Part 4
The master and wardens of the company are always in the direction of the stock, to whom are joined six other members annually elected; who adjust all accounts relating to it, and at Christmas report the state thereof to the board, who regulate the dividends accordingly.
The stationers company have also a share in the Irish estate, and other considerable estates, out of which they pay about 300_l._ _per annum_ in pensions, and other charities. _Maitland._
STATIONERS HALL, a spacious brick building near Amen Corner. There is an ascent to it by a flight of steps, and the light is thrown in by two series of windows, the lower large and upright, and the upper of an elliptical form. Underneath it, and at the north end are the warehouses for the company’s stock. This hall has but few ornaments; but it is however extremely convenient.
STATIONERS _court_, in which stationers hall is placed, has three passages into it one from Ludgate street; one from Ave Mary lane, and one from Amen Corner. This court, and the passages into it, are inhabited by eminent booksellers.
STAYMAKERS _alley_, Booth street, Spitalfields.
STEBBING’S _rents_, Portpool lane, Leather lane, Holbourn.†
STEEDWELL _street_, Hog lane, St. Giles’s.†
STEEL’S _court_, Bread street, Cheapside.†
STEEL _yard_, in Thames street above the Bridge. Here was originally the hall of the Anseatic merchants, and the warehouses where they used to stow their steel, flax, hemp, pitch, tar, masts, cables, linen cloth, wheat, rye and other grain. And in this place are still large warehouses for iron, in bars, &c.
STEEL _yard stairs_, by the Steel yard.
STEEL _yard wharf_, at the end of the Steel yard.
STEEP’S _garden_, Kent street, near St. George’s church, Southwark.
_St._ STEPHEN’S _chapel_, at the south-east corner of Westminster hall, was founded by King Stephen, who dedicated it to St. Stephen the Proto martyr. See _House of_ COMMONS.
_St._ STEPHEN’S _Coleman street_, is situated on the west side of that street, and in the ward of the same name. It is of great antiquity, and was originally a chapel belonging to the dean and chapter of St. Paul’s, who between the years 1171, and 1181, granted the church of St. Olave Jewry, together with this chapel, as an appendage to it, to the prior and abbot of Butley in Suffolk.
This chapel was made parochial in the year 1456, but continued under the patronage of the prior and canons of Butley, till the suppression of that convent, when it came to the crown. However in the year 1577, Queen Elizabeth granted the patronage, together with the church and rectory to Thomas Paskins and others, and in 1590 to William Daniel, serjeant at law, and other parishioners; which rectory impropriate, and right of advowson, have been held by the parish in fee farm of the crown ever since. _Newc. Repert. Eccless._
This church sharing the common fate in the dreadful fire of London, the present structure was erected in its stead about four years after. It is a plain and solid building strengthened with rustic at the corners, and enlightened by one series of large windows. The steeple is a square tower crowned with a lanthorn which has four faces.
The rector, besides several annual donations, and other advantages, receives 110_l._ _per annum_.
Mr. Munday, in his edition of Stow’s Survey, mentions several monumental inscriptions in this church, among which are the following.
1. Our life is all but death; time that ensueth, Is but the death of time that went before: Youth is the death of childhood; age of youth. Die once to God, and then thou diest no more.
2. Agnes, the wife of Leonard Darr, whose sight, By sickness much impair’d, in heav’nly light, Look’d, liv’d and died, as dimness her were giv’n, That her soul’s eyes might better look to heav’n.
In this church Munday himself lies, and on his monument is the following inscription.
3. To the Memory of that ancient servant to the city with his pen in divers employments, especially the _Survey of London_, master _Anthony Munday_, citizen and draper of London.
He that hath many an antient Tombstone read, (I’th’ labour seeming more among the dead To live, than with the living) that survey’d Obstruse antiquities, and o’er them laid Such vive and beauteous colours with his pen, That (spite of time) those old are new again, Under this marble lies interr’d; his tomb Claiming (as worthily it may) this room, Among those many monuments his quill Has so reviv’d, helping now to fill A place (with those) in his Survey; in which He has a monument, more fair, more rich Than polish’d stones could make him, where he lies, Though dead, still living, and in that ne’er dies.
