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building. Gresham was not only a mercer and merchant adventurer, but a banker-a term which in those days of 10 or 12 per cent. interest meant also, “a usurer, a pawnbroker, a money scrivener, a goldsmith, and a dealer in bullion" (Burgon). After his knighthood, Gresham seems to have thought it undignified to reside at his shop, so he left it to his apprentice, and removed to Bishopsgate, where he built Gresham House. It was a vulgar tradition of Elizabeth's time, according to Lodge, that Gresham was a foundling, and that an old woman who found him was attracted to the spot by the increased chirping of the grasshoppers. This story was invented, no doubt, to account for his crest.

During the first two years of Gresham's acting as the king's factor, he posted from Antwerp no fewer than forty times. Between the 1st of March, 1552, and the 27th of July his payments amounted to £106,301 4s. 4d.; his travelling expenses for riding in and out eight times, £102 10s., including a supper and a banquet to the Schetz and the Fuggers, the great banks with whom he had to transact business, £26 being equal, Dean Burgon calculates, to £250 of the present value of money. The last-named feast must have been one of great magnificence, as the guests appear to have been not more than twenty. On such occasions Gresham deemed it policy to "make as good chere as he could."

He was living in Lombard Street, no doubt, at that eventful day when, being at the house of Mr. John Byvers, alderman, he promised that "within one month after the founding of the Burse he would make over the whole of the profits, in equal moities, to the City and the Mercers' Company, in case he should die childless ;" and "for the sewer performance of the premysses, the said Sir Thomas, in the presens of the persons afore named, did give his house to Sir William Garrard, and drank a carouse to Thomas Rowe." This mirthful affair was considered of so much importance as to be entered on the books of the Corporation, solemnly commencing with the words, "Be it remembered, that the ixth day of February, in Anno Domini 1565," &c.

Gresham's wealth was made chiefly by trade with Antwerp. "The exports from Antwerp," says Burgon, "at that time consisted of jewels and precious stones, bullion, quicksilver, wrought silks, cloth of gold and silver, gold and silver thread, camblets, grograms, spices, drugs, sugar, cotton, cummin, galls, linen, serges, tapestry, madder, hops in great quantities, glass, salt-fish, small wares (or, as they were then called, merceries), made of

metal and other materials, to a considerable amount; arms, ammunition, and household furniture. From England Antwerp imported immense quantities of fine and coarse woollen goods, as canvas, frieze, &c., the finest wool, excellent saffron in small quantities, a great quantity of lead and tin, sheep and rabbit-skins, together with other kinds of peltry and leather; beer, cheese, and other provisions in great quantities, also Malmsey wines, which the English at that time obtained from Candia. Cloth was, however, by far the most important article of traffic between the two countries. The annual importation into Antwerp about the year 1568, including every description of cloth, was estimated at more than 200,000 pieces, amounting in value to upwards of 4,000,000 escus d'or, or about £1,200,000 sterling."

In the reign of Charles II. we find the "Grasshopper" in Lombard Street the sign of another wealthy goldsmith, Sir Charles Duncombe, the founder of the Feversham family, and the purchaser of Helmsley, in Yorkshire, the princely seat of George Villiers, second Duke of Buckingham:

"Helmsley, once proud Buckingham's delight,
Yields to a scrivener and a City knight."

Here also resided Sir Robert Viner, the Lord Mayor of London in 1675, and apparently an especial favourite with Charles II.

The Post Office, Lombard Street, formerly the General Post Office, was originally built by "the great banquer," Sir Robert Viner, on the site of a noted tavern destroyed in the Great Fire of 1666. Here Sir Robert kept his mayoralty in 1675. Strype describes it as a very large and curious dwelling, with a handsome paved court, and behind it "a yard for stabling and coaches." The St. Martin's-le-Grand General Post Office was not opened till 1829.

"I have," writes "Aleph," in the City Press, "a vivid recollection of Lombard Street in 1805. More than half a century has rolled away since then, yet there, sharply and clearly defined, before the eye of memory, stand the phantom shadows of the past. I walked through the street a few weeks ago. It is changed in many particulars; yet enough remains to identify it with the tortuous, dark vista of lofty houses which I remember so well. Then there were no pretentious, stucco-faced banks or offices; the whole wall-surface was of smoke-blacked brick; its colour seemed to imitate the mud in the road, and as coach, or wagon, or mail-cart toiled or rattled along, the basement storeys were bespattered freely from the gutters.

minutes; the clamour deepens, the hubbub seems increasing; but ere the last sixty seconds expire, a sharp winding of warning bugles begins. Coachee flourishes his whip, greys and chestnuts prepare for a run, the reins move, but very gently, there is a parting crack from the whipcord, and the brilliant cavalcade is gone-exeunt omnes! Lombard Street is a different place now, far more imposing, though still narrow and dark; the clean-swept roadway is paved with wood, cabs pass noiselessly-a capital thing, only take care you are not run over. Most of the banks and assurance offices have been converted into stone."

