volume ii. of his ‘_Historiæ Anglicanæ Scriptores_ xv.’ Oxford, 1691,

folio, they merely state that ‘a vehement wind struck down London the 6th of the kalends of November,’--that is to say, on the 27th of October,--‘at the hour of six!’ I doubt not but the truth was, that the good Monks of Waverley Abbey in Surrey felt nothing of this _ventus vehemens_ themselves, and therefore gave a much more trivial record of it, than if it had shaken but a single bell in the turrets of their own _Cenobium_. The ‘_Annals of Waverley_,’ you know, were, down to about 1120, almost a translation from the ‘_Saxon Chronicle_,’ executed in the twelfth century. The following year, 1092, the sixth of the reign of William Rufus, was marked by a season fatal to bridges in general; although there is no mention that our’s at London participated in the destruction. This fact is related by William of Malmesbury, page 125, and by Roger de Hoveden, page 464, in these words:--‘Also, in his sixth year, there was such an excessive rain, and such high floods, the rivers overflowing the low grounds that lay near them, as the like was remembered by none. And afterward, in the winter, ensued a sudden frost; whereby the great streams were congealed in such a manner that they could draw two hundred horsemen and carriages over them; whilst at their thawing, many bridges, both of wood and stone, were borne down, and divers water mills were broken up and carried away!’

“Frequent destructions by fire seem, also, to have been a very general fate of all our ancient buildings; for, in 1093, the wooden houses and straw roofs of the London Citizens were again in flames, and a great part of the City was thus destroyed.

“Too soon after this calamity, at a most inauspicious time for commencing, or executing, expensive public works, in 1097, King William Rufus imposed a heavy tax upon his subjects for the re-building of London Bridge,--though _that_ might very well be defended,--the erecting of the palace of West-Minster Hall, and the construction of a wall round the Tower. The ‘_Saxon Chronicle_’ speaks of these ill-advised undertakings in the blended tones of sorrow and of anger. ‘This was, in all things,’ says that faithful old history, at pages 316, 317, ‘a very heavy-timed year, and beyond measure laborious from the badness of the weather, both when men attempted to till the land, and, afterwards, to gather the fruits of their tilth; and from unjust contributions they never rested. Many counties also, that were confined to London by work, were grievously oppressed, on account of the wall that was building about the Tower, and _the Bridge that was nearly all afloat_, and the King’s Hall that they were building at West-Minster; and many men perished thereby.’

“Our brave old River of Thames itself, however, is of the same changeful nature as Luna, the mistress of his tides; for, if at one time, he overflows his banks, blows up his Bridge, or drowns an invading army, by the fury of his waves; at another season he contracts his waters into their narrowest channel, or draws them back into his urn, without leaving enough to float a wherry over his bed. Of this I shall give you several instances, as we get lower down the stream of time; and now only remark, in chronological order, that on the 6th of the Ides of October, _videlicet_ the 10th, in the 15th Year of the reign of Henry I. 1114, the River was so dried up, and there was such want of water, that between the Tower of London and the Bridge, and even under it, ‘a great number of men, women, and children,’--says Stow, in his ‘_Survey_,’ volume i. page 58,--‘did wade over both on horse and foot,’ the water coming up to their knees.

“The original account of this is to be found in the ‘_Annales_’ of Roger de Hoveden, page 473; from whom we derive the additional information, that this defect of water commenced in the middle of the night preceding, and lasted until the darkest part of the next. The same historian, also, records, on the same page, that in the year 1115, the winter was so severe, that all throughout England the Bridges were broken by the ice.

“But although London Bridge was an edifice to which there was a continual and heavy cost attached, yet its possessions were, even anciently, very extensive; for you find that so early as in the 23d year of Henry I., A. D. 1122, Thomas de Ardern, and Thomas his son, gave to the Monks of Bermondsey, and the Church of St. George in Southwark, the tenth of his Lord’s corn lands in Horndon, and the immense sum of Five Shillings per annum rent, out of the Lands pertaining to London Bridge. Calculate this, my good Sir, at twenty times its present value; for we know that in the Great Charter of King John, Chapter II. a knight paid but five pounds to the King as a Relief when he came to his estate; and _that_, Lord Coke tells you in his _Second Institute_, even several years later, was the fourth part of his annual income. Remember too, that sixpence by the week was then a living stipend to an ordinary labourer; that the Black Book of the Exchequer--which was written about the reign of Henry I.--ordains that a tenant shall pay one shilling to the King, instead of providing bread for one hundred soldiers for one meal; that the provender of twenty horses for one night, also to be paid by a tenant, was commuted for four pence; that in 1185, the tenants of Shireburn paid by custom two pence, or four hens, which they would; and, lastly, recollect, that in 1125,--called by Robert de Monte, the dearest year ever known,--a horseload of wheat was sold but for six shillings: in ordinary times, as in 1043, it was sixpence the quarter. Of all this you may see most abundant and curious proof, in Bishop Fleetwood’s ‘_Chronicon Preciosum_,’ London, 1745, 8vo. pages 55, 56; and therefore the gift of Thomas de Ardern was munificent.