_St._ STEPHEN’S HOSPITAL, situated in the Woolstaple at Westminster, was founded by Henry VIII. in the year 1544, for eight maimed soldiers, who have each a convenient room, and an allowance of 5_l._ _per annum_ out of the Exchequer.
_St._ STEPHEN’S _Walbrook_, behind the Mansion-house of the Lord Mayor, in Walbrook ward. We read of a church near the same spot dedicated to the same patron so early as the year 1135; but it then stood on the other side of the street. However about the year 1428, Robert Chichely, Mayor of London, purchased the ground of the present church and cemetry of the Grocers company, and the first stone of the new structure was laid in 1429; but the work advanced so slowly, that it was not finished, till the year 1439.
The old structure was destroyed by the fire of London in the year 1666, and the present noble edifice was erected in its place by the great Sir Christopher Wren. The steeple rises square to a considerable height, and is then surrounded with a balustrade, within which rises a very light and elegant tower in two stages, the first adorned with Corinthian, and the second with Composite columns, and covered with a dome, whence rises the vane.
The outside of the church is plain and void of ornament, but in the center of the roof is a large dome; which cannot be seen to advantage, on account of its being in a manner hid by the Mansion-house. The principal beauties of this justly admired edifice are on the inside; where this dome, which is spacious and noble, is finely proportioned to the church, and divided into small compartments decorated with great elegance, and crowned with a lanthorn, while the roof, which is also divided into compartments, is supported by very noble Corinthian columns, raised on their pedestals. It has three isles and a cross isle; is seventy-five feet in length, and thirty-six in breadth, the height of the middle roof is thirty-four feet, and of the cupola and lanthorn fifty-eight feet. On the sides under the lower roofs are only circular windows, but those which enlighten the upper roof are small arched ones; and at the east end are three very noble arched windows.
In the opinion of some persons this is Sir Christopher Wren’s masterpiece. It is even thought that Italy itself can produce no modern structure equal to this in taste, proportion, elegance and beauty. It is certain that foreigners, to whom it is well known, might very justly call our judgments in question, were we not to allow it as high a degree both of merit and fame as they have bestowed upon it. It is one of the happy productions of Sir Christopher Wren’s great genius without a strict observance of the rules of art. It has a very striking effect at entering, every part coming at once to your eye, except the bases of the columns, which are injudiciously eclipsed by the carving on the top of the pews (these are not represented in the print) and was not the design of the architect. The outside is now in part hid by the Mansion house. The plate also represents a plan and section.
To this church that of St. Bennet Sherehog is annexed, whereby the profits of the rector are much increased: besides other advantages, he receives 100_l._ a year in lieu of tithes.
STEPNEY, a very ancient village near London; but as it not joined to it by contiguous buildings, we shall not, after the example of some of our late compilers, represent it as a part of this metropolis.
This parish was of such a vast extent, and so amazingly increased in buildings, as to produce the parishes of St. Mary Stratford at Bow, St. Mary Whitechapel, St. Ann’s Limehouse, St. John’s at Wapping, St. Paul’s Shadwell, St. George’s Ratcliff Highway, Christ Church Spitalfields, and St. Matthew’s Bethnal Green; all which have been separated from it, and yet it still remains one of the largest parishes within the bills of mortality, and contains the hamlets of Mile-end, Old and New Towns, Ratcliff and Poplar.
The village of Stepney, is remarkable for its church, and the great number of tombstones, both in that edifice and its spacious cemetry. It has also an independant meeting-house, and an almshouse. The village, however, is but small, and consists of few houses besides those of public entertainment; vast crowds of people of both sexes resorting thither on Sundays, and at Easter and Whitsun holidays, to eat Stepney buns, and to regale themselves with ale, cyder, _&c._
There was a church here so long ago as the time of the Saxons, when it was called the church of all Saints, _Ecclesia omnium Sanctorum_, and we read of the manor of Stepney under the reign of William the Conqueror, by the name of _Stibenhede_, or Stiben’s-heath; but it does not appear when the church changed its name by being dedicated to St. Dunstan, the name it at present bears. To this church belong both a rectory and vicarage; the former, which was a sinecure, was in the gift of the bishop of London, and the latter, in the gift of the rector, till Ridley, bishop of London, gave the manor of Stepney, and the advowson of the church to Edward VI. who, in his turn, granted them to Sir Thomas Wentworth, Lord Chamberlain of his houshold. But the advowson being afterwards purchased by the principal and scholars of King’s Hall and Brazen-Nose college in Oxford, they presented two persons to the rectory and vicarage by the name of the Portionists of Ratcliff and Spitalfields, till the year 1744, when the hamlet of Bethnal Green being separated from it, and made a new parish by act of parliament, Stepney became possessed by only one rector.