In Plough Court (No. 1), Lombard Street, Pope's father carried on the business of a linen merchant. "He was an honest merchant, and dealt in Hollands wholesale," as his widow informed Mr. Spence. His son claimed for him the honour of being sprung from gentle blood. When that gallant baron, Lord Hervey, vice-chamberlain in the court of George II., and his ally, Lady Mary Wortley Montague, disgraced themselves by inditing the verses containing this couplet

"Whilst none thy crabbed numbers can endure, Hard as thy heart, and as thy birth obscure ;” Pope indignantly repelled the accusation as to his descent.

The glories of gas were yet to be. After three heels. The clock will strike in less than five o'clock p.m. miserable oil lamps tried to enliven the foggy street with their 'ineffectual light,' while through dingy, greenish squares of glass you might observe tall tallow candles dimly disclosing the mysteries of bank or counting-house. Passengers needed to walk with extreme caution; if you lingered on the pavement, woe to your corns; if you sought to cross the road, you had to beware of the flying postmen or the letter-bag express. As six o'clock drew near, every court, alley, and blind thoroughfare in the neighbourhood echoed to the incessant din of letter-bells. Men, women, and children were hurrying to the chief office, while the fiery-red battalion of postmen, as they neared the same point, were apparently well pleased to balk the diligence of the public, anxious to spare their coppers. The mother post-office for the United Kingdom and the Colonies was then in Lombard Street, and folks thought it was a model establishment. Such armies of clerks, such sacks of letters, and countless consignments of newspapers! How could those hard-worked officials ever get through their work? The entrance, barring paint and stucco, remains exactly as it was fifty years ago. What crowds used to besiege it! What a strange confusion of news-boys! The struggling public, with late letters; the bustling redcoats, with their leather bags, a scene of anxious life and interest seldom exceeded. And now "I am sorry (he said) to be obliged to such the letter-boxes are all closed; you weary your a presumption as to name my family in the same knuckles in vain against the sliding door in the leaf with your lordship's; but my father had the wall. No response. Every hand within is fully honour in one instance to resemble you, for he occupied in letter-sorting for the mails; they must was a younger brother. was a younger brother. He did not indeed think be freighted in less than half an hour. Yet, on it a happiness to bury his elder brother, though payment of a shilling for each, letters were received he had one, who wanted some of those good till ten minutes to eight, and not unfrequently a qualities which yours possessed. How sincerely post-chaise, with the horses in a positive lather, glad should I be to pay to that young nobleman's tore into the street, just in time to forward some memory the debt I owed to his friendship, whose important despatch. Hark! The horn! the horn! early death deprived your family of as much wit The mail-guards are the soloists, and very pleasant and honour as he left behind him in any branch music they discourse; not a few of them are first- of it. But as to my father, I could assure you, rate performers. A long train of gaily got-up my lord, that he was no mechanic (neither a hatter, coaches, remarkable for their light weight, horsed nor, which might please your lordship yet better, by splendid-looking animals, impatient at the curb, a cobbler), but, in truth, of a very tolerable family, and eager to commence their journey of ten miles and my mother of an ancient one, as well born and (at least) an hour; stout 'gents,' in heavy coats, educated as that lady whom your lordship made buttoned to the throat, esconce themselves in 're-use of to educate your own children, whose merit, served seats.' Commercial men contest the right of a seat with the guard or coachman; some careful mother helps her pale, timid daughter up the steps; while a fat old lady already occupies two-thirds of the seat-what will be done? Bags of epistles innumerable stuff the boots; formidable bales of the daily journals are trampled small by the guard's

beauty, and vivacity (if transmitted to your posterity) will be a better present than even the noble blood they derive from you. A mother, on whom I was never obliged so far to reflect as to say, she spoiled me; and a father, who never found himself obliged to say of me, that he disapproved my conduct. In a word, my lord, I think it enough,

that my parents, such as they were, never cost me a blush; and that their son, such as he is, never cost them a tear."

The house of Pope's father (pulled down about 1870) was afterwards occupied by the wellknown chemists, Messrs. Allen, Hanbury, and Barry. Mr. William Allen was the son of a Quaker silk manufacturer in Spitalfields. He became chemical lecturer at Guy's Hospital, and an eminent experimentalist-discovering, among other things, the proportion of carbon in carbonic acid, and proving that the diamond was pure carbon. He was mainly instrumental in founding the Pharmaceutical Society, and distinguished himself by his zeal against slavery, and his interest in all benevolent objects. He died in 1843, at Lindfield, in Sussex, where he had founded agricultural schools of a thoroughly practical kind.

