THE CORN EXCHANGE, The en Mark Lane; projected and opened in 1747. It is a quadrangular court, surrounded by a colonnade, in which are seats for the cornfactors, who have each a desk, containing samples of corn. trance consists of eight Doric columns, supporting a plain building, in which are two coffee-houses. The chief business is transacted here on Mondays, though Wednesdays and Fridays are likewise market days. The Kentish "hoymen (distinguished by their sailor's jackets) have stands here free of expense, and pay less for rentage and dues than others. Wheat is paid for in bills at one month, and all other description of corn and grain, in bills at two months. Mark Lane; erected in 1827, from the designs of Mr. George Smith, at a cost of £90,000. It has a receding hexastyle Grecian-Doric portico, the cornice of which is crowned by a lofty blocking-course, which supports a stylobate, bearing the arms of the United Kingdom, with agricultural emblems, and an inscription. The interior consists of the sale-room, a spacious and well-lighted hall, comprising the corn and seed markets, containing eighty-two stands for the factors, in the floor of which are inserted circular glasses to light the underground premises, the roof being supported by twelve cast-iron pillars, with wheat-sheaf capitals. Market days: Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Open at ten o'clock, and closes at three. HALL OF COMMERCE, Threadneedle Street; erected in 1841, by Mr. Moxhay. The front is ninety-two feet in length, and fifty-four feet in height; having a doorway, with two windows on each side, which from their noble proportions give it an imposing appearance. The upper part of the front is enriched with a bas-relief, seventy-three feet in length, designed by Mr. L. Watson, illustrative of the influence of commerce on the fine arts, the figures being life-size; and the elevation is terminated by a richly sculptured cornice. It is at present unoccupied THE AUCTION MART, Bartholomew Lane, Lothbury. A spacious and commodious building, erected by a company composed principally of auctioneers, between the years 1808 and 1810, from the designs of Mr. John Walters, for the sale of estates, annuities, shares in public institutions, pictures, books, and other property by public auction. The architecture is of a simply beautiful character; the attached portico af the principal entrance being composed of two stories, the lower of the Doric, and the upper of the Ionic order, surmounted by a pediment. The interior is very conveniently disposed, and contains a spacious saloon, a coffee-room, and various offices and apartments. STOCK EXCHANGE,' Capel Court. A neat plain building, erected in 1801-2, from the designs of Mr. James Peacock; the first stone having been laid May 13th, 1801, and the building opened in March, 1802; the expense being defrayed by a subscription amongst the principal stock brokers, of fifty pounds transferable shares. No person is allowed to transact business here unless ballotted for annually by a committee: persons so chosen subscribe fifteen guineas each. The hours of business are from ten to four o'clock. COMMERCIAL HALL, Or Sale Room, Mincing Lane; erected by subscription, in 1811, for the sale of colonial produce of every description, from the designs of Mr. Joseph Woods. It contains five public sale rooms, a large coffee, room, several show-rooms, and numerous counting-houses, let out to various merchants. The front is ornamented with six Ionic columns, between which are introduced five emblematical devices, in bassorelievo, executed by J. G. Bubb; representing Husbandry, Science, Britannia, Commerce, and Navigation. CHAPTER IX. THE PORT OF LONDON AND THE DOCKS. Commercial edifices, or custom house, or docks, Chose for his grand resort.-Thomson. It is a fact not a little interesting to Englishmen, and combined with our insular station, in that great highway of nations, the Atlantic, not a little explanatory of our commercial eminence, that London occupies nearly the centre of the terrestrial hemisphere.-Sir John Herschel The visitor who desires to appreciate the power, the wealth, and the world-wide commerce of London, in all its varied phases, will naturally be desirous to see the docks, the shipping, and the river below bridge, in which are to be found concentrated, the evidences of a commerce, and of a concourse of nations, the like of which has never yet been seen, and is calculated to astonish the most heedless observer. A more striking contrast than that between the appearance of the east and west ends of London, can scarcely be conceived: instead of the numerous fashionable equipages, and the gaily-dressed throngs of pedestrians, which crowd the spacious and handsome streets of the west end, the stranger will find himself in a region, half land, half water, in which the population are chiefly sailors and Jews, and the businesses all that pertains to ships and shipping; and, ever and anon, he will be startled by the figure-head of a ship, or a bowsprit thrusting itself between the houses into the street, while the atmosphere is an olio of smells more powerful than savoury, and justifies a doubt as to our basis being on terra firma. THE PORT OF LONDON Is in the judicature of the lord mayor and corporation, whose municipal functions, except in respect of the river, are confined to that portion of the metropolis known as the "city." For certain pur i poses, the "Trinity House corporation," a body chiefly composed of naval officers, but of which, Prince Albert and the Duke of Wellington are honorary members, have concurrent jurisdiction. The commerce of London dates from a very early period; for we find it mentioned by Tacitus, and other Roman historians, as a place of mercantile_importance, and afterwards, in the days of Alfred the Great. The Londoners traded with the East Indies; but the trade fluctuated