Reely relieved, and Twenty pounds yearly to be distributed to threescore poor aged and impotent Men and Women, by Nobles apiece upon every St. Thomas's Eve for ever.

Ad Gloriam Dei

Per Nepotem ac Hæredem Zachary Dow posthumum.

It was repaired by the Merchant Taylors in the year 1675, This monument is adorned with the effigies of the deceased carved in marble, both his hands resting on a death's head, above which is the arms of the company of Merchant Taylors.*

Mr. Stow says, there was a tomb in the south part of the church-yard, with this inscription :

Here under this Stone lyeth the Body of George Clarke, Citizen and Vintner of London, who, by his last Will and Testament, gave for divers good and charitable Uses these Legacies hereafter following:

1. For the Publick School in the University of Oxenford,

200

the Summ of To the Use of the Poor of the 4 Precincts of the Ward of】 Portsoaken, being the Parish of St. Botolphs without Ald-293 gate, 2931. 6s. 8d.

To the Parish of White Chapel, for the Relief of the Poor there

}

230

To the Parish of St. Leonards in Shoreditch, to the Use of the Poor there, 106l. 15s. and 4d.

of }

106

10

To the Company of Vintners
To the Poor of Christ's Hospital

5

He deceased the 19th day of April, Anno Dom. 1606. Ætat

suæ 63.

We have before mentioned, under the monastery of St. Clare, Minories, concerning Dr. Clark, bishop of Bath and Wells, said to have been buried here.

Monuments of modern date are to the memory of the Reverend Michael Hallings, late secretary to the Society for the promotion of Christian Knowledge, 1786. Maria Hallifax, wife of Dr. Benjamin Hallifax, Gresham professor of Divinity; 1802.

We shall have occasion to mention this gentleman's other charities, under the article Newgate.

5

The

The living is a curacy; the impropriator being held in fee from the crown. Among the curates, the most eminent were Dr. White Kennet, afterwards bishop of Peterborough.

Eastward, the street now forming the High Street, was formerly a road with a few houses and inns, for the entertainment of travellers, and the city liberties ended at a place then called Hog Lane.

In this lane and the fields adjoining, hogs were allowed to be nourished by the bakers of London, whence the name. Here, in Stow's time, were "fair hedge rows of elm trees on each side, with bridges and easy stiles, to pass over into the pleasant fields, very commodious for citizens therein to walk, shoot, and otherwise to recreate and refresh their dulled spirits in the sweet and wholesome air; which is now, says he, within few years, made a continual building throughout of garden-houses and small cottages, and the fields on either side are turned into garden-plats, timber yards, bowling allies, and such like, from Houndsditch in the west, so far as Whitechapel, and farther in the east." This plot is now covered by the pleasant streets and alleys of Petticoat Lane, and its cleanly neighbourhood.

Curious, however, and singular as it may appear, this spot was formerly the habitation of great men; and we have the authority of the ingenious Mr. Moser, for saying that in Petticoat Lane was the town residence of the stately count Gondamar, ambassador from Spain, and the cause of Sir Walter Raleigh's death in the reign of James I.

"Nurtured in a nation which had," says Mr. M. " all that chivalrous dignity, those heightened notions of honour, that Moorish gallantry left to Spain when it receded, combined with that splendid enthusiasm which the torrent of Mexican riches then just poured upon it, produced, Count Gondamar is said to have been dazzled and impressed with the magnificence of his own country, and to have brought with him to this all those ideas of state and grandeur which his close connexion with the contemplators of visionary worlds and the possessors of realms of gold might be supposed to inspire.

"Having stated this to be the character of the representative of the Spanish monarch, I could hardly have supposed that the metropolis had in it a palace fit for his reception; yet we have it from unquestionable authority, that he did find a mansion. The reader will hardly conjecture where? and be surprised when he is informed, in Petticoat Lane.

"It is certain, that in a branch from the long avenue (Petticoat Lane), which leads from the high street Whitechapel to Smock Alley, called Gravel Lane, and which was formerly bounded with hedge-rows and elm-trees, and had, on both sides of the way, "very pleasant fields to walk in, insomuch that gentlemen used to have houses there," stood, till within these last twenty years, a very large quadrangular mansion, which had had court-yards, gates, and all other appendages of state, and in which once resided that august personage Count Gondamar, whose name it retained till its final dilapidation. Tradition says, it had formerly been occupied by the Earl of Essex. In the Interregnum, it was possessed by Cromwell's soldiers, probably to communicate with the gar rison in Houndsditch, and ultimately with the Tower, and to assist in having an eye to the eastern side of the city..

