferryman could not long support this indecent exhibition; but when his patience gave .way, and stirring and struggling in his sheet, with a candle in each hand, he attempted to rise, and rate his malapert domestics, "one of them, thinking that the 152 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. Devil was about to rise in his likeness, being in a great amaze, catched hold of the butt-end of a broken oar, which was in the chamber, and, being a sturdy knave, thinking to kill the Devil at the first blow, actually struck out his master's brains." A notable instance if the story had been true of the engineer hoist with his own petard ! The serving- man was arrested and brought to trial ; but, on all the circumstances being explained, the judge ordered his release, holding that the ferryman, by his mean trickery, had brought about his own end. The estate of Overs then fell to his daughter; whose lover, on hearing what had happened, hastened up from the country to press his suit ; but, in riding post, his horse stumbled and threw him, and he broke his neck on the highway. This melan- choly event, following immediately on the ferryman's death, almost overwhelmed the young heiress ; but she was recalled to herself by the necessity of providing for her father's interment. An excommunicated wretch, in punish- ment of his extortionate and usurious dealings he was denied Christian burial. At length, in the absence of their Abbot, the monks of Bermondsey were bribed into providing a little earth for the ferryman's bones to lie in. But, on his return, the Abbot, detecting a newly-covered grave, inquired who had been laid therein, and on hearing that it was the ferryman of ill repute he severely reproached the brethren for the dishonour they had inflicted on the Church through their lust of lucre, and ordered the im- mediate exhumation of the body. Which was placed on the back of an ass, and the ass was driven forth from the abbey gates, the Abbot praying of God that it might carry its burden to some place where it might justly rest. With slow and solemn pace the ass made its way along LONDON BRIDGE (OLD). 153 the line .of road afterwards designated Kent Street, to the small pond known in later times as St. Thomas's Watering, where the Canterbury pilgrims refreshed their steeds before starting on their long journey to the martyr-archbishop's shrine, and there, at the common place of execution, and under the gallows, shook off the ferryman's body. It was immediately interred, without bell, book, or candle. Mary Overs, greatly distraught by the sorrows she had undergone, and wearied by the importunacy of the numerous suitors who threw themselves at her feet, retired into a religious house, having first made provision for the erection of the stately church which bears her name St. Mary Overy. Such is the story told in a tract entitled " The True History of the Life and Sudden Death of old John Overs, the rich Ferry-Man of London, showing how He lost His Life by His Own Covetousness. And of his Daughter Mary, who caused the Church of St. Mary Overs in South- wark to be built." Printed in 1637, and reprinted in 1744. The writer, in all probability, took the idea of his ingenious narrative from a paragraph in John Stow's " Survey," which states that a ferry being kept in the place where now the bridge is built, the ferryman and his wife deceasing, left the said ferry to their only daughter, a maiden named Mary; who, with the goods left her by her parents, as also with the profits rising of the said ferry, built a House of Sisters in the place where now standeth the east part of St. Mary Overies Church, above the choir, where she was buried. Unto the which house she gave the oversight and profits of the ferry. Whether there is any truth in the tradition recorded by Stow seems doubtful. " Overy " is simply " Over-ree," over the water ; from which the name " Overs," according to some 154 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. authorities, is corrupted.* That there was a ferry of great antiquity is certain; but the legend of the ferryman and his daughter I take to be of mediaeval growth. If I mistake not, similar myths attach to ferries elsewhere. When the first timber bridge was built across the Thames our antiquaries have not decided ; but one was standing as early as 1052, which Maitland believes to have been erected between 993 and 1016, at the public expense, to prevent the Danish incursions up the river. It seems to have stood much farther eastward than the present stately structure; fcr in a charter of William I., dated 1067, he confirms to the monks of St. Peter's, Westminster, a gate in London, then called Botolph's Gate, with a wharf which stood at the head of London Bridge. This timber bridge, however, had no very long existence ; for on November 16th, 1091, at the hour of six, "a dreadful whirlwind from the South-East, coming from Africa, blew upon the City," and overthrew upwards of six hundred houses, several churches, and greatly damaged the tower. The storm drove the water up the river with such fury as to sweep away the bridge, which was soon after- wards re-built, but again of timber. This second wooden bridge was almost destroyed by fire in 1136; but must have speedily been repaired, since the old chronicler, Stephanides, describes it as affording a convenient standing- place for spectators of the river-tournaments or aquatic sports. Of these one of the most amusing was the water-quintain, which Dr. Pegge describes in the following fashion : * Canon Taylor, however, disputes this etymology. " Overy," he says, is simply " ofer-ey." LONDON BRIDGE (OLD). 155 At Easter, the diversion is prosecuted on the water : a target is strongly fastened to a trunk or mast, fixed in the middle of the river, and a youngster, standing upright in the stern of a boat, made to move as fast as the oars and current can carry it, is to strike the target with his lance; and if in hitting it he break his lance, and keep his place in the boat, he gains his point, and triumphs ; but if it happen that the lance be not shivered by the force of the blow, he is of course tumbled into the water, and away goes his vessel without him. However, a couple of boats full of young men are placed, one on each side of the target, so as to be ready to take up the unsuccessful ad- venturer, the moment he emerges from the stream, and comes fairly to the surface. The bridge, and the balconies on the banks, are thronged with spectators, who pro- fess to be amused by the mishaps of the unsuccessful competitors. The first stone bridge across the Thames at London was erected, or at least begun, in 1176, the architect being, as was usual in those days, an ecclesiastic, a certain Peter of Colechurch,* Priest and Chaplain. One of the most liberal contributors to the cost of its erection was Richard, Archbishop of Canterbury, who, ac- cording to Leland, gave a thousand marks. This was the prelate " very liberal, gentle, and passing wise " who suc- ceeded Thomas Becket, and has been somewhat eclipsed in the eyes of posterity by the stirring history of his predecessor. A strange story as to the manner of his death is told by Henry Knyghton and other chroniclers. How that as he * St. Mary Colechurch stood on the north side of the Poultry, and was famous as the place where St. Edmund and Thomas Becket were baptized. It was destroyed in the Great Fire. 166 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. lay asleep in the archiepiscopal manor-house of Wrotham, a certain terrible personage appeared and demanded who he was ; in his terror he could answer nothing. " Thou art he," replied the unwelcome visitor, " who hast destroyed the goods of the Church, and I will destroy thee from the face of the earth." With this awful threat he vanished. Next day, as the Archbishop journeyed towards Rochester, he related his disagreeable vision to a friend who accompanied him ; and had no sooner ceased speaking than he was suddenly seized with a great cold and rigor in his limbs, and it was with much ado that he got as far as the Bishop of Rochester's house at Hay ling. There he took to his bed, and after severe suffering died on the following night. It is curious that such a story should be told of a prelate of stainless life and gentle manners; more particularly as he was a staunch advocate of the claims of the monks against those of the secular clergy. The produce of a tax on wool was also given towards the cost of the foundation. Hence the saying " London Bridge was built upon woolpacks." It was completed in 1207 by three worthy merchants of London, Serle Mercer, William Almaine, and Benedict Boteconte, having been three-and-thirty years in building ; and consisted of a platform 926 feet long, 40 feet wide, and about 60 feet above the water-level. It contained a draw- bridge and nineteen broad pointed arches, with solid massive piers, raised upon strong elm piles; and was so staunchly and honestly wrought that it stood for upwards of six centuries, though not without suffering serious injury. The narrowness of the arches, I may add, was a serious obstruction to the free course of the river current, and when the tide flowed, being unable to disperse with LONDON BRIDGE (OLD). 157 sufficient celerity, the waters were dammed up into a kind of sloping rapid, down which the river-craft was hurried with dangerous swiftness. This process of " shooting the bridge " was frequently attended with accidents more or less severe. A peculiar feature of old London Bridge, with which almost everybody has been made familiar by antique engravings or reproductions of it, was the buildings which lined the narrow roadway on either side, some with their backs projecting over the stream below. The most celebrated was the chapel dedicated to St. Thomas Becket, popularly known as St. Thomas of the Bridge. It crowned the tenth or "great pier," and stood over the parapet on the eastern side, having a pathway about nine feet wide on the western. The Bridge suffered terribly from fire in 1213. Ac- cording to Stow, the conflagration originated in Southwark, involving the church of St. Mary Overy ; whereupon " an exceeding great number of people " rushed upon the bridge for safety. But by blowing of the south wind the north part of the bridge caught fire, and the terrified crowd then made to return by the way they had come. Meanwhile, the south end also broke into flames, and the struggling people finding themselves caught between two fires were thrown into a panic of terror. Numerous vessels and boats hastened to their assistance. Unfortunately no order could be preserved, and the frightened mass drove headlong, crushing and crowding on board the craft that had moved to their rescue, until they capsized them by their numbers, and all perished. The death-roll on this occasion showed, it is said, a total of three thovisand. In 1263, at the outset of the Barons' War, Queen Eleanor, 158 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. desiring to escape from the Tower and seek an asylum at Windsor, set out by water; but just as her barge was preparing to shoot the bridge, the populace from the parapets assailed her with showers of stones and mud, as well as with sharp reproaches and insulting words for which she probably cared much less and compelled her to return. Later in the year, Simon de Montfort, at the head of the Barons' army, marched through Southwark in the hope his friends would open to him the bridge-gates. Informed of his design, King Henry hastily quitted the Tower, crossed the bridge, and encamped in Southwark. But the citizens broke open the gates, and hurried to swell De Montfort's forces. The king was compelled to retreat, and De Montfort entered London in triumph. This was the first occasion on which the bridge echoed with the tramp of armed men and the clang of weapons but not the last. In 1306, William Wallace, the champion of Scottish Independence, was betrayed into English hands; and loaded with heavy fetters was hurried to London, where he arrived on August 22nd, and was securely lodged in William de Leyse's house in Fenchurch Street. The next day he was mounted on horseback, and with a splendid procession of mayor, sheriffs, and aldermen, and a strong guard, conducted to Westminster Hall. He was mocked with a crown of oak-leaves as suitable to a king of outlaws ; and put on his trial as a traitor to the English crown, " though that I could never be," exclaimed the hero, " since I was no subject of King Edward's ! " As a matter of course, he was found guilty, and sentenced to death. At the tails of horses he was shamefully dragged through the streets to a gibbet standing at the Elms at Smithfield, where he under- LONDON BRIDGE (OLD). 159 went the disgusting barbarities then accompanying an execution for treason. His body was divided into four quarters, which were posted in the public places of four northern cities ; and his head was exposed on the tower-gate at the entrance of London Bridge. " Such," exclaims Matthew of Westminster, " was the unpitied end of this man " " hie vir Belial" the chronicler calls him " whom want of pity brought to such a death ! " In the course of the year his loyal adherent Sir Simon Fraser Simon Frisell, as the old ballad puts it was captured and executed, and his head set beside his leader's on the Bridge. Those two heads were the first which were thus subjected to indignity. In 1381, the year of the insurrection of Wat Tyler, his Kentish followers attempted to force the passage of the Bridge (June 13th), but were anticipated by Sir William Walworth, the Lord Mayor, who hastily fortified it, hauled up tlie drawbridge, and threw a strong iron chain across, to prevent their passage. Then the populace shouted to the wardens to lower the drawbridge so that they might pass, or else they would destroy them all; whereby Walworth " was constrained for fear to let it down and give them entry, at which time the religious present were earnest in pro- cession and prayer for peace." I mention this incident, because the dagger which figures in the arms of the City of London is often represented as an " honourable augmentation " granted in commemoration of Walworth's gallantry during the Wat Tyler rebellion. Stow, on the contrary, believes it to be the sword used in the martyrdom of St. Paul, who may be regarded as the titular saint of London ; others see in it the sword of justice. 160 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. But at all events it was included in the civic escutcheon before the reign of Richard II. THE STOBY OF THE PASSAGE-AT-ARMS ON LONDON BRIDGE. On St. George's Day, April 23rd, 1390, London Bridge was the scene of one of those tourneys, or passages-at-arms, which illustrate with a rude kind of chivalric splendour our mediaeval records. Scotland and England at the time enjoyed a brief interval of peace, and the knights of both countries availed themselves of the unusual tranquillity to challenge each other to the display of military art and prowess in the tournament. Now it happened that a gallant Englishman, the Lord Wells, then representing King Richard II. at the Court of Edinburgh, was present at a great banquet, where many guests, English and Scotch, discoursed wisely upon valour and in praise of arms. "Away with this strife of words," he exclaimed, after a while ; "and whosoever would make assay of English courage, let his name be declared, and also a time and place be appointed, whenever and wherever ye list, and I am ready." And turning to a Scotch noble, David Lindesay, Earl of Crawford, he added : " I call on thee, who has spent many words against me, and thou shalt cross lance with me rather than all the rest." " Even so," rejoined the earl, " and blithe shall I be, if thou canst obtain the king's consent." Lord Wells then made petition to the King of Scotland, and he agreeing, the English knight as the challenger selected the place of combat, choosing London Bridge, while the earl named the time, St. George's Day. Thereafter Lord Wells rode back to London, and David Lindesay, LONDON BRIDGE (OLD}. 161 after providing himself with suitable arms, quickly followed him, with twenty-nine or thirty gentlemen in his train, all of whom, as well as the earl, were right courteously welcomed by King Richard. As were also twelve other Scottish knights, with their esquires, valets, and pages, altogether a brilliant show. Great preparations were made to do honour to so interesting an occasion. The parapets and towers of the bridge were hung with costly tapestries and cloth of gold, and decorated with silken banners and gay streamers. The lists were duly set out, and surrounded by galleries, in which sat King Richard, with all the rank and beauty of his Court in itself a dazzling spectacle ! while the common people had gathered in thousands to watch a scene which appealed so strongly to their sympathies. At either end stood the tents of the two contending knights, with their shields suspended over the entrances. A blare of trumpets announced their appearance in the arena, each fully armed, and mounted on a richly-caparisoned charger. The heralds then came forward in their emblazoned tabards and made proclamation of the names and titles of the combatants; after which came another flourish of trumpets, and the king cast down his warder or truncheon. At the signal the two knights, striking their heavy spurs deep into their horses' flanks, and setting their lances in rest, rushed together with the fury of two mountain-torrents. The shock was rude the spears snapped in fragments but neither horseman was shaken in his seat. This result displeased the English populace, who had expected to see the Scottish earl unhorsed, and they cried out that he was bound to the saddle of his horse, contrary to the law of arms. When the earl heard tliis 11 162 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. grievous slander he was much displeased, and to show its falsity lightly leaped off his charger, and as lightly vaulted on his back again, no insignificant feat on the part of a man weighted with heavy armour ! Having regained their starting-points, the two knights took fresh spears, and made a second course; again the spears were shivered, but the combatants sat unmoved. At the third and final onset, however, Lord Wells was borne to the ground, and lay there senseless, with great sounds of mourning from the spectators that he was killed. The Scottish champion, when he saw himself victorious, hastily dismounted, for he had fought for glory only, and in no spirit of hostility or revenge and throwing himself upon Lord Wells, tenderly embraced him until he revived, and the chirurgeon came to his assistance. Nor did he fail one day to visit him during his sickness, attending upon him with the utmost gentillesse. He remained in England for three months by King Richard's desire ; and there was not one person of the nobility who was not well affected towards him. Is not this a bright and pleasant picture from the annals of chivalry? It finds a place in Wyntoun's " Chronicles of Scotland," and is reproduced with vivid details : " The Lyndyssay thare with manful fore Strak gwyte the Wellis fra his hors, Flatlyngis downe a-pon the grene, Thare all his saddile tome was sene." Wyntoun, however, represents the two knights as renewing the contest afoot, and with their daggers; until Lindesay fastening his weapon deep in Lord Wells's armour, lifted him off the ground, and then threw him " with a great fall." He had his adversary wholly at his mercy, but LONDON BRIDGE (OLD). 163 the king interfered. As these additions are confirmed by no other authority, it is allowable to suppose that they were evolved out of the Scotch poet's ardent patriotism for the edification of his fellow-countrymen. THE STORY OF THE PAGEANT ON LONDON BRIDGE. Great was the enthusiasm in London when messengers from King Henry V. brought the glorious tidings of the victory of Agincourt, won upon St. Crispin's Day, 1425, " Upon St. Crispin's Day Fought was this noble fray, Which fame did not delay o England to carry." From every steeple and spire the bells rang out a merry peal; and in every church was raised the nobly exultant strain of the Te Deum Laudamus (Tuesday, October 29th).* At nine o'clock all the religious orders went in solemn procession from St. Paul's to St. Edward's shrine at West- minster. Thither, too, went the Lord Mayor and Aldermen, with the London Guilds, and the Queen with all her lords. And after thanksgiving had been made, every man rode home on horseback, and " they were joyful and glad for the good tidings that they had of the king, and thanked our Lord Jesus Christ, His mother St. Mary, and St. George, and all the holy company of Heaven, and said, ' Hie est dies quam fecit Dominus' (This is the day which, the Lord has made)/' The hero of Agincourt landed at Dover on November 16th, and on the following Saturday, the 23rd, rode to- wards London, where the citizens had prepared a splendid * The battle was fought on the 25th. 164 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. welcome. Henry was at this time about twenty-six years old, and well fitted by his personal appearance to be the principal figure in a great public spectacle. He was tall and well proportioned, with an air of singular dignity, and the composure of one accustomed to command. His features were regularly formed, his eyes keen and brilliant, the nose was well cut, the brow lofty and grave, the mouth large, with lips close set, and the general expression that of seriousness and thought. Such was the young sovereign who, on arriving at Blackheath, saw before him the array of the Lord Mayor and Aldermen of his capital, in their gorgeous robes, attended by nearly twenty thousand horse- men, all of whom, according to their crafts, carried ingenious emblematic devices. Escorted by this noble company, he rode on to his capital, arriving there " about the hour of ten in the day ; " and when they saw him in their midst, the citizens gave glory and honour to God, and many con- gratulations and blessings to their king for the victories he had brought them, and for the public works which he had achieved. Then came the pageant. On the summit of the tower which guarded the approach to London Bridge was raised a colossal statue, bearing in its right hand a great axe, and in its left the city's keys. On the right stood the figure of a female not much inferior in size clothed in a scarlet mantle; and the two were as man and wife, who looked upon the venerated face of their lord, and received him with full praise. All around floated the silken folds of the banners of the royal arms; and the air echoed and re-echoed with the strains of horns, trumpets, and clarions. At the other end of the bridge, behold another tower, with a canopied image of St. George, blazing with precious stones ; while close at hand, in " a contiguous LONDON BRIDGE (OLD). 165 house," innumerable boys, attired in white, represented the cjlestial host of cherubim and seraphim, their countenances shining with gold, their wings glittering, and their flowing locks set with precious sprays of laurel. And on both sides of the bridge, out of the stone-work, rose a lofty column made of wood, not less delicate than elegant, which was covered over with a linen cloth, painted the colour of white marble and green jasper, as if it had been of a square shape, and formed of stones cut out of the quarries. And upon the summit of the right-hand column stood the image of an Antelope rampant, with a splendid shield of the Royal Arms hanging about his neck, and in his right foot a sceptre extended, as if offering it to the king. On the top of the left-hand column was the figure of a lion, also rampant, carrying a spear with the royal banner displayed, which he held aloft in his dexter paw. At Henry's approach the children aforesaid, with modu- lations of voice and melody of organs, sang an English anthem ; and he then ascended the rising ground to the Conduit in Cornhill, where a third tower had been erected, blazoned with armorial bearings and inscriptions, and accommodating a company of prophets of " venerable hoari- ness," who sent forth a swarm of sparrows and other small birds, as a sacrifice agreeable to God in return for the victory, some of which alighted on the king's breast and some on his shoulders, while others hovered about him. These prophets raised the psalm of thanks- giving, Cantate Domino canticum novum. At the entrance of the street of Cheape, a fourth tower was the station of certain aged men, who had the names of the Twelve Apostles written on their foreheads, together with those of the twelve Kings, Martyrs, and Confessors of the royal 166 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. line of England. The cross of Cheape was converted for the occasion into " a very fair castle," with towers, columns, bastions, arches, gates, a superfluity of tapestry, and a wealth of emblematical ornament. Thence issued a chorus of virgins, clad in white, and singing and dancing to the music of the timbrel ; while the entire fabric was covered with boys, also in white, who flung about golden coins and boughs of laurel, and welcomed the king with the Te Deum. The streets through which the royal procession made its way were crowded with glad faces ; and the balconies and windows shone with knights and nobles and wealthy burghers, and their wives and daughters, all so brave in garments of velvet and silk and cloth, with much gold and fine lace about them, that a greater assembly or a nobler spectacle was not recollected to have been ever before seen in London. Henry himself was clothed in a robe of purple; his horse in trappings of blue velvet, embroidered with devices of antelopes, and long flowers springing between their horns. The chroniclers comment on his grave and modest aspect and his reverent demeanour ; and record that he would not allow his helmet the casque " that did affright the air at Agincourt," that twice saved his life on the well-foughten field, and to this day bears the dents made by the Due d'Alen9on's formidable sword to be borne in state before him, inasmuch as he was resolved that the praise should wholly be given to the Divine Power : " Being free from vainness and self-glorious pride, Giving full trophy, signal and ostent, Quite from himself to God." When the procession reached St. Paul's he dismounted, LONDON BRIDGE (OLD). 167 and being received by fourteen bishops, passed into the Cathedral, 'where he made his offering at the high altar ; after which the Te Deutn was chanted. In the same order he went to Westminster, where he again performed his devotions, previous to entering his ancient palace. Then the citizens returned to their homes, elated with the success of their pageantry, which, it must be owned, they had managed excellent well. Next day the Mayor and Aldermen, with two hundred of the principal burgesses, waited upon King Henry, and presented him with two golden basins, of the value of five hundred pounds, each filled with coins of gold. The splendour of this pageant evidently left a deep impression on the popular memory ; and one of the songs sung in the course of it perhaps the " English anthem " chanted by the cherubic boys in the house " contiguous " to the second tower on London Bridge has been handed down to us. I print it here from the copy preserved by Bishop Percy : Deo gratias Anglia rvdde pro victoria! " Owre Kynge went forth to Normandy, Wyth grace and might of chivalry ; The God for hym wrought marvelously, Wherefore Englande may calle and cry, Deo gratias Anglia redde pro victoria ! " He sette a sege, the trothe for to say, To Harfleur towne with ryal array ; That towne he won, and made a fray, That France shall rue tyll Domis day. " Then went owre Kynge, with alle his oste, Thorowe Fraunce for all the Frenche host ; Ne spared, for drede of leste, ne most, Tyl he come to Agincourte coste. 168 A BOOK ABOUT LQNDON. " Then for sothe that Knyght comely, In Agincourt feld he fought manly ; Throwe grace of God most myghty, He had both the felde and victory. " Then Dukys and Erlys, Lords and Barons, Were take, and slayne, and that wel sone, And some were ledde in to Lundone With joye, and merthe, and grete renoune. Now gracious God, he save our Kynge, His peple, and all his well wyllynge ; Gif him gude lyfe, and gude endynge, That we wist meist mo we savely synge, Deo gratias ; Deo gratms Anglia redde pro victoria." fc>ome years later, the hero of Agincourt figured again in a procession which traversed the long highway of London Bridge ; but then all his pride and glory were as shadows of the past, and it was to his dead body his late subjects paid their final homage. He had died at Vincennes, of dysentery, on the last day of August 1422; but it was not until November 10th that his remains arrived in London. The spectacle, as the funeral cortege crossed the bridge, must have been both solemn and magnificent. On a triumphal car, decorated with cloth of gold like a bed of state, reposed an effigy of the conqueror, habited in a robe of purple velvet lined with ermine, an imperial crown of gold and jewels on the head, and in one hand the regal sceptre, in the other the ball and cross. The face, painted to resemble life, was uncovered, and looked towards heaven ; on the bier lay a coverlet of vermilion- coloured silk, beaten with gold. The chariot was drawn by six strong horses, richly harnessed, with heraldic devices upon their housings, the first exhibiting the arms of LONDON BRIDGE (OLD). 169 St. George; the second, of Normandy; the third, those of King Arthur ; the fourth, those of Edward the Con- fessor ; the fifth, those of France ; and the sixth, those of France and England, quartered. A splendid canopy was borne over it by noble hands, and it was surrounded by three hundred torch-bearers, habited in white; while in attendance upon it marched five thousand men-at-arms on horseback, in black armour, holding their spears re- versed, and a long train of lords with pennons, banners, and baaneroles. In advance went twelve captains, carrying the king's achievements. Immediately after the corpse followed the servants of the household, all in black ; then came James I. of Scotland, as chief mourner, with the princes and lords of the royal blood, in mourning habits ; and finally, at a distance of two miles in the rear, Queen Katherine, the dead king's widow, with an honourable retinue On entering the city, ten bishops, wearing their pontifical adornments reversed, and many mitred abbots and other men of the Church in great number, with a right great multitude of citizens, came out to meet the corpse, receiving it with due honour. " And all the said Spirituals singing, the officers accustomed in like case, conveyed the corpse by Lombard Street, through the Cheap, unto the cathedral church of St. Paul." " Thus," says Stow, " this most victorious and renowned king entered the way decreed for every creature, in the flower and most lusty time of his age." And thus all human achievement and activity are finally summed up in the melancholy words, Hie jacet. The old bridge presented a brilliant scene on Friday, November 12th, 1501, when the Princess Catherine of Arragon, daughter of Ferdinand V., King of Spain, was 170 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. conveyed from Lambeth through the city to witness the preparations made by the citizens to do honour to her marriage with Prince Arthur, eldest son of Henry "VII. Our ancestors had a mighty pretty taste in this sort of thing ; and I doubt whether a Wingfield or a Harris could have improved upon their pageantry in variety and vividness of colouring. On this occasion the whole city was brave with hangings and devices, arches and columns, and on London Bridge was set up a splendid allegory of St. Katherine and St. Ursula, with attendant virgins. "I pass over," says Hall, the chronicler, " the wise devices, the prudent speeches, the costly works, the cunning por- traiture practised and set forth in seven goodly beautiful pageants, and set up in divers places of the city. I leave also the goodly ballads, the sweet harmony, the musical instruments, which sounded with heavenly noise on every side of the street. I omit, further, the costly apparel, both of goldsmiths' work and embroidery, the rich jewels, the massy chains, the stirring horses, the beautiful barbs, and the glittering trappers both with bells and spangles of gold. " I pretermit also," continues the historian, " the rich apparel of the Princess, the strange fashions of the Spanish nation, the beauty of the English ladies, the goodly de- meanour of the young damsels, the amorous countenances of the lusty bachelors. I pass over also the fine ingrained clothes, the costly furs of the citizens standing on scaffolds, railed from Gracechurch to Paul's. What should I speak of the odoriferous scarlets, the fine velvet, the pleasant furs, the massy chains, which the Mayor of London, with the Senate, sitting on horseback, at the Little Conduit in Chepe, wore on their bodies and about their necks ? I will not molest [weary] you with rehearsing the rich arras, the LONDON BRIDGE (OLD*). 171 costly tapestry, the fine clothes both of gold and silver, the curious velvets, the beautiful satins, nor the pleasant silks, which did hang in every street where she passed ; the wine that ran continually out of the conduits, the gravelling and railing of the streets, needeth not to be remembered." Thus, while declaring his resolution to say nothing of those brave sights to pass over or pretermit them Hall contrives to enumerate all their principal details, and to present us with quite a lively picture of the wedding shows and decorations. It seems to me that these and similar words hardly confirm one's belief in the truth of Froissart's oft-quoted remark that the English took their pleasure sadly. At all events, the pleasure to be derived from public pageants they took with the eagerness almost of children ; showing a fondness for contrasts and combina- tions of colour, and for general picturesqueness of form and appearance, not to be surpassed, I think, even by the populations of the great Italian cities. What could be better contrived than Cardinal Wolsey's progress when he set out from London to Dover to cross the Channel on an embassy to the King of France ? How well it all sounds the Cardinal's gentlemen in black velvet livery coats, with chains of gold about their necks the Cardinal's yeomen and servants, in French tawny coats, with the initials T. and C., under the Cardinal's hat, embroidered on their backs and breasts the Cardinal's sumpter mules and carts and carriages, guarded by a large company of bows and spears the Cardinal's two great crosses of silver, and his two pillars of silver, the Great Seal of England and the Cardinal's hat the Cardinal's valaunce or cloak- bag, a fine bit of colour, for it was embroidered all over very richly with cloth of gold, underneath which showed 172 A SO OK ABOUT LONDON. the bright scarlet cloth ; and, chief of all, the Cardinal himself, in his Cardinal's robes, riding on a mule trapped with crimson velvet upon velvet, and his stirrups of copper and gilt ! THE STORY OF EDWARD OSBORNE. It was in 1536 that the accident happened which, in books that record " the Romance of the Aristocracy," is always described as the origin of the prosperity of the ducal house of Leeds. A wealthy cloth-merchant, named Hewit, afterwards Lord Mayor and knighted, lived at that time in a house upon the bridge. He was possessed of a great estate ; was worth 6,000 per annum, or about .50,000 at the present value of money. To this large fortune his daughter Anne was heiress. In her childhood she had a narrow escape from what penny-a-liners call " a watery grave ; " for her nursemaid, dandling the babe in her arms while staring out of window at the boats veering up and down the river, and the lights and shadows that glanced across them, by some mischance relaxed her hold and the child fell. The rescue seemed impossible, when the maid's cries drew to the spot her master's apprentice, young Edward Osborne ; who, im- mediately perceiving what had happened, bravely leaped into the river, and was just in time to seize the child's frock before she was carried down by the swirling eddies. He supported her until assistance arrived, and had then the happiness of restoring her to her anxious father. Edward Osborne was the son of Richard Osborne, a reputable yeoman of Ashford, in Kent. He continued in Sir William Hewit's household until the child he had saved grew up into beautiful womanhood. She was fifteen or LONDON BRIDGE (OLD'). 173 sixteen years his junior; but their attachment seems to have been mutual, and probably on her part was strengthened by a feeling of gratitude. Though her personal charms and splendid dowry brought many suitors to her feet, all were refused ; and her choice of the brave apprentice was con- firmed by her father, who would say, " Osborne saved her, and Osborne shall have her." The year of their marriage I do not find recorded ; but they seem to have been a happy as well as a prosperous couple, and had several children. Osborne became Sheriff of London in 1575 and Lord Mayor in 1583-84, when he was knighted by Queen Elizabeth at Westminster. He died in Sir William Hewit's house in Philpot Lane (to which and all his estates he had succeeded in right of his wife) in 1591, when he was probably seventy- two or seventy-three years of age. In 1675 his great- grandson, Sir Thomas, was raised to the peerage as Viscount Latimer; in the following year he was created Earl of Danby ; in 1680, advanced to the dignity of Marquis of Carmarthen; and in 1694 became first Duke of Leeds. This is the politician of whom Macaulay says that " he was not a man whose character, if tried by any high standard of morality, would appear to merit approbation. He was greedy of wealth and honours, corrupt himself, and a corrupter of others." Yet " he was not without the feelings of an Englishman and a Protestant; nor did he, in his solicitude for his own interests, ever wholly forget the interests of his country and of his religion." HEADS UPON LONDON BRIDGE. The grisly practice of exposing the heads of criminals, or of the victims of arbitrary power and bigotry, upon London 174 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. Bridge began in 1305, when the head of Wallace, the great Scotch champion, was thus outraged. In the following year the head of another Scotch worthy, Simon Fraser, was placed beside it. In 1399, the heads of the four knights Sir Bernard Brocas, the Lord Marchais, John Derby, and the Lord Stelle convicted of having murdered Thomas of Woodstock, Duke of Gloucester, at Calais, were placed over the gate on London Bridge. In 1408 the head of Thomas Percy, Earl of Northumber- land, who had rebelled against Henry IV. In 1450 the head of James Fiennes, Lord Saye, murdered by Jack Cade and his insurgents. Also the head of Jack Cade himself. In June 1535 the head of John Fisher, Bishop of Rochester, who was executed for refusing to acknowledge King Henry VIII. as Supreme Head of the Church of England. A curious story is told by Hall, how that after the saintly prelate's head had stood for the space of fourteen days upon the bridge, it could not be seen to have wasted or consumed, but every day grew fresher and fresher, no that in his life-time he never looked so well. How that the cheeks being beautified with a comely red, the face looked as though it had beholden the passers-by, and would have spoken to them. How that many took it for a miracle, which Almighty God was pleased to show above the course of nature, this preservation of the fresh and living colour in his face, and how that it proclaimed to the world the innocence and holiness of this saintly father, who had suffered so heroically in defence of his mother, the Holy Catholic Church of Christ. The people daily nocking to see this strange sight so blocked the thoroughfare on the bridge LONDON BRIDGE (OLD). 