London

"Sir, my forefathers for five generations--at least, my memory goes not farther back--are all buried in the little green church-yard behind St. Michael's Cornhill. My grandfathe...

I looked with curiosity at this historical edifice, which was smaller, as all historical things are, than one expected. It was made of timber, mounted upon steps of stone, and c...

Most of the brethren, again, of the new and more austere Orders, until they became rich, were simple and illiterate. They wanted a rule of life which should give them no chance...

To keep a troop of servants has always been a mark of state. Ladies used to beat their servants--following the example of the Queen, who sometimes boxed the ears of her courtier...

The disease continued to spread. It was thought that dogs and cats carried about infection. All those in the City were slaughtered. They even tried, for the same reason, to pois...

Death by hanging or pillory. These were almost the only punishments. The cases before the Mayor's Court remind us of the remarkable resemblance we bear to our ancestors. They ar...

A manuscript diary of a middle-class family belonging to the time of George the First shows anything but a stay-at-home life. The ladies were always going about. But they stayed...

We who now object to the noise of a barrel-organ in the street, or a cry of milk, or a distant German band, would be driven mad by a single day of George the Second's London str...

When, in the case of Richard II., the time of expostulation had passed, and that for armed resistance or passive submission had arrived, the Londoners remembered their action in...

The main streets of the City were not mean at all; they were broad, well built, picturesque. If here and there a small tenement reared its timbered and plastered front among the...

In the months of June and July, on the vigils of festival days and on the same festival days in the evenings after the sun setting, there were usually made bonfires in the stree...

Let us consider, therefore, as the most conspicuous feature of Plantagenet London, her great religious Houses. We have seen what they were in Norman London. Already there were t...

The gate was closed. They blew their horns and called upon the people, if there were any, to surrender. There was no answer. No arrow was shot from the walls, not a stone was th...

Again, continuity of occupation is illustrated by tradition. It is impossible for the traditions of the past to die out if the people continue. Nay, if the conqueror makes slave...

This family consisted of the master, the mistress, and "Mr. Arthur," who was probably the master's brother. The two former were at this time a young married couple, whose joys a...

"There were in London," Fitz Stephen says, "a hundred and twenty-six parish churches besides the cathedral and conventual churches." Whatever the population may have been, the C...

As regards the alleged luxury of the time, this poor monk wrote from a dismal cell, very likely of wattle and daub, certainly draughty and cold; his food was poor and scanty; hi...

Again, the City palaces, the town-houses of the nobles, were at no time, it must be remembered, fortresses. The only fortress of the City was the White Tower. The houses were ne...

The in-door amusements of the time were very much like our own. We have a little music in the evening; so did our forefathers; we sometimes have a little dancing; so did they, b...

There were other ruins. Cromwell's men were not the only zealots against popish monuments, signs, and symbols. The parish churches were filled with ruins. The carved fonts were...

When he was thirty-two years of age a thing happened to Thomas Gresham which proved to be the most fortunate chance that ever came to the City of London. He was appointed Royal...

On September 18th the Houses of Parliament created a Court of Judicature for settling the differences which were sure to arise between landlord and tenants, and between owners o...

Mail-coaches started every night at eight o'clock with a guard. They were timed for seven miles an hour, and the fare for passengers was fourpence a mile. A passenger to Bristol...

Everything was made within the walls of the City. When one thinks upon the melting of tallow, the boiling of soap, the crushing of bones, the extracting of glue, the treatment o...

The city (Fitz Stephen adds), like Rome, is divided into wards, has annual sheriffs for its consuls, has senatorial and lower magistrates, sewers and aqueducts in its streets--i...

It was now nine o'clock in the evening. In the neighborhood of the Mall they saw a great block of carriages on their way to Lady H--'s Sunday routs. The explorers then visited c...

First, that of St. Thomas of Acon. The college was founded by Agnes, sister of Thomas à Becket. She endowed it with her father's property in London. It stood on the site of the...

Now, in the talk that followed I observed that, while the players amused by relating anecdotes, Ben Jonson made laughter by what he said, speaking in language which belongs to s...

On the north side, Moorfields still remained an open space; beyond lay Hoxton Fields, White Conduit Fields, Lamb's Conduit Fields, and Marylebone Fields. The suburb of Bloomsbur...

In the following chapters it has been my endeavor to present pictures of the City of London--instantaneous photographs, showing the streets, the buildings, and the citizens at w...

Have an enduring value for the twofold reason that they discuss public men and events of so high an order of interest that they cannot soon fade from the public eye, and that th...