The church of St. Edmund King and Martyr (and St. Nicholas Acons), on the north side of Lombard Street, stands on the site of the old Grass Market. The only remarkable monument is that of Dr. Jeremiah Mills, who died in 1784, and had been President of the Society of Antiquaries many years. The local authorities have, with great good sense, written the duplex name of this church in clear letters over the chief entrance.

The date of the first building of St. Mary Woolnoth of the Nativity, in Lombard Street, seems to be very doubtful; nor does Stow help us to the origin of the name. By some antiquaries it has been suggested that the church was so called from being beneath or nigh to the wool staple. Mr. Gwilt suggests that it may have been called "Wool-nough," in order to distinguish it from the other church of St. Mary, where the wool-beam actually stood.

Sir Hugh Brice, goldsmith and mayor, governor of the Mint in the reign of Henry VII., built or rebuilt part of the church, and raised a steeple. The church was almost totally destroyed in the Great Fire, and repaired by Wren. Sir Robert Viner, the famous goldsmith, contributed largely towards the rebuilding, "a memorial whereof," says Strype, "are the vines that adorn and spread about that part of the church that fronts his house and the street; insomuch, that the church was used to be called Sir Robert Viner's church." Wren's repairs having proved ineffectual, the church was rebuilt in 1727. The workmen, twenty feet under the ruins of the steeple, discovered bones, tusks, Roman coins, and a vast number of broken Roman pottery. It is generally thought by antiquaries that a temple dedicated to Concord once stood here. Hawksmoor, the architect of St. Mary Woolnoth, was born the year of the Great Fire, and died in 1736. He acted as Wren's deputy during the erection of the Hospitals at Chelsea and Greenwich, and also in the building of most of the City churches. The principal works of his own design are Christ Church, Spitalfields, St. Anne's, Limehouse, and St. George's, Bloomsbury. Mr. J. Godwin, an excellent authority, calls St. Mary Woolnoth "one of the most striking and original, although not the most beautiful, churches in the metropolis."

On the north side of the communion-table is a plain tablet in memory of that excellent man, the Rev. John Newton, who was curate of Olney, Bucks, for sixteen years, and rector of the united parishes of St. Mary Woolnoth and St. Mary Woolchurch twenty-eight years. He died on the 21st of December, 1807, aged eighty-two years, and was buried in a vault in this church.

On the stone is the following inscription, full of Christian humility:—

"John Newton, clerk, once an infidel and libertine, a servant of slaves in Africa, was, by the rich mercy of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, preserved, restored, pardoned, and appointed to preach the faith he had long laboured to destroy."

The first rector mentioned by Newcourt was John de Norton, presented previous to 1368. Sir Martin Bowes had the presentation of this church given him by Henry V., it having anciently belonged to the convent of St. Helen's, Bishopsgate. From the Bowes's the presentation passed to the Goldsmiths' Company. Sir Martin Bowes was buried here, and so were many of the Houblons, a great mercantile family, on one of whom Pepys wrote an epitaph. Munday particularly mentions that the wills of several benefactors of St. Mary's were carefully preserved and exhibited in the church. Strype also mentions a monument to "Olney.Hymns." Sir William Phipps, that lucky speculator who, in 1687, extracted £300,000 from the wreck of a Spanish plate-vessel off the Bahama bank, Sir Simon Eyre, the old founder of Leadenhall Market, was buried in this church in 1549.

Newton's father was master of a merchant-ship, and Newton's youth was spent in prosecuting the African slave-trade, a career of which he afterwards bitterly repented. He is best known as the writer, in conjunction with the poet Cowper, of the

The exterior of this church is praised by competent authorities for its boldness and originality, though some critic says that the details are ponderous enough for a fortress or a prison. The elongated tower, from the arrangement of the

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Godwin seems to think Hawksmoor followed Vanbrugh's manner in the heaviness of his design.

St. Clement's Church, Clement's Lane, Lombard Street, sometimes called St. Clement's, Eastcheap, is noted by Newcourt as existing as early as 1309. The rectory belonged to Westminster Abbey, but was given by Queen Mary to the Bishop of London and his successors for ever. After the Great Fire, when the church was destroyed, the parish of St. Martin Orgar was united to that of St. Clement's.

One of the rectors of St. Clement's, Dr. Benjamin Stone, who had been presented to the living by Bishop Juxon, being deemed too Popish by Cromwell, was imprisoned for some time at Crosby Hall. From thence he was sent to Plymouth, where, after paying a fine of £60, he obtained his liberty. On the restoration of Charles II., Stone recovered his benefice, but died five years after. In this church Bishop Pearson, then rector, delivered his celebrated sermons on the Creed, which

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