175 that scarcely any vehicle could pass ; and, therefore, at the end of fourteen days, the executioner was commanded to throw the head, under cover of night, into the river. In its place was set the head of that good and wise man, whose urbane wit has left so pleasant a memory in the minds of men, Sir Thomas More, the victim, like Bishop Fisher, of a king's capricious tyranny. After it had been exposed for some months, his married daughter, Mrs. Margaret Roper, bribed one of the bridge-keepers to drop it into her boat as she, at a time agreed upon, passed underneath. For this deed of filial affection she was summoned before the King's Council; but ultimately she retained her treasure, and, enclosing it in a leaden casket, carried it to Canterbury, where she and her husband resided. At her death she left instructions that it should be interred with her own body in the Roper vault. For some unexplained reason this was not done, but the precious casket was placed in a niche in the wall of the tomb, where it may be seen to this day. In 1583, the head of James Earl of Desmond, the principal leader of the Irish rebellion. In 1605, Father Henry Garnet, the principal of the English Jesuits, was executed in St. Paul's Churchyard (May 3rd), for alleged complicity in the Gunpowder Plot. His head was fixed on a pole on London Bridge, and the same story was circulated about it that had formerly been told of Bishop Fisher's that the countenance retained for upwards of twenty days " the same lively colour which it had during life " drawing all London to the spectacle, which was interpreted, of course, as a miraculous testimony to his innocence. Another marvellous incident is disposed of by Mr. S. R. Gardiner : " It was said that 176 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON, among the straws used upon the scaffold one had a minute likeness of the martyr's head upon its husk. The miracle was trumpeted abroad by those who should have known better, and found its way from common conversation into the pages of grave writers. An inquiry was instituted by the Government, and it was found that some who had seen the straw declared that there was nothing wonderful in the matter at all, and that the drawing could have been easily executed by any artist of moderate skill." In 1643, the head of Father Heath, the Jesuit. 1^ jltunj uf % mtm>: Jrhw. - \ HISTORIC ASSOCIATIONS. THERE were many famous builders among the great mediaeval ecclesiastics, and not one of the least famous was Gundulph Bishop of Rochester. To his lofty ideas of things we owe the grim and massive keep which at Rochester overlooks the Medway, and that greater keep which, as part of London's Tower, overlooks the Thames. While the latter structure was rising on its solid founda- tions, Bishop Gundulph lodged, it is said, in the house of one Edmere or Eadmer, a citizen, so that he might daily supervise the labours of his masons. This was in or about the year 1078, and in the reign of William the Conqueror, at whose command it was that the episcopal castle-maker undertook his important enterprise. We may reasonably conjecture that William and his architect were attracted to this site because it had already been utilised for military purposes. There seems good reason for believing that the Romans had built a castellum here, and that the Saxons (if I may use a term which is convenient, if not strictly accurate) had also their walls and bulwarks. In 1090 London was visited by a terrible hurricane, which destroyed some five hundred houses, probably of timber and mud, and, it is said, " sore shook the Tower " not, indeed, Gundulph 's 12 178 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. solid keep, but lesser and slighter fortifications. These' were repaired by Rufus, who (and his successor Henry I.) added a castle on the south side towards the Thames, and walled it round about. Thus it was that by degrees it grew into a regular and formidable fortress. As a prison it was first used by Henry I., who confined in it Ralph Flambard, the militant Bishop of Durham. The Bishop, like many of his brethren, loved good liquor ; and as he shared it freely with his keepers, they made no demur when his friends sent him a cask of good Bordeaux. On the night of its arrival, rare were the doings in St. Thomas's Tower ! Guards and prisoner alike made merry ; but the former got drunk while the latter kept sober, and when they were snoring heavily he took a rope that was coiled up in the cask, lowered himself from his window, and was soon stealing down the river in the darkness. As a palace its first occupant was King Stephen, who, in 1140, kept his court here with great magnificence during the Whit- suntide festival. About a century after the Great Storm, another ecclesi- astical builder, William Longchamp, Bishop of Ely, who was guarding the kingdom for Richard I. while that royal knight-errant was crusading in Palestine, set to work to strengthen London's citadel by surrounding it with an embattled stone wall and a broad deep ditch or moat, operations which the citizen folk regarded with much dis- favour. W'hen Prince John began his covert rebellion against his brother, he marched against the Bishop, who thereupon retired into his fortress, relying upon his stone wall and deep moat. But next day the bishops and nobles who sided with John, together with the citizens of London, assembled, and, deposing Longchamp from the regency, pro- THE STORY OF THE TOWER. 179 claimed Prince John as his successor. When the Bishop was informed of their decision he swooned and fell on the floor. Early on the following morning, looking forth from the battlements, he saw that the broad grassy spaces of East Smithfield shone with warrior, spear, and battle-axe ; that John's troops had invested the Tower by land and water, and that resistance was impossible. Admitted to an audience of the Prince, he was informed that in return for his allegiance John would confirm him in his bishopric, and give him the custody of three royal castles. Long- champ replied with dignity that he would surrender none of his sovereign's rights ; " But you are stronger than I," said the old man, " and Chancellor and Justiciary as I am, I yield to force." And he handed to John the keys of the Tower. A day or two later, the tall gaunt figure of a woman, with a web of cloth and a yard measure in her hand, was seen on the sea-shore at Dover ; but some fisher- wives, drawing near out of curiosity, perceived a man's new-shaven chin and sharp features beneath the green hood. It was in this disguise that the unfortunate bishop waited for the sailing-boat which carried him across to Normandy. Henry III. repaired and strengthened the White Tower (as Gundulph's keep was called), and enlarged the fortifica- tions on the west side, founding what was afterwards called the Lion Tower. He made it his principal place of resi- dence, and during his long contention with the Barons frequently had occasion to shut himself up within its walls for safety. It was he who repaired and ornamented the chapel in the White Tower a very fine specimen of Norman ecclesiastical work. He also erected the Bell Tower, the Wakefield, and the so-called " Bloody " Towers. In the reign ]80 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. of Edward II. the famous alchymist, Raymond Lulli, was lodged here as the King's guest, professing to make gold. In one of his works he states that, in the secret chamber of St. Katherine, in the Tower, he performed in the King's presence the experiment of transmitting some crystal into a mass of adamant, or diamond, of which Edward made little pillars for the tabernacle of God. The queen here gave birth to her eldest daughter, Joan of the Tower. Edward III., in his minority, was secluded here from public affairs by his mother, Isabel, and her paramour, Mortimer ; which act the King, on gaining his freedom, repaid by arresting Mortimer at Nottingham, in 1330, and hanging him on the Tower gibbet. The Tower first acquires repute as a prison in Edward III.'s reign. For some years it held in safe keeping the gallant Scotch nobleman, John Earl of Murray, who was unable to raise the high ransom demanded for his release. In 1340 he was granted to William Earl of Salisbury, "to do with him as most for his advantage ; " and much to Salisbury's advantage the transaction proved, as he was exchanged for the latter, when made prisoner in France, through the intervention of the King of Scotland. Defeated and made prisoner at Neville's Cross, in 1346, the King of Scotland (David) was removed, under an escort of twenty thousand men, to London ; and, mounted on a coal-black steed, was conducted with much triumphal ceremony to the Tower, where he lay for eleven years before he obtained his deliverance, on agreeing to pay a hundred thousand marks and to give up some of his principal nobles as hostages. Another royal prisoner was John King of France, who, with Philip his son, four princes of the blood royal, and earls, barons, and knights galore, was THE STORY OF THE TOWER. 181 among the spoils of Poitiers (1357). John and his conqueror, our Black Prince, entered London on April 24th. All the city flocked to stare at the splendid pageant. A thousand Londoners, wearing the costumes and insignia of their respective guilds, and headed by the Lord Mayor and Aldermen, joined the procession at South wark, whence it defiled across London Bridge ; and through streets spanned by triumphal arches, and shining with trophies of war, passed on to Westminster. The French king was mounted, we are told, on a white war- horse, richly caparisoned ; at his side, with something like an affectation of humility, rode the Prince of Wales, on a little black hackney. The palace of the Savoy was set apart as a residence for the royal prisoner, until, on the renewal of the war with France in 1359, Edward III., according to Froissart, " made all the lords of France, suche as were prisoners, to be put into dyvers places and stronge castelles, to be the more sure of them ; and the Frenche Kyng was set in the Toure of London, and his yonge son wyth hym, and moche of his pleasure and sport restrayned ; for he was then straigtlyer kept than he was before." He was released in the following year ; but being unable to make up the stipulated ransom, voluntarily re- turned to England, and died in the Savoy in 1369. There were other notable prisoners during Edward's reign; such as the Earl of Monteith, the Constable of France, Charles of Blois, and that Governor of Calais and his fellow-citizens of whose patriotic devotion Froissart tells so picturesque a tale. Nor must we forget Waleran, Comte de St. Pol, a brilliant young French noble, who made of his captivity quite a gay and gracious thing, and after- wards being entertained at Windsor, and meeting there the 182 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. Lady Maud, a daughter of the Princess of Wales (by her first husband), straightway fell in love with her. Like him she had a taste for " carolling and dancing ; " she smiled on his suit ; and when he returned to his native country, accompanied him as his wife, and they lived happily ever afterwards. During the insurrection of Wat Tyler, Richard II. sought shelter in the Tower, with all his Court and his principal nobles and gentry, to the number of six hundred (1381). On June 12th he resolved on an attempt to conciliate the insurgents, and descended the river in his barge to meet them ; but, on his arrival at Rotherhithe, " they set up shouts and cries," says Froissart, " as if all the devils from hell had come into their company," and he returned in hot haste to his palace fortress. The insurrection continuing to spread, and the multitude demanding the heads of the Chancellor (Sudbury, Archbishop of Canterbury) and the Treasurer (Sir Robert Hales), Richard went forth to meet the leaders at Mile End, whence he rode on to Smithfield, and in the hurly-burly that followed Wat Tyler was killed and the rebellion suppressed. During the King's absence, however, a body of the insurgents forced their way into the Tower, through the negligence or treason of its garrison, seized upon the Chancellor and the Treasurer, and beheaded them on Tower Hill. They then indulged in the wildest license. Stow relates that many broke into the King's privy chamber, and played the wantons, in sitting, lying, and disporting themselves upon the King's bed. The Princess of Wales, widow of the Black Prince, fell into their hands, but escaped at the cost of a few rude kisses. She swooned with terror, and her ladies carried her, while uncon- scious, into a boat, and rowed her to the other side of the THE STORY OF THE TOWER. 183 river, where, at a house in Carter Lane, the King eventually rejoined her, with the good news of Wat Tyler's death. It was afterwards Richard's misfortune to be imprisoned in the Tower, where, in September 1399 (?), he was forced to surrender his crown to Henry of Lancaster. Thence he was removed to Pontefract. The coronation of Henry IV., which took place on the anniversary of the day of his banishment by Richard II., a noteworthy coincidence, was celebrated with much gorgeous pageantry. Attended by his son, Prince Henry, by six dukes, six earls, eighteen barons, and nine hundred knights and esquires, all in glittering armour, with banners and pennons floating above them, he rode, bareheaded, all the way from the Tower to Westminster Abbey, and from the Abbey back to the Tower, wearing a short coat of cloth of gold, with the Garter on his left leg, and the livery of France round his neck. During the Wars of the Roses the Tower was associated with some memorable events. In 1460, Lord Scales was besieged here by the Yorkists, but, endeavouring to escape by water, was forthwith captured and slain. Henry VI. was a frequent resident at one time as king, at another as prisoner. After the collapse of his dynasty on the lost field of Barnet, he was brought back to the Tower for the last time in the latter capacity. Not long afterwards the grim fortress received his intrepid consort, Margaret of Anjou, who had been taken prisoner at Tewkesbury. That same night, " between eleven and twelve," died King Henry ; "the Duke of Gloucester and divers of his men being in the Tower that night." It was sedulously given out that he had died of " pure displeasure and melancholy ; " but a trustworthy contemporary writer does not hesitate to speak 184 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. of him as murdered. No doubt the coincidence of his death with Edward's return, and the obvious advantage which the House of York derived from the removal of the last and only representative of the House of Lancaster, gives some confirmation to the suspicion. " May God give him time for repentance," exclaims the Monk of Croyland, " whoever he was, who laid his sacrilegious hands on the Lord's anointed ! " a pious wish, at all events. The next celebrated victim was George Duke of Clarence, whom his brother, Edward IV., threw into the Tower, and afterwards arraigned before the Lords, on a charge of high treason, the king himself conducting the prosecution and examining the witnesses (January 1478). The peers found him guilty, and he was sentenced to death (February 7th). Execution was delayed for some days, until the Speaker of the House of Commons, appearing at the bar of the House of Lords, desired that justice might be done. Even then Edward shrank from the odium of a public scaffold ; and ten days later it was announced that the Duke had died in the Tower (February 18th). The secret was so well kept that the manner of his death has never been discovered ; for it is needless to say that no credence can be given to the legend that he was drowned in a butt of malmsey wine a liquor to which he was reputed to be exceedingly partial. Of the dark, deep crime of this fratricidal action Edward cannot be acquitted; nor is his guilt lightened because he yielded to it at the instigation of his queen and the Woodvilles. But he would seem to have been troubled by the " worm of remorse," if the story be true that thereafter, whenever his clemency was solicited for a criminal, he would exclaim, " Oh, unfortunate brother, that no man would ask pardon for thee ! " THE .STORY OF THE TOWER. 185 THE STORY OF THE Two PRINCES. Immediately upon the death of Edward IV. the Council assembled and made proclamation of the succession of his eldest son, then about thirteen years of age, by the style and title of Edward V. The young sovereign at the time was at Ludlow Castle, on the Welsh frontier, in the hands of Earl Rivers and Lord Gray, his mother's kinsmen who hastened to conduct him towards London. But at Northampton they were interrupted by Richard Duke of Gloucester, attended by the Duke of Buckingham and a large armed force. Gloucester, acting with characteristic decision, immediately arrested the two nobles and sent them to Pontef ract Castle ; then, taking charge of the boy King, he continued his journey to the capital. At their approach Queen Elizabeth Woodville, with her son Richard and her daughter, fled to the sanctuary at Westminster ; whither she was followed by her eldest son (by her first husband), the Marquis of Dorset, who abandoned his important trust as Constable of the Tower. It was on May 4th that the boy King entered London. At Hornsey Park he was met by the Lord Mayor and aldermen, splendid in robes of scarlet, and followed by five hundred mounted citizens, attired in violet. Young Edward was comely to see in a long mantle of blue velvet ; but his attendants still wore mourning for his royal father. In front of him rode Gloucester, bareheaded, frequently crying, with a loud voice, " Behold your King and Sovereign ! " With all the honours of royalty he was conducted through the city to the Bishop of London's palace, where he im- mediately received the homage of the prelates and nobles present. Within a few days a great council was summoned 186 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. " to settle the government." As the King's uncle, the next prince of the blood, and a person of " eminent judgment and courage," the Duke of Gloucester was appointed Protector of the kingdom during his nephew's minority; and assumed the sonorous designations of " Protectour and Defensour, Grete Chamberlayne, Constable, and Lord High Admiral of England." Thus he enjoyed all the power and reality of royalty, with the full consent and approval of the people. But he was by no means satisfied. The Queen, and the Woodvilles generally, he regarded with deadly hatred, believing, or professing to believe, that they meditated designs against his life or power. He was not a man to meet danger with folded hands ; and encountering plot by counter-plot, he resolved to get into his hands the young Duke of York. He proposed therefore to the lords of the council that the Prince should be removed from sanctuary. The proposal occasioned a vehement debate ; but Gloucester's friends or creatures being largely in the majority, it was eventually decided that there might be " sanctuary men and women," but as children could commit no crime for which an asylum was needed, the privileges of sanctuary could not be extended to them. Therefore, the Lord Protector might possess himself of his nephew by force if he chose. Richard in the first place resolved to trust to persuasion ; and sent the Archbishop of Canterbury, with some of the nobles, to prevail upon the Queen to surrender her son. The Archbishop's principal argument was, that the young King was melancholy without a playfellow, and required his brother's company. " Troweth the Protector ah, pray God he may prove a protector ! " exclaimed Elizabeth, " that the King doth lack a playfellow? Can none be found to play with the THE STORY OF THE TOWER. 187 King but only his brother, which hath no wish to play because of sickness ? as though princes, as young as they be, could not play without their peers ; or children could not play without their kindred, with whom (for the most part) they agree worse than with strangers ! " The Archbishop continuing to press her, she said, " My lord, and all my lords now present, I will not be so suspicious as to mistrust your truth." And taking her son by the hand, " Lo, here is this gentleman," she continued, "whom I doubt would safely be kept by me, if I were permitted ; and well do I know there be some such deadly enemies to my blood that, if they wist where any lay in their own bodies, they would let it out if they could. The desire of a kingdom knoweth no kindred ; brothers have been brothers' bane, and may the nephews be sure of the uncle ? Each of these children is safe while they be asunder. If one be safe, they are both secure, but being both together they are in great danger. But, notwithstanding, I do here deliver him, and his brother in him, to your keeping, of whom I shall ask him again at all times before God and the world. I am confident of your fidelity, and have no reason to distrust your wisdom, power, or ability to keep him, if you will make use of your resolution when it is required." Turning to her child, she said : " Farewell, mine own sweet son, the Almighty be thy Pro- tector ! Let me kiss thee once more before we part, for God knows when we shall kiss again." And having kissed him, she blessed him, and turned from him and wept, and so went her way, leaving the child with the lords, weeping also for her departure. The young Duke was then con- ducted to the Tower, whither the King had previously been removed ; and beyond the precincts of that gloomy prison they were seen never more (June 1483). 188 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. In Shakespeare's tragedy of Richard III., and again in Lord Lytton's romance of " The Last of the Barons," the Lord Hastings makes a splendid and very interesting figure. He was a man of fine parts and many brilliant accomplish- ments, one of the new nobility, and the chief counsellor of Edward IV. ; but had afterwards sided with Gloucester and Buckingham, owing to his deep dislike and jealousy of the Woodvilles. Now, however, whether alarmed for his own safety or apprehensive of Richard's designs upon the crown, he resolved on a change of position, and meditated on the best means of loosening the Protector's hold on the boy King and his brother. But he was no match in political craft for his astute opponent, whose most devoted and un- scrupulous agent, Catesby, was the man whom Hastings had unfortunately selected as the depositary of his intentions. To throw dust in his eyes, Gloucester issued a summons to forty-eight lords and commoners to attend and receive knighthood, preparatory to the young King's coronation ; while he despatched orders to his retainers in the north to hasten to London for his defence against the murderous projects of the Queen and her kinsmen. And all his pre- parations being made, he struck with his usual promptitude. The usually accepted account of the remarkable scene that ensued made familiar to everybody by Shakespeare's adap- tation of it is Sir Thomas More's, and runs as follows : The Protector called a great council at the Tower on Friday, June 13th. He took his seat about nine o'clock, and saluting the lords and prelates very courteously, excused himself for being so late (what a change has taken place in our mode of living since the fifteenth century !), re- marking that he had played the sluggard that morning. Then he discussed affairs of state, and was very pleasant THE STORY OF THE TO WEB. 189 and jocose in all his speeches. He relieved the seriousness of the discussion by turning to the Bishop of Ely, and complimenting him upon the strawberries which he grew in his " garden at Holborn." The prelate, well pleased, promised him a dish for his dinner, and sent his servant to get it ready. Then the Protector suddenly rose, and asked the lords to excuse his absence for awhile. It all reads like a scene from a melodrama. In about an hour he returned, but wearing such an angry countenance knitting his brows, frowning, and biting his lips that the Council looked at him amazed. Sitting down, he was silent for some minutes, then abruptly inquired what punishment did they deserve who had plotted against the life of one who was so near in blood to the King as himself, and entrusted, moreover, with the protection of the King's person and realm 1 The lords were silent, but Hastings lightly replied that they deserved to be punished as heinous traitors. " That sorceress, my brother's wife," shouted the Duke, "and others with her, see how they have wasted my body by their sorcery and witchcraft ! " and therewith he bared his left arm and showed it dry, fleshless, and withered, as it had always been. Qloucester. " Look here, I am bewitched ; behold mine arm IB, like a blasted sapling, withered up ; And this is Edward's wife, that monstrous witch, Consorted with that harlot strumpet Shore, That by their witchcraft thus have marked me." (Richard Til., act iii., scene 4.) "If they have indeed done any such thing," rejoined Hastings, cautiously, " it is meet they should both be severely punished." "What!" exclaimed the Duke, "dost thou answer me with ifs, as though I charged them falsely ? 190 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. I tell thee they have done it, and that will I make good upon thy body, traitor ! " Therewith he struck his fist violently upon the council-table, and the chamber was immediately filled with a disorderly throng of armed men who shouted, " Treason ! treason ! " Turning to Hastings, the Protector sharply said, " I arrest thee, traitor ! " " What, me, my lord 1 " " Yes, thee, traitor ! " In the con- fusion, which had been preconcerted, a blow was aimed at the Lord Stanley with a pole-axe, which he partially avoided by slipping under the table, but his head received so sore a wound that the blood ran about his ears. He was after- wards arrested, together with the Archbishop of York, the Bishop of Ely, and others, who were all thrown into the Tower ; while Hastings was ordered to prepare instantly for death, the Protector swearing by St. Paul that he would not dine until they brought him his head. He was shrived by the first priest that could be found; hurried to the Chapel Green within the Tower ; and a log of timber intended for some repairs being converted into a block, his head was severed from his body. With such startling suddenness terminated the career of one of the most brilliant nobles of his time ! Men's heads must surely have sat uneasily on their shoulders, when they could be parted with so short a shrift ! It is evident that the end of Lord Hastings made a profound impression on the mind of his contemporaries ; this we know from the myths that afterwards gathered around it. Thus, Hall, the chronicler, writes : " The night before his death the Lord Stanley sent to him (Hastings) a trusty messenger at midnight in all haste, requiring him to rise and ride away with him, for he was disposed utterly no longer to abide, for he had a fearful dream, in the which THE STORY OF THE TOWER. 191 he thought a boar with his tusks so rased them both by the heads that the blood ran about both their shoulders? and forasmuch as the Protector gave the boar for his cognisance, he imagined that it should be he. ' Ah, good lord,' quoth the Lord Hastings to the messenger, ' leaneth my lord thy master so much to such trifles, and hath such faith in dreams, which either his own fear phantasieth, or do rise in the night's rest by reason of the day's thought ? Tell him it is plain witchcraft to believe in such dreams, which, if they were taken of things to come, why thinketh he not that we might as likely make them true by our going, if we were caught and brought back (as friends fail fliers), for then had the boar a cause likely to rase us with his tusks, as folks that have fled for some falsehood, wherefore either is there peril, or none, there is deed, and if any be it is rather in going than abiding. And if we should needs fall in peril one way or other, yet had I liefer that men should say it were by other men's falsehood, than think it were either our own fault or faint feeble heart; and therefore go to thy master and commend me to him, and say that I pray him to be merry and have no fear, for I assure him I am assured of the man he wotteth of [Catesby], as I am sure of mine own hand.' 'God send grace,' quoth the messenger, and so departed. Certain it is also that in riding toward the Tower the same morning in which he was beheaded, his horse that he was accustomed to ride on stumbled with him twice or thrice almost to the falling ; which thing, though it happen daily to whom no mischance is toward, yet hath it been an old evil token observed as a going toward mischief." Hastings, the most capable of his opponents, being re- moved, there remained no obstacle between Richard and the 192 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. goal of his ambition. Buckingham supported him in the claim on the crown, which he now pushed forward with characteristic energy and determination. He began by spreading abroad rumours that the late king's marriage with Elizabeth Woodville was invalid, and consequently that its offspring were illegitimate. Then a Parliament was hastily summoned, which made haste to confirm the alleged illegitimacy, and to present a petition to the Pro- tector, beseeching him, on behalf of the Lords and Commons of the realm, to assume the crown as his proven right. He was nothing loth, and on June 24th, 1483, became king, with the name and title of Richard III. For some months the kingdom was at peace, and Richard made a progress to the north, which called forth very general demonstrations of loyalty. But in the autumn a rumour got abroad that Edward V. and his brother were no longer ah' ve ; though how or where they died to none was known. Who first communicated the intelligence of their death does not seem to have been ascertained ; only, with white lips and haggard faces, men whispered to each other that the two princes were dead. As Richard was the sole person who could gain by their removal, it was speedily inferred that they had been murdered by his orders ; and in the following reign the murderers, or the men who alleged they were the murderers, acknowledged that the nephews had fallen victims to the cruel ambition of their uncle. Our knowledge of the events of Richard III.'s reign depends chiefly on the authority of Sir Thomas More, who based his history on information supplied to him by the King's great enemy, Morton Bishop of Ely, and in his account of the supposed murder of the two princes THE STORY OF THE TOWER 193 adopted without examination the so-called confession of the murderers. According to More, King Richard, when setting out on his northern progress, sent one of his creatures, John Greene, to Sir Robert Brackenbury, the Constable of the Tower, with a letter, desiring him by some means to make away with the two children whom he had in keeping. Brackenbury indignantly refused, and Greene returned to Richard with the Constable's negative answer : whereat he was much displeased, and to a page of his said, that same night, " Alas, who is there that a man can trust 1 Those whom I have myself brought up, those whom I thought would be most ready to serve me, even those fail me, and will not do what I command them." " Sir," replied the page, " on the pallet in the outer chamber is one who I am sure will think nothing too hard that you shall require him to do." This was Sir James Tyrrel (or Tyrells), a brave and handsome man, who would have won universal esteem had his virtue been as great as his valour. But he was ambitious, unscrupulous, and pitiless. The King, who knew his character, welcomed the page's suggestion as a happy one, and going out into the antechamber, found Sir James, and his brother, Sir Thomas, stretched upon a pallet-bed. " What," he said, uneasily, " are you abed so soon, gentle- men ? " Then, calling Sir James to him, he communicated his design, and was well pleased to find that he offered no objection to executing it. Next day, therefore, he despatched him with a letter to Brackenbury, requiring him to deliver up to Sir James the keys of the Tower, to the end that he might accomplish the King's pleasure in certain matters respecting which he had received the King's command. Sir Robert surrendered the keys to this assassin, who resolved to murder the two princes in the ensuing night. The elder. 13 194 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. who bears in our history the name of Edward V., on hearing that his uncle was crowned King, exclaimed with a sigh, " Ah, would my uncle but let me keep my life, he might take my kingdom ! " " The person who had brought the news, comforted him as well as he could, and for a while the King and his brother were well used ; but after- wards their captivity became more rigorous, and all their attendants were removed but one, commonly called Black Will, or Will Slaughter. After which time the Prince never tied his points, nor aught wrought of himself ; but with that young babe, his brother, lingered in thought and heaviness." Sir James Tyrrel, with some lingering touch of humanity, resolved that his victims should be done to death in their beds ; and selected for the doers of this cruel deed one Miles Forrest, a noted ruffian, and John Dighton, his groom, a lusty fellow. Those who waited near the Princes' lodgings were removed, and way made for Forrest and Dighton to enter their chamber, unperceived of anyone, at midnight. The poor youths were asleep in their beds. The assassins wrapped them up in the blankets and coverlet of the bed, clapped the feather-beds and pillows upon them, stopped their mouths, and smothered them to death. So Shakespeare (who follows Holinshed, as Holinshed followed More) : Tyrrel. " Dighton and Forrest, whom I did suborn To do this piece of ruthless butchery, Albeit they were flesh'd villains, bloody dogs, Melting with tenderness and mild compassion, Wept like to children in their death's sad story. ' Oh, thus,' quoth Dighton, ' lay the gentle babes.' 1 Thus, thus,' quoth Forrest, ' girdling one another Within their alabaster innocent arms : THE STORY OF THE TO WEE. 195 Their lips were four red roses on a stalk, Which, in their summer beauty, kissed each other. A book of prayers on their pillow lay : Which once,' quoth Forrest, ' almost changed my mind, But oh ! the devil ' there the villain stopp'd." When the ruffians perceived (says More) by their struggling that they were dying, and afterwards by their lying still that they were dead, they laid their bodies out naked upon the bed, and fetched Sir James Tyrrel to see them, who ordered the murderers to bury them at the stair-foot, deep in the ground under a heap of stones. Tyrrel then rode to give the King a full account of the murder. So well pleased with it was he that, 'tis said, he knighted him at the time ; but he seemed not to approve that the sons of a king should be buried in so vile a corner. Whereupon Sir Robert Bracken- bury's chaplain took up their bodies and interred them privately in a place that, owing to his death, never came to be known. In the reign of Henry VII., Sir James Tyrrel, being committed to the Tower for treason, confessed the murder and furnished the particulars already related. So did Dighton ; and both the master and man, and Forrest the warder, came to miserable ends, through the just judgment of God, the Avenger of Blood. No one can deny that More has told this tale with much dramatic power. To furnish it with a moral, he goes on to paint in vivid colours the remorse of the ambitious Richard. Thenceforward he knew no rest no sweet repose of con- science. His guilt followed him like his shadow. " His eyes whirled about, his body privily fenced, his hand ever on his dagger, his countenance and manner like one always ready to strike again. He took ill rest at nights, lay long 196 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. waking and musing ; sore wearied with care and watch, he rather slumbered than slept. Troubled with fearful dreams, suddenly sometimes started he up, leapt out of his bed, and ran about the chamber. So was his restless heart con- tinually tossed and troubled with the tedious impression and stormy remembrance of his most abominable deed." I think it must be acknowledged by every impartial student that this narrative is embellished with numerous details which do not belong to the region of sober fact. For instance, it is surely difficult to believe that Richard, who was so anxious to rest his throne on the confidence and affection of his subjects, committed to writing an order for the perpetration of a murder of such extreme foulness that, if traced to him, it would damn his name and memory to everlasting infamy ; and then entrusted the missive to an obscure messenger, " one John Greene." It is equally difficult to believe that he made a confidant of his page, and on his chance recommendation selected the instrument of a most hazardous action. Further, does it not seem probable that if he had designed the removal of his nephews, he would have carried out his design while he was residing in the Tower, and therefore was in a position to secure something like absolute secrecy ? The story as told by Sir Thomas More whose authority was Morton Bishop of Ely, Richard's bitterest enemy would almost lead us to suppose that the king purposely laid his plans so as to ensure the speediest and widest publicity. But had Richard anything to gain by the death of the two princes? It is true that they might, while living, occasionally serve as centres of disaffection and conspiracy ; but dead, and dead by the hands of hired assassins, dead in order to gratify an uncle's ruthless ambition and thirst THE STORY OF THE TOWER. 