“I should observe that Stow obtained the knowledge of this donation from the manuscript ‘_Annals of Bermondsey Priory_,’ which are now preserved in the Harleian Library in the British Museum, No. 231, very fairly written in a good legible black text upon vellum; having vermillion rubrics of the King’s Reign, and the date of the year. It is a rather small quarto volume, of 71 written leaves, delicately paged by some later hand; and the passage occurs on the reverse of folio 11. The Harleian Catalogue calls it, in Latin, ‘the Annals of the Abbey of St. Saviour’s of Bermondesie, from the year of our Lord 1042, down to the year of our Lord 1433; in which, beside the public affairs of each reign,’--told in the words of other Chronicles--‘many things are narrated which belong to the history of the same Abbey.’

“You have already seen that London Bridge was a public work, to which all England furnished some labourers; but, as I mentioned some time back, Maitland, in his ‘_History of London_,’ volume i. page 44, notices a deed cited by Stow, exempting the lands of Battle Abbey, in Sussex. This was granted by King Henry I. but is perhaps now lost, for it remains wholly unnoticed by the learned Editors of the new edition of Dugdale’s ‘_Monasticon_;’ and I must therefore give it you in the very words of the old Antiquary himself, who says, page 58, that in his time it remained with the seal very fair, in the custody of Joseph Holland, Esq.;--it is as follows:--

“‘Henry, King of England, to Ralph, Bishop of Chichester, and all the Officers of Sussex, sendeth greeting. Know ye, &c. I command by my kingly authority, that the manor called Alceston, which my father gave with other lands to the Abbey of Battle, be free and quiet from shires and hundreds, and all other customs of earthly servitude, as my father held the same, most freely and quietly; and namely, _from the work of London Bridge_, and the work of the Castle at Pevensey: and this I command upon my forfeiture. Witness, William Pont de l’Arche, at Berry.’

“The second year of the succeeding King, however, namely Stephen, saw London Bridge in a state to require the exertions of all England to raise it: for, in 1136, a fire broke out in the dwelling of one Aileward, near London Stone, that consumed Eastward as far as Aldgate; and to the Shrine of St. Erkenwald, in St. Paul’s Cathedral, to the West. On the Southern side of London the Wooden Bridge over the Thames was destroyed, but was soon after repaired, since Stephanides, whose description of London was written between 1170 and 1182, speaks of it as affording a convenient standing place to the spectators of the Citizens’ Water Tournaments. I shall give you the whole passage, because it describes a very curious sport of the twelfth century, which was celebrated in the immediate vicinity of this very spot; and the account is at page 76, beginning ‘_In feriis Paschalibus_;’ we’ll content ourselves, however, with Dr. Pegge’s translation of it, which runs thus.

“‘At Easter, the diversion is prosecuted on the water; a target is strongly fastened to a trunk or mast, fixed in the middle of the River, and a youngster standing upright in the stern of a boat, made to move as fast as the oars and current can carry it, is to strike the target with his lance; and if in hitting it he break his lance, and keep his place in the boat, he gains his point, and triumphs; but if it happen that the lance be not shivered by the force of the blow, he is of course tumbled into the water, and away goes his vessel without him. However, a couple of boats full of young men is placed, one on each side of the target, so as to be ready to take up the unsuccessful adventurer, the moment he emerges from the stream, and comes fairly to the surface. The Bridge, and the balconies on the banks, are filled with spectators, whose business it is to laugh.’

“Of this singular sport, Joseph Strutt copied in his ‘_Sports and Pastimes of the People of England_,’ London, 1801, 4to. page 92, plate x. a very curious illumination, contained in a volume of the Royal Manuscripts in the British Museum,--2 B. vii.--which consists of a history of the Old Testament, the Psalter, the Hymns of the Church, and a Calendar; all richly painted in water-colours, and beautified with gold,--‘yellow, glittering, precious gold,’--so highly embossed, as to be ‘sensible to feeling as to sight.’

