City; and that from the great number of holidays for legendary saints, fasts, vigils, processions, &c. enjoined by the Rubric, the inhabitants dedicated but one day in the week to labour, instead of six. There cannot be a question, indeed, but that both the interests of commerce and the progress of population were greatly retarded by the numerous monastic institutions which thus encumbered' the Capital; and however we may lament or execrate the worse than Gothic barbarity,' which demolished the immense and beautiful piles connected with these establishments (in many instances merely for the sake of the materials), and destroyed the rich specimens of art which they contained, we cannot but rejoice in the destruction of those bonds which separated man from his kind; and, in violating the strongest impulse of his nature, gave new strength to temptation, and led the way to the commission of every sensual enormity.

The liberation of so many thousands from the seclusion of the cloister, quickly led to an increased bustle and traffic, which called for new improvements in the avenues to the City. In 1540, a Statute was passed, giving authority to the Lord Mayor and Aldermen to levy assessments, &c. for erecting new Conduits, and repairing such as had fallen into decay, and for paving with stone various streets, &c. described in the Act to be very foul, and full of pits and sloughs, very perilous and noyous, as well for all the King's subjects on horseback, as on foot, and with carriages. The streets paved under this Statute were Aldgate High Street, Shoe Lane, Fetter Lane, Gray's-Inn Lane, Chancery Lane, and the way leading from Holborn Bars towards St. Giles in the Fields, as far as any habitation is on both sides of the said street.' +

The next Act that was passed for the paving of London, viz. 34th and 35th of Henry the Eighth, c. 12, refers particularly to the following streets, lanes, &c.: Chiswell Street; Whitecross Street; Golding Lane; Grub Street; Goswell Street; Long

. Vestiges, &c. in Eur. Mag. Vol. L. p. 427.

† 32 Hen. VIII. c. 17.

Lane;

Lane; St. John's Street, from the Smithfield Bars up to the Pound; Cow Cross, from the said Bars; Water Lane, in Fleet Street, leading down to the Thames; the way leading without Temple Bar, westward, by and to Clement's-Inn Gates and New-Inn Gates, to Drury Place, and also at one end stretching from the said way to the sign of the Bell, at Drury Lane end; and the common way leading through a certain place called Petty France, from the Bars of the West end of Tothill Street, at Westminster; the street or highway leading from Bishopsgate to and above Shoreditch Church; the Bridge called Strand Bridge, and the way leading thither from Temple Bar; and the lane called Foscue Lane, leading from the garden and tenement of the Bishop of Lichfield, and the garden and tenement, called the Bell and Proctors, down to Strand Bridge all which are stated to be "very foul," &c. and "very necessary to be kept clean, for the avoiding of corrupt savours, and an occasion of pestilence; for the amendment and reformation whereof," all who "had any lands or tenements adjoining to the aforesaid streets, lanes, or ways," are ordered "to pave the same with paving-stones before their tenements to the middle of the street or lane, in the like manner and form as the streets of the City of London, with causeways and channels in the midst of the said streets, and to maintain the same." * About this era, some fresh supplies of water were conveyed to the City from the springs near Perilous Pool, Hackney, Muswell Hill, Hampstead Heath, and St. Mary le Bone;

⚫ It is evident from this Act, that the streets afterwards named Butcher Row, and Holywell Street, St. Clement's, were not then built; and in most of the others, the dwellings had little more connection than was made by their garden walls, &c. Golding Lane, now Golden Lane, was literally a green avenue betwixt cottages and gardens. Whitecross street derived its name from a Conduit which stood there, surmounted with a white cross. Chiswell street was an open road between detached wooden houses, shaded with trees. Bishopsgate Street Without was also in a considerable degree composed of detached wooden and brick houses, with trees intermingled, and standing at a distance from each other.

le Bone; and in 1546, new Conduits were erected in Coleman

Street and Lothbury."

Had the view, or ground-plot' of London, painted on board,' which the industrious antiquary, Mr. John Bagford, mentions in his letter to Hearne,† to have found in a manuscript inventory of Henry the Eighth's furniture, been still extant, it would have afforded a most curious contrast to the state of the Metropolis as it now exists; occupying an immense extent of ground in Middlesex, and branching out into the adjacent counties of Surrey, Kent, and Essex. In respect, however, to the western Suburb, this enquiry may be partially gratified from a cut by Holbein, which has been thus described.