197 of blood, why, in nearly every Englishman they would find an avenger ! To Richard's subtle intelligence this must have been clear enough. A contemporary and trustworthy authority, the Croyland chronicler, after describing Richard's northern progress, continues : " While these things were passing in the north, King Edward's sons remained under certain deputed custody, for whose release from captivity the people of the southern and western parts began very much to murmur. And when at last the people about London, in Kent, Essex, Sussex, Hampshire, Dorsetshire, Devonshire, Wilts, Berk- shire, and other southern counties, made a rising in their behalf, publicly proclaiming that Henry Duke of Bucking- ham, who then resided at Brecknock in Wales, repenting the course of conduct he had adopted, would be their leader, it was spread abroad that King Edward's sons were dead, but by what kind of violent death is un- known." Many persons, however, disbelieved the report ; and Lord Bacon tells us that, soon after the accession of Henry VII., secret rumours and whisperings prevailed, and gained in strength, to the effect that the young princes reputed to have perished in the Tower had not so perished, but had been conveyed away secretly, and were still living. Even Sir Thomas More confesses that their " death and final infortune " had so far been questioned that some still remained " in doubt whether in King Richard's days they were destroyed or no." And Polydore Vergil, though he wrote by command of Henry VII., is forced to own to the general belief that Edward's sons were still alive, having been smuggled out of the Tower, and obscurely concealed in some distant region. We take it, then, that there is no absolute proof of the 198 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. murder of the two princes; or, allowing that they were murdered, of the murder having been committed by Richard's order. The probabilities may be in favour though I do not say so of the common tradition, but of clear and satisfactory evidence I find no trace. Dr. Lin- gard and in this relation he is followed by other historians relies largely on the circumstance that, in 1674, during some repairs in the White Tower, the workmen came upon " the bones of two striplings in (as it seemed) a wooden chest, which upon the survey were found proportionable to the ages of the two brothers, viz. about thirteen and eleven years." But here again we have no proof that the young princes were buried in this place, or that their remains were consigned to a wooden chest ; and whoever will take the trouble to study the account of the discovery of these bones given by Sandford, and of the condition in which they were found (" the skull of one was broken, and many of the bones likewise," and " the workmen cast them and the rubbish away together "), will be surprised that any historical value has been attached to it. Stress is also laid on a confession reputed to have been made by Sir James Tyrrel, of which, however, no word was heard until the Perkin Warbeck insurrection had alarmed Henry VII. for the safety of his throne, and made it necessary for him to show, as best he could, that Edward IV.'s sons had perished. Yet, after making this confession, Tyrrel was confidentially employed by Henry, while his agent and accomplice, Dighton, was set at liberty. In the reign of Henry VII. the Tower became the scene of a noble pageant on the occasion of the coronation of his Queen, Elizabeth, November 1487. Two days previous to THE STORY OF THE TOWER. 199 the ceremony, she came by water from Greenwich Palace, attended by the Mayor, Sheriffs, and Aldermen, and by citizens representative of the different guilds, attired in appropriate liveries, all in barges freshly equipped with banners and streamers of silk. One of the barges, ycleped the Bachelors', contained " many gentlemanly pageants well and curiously devised to do her Highness sport and pleasure." Henry received her at the Tower gate, and con ducted her to the royal apartments, where their Majesties " kept open household and frank resort " for all their courtiers. After dinner, on the day following, the Queen was royally apparelled, " having about her a kirtle of white cloth of gold of damask, and a mantle of the same suit furred with ermines, fastened before her breast with a great lace curiously wrought of gold and silk, and rich knobs of gold at the end tasselled ; her fair yellow hair hanging down plain behind her back, with a caul [or network] of pipes over it, and a circlet of gold, richly garnished with precious stones, upon her head." Must she not have looked every inch a queen, as, thus attired, the fair and comely woman was conveyed, in a litter hung with cloth of gold of damask, to the Abbey at Westminster ? Henry held his court at the Tower in 1491, when Sir William Stanley, Lord Chamberlain, was condemned to die on Tower Hill for some hasty utterances which the jealous Ning construed to express sympathy with Perkin Warbeck's enterprise. Warbeck himself, whom there is good reason for suspecting to have been the real Duke of York, was imprisoned here in 1498 ; and in the following year hung at Tyburn. In 1501, in honour of the marriage of his son, Prince Arthur, with Katherine of Aragon, Henry held a splendid tournament within the precincts. His unfortunate 200 A SO OK ABOUT LONDON. Queen frequently retired to the seclusion of the Tower from " the society of her sullen and cold-hearted husband," and she died beneath its grim roof on February llth, 1503. Surely an evil fortune attended the White Rose from first to last ! Richard Duke of York, father of Edward IV., suffered on the scaffold ; Edward IV. reigned but for a few years, and died in the prime of manhood ; of his two princely sons the fate is dubious ; and his daughter Elizabeth's love- less life was early terminated by an unlamented death. In the earlier years of his reign Henry VIII. kept his royal state frequently in the Tower, filling it with the splendour and bravery in which his luxurious taste delighted a taste inherited, perhaps, from his maternal grandfather. Very sumptuous was the processional array on the occasion of the coronation of himself and Katherine of Aragon ; but it was far surpassed at the coronation of Anne Boleyn (May 19th-31st, 1533) "the most magnificent pageant which London had witnessed since the unknown day on which the first stone of it was laid." The beautiful young Queen was conducted from Greenwich to the Tower by the Lord Mayor and the City Companies, with one of those picturesque aquatic spectacles which, in the days when the Thames ran clear and pure, and reflected the sunshine from its waves as from a mirror, rivalled in effect the Venetian " wedding of the Adriatic." The river was thronged with boats ; the quays and the ships in the port swarmed with applauding spectators ; and fifty great barges, gay with gilding and banners, formed the procession, in advance of which went ' a foyst or wafter full of ordnance, in which was a great dragon continually moving and casting wildfire, and round about the foyst stood terrible monsters and wild men, casting fire and making hideous noyse." And so amid the THE STORY OF THE TOWER. 201 blare of trumpets and the roar of cannon, in a blaze of fireworks and splendour, Anne Boleyn was swept up to the great archway of the Tower, where Henry was waiting on the stairs to receive her. Her coronation took place on the 31st. In a white chariot, drawn by two palfreys in white damask, a golden canopy hung with silver bells sheltering her from the sun, the beautiful queen, attended by the officers of her house- hold, by the Lord Mayor and Corporation, by the French and Venetian ambassadors, by prelates and peers in their rich robes, by the Knights of the Bath " in gowns of violet," rode through the crowded streets along Gracechurch Street and Cornhill, Cheapside and the Strand, all draped with cloth of gold, and arras and tapestry, and silk and velvet to the great Hall of Ruf us. On the following day she was crowned in the Abbey, receiving from the hands of Cranmer the golden sceptre and St. Edward's crown. Three short years, and Anne Boleyn, on another summer morning, again left the Tower of London on " a sad tragic errand," from which she never more returned. Accused of shameless incontinence, she was committed to the Tower on May 2nd, 1536, and by a grim coin- cidence was taken " to her own lodgings in which she lay at her coronation." When Sir William Kingston informed her that these rooms had been prepared for her, she ex- claimed, " It is too good for me Jesu have mercy on me ! " and, kneeling down, she wept a great space ; " and in the same sorrow fell into a great laughing." Then the poor hysterical woman begged to receive the Sacrament in the closet of her chamber, that she might pray for mercy which, alas ! she needed. I need not repeat the well-known story. Ultimately the 202 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. terrible charges against her were presented by two grand juries before the highest judicial tribunal in the realm ; and on Monday, May 15th, she was tried in the Tower before a Commission of the Peers (twenty-seven in number), who unanimously found her guilty, and sentenced her to be executed on the Tower Green. In her last hours she behaved with a wonderful composure. Her execution was fixed for Friday the 19th. On the previous morning she sent for Kingston, " that I might be with her," he says, " at such time as she received the good Lord, to the intent that I should hear her speak as touching her innocency always to be clear. ' Mr. Kingston,' she said, ' I hear say I shall not die before noon, and I am very sorry therefor, for I thought to be dead by this time, and past my pain.' I told her it should be no pain, it was so subtle ; and then she said, ' I heard say the executioner was very good, and I have a little neck,' and put her hands about it, laughing heartily. I have seen many men, and also women, executed, and they have been in great sorrow ; and to my knowledge, this lady hath much joy and pleasure in death." At nine o'clock, next morning, she was led down to the Green. She walked feebly, supported by the Lieutenant of the Tower. After a few words to the spectators, in which she neither denied nor confessed her guilt, but said, " If any person will meddle of my cause, I require him to judge the best," she took off her ermine cloak and removed her head-dress, gathering up her long fair hair into a cap which one of her attendants handed to her. She then knelt, and as she breathed faintly a commendation of her soul to Christ, the executioner with a single blow struck off her head. THE STORY OF THE TOWER. 203 Such was the end of Queen Anne Boleyn. Another queen went from the Tower to the scaffold on February llth, 1542. This was Catherine Howard, a woman who almost deserved her terrible punishment. Her confederate, Lady Rochford, suffered on the same occasion. During the reign of Henry VIII., the Tower was more used as a prison than as a palace ; though it was there that the French nobles, after the conference at Guisnes, were sumptuously feasted by the Earls of Derby and Essex. The list of prisoners is a long and painful one. To begin with : Edward Bohun, Duke of Buckingham, incurred the king's pitiless resentment by some idle speeches, more, perhaps, by his misfortune in standing near the throne. When he was conveyed from the Tower to Westminster to take his trial, his barge was furnished with carpets and cushions, as befitted his rank. On his return he refused to occupy the same seat. " No," he said, " when I came to Westminster, I was Lord High Constable and Duke of Buckingham, but now poor Edward Bohun ! " A more illustrious victim was Sir Thomas More, over the sad narra- tive of whose undeserved fate one would shed hot tears were they not chased away by the smiles which his playful and urbane wit inspires. From the moment when he passed through the fatal gate, and to the porter who demanded as his fee his uppermost garment, tossed his cap, saying lightly, that was his uppermost garment, and he wished it was of more value to that when, as the axe was about to fall, he moved aside his beard, murmuring, " Pity that should be cut that hath not committed treason," his lambent humour lighted up the dreary scene. Not once did his cheerful courage fail him. When he was returning from his trial and sentence at the Hall, and had reached 204 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. the Tower wharf, his best-beloved child, Margaret, broke through the ring of halberdiers which encompassed him, and threw her arms about his neck and kissed him, sobbing. " Oh, my father ! Oh, my father ! " And then he gave her his blessing calmly, and endeavoured to eomfort her. " She was no sooner parted from him," continues the pathetic narrative, " and had gone scarce ten steps, when she, not satisfied with the former farewell, like one who had forgot herself, ravished with the entire love of so worthy a father, having neither respect to herself nor to the press of people about him, suddenly turned back, and ran hastily to him, and took him about the neck and divers times together kissed him ; whereat he spoke not a word, but carrying still his gravity, tears fell also from his eyes ; yea, there were very few in all the troop who could refrain hereat from weeping, no, not the guard themselves." More suffered on July 5th, 1535. He had been preceded by a man of as pure and lofty a character, though of inferior intellectual power, the saintly Bishop Fisher, who, for refusing to acknowledge Henry's newly-assumed headship of the Church, was executed on June 22nd. " When the last morning dawned, he dressed himself carefully as he said, for his marriage day. The distance to Tower Hill was short. He was able to walk ; and he tottered out of the prison gates, holding in his hand a closed volume of the New Testament. The crowd flocked about him, and he was heard to pray that, as this book had been his best comfort and companion, so in that hour it might give him some special strength, and speak to him as from his Lord. Then, opening it at a venture, he read : ' This is life eternal, to know Thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, Whom Thou hast sent.' It was the answer to his prayer ; THE STORY OF THE TOWER. 205 and he continued to repeat the words as he was led forward. On the scaffold he chanted the Te Deum, and then, after a few prayers, knelt down, and meekly laid his head upon a pillow where neither care nor fear nor sickness would ever vex it more." The Bishop, during his imprisonment, was lodged in the Bell Tower. In 1538, for their share in what is known as the Exeter Conspiracy, the Marquis of Exeter, Lord Montague, and Sir Edward Neville were imprisoned in the Tower, and afterwards beheaded on Tower Hill (December 9th). Cromwell, Henry's powerful minister, fell a victim to his master's arbitrary temper and his own ambition in 1540. He passed from the Tower to the scaffold on July 22nd, and behaved himself with the fortitude of a brave man, though he was made to suffer severely through the awk- wardness of the executioner, " a ragged and butcherly miser," says Hall, " who very ungoodly performed the office." Lord Leonard Grey, for alleged misconduct in his Irish government, suffered in 1541. The poet Earl of Surrey was the last man of note sent to the block by Henry VIII.; he was executed on January 19th, 1547. His father, the Duke of Norfolk, was to have followed him on the 20th ; but in the interval the King died, and the duke escaped, to linger out his life in the grim riverside fortress. The gloomy record is continued in the reign of Edward VI. Here the first name we meet with is that of the proud, handsome, and aspiring Thomas Seymour, who endeavoured to force or cajole Elizabeth into a secret marriage, while 206 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. intriguing to supplant his brother, the Protector Somerset, in the young King's confidence. He was on the brink of open revolt when, in January 1549, he was suddenly arrested, refused a trial, and attainted. While lying in the Tower, under sentence of death, he contrived to manu- facture a substitute for ink, and converting the aglet of a point which he plucked from his hose into a pen, wrote letters to the Princesses Mary and Elizabeth, urging them to combine against his brother. That the letters might reach their destination, he concealed them in the sole of a shoe ; and when in front of the block, and about to kneel for the death-stroke, he whispered a charge to his servant not to forget to deliver them. "As touching the kind of his death," says Bishop Latimer, " whether he be saved or no, I refer that to God. In the twinkling of an eye He may save a man, and turn his heart. What He did I cannot tell. And when a man hath two strokes with an axe, who can tell but between two strokes he doth repent? It is hard to judge. But this I will say, if they will ask me what I think of his death, that he died very dangerously, irksomely, and horribly. He was a wicked man, and the world is well rid of him." The Protector's fall was not long delayed. A feeble administrator, he involved the kingdom in disorder by his vacillation and misgovernment. Having lost the confidence of the Council, he was sent to the Tower in October. In the following March he was released, and for some months regained his favour with Edward. Jealous of his increasing power, the Duke of Northumberland a man of deep and dark designs contrived to procure his arrest ; and in October 1551 he was again sent to the Tower. Brought to trial on charges of high treason and felony, he was THE STORY OF THE TO WEE. 207 acquitted of the former but found guilty of the latter ; and after lingering in captivity through the Christmas season, was suddenly without any pretence of legality led out upon Tower Hill, on the morning of January 22nd, 1552, and beheaded. By the removal of his great rival, Northumberland was left the most powerful man in the country, and met with no obstacle in the conduct of the subtle schemes which, on the death of Edward VI., placed Lady Jane Grey on the throne of England. As everybody knows, her reign was a ten days' dream. The country at large supported Queen Mary's title, and she entered London amidst spontaneous demonstrations of loyalty. Northumberland was immediately arrested, and committed to the Tower; he died a traitor's death on Tower Hill on August 22nd. Lady Jane had resigned her crown with much greater pleasure than she had assumed it, and prepared to retire to the private station which her tastes affected. Queen Mary seems to have been not unwilling to have dismissed her ; but Renaud, the Spanish Ambassador, persuaded her to detain her, her husband, and her parents the Duke and Duchess of Suffolk in close confinement. Though after a few days the Duke and Duchess were released, Renaud would not allow the Queen's compassion to be extended to Lady Jane and Lord Guil- ford, though they were merely the victims of the ambition of others. To increase their sufferings, they were placed in different apartments, and refused the consolation of each other's society. On November 13th, Lady Jane and her husband and her husband's brothers, Lords Ambrose and Henry Dudley, 208 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. were brought to trial at the Guildhall. They offered no defence none was possible ; and sentence of death was passed upon them. They were removed then to the Tower under a strong guard ; the populace, as Lady Jane Grey went by, evincing their sympathy in the most significant manner. Though they had refused to acknowledge her as queen, they revered her virtues, and pitied her as the victim of Northumberland's dangerous schemes. On this occasion she met her husband for the first time since the ruin of their fortunes. But on their arrival at the Tower they were again parted to see each other no more on this side of the grave. Her kinsmen and friends exerted all their influence to obtain Queen Mary's pardon ; and some authorities assert that it was definitely promised if she would abjure the Reformed faith, which she steadfastly refused to do. Life would be dearly purchased, she said, by an apostasy which would wreck her soul. It is probable, however, that she would after all have been spared if Mary's fears had not been aroused by Sir Thomas Wyatt's abortive rebellion. " The fathers have eaten sour grapes," says the wise old text, " and the children's teeth are set on edge." Mary now determined on Lady Jane Grey's death; and her confessor informed the hapless prisoner, on February 8th, that the next day would be her last. She listened with composure : and when Feckenham endeavoured to discuss with her the dogmas of Romanism, gently replied that she had no time to think of aught but her preparation for eternity. In his anxiety to attempt her conversion, he obtained from the Queen three days' respite a delay by no means welcome to Lady Jane. " You are much deceived," she said, " if you think I had any desire of longer life ; TUB STORY OF THE TOWER. 209 for 1 assure you, since the time you went from me, my life has been so tedious to me that I long for nothing so much as death, and, since it is the Queen's pleasure, I am most willing to undergo it." Feckenham soon discovered that even in three days he could not convince her of the truth of the Roman claims ; it is said, indeed, that she replied to his pleadings with a force of argument which not a little embarrassed and confused him. During her last hours she gave expression to her feelings of Christian hopefulness and constancy in Latin sentences, which she scratched on her prison walls with a pin. As, for example : " Non aliena putes homini quae obtingere possunt : Sors hodierna mihi eras erat ilia tibi." Which may be Englished thus : " Believe not, man, in care's despite, That thou from others' ills art free : The cross that now I suffer might To-morrow haply fall to thee." And agai " Deo juvante nil nocet livor malus. Et non juvante, nil juvat labor gravus, Post tenebras spero lucem." Which we may render : ' Bootless all malice if our God be nigh : Fruitless all pains, if He His help deny. Patient I pass these gloomy hours away, And wait the morning of eternal day." A book of prayers, written on vellum, was her constant companion during her brief period of preparation. Who compiled it historians have been unable to ascertain; but the received belief is that it was written for the use of the 14 210 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. Duke of Somerset, the Protector, during his imprisonment in the Tower, and that it descended from him to Lord Guilford Dudley. After the imprisonment of the Duke of Suffolk, leave was granted to him, his daughter, and her husband to borrow it from one another, and in this way it became a medium for the interchange of tender messages. Here, for example, is a little loving communication from Lady Jane to her father (modernised in spelling) : " The Lord comfort your Grace, and that in His Word, wherein all creatures only are to be comforted ; and though it hath pleased God to take away two of your children, yet think not, I most humbly beseech your Grace, that you have lost them ; but trust that we, by leaving this mortal life, have won an immortal life. And I, for my part, as I have honoured your Grace in this life, will pray for you in another life. Your Grace's humble daughter, "JANE DUDLEY." Lady Jane bequeathed this book as a souvenir to Sir John Brydges, the Lieutenant of the Tower, and inscribed on one of the leaves a farewell sentence, which I give as in the original: " Forasmuche as you have desired so simple a woman to wrighte in so worthy a booke, good Mayster Lieuftenante, therefore I shall, as a friend, desire you, and as a Christian require you, to call upon God to incline your harte to His lawes, to quicken you in His waye, and not to take the worde of truthe utterlye oute of your mouthe. " Lyve still to dye, that by death you may purchase eternall life ; and remember howe Mathusael, whoe, as we THE STORT OF THE TOWER. 211 reade in the Scriptures, was the longeste liver that was of a manne, died at laste ; for, as the Precher sayeth, ' There is a tyme to be born and a tyme to die ; and the daye of deathe is better than the daye of our birthe.' Yours, as the Lord knowethe, as a frende, JANE DUDDELEYE." The last day at length arrived. The Queen's Council had at first determined that Lady Jane and her husband should both suffer upon Tower Hill ; but reflecting that the spectacle of so youthful a pair, done to death under such hideously cruel circumstances, might dangerously influence the popular sympathies, it was ordered that Lady Jane should be executed within the Tower walls. Guilford had obtained leave to bid farewell to his wife ; but fearing that the agony of parting might unnerve them both, and shake their constancy at the moment it was most needed, she affectionately declined the proposed interview, while sending him many tender messages, reminding him how brief would be their separation, and how quickly they would rejoin each other, " where the wicked cease from troubling, and the weary are at rest." On his way to the place of execution, however, he passed beneath the window of her cell ; so that they had an opportunity of exchanging one long and lingering farewell look. On the scaffold the young noble behaved with great firmness. After spending a few minutes in silent devotion, he requested the prayers of the spectators, and, laying his head upon the block, gave the fatal signal. At one blow his head was severed from his body. The platform erected for Lady Jane stood on the green opposite the White Tower. Immediately, on her husband's death, the officers announced that the sheriffs waited to 212 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. attend her thither. And being come down, and delivered into their hands, the bystanders noted in her " a countenance so gravely settled with all modest and comely resolution, that not the least symptom either of fear or grief could be perceived either in her speech or motions ; she was like one going to be united to her heart's best and longest beloved." For one moment only was her composure disturbed ; when, through an unfortunate accident, for it was no premeditated cruelty, she met her husband's headless corpse being borne to its last resting-place. At this sad sight she showed signs of deep emotion, and a few tears glistened on her cheeks. But, recovering herself, she exclaimed, " Guilford ! Guilford ! the ante-feast is not so bitter that you have tasted, and that I shall soon taste, as to make my flesh tremble ; it is nothing compared to the feast that you and I shall this day partake of in Heaven." To the place of her death she was conducted by Sir John Brydges, the Lieutenant of the Tower, and attended by her two waiting-women, Mrs. Elizabeth Tylney and Mistress Ellen. While they sobbed bitterly she remained tearless, and the serenity of a Christian's assured hope shone upon her calm young face. She read earnestly as she went her " Manual of Devotion." On reaching the scaffold-foot she gracefully saluted the spectators, and turning to Feckenham, said : " Go now ! God grant you all your desires, and accept my own warm thanks for your attentions to me; although, indeed, those attentions have tried me more than death can now terrify me." Ascending the steps lightly, she said a few words to those who crowded round. " I pray you all, good Christian people," she concluded, " to bear me witness that I die a trvie Christian woman, and that I look to be saved by none other means but only by the mercy of THE STORY OF THE TOWEIi. 218 God, in the merits of the blood of His only Son, Jesus Christ : and I confess, when I did know the Word of God, I neglected the same, loved myself and the world, and therefore this plague or punishment is happily and worthily happened unto me for my sins ; and yet I thank God of His goodness, that He hath thus given me a time and respite to repent. And now, good people, while I am alive, I pray you to assist me with your prayers." She then knelt down to perform her devotions, and turning to Feckenham, who, notwithstanding his dismissal, still clung to her side, she asked him, " Shall I say the Miserere [Psalm li.] ? " He replied in the affirmative, and she then repeated it most earnestly. Rising from her knees, she made ready for the headsman ; and removing her gloves, gave them and her handkerchief to Mistress Tylney. The prayer book, which she had found so helpful, she handed to Thomas Brydges, the lieutenant's brother. When she began to undo her robe the exe- cutioner proffered his assistance; but she put him aside, and accepted the last offices of her waiting-women, who coiled up her hair, uncovered her neck, and gave her a white handkerchief with which, if she pleased, to bandage her eyes. *' The headsman kneeled down and asked her forgiveness, whom she forgave most willingly. Then he willed her to stand upon the straw, which doing, she saw the block. Then she said, ' I pray you dispatch me quickly.' Then she kneeled down, saying, ' Will you take it off before I lay me down? ' and the headsman answered, 'No, madam.' She tied a kercher about her eyes ; then, feeling for the block, she said, ' What shall I do ? where is it 1 ' One of the bystanders guiding her thereunto, she laid her head 214 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. down upon the block, and stretched forth her body, and said, ' Lord, into Thy hands I commend my spirit.' And so ended" And so ended ! So ended an act of savage and un- necessary brutality, which has loaded the memory of Mary with everlasting shame. The wonder is, that grave and honourable men could look on quietly and see it done. Every sword should have leaped from its scabbard to have rescued that pure and gentle creature from a fate she so little deserved.* BAGENHALL (loquitur). " All wept but she, Who changed not colour when she saw the block, But asked him, childlike, ' Will you take it off Before I lay me down ? ' ' No, madam,' he said, Gasping ; and when her innocent eyes were bound, She, with her poor blind hands feeling ' Where is it ? Where is it 1 ' You must fancy that which followed, If you have heart to do it ! " Lord Guilford was a prisoner in the Beauchamp Tower ; Lady Jane was lodged in " Master Partridge's house." Another inmate of the Beauchamp Tower at the same time, and for the same cause, was Robert Dudley, after- wards so well-known as Elizabeth's splendid favourite, the Earl of Leicester, t We pass on to Elizabeth's reign, during which the prisons of the Tower were seldom empty. I may note, however, that Elizabeth herself had, during her sister's * This pathetic scene is finely told in Lord Tennyson's drama of Queen Mary, act iii. scene 1. f Among other prisoners in Mary's reign were Archbishop Cran- mer, Bishops Ridley and Latimer, Courtenay Earl of Devonshire, Lord Cobham, and Sir John Cheke. THE STORY OF THE TOWER. 215 time of power, been confined therein ; * and that when, previous to her coronation, she re-visited it as a sovereign, she could not but reflect upon the mutability of fortune. Dismounting from her horse, she kneeled, and offered up to Almighty God, who had delivered her from a danger so imminent, a solemn and devout thanksgiving for " an escape so miraculous," as she expressed it, like that of Daniel out of the mouths of lions. The principal inmates during the Elizabethan reign were the Archbishop of York, the Bishops of Winchester, Lin- coln, Ely, Worcester, Exeter, and Bath, and the Abbot of Westminster, for denying her supremacy ; the Bishop of Ross, and Baily the Fleming, for their intrigues with Mary Queen of Scots; Dr. Storr, a papist agent; and, on various charges of treason, Thomas Miagh, Alexander Briant, Thomas Duke of Norfolk, Philip Earl of Arundel, Henry Earl of Northumberland, Robert Earl of Essex, and his friends, the Earls of Rutland and Southampton, the Lords Sandes, Cromwell, and Monteagle, Sir Charles Danvers, and Sir Christopher Blunt. A few details in reference to these cases are all I can permit myself. Charles Baily was one of the agents employed in the Ridolfi plot for seizing Elizabeth's person. He was thrown into the Tower in April 1571, and confined in a foul " rheumatic and unsavoury cave, without a bed, with * Elizabeth was sent to the Tower on Palm Sunday, March 18th, 1554. That she was in great danger of her life is certain, but the temper of the people prevented her enemies from carrying out their designs against her. As Sir Thomas Wyatt, on the scaffold, had cleared her from all suspicion of being involved in his rebellion, thence- forward it was impossible to attempt to charge her with high treason, or to detain her any longer in the Tower. On May 19th she was taken up the river to Richmond, and thence to Woodstock. 216 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. nothing but a little straw on the moist earth floor to lie upon." To extort a confession from him, he was put to the torture, and when the rack failed to open his lips, he fell into an ingenious trap laid for him by Lord Burghley, which is described in some detail by Mr. Froude. Dr. Story was another conspirator, and as, during Mary's reign, he had been very zealous against the Protestants no mercy was shown him. He suffered the punishment allotted for treason in all its full severity ; and during the last and most brutal parts of it, struggled violently with the heads- man an awful scene ! Thomas Howard, Duke of Norfolk, was steeped to the lips in treason, and fully merited his fate. He was committed to the Tower early in September 1571 ; tried by a Com- mission of Peers, with the judges, and lords of the council, on January 16th, 1572; found guilty of various crimes and misdemeanours, and sentenced to a traitor's death. It was long before Elizabeth could be induced to consent to his execution ; but eventually she yielded to the pressure put upon her by Parliament, and the Duke suffered on Tower Hill early on June 2nd. " He shook hands with all who were standing round him, gave the executioner a purse of sovereigns, knelt, said a few prayers, and recited Psalm li. It was observed that at the 18th verse he altered the words, and for ' Build Thou the walls of Jerusalem/ said, ' Build Thou the walls of England.' He then threw off his cloak, refused to allow his eyes to be blinded, laid his head upon the block, and died at a blow." Sir Henry Percy, Earl of Northumberland, shot himself in his room in the Tower, in order to save his property for his children, June 1585. Thomas Miagh, charged with treason, was ordered to be THE STORY OF THE TOWER. 217 tortured, and the persons appointed to examine him re- ported, on March 10th, 1581, that they had refrained from putting him in Skevington's irons, not only because a gaoler's presence would be required, but also because they found the man so resolute that nothing, in their opinion, would be wrung out of him but by some sharper torture. The irons referred to were invented by Sir William Skevington, Lieutenant of the Tower, in the reign of Henry VIII., and acted by compressing the body and limbs together. Miagh was subjected eventually to the double torture of the irons and the rack. The Queen's latter-day favourite, Robert Devereux, Earl of Essex, was arrested, after his mad attempt at armed in- surrection in the London streets, on the night of February 8th, 1601, and, along with his friend who was also Shakespeare's friend the Earl of Southampton, conveyed to the Tower. The two nobles were put upon their trial on the 19th, and found guilty. Southampton escaped the scaffold, but was held a close prisoner. Essex was beheaded within the walls of the Tower, on Wednesday morning, the 25th. According to Camden, his end was truly " pious and Christian." To those upon the scaffold he addressed a few words, deploring his " last sin," which had drawn others for love of him to offend God and their sovereign. But he besought them to hold a charitable opinion of him for his intention towards her Majesty, " whose death," he said, " I protest I never meant, nor violence to her person." In the reign of James I., as in that of his predecessor, the Tower prisons were generally full. They received Guido Fawkes and his conf erates, on the discovery of their nefarious scheme. Their trial took place in Westminster Hall, on 218 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. January 27th, 1606, before a special commission. All were found guilty, and executed. In 1613, the murder of Sir Thomas Overbury was added to the dark memories of the Tower. Robert Carr, the handsome favourite of James I., was married (having previously been raised to the peerage as Earl of Somerset) to the divorced wife of the Earl of Essex, a woman of strong passions and unscrupulous will on St. Stephen's Day, 1613. A strenuous opponent of their unhappy nuptials was Sir Thomas Overbury, a young man of brilliant gifts, the friend and confidant of Somerset. As he had acquired a knowledge of some dangerous secrets, the Countess was anxious to get him out of the way. Accordingly, the King pressed upon him a diplomatic appointment on the Continent, and when he refused it, committed him to the Tower. There he lingered for some months in failing health, until a dose of poison terminated his sufferings on September 13th, 1613, rather more than three months before the completion of the marriage he had ineffectually endeavoured to prevent. There can be no doubt that this poison was administered at the instigation of Lady Essex, probably through the agency of Lobell, a French apothecary who attended Overbury. For two years the murder thus foully committed remained unknown; but in the summer of 1615, when James's affection for Somerset was rapidly declining, and a new and more splendid favourite had risen in the person of George Villiers, some information respecting it was conveyed to the King by his secretary, Winwood. How Winwood obtained it is still a mystery ; but we may conjecture, perhaps, that he received it from the apothecary's boy, who, being taken ill at Flushing, may have sought to relieve his conscience THE STORY OF THE TOWER. 219 by confession. Then Helwys, the Lieutenant of the Tower, acknowledged that frequent attempts had been made to poison Overbury in his food, but that he had succeeded in defeating them until the apothecary's assistant eluded his vigilance. A woman of evil character, Mrs. Turner, an agent of Dr. Forman, the astrologer, was also implicated ; and for her share in the crime was brought to trial on November 8th, was found guilty, sentenced to death, and executed at Tyburn. Weston, another accomplice, met with the same fate. The revelations made at these trials led to the arrest of the Earl and Countess of Somerset, and their imprisonment in the Tower. Some months elapsed, however, before further proceedings were taken ; and it was not until May 24th, 1616, that the Countess was put on her trial before the High Steward's Court in Westminster Hall. Contemporary testimony differs as to her behaviour. One authority says that, whilst the indictment was being read, she turned pale and trembled ; another, that she won pity by her sober demeanour, which, he adds, "in my opinion, was more curious and confident than was fit for a lady in such distress, yet she shed, or made show of, some tears divers times." The evidence against her was too strong to be confuted, and she pleaded guilty. When the judge asked her if she had anything to say in arrest of judgment, she replied, in low almost inaudible tones, that she could not extenuate her fault. She implored mercy, and begged that the Lords would intercede with the King on her behalf. Sentence was then pronounced, and the prisoner sent back to the Tower, to await the King's decision. The Earl was tried on the following day, and was also found guilty. To complete the strangeness of this strange 220 A BOOK AL T JT LONDON. case, the King, on July I3t pardoned Lady Somerset, who was certainly the guiltiest v f all concerned ; while he left the Earl, who was the least guilty, in the Tower prison, with sentence of death suspended over him for several years. He was not released until January 1625, a few months before the King's death. Gervase Lord Clinton; the Earls of Arundel, Oxford, and Suffolk ; the Lord Chancellor Bacon ; and Sir Edward Coke, were also confined in the Tower during the reign of James I. Bacon was sent here after his degradation from the Chancellorship for taking bribes. He was confined only a few days, and in June 1621, was allowed to retire to his seat at Gorhambury. Sir Edward Coke, having offended James by his inde- pendent attitude in the House of Commons, was sent to the Tower on December 27th, 1620; and in a few days was followed thither by two other recalcitrant members of the House, Philips and Mallory. They were liberated early in the following August, on condition that they bound themselves not to travel more than a limited distance from their own houses in the country. But the chief interes of the Tower in James's reign attaches to the imprisonment and attempted escapes of Lady Arabella Stuart and Sir Walter Baleigh. Our brief narratives of these romantic episodes are based upon the latest authorities. THE STORY OF LADY ARABELLA STUART. Arabella Stuart was the only child of Charles Stuart, fifth Earl of Lennox, by Elizabeth, daughter of Sir THE STORY OF THE TOWER. 