PAGE Man who Died (The). By Horace Annesley Vachell Merriman, Henry Seton: The Isle of Unrest (Chapters I.-XVIII.), Milligan, Miss Alice L.: An Account of his Stewardship Miss Gunton of Poughkeepsie. By Henry James Miss Sophia's Prescription. By Miss Elizabeth Stuart-Langford Mistake in War. By Lieut.-Col. F. N. Maude Modern Parent (The). By Stephen Gwynn Parkinson, C.: The Great Birds of the Southern Seas. Prichard, Hesketh: The Home Army. Prichard, K. and Hesketh (E. and H. Heron): Or Storm, or Poison. 818 Reid, J.: A Sacrifice to Bhowani. Reid, Stuart J.: Mr. Blackmore. Robinson, Sir John: South African Reminiscences, III.-V. 290, 437, 586 Souls of the Slain (The). By Thomas Hardy South African Reminiscences, III.-V. By Sir John Robinson, 290, 487, 586 Stuart-Langford, Miss Elizabeth: Miss Sophia's Prescription Sycophant of the Last Century (The). By Alexander Innes Shand Thomas, W. Beach: Athletics and Health Trek from the Transvaal (A). By Freiheer von Elft Vachell, Horace Annesley: The Man who Died THE CORNHILL MAGAZINE. JANUARY 1900. ELIZABETHAN LONDON BY THE BISHOP OF LONDON. LONDON is not a good field for the exercise of historical imagination. It has grown so rapidly in modern times that its ancient features are obliterated. There is no place from which it is possible to obtain a view of London which enables you to reproduce to your own mind its past appearance. Any one who has gazed on Rome from the Pincian Hill, or has looked down on Florence from the height of San Miniato, will understand how London is destitute of an imperishable charm which belongs to places whose distinctive characters cannot be affected greatly by the results of man's activity. More than this, the most ancient parts of London are still the scenes of its most abundant life, and leave little opportunity for archæological exploration. You can only meditate at your leisure on the dome of St. Paul's or on the top of the Monument; and it is more than doubtful if the condition of the atmosphere will allow you to find much external help for your meditations. They have to be founded on your own previous knowledge rather than inspired by any suggestions from the place itself. My object is to try and form some imperfect picture of London as it was at the period when modern England first came into conscious being in the spacious days of great Elizabeth.' It was a time when the old historic capital of England still retained its ancient features, and had carried them as far as they would go. The next century saw the beginning of that process of expansion, the end of which no one can forecast. A lecture delivered at the Queen's Hall on Wednesday, November 8, at a meeting of the London Reform Union. VOL. VIII.-NO. 43, N.S. 1 Now the distinctive feature of the site of London was that the original site lay on the lowest of a series of hills rolling down from the north to the banks of the Thames, while round it lay a region of marshes or lagoons, extending to the hills of Surrey. The estuary of the river Lea covered the Isle of Dogs. South London was a series of little islands. Westminster with difficulty emerged from the marshes. Pimlico and Fulham were swamps. London was built on two little hills, bounded on the west by the Hole Bourne or Fleet River, and divided from one another by the Wall Brook. I need not call your attention to the entire disappearance of these natural features. The Holborn Viaduct is the only thing that can remind you of the existence of a river valley. The parks contain the sole remaining grounds that give you any conception of the country on which London was built. So skilful has been the work of the engineer that some one remarked to me that he only learned that London was not quite level when he began to bicycle in its streets. We must think then of the life of Elizabethan London as mostly lived within the limits of the old City walls. Its suburban district may be briefly described. East of the Tower was St. Katharine's Hospital, a college for charitable purposes, founded by Matilda, wife of King Stephen, and still belonging to the Queen of England, being, I think, her only possession. It is now removed to Regent's Park, but has left its name in St. Katharine's Docks. Beyond this a street of poor houses reached to Wapping, and was inhabited by watermen and fishermen. North of that a few houses had gathered round the White Chapel erected on the high road that led to the Old gate which we know as Aldgate. From Aldgate, outside the wall, ran Houndsditch, and the name still suggests an unsavoury memory of dead dogs which there accumulated. North of it lay Spitalfields, an open space around the dissolved Hospital of St. Mary, described as a pleasant place for the citizens to walk in, and for housewives to whiten their clothes.' Beside it was the Artillery Ground, reserved for military training. Moor Fields had just been drained, and formed another open space. But I can best describe to you North London by telling you that I heard a year ago of an old lady who was still alive at the age of a hundred and five, and remembered in her childhood that she went with her nurse to see the cows milked at a farm where now is Finsbury Square, and then walked through cornfields to the quiet village of Islington. Beyond Gray's Inn the open high road went through the country to Hampstead. North of Lincoln's Inn Fields a row of houses extended to the church of St. Giles, which, with its neighbour St. Martin's, still bears the title of in the fields,' to indicate that with them for a long period habitation ceased. St. James's Palace stood in its park, well stocked with deer. Westminster was merely the purlieus of the royal Palace of Whitehall, the Abbey and Palace of Westminster, which was the seat of Parliament and of the Law Courts. South London was represented by the little borough of Southwark, which was incorporated with the city of London in the reign of Edward VI. Its western promenade was open to the river, and was called Bankside. It was a natural centre of amusement to the citizens of London, and the Globe Theatre on the Bankside is famous through its connection with Shakespeare. Such, then, are roughly the boundaries of the district which your imagination has to recreate. It was a place from which it was easy to take a country walk through a lovely series of undulating hills, showing the glories of the city which lay stretched along the river below. There might sometimes be fogs to impede the view, but there was not much smoke, as the fuel used in the houses was mostly wood. The introduction of coal was forbidden as early as the reign of Edward I., 'to avoid the sulphurous smell and savour of that firing.' It was not till a little later that the increase of manufactures and the diminution of forests compelled the common use of coal. Small as we may think Elizabethan London to be, its increase was viewed with apprehension, partly on sanitary and partly on political: grounds. Royal proclamations were frequently issued forbidding new buildings. At the close of her reign Elizabeth ordered the pulling down of late builded houses, and voyding of inmates in the cities of London and Westminster, and for the space of three miles distant of both cities.' We are not surprised to find that in spite of royal proclamations and Acts of Parliament 'little was done, and these cities are still increased in buildings of cottages and pestered with inmates.' Alas! human affairs will never accommodate themselves to the convenience of organisation, and organisation is sorely pressed to cope with problems which it is perpetually trying to avert. Economic forces were at work which compelled the increase of London, though their full influence was only slowly felt. The troubles in the Netherlands caused a great transference of industry to England. This |