As this is at present a rectory impropriate, the above principal and scholars receive the great tithes, and the incumbent the small, together with Easter offerings, garden pennies, and surplice fees, which are very considerable. _Newc. Repert. Eccles._
When the present church was erected is not recorded; the wall and battlements are built of brick and wrought stone, plastered over; and the roof is covered with lead. It is of a very considerable extent, for it is an hundred and four feet long, though it is no more than fifty-four broad; the height of the roof is thirty-five feet, and that of the tower, with its turret, ninety-two feet. The pillars, arches and windows, are of the modern Gothic, and the west porch, built in 1610, has no resemblance to the rest of the building, it being of the Tuscan order. The tower, which is plain and heavy, is supported at the corners by a kind of double buttresses; it is crowned with square plain battlements, without pinnacles, and with a small mean turret; and the same kind of battlements are carried round the body of the church.
On the inside are three galleries and an organ, and the altar-piece is adorned with four Corinthian pilasters, with their entablature and a pediment; these have gilt capitals; with the arms of Queen Anne carved: but what is most singular is a stone on the east side of the portico, leading up to the gallery, on which is the following inscription.
Of Carthage great I was a stone, O mortals read with pity! Time consumes all, it spareth none, Men, mountains, towns, nor city: Therefore O mortals! all bethink You where unto you must, Since now such stately buildings Lie buried in the dust.
It is probable this stone was really brought from Carthage, otherwise this inscription would scarcely be permitted to be there; but as a modern author observes, it is to be hoped, that he who ordered it to be fixed there, did not go to Carthage on purpose to fetch it.
At the east end of the church-yard near the church is a monument of white marble, adorned with a cherub, urn, palm-branches and a coat of arms, under which is the following inscription:
Here lieth interred the body of Dame Rebecca Berry, the wife of Thomas
Elton of Stratford Bow, gent. who departed this life April 16, 1696, aged 52.
Come ladies, you that would appear Like angels fair, come dress you here; Come dress you at this marble stone And make that humble Grace your own, Which once adorn’d as fair a mind, As e’er yet lodg’d in womankind. So she was dress’d, whose humble life Was free from pride, was free from strife: Free from all envious brawls and jars (Of human life the civil wars) These ne’er disturb’d her peaceful mind, Which still was gentle, still was kind. Her very looks, her garb, her mien, Disclos’d the humble soul within. Trace her through ev’ry scene of life, View her as widow, virgin, wife, Still the same humble she appears, The same in youth, the same in years; The same in low and high estate, Ne’er vex’d with this, ne’er mov’d with that. Go, Ladies, now, and if you’d be } As fair, as great, as good as she,} Go learn of her humility. }
On another grave-stone near the south-east corner of the church-yard, is the following inscription on Mary Angel:
To say an angel here interr’d doth lie, May be thought strange, for angels never die. Indeed some fell from heav’n to hell. Are lost, and rise no more: This only fell by death to earth, Not lost but gone before. Her dust lodg’d here, her soul perfect in grace, ’Mongst saints and angels now hath took its place.
Near the south side of the church on a marble tomb-stone, adorned with a coat of arms, are the following lines on capt. Thomas Chevers, his wife, and a son who died at five days old.
Reader, consider well how poor a span, And how uncertain is the life of man: Here lie the husband, wife, and child, by death All three in five days time deprived of breath. The child dies first, the mother on the morrow Follows, and then the father dies with sorrow. A Cæsar falls by many wounds, well may Two stabs at heart the stoutest captain slay.
On a stone near the foot path on the north-west side, is the following inscription:
Whoever treadeth on this stone, I pray you tread most neatly, For underneath the same doth lye Your honest friend Will. Wheatly.
The last inscription we shall mention is the following short one on the south-west side of the church.