221 William Cavendish of Hardwick, in Derbyshire. Her father came of the royal blood both of England and Scotland, being a younger brother of Henry Earl of Darnley, the unfortunate husband of Mary Queen of Scots ; while through his mother, a daughter of Margaret Tudor, Queen of Scotland, he was the great-grandson of Henry VII. These genealogical details are necessary, because they explain Arabella Stuart's affinity to the throne an affinity which, by provoking the jealousy both of Elizabeth and James I., was the cause of all her woes. An accomplished and amiable woman, her hand was sought for Lord Esme Stuart, afterwards created Duke of Lennox; but Queen Elizabeth forbade the match and imprisoned Lady Arabella in the Tower. In 1608 she met with the handsome young cavalier, Mr. William Seymour, second son of Lord Beauchamp and grandson of the Earl of Hertford. He was a man of more than ordinary parts, of a graceful address, and of great personal advantages. A strong attachment sprang up between the two, and they agreed to become husband and wife at the earliest possible op- portunity ; but their " lover-passages " being discovered, Seymour was summoned before the King's Council, and severely reprimanded for his presumption in seeking to ally himself with royal blood. However, the fond couple were not to be daunted, and they concluded a secret marriage, designing to make it known when circumstances were more favourable, and hoping perhaps that the King would con- done a step which was irrevocable. Unhappily they were betrayed ; and James, in a passion of resentment, threw Seymour into the Tower for " his contempt in marrying a lady of the Royal Family without the King's leave " while he committed the Lady Arabella, then about thirty-four, to 222 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. the custody of Sir Thomas Parry at Lambeth. They, how- ever, contrived to open a correspondence. It was discovered, and to prevent any further communications, James ordered the lady's removal to Durham. When informed of the King's intention, Arabella fell seriously ill, so that she could travel only in a litter (March 13th), accompanied by a physician. The sickness increased so rapidly that she was compelled to halt at Highgate for six days, proceeding to Barnet on the 21st. The physician then hastened back to London to acquaint the King with her condition. " She was very weak," he said ; " her pulse slow and melancholy, her countenance heavy and pale. She was wholly unfit to travel." " It is enough," rejoined the King, sharply, " to make any sound man sick to be carried in a bed in that manner she is ; much more for her whose impatient and unquiet spirit heapeth upon herself far greater indisposition of body than otherwise she would have." But he had taken his resolution. ' She should go to Durham, if he were King ! " " We answered," says the doctor, " that we made no doubt of her obedience." " Obedience is that required," rejoined the King ; " which being performed, I will do more for her than she expects." On the urgent representation of her physician, however, he consented to her remaining at Barnet for a month, under the charge of Sir James Crofts, that she might be sufficiently recovered to resume her journey to Durham. Another month's delay was afterwards accorded, in answer to a letter from the Lady Arabella herself, which was written with so much natural and forcible eloquence as to elicit the applause of the King, Prince Henry, and the members of the council ; and the date finally fixed was June llth. THE STORY OF THE TOWER. 223 Of this final delay the lady and her husband took advantage to arrange a plan of escape, which, wild and romantic as it was, very nearly proved successful. A few days before the one fixed for her departure to Durham, Arabella persuaded one of her attendants to consent to a last interview between her and her husband, and for this object to assist her to disguise herself in a manner which seemed well-adapted to baffle detection. Over her petticoats she wore a pair of large French- fashioned hose or trousers. She put on a man's doublet ; a man's peruke, the long locks of which concealed her own ringlets ; a black hat, a black cloak, and russet boots with red tops. By her side she carried a rapier. Thus equipped she set out, at about three o'clock on the afternoon of June 3rd, under charge of a Mr. Markham. After walking about a mile and a half, they stopped at a poor inn, where a confederate was in attendance with horses. Arabella was so sick and faint with anxiety and fatigue as to draw from the ostler who assisted her to mount the sympathetic remark, that the young gentleman would hardly hold out to London. But as the hope of escape grew upon her, she rallied her energies, riding with such speed that she reached Blackwall at six o'clock. Here a boat was in waiting, and two of her gentlewomen attended her with a change of apparel suitable to her sex. The watermen were directed, in the first place, to take them to Woolwich. They were then ordered to drop down the river to Tilbury, where they landed to obtain refreshment. The promise of a heavy fee induced them to row on to Leigh ; and at early noon they came in sight of the French ship which had been hired to carry the fugitives to the Continent. 224 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. Meanwhile, Seymour had slipped out of the Tower, resorting to one of those simple stratagems by which prisoners have so frequently succeeded in eluding their gaolers. He left his servant watching at his door, with instructions that no visitor should be allowed to disturb his master, who was suffering from violent toothache. Dis- guised with a black wig and a pair of black whiskers, he then followed a cart which had brought a supply of fuel to his apartments, and walked, without let or hindrance, out of the western entrance of the Tower. At the Tower wharf a boat was ready to take him down the river to Leigh ; but when he arrived there his wife was gone, and as the pursuit was sure to be hotly pressed, he got on board the first ship (a collier) he chanced to fall in with, and was landed safely at Ostend. Not so fortunate the unhappy Lady Arabella. On her husband failing to make his appearance at the hour appointed, her attendants, apprehensive of being overtaken by a king's ship, would not allow her vessel to lie at anchor, but persuaded the captain to set sail. When within a few miles of Calais she insisted, however, that they should linger on their course, in the hope she might hear some tidings of him for whose sake she had undertaken so desperate an enterprise. Here, when within sight of the port of safety, she was surprised by a ship which had been sent out from Dover in search of her. She submitted to her fate with perfect composure ; her sole anxiety being for the escape of her husband. For four years more she lingered a prisoner in the Tower, her sufferings gradually undermining her health and impairing her reason. She died on September 25th, 1615, in the forty-first year of her age, and was interred in THE STORY OF THE TO WEE. 225 Westminster Abbey, "in the same vault," says Camden, " wherein Mary Queen of Scots and Prince Henry were buried." THE STORY OP SIB WALTER RALEIGH. " The year 1592," says Mr. Edmund Gosse, " opened with promise of greater activity and higher public honours for Raleigh than he had yet displayed and enjoyed," though as courtier, adventurer, and seaman he had already made his mark, and stood among the foremost in the brilliant circle which Elizabeth's state-craft had drawn around her. An expedition, this year, was to be sent to intercept the Spanish treasure -ships, known as the Indian Carracks, and thence to push on and attack the rich city of Panama. " For the first time, Elizabeth had shown herself willing to trust her favourite in person on the perilous western seas. Raleigh was to command the fleet of fifteen ships, and under him was to serve Sir Martin Frobisher. When the moment for parting came, however, the Queen found it impossible to spare him, and Sir John Burrough was appointed admiral." Raleigh had probably hoped that his absence from England would relieve him from the conse- quences of his love-passages with the beautiful maid of honour, Elizabeth Throckmorton ; but he was forced to stay and bear the full brunt of the storm which arose when the Queen discovered them. Both Raleigh and the young beauty were thrown into the Tower. Raleigh's impatient spirit chafed at the loss of liberty ; and he attempted to propitiate his royal mistress by cries of wretchedness at her anger and protestations of intense devotion. One day, when the Queen's barge, on its way to Gravesend, passed 15 226 A SOOK ABOUT LONDON. beneath his window, he burst into a well-simulated fit of passion, swearing that his enemies had brought the Queen thither " to break his gall in sunder with Tantalus' torment." On another occasion, he declared that he must put on the disguise of a boatman, and catch a glimpse of his Queen, or his heart would rend in twain. He drew his dagger on his keeper, Sir George Carew, and broke the knuckles of Sir Arthur Gorges, because they held him back, he said, from the sight of his mistress. He expressed a wish to Lord Howard of Effingham that he might be thrown to " feed the lions," as the Queen would not relent from her obduracy. Entering into the comedy, or rather farce, Sir Arthur Gorges professed to think that his prisoner was going mad " He will shortly grow to be Orlando Furioso, if the bright Angelica persevere against him a little longer." These representations may have had some influence with Elizabeth ; at all events, at the end of two months she consented to his release. This was Raleigh's first experience of the Tower as a prison. His second was much more serious. On the accession of James I., through the agency of his powerful rival, Cecil, afterwards Earl of Salisbury, he was deprived of his post of Captain of the Guard, and also of his town mansion, Durham House. A few weeks later (July 18th, 1613), on a charge of conspiring with Lord Cobham and others to depose James, and place the Lady Arabella Stuart on the throne, he was suddenly arrested, and committed to the Tower. The chief witness against him was his intimate and only friend, Lord Cobham, who had been made to believe that Raleigh had gratuitously betrayed him. In the ungovernable agony of his soul, Raleigh made an attempt at suicide, wounding himself THE STORY OF THE TOWER. 227 "under the right pap, but no way mortally." It is not difficult to understand the mental torture which wrought him up to this act of madness. His intense activity of mind and body shrank from the burden of a long imprisonment, to be terminated, perhaps, by a shameful death. Devotedly attached to his wife and son, he was plunged into despair at the thought of the ruin that must overtake them. The workings of his mind are revealed in the impassioned letter which he addressed to Lady Raleigh before stabbing himself : " Receive from thy unfortunate husband these his last lines : these the last words that ever thou shalt receive from him. That I can live never to see thee and my child more I cannot ! I have desired God and disputed with my reason, but nature and compassion hath the victory. That I can live to think how you are both left a spoil to my enemies, and that my name shall be a dishonour to my child I cannot ! I cannot endure the misery thereof. Unfortunate woman, unfortunate child, comfort yourselves, trust God, and be contented with your poor estate. I would have bettered it, if I had enjoyed a few years. . . . Woe, woe, woe be unto him by whose falsehoods we are lost ! He hath separated us asunder ; he hath slain my honour, my fortune ; he hath robbed thee of thy husband, thy child of his father, and me of you both. . . . " The Lord knows my sorrow to part from thee and my poor child ; but part I must, by enemies and injuries, part with shame and triumph of my detractors; and therefore be contented with this work of God, and forget me in all things but thine own honour, and the love of mine. I bless my poor child, and let him know his father was no traitor. Be bold of my innocence, for God, to Whom I offer life and 228 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. soul, knows it. And whosoever thou choose again after me, let him be but thy politic husband ; but let my son be thy beloved, for he is part of me, and I live in him, and the difference is but in the member, and not in the kind. And the Lord for ever keep thee and him, and give thee comfort in both worlds ! " With all his faults Raleigh was a strong man and a brave man; and this suicidal attempt is the only act of cowardice with which his memory can be charged. But he quickly recovered himself, both physically and mentally, and thenceforward his fortitude never failed him. After having been subjected to rigorous examination, he was removed to Winchester in order to take his trial for high treason, before commissioners specially appointed, amongst whom Sir Robert Cecil and Chief Justice Popham, both of whom were his enemies, were the most conspicuous. The prosecution was conducted with unseemly violence by Sir Edward Coke, the Attorney General ; and the jury was composed of men who were known to bear the prisoner no good will. A verdict of guilty was a foregone conclusion, and senteece of death was pronounced by the Chief Justice. In the middle of December Raleigh was reprieved, and again committed to the Tower, where he lay a prisoner for nearly thirteen years. His lodging was in the upper story of the Garden (now called the Bloody) Tower; immediately above the principal gate to the Inner Ward, with a window looking westward, and a separate entrance. The roomg were of good size, and adequately furnished. He was allowed three servants to attend upon him, and for a considerable period enjoyed the company of his wife and son. But the hot summer of 1604 brought back the malarial fever of the Tower, and Raleigh began to suffer THE STORY OF THE TOWER. 229 in health. He wrote to Cecil complaining that he was withering both in body and mind. The plague was his immediate neighbour, his son having lain a fortnight with nothing but a paper partition between him and a woman whose child was dying of the terrible disease. At length, unable to endure any longer the dread of infection, Lady Raleigh left, with her son ; and Raleigh, " daily in danger of death by the palsy, and nightly of suffocation by wasted and obstructed lungs," entreated that he might be transferred to healthier quarters. His request, however, met with no favourable response. But though his health suffered from his confinement, as would necessarily be the case with a man of his active habits, he was by no means harshly treated. Sir George Harvey, the Lieutenant of the Tower, showed him a good deal of indulgence. He frequently invited him to his table ; and finding that he was much interested in some chemical experiments, allowed him to set up a little laboratory in his private garden. As the paling was low, visitoi's frequenting the terrace could readily discern the illustrious amateur chemist.' On one occasion Lady Effingham and the Countess of Beaumont engaged in pleasant conversation with Him while he was poring over alembic and crucible ; and Lady Effingham jestingly petitioned for a supply of the magical balsam he had brought back with him from Guiana. He promised to prepare some, and to send it by their common friend, Captain Whitlock. When, in August, Harvey was succeeded by Sir William Ward, matters went less smoothly. The new governor thought the paling an insufficient barrier between the prisoner and the outside world, and would fain have erected a brick wall ; but could not obtain permission until the 230 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. Government was frightened by the Gunpowder Plot. Even then the wall was so low that Raleigh could easily stand on the parapet, and survey the passers-by. In the spring of 1606 he was so disabled by a rheumatic attack that the physicians advised and obtained his transference from his old apartments to " a little room he had built in the garden, adjoining his still-house." During the year various attempts were made to obtain the illustrious prisoner's pardon. The Queen had become his friend ; and when her father, the King of Denmark, visited James's Court, he pleaded warmly for the hero's release, probably at her request. In September, Lady Raleigh contrived to obtain admission, with her children, to the royal presence ; but these efforts were made in vain. In the year following Raleigh himself made an appeal to Salisbury for permission to make one more voyage across the seas to that Golden Land which was never absent from his dreams. The sole reply was increased stringency in the conditions of his imprisonment. He and his servants were required to withdraw to their apartments at eight p.m., and Lady Raleigh to go back to her own house ; guests were no longer allowed in the evening. It was in these altered circumstances that Raleigh, whose natural temperament was rather that of the man of action than of the scholar, began to occupy his enforced leisure and expend his restless energies in the composition of no less ambitious a work than a " History of the World." In the summer of 1611 some mysterious correspondence took place between Raleigh and Salisbury there are no enemies so bitter as they who have once been friends which so provoked the latter that he deprived the prisoner of some of his indulgences, taking away from him his THE STORY OF THE TOWER. 231 private garden and gallery, and curtailing his wife's visits. In his latter days Salisbury pressed heavily upon Raleigh ; but the prisoner had his revenge when Salisbury died (May 24th, 1612), laying on his grave the following savage epitaph: " Here lies Hobbinoll, our pastor whilere, That once in a quarter our fleeces did shear ! To please us, his cur he kept under clog, And was ever after both shepherd and dog : For oblation to Pan his custom was thus, He first gave a trifle, then offered up us ; And through his false worship such power he did gain, As kept him on the mountain and us on the plain." When this epigrammatic verse was shown to the King, he shrewdly remarked that he hoped the man who wrote it would die before he did ! The fear of having his epitaph written by Raleigh added " a new terror to death." After Salisbury's decease, Raleigh began to entertain hopes of pardon. He was honoured with the friendship and confidence of James's eldest son, Prince Henry, who sought his advice constantly on questions connected with navigation and ship-building. It was well known that the Prince disapproved of his imprisonment, and he had been heard to say that no man but his father would keep such a bird in a cage. He obtained a promise from his father that Raleigh should be released at Christmas; but was prevented from claiming fulfilment of the promise by an attack of typhoid fever, which proved fatal on November 6th. On the evening of his death the Queen sent to Raleigh, in whose medical skill she had great faith, for some of his famous cordial. It relieved the sufferer's pains, but could not save bis life. Raleigh had sent a message with it to the effect that if it was not poison the Prince had sickened 232 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. of his potion must needs cnre him. These hasty words lent support to the suspicion which the Prince's unexpected death had suggested, that he had been killed by poison ; but there is no reason to suppose that the suspicion was well founded. It is stated by Izaak Walton that during Raleigh's imprisonment Ben Jonson was introduced to him by the antiquary Camden, and that the dramatist assisted him in collecting and arranging materials for his " History of the World." He was entrusted with the charge of young Raleigh when, having slain a man in a duel, he was constrained to go abroad. The first volume of Raleigh's magnum, opus, containing 1,354 closely-printed folio pages, was published in 1614. It carries the history of the world down only to the Roman conquest of Macedonia, and remains a splendid fragment. No work of equal genius and labour was ever so entirely forgotten. But it could not be otherwise. Raleigh treats at inordinate length of remote periods of antiquity, of which we possess no accurate or detailed information. Other periods included in his survey have since been examined by scientific methods, and with a comprehensive research which to him were impossible. Again, he indulges in theological and meta- physical inquiries wherein the present generation have neither interest nor concern. There are not a few passages of noble eloquence, it is true; but to arrive at them the reader is compelled to traverse many an extensive wilder- ness of arid prose. Raleigh's prison-hours in the Tower also gave birth to his treatises on the " Prorogation of Parliament " and " The Cabinet Council," to " A Discourse on War," and " Observa- tions on Trade and Commerce." THE STORY OF THE TOWER. 233 At length, after undergoing an apoplectic attack, Raleigh obtained his release, through the intervention of Winwood and Villiers, and the Queen's influence, on condition that he conducted an expedition to Guiana in search of a gold mine which was supposed to be located on the banks of the Orinoco (January 30th, 1606). He sailed with seven armed vessels on June 12th, 1607 ; but his plans had been betrayed to the Spanish Government, who were consequently enabled to take the necessary means for bringing about their failure. The voyage was one long series of disasters ; and after his men had been defeated in an attack on the Spanish settlement of San Thome, and it was discovered that the gold mine was an illusion, Raleigh returned home, a ruined and hopeless old man. He was immediately arrested on the old charge of treason, brought up to London, and once more committed to the Tower, after a futile attempt to escape to France. At the instance of the Spanish Government, James resolved to sacrifice his famous subject, by carrying out the old sentence of death, which, though it had lain so many years in abeyance, had never been formally cancelled. On October 20th he was removed from the Tower to the Gate-house at Westminster, which had long been used as a prison; and on the following day was beheaded on a scaffold erected in the prison-yard, meeting his cruel fate with a cheerful courage and a playful humour which remind us of Sir Thomas More. The Tower received some illustrious prisoners in the reign of Charles I., including Wentworth Earl of Strafford, Laud Archbishop of Canterbury; the Earl of Pembroke; Lord Mowbray, the Archbishop of York; Lord Montague 234 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. of Boughton; nine bishops, and others, both peers and commoners. On November llth, 1640, Pym accused Strafford of high treason, and the House of Commons adopted the impeach- ment. Followed by the members appointed to support it, Pym then repaired to the House of Lords. At the time Strafford was closeted with the King. As soon as he was informed of the proceedings in the Commons, he hastened to the Upper Chamber, but Pym had been before him, and the door was shut. He knocked rudely, and angrily pushing aside the usher, who showed some reluctance in opening it, was advancing towards his seat, when a storm of voices called upon him to retire. Strafford paused, looked round him, and after a moment's hesitation obeyed. An hour afterwards he was kneeling at the bar, to learn that the Peers had admitted the Commons' impeachment, and on their demand had ordered his committal to the Tower. He would fain have spoken in his defence, but the Peers refused to hear him ; and he who had risen that morning the most powerful man in England left the House a prisoner. His trial began on March 22nd, 1641. The articles against him were maintained by the Commons in a body, and with them, as accusers also, sat the Scotch and Irish Commissioners. Twenty-four peers constituted the Court. The daily course of events was watched anxiously by the King and Queen, who sat concealed behind a trellised par- tition. Every vacant space was seized upon by spectators, mostly of the upper classes; either moved by sympathy with the prisoner or his adversaries, attracted by a spectacle so imposing, or influenced by the gravity of the issues which were at stake. Strafford bore himself with a proud dignity and composure which awed into silence the un- THE STORY OF THE TOWER. 235 friendly crowd collected at the entrance to the Hall, and commanded the respect of his bitterest enemies. With his tall and handsome form prematurely bent by disease, but with his glance as brilliant and arrogant as ever, he moved to his place, the bystanders lifting their hats as he passed, and he in his turn saluting them with a grave courtesy. Throughout the seventeen days which the trial lasted, he defended himself unaided, with an intellectual vigour that never failed, against his thirty accusers, each of whom in his turn conducted the attack. He played his part so well that the Commons began to fear lest the impeachment should prove futile, and, changing their ground, resolved to proceed against their victim with a Bill of Attainder. Notwithstanding the opposition of the Moderates, it passed rapidly through its various stages, and was read a third time in the Lower House on April 21st, and in the Upper on the 29th. On May 12th, Strafford, with tranquil courage, prepared to take his leave of the world. He must have been conscious, I think, at that dread moment, what a pitiable failure he had made of his life and opportunities ; but no symptom of that consciousness was apparent in his demeanour. The Constable of the Tower wished to convey him to Tower Hill in a carriage that he might escape the violence of the rabble. " No, Master Lieutenant," was the firm reply ; " I dare look death in the face, and I hope the people too. Have you a care that I do not escape, and I care not how I die, whether by the hand of the executioner or the mad- ness and fury of the people. If that may give them contentment, it is all one to me." And he set forth on foot, preceding the guards, and casting proud glances on every side, like a general at the head of his army. 236 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. When he came outside the apartment in which Arch- bishop Laud was confined, he paused, and looking towards the window at which the aged primate stood, he said, " My Lord, your blessing and prayers." Laud raised his hands to heaven to implore God's mercy on his friend and fellow-servant, but, overcome by his emotion, fell to the ground in a swoon. "Farewell, my lord," said Strafford, as he moved on, " may God protect your innocence ? " On the scaffold he knelt in prayer for a few minutes; addressed the people briefly; resumed his devotions for a quarter of an hour ; shook hands with his friends, and said a few parting words ; then placed his head on the block. One stroke of the headsman's axe and all was over. Laud, like Strafford, was impeached for high treason; and on March 1st, 1641, was committed to the Tower, where he lay, with the shadow of death upon him, for several months. The persecution of his enemies was not revived till May 1st, 1643, when a motion was made in the House of Commons that, without trial or hearing, he should be transported to the colony of New England. The motion was rejected; but many indignities were now heaped upon him. His papers were searched and seized; his goods sold for a third part of their value ; his estates confiscated; and he was reduced to such poverty that he could scarcely supply himself in his prison with the neces- saries of life. At length the Commons resolved to offer him up as a sacrifice to the Scots ; new articles of impeach- ment were formed against him; and he was brought to trial. The proceedings extended over five months, and Laud was heard in his defence twenty days. As in Strafford's case, the Commons then resorted to a Bill of THE STORY OF THE TOWEP. 237 Attainder, and eventually January 10th was fixed for his execution, which took place on Tower Hill, the aged prelate behaving with the steadfast courage of a martyr. After Cromwell's great victory at Worcester in September 1651, the Earls of Cleveland and Lauderdale, who had been taken prisoners, were sent to the Tower. A contemporary chronicler records that as they passed along Cornhill in their coaches, with a guard of horse, Lauderdale's coach " made a stand near the Conduit," and a carman, who re- cognised the Scotch nobleman, exclaimed, " Oh, my lord, you are welcome to London ! I protest, off goes your head, as round as a hoop ! " His lordship dismissed the prediction with a loud laugh, and continued his journey to the Tower. The carman proved a false prophet. Lauderdale lived to become a very humble servant of Charles II., and a member of the notorious Ministry which was branded with the sobriquet of the " Cabal." When Charles II. "came to his own again," several of the regicides were thrown into the Tower, to pass with but a brief delay to Tower Hill. On October 16th, 1660, Evelyn writes : " Scott, Scroop, Cook, and Jones, suffered for several of their iniquities at Charing Cross, in sight of the place where they put to death their natural Prince, and in the presence of the King, his son, whom they also sought to kill. I saw not their execution, but met their quarters, mangled, and cut, and reeking, as they were brought from the gallows in baskets on the hurdle." General Harrison, Colonels Axtell and Hacker, and Hugh Peters, the Puritan divine, were also executed. During the mania of the Popish Plot, the Tower was full of prisoners of whom one of the most eminent was Lord 238 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. Stafford. On the perjured evidence of Titus Gates and his confederates, he was charged with high treason, and brought to trial before his Peers in Westminster Hall on the 30th of November, his 69th birthday. He was found guilty, and beheaded on Tower Hill on December 29th, 1680. The unscrupulous Shaftesbury was sent to the Tower in July 1681. In the following November he was indicted of high treason before a London grand jury, who had the courage, however, to dismiss the indictment. The Whig conspiracy, popularly known as the Rye House Plot, brought also its tale of sufferers. The Earl of Essex died in the Tower by, it was said, his own hand, though there are some who for " suicide " read " assassination." Evelyn notes that " there were odd reflections upon it." His head was so severed from his body " that an executioner could hardly have done more with an axe." Lord William Russell, a man of pure character and noble sympathies, and Algernon Sidney, who had a good deal of the old Roman about him, were also arrested. Russell, from the first, knew that he was doomed. As he passed under the gloomy gateway of his prison, he told his servant Taunton that he was sworn against, and that his enemies would have his life. Taunton expressed a hope that they wouM have no such power. " Yes," said Russell, " the devil is loose." He was tried on July 13th his heroic wife, as everybody knows, acting as his amanuensis, and taking notes of the statements of the witnesses against him. On the 21st he was beheaded on a scaffold erected in Lincoln's Inn Fields. Algernon Sidney was tried on November 21st, and sentence on the 26th. He suffered on Tower Hill. " When he came on the scaffold, instead of a speech, he told them only that he had made his peace with God ; THE STORY OF THE TOWER. 239 that lie came not thither to talk, but to die ; put a paper into the sheriffs hand, and another into a friend's ; said one prayer as short as a grace ; laid down his neck, and bid the executioner do his office." (December 7th.) In this reign occurred Colonel Blood's daring attempt to carry off the Eegalia. In the reign of James II., the first victim was the King's nephew, the unfortunate Duke of Monmouth, who was committed to the Tower after his defeat at Sedgmoor, and attempted escape to the coast (July 13th). On the 15th, after only two days' respite, he was butchered on Tower Hill. " The first blow inflicted only a slight wound. The Duke struggled, rose from the block, and looked reproach- fully at the executioner. The head sank down once more. The stroke was repeated again and again, but still the neck was not severed, and the body continued to move. Yells of rage and horror rose from the crowd. Ketch flung down the axe with a curse. ' I cannot do it,' he said ; ' my heart fails me.' ' Take up the axe, man," cried the sheriff. ' Fling him over the rails,' roared the mob. At length the axe was taken up. Two more blows extinguished the last remains of life ; but a knife was used to separate the head from the shoulders. The crowd was wrought up to such an ecstasy of rage that the executioner was in danger of being torn in pieces, and was conveyed away under a strong guard." The Duke's children were for some time imprisoned in the Tower. The imprisonment of the Seven Bishops took place in 1688. Archbishop Sancroft, and Bishops Lloyd, Turner, Lake, Ker, White, and Trelawney were arrested for refusing to sanction the reading in the churches within their dioceses 240 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. of the King's Declaration of Indulgence. On the evening of June 8th they were conducted, under a strong guard, to Palace Yard Stairs, where the state-barge was await- ing to convey them to the Tower. The streets were everywhere lined with weeping men and women, who prayed aloud for their safety, and knelt to ask their bless- ing. Hundreds of wherries escorted them down the river, the banks of which were crowded with sympathising multi- tudes, while the air echoed with repeated shouts of "God bless your Lordships ! " The soldiers on duty in the Tower refused to drink any other health than that of the bishops. Every day, the people resorted to them in such numbers " for their blessing and to condole their hard usage, that great and very extraordinary remarks were made both of persons and behaviour." Not the least conspicuous visitors were ten of the most eminent of the Nonconformist clergy, For a week they remained in confinement; but on the 18th being brought before the Court of King's Bench, they were enlarged in their own recognisances. Their trial took place on the 27th, when a verdict of "Not Guilty" was returned. That night all London was ablaze with bonfires and illu- minations. THE STORY OF COLONEL BLOOD. The Regalia those interesting memorials of the old days when the Tower presented a threefold aspect, and was not only a fortress and a prison, but a palace have been preserved for the last two centuries in their present sanctuary. They are first mentioned in the reign of Henry III., when, on his return from France, he com- manded the Bishop of Carlisle to replace them in the Tower. In critical periods of pecuniary distress they THE STORY OF THE TOWER. 241 were frequently pledged as security for advances by Henry III. to certain merchants of Paris ; by Edward III. to the merchants of Flanders ; and Richard II. to those of London. It is satisfactory to find that our moiiarchs were honest enough to redeem them ! Henry VIII. was less scrupulous; for during the great Lincolnshire rebellion of 1536 he sent his Minister, Cromwell, to the jewel-house to remove from it as much plate as he thought might safely be spared, and coin it into money. At present the Regalia consists of five crowns namely, St. Edward's (so called because made at Charles II. 's coronation to replace the previous crown which, it was supposed, the Confessor had actually worn) ; the crown of state, with its inestimable jewels ; the Queen's circlet of gold ; the Queen's crown ; and her coronation crown. Also, the orb, an emblem of world-wide power, borrowed from the Roman emperors, which the sovereign holds during the act of coronation ; the ampulla, or golden eagle, con- taining the anointing oil ; the curtana, or sword of Mary ; St. Edward's staff, a sceptre of gold, four feet seven inches and a half in length, with a mound and cross at top ; four other sceptres of gold and precious stones ; the Queen's ivory rod, a short sceptre of ivory and gold made for James II.'s queen, Mary of Modena ; and some minor articles, valuable in themselves, and interesting in their associations. Looked at merely as gold and jewellery the Regalia may suggest to an economist the most depreciatory conclusions ; but surely they acquire a weight and dignity of their own when we connect them with the hands which have held them or the heads which have worn them Plantagenets, Tudors, Stuarts, Guelphs ; when we re- member how in this way they are linked to the history 16 242 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. of our country ; how they represent the various periods of our national development. Descending to a lower level of thought, we are reminded, by the gleam and glitter of these treasures, of the story of the Irish desperado, Colonel Blood, and of his attempt to carry them off. Thomas Blood was a native of Ireland, born in or about 1628. Of his early history little is known, except that he came to England, and so far prospered, that in his twentieth year, he contrived to find a wife in the daughter of a respectable Lancashire gentleman. A married man, he returned to Ireland, where he obtained a lieutenant's com- mission in the army of the Parliament ; was rewarded for his services with a grant of land, and placed on the commission of the peace. So far his career had been unmarked by any crime. But at the Restoration the grants made by the Commonwealth authorities were re- called ; and Blood, reduced to poverty, began to display the darker side of his character, the fierce recklessness of his temper. An insurrection having been planned, in which Dublin Castle was to be surprised and the person of the Lord Lieutenant (the Duke of Ormond) seized, Blood threw himself eagerly into the affair, and by sheer force of will and strength of purpose became the leader of the daring spirits who had planned it. But on the very eve of its execution all the details were revealed to the authorities. The leading conspirators were arrested and executed ; except Blood, who contrived to effect his escape, and after wandering for some time among the Irish moun- tains, crossed to Holland, where he found a friend in Admiral Ruyter. In 1666 we find him in Scotland fighting on the side of THE STORY OF THE TOWER. 