"Latterly it was let out in tenements; its gardens covered with mean cottages and sheds; and its once, I presume, magnificent apartments inhabited by a colony of the children of Ifrael, much more remarkable for the cunning than the candour of their dealings.

"Some years since, the East India company purchased this spot, which had long been a public nuisance, and erected upon it those magnificent warehouses, which extend from the new street, Bishopsgate, to Cutler's Street, Houndsditch, &c.

"Petticoat Lane itself is still inhabited by Jews, who hav ing always an eye to traffic, have established in it a Ragfair, which seems intended to rival Rosemary Lane. Indeed, I fear, its situation affords facilities for the disposal of stolen and ill acquired goods. Therefore, as I understand that the East India company have for some time had an extension of their warehouses in contemplation, and had once almost

agreed

agreed for that part of this wretched place which is in the parish of Christ Church, Middlesex, it is devoutly to be wished, if there are any persons so inimical to their own interests, the interests of the parish, of morality, of society in general, as to withhold their sanction, after the truly liberal offers that have been made, that legislative authority would interfere to correct an error which cannot arise from any thing short of insanity; and, at the same time that they enabled the said company to complete their noble and necessary plan, they would remove and extirpate one of the greatest nuisances, whether considered in point of morals or health, that at present exists in the metropolis.

"STRYPE, THE HISTORIAN'S, HOUSE.-Before I take a final leave of Petticoat Lane, which were it not to shew the reader that such things were and are, I ought to apologize for leading him into, I must observe, that on the opposite side of the way, and within sight of count Gondamar's, stood another large house, formerly occupied by Hans Jacobson, jeweller to king James the First; it was in a paved alley, called, from the ancestors of the historian, Strype's Court, now, in the phraseology of the place, termed " Tripe's Yard;" part of it still remains. It had formerly gardens behind it, and was said to have been, with respect to its situation, exceedingly pleasant.

"In this house, JOHN STRYPE, that exemplary divine, industrious biographer, and ingenious historian, was born. He has, in several parts of his works, left notices of this, the place of his nativity, which we find in his most early years, which must have been soon after the middle of the seventeenth century, was very different from what it has lately been, and is at present. He died in the year 1787, at a very advanced age, having held the vicarage of Low Layton near sixty-eight years. This Strype's, or Tripe's Yard, takes its name from the house in which his father and himself resided; but is now, like Petticoat Lane, the resort of the lowest order of Jews."*

Vestiges, &c. Europ. Mag. March 1804.

Part

Part of the street from Aldgate is occupied on the south side by butchers, and is called Whitechapel Market.

Returning to St. Botolph's church, through Church Row,

we come to HOUNDSDITCH.

This was formerly a ditch, which took its name from being the receptacle for dead dogs and other filth. It was, however, if not dignified, remarkable, as being the deserved place of burial for the traiterous noble, Edric, the murderer of his sovereign Edmund Ironside, in favour of Canute."I like the treason," observed the latter, "but I detest the traitor!" and in consequence of this opinion, when Edric came to demand the wages of his iniquity, which had been promised to be the highest situation in London; "behead the traitor!" says Canute," and agreeably to his desire, place his head on the highest part of the Tower!" He was then drawn by his heels from Baynard's Castle, and tormented to death by burning torches; his head exposed as directed, and his body thrown into Houndsditch.*

On the side of this ditch, opposite the city wall, was a field belonging to the priory of the Holy Trinity; which being given upon the dissolution to Sir Thomas Audley, was conferred by him on Magdalen College, Cambridge, of which he was the founder.

Towards the street were small cottages, two stories high, with little garden plats; these cottages were built by a prior of the Holy Trinity, and was appointed for the reception of bed-rid people, who, when past labour, solicited the benefi cence of the humane.

as

"In my youth," says Stow, "I remember, devout people, well men as women of this city, were accustomed oftentimes, especially on Fridays, weekly, to walk that way purposely, and there to bestow their charitable alms, every poor man or woman lying in their bed within their window, which was towards the street open, so low, that every man might see them, a clean linen cloth lying in their window, and a pair of beads, to shew that there lay a bed rid body, unable, but to pray only. This street was first paved in 1503.”

VOL. II. No. 44.

Richard of Cirencester.
3 D

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