“That volume brings back old days to my recollection, whenever I behold it; for, in the year 1553, it belonged to Queen Mary of England, and is bound in a truly regal style for her; being in thick boards covered with crimson velvet, richly embroidered with large flowers in coloured silks and gold twist; besides being garnished with gilt brass bosses and clasps, on the latter of which are engraven the Royal devices and supporters. Another, and more pleasing proof of its having been her’s,--inasmuch as it records a good action of a London Citizen concerned with the affairs of this brave river,--is to be found in a Latin note written in a beautiful black text hand, on the reverse of the last leaf of the volume. ‘This Book,’ it states, ‘formerly a gift, was afterwards carried away by a sailor; but that excellent and honest person, Baldwin Smith, Receiver of the Customs of the Port of London, hath restored and given it unto the most illustrious Mary, Queen of England, France, and Ireland, in the month of October, in the year of our Lord, 1553, in the first year of her reign.’ The text of this volume is said to have been written, and the illuminations executed, in the fourteenth century, though, from their style, I cannot help thinking that the period is nearly an hundred years too late; for beneath the pages of the Psalter is a series of most interesting and excellent drawings, in pen-and-ink outlines, very slightly and delicately tinted with colours, which was certainly a far more ancient custom. However that may be, this series consists ‘_de omnibus rebus, et quibusdam aliis_,’ for there are the representations of animals and birds, field-sports, games, legends, martyrdoms, battles, and fables, of an almost infinite variety; and in the course of them occur the figures of a water-quintain, both as it is described by Fitzstephen, and also of a more warlike character. The first of these was engraved by Strutt in the work which I have before referred to, and gives a very perfect idea of the RIVER TILTING OF THE TWELFTH CENTURY,

which the illuminator had, no doubt, personally witnessed in his own time. The other, which has also been engraven in the same work, page 113, plate xv. shews two armed knights getting ‘grysly together,’ as the ‘_Morte d’Arthur_’ calls it, in boats;

and you will find it under the 60th Psalm, ‘_Dominus repulisti nos_,’ &c.

“Stow, in his ‘_Survey_,’ volume i. page 301, mentions a very rude imitation of this kind of jousting on the water at London; when he says, ‘I have seen also in the summer season, upon the River of Thames, some rowed in wherries, with staves in their hands, flat at the fore-end, running one against another, and, for the most part, one or both of them were overthrown and well ducked.’ In Queen Mary’s Manuscript, under the psalm of ‘_Misericordiam et judicium cantabo_,’ is also a representation of two fiends hurling a Monk from a rude stone Bridge; but as I rather think that did not occur at London, I mention it no farther.

“But now, to return to our subject:--Stow relates the particulars of the great fire of 1135-36, at page 58 of his ‘_Survey_,’ citing in the margin the ‘_Annals of Bermondsey_,’ and the ‘_Book of Trinity Priory_,’ as his authorities. The latter of these is, perhaps, now no more; but in the former you may find the conflagration mentioned at page 13 b, where it is said to have happened in the year 1135, and to have extended to the Church of St. Clement Danes. It was probably in the Register of Trinity Priory, that Stow found a notice that London Bridge was not only repaired, but a new one erected of elm timber, in 1163, by the most excellent Peter of Colechurch, Priest and Chaplain; since I find it in none of the historians with whom I am acquainted. It is, however, much better authenticated that the same pious architect began his labours upon the first stone one in 1176; for, in the ‘_Annals of Waverley_,’ at page 161, you find the following entry.--‘1176. In this year, the Stone Bridge at London is begun by Peter, the Chaplain of Colechurch.’ Here, therefore, ends the history of the infancy of London Bridge: and a very chargeful infancy it was, for, as old Stow says, ‘it was maintained partly by the proper lands thereof, partly by the liberality of divers persons, and partly by taxations in divers shires, as I have proved, for the space of 215 years,’--And now, Mr. Geoffrey Barbican, your very good health.”

“Sir, my hearty thanks to you,” replied I, rubbing my eyes, “for this Bridge Story is as dull as proving a Peerage, where there’s no reliance, and much doubting:--but how’s this, Master Postern!” continued I, looking into the tankard, “you have drank, and I have drank, and yet the jug is as full as ever, and as hot as it was as first?”