243 the Covenanters ; but when their gallant revolt against tyranny was crushed in blood he again made his escape, and sought an asylum in Holland. Leading the life of an adventurer reckless of danger without scruple of conscience ever on the watch for an opportunity of making friends with fortune, Blood wandered to and fro on the earth, and, like Ulysses, saw many cities and many men. But through all the chances and dangers of his career he kept his mind steadily fixed upon one object the punishment of the Duke of Ormond, whom he charged with the loss of his estate and the death of his friends. He openly expressed his intention of seizing the Duke and hanging him at Tyburn. Finding his way back to London, he took measures for the gratification of his lust of revenge. On the evening of December 6th, 1670, the Duke was returning from an entertainment in the city, and crossing the end of St. James's Street to his residence at Cleveland House, when the door of his coach was suddenly opened, he was violently dragged out by Blood and his associates, and mounted on horseback behind one of them. The Duke, as usual, was attended by his footmen, three of whom ran on one side of his coach and three on the other ; but he had driven very rapidly, and at the moment of the attack they happened to be some distance in the rear. With Blood leading the way, the kidnappers galloped up St. James's Street and along Piccadilly, towards the gallows at Tyburn. They had got beyond Devonshire House when the Duke, who, though sixty years of age, was strong and robust, contrived to slip his foot under that of his companion, lift him out of his stirrup, and unhorse him. The man, however, dragged the Duke down 244 A SO OK AS OUT LONDON. in his fall, and both were struggling desperately in the mud when the Duke's servants, who had been alarmed by the cries of the coachman, arrived on the scene. The ruffian then took to his horse, after firing two pistols at the Duke and missing him, and rode off with his accomplices. Whatever suspicion may have attached to Blood, he had planned this outrage with such craft and secrecy that it could not be brought home to him ; and though a reward of one thousand pounds was offered for the discovery of the perpetrators, it failed to elicit the desired information. Perhaps it was the immunity he enjoyed which emboldened him to suggest to his partners a crime which was not less audacious, and, if successful, would be infinitely more pro- fitable. His proposal was to carry off the Regalia from the Tower, which would enrich each man with an almost boundless " potentiality of wealth." The keeper of the Regalia at this time was one Talbot Edwards, an old confidential servant of Sir Gilbert Talbot, the master and treasurer of the Jewel House. One day in April, Blood, dressed as a parson in a long cloak-cassock with a canonical girdle paid a visit to the Tower, ac- companied by a woman, whom he represented as his wife. They expressed a wish to see the Regalia ; and after their desire had been gratified, the lady complained of " a qualm upon her stomach," for which the keeper's wife administered a dram the remedy usual in such cases inviting her at the same time into her house to lie down and rest her- self. "Mrs. Blood" quickly recovered, and at her departure both she and " the parson " were profuse in their grateful acknowledgments of Mrs. Edwards's civility. A few days afterwards the Colonel brought a present of THE STORY OF THE TOWER. 245 four pairs of white gloves to Mrs. Edwards, with his wife's compliments ; and, having thus begun the acquaintance, took care to improve it by repeated visits. At last he told his new friends that his wife had thought of a means of suitably acknowledging their great kindness. " You have," he said, " a pretty gentlewoman to your daughter, and I have a young nephew, with two or three hundred a-year in land, who is at my disposal. If your daughter be free, and you approve it, I will bring him here to see her, and we will endeavour to make it a match." To this proposal Mr. and Mrs. Edwards assented, and were so pleased that they invited the parson to dine with them that day. At the dinner he took upon himself to say " grace," and said it in the most prolix and unctuous terms, concluding with a prayer for the king, queen, and royal family. Afterwards he went up to see the rooms, and at his departure, which was accompanied by a pastoral benediction in orthodox form, he appointed a day on which his young nephew would attend to pay his respects to the young lady of the house ; and as he wished to bring a couple of friends with him to see the Regalia, who were to leave town early on the same morning, the hour was fixed at seven. The octogenarian keeper rose early to receive his visitors, and his daughter put on her best attire. And behold, in the grey of the morning came Blood, with three confederates, each carrying a rapier blade in his cane, a dagger, and a brace of pocket pistols. Two of them followed him into the house, the third stayed at the door to keep watch. Blood told Mr. Edwards that they would not go upstairs until his wife was ready ; but that, meanwhile, his friends would have a look at the Regalia. No sooner had they 246 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. passed into the treasure-room than the door was shut a cloak suddenly thrown over the old man's head a gag thrust into his mouth and a hook fastened to his nose. Having thus secured him, Blood told him they were resolved to seize the crown, orb, and sceptre ; that if he submitted quietly they would spare his life ; otherwise, he might expect no mercy. Indifferent to the threat, and enraged no doubt at the consummate duplicity of which he had been the victim, the brave old man made every effort to to give the alarm, until stunned by blows from a wooden mallet, and stabbed in the belly by one of the ruffian's swords. For awhile he lay unconscious. As he slowly recovered he heard the robbers speaking of him as dead, and judged it prudent to make no movement, while they were preparing to carry off the plunder. For this purpose Blood concealed the crown under his cloak ; Parrot, an old Roundhead soldier, put the orb into his breeches pocket ; and the third, a man named Hunt, Blood's son-in-law, was about to file the sceptre in two in order to place it in a bag, when, by a remarkable coin- cidence, the keeper's son, who had been on service in Flanders, returned home on a visit to his father. The sound of his feet upon the stairs put the robbers to flight, taking with them the crown and orb, but leaving the sceptre benind them. The aged keeper then got upon his knees, and, forcing the gag from his mouth, cried, " Treason ! Murder ! " In a few moments the whole affair became known, and young Edwards, with his brother-in-law Captain Beckman, immediately pursued the robbers, who had crossed the drawbridge almost without let or hindrance, and with rapid feet sped along the wharf, shouting, " Stop the rogues ! " so as to divert attention from themselves. At THE STORY OF THE TOWER. 247 St. Katherine's Gate their horses were waiting for them ; but before they could reach it Captain Beckman overtook them, and grappled with Blood, who fired a pistol at him, but missed. The crown was found under his cloak ; but though made prisoner, Blood would not give it up without a struggle, exclaiming, " It was a gallant attempt, however unsuccessful for it was for a crown ! " Parrot was also taken, and afterwards Hunt. On receiving information of this extraordinary attempt which, for sheer audacity, stands almost unequalled in the annals of crime Sir Gilbert Talbot had an interview with the King, who ordered him to return to the Tower, put Blood under an examination, and report to him the result. But in the meantime Charles was persuaded by some of those about him to conduct the examination himself an exceptional circumstance, to which Blood's escape from the punishment he merited is generally attributed. In my humble opinion it suggests the probability that more persons than Blood and his confederates, and persons of higher rank, were concerned in this raid on the Regalia. The Colonel, as he is always called though I am not aware that he ever received a colonel's commission was a man of remarkable appearance. " He was tall, strongly built, and past the middle period of life, and his countenance might have been pronounced a handsome one," had it not been marked by an expression of great ferocity.* To the King's questions he replied, " he would never betray an associate, or defend himself at the expense of uttering a falsehood." He confessed what was probably an impudent fiction that he had hidden himself among the reeds on one * Evelyn describes him as having " not only a daring but a villainous unmerciful look, and a false countenance," but as being " very well spoken, and dangerously insinuating." 248 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. occasion to kill the King while bathing ; but affirmed that he was disconcerted by the awe he felt at the sight of naked Majesty ! He added that he was at the head of a numerous body of disbanded soldiers who were sworn, from religious motives, to take Charles's life, as he was the sole obstacle to their obtaining freedom of worship and liberty of conscience. His execution, he said, would determine these men to fulfil their vow at all hazards ; whereas, by sparing his life, the King might disarm a hundred poniards directed against his own. This view of the case, says Scott, made a strong impression on Charles, whose selfishness was acute; but, on the other hand, he was no coward, and, besides, there was no proof that the Colonel's allegation was well founded. Blood went on to acknowledge that he was the leader of the assault upon the Duke of Ormond, and that he had designed to hang him at Tyburn. This confession made it awkward for Charles to pardon the ruffian without the Duke's consent ; and he condescended to ask for it. Ormond replied that if he chose to pardon the attempt to steal his crown, he himself might easily agree that the attempt upon his life, as a crime of inferior importance, should also be forgiven. Blood accordingly was pardoned a mysterious act of lenity, rendered more mysterious by the fact that the King actually gave him a pension of .500 a year ; while Edwards, the faithful keeper of the Regalia, received only a .grant of .200 from the Exchequer, and ,100 for his son. And so little pains were taken about the payment of these donations that the parties entitled to them eventually sold them for half the sum. Among the many shameful trans- actions which blacken the record of Charles's reign this has always seemed to me pre-eminent. THE STORY OF THE TOWER. 249 After his extraordinary escape from justice, Blood as- sumed the airs of a Court favourite. It is known that he prosecuted the suits of many of the old Republican party, and obtained concessions, when the Cavaliers, who had ventured life and property in the cause of the Stuarts, were deliberately ignored. He got into good society, for Evelyn in his Diary takes note that he dined at Mr. Treasurer's, in company with Monsieur de Grammont and several French noblemen, and " one Blood, that impudent, bold fellow who had not long before attempted to steal the imperial crown itself out of the Tower." During the sway of the notorious Cabal ministry, he was high in favour with the Duke of Buckingham ; but as their authority declined, so did his favour, and he soon appeared in oppo- sition to the Court. When Titus Gates invented his Popish plot, Blood, in the intrigues which it set afoot, found a convenient field for the exercise of his powers. But to trace his sinuous career would be wearisome, and I pass on with satisfaction to its close. With one Edward Christian and Arthur O'Brien he joined in a plot against the Duke of Buckingham ; was detected, and indicted, with his accomplices, in the King's Bench, and found guilty, June 25th, 1680. The damages claimed were laid at 10,000, for which Blood found bail. It was his last public appearance ; for on August 24th he departed this life in a species of lethargy, and was buried in Tothill Fields. The reader will remember how effectively Scott has introduced him in his romance of " Peveril of the Peak." STORY OP LADY NITHISDALE'S DEVOTION. In the reign of William III. several Jacobites and other conspirators were confined in the Tower, and Tower Hill 250 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. was again red with blood. Under Queen Anne there is little to record ; but the next reign presents some features of interest. Harley, Earl of Oxford, was committed to the Tower in June 1715 on a charge of high treason and other crimes and misdemeanours. Lords Scarsdale and Powis and Sir William Wyndham were his companions. When the Scotch Insurrection of 1715 was subdued, the Earls of Derwentwater, Nithisdale, Wintoun and Carnwath, Viscount Kenmure, and Lords Widrington and Nairne were sent here as traitors. After due trial, on February 9th, the ancient sentence in cases of high treason was pro- nounced against them. Great efforts were made to obtain a commutation of the death penalty. For this purpose the young Countess of Derwentwater and Lady Nairne, ac- companied by the highest ladies of the court, obtained an audience of George I., and throwing themselves at the feet of the phlegmatic monarch, essayed to present their petitions. Said Lady Nithisdale afterwards, in describing the scene : " I caught hold of the skirts of his coat that he might stop and hear me. He endeavoured to escape out of my hands ; but I kept such strong hold that he dragged me upon my knees from the middle of the room to the very door of the drawing-room. At last one of the blue ribbands who attended his Majesty took me round the waist, whilst another wrested the coat out of my hands. The petition, which I had endeavoured to thrust into his pocket, fell down in the struggle, and I almost fainted away through grief and disappointment." Finding there was no hope for her husband in the royal mercy, the heroic lady matured a plan for effecting his escape. On the night before the fatal day, she went in a coach to the Tower, accompanied by a Mistress Morgan, THE STORY OF THE TOWER. 251 who was tall and of slender figure, and dexterously carried under her riding-hood a complete dress, fitted for a tall and stout lady named Mills, who in size and stature re- sembled Lord Nithisdale. Mrs. Morgan was shown into the prisoner's apartment, and relieved of the clothes in- tended for the person of Mrs. Mills ; after which she slipped downstairs unnoticed, and sent up the latter lady, who was weeping, and covering her tear-stained face with her hand- kerchief. She quickly effected a change of dress, leaving her own garments for the prisoner's use ; and then took her departure, amid loud and vehement injunctions from Lady Nithisdale to send her lady's maid with a dress fitted for her to wear that night when she presented another petition to the King. Lady Nithisdale quickly returned to her lord, whose face she painted in imitation of a woman's complexion. She adroitly concealed his beard ; arranged his dress to the best advantage ; and further disguised him with suitable headgear. She then conducted the pseudo Mistress Mills weeping, and with a handkerchief ostentatiously displayed to the outer door, where the supposed lady's maid in reality a confidential friend made her appearance, and assisted the fugitive to reach a place of safety. Lady Nithisdale once more returned to her husband's apart- ment, where she went through the farce of talking loudly as if to her husband, imitating his voice in reply, and finally bidding him good-night with the assurance that she hoped very shortly to bring the joyful news of his reprieve. Then she, too, took her departure, and in two or three days had the satisfaction of knowing that her lord had got to Dover, disguised as a footman to the Venetian Ambassador, who had despatched his coach and 252 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. six there to meet his brother. Thereafter he crossed to the Continent. Due praise must be given to the courage and ingenuity of the heroic wife who devised this little comedy; but it could hardly have been carried to a successful denouement if disciplinary arrangements in the Tower had not been exceedingly lax, and the guards accustomed, perhaps by judicious gifts, to observe Lady Nithisdale's movements with indifference. THE STORY OP LORDS KILMARNOCK AND BALMERINO. Under the gallery^at the western end of St. Peter's Chapel lie the headless bodies of the penitent Earl of Kilmarnock, the brave Lord Balmerino, and the notorious Simon Lord Lovat, who took part in the celebrated rebellion of the '45. Companions in a hopeless enterprise, they were not separated even by death ; all three having been interred in the same grave. Some years ago, when the adjoining ground was opened, the leaden plates which had been affixed to their coffins were discovered. They are still preserved in the chapel, and bear the following inscrip- tions : (1) Wilhelmus Comes de Kilmarnock Decollatus 18 die Augusti 1746. ^Etatis suse 42. (2) Arthurus Dominus de Balmerino Decollatus 18 die Augusti 1746. ^Etatis suse 58. (3) Simon Dominus Frazer de Lovat Decollat. Aprilis 9, 1747. JEt&t. suse 80. After the crushing defeat of the Jacobites on the red field of Culloden, Lords Kilmarnock, Balmerino, and Cro- marty were conveyed to London and imprisoned in the THE STORY OF THE TOWER. 253 Tower. The usual formal preliminaries having taken place, the Lords sat in Westminster Hall on July 28th (1746) to hear the charges brought against the three prisoners. The rough and dauntless Balmerino fought for his life in an unequal contention with the Crown lawyers, and frankly retired from it when he saw that it was useless. Kilmar- nock lost his nerve, admitted that his crime was of too heinous a nature to be vindicated, and condescended to ap- peal in eager terms for a mercy which could not be granted. Cromarty followed his example, but with more spirit ; and was able to plead that he had hesitated long before he joined Charles Edward's standard, and had yielded at last only to the overwhelming solicitations and temptations by which he was surrounded. His plea was admitted, and the royal clemency extended to him. Balmerino and Kilmar- nock were ordered for death on August 18th. Balmerino during his imprisonment was frequently visited by his wife, who was dining with him when the warrant arrived for his execution on the following Monday. Ob- serving that she was deeply moved, he endeavoured to sustain her by the example of his fortitude. " If the King had given me mercy," he said, " I should have been glad of it ; but since it is otherwise, I am very easy, for it is what I have expected, and therefore it does not at all surprise me." Weeping and disconsolate she rose from the table ; on which he started from his seat, and exclaimed, " Pray, my lady, sit down, for it shall not spoil my dinner." The day of doom arrived, and the prisoners were con- ducted from their respective apartments. At the foot of the stone staircase they met, and Kilmarnock, embracing his brother-noble, said, " My lord, I am heartily sorry to have your company in this expedition." At the gate of 254 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. the Tower the sheriffs gave receipts for their bodies to the Lieutenant, who, as usual, cried, " God bless King George ! " whereat Lord Kilmarnock bowed, and the uncom- promising Balmerino shouted, " God bless King James ! " The procession was then formed the Constable of the Tower Hamlets, the knight-marshal's men, tipstaves, and the sheriffs' officers preceding the two prisoners, who were attended by the sheriffs, and followed by the Tower warders and a guard of musketeers. Two hearses and a mourning coach made a melancholy conclusion to the cortege, which slowly passed through double lines of foot-soldiers to the scaffold on the south side of the hill. Here the guard de- ployed so as to enclose a sufficient open space, while troops of horse drew up in their rear, five deep. The two Lords were allowed to receive their friends in separate rooms, in a house opposite the scaffold. The Rev. Mr. Home, a near kinsman of the Earl of Home, and the Rev. Mr. Foster, a Dissenting minister, who never recovered, it is said, from the effect of the tragic scene, assisted Kilmar- nock in his religious exercises. The Tower chaplain and another Church of England clergyman rendered the same service to Balmerino. The two Lords were afterwards permitted to exchange farewells ; Balmerino, on taking leave, exclaiming with obvious sincerity, " My dear Lord Kilmarnock, I am only sorry that I cannot pay this reckoning alone. Once more, farewell for ever ! " As Kilmarnock proceeded to the scaffold, attended by his friends, the crowd of curious bystanders displayed the liveliest emotions of compassion and regret. Touched by their profound sympathy, and moved by the ghastly ad- juncts of the tragedy in which he was to play the victim's part, by the block, the axe, the coffin, the executioners, THE STORY OF THE TOWER. 255 he turned to Mr. Home, and said, " Home, this is terrible ! " but his countenance preserved its serene composure. The black baize over the rails of the scaffold was removed that the people might witness every detail of the execution. Kilmarnock knelt, put his head on the block one stroke of the axe, and all was over. In the meantime, Balmerino, having solemnly recom- mended himself to the Divine Mercy, conversed cheerfully with his friends, took wine, and desired them to drink to him " ane degree ta haiven." The sheriff entered to inform him that all was ready, but was prevented by his quickly inquiring if the affair was over with Kilmarnock. " It is," said the sheriff. In reply to his questions he was informed how the executioner had discharged his dreadful office. " It was well done," said he, and turning to the company, he remarked, " Gentlemen, I will detain you no longer," and saluted them with easy cheerfulness. The vivacity with which he mounted the scaffold surprised the specta- tors. One would have said he was going to a wedding, so light and unconcerned, yet not unbecomingly so, was his demeanour. A natural intrepidity was to him what Christian faith had been to Sir Thomas More, and patriotic aspiration to Algernon Sidney. He walked several times round the scaffold, bowing to the people ; read the in- scription on his coffin, remarking with a nod that it was quite right ; and then examined the block, which he called his " pillow of rest." Taking a paper from his pocket, he put on his glasses and read it aloud, prior to handing it to the sheriff; then called for the executioner, who appearing, and being about to ask his lordship's pardon, he interrupted him " Friend, you need not ask my forgiveness, the performance of your duty is commendable." 256 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. He gave him three guineas. ' " Friend," he said, " I never was rich ; this is all the money I have now, and I am sorry I can add nothing to it but my coat and waistcoat ; " which he removed, together with his neckcloth, and threw upon his coffin. Assuming a vest of flannel, he took off his periwig, drew a plaid cap from his pocket, put it on his head, and exclaimed that he died a Scotchman. He knelt down at the block to adjust his posture, and show the executioner the signal for the stroke. Once more he turned to his friends, and then looking upon the crowd, he said, " Perhaps some may think my behaviour too bold ; but remember that I now declare it to be the effect of confidence in God and a good conscience, and I should dissemble if I should show any signs of fear." Still, one can hardly help wondering that the authorities should have permitted a ceremony so dreadful to be protracted to such an inordinate length ; and it is difficult not to feel that Balmerino pushed too far the display of his easy composure.* Observing the axe in the executioner's hand as he passed him, he took it, felt the edge, and, returning it, clapped the man on the shoulder to encourage him, though his conduct was well calculated to unnerve the poor wretch, and, as we shall see, actually had that effect. Tucking down the collar of his shirt, he showed him where to strike, and desired him to strike resolutely, for in so doing would consist his kindness. * Walpole remarks that he died " with the intrepidity of a hero, but with the insensibility of one too." And Shenstone says that either his behaviour wanted coolness, or else was equal to " that of Adrian, Cato, Sir Thomas More, or any of those heroes who had spirit enough to make an ostentation of their unconcern." THE STORY OF THE TOWER. 257 Passing to the side of the scaffold, he called up the warder, to whom he gave some money ; asked which was his hearse, and ordered the driver to come near. Then, with a cheerful and unmoved countenance, he knelt down at the block, and stretching out his arms, exclaimed : " Lord, reward my friends, forgive my enemies, and receive my soul ! " giving the signal by letting them fall. His ex- traordinary resolution and the suddenness of the signal so dismayed the executioner, who was already labouring under excitement, that he delivered his blow with an uncertain hand. A second blow was necessary to render his victim insensible, and a third to complete the work of death. THE STORY OP LORD LOVAT. The sympathy which had been excited in the cases of Balmerino and Kilmarnock was not felt in that of Lord Lovat. His life had been one of shameless profligacy, and he was so great a master of double dealing that he was almost as little trusted by his friends as by his foes. When Prince Charles Edward first landed on his fatal expedition he had held aloof from any active participation ; but sent a secret messenger to recommend him to secure the Lord President, Duncan Forbes, who represented the British Government, dead or alive. When he found the Prince had failed to bring with him a couple of documents which he eagerly coveted the one a commission to act as commander-in- chief of the forces, and the other a patent creating him Duke of Eraser the octogenarian traitor turned to the Government, demanding arms that his clan might defend themselves from the rebels, and take the field for the King. But Forbes knew his character, and sent him no arms, 17 258 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. though offering him a commission to raise men for King George. Lovat remained in a condition of painful uncer- tainty, until the Jacobite victory at Preston decided him that the Pretender's was the successful cause. He then sent his son and his clan into the field to serve under Charles Edward's standard, while he remained at home and wrote letters to the President, " bewailing his sad lot as the parent of a frantic and abandoned son, who, defying all his exhortations, entreaties, and threats, had madly resolved to raise his clan in wicked rebellion both against the best of kings, and that heart-broken parent whose grey hairs he was bringing in sorrow to the grave." But as, meanwhile, he took no steps to recall his Erasers from the field, the value of his protestations was sadly discounted. When the Prince fled from the lost field of Culloden, along the south-east bank of Loch Ness, he found Lovat at the house of Gorterlay, near the Fall of Foyers, where, according to tradition, he was superintending the prepara- tions for a feast to welcome the Prince at the head of an army flushed with victory. The interview was a painful one ; and Lovat, it is said, overwhelmed the adventurer with reproaches. He had expected a conqueror and to see instead a beaten and discredited fugitive was a bitter mortification. No chance of escape was given him ; he was immediately arrested, and sent to the Tower of London. From the nature of his offence, he could not be tried as Kilmarnock and Balmerino had been. It was found neces- sary to bring him before the House of Lords by the more solemn and leisurely process of impeachment. And as he had not actually drawn the sword, legal points were involved which required careful discussion. But the THE STORT OF THE TOWER. 259 evidence of his treachery was overwhelming; and after exhausting his ingenuity in a wonderfully subtle defence a remarkable effort on the part of a man of eighty he listened to his condemnation " with the stoicism of the American Indian." Lovat died decorously, quoting the line of Horace, " Dulce et decorum mori pro patria." But it was in- applicable to his career. Among the spectators was George Selwyn, the wit, un- enviably notorious for his singular partiality for " coffins, corpses, and executions." Some ladies reproached him for his want of feeling in going to see the old lord's head cut off. " Well," said he, " I made amends by going to the undertakers to see it sewn on again." It was true that he had attended the latter ceremony; exclaiming, when it was completed, after the manner of the Lord Chancellor at the trial : " My Lord Lovat, your lordship may rise ! " Sir Francis Burdett was a prisoner in the Tower in 1810. And the offenders implicated in the Cato Street Con- spiracy were prisoners in February 1820. DYNAMITE EXPLOSION. About two p.m. on January 24th, 1885, Saturday, a " free day " at the Tower, a crowd of sightseers was passing through the Armoury, when a boy discovered something smoking on the ground. He took no particular notice of it, however, concluding it to be a fusee which some smoker had carelessly thrown away. Suddenly there was a tre- mendous explosion, filling the room with a dense stifling 260 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. cloud of smoke ; a large hole was knocked in the floor, which caught fire, and burned for fifteen to twenty minutes, and about sixteen persons received severe injuries. So ad- mirable was the discipline maintained in the establishment that within four minutes the gates were closed, and no one was allowed to leave until he had given his name and address, and satisfactorily answered some searching inter- rogatories. This process led to the arrest of a man named John Cunningham, alias Dalton, alias Gilbert, who proved to be an Irish-American, lodging at Great Scarborough Street, near the Minories. On the same day was caught another Irish- American, named Harry Burton, the head of a regular dynamite gang, which had been concerned in various outrages. The two men were tried on May llth to May 18th, and convicted of treason-felony and com- plicity with criminal explosions. They were sentenced to penal servitude for life. THE STORY OP A STRANGE COMBAT. TOTHILL FIELDS occupied the area between Tothill Street, Westminster, the Vauxhall Road, Pimlico, and the river. Of old they would seem to have been the frequent scene of "fightings" and "challenges," and of one such Stow furnishes a minute but interesting account, which, some- what modernised, I hasten to place before the reader. On June 18th, 1571, was a combat appointed to have been fought for a certain manor and demesne lands belonging thereto in the Isle of Harty, adjoining the Isle of Sheppey, in Kent. The plaintiffs were Simon Low and John Kyme. They had laid their claim against T. Paramore, who, on his part, offered to defend his right by battle. The plaintiffs hastened to accept his challenge, offering in the same way to defend their right to the same manor and lands and to prove by battle that Paramore had no right or title to the same. Whereupon the said Paramore brought before the Court of Common Pleas one George Thorne, a big, broad, strong-set fellow ; and the plaintiffs one Henry Nailor, master of defence [fencing-master], and servant to the Earl of Leicester, a proper slender man, and not so tall as the other. Thorne cast down a gauntlet, which Nailor took up. 262 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON, Upon the Sunday before the battle should be tried on the next morrow, the matter was stayed, and the parties agreed that, Paramore being in possession, he should hold the land, being bound in 500 to consider the plaintiffs as, after hearing the matter, the judges should award. But it was thought desirable, for Paramore's assurance, that the combat should take place, and the parties produce their respective champions. For this purpose, the Court agreed to sit in Tothill Fields, where was prepared a plot of ground twenty-one feet square, double railed, for the combat, and a stage or platform for the accommodation of the judges. All the compass outside the lists was set with scaffolds one upon another for people to stand and behold; and behind the judges' seat two tents were set up, one for Nailor, the other for Thorne. Thorne made his appearance early in the morning. Nailor, about seven o'clock, came through London " ap- parelled in a doublet and gally-gascoigne breeches, all of crimson satin^cut and raised, a hat of black velvet, with a red feather, before him drums and fifes playing." The gauntlet that had been cast down by George Thorne was borne before the said Nailor on the point of a sword ; and his bdton (a staff of an ell long, made taper- wise, and tipped with horn), with his shield of hard leather, was borne after him by Ascham, a yeoman of the Queen's Guard: he came into the Palace of Westminster, and staying not long before the Hall door, returned into the King's Street, and so along through the Sanctuary and Tothill Street into the field, where he stayed till past nine of the clock, and then Sir Jerome Bowes brought him to his tent, Thorne being in the tent with Sir Henry Cheyney long before. About ten of the clock, the Court of Pleas removed, and TOTHILL FIELDS. 263 came to the place prepared. When the Lord Chief Justice, with two of his fellow- judges, were seated, then Low was called solemnly to come in, or else to lose his writ of right. Then, after an interval, the sureties of Henry Nailor were summoned to bring in the said Nailor as champion for Simon Low, and immediately Sir Jerome Bowes, holding him by the hand, entered the lists with him, " bringing him down that square by which he entered, being on the left hand of the judges, and so about till he came to the next square just against the judges, and there making courtesy, first with one leg, and then with the other, passed forth till he came to the middle of the place, and there made the like obeisance, and so passing till he came to the bar, there he made the like courtesy, and his shield was held up aloft over 'his head. Nailor put off his nether stocks ; and so, bare-footed and bare-legged, save his silk scauilonians to the ankles, and his doublet sleeves tied up above the elbow, and bare-headed, came in as aforesaid. Then were the sureties of George Thorne called to bring in the said Thorne ; and immediately Sir Henry Cheyney, entering at the upper end, on the right hand of the judges, used the like order in coming about by his side as Nailor had observed before on the other side ; and so coming to the bar with like obeisance, held up hL shield. Proclamation was then made in the following form : The judges an- nounced, in the Queen's Majesty's name, that no person, of whatsoever degree, estate, or condition he might be, must dare to give any token or sign, " by countenance, speech, or language," either to the prover or to the defender, whereby the one of them might take advantage of the other. All persons were to keep still in their places, and " keep their staves and weapons to themselves ; nor suffer the said prover 264 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. or defender to take any of their weapons, or any other thing, that might avail the one or the other," upon pain of forfeiture of lands, tenements, goods, chattels, and imprison- ment of their bodies, and making fine and ransom at the Queen's pleasure. Then was the approver sworn in the following form : " This hear you, Justices, that this day I have neither eaten, drunken, nor have upon me either bone, stone, or glass, or any enchantment, sorcery, or witchcraft whereby the power of the Word of God might be inleased or diminished, and the Devil's power increased : and that my appeal is true. So help me God and His Saints by this book." After this solemn order was finished, the Lord Chief Justice, rehearsing the manner of bringing the writ of right by Simon Low, of the answer made thereunto by Paramore, of the proceeding therein, and how Paramore had challenged to defend his right to the land by battle, by his champion George Thorne, and how Low had accepted the trial with his champion Henry Nailor, and then had himself, made default in appearance, he adjudged the lands to Paramore, and dismissed the champions, acquitting the sureties of their bonds. He also willed Henry Nailor to render again to George Thorne his gauntlet ; whereunto the said Nailor answered that his lordship might command him anything, but willingly he would not render the said gauntlet to Thorne except he could win it. And further, he challenged the said Thorne to play with him half-a-score blows, to show some pastime to the Lord Chief Justice, and the others there assembled. But Thorne answered grimly that he came to fight, not to play. Then the Lord Chief Justice, commending Nailor for his valiant courage, commanded them both quietly to depart the field. TOTHILL FIELDS. 