Here lies the body of Daniel Saul, Spittlefields weaver, and that is all.
STEPNEY _causeway_, Whitehorse lane.☐
STEPNEY _green_, Stepney.☐
STEPNEY _rents_, Shoreditch.☐
STERN’S _yard_, Kent street, Southwark.†
STERRY’S _rents_, in the Minories.†
STEVENS’S _alley_, Chanel row, New Palace yard.† 2. King’s street, Westminster.†
STEVENS’S _court_, New Palace yard, Westminster.†
STEVENS’S _yard_, Poplar.†
STEWARD’S _court_, Clerkenwell green.†
STEWARD’S _rents_, Great Wild street.†
STEWARD’S _street_, Artillery lane, Spitalfields.†
STEWART’S SCHOOL, for the benefit of twenty poor boys of the parish of St. George Hanover square, was founded and endowed by lieut. general Stewart, who about the year 1728, bequeathed the sum of 500_l._ for that purpose. _Maitland._
STEW _lane_, High Timber street.
STEWS, a number of brothels anciently situated on the Bank-side, Southwark, and licensed by the bishop of Winchester. There were at first eighteen of these houses, but afterwards only twelve were allowed: they stood in a row, and had signs on their fronts towards the Thames, not hung out, but painted on the walls, as the Boar’s Head, the Cross Keys, the Castle, the Cardinal’s Hat, the Bell, the Swan, _&c._ These houses which were frequently kept by Flemish bawds, were under very strict regulations, among which were the following, confirmed by act of parliament, in the reign of Henry II.
That no stewholder or his wife should hinder any single woman from going and coming as often as she pleased.
That no stewholder should board any single woman; but she should board abroad at her pleasure, and that no more should be taken for the woman’s chamber than 14_d._ a week.
That the doors should be shut up on all holidays, and no single woman suffered in the house.
That no single woman desirous of forsaking her sins, should be kept against her will.
That no stewholder should receive a nun, or any man’s wife.
That no man should be drawn or inticed into any of these houses, nor any single woman take money for lying with a man, unless he lay all night.
That no stewholder should keep any woman that had the perilous infirmity of burning; [the venereal disease;] nor sell bread, flesh, fish, ale, wood, coals, or any kind of food; and that the constables, bailiffs and others should search every stewhouse weekly.
These and many other orders were to be observed, under the penalty of suffering great pains and punishments; and any woman leading a life of lewdness was forbidden the rights of the church, and denied Christian burial, if she was not reconciled before her death. And therefore there was a plot of ground called the single woman’s church-yard, appointed for these women at a distance from the parish church.
These stews were put down by order of Henry VIII. in the year 1546, when it was proclaimed by sound of trumpet, that this row of stews was no longer to be privileged, and used as a common brothel. _Stow’s Survey._
STICHBONE’S _court_, High Holbourn.†
STILL _alley_, Bishopsgate street without.* 2. Bluegate field, Upper Shadwell.† 3. George street.* 4. Houndsditch.† 5. Long alley, Moorfields.* 6. New street, St. Thomas’s.* 7. Petticoat lane, Whitechapel.*
STILL _stairs_, Pickleherring street.*
STILL _yard_, 1. Liquorpond street, Leather lane.* 2. Maze Pond street, Southwark.* See STEEL _yard_.
STOCKDON’S _yard_, Vine yard, Horselydown lane.†
STOCKING FRAME _alley_, Shoreditch.*
STOCKS MARKET, stood at the north-east corner of Walbrook, where the Mansion House of the Lord Mayor is now erected. This was made a market about the year 1282, at which time was a pair of stocks there, for the punishment of offenders, the first set up in the city of London.
This market was about 230 feet long from north to south, and about 180 feet broad, besides the room left for passengers on each side. On the east side were planted rows of trees, and on the north were twenty-two stalls covered over for fruit, as well on market days, as at other times. The rest of the market was taken up by gardeners, only at the south-west corner were two ranges of stalls for butchers.
