Picturesque Sketches of London, Past and Present

sun sets. To the point from whence we started at the commencement of our work (the foot of Blackfriars Bridge) we shall find but little to detain us; for the Bank and Exchange are too commercial

yrinths of streets that spread north and west-to say nothing of the Surrey side of the Thames. A mere glance at the map of London a

e-end-road, we will at once dash into Whitechapel; for all behind us

e old-world splendours have given place to gin-shops, plate-glass palaces, into which squalor and misery rush, and drown the remembrance of their wretchedness in drowsy and poisonou

-string of an old black bull, takes his stand proudly at the front of his shop, and looks "lovingly" on the well-fed joints that dangle above his head. The gutters before his door literally run with blood: pass by whenever you may, there is the crimson current constantly flowing; and the smell the passenger inhales is not such as may be supposed to have floated over

or any thing except what they are called. As for the fried fish, it resembles coarse red sand-paper; and you would sooner think of purchasing a pennyworth to polish the handle of a cricket-bat or racket than of trying its qualities in any other way. The black puddings resemble great fossil ammonites, cut up lengthwise; for while you gaze on them you cannot help picturing these relics of the early world, and fancying that they must have been found in some sable soil abounding in broken fragments o

ntial bladders of lard shoved into a strong crust, from which there was no chance of escape, then sent to the oven and "done brown." The ham-and-beef houses

ot help wondering what would be the result if you attempted to eat one; and while you are thus doubting, without "doating," some great broad-shouldered fellow comes up, throws down his penny, and, making but one mouthful of the lot, lifts the saucer to his lips, and drains the last drop of vinegar, then goes, for a finisher, into the nearest gin-shop. Pickled eels, cut up into Whitechap

into the suburbs, especially on Sundays, when they either carry the pigeons with them in bags or thrust them into their coat-pockets, and so wander for three or four miles out, when they turn the birds loose, both parties thus enjoying the luxury of a little fresh air. They are excellent hands at decoying pigeons, for all the "strays" that alight in the neighbourhood are prett

s "von halfpenny," a toll from which neither Jew nor Gentile is exempt. This market or fair for old rubbish of every description is well worth

nd and rain blow and beat through these open sheds, both drenching and sweetening the fusty rags that are exposed for sale. Those who wish to purchase pass up and down the "ragged" alleys. We were detained at the narrow entrance of

ese, Mo'?" inqui

red the other; "t

having examined them; "could not cut off en

n, three-

e he carried off a whole suit in exchange for two geraniums which looked as if they could not live a week. The very things he was then running down, as he pointed out every thin spot and speck of grease to the little Cinderella he was bargaining with in the Borough, he was now extolling, and vowing that they had but been worn "wery leetle, wery leetle indeed."

contribute to the stock of filth there accumulated. And yet, through the dirty mass the eye may here and there d

melt s

a heap of rags, bundled up beside the thread-bare blackness of the poor widow's cast-off weeds. One might almost fancy that Pride had come here to crawl out of it

uses do we c

dress-coat of some young lord, thrown down with disdain by the hunger-bitten jobbing-tailor, because

together, that escaped the Great Fire, namely, St. Andrew's Undershaft and St. Catherine Cree. In the first Stowe was buried, and there his monument sti

and fourth corners, bowing at each corner three times: but when he came to the side of the table where the bread and wine was, he bowed himself seven times; and then, after the reading of many prayers by himself and his two fat chaplains which were with him (and all this while were upon their knees by him, in their surplices, hoods, and tippets), he himself came near the bread, which was cut and laid in a fine napkin, and then he gently lifted up one of the corners of the said napkin, and peeping into it till he saw the bread (like a boy that peeps into a bird's nest in a bush), and presently clapped it down again, and flew back a step or two, and then bowed very low three times towards it and the table. When h

stern-souled Cromwell despised, with many others who were so soon to shake a throne, and trample on the "divinity of kings," as if it were but dust. But we are forgetting Stowe and the adjoining church of St. Andrew's Undershaft. Why it was so called, the pleasing historian, who has long slept (not undisturbed) within the church, shall tell us in his own sweetly-quaint old language; for though "dead, he yet speaketh," and never hath London before or since had so pleasing a chronicler. He says, "because that of old time every year, on May-day morning, it was used that an high or long shaft or May-pole was set up there before the south door of the said church." And he had often seen that "long shaft" set up-perhaps in his younger days danced around it, eyeing askance some citizen's pretty daughter: it

d glance at Crosby Hall (endeared to us th

hfield, prioress of the adjoining convent of St. Helen's, for ninety-nine years, at an annual rent of 11l. 6s. 8d. From grocer and

Protector kept his household. The Protector had his resort, the king (prince?) in a manner desolate; while some for their business made suit to them who had the doing; some were by their friends secretly warned that it might haply turn them to no good to be too much attendant about the king without the Protector'

e he inters the remains of the king at Chertsey monastery. Marriage and murder were planned under the very roof which we can still look at by that daring duke. It is one of the f

is assertion is not well authenticated. The hall, at a first glance, appears somewhat narrow for its height-the latter exceeding its width by about 13 feet, while its length is 54 feet. From the depth of the oriel the dim

cupied much damage was done to its ornaments. The work of restoration commenced in 1

ents, and perhaps, with the exception of the little church in the Tower, abounds more in these valuable records than any other building in the City that escape

in 1594, lies here: he is said to have been worth near a million of money in his day, a sum which, multiplied according to the value of the period, almost

ce at times, and must often have caused great anxiety to such worthy prioresses as Alice Ashfield; for it was not safe to entrust them with the "latch-key," according to what is whispered by a dean of St. Paul's, who, it seems, made a few unpleasant

SWANS'

at they were not disciplined as rigidly as those who took the veil and vowed to lead a secl

nd galleries as we may suppose were occupied by our early dramatists, while the stage was in its i

o have slept under that sloping roof-who have peeped through the old ancient bannisters of the wooden gallery! What saddling and mounting "in hot haste" must there have been in former times at th

t her for a few minutes, until carried away by the lady-prioress of St. Helen's from the old inn-yard and across the stree

old carriers, such as Shakspe

es the bots. This house is turned upside down, since Robin died. Poor fellow! ne

emains in the adjoining church of St. Botolph's, though the church has been rebuilt. It stands on the edge of what was the old City moat, "without" the ancient gate which, in former times, opened into the wide waste of fen and moor tha

citizens might get to the green fields beyond, though it was not until nearly two centuries after this time that the fen was drained. Thro