in importance, and by the time of Elizabeth, had very materially degenerated, and we then find that it was chiefly in the hands of foreigners: the judicious encouragement of commercial enterprise by this wise queen and her able ministers, and the maritime rank England attained by the defeat of the Spanish Armada, added to the quarrel between that power and the Netherland provinces, gave a new impetus to our foreign relations: the geographical discoveries by two of the greatest navigators of that and the preceding century, roused all the adventurous and chivalrous spirits of the age; and trade, when invested with the danger and excitment of war assumed an air of honour and fashion. And we accordingly hear of enterprizes in which the noble and the powerful, associated with mariners and merchants, in trading adventures beyond seas: as an instance of which, the Earl of Pembroke; the Lord High Admiral (Lord Robert Dudley); and Sir William Cecil, Secretary of State, embarked in a joint-stock speculation, to the African coast. The expedition consisted of four vessels, with one hundred and fifty seamen; and their fellow shareholders were five merchants of London, and two master mariners. The expedition was eminently successful. The first trading company of London, was the Hamburgh Company, formed so far back as 1296, for the puposes of trade with Flanders. then, and until the reign of Charles II., the principal carriers of the world. The Russia Company, still extant, dates from Edward VI., and had for its first governor, the noble mariner, Sebastian Cabot. The trading spirit of those days was as exclusive and monopolist as any protectionist of our own times could desire; and monopolies were somewhat more easily granted by the crown, when radicalism was purged by the sharp medicine of the axe. This company had licence to trade with all the countries under the dominion of Russia, to the exclusion of all other merchants. The greatest of trading companies, whose small beginnings has led to mightiest ends, is the East India Company. Originally formed in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, with a capital of £370,000, and five ships, they have proceeded onward, until, from an association of traders, scarce able to protect their factories from the turbulence of an Indian mob, they have become sovereigns and potentates of many kingdoms, each larger than the United Kingdom, and control the destinies of one hundred millions of human beings, holding in their hands all the wealth ef India, the land vainly coveted by every conquerer from the earliest era of war, rapine, and territorial aggression. Until the year 1834, the East India Company held the monopoly of trade in the Indian and Chinese waters; to carry on which, they had a numerous fleet of noble ships, manned and officered almost on the scale of ships of war. They also constructed the East India Docks, and erected vast piles of warehouses, all of which have since been transferred to private hands. There are other trading companies in London, whose maritime and commercial importance have been gradually merged in the amazing commerce carried on by our private merchants: some of whose singlehanded undertakings are of a magnitude far exceeding that of the companies of yore. The port of London, as actually occupied by shipping, extends a distance of four miles: the average width of the water way being from four hundred to five hundred yards. It is divided into the Upper, Middle, and Lower Pools, besides the space between Limehouse and Deptford. THE POOL, Is that part of the Thames, between London Bridge and Cuckold's Point, where the colliers' and other vessels lie at anchor. From London Bridge to King's Head Stairs, at Rotherhithe, is called the Upper Pool; from the King's Head Stairs to Cuckold's Point, the Lower Pool. 66 Every master of a collier," says Cruden, in his History of Gravesend, "is required, upon reaching Gravesend, to notify the arrival of his veesel to the officer upon the spot; and then he receives a direction to proceed to one of the stations, exclusively appointed for the anchorage of colliers. There are seven of these stations on different reaches of the river. The ships are then permited and directed to proceed in turn to the Pool, where two hundred and forty-three are provided with stations, at which they remain for a limited time to unload their cargoes. Ten thousand vessels engaged in the foreign trade, and upwards of forty thousand coasters, with a tonnage altogether of six millions and a half, exclusive of steamships and passenger vessels, annually discharge their cargoes into the warehouses and markets of the world's magazine, whence this enormous collection is re-distributed to supply our wants and luxuries, and to sustain our mercantile transactions in all quarters of the globe. A prodigious amount of this shipping business is transacted in the docks, in which nearly all the foreign vessels discharge and load: the coasters and colliers lying chiefly in the river. The dock accom modation, which, notwithstanding its immense extent, is yet manifestly inadequate to the wants of the shipping trade, and to preserve the due navigation of the river, took its origin in the depredations committed on vessels lying in the stream, by river pirates, a system, that had risen to a great height, and called for stringent measures of repression and protection. Hence the wet docks with enclosing walls, watched and protected by an efficient police. The safety thus secured, and the difference of convenience and expense in unloading on the quays, and into well-arranged and commodious warehouses, instead of into lighters in the stream, is so great as to have soon led to the use of wet docks, by all vessels whose cargoes would bear the expense of dock charges; and, the wonder is not at the extent of such conveniences but that there should not be still more. |