But what was most singular in this market, was, there being placed at the north end, a pretended Equestrian statue of King Charles II. set up at the expence of Sir Robert Viner, alderman, knt. and baronet. This statue was originally made for John Sobieski King of Poland, but, by some accident, was left upon the workman’s hands: about the same time the city was loyal enough to pay their devoirs to King Charles, immediately upon his restoration; and, finding this statue ready made to their hands, resolved to do it the cheapest way, and convert the Polander into a Briton, and the Turk, underneath his horse, into Oliver Cromwell, to make their compliment compleat. In this very manner it appeared, and the turbant upon the last mentioned figure was an undeniable proof of the truth of the story.
The above statue and all the stalls were removed in the year 1738, in order to lay the foundation of the present Mansion-house.
STOKE GREEN, a village in Buckinghamshire, a little to the north of Windsor. Sir Thomas Stapleton has here a very handsome house, and large and most beautiful gardens.
In the neighbourhood of this village is Stoke House, which belongs to the Lady Cobham, and is a noble and large edifice, with a pleasant park. Adjoining to the house is the parish church of Stoke, and a neat hospital, built and endowed by —— Countess of Huntingdon, for the support and maintenance of 12 ancient poor people of both sexes.
STOKE POGES, a village so called from the Poges, its ancient Lords, is situated a little to the north of Stoke Green. Here Edward Lord Hastings, in the reign of Queen Mary, erected a chapel and hospital, adorned with a portico supported by pillars, that still remain on the east end of this ancient seat. The entrance to the house, is like that of the Villa Borghese at Rome, by a great hall paved with marble, and adorned with many fine ancient busts of the Roman Emperors, some of marble, some of granate, and others of porphyry, brought from Rome by the late Sir Robert Gayer. At the bottom of this hall is a pretty little chapel paved with marble, seeming to rise like steps. From this hall there is an entrance into a fine park, with seven avenues in the form of a star; from each of which there is a delightful prospect, and from one of them a good view of Windsor Castle.
STONE _alley_, Broad street, Ratcliff.
STONE _court_, 1. Aldersgate street: 2. St. Catharine’s by the Tower: 3. Lower East Smithfield: 4. New street, Fetter lane.
STONE CUTTERS _alley_, 1. Black Friars: 2. Fleet ditch: 3. Little Queen street: 4. Pallmall.
STONE CUTTERS _court_, 1. Gutter lane, Cheapside: 2. Old street. 3. Pallmall.
STONE CUTTER _street_, next to Harp ally, in the Fleet market.
STONE CUTTER _yard_, 1. Blackman street: 2. Butcher row, Ratcliff: 3. near Castle street: 4. Great stone stairs, Ratcliff: 5. St. Martin’s lane, Charing Cross: 6. Kent street, by St. George’s church, Southwark: 7. Millbank, Westminster horse-ferry: 8. Peter’s street: 9. Poor Jewry lane, Aldgate.
STONE’S _rents_, Limehouse.†
STONE _stairs_, near Ratcliff cross.
STONE _yard_, 1. Lower East Smithfield: 2. Tooley street, Southwark.
STONY _lane_, St. Olave street, Southwark: 2. Old horselydown, Southwark: 3. Petticoat lane.
STONY _street_, near Deadman’s Place, Southwark: 2. Cock lane, Shoreditch.
STOREHOUSE _yard_, New Rag Fair, East Smithfield.
STOREY’S _passage_, and STOREY’S _gate_, by Storey’s coffee-house; both removed in order to extend the view through Great George street into St. James’s Park.†
STRAFFORD _street_, Albemarle street.
STRAND, a street which extends from Temple bar to the corner of St. Martin’s lane, Charing cross. Maitland observes that the Strand was anciently a village, which took its name from its being placed on the bank of the Thames, and that its ancient situation was not much higher than that river; as upon digging the foundation of the New church called St. Mary le Strand, the virgin earth was discovered at the depth of nineteen feet.
In this street formerly resided many of the Nobility, whose gardens extended to the Thames, among which there are still remaining Northumberland house, Somerset house, and the ruins of the Savoy.
As this is the grand channel of communication between the city of London and Westminster it would have been a great ornament to both, had it been a spacious, straight and uniform street, without that incumberance which begins at Butcher Row, and ends at the New Church. In this case, the prospect from Temple Bar would have afforded a noble vista, terminated by Charing Cross, and this might have been still enlarged, by letting in the more distant view of the park, through a street of the same breadth with itself.