265 And such was the lame and impotent conclusion of a scene which had opened with so much dramatic fervour and picturesque force. Tothill Fields were frequently patronised by duellists. The last combat of the kind of which we have any record as taking place there was the duel, in 1711, between Sir Cholmley Bering and Mr. Thornhill. PART III. of Crime anU 9tp&adfeenture. Earl of Sandwich, First Lord of the Admiralty during Lord North's administration, and the "Jemmy Twitcher " of The Beggar's Opera, was a man of infamous character a member of the worst circle of the corrupt society of Georgian London and one of the rakes and profligates whose orgies at Medmenham Abbey were the scandal of the time. This nobleman, in passing through Covent Garden, caught sight in a milliner's shop (No. 4, at the west-end corner of Tavistock Court), of a beautiful young woman of the name of Reay, who, according to one account, was the daughter of a labourer at Elstree, according to another of a corset-maker in Holywell Street. Her virtue was not proof against his solicitations, though he was more than double her age. He placed her under tutors to complete her education, and instruct her in music and singing, for which she had a strong natural capacity, and then con- veyed her, as his acknowledged mistress, to his seat at Hinchinbroke, in Huntingdonshire, where he installed her in his family circle, to the great pain of Lady Sand- wich. By her quiet and modest behaviour she did her best to mitigate the awkwardness of the situation, and she seems to have won the good opinion of all who knew her even of a bishop's wife, who pronounced her " so assiduous to please, so very excellent, yet so unassuming," while her 270 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. singing in the concerts which Lord Sandwich, whose one redeeming virtue was a passionate love for music, gave at Hinchinbroke, charmed every hearer. Her beauty and accomplishments inspired with intense devotion a handsome young soldier, Captain Hackman, of the 68th Foot, who had the entree at Hinchinbroke. He offered her his hand, and she was not unwilling to accept it ; but two circum- stances led her to hesitate her gratitude to the man who had educated her, and her sense of her soldier-lover's narrow income. Thereupon he doffed his military uniform and entered the Church, which seemed to offer better chances of preferment ; in some way or other he obtained ordination, and was presented to the curacy of Wiverton, in Norfolk. It was an unholy transaction ; for no man was less fitted for the core of souls than this passionate suitor to a nobleman's mistress, whose thoughts were absorbed by the desire of possession ; this poor weak crea- ture who, when he found that Lord Sandwich had taken steps to prevent his seeing Miss Reay, and was informed that she was quite indifferent towards him, could think of no other resource than to blow out his brains ! Un- fortunately, events were so ordered that he committed murder instead of suicide. On the evening of April 7th, 1779, Miss Reay, accom- panied by her duenna, attended the performance at Co vent Garden Theatre of Love in a Village. Hackman,* who was on the watch, saw her carriage drive past the Cannon Coffee-house in Cockspur Street, and immediately followed. In the theatre, the two ladies sat in a front box, and three gentlemen connected with the Admiralty occasionally looked * It is said that he spent the morning of this fatal day in reading Blair's " Sermons." THE STORY OF MISS RE AY. 271 in upon them. Mr. Hackman flitted from the lobby to an upper side-box, and more than once to the Bedford Coffee House for a glass of brandy and water. At length the performance came to an end; the drop-curtain fell; Miss Reay left her seat and descended the stairs to seek her carriage, accompanied by her duenna and a gentleman, between whom she walked in the piazza. Then Without uttering a word Hackman stepped forward, put a pistol to her temple, and shot her dead. He then fired another at himself with a less steady hand. The bullet grazed the scalp, but did no mortal injury. He fell to the ground, and in his mad desire to commit self- destruction beat himself violently about the head with the butt-end of his pistol, until it was wrenched from his hand. He was carried to the Shakespeare tavern, where his wound was dressed. In his pocket two letters were found, one being a copy of a letter which he had addressed to Miss Reay. On recovering consciousness he inquired anxiously after her ; and being told she was dead desired that her dead body might not be exposed to the gaze of the curious. About five in the morning Sir John Fielding, the magistrate, attended, and, finding that Hackman's wounds were not of a dangerous character, ordered his committal to Tothill Fields Bridewell Miss Reay's body was decently laid out in a room in the Shakespeare to await the coroner's inquest. Here is Horace Walpole's account of the catastrophe, but it is full of errors: " Miss Reay, it seems, had been out of order, and abroad but twice all the winter. She went to the play on Wednesday night for the second time with Galli the singer. During the play the desperate lover was at the 272 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. Bedford Coffee House, and behaved with great calmness, and drank a glass of capillaire. Towards the conclusion he sallied into the Piazza, waiting till he saw his victim handed by Mr. Macnamara (an Irish Templar, with whom Miss R had been seen to coquet during the performance in the theatre). He (Hackman) came behind her, pulled her by the gown, and, on her turning round, clapped the pistol to her forehead, and shot her through the head. With another pistol he then attempted to shoot himself, but the ball only grazing his brow, he tried to dash out his brains with the pistol, and is more wounded by those blows than by the ball. " Lord Sandwich was at home, expecting her to supper, at half an hour after ten. On her not returning an hour later, he said something must have happened ; however, being tired, he went to bed half an hour after eleven, and was scarce in bed before one of his servants came in and said Miss Reay was shot. He stared, and could not com- prehend what the fellow meant ; nay, lay still, which is full as odd a part of the story as any. At twelve came a letter from the surgeon to confirm the account. Now, is not the story full as strange as ever it was ? Miss Reay has six children ; her eldest son is fifteen, and she was at least three times as much." On the question of her age Walpole was certainly mis- taken. A Mr. Cradock, a friend of Lord Sandwich, on the authority of Lord Sandwich's confidential servant, gives a very different account of his lordship's reception of the melancholy news. He says that Lord Sandwich, for a while, seemed petrified ; then, seizing a candle, he ran upstairs and threw himself on a bed, exclaiming, in great THE STORY OF MISS RE AY. 273 distress, " Leave me to myself. I could have borne any- thing but this ! " He retired for a few days to Richmond. On his return to the Admiralty he was in evident ill-health, and thenceforward any allusion to Miss Reay, whom he survived twelve years, greatly disturbed him. One of his sons by this unfortunate lady was Mr. Basil Montagu, a man of letters of considerable distinction, who edited Bacon, and died in 1851 at the age of eighty-one. Miss Reay was buried in the churchyard at Elstree. There is extant an old street ballad commemorative of her tragical fate : " A clergyman, wicked one 1 In Covent Garden shot her ; No time to cry upon her God, It's hoped He's not forgot her ! " Hackman was tried at the Old Bailey on a charge of wilful murder. In his speech he acknowledged that he had intended to kill himself, but protested that he should not have destroyed her who was dearer to him than life but for a sudden paroxysm of insanity. The fact that he was furnished with two pistols was held, however, by the judge to invalidate this assertion. In a conversation with Dr. Johnson, Beauclerk took up an opposite view. " Every wise man," he said, " who intended to shoot himself took two pistols, that he might be sure of doing it at once. Lord 's cook shot himself with one pistol, and lived two days in great agony. Mr. , who loved buttered muffins, but durst not eat them because they disagreed with his stomach, resolved to shoot himself, and then he ate three buttered muffins for breakfast before shooting himself, knowing that he should not be troubled with 18 274 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. indigestion ; * he had two charged pistols ; one was found lying charged upon the table by him, after he had shot himself with the other." "Well," said Johnson, triumphantly, "you see here one pistol was sufficient." Beauclerk replied sharply, " Because it happened to kill him." For my part I think no person can read the evidence adduced at Hackman's trial without coming to the conclusion that he had made up his mind to shoot Miss Reay prior to shooting himself. He was executed on Monday, April 19th, only twelve days after Miss Reay's murder. A contemporary journal furnishes the following narrative of his last hours : " A little after five the Rev. Mr. Hackman got up, dressed himself, and was at private meditation till near seven, when Mr. Boswell and two other gentlemen waited on him, and accompanied him to the chapel, where prayers were read by the Ordinary of Newgate, after which he received the Sacrament; between eight and nine he came down from chapel and was haltered. When the sheriffs officer took the cord from the bag to perform his duty, Mr. Hackman said, ' Oh ! the sight of this shocks me more than the thought of its intended operation ! ' He then shed a few tears, and took leave of two gentlemen. He was then conducted to a mourning-coach, attended by Mr. Villette, the Ordinary, Mr. Boswell, and Mr. Daven- port, the sheriff's officer, when the procession set out for Tyburn in the following manner: viz., Mr. Miller, City Marshal, on horseback, in mourning, a number of sheriff's officers on horseback, constables, etc., Mr. Sheriff Kitchen, with his under-sheriff, in his carriage, the prisoner, with * We have here the germ of a joke in " Pickwick." THE STORY OF MISS RE AY. 275 the afore-mentioned persons in the mourning-coach, officers, etc., the cart hung with black. " On his arrival at Tyburn Mr. Hackman got out of the coach, mounted the cart, and took an affectionate leave of Mr. Boswell and the Ordinary. When Mr. Hackman got into the cart under the gallows, he immediately kneeled down with his face towards the horse, and prayed some time ; he then rose and joined in prayer with Mr. Villette and Mr. Boswell about a quarter of an hour, when he desired to be permitted to have a few moments to himself. The clergyman then took leave of him. His request being granted, he informed the executioner when he was prepared he would drop his handkerchief as a signal; accordingly, after praying about six or seven minutes to himself, he dropped his handkerchief, and the cart drew from under him." Lord Carlisle, who was present at the execution, states that Hackman " behaved with great fortitude ; no ap- pearances of fear were to be perceived, but very evident signs of contrition and repentance. He was long at his prayers ; and when he flung down his handkerchief for the sign for the cart to move on, Jack Ketch, instead of instantly whipping on the horse, jumped on the other side of him to snatch up the handkerchief, lest he should lose his rights. He then returned to the head of the cart, and jehu'd him out of the world." A queer book, by Sir Herbert Croft, entitled " Love and Madness, a Story too True ; or, a Series of Letters between Parties whose Names would, perhaps, be Mentioned, were they less Known or less Lamented" (1st Edit. 1780), en- joyed at one time a considerable popularity. It purports to consist of letters written to each other by Miss Eeay 276 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. and Hackman; but there can be little doubt of their fictitious character. It is said that while he lay in Newgate, after his con- demnation, the following letter reached him : " 17 April, '79. " To Mr. Hackman, in Newgate. " If the murderer of Miss Reay wishes to live, the man he has most injured will use all his interest to procure his life." And that he replied as follows : " CONDEMNED CELL, NEWGATE, "17 April, 1779. " The murderer of her whom he preferred, far preferred, to life respects the hand from which he has just received such an offer as he neither desires nor deserves. His wishes are for death, not for life. One wish he has could he be pardoned in this world by the man he has most injured ? Oh, my lord, when I meet her in another world, enable me to tell her (if departed spirits are not ignorant of earthly things) that you forgive us both, that you will be a father to her dear infants ! H. H." 1^0 jlterij uf % Jttfo uf IfaroHten's Jpttnl uiii^ Jfoqit ftuljm HYDE PARK, in the bad old days, was the scene of some notorious duels. One of the most sensational was that between Lord Mohun and the Duke of Hamilton in 1712, which cost the lives of both. The reader of " Esmond " will remember with what skill Thackeray has woven it into the plot of that noble story. Charles Lord Mohun was a graceless libertine ; perhaps physical bravery was his sole virtue, if I may use the word in its classical rather than its modern sense. He had seen a good deal of military service ; was an adroit swordsman ; and experienced in all the details of the duello. While yet a young man he had incurred disgrace by the part he had taken, along with Lord Warwick and another friend, in a midnight brawl, which had resulted in the death of a Captain Coote. Both he and Warwick were tried by their peers ; the latter was convicted of manslaughter ; it was Mohun's good fortune to be acquitted. Some years later he was deeply implicated in the murder of Mountfort the player ; was again tried, and again acquitted. He was a man of handsome presence, with the " air noble," and a dashing, daring aspect which had carried him successfully through many affairs of gallantry. James Duke of Hamilton, on the other hand, was a 278 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. nobleman of high character, dignified by his lofty patriotism and eloquence. Queen Anne had bestowed upon him the unusual distinction of the Garter when he already wore the Thistle, and the Tory party looked upon him as one of its great pillars. Mohun was a Whig, and therefore politically opposed to him, but he hated him for personal reasons also. The two peers had married the nieces of the Earl of Macclesfield. By his marriage with Elizabeth, daughter of Lord Gerard, the Duke had come in for the great Gerard estates. Lord Mohun, in right of his wife, advanced a claim upon them, which was referred to a Master in Chancery ; and the two peers happening to meet at his house in Lincoln's Inn Fields, Mohun forced upon the Duke a quarrel, pressing it so relentlessly that within an hour he sent his friend, General Macartney, with a challenge to the Duke to meet him with swords, on the following morning, in Hyde Park. At seven o'clock, on November 15th, the Duke, with his friend Colonel Hamilton, appeared at the rendezvous, which was situated between the Ring and the Cake-House.* After the ground had been measured, the Duke charged Macartney with having instigated the duel, and when the latter expressed his readiness to take part in it, exclaimed, pointing to Colonel Hamilton, " My friend here will take his share in my dance." Swords were immediately drawn, and both principals and seconds plunged into the fray. Mohun received almost at the outset a wound which laid * It is here that Fielding, in his "Amelia," places the duel between Booth and Colonel Bath. " It may properly be called," he says, " the field of blood, being that part, a little to the left of the Ring, which heroes have chosen for the scene of their erit out of this world." DUKE OF HAMILTON'S DUEL WITH LORD MOHUN. 279 him dead on the ground; the Duke was also severely wounded by his antagonist, and, while lying helpless, was stabbed to death by Macartney. By this time the clashing of swords had brought the park-keepers to the spot. They found both Mohun and the Duke dead or dying, and Colonel Hamilton standing beside them ; Macartney had taken flight. Writing on the same day to " Stella " (Miss Johnson), Swift says : " Before this comes to your hands you will have heard of the most terrible accident that hath almost ever happened. This morning at eight, my man brought me word that Duke Hamilton had fought with Lord Mohun and killed him, and was brought home wounded. I immediately sent him to the Duke's house in St. James's Square; but the porter could hardly answer for tears, and a great rabble was about the house. In short, they fought at seven this morning. The dog Mohun was killed on the spot; and, while the Duke was over him, Macartney shortened his sword, and stabbed him in the shoulder to the heart. The Duke was helped toward the Cake-House, by the Ring in Hyde Park, where they fought, and died on the grass before he could reach the house ; and was brought home in his coach by night, while the poor Duchess was asleep. Macartney and Hamilton are the seconds, who fought like- wise, and are both fled. I am told that a footman of Lord Mohun's stabbed Duke Hamilton, and some say Macart- ney did so too. Mohun gave the affront, and yet sent the challenge. I am infinitely concerned for the poor Duke, who was a frank, honest, good-natured man. I loved him very well, and I think he loved me better.' In due course Colonel Hamilton was put on his trial 280 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. at the Old Bailey and acquitted. In the following year General Macartney returned to England, surrendered, and was tried in his turn. He was found guilty of manslaughter only, though the Colonel affirmed on his oath that it was he who had given the death-stroke to the Duke. Colonel Hamilton, to avoid a prosecution for perjury, fled to the Continent, where he died about four months afterwards General Macartney died in 1730. An attempt was made to put upon the duel a political complexion, and to represent it as forced on the Duke in order to deprive the Tory party of his great influence and valuable support ; but the allegation was never substantiated. Hfo itortt xtf fib 10or O 41 6 O Cr HOWARD STREET was the scene of the death of Mountfort, the player, under circumstances of tragical interest. I suppose it may be taken for granted that the famous Mrs. Bracegirdle was one of the most brilliant and beautiful women who ever trod the English stage a stage which has never been wanting in brilliant and beautiful women. At all events, she confused the brains and won the hearts of our forefathers for something like a quarter of a century, that is, from 1680 to 1707, when her meridian lustre yielded before the rising splendour of Mrs. Oldfield. "Never," says Colley Gibber, who introduces her into his wonderful gallery of theatrical portraits, " never was any woman in such general favour of the spectators." And he adds no doubt with a touch or two of pleasant exaggeration " It will be no extravagant thing to say scarce an audience saw her that were less than half of them her lovers, without a suspected favourite among them ; and though she may be said to have been the universal passion, and under the highest temptations, her constancy in resisting them served but to increase her admirers. It was ever the fashion for the gay and young to have a taste or tendre for Mrs. Bracegirdle." And their elders could not or would not help falling in with so agreeable a fashion, though they sometimes exposed themselves to a mortifying rebuff. Thus 282 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. the Earl of Burlington sent her, one day, a present of some fine antique china. She told the servant he must have made a mistake; that it was true the letter was for her, but the china was for his lady, to whom she bade him carry it. " Lord ! " exclaims Horace Walpole, "the countess was so full of gratitude when her husband came home to dinner ! " The beautiful actress's conduct was always so discreet and reserved, that the attacks of slander fell harmlessly against it. To the number and variety of love-tokens, love-gifts, and love-letters which were laid at her feet Dryden makes her allude in an epilogue he wrote expressly for her : " I have had to-day a dozen billets-doux From fops and wits and Bow Street beaux ; Some from Whitehall, but from the Temple more ; A Covent Garden porter brought me four." But she treated all alike with cool indifference, and earned for herself the flattering appellation flattering to her, but by implication the reverse of nattering to her fellow- actresses of "the Diana of the Stage." Her chastity seems to have been almost as much a matter of sur- prise to her contemporaries as her beauty and ability were of admiration ; whence we may infer that the moral standard of the London stage in Mrs. Bracegir die's time was unfortunately very low. It was the misfortune of Mrs. Bracegirdle to become the indirect cause of the tragical death of Mountfort the player. There was a certain Captain Richard Hill, a dissolute man about town, who fell violently in love with her, and offered her marriage ; but his character was notoriously THE- STORY OF THE POOR PLAYER. 283 bad, and Mrs. Bracegirdle was too prudent to put her happiness in his hands. The Captain, as vain as he was dissolute, made up his mind that nothing could have pre- vented his success but the interference of other suitors: and came to the conclusion that the great obstacle was Will Mountfort, the player though Mountfort was married and lived happily with his wife, and the only cause Hill had for his suspicion was that Mountfort, who was the most accomplished gentleman and best lover on the stage, frequently acted with Mrs. Bracegirdle. The pair were excellent as Alexander and Statira, and played the pas^ion- ate love-scenes in Lee's play with so much fire that Hill thought they must be in earnest. They had appeared in these characters only a fortnight before the catastrophe I am about to unfold. Hill was intimate with Lord Mohun, whose character I have already depicted, and disclosed to him a design he had formed of abducting Mrs. Bracegirdle. Mohun readily promised his assistance ; for so daring a violation of law and morality was exactly to his taste. The Captain had often and openly declared he would be revenged upon Mountfort; and at dinner with Lord Mohun on the day fixed for the attempt he swore that he would stab him if he offered any opposition, Mohun blithely rejoining that he would " stand by his friend." That day was November 9th, 1692, when, as Hill had ascertained, charming Mrs. Bracegirdle was engaged, with her mother and brother, to sup at the house of a friend, Mr. Page, in Prince's Street, Drury Lane. After dining with Lord Mohun, he set out for Prince's Street, and posted near Page's house six soldiers, whose services he had hired. About ten o'clock "Diana" came forth, accompanied by 284 A SO OK ABOUT LONDON. her relatives, and was immediately seized by Hill, who, with the help of the soldiers, endeavoured to drag her towards a coach he had in waiting, whereon was seated Lord Mohun, with quite a battery of pistols. But Mrs. Bracegirdle screamed so loudly, and both she and her friends offered such a resolute resistance, that Hill's heart failed him, and the beautiful actress was permitted to reach her lodgings in Howard Street, Hill and Mohun slowly following. At the door Hill would have spoken with Mr. Page, but was denied. It was afterwards given in evidence that the two gallants knocked several times at Mrs. Bracegirdle's door, and that Hill expressed an earnest desire to apologise to her for the outrage of which he had been guilty, but that, naturally enough, she had refused to see him. In a mood of ungovernable excitement, Hill, with his friend, remained in the street. They sent to a tavern for a bottle of wine, and paced hastily to and fro, with drawn swords. Mrs. Brown, the mistress of the house, ventured to ask them what they waited for ; upon which Hill said, moodily, that he should fall in with Mountfort some day or other, and would have his revenge. Mrs. Bracegirdle, on hearing of this threatening speech, thought it advisable to warn Mrs. Mountfort, who lived hard by in Norfolk Street ; and she, on her part, hastened to send messengers to the places most frequented by her husband, to put him on his guard. Unfortunately, none of them found him, or the evening might have ended less sorrowfully. Meanwhile, the constables and watchmen were attracted to the spot, and sought to ascertain of the two strangers what they were doing. Drinking a bottle of wine, was the curt reply. Lord Mohun added that he was ready to put up THE STORY OF THE POOR PLAYER. 285 his sword, but that his friend could not, because he had lost his scabbard ; and he impressed upon the venerable guardians of the public peace that he was a peer of the realm whereupon they adjourned to the nearest tavern to discuss the circumstances over a tumbler of gin and water. It was now about midnight, and Mountfort, who had probably heard of the attempted abduction, and wished to hear the particulars from Mrs. Bracegirdle herself, turned into Howard Street, and made towards her house. His approach was perceived by Mrs. Brown, who ran forward to caution him, but was either not understood or not heard by the young actor. Meeting with Lord Mohun, whom, as a patron of the playhouse, he necessarily knew, he saluted him courteously. " Your humble servant, my Lord." " Your servant, Mr. Mountfort," replied Mohun, cocking his hat. " I have a great respect for you, Mr. Mountfort, and dasire there should be no difference between us. But there is a thing fallen out, I must tell you, between Mr. Hill and Mrs. Bracegirdle." Mountfort, not a little surprised, answered with both spirit and dignity. " My Lord, has my wife " [Mrs. Mountfort was a popular actress Colley Gibber will tell you what a splendid Me- lantha she made !] " offended your Lordship ? If she has, she shall ask your pardon. But with Mistress Bracegirdle I have no concern. I know nothing of this matter; I came here by accident. But I hope your Lordship will not vindicate Hill in such actions as these." This is Mrs. Brown's version of the brief conversation that passed between peer and player. But a woman who 286 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. lived next door, and overheard the parties, supplied a somewhat different, and, I expect, a more accurate report, the speeches, as repeated by Mrs. Brown, having too formal an air. " Mr. Mountfort, your humble servant," said Lord Mohun, embracing him ; " I am glad to see you." " Who is this ? My Lord Mohun ? " " Yes, it is." " What brings your Lordship here at this time of night?" Mohun replied to this blunt question, more Socratico, by asking another. " I suppose you were sent for, Mr. Mountfort 1 " " No, indeed, I came by chance." " You have heard," continued Lord Mohun, whom wine and excitement had made loquacious, "of the business of Mrs. Bracegirdle ? " Then Hill came forward, exclaiming sharply, " Pray, my Lord, hold your tongue. This is not a con- venient place to discuss this business." And he endeavoured to draw Mohun away. " I am very sorry, my Lord," rejoined Mountfort, " to see that your Lordship should assist Captain Hill in so ill an action as this; pray let me desire your Lordship to forbear." This reproach from " a poor player " was more than Hill could endure; and he dealt Mountfort a sudden blow on the ear. Mountfort angrily demanded what he meant by such an insult, and was on the point of drawing to defend himself when Hill ran him through the body. The constables were soon on the spot, and the dying actor was removed to his house, where he lingered until the following day, deposing with his latest breath that THE STORY OF THE POOR PLATER. 287 Mohun did him no violence, and that Hill was his murderer. Hill fled to the Continent, and was never heard of again. Had he been caught he would hardly have escaped the gallows at Tyburn, as several persons were cognisant of his threats to be revenged on the unfortunate player. Lord Mohun was tried as an accomplice in the murder, but acquitted of malice prepense by his peers, the vote being 60 to 14. He was afterwards killed, as I have related (see p. 277), in a duel with Charles Duke of Hamil- ton, in which the latter also perished. He belonged to a class of reckless, roystering gallants, happily now extinct, or, at all events, seldom heard of. ON November 29th, 1727, Richard Savage, poet, man of letters, and, I fear I must add, vagabond, came from Rich- mond, where he then resided, to Westminster ; and meeting with two boon companions, Merchant and Gregory, drank with them until a late hour. He would gladly have secured a bed at the inn; but as accommodation could not be provided for the three, they agreed to ramble about the streets, and amuse themselves with such ad- ventures as might fall in their way. In the course of their wanderings they discovered a light in Robinson's Coffee-house, near Charing Cross. Entering it, Merchant rudely demanded a room, and was informed that the next parlour would be at their service, as the company were about to leave. Excited by drink, he forced his way into it, followed by his friends, interposed between the company and the fire, and, in a petulant humour, kicked over the table. This impertinence was strongly resented; swords were drawn on both sides, and a fatal thrust stretched James Sinclair on the floor. In the scuffle Savage had also wounded a maid-servant, who had endeavoured to hold his arm. Along with Merchant, he at length broke out of the house ; but, confused and alarmed, was easily taken prisoner in a back court by one of the company who had called some soldiers to his assistance. THE STORY OF RICHARD SAVAGE. 289 Next morning, Savage and his friends were carried before three justices, who committed them to the Gate-House, whence, on the death of Sinclair which took place the same day they were removed to Newgate. When the day of trial came, the court at the Old Bailey was crowded to excess. Here was quite a new sensation a man of fashion and of letters, reputed to be the illegitimate son of a countess,* charged with murder, committed in a vulgar brawl The witnesses against the prisoners were the mistress of the house (which bore a questionable reputation), the companions of the murdered Sinclair, and a loose woman who had been drinking with them. They were not above suspicion ; but their evidence was given straightforwardly, nor was its general veracity impeached. They all agreed that the original provocation was given by Merchant ; that Savage and Gregory drew their swords to support him ; that Savage in his heat stabbed Sinclair while he was defending himself against Gregory ; that, on seeing the terrible consequence of his hasty action, he turned pale, and would fain have escaped ; that the maidservant then clung to his arm, from whom he released himself by striking her a blow on the head. In his dying deposition Sinclair declared that he had received his death-wound at the hand of Savage. Nor did the latter attempt to deny it ; but in an eloquent and forcible defence, which occupied an hour in the delivery, he attempted in the first place to excuse his action by urging its suddenness and want of premeditation, and, in the second, to justify it by the necessity of self-defence. The two pleas were to some extent contradictory, but were enforced with a skill which * The Countess of Macclesfield. 19 290 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. convinced the audience, if it did not satisfy the jury. The judge who tried the case, Mr. Justice Page, a man of cruel and arbitrary disposition, summed up against him with exceptional vehemence : " Gentlemen of the jury," he said, " you are to consider that Mr. Savage is a very great man, a much greater man than you or I, gentlemen of the jury ; that he wears very fine clothes, much finer clothes than you or I, gentlemen of the jury; that he has abundance of money in his pocket, much more money than you or I, gentlemen of the jury : but, gentlemen of the jury, is it not a very hard case that Mr. Savage should therefore kill me or you, gentlemen of the jury 1 " Against an attack so full of prejudice Savage hastened to protest; but the judge desired him to be silent, and when he persisted in his observations, ordered him to be forcibly removed from the bar. He then informed the jury that good character could not weigh against positive evidence, though it might turn the scale when the evidence was doubtful ; and that, though, when two men attack each other, the death of either, in the eye of the law, is simply manslaughter yet if one shall be the aggressor, as in the case before them, and in making the first attack should kill his opponent, the law supposed the action, however sudden, to be wilful and premeditated. Guided by these instructions, the jury returned a verdict of Guilty of Murder against Savage, and of Manslaughter against Merchant. Savage was sentenced to death ; but his friends laboured earnestly to obtain his pardon, and the Countess of Hert- ford threw her influence on his side. There were certainly circumstances which mitigated the gravity of the offence, and the punishment of death was in excess of what justice THE STORY OF RICHARD SAVAGE. 291 might reasonably have required. That he should wholly escape the consequences of his violence was surely an error in the other direction. Yet such was his good fortune. He was set at liberty unconditionally on March 9th, 1728. What became of Merchant or Gregory I am unable to learn. aJj Jforfo dam^farfo Ifctal LORD CAMELFORD the great-grandson of Governor Pitt, the Anglo-Indian " nabob," who made most of his large fortune by the sale of " the Pitt diamond " to the Regent Duke of Orleans was born in 1775, and from his boyhood was unhappily distinguished by a violent and ungovernable temper. At an early age he entered the Royal Navy, and as a midshipman served on board Captain Vancouver's ship, the Discovery, in her exploring voyage; but his frequent disobedience of orders subjected him to severe disciplinary treatment. On his return to England he endeavoured to revenge himself by challenging his captain ; and, meeting him in Bond Street, would have struck him with his cane but for his brother's prompt interference. In those days metropolitan life afforded abundant oppor- tunities for young noblemen to gratify their love of violent doings. At Drury Lane Theatre, on April 2nd, 1799, he played a conspicuous part in a riot which broke out there, and fell upon and wounded a gentleman who had given him no offence a luxurious proceeding for which he was fined 500 in the Court of King's Bench. Shortly afterwards he and his choice companions savagely attacked five watchmen in Cavendish Square, but this was an occasion of " the biter bit ; " for after a fierce contest of upwards of an hour, the watchmen turned the tables upon their assailants, and, STORY OF LORD CAMELFORD' S FATAL DUEL. 293 assistance arriving, arrested them, and carried them off in triumph to the watch-house. His next exploit was, on the night of the general illumination for peace with France, in 1801, to keep the windows of his apartments in New Bond Street darkened. The angry mob battered them into fragments with volleys of stones, whereupon the mad young nobleman for he was certainly not sane dashed into the midst of the crowd with no other weapon than a cudgel, and strove frantically against overpowering numbers, until, bleeding fearfully and half unconscious, he was driven back into his house. By this time the name of Camelford had become one to charm with like that of Marlbrook in France, it was an evil omen. One evening he was reading the newspapers in the Prince of Wales's Coffee-house, Conduit Street, when " a buck," or fine gentleman of the period, entered, seated himself opposite his lordship, and ordered the waiter to put a pint of Madeira and a couple of wax candles in the next box. At the same time he drew to himself Lord Camelford's candles, and began to read. Lord Camelford looked on, annoyed. In a minute or two the waiter announced that the fine gentleman's orders had been obeyed, whereupon the latter withdrew, yawning, to his box. Mimicking his affected air, Lord Camelford lounged after him, and, taking up a pair of snuffers, coolly snuffed out both candles, and returned to his seat. " Waiter ! " shouted the dandy, "who is this fellow that dares thus to insult a gentleman? Who is he what is he d'ye know his confounded name ? " " Lord Camelford, sir," replied the waiter. " Lord Camel- ford ! Good heavens ! What have I to pay 1 " And, hastily discharging his account, he stole from the coffee- house, leaving his Madeira uncousumed. 294 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. The two clever brothers, James and Horace Smith, have put it on record that on one occasion when they were at the Royal Circus, the exuberant loyalty of the audience demanded " God save the King ! " with the usual for- malities of "Stand up" and "Hats off!" A naval lieutenant, much the worse for liquor, perceiving that a gentleman in a neighbouring box showed no particular haste to comply with the popular demand, bent forward and struck his hat off with his stick, exclaiming, " Remove your hat, sir ! " Unfortunately for the lieutenant, the gentleman thus insulted proved to be Lord Camelford, who dragged the valorous officer into the lobby and punished him severely, " The devil is not so black as he is painted," said James Smith to his brother ; " let us call upon Lord Camelford and offer ourselves as witnesses that he was first assaulted." Accordingly, next morning, they presented themselves at his lordship's lodgings, 148, New Bond Street. The ornaments of his sitting-room were truly appropriate. Over the fireplace a couple of strong brass hooks supported an immense bludgeon. Above this was one of smaller size, and another and another, each of reduced dimensions, until a pyramidal trophy of weapons was crowned by a horsewhip. Lord Camelford received his visitors with great affability, and thanking them for their proffered evidence exclaimed, " If ever I see you in a row, my friends, 'pon my soul I'll stand by you to the last ! " About a fortnight later occurred the event which has invested Lord Camelford's name with so tragic an interest. He had for some time been on intimate terms with a Mrs. Simmons, who had formerly been the mistress of his friend, Captain Best. A tattling tongue whispered to STORY OF LORD CAMELFORD'S FATAL DUEL. 295 him that Captain Best had slandered him to this woman. Her good or ill opinion was of no value; but Camelford was so irritated by the report that, falling in with his quondam friend at the Prince of Wales's Coffee-house (March 6th, 1804), he abruptly addressed him in a voice loud enough to be heard by all present " I find, sir, that you have been speaking of me in the most unwarrantable terms." Best quietly replied that he was unaware of having done anything to deserve such a charge. Lord Camelford angrily retorted that he was not ignorant of what he had said to Mrs. Simmons, and, in a burst of fury, declared he was " a scoundrel, a liar, and a ruffian ! " In those days there could be but one answer to such a provocation. A challenge was given and accepted, and the meeting fixed for the following morning. Remembering their former friendship, Best, who, from the first, seems to have be- haved with a good deal of moderation, sent to Lord Camelford a message, earnestly assuring him that he had grossly been misinformed, and that, as he had acted under an erroneous impression, he should be satisfied if he would withdraw his injurious expressions. Unhappily, influenced by his ungovernable temper, Lord Camelford refused. The people of the coffee-house, apprehending that the affair would end in blood, lodged information at the Marlborough Street Police Ofiice; but the authorities delayed action until nearly ten o'clock on the following morning, when constables were stationed too late ! at Lord Camelford's door. To prevent police interference, Camelford had left his lodgings and passed the night at a tavern. Early in the morning, in accordance with the arrangements of their seconds, the two opponents met at a coffee-house in Oxford 296 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. Street, and Best made another effort to obtain from Lord Camelford a retractation of his insults. The sole reply he could obtain from the infatuated nobleman was " Best, this is child's play; the thing must go on." And it went on. Mounted on horseback, Camelford and Best rode away to Kensington a strange ride for two men who had challenged each other to the death ! fol- lowed by a post-chaise conveying the two seconds. On arriving at the Horse and Groom they dismounted, and proceeded along the path which in those days led to some open fields in the rear of Holland House. The seconds measured their ground, and took their stations at the distance of nine-and-twenty yards. Lord Camelford fired first, but without effect. An interval of some seconds ensued, during which Captain Best made another fruitless attempt to stop the affair. As it was useless, he fired, and Lord Camelford fell flat upon the ground. The seconds, together with the Captain, hastened to his assistance, when he clasped Best by the hand, exclaiming, " I am a dead man ; you have killed me, but I freely forgive you "- which he might well do, since the offence had unquestion- ably come from him. The report of the pistols having alarmed some workmen near at hand, Best and his second deemed it advisable to provide for their safety. One of Lord Holland's gardeners coming up, called to these men to stop the fugitives, but Lord Camelford declared that he did not wish them to be stopped ; that he himself was the aggressor ; that he forgave the gentleman who had shot him, and hoped God would forgive him too. By this time a surgeon had arrived, and a sedan chair being pro- cured, the wounded nobleman was carried to Little Holland House, where, after three days' suffering, he died. STORY OF LORD CAMELFORD'S FATAL DUEL. 297 Lord Camelford fully acquitted Captain Best, and ad- mitted that he alone was in the wrong. . Captain Best, he said, was a man of honour; but his pride would not allow him to withdraw expressions he had once used. And his reason for persistently refusing Captain Best's overtures for a friendly settlement was, that he had heard Captain Best spoken of as the best shot in England, and feared that if he made an apology his courage would be called in question ! For this miserable punctilio he went to his grave. On the day after his death an inquest was held on the body, and a verdict of wilful murder was returned against " some person or persons unknown." Thereafter a bill of indictment was preferred against Captain Best and his second, but the grand jury threw it out. According to the " laws of honour," Best had behaved with exemplary forbearance and moderation; yet one could wish that he had been content to fire in the air, and not] stain his hands with the life-blood of this young nobleman, with whom he had been on friendly terms, and whose strange violence of temper rendered him scarcely accountable for his actions. IN January 1 760, Earl Ferrers, a man whose eccentricity of disposition and ungovernableness of temper so disturbed his intellect that he was constantly hovering on the border- line between sanity and insanity, killed his steward at his seat, Stanton Harcourt, in Leicestershire, under circum- stances, as the papers say, of peculiar atrocity. The Earl had been separated by Act of Parliament from his wife, a beautiful woman whom he had treated with meaningless cruelty as, for instance, putting into her bed squibs and crackers which were so contrived as to explode just as she was inclining to sleep. One of the witnesses against him was his steward, Johnson ; and on this man he resolved to be revenged. According to Horace Walpole, who so faithfully chronicled all the misdeeds of his order, " he sent away all his servants but one, and, like that heroic murderess, Queen Christina [who procured the death of her steward, Monaldeschi], carried the poor man through a gallery and several rooms, locking them after him, and then bid the man kneel down, for he was determined to kill him. The poor creature flung himself at his feet, but in vain ; was shot, and lived twelve hours. Mad as this action was from the consequences, there was no frenzy in his behaviour ; he got drunk, and at intervals talked of it coolly ; but did not attempt to escape, till the colliers beset THE STORY OF LORD FERRERS. 