“You’re pleased to be facetious, good Sir,” answered my visitor, “for truly I’m no Saint Richard to work such miracles; but, if you please, we’ll now return to the Bridge again.

“We are here entering upon the golden age of London Bridge, for the new stone building, by Peter of Colechurch, was such an ornament as the Thames had never before witnessed; indeed, in my poor judgment, it very far surpassed that erection, of which I shall hereafter have occasion to speak; and perhaps, for its time, even that which now stretches itself across the flood. The person to whom was entrusted the building of the first stone Bridge at London, was, as I have already told you, named Peter, a Priest and Chaplain of St. Mary Colechurch; an edifice, which, until the Great Fire of London, stood on the North side of the Poultry, at the South end of a turning denominated Conyhoop Lane, from a Poulterer’s shop having the sign of three Conies hanging over it. This Chapel, of which the skilful Peter was Curate, was dedicated to the Blessed Virgin, and was famous as the place where St. Edmund and St. Thomas à Beckett were presented at the baptismal Font; still it must have been something very like having a church on a first floor, for you may remember Stow says, in his ‘_Survey_,’ volume i. page 552, that it was ‘built upon a vault above ground, so that men are forced to ascend into it by certain steps.’ Of the architectural knowledge of the Curate thereof, I have already shewed you that the Citizens of London had experienced some proofs, since he is said to have rebuilt their last wooden Bridge: and John Leland the Antiquary--whom I shall anon quote more particularly,--observes, in the notes to his famous ‘_Song of the Swan_,’--a book of which I will also speak hereafter,--that Radulphus de Diceto, Dean of London, who wrote about 1210, states from his own knowledge, that he was a native of this City. The same venerable Antiquary also tells us in his ‘_Itinerary_,’ edited by Thomas Hearne, Oxford, 1768-69, octavo, volume vii. part I. marginal folio 22, page 12,--that ‘a Mason beinge Master of the Bridge Howse, buildyd _à fundamentis_ the Chapell on London Bridge, _à fundamentis propriis impensis_;’ or, as we should now say, from bottom to top, at his own costs and charges. The property of Peter of Colechurch, however, would not stand Bridge-building by itself; and therefore the present will be the most fitting place, to give you some account of the other contributors to this great national work.

“Master Leland, in the same place which I last quoted, observes that ‘a Cardinale, and Archepisshope of Cantorbyri, gave 1000 Markes or _li._ to the erectynge of London Bridge.’ Now, the Cardinal who is here alluded to, was Hugo, Hugocio, or Huguzen di Petraleone, a Roman, Cardinal Deacon of St. Angelo, whom Pope Alexander III. sent, in 1176, to France, Scotland, and England, as his Legate; which you may find stated in Alphonso Ciaconio’s noble book entitled ‘_Vitæ et Res Gestæ Pontificum Romanorum, et Sanctæ Romanæ Ecclesiæ Cardinalium_,’ Rome, printed with the Vatican types, in 1630, folio, page 578, a work of about 3000 pages in extent; of an enormous size, fairly bound in embossed vellum, and adorned with a prodigious number of copper-plates and wood-cut Armorial Ensigns; by the latter of which we are shewn, that this foreign contributor to the building of London Bridge bore for his arms, Quarterly, Argent and Gules, and over all, in the centre point, a sieve of the first. Whilst the Cardinal resided in England, he took some notice of the dispute which was then going on concerning the Primacy, between the Archbishops of Canterbury and York: when at a meeting held at Westminster, Roger de Ponte, the turbulent possessor of the latter see, arrogantly took his seat at the Cardinal’s right hand. Upon which the domestics of Richard, the mild and amiable Archbishop of Canterbury, took him thence by force, and in the ensuing scuffle he was beaten, and turned out of the assembly, with his episcopal robes sadly rent. Now this Richard was a Benedictine Monk, and Prior of the Monastery of St. Martin’s, Dover; who was elected to the See of Canterbury on the death of Thomas à Beckett, in 1174. ‘He was a man,’ says Bishop Godwin, when writing his memoirs, ‘very liberal, gentle, and passing wise;’ and, what gives him great honour in _my_ sight, he was the very Prelate whom Leland mentions in the passage I quoted, as subscribing so nobly to the foundation of London Bridge. And yet, ’tis strange, that only in his ‘_Itinerary_,’ and in Stow’s ‘_Survey_,’