"In this print we behold a large extent of fields, stretching from the village of Charing to the Hospital of St. James: to the left, the un-towered fabric of the Abbey, the gable roof of the Hall, and the square pinnacles of the Church of St. Margaret rising above a cluster of houses and trees, denote the City of Westminster. On the foreground, a few small dwellings shaded with large trees, and some contiguous ruins, discriminate the Chapel of Our Lady of the Pew;' close to which there was a house, wherein, Stow says, were distracted and lunatic people, but that some King of England, not liking to have such objects so near his Palace, caused them to be removed to Bethlem.' Near this Chapel stood the Hospital of St. Mary Rounceval, situated exactly opposite to St. Martin's Lane.-The beautiful Cross, one of those erected by Edward the First to the memory of his Queen, does not appear in the print; but in the central point of the foreground is the Hermitage-a small cell annexed to the Chapel of St. Catherine, over against the Cross." At

this

The expense of erecting the Lothbury Conduit, and of bringing the water into it from springs in Hoxton Fields, were ordered to be defrayed by a levy of two-fifteenths on the Citizens. City Records.

See Lel. Coll. Vol. I. p. lxxx.

Vestiges, &c. Eur. Mag. Vol. LI. p. 170.

this period, also, the ancient Church of St. Martin in the Fields stood alone: it appears to have been a small fabric, consisting of a barn-like body, with a square low tower. The parish annexed to it was immensely large in proportion to the building, as may easily be conceived, when we consider, that those of St. Paul, Covent Garden, St. James, and St. Anne, Westminster, have all been taken from it; and the circumstance of this edifice serving for such a considerable extent of district, shews how slenderly that district must have been inhabited.

In an Act of Parliament, made in the seventh of Edward the Sixth, for the general regulation of Taverns, the sale of Wines, &c. it was enacted, that the number of Taverns in the City and Liberties of London should not exceed forty, nor those in Westminster be more than three;' and that none of the said Taverns should retail wines to be spent or drank within their respective houses. By the same Act, the prices of Gascony and Guienne wines were fixed at eightpence per gallon, and that of Rochelle wine at fourpence per gallon; and it was likewise enacted, that not any wines should be sold at a higher price than twelve-pence per gallon. In the latter part of this reign, the Protector Somerset erected his magnificent Palace called Somerset House; to furnish room and materials for which, the Church of St. Mary and the mansions of three Bishops were demolished on the spot, besides the Chapel, Cloisters, and Charnel House that stood in St. Paul's Church-yard, and the Tower and part of the Church of St. John of Jerusalem, at Clerkenwell.

From the very curious Plan and View of London, intituled 'Civitas Londinum,' by Ralph, or Radulphus Aggas, made soon after the accession of Queen Elizabeth, which is yet extant, though extremely scarce, † a variety of interesting particulars of

* Vestiges, &c. Eur, Mag. Vol. LI. p. 172.

the

+ Aggas's original plan was first reduced and copied, with some additions, into Braun's Civitates: between the years 1572--3 and 1584. In 1748, it was re-engraved by Vertue, in six sheets, who annexed to it the date 1560. The original plan is printed on six sheets, and two half-sheets, and measures six feet three inches, by two feet four inches.

the state of the Capital at that period, may be derived. From this document it appears, that the most crowded part of the City, was then, as at present, on the south side, extending from Newgate Street, Cheapside, and Cornhill, to the banks of the Thames; and that besides the small bay at Billingsgate, there were two lesser ones above Bridge, at Ebgate and Queenhithe. Beyond Lothbury, from Basing-hall Lane to Bishopsgate, a great portion of the ground, with the exception of Coleman Street, and the houses adjacent to St. Augustine's Church, was uncovered, and apparently occupied for gardens.

Similar void spaces, but separated by buildings, occurred between Bishopsgate Street and the Minories, at the extremity of which, next Tower Hill, stood a Cross. Goodman's Fields was only an extensive inclosure, and East Smithfield, and St. Catherine's seem to have extended but very little beyond St Catherine's Tower. From the gardens and inclosures immediately attached to the north side of Whitechapel and Houndsditch, the ground was only shaded with trees; the Spital Fields lying entirely open from the back of St. Mary Spital, which gave them name. Houndsditch was only a single line of buildings, extending from St. Botolph's, Aldgate, to Bishopsgate Without: from thence a pretty regular street, but interspersed with openings and detached edifices, extended to Shoreditch Church, which terminated the avenue. Westward from Bishopsgate, a few buildings, the principal of which was a long range named the Dogg House,* with gardens and inclosures intermingled, reached to Moorfield and Finsbury Field, both of which, from the Dogg House to Finsbury Court, were completely open; and on Finsbury Field, where the handsome square of that name, and the houses beyond, extending to Old Street, now stand, were several Windmills. In Old Street, itself, from the spot now occupied by St. Luke's Church

to

* It seems probable that this building was so named from its being the Kennel for the City Pack, i. e. of Hounds; we find from Stow, that one of the Lord Mayor's officers was called Master Common-Hunt. Ann. p. 649. Edit. 1633.