299 his house, and were determined to take him alive or dead. He is now in the gaol at Leicester, and will soon be removed to the Tower, then to Westminster Hall, and I suppose to Tower Hill ; unless, as Lord Talbot prophesied in the House of Lords, 'Not being thought mad enough to be shut up till he had killed somebody, he will then be thought too mad to be executed ; ' but Lord Talbot was no more honoured in his vocation than other prophets are in their own country." On February 13tb he was committed to the Tower; was soon afterwards tried by his peers, found guilty, and sentenced to be hanged. The night that he was informed of his sentence he played at picquet with the warders, and would have done so every night if they had not refused. The Governor of the Tower, in accordance with recent regulations, limited his allowance of wine, much to his lordship's mortification ; and he pressed his brother, a clergyman, to intercede that he might have at least more porter, for what he had, he said, was not a draught. His brother succeeded in obtaining him this favour, and then said to the Earl, " This is as good a time as any to take leave of you Adieu ! " On the morning of the day appointed for his execution (May 5th), Lord Ferrers arrayed himself in his wedding clothes, observing, with savage irony, that it was at least as good an occasion for wearing them as that for which they were first made. His behaviour was distinguished by its composure and quiet fortitude ; so that it may well be said that the manner of his dying became him much better than the manner of his living. The procession from the Tower, along Holborn and Oxford Street, to Tyburn, lingered over two hours, yet his resolution never once 300 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. gave way. It left the Tower at nine, amidst the awful silence of thousands. The van was formed by a body of constables ; then came one of the sheriffs in his chariot and six ; next, Lord Ferrers, in his own landau and six, with guards on either side ; the empty carriage of the other sheriff; a mourning coach and six, a hearse, and a troop of Horse Guards. The other sheriff, Vaillant, a book- seller in the Strand, rode with the Earl in his landau. Their conversation turned at first into quite a lively strain, and Lord Ferrers, observing the immense crowds along the route, smilingly observed, " Well, they never saw a lord hanged before, and perhaps will never see another." One of the dragoons being thrown by his horse's leg catching in the hind-wheel of the carriage, Lord Ferrers exhibited the liveliest concern, saying, " I hope there will be no death to-day but mine," and was obviously gratified when the sheriff informed him that the man was uninjured. Vaillant excused himself for the unpleasant duty imposed upon him by his office. " Nay, nay," cried the Earl, " I am greatly obliged to you. I feared lest the disagreeable- ness of the service should induce you to depute your under - sheriff. As you are so good as to undertake it yourself, I am persuaded the dreadful apparatus will be more expeditiously conducted." The Tower chaplain, who also rode in the Earl's carriage, then endeavoured to direct his lordship's attention to religious thoughts, but he heard him with ill-concealed impatience. At one point the procession was stopped by the crowd. The Earl said that he was thirsty, and asked for some wine and water, which the sheriff felt compelled to refuse. " Well," he said, " I must be content with this," and pulled some pigtail tobacco from his pocket. As they approached THE STORY OF LORD FERRERS. 301 the fatal spot, " I perceive we are almost arrived ; it is time to do what little more I have to do ; " and taking out his watch he gave it to Vaillant, desiring him to accept it as a mark of gratitude for his kind behaviour. "It is scarce worth your acceptance," he said, " but I have nothing else it is a stop watch, and fairly accurate." He gave five guineas to the chaplain, and took out an equal sum for the executioner. On reaching Tyburn, the carriage was detained for some minutes by the throng ; but as soon as the door was opened Lord Ferrers stepped out and mounted the scaffold, which was hung with black at the expense of the family. Under the gibbet was a newly-invented platform or " drop," to be used instead of the cart, which had been degraded by its association with common criminals. Lord Ferrers main- tained his constancy and courage, though at the first sight of the gallows he showed a passing emotion of disgust. He had petitioned that he might suffer decapitation ; but George II. had sternly refused. " He has done," said the King, " the deed of the bad man, and he shall die the death of the bad men." There is probably no truth in the tradition that he was allowed the distinction of a silken rope. On the scaffold Lord Ferrers said but a few words. He kneeled for a moment while the chaplain prayed; said, " Lord, have mercy upon me, and forgive me my errors ; " then mounted the upper stage. It was not without re- luctance that he consented to have his hands tied and his face covered. In seven minutes from his leaving his coach the signal was given to let fall the drop. As the machine was new, it did not work readily; and the un- fortunate man was five minutes in dying. The body hung 302 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. for an hour, and then was conveyed, in solemn funeral pomp, to Surgeons' Hall, to be handed over to the knife of the dissector. The mob tore the black drapery off the scaffold into strips to be kept as souvenirs ; but, according to Walpole, they, as a whole, behaved " with great decency and admiration, as well they might ; for sure no exit was ever made with more sensible resolution, and with less ostentation." DYOT STEEET, St. Giles's, which figures in an amusing song in Rhodes's burlesque of Bombastes Furioso, is now called George Street. It formerly bore (and deserved) a most unsavoury notoriety as the haunt of desperadoes and lewd women, pickpockets, gaol-birds, and cellar-thieves. A legend was once current of a banker's clerk who, returning from his round, with his book of notes and bills fastened by the usual chain, as he passed down Dyot Street felt a cellar-door sinking under him. Conscious of his danger, he made a spring forward, dashed down the street, and escaped the trap set for him by the thieves. This, however, has a decidedly apocryphal air. At the Black Horse and Turk's Head public-houses in this street, the two criminals, Owen Haggerty and John Holloway, in November 1802 planned the murder of a Mr. Steele, proprietor of a lavender-water warehouse, in Catherine Street, Strand ; which they perpetrated on Satur- day, the 6th, on Hounslow Heath. The murderers were not discovered until 1806, when an accomplice, named Benjamin Hornfield, turned King's evidence against them. His story ran as follows : " I have known Haggerty eight or nine years, and Holloway six or seven. We were accustomed to meet at the Black Horse and Turk's Head public-houses in Dyot 304 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. Street. I was in their company in the month of November 1802. Holloway called me out from the Turk's Head, and asked me if I had any objection to be in a good thing ? I replied I had not. He said it was a ' No Toby,' meaning a foot-pad robbery. . . . We parted, and two days after we met again, and Saturday, November 6th, was appointed. I asked who was to go with us ? He replied that Haggerty had agreed to make one. We all three met on the Satur- day at the Black Horse, when Holloway said our business is to 'sarve' a gentleman on Hounslow Heath, who, I understand, travels that road with property. We then drank for three or four hours, and about the middle of the day we set off for Hounslow. . . . We stopped near the eleventh milestone, and secreted ourselves in a clump of trees. After loitering about a considerable time, Holloway said he heard a footstep, and we proceeded towards Bedfont. We presently saw a man coming towards us, and on ap- proaching him we ordered him to stop, which he im- mediately did. The deceased put his hand in his pocket, and gave Haggerty his money. . . . Haggerty proceeded to search him, when the deceased made some resistance, and struggled so much that we got across the road. He cried out severely; and, as a carriage was coming up, Holloway said, ' Take care, I will silence the b ,' and immediately struck him several heavy blows on the head and body. The deceased heaved a heavy groan, and stretched himself out lifeless." Confirmatory evidence being forthcoming, the two prisoners were convicted and sentenced to death. They were executed at the Old Bailey on February 22nd, 1807. It is said that 40,000 persons were present, and that in the crush and con- fusion, a panic taking place, nearly forty lives were lost. : its THE STORY OF OLD PATCH. A PLATITUDE that invariably drops from judicial lips, when some clever rogue has at last been tripped up by the law which he has hitherto contrived to elude, is to the effect that if the prisoner at the bar had devoted to the pursuit of honesty half the talent and perseverance he had given up to illegal and dishonourable practices, he would have secured a commensurate reward. This is hardly, I think, the world's opinion as founded upon the world's experience. Indeed, I think there is a very general belief that (from the world's point of view) honesty does not " pay." On the other hand, Justice does not always lag behind, as the Latin poet describes her, with limping foot, and the knave, even on this terrestrial globe, sometimes meets with his deserts is sometimes made to feel, with unexpected severity, that the way of the transgressor is hard. In homely phrase, the pitcher goes to the well unfortunately, not the well where Truth lies hidden once too often. In playing against Fate, the gambler finds that Fate throws the trump card after all ! Such was the case with that most con- summate of scoundrels, Old Patch ; and it is difficult to read the story of the man's infamous career without inclining to the judicial dictum already quoted, and coming to the con- clusion that he sadly wasted his extraordinary astuteness, 20 306 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. patience, and calculation. Yet, at the same time, we cannot read it without perceiving that he was, nevertheless, one of the sorriest of knaves mean, heartless, and unscru- pulous; with such grave defects in his moral nature that an honourable life would scarcely have been possible to him. Charles Price, alias Old Patch, was the son of a tailor, and born in Monmouth Street, Seven Dials. At the age of six he was sent to school, which he left at the age of twelve with the usual acquirements a smattering of French, and a rudimentary acquaintance with English. From childhood upwards he was in heart and brain a knave; and Calvinistic divines would be justified in point- ing to him as a proof of the truth of the " original sin ' dogma, so early did he begin to tread the path of dis- honesty. A single specimen of his boyish craft will suffice. A Jack Tar, fresh from sea, was caught by Master Price looking about for a slop-seller's, and inveigled into a room so dark that it was impossible to appraise the real texture of any article exhibited. He was induced to buy a coat and waistcoat much too small for him, by Charles's voluble assurances that the fit was excellent. Their real value was about two guineas; but Charles, when the sailor inquired the price, declared, "on his honour," that he could not possibly take less than five. His customer made no demur, and put down the money. Charles then slipped down to his father's journeyman, on the pretence of packing up the clothes, and told him he had fallen in with " a flat," and was angry with himself for not having asked another guinea. " Do you follow me upstairs," said he, " ask what I have done, pretend to be very angry, protest they cost you six guineas, give me two or three kicks or cufFs, and I dare swear we shall get more money out of him, and then, THE STORY OF OLD PATCH. 307 as my father is not at home, we will go halves in all we get above the five guineas." This ingenious little farce was performed exactly as invented by the author; and the good-natured sailor, to save the boy from a beating, gave the extra guinea. Master Price then handed two guineas to his father, half a guinea to the journeyman, and kept three guineas and a half as " the reward of virtue." This promising youth soon wearied out the patience of his father, who, to get rid of him, and in the hope he would do better under a stranger's discipline, apprenticed him, with a considerable premium, to a hatter and hosier in St. James's Street. But here his knaveries were soon detected, and, to escape punishment, he ran away. Next we find him making the tour of Europe as valet to Sir Francis Blake Delaval. On his return to London he took to the stage, and made the acquaintance of Foote, the dramatist, wit, and mimic, whom he induced to embark in a sham brewery, by which Foote lost 500. He himself became bankrupt ; then started a distillery, defrauded the revenue, and was sent to the King's Bench ; again turned brewer ; set up as a lottery-ofiice keeper and stockbroker ; paid his addresses to a Mrs. Pounteney, and ran away with her niece, who came of a good family; and by a variety of experiences perfected himself in his profession of swindler, though it is to be observed that he was never much the better for his exceptional skill. He was always cheating and tricking to make money, and yet always in want of it, which is usually the case with men like Charles Price. Ill-gotten gains have a way of vanishing swiftly, like fairy gold. It has been said of this prince of swindlers that he could be servile to meanness when his servility would gain a 808 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. shilling ; whereas he was rude to insolence when called upon to pay a shilling, unless the demand were enforced by the law. He occasionally paid his debts ; but only when by so doing he saw a prospect of running up others. Possessing an extensive knowledge of men and manners, to superficial observers he appeared a very agreeable and accomplished individual. He knew something of most of the living languages, had travelled all over France and Holland, and been at most of the German Courts. He was at Copenhagen during the crisis in the fate of the unhappy Matilda Queen of Denmark, sister to George III., and wrote a pamphlet in her behalf, with the view to prove that the true motive for the shameful attack on her character was to effect a revolution in favour of the Queen- Do wager's son. It showed that he had " an eye directed to the cabals of the Court, and an understanding capable of developing its intrigues." To this we may add that he had a considerable talent for the personation of character, in which he was assisted by his knowledge of the art and mysteries of " making-up " gained during his brief career upon the stage. Dishonesty was so ingrained in this man's nature that he never prospered in any vocation, from his utter inability to keep faith with customer or patron, or anybody he had to deal with. On the Exchange he was a keen and daring speculator ; his wary intellect enabled him to plan the most brilliant combinations ; but his disposition prevented him from enjoying the fruit of even his comparatively honest labours, for he would never settle the account of a customer unless frightened into it and to frighten him required no small portion of ingenuity and resolution. Thns it came to pass that the dealers before long tabooed him; THE STORY OF OLD PATCH. 309 neither bull nor bear would transact business with him ; and being at length excluded from every kind of legitimate enterprise he was driven into desperate courses. On November 5th, 1780, the authorities of the Bank of England, in conjunction with the Bow Street police, issued the following remarkable notice : " Whereas a person answering the following description stands charged with forging two notes, purporting to be bank-notes, one for forty pounds and the other for twenty pounds. Whosoever will apprehend him, or give such immediate notice at this office as may be the means of apprehending him, shall receive one hundred pounds reward on his commitment. . . . " He appears about fifty years of age, about five feet six inches high, stout-made, very sallow complexion, dark eyes and eyebrows, speaks in general very deliberately, with a foreign accent ; has worn a black patch over his left eye, tied with string round his head ; sometimes wears a white wig, his hat flapped before, and nearly so at the sides j a brown camlet great-coat, buttons of the same, with a large cape, which he always wears so as to cover the lower part of his face; appears to have very thick legs, which hang over his shoes as if swelled ; his shoes are very broad at the toes, and little narrow, old-fashioned silver buckles ; black stocking breeches, walks with a short crutch stick with an ivory head, stoops or affects to stoop very much, and walks slow as if infirm ; he has lately hired many hackney coaches in different parts of the town, and been frequently set down in or near Portland Place, in which neighbourhood it is supposed he lodges. " He is connected with a woman who answers the following 310 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. description : She is rather tall and genteel, thin face and person, about thirty years of age, light hair, rather a yellow cast on her face, and pitted with the small-pox, a downcast look, speaks very slow, sometimes wears a coloured tunic jacket and petticoat, and sometimes a white one, a small black bonnet, and a black cloak, and assumes the character of a lady's maid. " N.B. It is said that about fifteen months since he lodged at Mrs. Parker's, No. 40, in Great Titchfield Street (who is since dead), at which time he went by the name of Wigmore." The forger described with so much particularity of detail in this curious document was no other than our friend Charles Price ! For some months he had been putting into circulation Bank of England notes, so cleverly executed that only the most skilful experts could detect then- fraudulent character. These notes were invariably traced to have issued from one man, always disguised, but the most ingenious efforts of the authorities had failed to effect his capture. And this, because he had no co-operators. Having practised engraving until he had acquired the necessary adroitness, he engraved the forged notes himself. He made his own ink, and, having purchased the necessary implements, fabricated the well-known water-mark. And, as a rule, he was his own negotiator. He was secure, therefore, against betrayal by any accomplice. His sole confidante was his wife's aunt, Mrs. Pounteney, upon whose fidelity he knew he could safely rely. At her lodgings, near Portland Place, he kept his tools. To a man of Price's ingenuity the manufacture of the forged notes presented little difficulty ; it was the disposing of them that called into action all the resources of his THE STORY OF OLD PATCH. 311 invention. At length, he hit upon the expedient of engaging in the assumed character of Mr. Brunk, con- fidential servant to a wealthy young nobleman a youth of good character, whom he knew to be honest, unsophisticated, and ingenuous to act as under-servant. He was informed that his duties would be light, and his salary eighteen shillings per week. The engagement was no sooner com- pleted than the young fellow was immediately sent to purchase lottery tickets, for which he paid with Price's forged notes, Price invariably making some excuse to meet him on his return, and receive the change; while Mrs. Pounteney always " shadowed " the unsuspecting agent on his various errands, to watch if the notes were detected, and give immediate warning, in such an event, to the forger, who, by throwing off his disguise, could change at once from Mr. Brunk to Mr. Charles Price. For the young man, never having seen Price in his own person, would never have recognised his employer without his patch, his gouty legs, his great coat and cape. Some of his devices were singularly ingenious, though entailing upon him a vast strain and labour to carry out. One Sunday morning a coachman inquired for the young man, Samuel, at his former master's, where he still lodged, and was informed that he was not at home, and would not be till the next morning. The coachman held a parcel in his hand, which he said he was ordered to give to Samuel only, and accordingly he crossed the way, and returned it to an old gentleman who was waiting there. " Samuel's former master saw this old gentleman get into a coach, but in a moment the coachman came back and left the parcel, which contained notes to the amount of 300, with a letter 312 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. directing Samuel to buy, next morning, an eight-guinea lottery chance and a whole ticket, and to make other purchases of lottery tickets till all the notes were changed, and to meet his master, Mr. Brunk, at Mill's Coffee-house, Gerard Street, Soho, at twelve o'clock the next day. Samuel duly executed these commissions, but on inquiry at the coffee-house found no such person as Mr. Brunk had been there. In a few minutes, however, as he was standing at the coffee-house door, a coachman summoned him to Mr. Brunk, who was waiting in a coach at the corner of Macclesfield Street. He desired Samuel to come in, and made him sit on his left hand the patch was on the left eye and having received the tickets, shares, and balances, ordered him to bid the coachman drive towards Hampstead. On the way he gave Samuel three- sixteenths as a reward for his diligence, and talked much of his ward, the young nobleman, who, he said, would be in town in a day or two, when he would be highly pleased with Samuel's industry. He discoursed on these subjects till they reached Mother Blackcap's [a well-known tavern in Kentish Town, which is still, I believe, in existence], when Samuel received orders to bid the coachman turn round; and, on their way back, Samuel had notes for .500 given to him, with directions to lay them out in the same manner about the 'Change, and meet his master in the evening at the same place, where he intended to dine ; but, for obvious reasons, Samuel was ordered not to make his purchases at the offices he had previously visited. " Samuel, having performed this task also, went to the coffee-house, where a porter accosted him, and conducted him to his master in a coach, as usual. He was now THE STORY OF OLD PATCH. 313 blamed for his delay, and an appearance of anger assumed, with a declaration that he would not do if not punctual, for that the nobleman was very particular in time, even to a minute. Samuel apologised, and Brunk received the cash and shares, and ordered him to go to the New Inn, Westminster Bridge, and hire a post-chaise to carry them to Greenwich to meet the nobleman's steward, who was also his banker, to whom he was going for money to purchase more tickets, observing, at the same time, on the imprudence and prodigality of his ward. " At Greenwich Samuel was desired to go to the Ship and order a dinner, while Brunk was engaged, as he pretended, in negotiating his business ; he instructed him not to wait longer than three o'clock, but go to dinner at that time if he, Brunk, did not return. It was not till half-past four that Brunk came, hobbling, coughing, and seemingly quite out of breath with fatigue. They then drank tea together, and afterwards returned in the chaise to Lombard Street, where it was discharged. Then Sam received more notes to the amount of 350, which he got rid of in the usual way ; and at the City coffee-house was again fortunate enough to meet his master before he got to the door. Brunk ordered him to attend the next evening at his lodgings, which he accordingly did, and afterwards at three or four other times, in the course of which attend- ance he negotiated .500 more of the forged notes." Samuel was evidently a very simple-minded youth, or his suspicions would have been excited by so extraordinary a course of proceeding. He remained, however, in happy ignorance of the part he was playing until one of the notes was traced to him as the passer ; when his arrest and imprisonment effectually, but disagreeably, enlightened 314 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. him. He told his tale, but at first such simplicity met with incredulous smiles : and he lay in prison eleven months before he could establish his innocence. Upon the information which he supplied the police laid a plan for entrapping Old Patch, but his quick eye having detected some dubious movements, he took the alarm and escaped. In the next lottery Price played the same game, but with notes of higher value. They met, however, with a sharper scrutiny; another lad was taken into custody; another attempt was made to seize his employer, and Price, or Patch, again eluded pursuit. His next manffluvre was an advertisement for a person in the linen-drapery business; and with notes varying in value from .50 to .100 two young men, his agents, purchased linen-drapery at different shops. This fraud was also detected by the police, and Price compelled to try some fresh expedient. In November 1782, a Mr. Spilsbury, of Soho Square, proprietor of a patent medicine known as "Spilsbury's Drops," found that a card bearing the name of Wilmott had been left at his house during his absence. The next evening he received the following note : " Mr. Wilmott's compliments to Mr. Spilsbury wishes to converse with him ten minutes, having an order for his drops, at half -past five o'clock this evening. "No. 17, Gresse Street, Eathbone Place." Mr. Spilsbury punctually made his appearance in Gresse Street, and was ushered into the parlour by a foot-boy. A few minutes' delay, and in tottered a very infirm old man, oddly attired in a great coat and a slouched hat, with a large bush-wig under the hat, his jaws swaddled in red flannel, and his legs wrapped up in the same material. THE STORY OF OLD PATCH. 315 He wore green spectacles, and a green silk shade hung from his hat. Mr. Wilmott, alias Patch, alias Price, apologised for his dress, on the ground that he had suffered severely from the drawing of a tooth by an unskilful dentist, and was compelled to wear the flannel on his face as a protection against cold. He then entered into very familiar conversation with Mr. Spilsbury, warmly extolling the curative properties of his " Drops," relating some extraordinary cures which they had effected, and finally dismissing him with the promise of an order in a few days. The delay was probably intended to give time for discovering if any suspicion existed on Spilsbury's part ; and as soon as Price thought all was safe, he wrote as follows : " Mr. Wilmott's compliments to Mr. Spilsbury, desires he will put up twelve bottles of Drops at 3*. 6d. against Friday at three o'clock. The boy will call and pay for them ; also Mr. Spilsbury will send a form or copy of advertisement and attestation, leaving a blank for the names. The case was, the man was violently broke out in legs, body, and face, and he actually had no other physic than two of the bottles, and it is really astonishing how much he is recovered. When Mr. Wilmott comes to town to-morrow week he will send the voucher authenticated by six people of consequence. " Gresse Street, No. 17." Mr. Spilsbury must have believed (mirabile dictuf) in the merits of his own medicine, or this proffered testimonial would have led him to suspect Mr. Wilmott's good faith. Another week's delay occurred before the boy called for the dozen bottles, paying for them with a 10 note, and receiving 1 18s. change the paltry sum for which Price had worked out so elaborate a system of deception. The 316 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. .10 note was paid away; and directly thereafter Mr. Spilsbury was invited to attend at Bow Street, and charged with uttering a forged note. As the novelists say, his astonishment is more easily imagined than described. When he had to some extent recovered, he told his pathetic story about Mr. Wilmott, and his patronage of Spilsbury's Drops the police officers were immediately despatched to Gresse Street, but the bird had flown. Not long afterwards Mr. Spilsbury met Price with whom he had previously been acquainted, but whose identity with the fraudulent Wilmott he had not for one moment suspected at a coffee-house in Percy Street, where, over a cup of chocolate, he narrated his recent misadventure. Price affected to listen to the moving tale with the deepest interest, occasionally exclaiming, " Lack-a-day ! Good heavens ! Who would believe that such knavery existed ? What ! and did the Bank of England actually refuse pay- ment ? " " Oh, yes," replied Spilsbury, sharply ; " though it is on the faith of the Bank of England that I and a great many others have taken them ; and they are so inimitably executed that the wisest judges can hardly detect them." " Good heavens ! " again cried Price ; " he must have been an ingenious villain ! What a complete old scoundrel ! " In illustration of the amazing effrontery which was so marked a feature of the man's character, I may mention that when Ryland, an artist, was to suffer death for forging an East India bond, Price requested the use of a window in Oxford Street from a tradesman whom, as Mr. Wilmott or Mr. Patch, he had defrauded in the same way that he had practised upon Mr. Spilsbury. He was actually present when Ryland passed on his way to the fatal "Tyburn tree," though the consciousness that the same terrible fate THE STORY OF OLD PATCH. 317 might be his own must have been present to him ; and with the greatest composure, as was afterwards recollected, he remarked, " There goes one of the most ingenious men in the world, but as wicked as he is ingenious ! He is the very man who has done all the mischief in the character of Patch ! He deserves his fate, and would confess the fact if he was not in hopes of a respite, which he would have obtained, perhaps, had not the directors been certain that it was charity to the public to let him suffer." It is surprising that no one who heard this extraordinary speech seems to have inquired how Price had become aware of Ry land's identity with Patch. A question or two might have opened the way to some important revelations, which even Price's ingenuity, great as it undoubtedly was, could hardly have warded off. For five years from the date of the Bank of England's advertisement, quoted in the earlier part of this narrative, Price pursued his felonious career, defying every effort of justice at his detection. It is impossible within any moderate limits of space, and would assuredly be unprofit- able, to describe his frauds in their long succession. Necessarily they were all of a very similar complexion, only the details being altered to meet the different con- ditions under which they were perpetrated. They all evinced the same ingenuity of resource, the same patience in execution, and the same unscrupulousness. There was nothing about them of the romantic interest that attaches to the crimes of the highwayman or the pirate, who risks his life boldly, playing for the highest stake open to him. Price's felonies were of the meanest and vulgarest stamp ; and he was careful always to skulk in the shade, incurring the smallest possible amount of personal hazard. 318 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. At length he found the circulation of his forged notes rendered exceedingly dangerous by the vigilant measures which the authorities had adopted, and he turned his atten- tion to another form of knavery. Adopting an entirely new disguise, he resorted to one or other of the coffee-houses which were then so numerous near the Royal Exchange, and hired a boy to carry a sum of ten pounds to the Bank, with directions to receive from the teller the cus- tomary ticket to the cashier, but instead of taking it to the latter direct, to bring it first to Price ; who then altered the ticket from 10 to 100, or if it were for 50 to 150, and hiring another messenger sent it to the cashier. He, of course, paid over the larger sum in Bank of England notes without suspicion. It is obvious that this fraud must soon have been detected, as the Bank books, when balanced, would have revealed the discrepancy between the tickets as issued by the teller and received by the cashier. It was dis- covered, however, in a different manner. A bank-note which he had received on a forged ticket he passed to a pawnbroker in Berwick Street, where he was known by the name of Powell, and was in the frequent habit of pledging articles of value. Some small circumstances excited sus- picion that he was the urgently wanted Patch or Price ; and an officer was stationed in the shop every day to await his next call. He came on the second day, and was immediately arrested. At first his demeanour was insolent, and he accused everybody concerned in his arrest of ma- lignant efforts to blacken an innocent man's character; but when his old servant Samuel appeared as evidence against him at the Bow Street examination, he seems to have felt that " the game was up." Through the agency THE STORY OF OLD PATCH. 319 of his wife and son, who were now for the first time brought acquainted with the mystery of his double life, he contrived to send a message to Mrs. Pounteney, desiring her at once to destroy all his tools and disguises a message on which she faithfully acted. He was examined three times before the magistrate at Bow Street, defending himself on each occasion with great skill and composure ; but the witnesses for the prosecution became more numerous, and were positive as to his identity, so that his committal for trial was a foregone conclusion. Unable to face the shame of a public execution, he in- formed his son that " the people of the prison came into his room sooner than he wished ; and that he had something secret to write, which they might get at by suddenly coming upon him." This, he said, he wished to prevent ; and he gave him money to purchase two gimlets and " a sixpenny cord," showing him how he would fasten the gimlets in the doorpost, and tie the cord across the door, which opened inwards. The poor youth carried out his father's instructions ; and the turnkey, on entering his prisoner's apartment on the morning of January 25th, 1786, found the lifeless body of Old Patch hanging by the sixpenny cord from two gimlets fastened into a hat-rack. Such was the poor result of all his cleverness, all his fertile ingenuity, patience, and perseverance. A life with- out real enjoyment, and a suicide's death ! But something more remains to be stated. Price left behind him three documents : one, a petition to the King on behalf of his wife and children ; the second, a letter to the keeper of the prison, thanking him for his kindly treatment ; and the third, a letter to his wife, in which he begged her forgiveness for the injuries he had done her. In 320 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. his domestic life he seems to have been harsh and tyrannical. In each document he strongly and emphatically asserted his innocence of the crimes laid to his charge. And with this lie traced by his dying hand he went to face the Great Assize, which judges the souls of men. THE STORIES OF DR. DODD AND HENRY FAUNTLEROY. Two of the most remarkable victims of the Draconian statutes against forgery which formerly disgraced our criminal code (and were not wholly repealed until 1837, though no execution took place under them after 1829)* were the Rev. Dr. Dodd and Fauntleroy the banker. Owing to their social position, and the circumstances under which their crimes were committed, their cases produced a deep impression on the public mind, and a halo of sentiment gathered round the unhappy offenders which to this day is not entirely dissipated. That the punishment meted out to them was excessive, and that so far they might justly claim our sympathy, I admit ; but in all other respects I see nothing in them or their crime to justify the maudlin and morbid feeling which has invested their names with a spurious romance. Nothing is more remarkable, however, than the caprice with which the English public selects the objects of its anger or compassion. The severity with which it treats the crimes of some unfortunates is not less surprising than the leniency it exhibits towards the darker offences of others. And the worst of it is that no one can * The first execution for forgery took place in 1634. The last person who suffered was one Thomas Maynard, hung on December 31st, 1829. STORIES OF DR. DODD AND HENRY FAUNTLEROY. 321 predicate beforehand who will be the scapegoat or the hero. The most trifling circumstances suffice to determine the current of popular opinion ; so that one murderer is hooted to the gibbet, while another, not less guilty, evokes the profoundest commiseration, and not a stone is left un- turned to secure a mitigation of his sentence. Decidedly the vox populi is a vox incerta ! William Dodd was born at Bourne, in Lincolnshire, where his father held the vicarage, in 1729. After .re- ceiving his elementary education privately, he was admitted as a sizar of Clare Hall, Cambridge, and took his Bachelor's Degree in 1750. Endowed by nature with considerable talents, a handsome person, and attractive manners, he was welcomed among the young men of fashion in the University, and acquired a taste for luxury and dissipation which marred his future life. While yet an undergraduate he had shown some literary facility in his abridgments of Dr. Clarke, Grotius, and John Locke, and in numerous trifles in verse. But he began his career with a serious mistake, falling in love with and marrying a girl who had little to recommend her but her beauty " Lord Sand- wich's mistress," according to Horace Walpole; the daughter, other authorities say, of the verger of a cathedral ; though she may have been both. This mesalliance called his father up to London, where the reckless young man had furnished, on credit, a house in Wardour Street (then quite a fashionable locality), and after some consideration it was decided that he should take Holy Orders. In the same year he published his well-known " Beauties of Shakespeare," which may still be found in the catalogues of the London booksellers ; and in the following year a novel (" The Sisters "), which was a discredit to his cloth, and is now happily forgotten. 21 322 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. Possessed of some showy oratorical ability, Dodd soon became popular in London as a preacher ; while as curate at St. James's, Garlick-hithe, he did a considerable amount of solid parochial work. At bottom he was, 1 think, a man of good intentions, with a strong philanthropical bias ; but his tastes were expensive, and he lacked the safeguard of a settled purpose. He displayed no small activity in furthering the establishment both of the Humane Society and the Magdalen Hospital. He preached the inaugural sermon when the latter was opened in 1758 ; and Horace Walpole describes the effect produced by his eloquence, not only on the female penitents of the charity, but on the aristocratic ladies and women of fashion drawn thither by the popularity of the handsome young preacher. His patron, the Bishop of St. David's, bestowed on him some small preferments, and recommended him to the polite Earl of Chesterfield as tutor to his son, the Hon. Philip Stanhope. His feet were thus well placed on the ladder of fortune ; but his old failings still clung to him his luxurious pro- pensities and his defective standard of honour. He had his house in London and his country house at Baling; Mrs. Dodd had her coach and pair, and gave her ball's and card parties. It is due to the foolish man's memory to admit that he was no idler. He seems to have per- formed his clerical duties with regularity ; he wrote and published numerous sermons, poems, commentaries on the Bible, political pamphlets ; and he edited religious maga- zines. Such of his literary work as I have seen is, however, conspicuous for its mediocrity. Having won a prize of 1,000 in a lottery, he started two proprietary chapels, and conducted them with a good deal of success. STORIES OF DR. DODD AND HENRY FA UNTLEROT. 323 He was then presented with the vicarage of Hockliffe, and as he already held that of Chalgrove, his income must have been a fairly large one. But it was insufficient to meet his extravagance; and in 1772 his "eternal want of pence " drove him to the commission of a fatal error. The valuable living of St. George's, Hanover Square, was vacant. Its revenues would relieve him from all his em- barrassments. It was in the gift of the Crown, and his evil genius betrayed him into writing an anonymous letter to Lady Apsley, the wife of the Lord Chancellor, offering her a present of 3000 guineas if, through her influence, it was bestowed upon Dr. Dodd. The authorship of the letter was detected, and Dodd's reputation blasted by exposure. George III. struck him off the list of his chaplains ; the newspapers commented severely on his simony ; and Samuel Foote ridiculed him on the stage of the Haymarket. Bowing his head to the storm, he spent some months on the Continent. On his return to London he resumed his role of pulpit orator ; and might, perhaps, have recovered his position, but for the pressure of his debts and the clamour of his creditors. On February 2nd, 1777, he preached at the Magdalen what proved to be his last sermon. Two days later, in a moment of desperation, he forged the name of his former pupil, who had succeeded to the Earldom of Chesterfield, to a bond for 4,200. Of course a man who commits such a crime must have long been familiar with irregular expedients, and the suggestions of dishonesty. Pretending to act on behalf of an impecunious young nobleman, he endeavoured to negotiate this bond with several usurers, and succeeded at length with a Mr. Robertson. But the bankers to whom Robertson passed 324 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. it thought proper to refer it to Lord Chesterfield, who at once repudiated it, and thus the forgery was discovered before Dodd could complete his arrangements. When arrested he endeavoured to save himself by returning ,3,000, giving a cheque on his bankers for .700, and a bill of sale on his furniture for 400, while he made up the remaining 100 from various sources. This act of restitution, prompt and complete as it was, failed to pro- pitiate his persecutors; nor could Lord Chesterfield be persuaded to interfere on behalf of the man though he was his former tutor, and had made what reparation he could for his offence who had had the criminal audacity to trifle with his lordly name. His arrest took place at an old farmhouse near Whitton, whither he had fled for concealment. The unhappy man was brought to trial, found guilty by the jury after only five minutes' consultation (there was, of course, no doubt as to the fact), and sentenced to death. He declared in his defence that he had never intended to defraud, which was probably true, and had executed the bond only as a temporary provision to meet overwhelming pressure. I suspect he had also trusted to the lenity of his former pupil if his faux pas were discovered ; but in that case he had wrongly interpreted the young man's character. His miserable position, as contrasted with his former popularity and repute, went home to the feelings of the public ; and strenuous exertions were made to obtain a commutation of punishment. Letters on his behalf appeared in every newspaper. The parish officers, dressed in mourning, made a house-to-house visitation, to procure signatures to a petition to the King; which, when com- pleted, spread over twenty-three skins of parchment, and STORIES OF DR. D ODD AND HENR Y FA UNTLER Y. 325 bristled with 20,000 names. The Lord Mayor and the Common Council repaired in a body to St. James's Palace to solicit the royal mercy. Dodd appealed to Dr. Johnson to help him, and the great man of letters responded to the appeal with admirable energy. He drew up, in Dodd's name, a very effective letter to the King (which is reprinted by Boswell), and another to the Queen, in the name of Mrs. Dodd ; also letters in the public press ; and " Dr. Dodd's Last Solemn Declaration." All in vain : the King was not leniently disposed ; he had been taught to believe that the commercial credit of the country was indissolubly bound up with the death-penalty for forgery. Farther, in the previous year, pardon had been refused to two brothers named Perreau, who had been convicted of the same crime, though their guilt was far from being satisfactorily proved ; and Lord Mansfield, the great Chief Justice, frankly told the King that if Dodd's punishment were remitted, then the Perreaus had been murdered. When it was urged that his execution would sully the credit of the profession to which he belonged, the obvious answer was made, almost in the words of the Regent Duke of Orleans (which he borrowed from Corneille *) in the case of the Count d'Horn, that if their credit were sullied, it would be by the man's crime, and not by his punishment. Some doubt having been thrown on the legal admissibility of a portion of the evidence on which the unfortunate man had been convicted, a delay of several weeks occurred while the chief judicial authorities were consulted. Eventually they decided against the prisoner; and the execution of his sentence was thereupon fixed for June 27th. There is * Corneille's words are to the effect that the scaffold is not the shame, but the crime. 826 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. a story that he might have made hjs escape, if he had not too sanguinely relied on the certainty of a reprieve. The governor of Newgate treated him with exceptional in- dulgence, allowing him books, papers, and a reading-desk, as well as a daily supply of delicacies, which were brought to him by a female servant. It so happened that this woman bore a remarkable facial likeness to the Doctor, which was greatly heightened when she put on his wig and gown. Her consent having been obtained, some of his friends arranged that, on a certain day, his irons having previously been filed asunder, he should change clothes with the servant, and while she, dressed in his canonical habili- ments, took his place at the desk, he, in a woman's attire, with a bundle under his arm, should quietly walk out of the prison. And in those days prison discipline was so lax that the stratagem, though an old one, might probably have succeeded if the Doctor could have been induced to adopt it. Shortly before the day of execution, he delivered in the prison chapel an " Address to his Unhappy Brethren," which, it is understood, was written for him by Dr. Johnson. It was generally reported that the unfortunate man was fully resigned to his fate, but Johnson said, in his rough emphatic way, that " he would have given both his hands and both his legs to have lived." It is known that he charged the executioner, Edward Dennis, afterwards hanged for his share in the Gordon Riots, " not to pull his legs " which was frequently done in those days in order to shorten a criminal's sufferings. The hangman was also bribed, it is said, so to adjust the knot that it might not cause strangulation. STORIES OF DR. D ODD AND HENR T FA UNTLER Y. 327 " In a drizzling shower of rain, by the side of a horse stealer," as Horace Walpole chronicles, " the unhappy forger was conveyed from Newgate to Tyburn, and there, in the presence of an immense concourse of spectators, was done to death, according to the law."* As soon as the body was cut down, it was conveyed by Dr. Dodd's friends to the house of one Davies, an undertaker, in Goodge Street, Tottenham Court Road, where, under the direction of the then famous Dr. Potts, it was placed in a hot bath, and strenuous exertions were made to resuscitate life. They failed ; and I think it is safe to assume that the hangman had ignored Dodd's instructions. His remains were after- wards interred privately in the churchyard of Cowley, Middlesex, where they lie without any memorial. It is worth noting, I think, that among Dodd's published works is a sermon entitled " The Frequency of Capital Punishments is Inconsistent with Justice, Sound Policy, and Pveligion." In 1772, a highwayman, who had stopped his coach on the road from Baling, and fired at him, but was captured, on Dodd's evidence was found guilty and executed. Thereafter the Doctor preached and published the foregoing discourse. Bishop Newton is reported to have said that Dr. Dodd deserved pity because he was hanged for the least crime he had committed. It is abundantly clear, from contem- porary records, that his moral character had undergone a serious deterioration before he ventured on the crime of forgery. He had been living a double life a kind of Hyde and Jekyll life for many years. In bis wig and gown he was the fervent preacher, the active parson, the practical * The gibbet stood on the site of what is now No. 7, Connaught Square. 328 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. philanthropist ; when he threw them aside he was the boon companion, the gay roysterer, the man of luxurious and expensive tastes which had to be gratified at any cost. That such a man would some day slip from vice into crime might, I suppose, have safely been predicted of him by any observer. A good many of us, it is to be feared, are always hovering on the brink ; and our escape from destruction may not be due to any good resolution of our own, or any timely penitence. When Richard Baxter saw a poor wretch, handcuffed and fettered, going to prison between a couple of constables, " There, but for the mercy of God," he exclaimed, " goes Richard Baxter." The reflection may teach us to deal charitably with men like Dr. Dodd, though we refuse them the sympathy they do not deserve. [The following bibliographical particulars may be useful : " Authentic Memoirs of the Life of William Dodd : to which is added a Letter from Lady Huntington to the Unfortunate Convict," Salisbury, 1777. "An Account of the Life of William Dodd," London, 1777. A New Song on Dr. Dodd," broadside folio, London, 1777. "Historical Memoirs of the Life and Writings of the late Rev. William Dodd" (by T. Read), London, 1777. "Genuine Memoirs of the Rev. William Dodd, with the Particulars of the Trial," London, 1777. "A full Account of the Life and Trial of Doctor Dodd," London, 1777. "Thoughts in Prison, in Five Parts, by William Dodd, to which are added his Last Prayer, and Other Pieces," same date. " Thoughts in Prison, etc. ; to which are added, the Last Prayer, the Convict's Address to his Unhappy Brethren, and other Miscellaneous Pieces, with an Account of the Author, and a List of his Works," 3rd edition, London, 1789. And "The Convict's Address to his^ Unhappy STORIES OF DR. DODD AND HENRY FAUNTLEROY. 329 Brethren, Delivered in the Chapel of Newgate on Friday, June 6th, 1777, by William Dodd, 2nd edition. To which is added his Genuine Speech in the Court, Previous to his Receiving Sentence," London, 1777.] The terrible discrepancy between the penalty and the crime was probably one of the reasons why persons con- victed of forgery excited, according to Gibbon Wakefield, the prison philanthropist, " an extraordinary degree of interest in all who approached them." When the punish- ment largely exceeds the offence in its degree, a reaction always takes place in men's minds towards the offender. And as the forger usually belonged to a class superior in social position to that from which criminals were generally drawn, his treatment in prison was generally very different to theirs. Fauntleroy the banker, for instance, was not thrust into the dreadful gloom of a prison-cell, but allowed to occupy a turnkey's room; was liberally supplied with every comfort ; and kept separate from the other prisoners during the whole period of his confinement. A curious incident occurred in connection with his last hours. The chaplain of Newgate, the Rev. Mr. Cotton, when preaching before the unhappy man " the condemned sermon " on the Sunday immediately preceding his execution had, with more honesty than feeling, drawn a moral from his career, and the sad conclusion of it, for the benefit of the rest of the congregation, which then included a large number of outsiders. For this mistake he was afterwards summoned before the gaol committee of aldermen, and informed that in future the public would not be admitted a very proper decision. "I was also informed," says the chaplain, "that this resolution was in consequence of their disapproving of 330 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. my last discourse, in which I had enlarged on the heinous nature of Fauntleroy's crime, and warned the public to avoid such conduct. I was informed that this unnecessarily harassed his feelings, and that the object of such sermons was solely to console the prisoner, and that from the time of his conviction nothing but what is consolatory should be addressed to a criminal." Henry Fauntleroy was the leading partner in a well- known firm of bankers, which had been established by his father and some other gentlemen. After receiving a careful education, he was placed in the bank as a clerk at the age of fifteen. In 1807 he succeeded his father in the manage- ment, and at once discovered, as he afterwards alleged, that the firm had greatly endangered their position by reckless advances to builders, and maintained their credit simply by a system of wholesale discounting. The bankruptcy of two of its clients dealt the bank a further shock, as it became liable for a sum of .170,000; and additional failures involved another loss of .100,000. Then in 1819 one of the partners died, and his heirs withdrew his share of the capital. By this time the bank's resources were almost entirely exhausted; but Fauntleroy, instead of acknow- ledging the desperate condition of its affairs, created a temporary capital by the expedient of forging powers of attorney, and realising the securities of depositors. When the bubble eventually burst, a document was found among his papers giving full particulars of the sums he had thus obtained, amounting in all to $ jitenj alj % JtaHan Jteij* IN these London Stories we find it impossible to ignore the darker aspects of the life of the Great City. To some of the terrible crimes which stand recorded in its annals every writer is necessarily compelled to allude. I confess, however, that for such subjects I have no special liking; and it is not without reluctance I repeat the painful narrative of the foul atrocity which at one time made the names of Bishop and Williams the familiar theme of popular execration. Sixty years ago the authorities of the London medical schools carried on a repulsive traffic in dead bodies for anatomical purposes ; and as they made no, or few, inquiries into the circumstances under which they were obtained, it is to be feared that their culpable carelessness led, as in the case of Burke and Hare, and the so-called Resurrection Men the ghouls who violated the sanctities of the graveyard to the perpetration of numerous crimes. It was unques- tionably the cause of the murders with which the names of Bishop and Williams are connected. On November 5th, 1831, Mr. Partridge, Professor of Anatomy at King's College School, was informed that two men, named Bishop and May, well known in this particular line of business, had offered " a subject " for sale in the usual manner. It was purchased for nine guineas, but while examining it Mr. Partridge came to the conclusion THE STORY OF THE ITALIAN BOY. 343 that violence had been used, and made an excuse for de- taining the men until the police could be fetched. The two men, and two others, Williams and Shields, who had helped to carry the hamper, were then conveyed to Bow Street. The police soon ascertained that the " subject " was a poor Italian boy, named Carlo Ferrari, who went about the streets of London with some tame white mice which turned a circular cage for the amusement of the lookers- on; and the evidence adduced at the inquest established the fact that he had been violently done to death the verdict said "by some persons unknown" but the jury intimated their belief that strong suspicion attached to the men in custody. Mr. Minshul, who was then the magistrate in charge at Bow Street, undertook to investigate the affair. He caused an examination to be made of the house where the prisoners lived, No. 3, Nova Scotia Gardens, Bethnal Green. Here clothes stained with blood were found, buried some feet deep in the small back garden. The next house belonged to Williams ; it was also searched, and in the garden were dug up a woman's clothes, which were afterwards proved to have belonged to a woman named Pigburn, one of the victims of these wholesale murderers. A boy's clothes were also disinterred ; and in the end such a mass of evidence was accumulated against the prisoners that when Bishop, Williams , and May were brought to trial on December 2nd, the jury unhesitatingly returned a verdict of Guilty. Sentence of death was immediately recorded, but eventually May was exculpated by Bishop's confession, and respited, and Bishop and Williams alone suffered. The following passages from Bishop's confession may here be given : 344 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. " I, John Bishop, do hereby declare and confess that the boy supposed to be an Italian boy was a Lincolnshire boy. I and Williams took him to my house about half -past ten o'clock on Thursday night, November 3rd. We walked, all three, to the Nova Scotia Gardens, taking a pint of stout at a public-house near Holywell Lane, Shoreditch, on our way, of which we gave the boy a part. We only stayed just to drink it, and walked on to my house, where we arrived about eleven o'clock. My wife and children and Mrs. Williams were not gone to bed, so we put him in the closet, and told him to wait there for us. Williams went in and told them to go to bed, and I remained in the garden. Williams came out directly, and we both walked out of the garden a little way, to give time to the family getting to bed. We returned in about ten minutes or a quarter of an hour, and listened outside the window to ascertain whether the family were gone to bed. All was quiet, and we then went to the boy in the closet, and took him into the house. We lighted a candle, and gave the boy some bread and cheese ; and after he had eaten we gave him a cupful of rum, with about half a small phial of laudanum in it. I had bought the rum the same evening in Smithfield, and the laudanum also in small quantities at different shops. There was no water or other liquid put into the cup with the rum and laudanum. The boy drank the contents of the cup directly in two draughts, and afterwards a little beer. In about ten minutes he fell asleep in the chair on which he sat, and I removed him from the chair to the floor, and laid him on his side. We then went out and left him there. " We then had a quartern of gin and a pint of beer at the ' Feathers/ near Shoreditch Church, and then went THE STORY OF THE ITALIAN SOT. 345 home again, having been away from the boy about twenty minutes. We found him asleep as we had left him. We took him directly, asleep and insensible, into the garden, and tied a cord to his feet to enable us to pull him up by. I then took him in my arms, and let him slide from them headlong into the well in the garden, whilst Williams held the cord to prevent the body going altogether too low in the well. He was nearly wholly in the water, his feet being just above the surface. Williams fastened the other end of the cord round the paling, to prevent the body getting beyond our reach. The boy struggled a little in the water with his arms and legs, and the water bubbled a minute. We waited till these symptoms were past, and then went indoors, and I think we went out and walked down Shoreditch to occupy the time ; but in three-quarters of an hour we returned and took him out of the well, by pulling him up by the cord attached to his feet. We un- dressed him in the paved yard, rolled his clothes up, and buried them. We carried the boy into the washhouse, laid him on the floor, and covered him with a bag. We left him there, and went and had some coffee in Old Street Eoad, and then (a little before two in the morning of Friday) went back to my house. We immediately doubled the body up and put it into a box, which we corded so that nobody might open it to see what it was, and then went again and had some more coffee at the same place in the Old Street Road, where we stayed a little time, and then went home to bed both in the same house, and in our own beds, as usual. We slept till about ten o'clock on Friday morning, when we got up, took breakfast together with the family, and went, both of us, to the 'Fortune of War,' in Smithfield." Bishop also confessed to the murder of Frances Pigburn, 346 A SO OK ABOUT LONDON. the woman whose clothes were exhumed in Williams's garden. It is evident that he and his confederate were led on to these crimes by the ease with which they disposed of their " subjects." After describing their treatment of the poor woman, who, like the Italian boy, was first stupefied with rum and laudanum and then drowned in the well, he continued : " On our return we took her out of the well, cut her clothes off, put them down the closet of the empty house, carried the body into the washhouse of my own house, where we doubled it up and put it in a hair-box, which we corded, and left it there. We did not go to bed, but went to Shields' house in Eagle Street, Red Lion Square, and called him up between four and five in the morning. We then went with Shields to a public-house near the Sessions House, Clerkenwell, and had some gin ; from thence to my house, and stayed a little to wait the change of the police. I told Shields he was to carry the trunk to the London Hospital. He asked if there was a woman in the house who could walk alongside of him, so that people might not take any notice.* Williams called his wife up and asked her to walk with Shields, and to carry a hat-box, which he gave her. There was nothing in it, but it was tied up as if there were. " We then put the box with the body on Shields' head, and went to the hospital, Shields and Mrs. Williams walking on one side of the street, and I and Williams on the other. At St. Thomas's Hospital I saw Mr. South * It is necessary to explain that the exposure of the atrocities of the Resurrection Men had caused immense popular excitement, and suspicious-looking persons with suspicious-looking trunks or boxes were in no little danger of being lynched. THE STORY OF THE ITALIAN BOY. 347 (the surgeon's) footman, and sent him upstairs to Mr. South, to ask if he wanted a subject. The servant brought me word that his master wanted one, but could not give an answer till the next day, as he had not time to look at it. During this interview, Shields, Williams, and his wife were waiting at a public-house. I then went to Mr. Appleton at Mr. Grainger's, and agreed to sell it to him for eight guineas ; and afterwards I fetched it from St. Thomas's Hospital and took it to Mr. Appleton's, who paid me five pounds then and the rest on the following Monday ^ After receiving the five pounds I went to Shields and Williams and his wife at the public-house, and we all went to the ' Flower Pot ' at Bishopsgate, where we had something to drink, and then went home." It is evident that neither Mr. South nor Mr. Appleton made any inquiries as to the circumstances under which these men obtained possession of the " subjects " they dis- posed of so cheaply. Such indifference necessarily favoured the commission of crimes, as the criminals not unreasonably counted upon immunity. Bishop confessed to another murder, that of a boy named Cunningham. The modus operandi was as before : " I and Williams found him sleeping about eleven or twelve o'clock at night, on Friday, October 21st, as I think, under the pig hoards at Pig Market, Smithfield : Williams woke him, and asked him to come along with him, and the boy walked with Williams and me to my house in Nova Scotia Gardens. We took him into my house, and gave him some warm beer, sweetened with sugar, with rum and laudanum in it. He drank two or three cupsful, and then fell asleep in a little chair belonging to one of my children. We then laid him on the floor and went out and got some- 348 A BOOK ABOUT LONDON. thing to drink, and then returned, carried the boy to the well, and threw him in it in the same way as we served the other boy and the woman. He died instantly in the well, and we left him there to give time for the mixture to run out of his body. We then took the body from the well, tore off the clothes, and buried them in the garden. The body we carried into the washhouse, and put it into the same box, and left it there till that same evening, when we got a porter to carry it to St. Bartholomew's Hospital, where I sold it to Mr. Smith for eight guineas." These three murders, it will be seen, brought the perpe- trators no larger gain than about five-and-twenty pounds. On the day of execution both the criminals manifested the most pitiful cowardice and despair. In the case of Bishop, terror had almost paralysed his reason ; he seemed in a state of hideous apathy, and almost unconscious while the process of tying his hands and pinioning his arms was carried out. Then he sank upon a bench, silent. One of the under-sheriffs seated himself by his side, and inquired if he had any further confession to make. " No, sir," he muttered, in a low tone, " I have told all " which, there is good reason to believe, was not true. Williams was then introduced into the press-room ; like his fellow- criminal he was prostrate with fear. His limbs per- ceptibly trembled as he approached the officer who was to pinion him; and his hands shook so violently that a warder was obliged to hold them up while they were bound together. He was heard to repeat to himself, *' Oh, I have deserved this and more ! Oh, I have deserved this and more ! " When asked whether he had anything more on his mind, or whether he wished to add to his THE STORY OF THE ITALIAN BOY. 349 disclosures, he replied, " Oh no, sir, I have told all. I hope I am now at peace with God. What I have told is the truth ; " but it is to be feared that he, too, kept back a good deal which was also the truth. No doubt there is always something shocking in the spectacle of a fellow-creature proceeding to a violent and shameful death, but I confess I cannot feel the com- passion that seems to have been felt by under-sheriffs and others for these two sanguinary wretches, who committed murder after murder in cold blood, and with deliberate calculation, for a few paltry pounds, having no excuse of jealousy, of wrong suffered, or sudden wrath, to plead for their bloody actions. In our own day we have seen the monster known as " Jack the Ripper " slaying his half- dozen victims with similar cold-bloodedness and premedita- tion ; but I refuse to believe that in callous brutality he was the superior of Williams and Bishop. At a few minutes before eight the sheriffs, accompanied by their officers and the prisoners, proceeded towards the scaffold, the Ordinary reciting part of the Funeral Service. Bishop moved on in the same gloomy and despondent manner which I have already noticed. There was no change in his appearance as he approached the foot of the scaffold, but the agitation of Williams increased violently. Just as he came within sight of the drop he expressed a wish to speak again to the chaplain, who accordingly, while Bishop was being led out, seated himself near him, and said, " Now, Williams, you have another moment intervening between you and death, and, as a dying man, I implore you, in God's name, to tell the truth ; have you told me the whole truth 1 " " All I have told you is true, Mr. Russell." " But, Williams, have you told me all?" No other answer 350 A SO OK ABOUT LONDON. was forthcoming but, in a low tone, " All I have told you is quite true." When Bishop appeared on the scaffold he was received with a tremendous outburst of sounds of execration from the thousands who were huddled and packed into the Old Bailey a seething mass of humanity but the wretch was too prostrate to heed this manifestation of loathing, or the not less terrible cry of exultation which arose when the hangman, having put the rope round his neck and fastened it to the chain, placed him under the fatal beam. Williams, when his turn came, appeared keenly conscious of the feelings which the multitude exhibited ; and while the dreadful preliminaries were being completed his whole frame shook convulsively, and he uttered broken fragments of prayer. The drop fell, and the passion -swayed crowd broke into a thunderous shout of applause which lasted for several minutes ; and thus the souls of the miserable criminals went to seek the mercy of their God, rejected, and denied one passing throb of compassion, by their fellow -men ! Printed by Hazoll, Watson, & Viney, Ld., London and'Ayleslrary. GLORIANA; or, the REVOLUTION of 1900. By LADY FLORENCE DIXIE, Author of " Redeemed in Blood," The Young Castaways," " Across Patagonia," 1 vol., with Portrait, Crown Svo, 6*. OPINIONS OF THE PRESS. * There is abundant play of fancy in the book, a3 well as some of the ordinary elements of romance." Queen. ' ' A good many of the characters have a touch of individuality ; and in a literary point of view this book is more carefully written and is more interesting than any of our author's previous works." Athenceum. "A prose Revolt of Islam." Saturday Review. " It is a book that cannot fail to interest anyone who takes it up ; and to any one who thinks at all it will, as it has done for us, afford a good deal to think about. It is full of exciting incidents and adventures closely drawn from life." St. Stephen'* Review. " Giving the clever and accomplished novelist all credit for earnestness of purpose, it is scarcely possible to accept wholly the form in which she has urged and illustrated her views ; still we must respect and admire the talent with which she pleads the cause she has so much at heart. . . . The tale is well written, vigorous, and interesting." Life. " The novel is meritorious by reason of its crisp writing and sparkling satire." People. A plot which we timidly elect to call unusual, while hastening to add that the book itself is thoroughly sensible where it desists from being clever. . . . We admire Lady Florence Dixie's ceaseless vivacity of nar- ration, and her wise and earnest pleading for the truer education of girls." Manchester Guardian. " Doubtless ' Gloriana ' will achieve the end of the author to place before the country in a striking way the arguments for the equality of women with men in everything. This is done with characteristic ability, earnestness, and courage." Dundee Advertiser. " Lady Florence Dixie's lon^-promised book will not disappoint those who expect to find in it the advocacy of Women's Rights. It is written in a dashing, vivacious style, and bears unmistakable evidence of having been produced unde? the white heat of enthusiasm. Any book written under such circumstances must be full of charm, more especially when it is the expression of the brave, pure, and true heart. The plot f the story is prettily conceived." Women 1 * Penny Paper. "We hail with satisfaction every rational attempt to show up the monstrous travesty of law and justice by which woman, simply as woman, is loaded with disabilities. . . . Our authoress has grasped the important truth that, if once justice be done to woman as a free citizen, many evils which she suffers, and which to many appear almost impossible of remedy, will disappear without the application of the legislative nostrums now so much in vogue." Personal Rights Journal. LONDON : HENRY AND CO., 6, BOUVERIE STREET, E.C. AND AT ALL LIBRARIES AND BOOKSELLERS. U vj O U L_ I THE NEW ROMANCE. At all Libraries and Booksellers'. RAYMI ; or, The Children of the Sun. By OLIVE HOLLAND, Author of " The Golden Hawk," etc., etc. Crown 8vo, tastefully bound, 5*. Illustrated. OPINIONS OF THE PEES8. " Of all the writers who may be described as belonging to the school of Rider Haggard, Mr. Olive Holland is the most original and the most successful. His ' Raymi ' would do no discredit to Mr. Haggard himself. There is room for improvement in the style, but that will come with use. What is of more importance in a new (and presumably young) writer is that he should have the root of the matter in him ; and in all the essen- tials for a good story character, ' go,' and incidents Mr. Holland mani- fests great facility. Hugh Carton, the hero, is put through some sad and dramatic experience , and not the least enthralling of these is his encounter with Richard Savill, the buccaneer. It is under the most extraordinary circumstances that Hugh makes his acquaintance. Savill is vigorously drawn, so that one is able to realise the man as he was in his habit. Another part of the volume which contains several graphic passages is that devoted to a description of the Children of the Sun, with their rites and customs. Mr. Holland has written a previous romance, with which we are not acquainted, but his present venture certainly warrants the expectation of good work from him in the future." Daily Chronicle. " This is a good story a mixture of the real and the romantic. Both ele- ments are well worked out : the real is so like to Nature that we are ready to think that the marvellous is not so very remote from it." Spectator. "... The whole conception here is splendid and novel. The descrip- tions of the City of the Dead, the embalmed Inca in his Royal Chamber of Death, and other incidents of the Peruvian portion of the narrative, strike us as being thoroughly artistic and finely conceived. In ' Raymi ' we have a good stirring story of adventure, which is marred neither by improbability nor extravagance. The tone is good, and some of the descriptive portions are really eloquent." Public Opinion. NEW WORK FOR THE YOUNG. ANIWEE; or, The Warrior Queen. A Tale of the Araucanian Indians and the Mythical Trauco People. By Lady FLORENCE DIXIE, Author of "Redeemed in Blood," " G/loriana ; or the Revolution of 1900," " The Young Castaways," etc. In large crown 8vo, 5*. Illustrated. {Just pitblished.] NEW NOVEL. By Mrs. A. 8. BRADSHAW. "WIFE OR SLAVE?" By the Author of "A Crimson Stain," "A Noble Vengeance," etc., etc. Cloth, 3s. 6d. In paper boards, 2. [Just published.] AT ALL BOOKSELLERS' AND BOOKSTALLS. LONDON: HENRY & CO., BOUVERIE STREET, B.C.