of the nuns and the parishioners respectively. The church of St
Mary-le-Bow, in Cheapside, is built upon a Norman crypt, and that
of St Olave’s, Hart Street, which was Pepys’s church and contains a
modern memorial to him, is of the 15th century. Other ancient
churches outside the City are few; but there may be noted St
Margaret’s, under the shadow of Westminster Abbey; and the
beautiful Ely Chapel in Holborn (q.v.), the only remnant of a palace
of the bishops of Ely, now used by the Roman Catholics. The
Chapel Royal, Savoy, near the Strand, was rebuilt by Henry VII.
on the site of Savoy Palace, which was erected by Peter, earl of
Savoy and Richmond, in 1245, and destroyed in the insurrection of
Wat Tyler in 1381. In 1505 Henry VII. endowed here a hospital of
St John the Baptist for the poor. The chapel was used as the parish
church of St Mary-le-Strand (1564–1717) and constituted a Chapel
Royal in 1773; but there are no remains of the rest of the
foundation.
The architect to whom, after the great fire of 1666, the opportunity fell of leaving the marks of his influence upon London was Sir Christopher Wren. Had all his schemes been followed out, that influence would have extended beyond architecture Sir Christopher Wren. alone. He, among others, prepared designs for laying out the City anew. But no such model city was destined to be built; the necessity for haste and the jealous guardianship of rights to old foundations resulted in the old lines being generally followed. It is characteristic of London that St Paul’s Cathedral (q.v.) should be closely hemmed in by houses, and its majestic west front approached obliquely by a winding thoroughfare. The cathedral is Wren’s crowning work. It is the scene from time to time of splendid ceremonies, and contains the tombs of many great men; but in this respect it cannot compete with the peculiar associations of Westminster Abbey. Of Wren’s other churches it is to be noted that the necessity of economy usually led him to pay special attention to a single feature. He generally chose the steeple, and there are many fine examples of his work in this department. The steeple of St Mary-le-Bow, commonly called Bow Church, is one of the most noteworthy. This church has various points of interest besides its Norman crypt, from which it took the name of Bow, being the first church in London built on arches. The ecclesiastical Court of Arches sat here formerly. “Bow bells” are famous, and any person born within hearing of them is said to be a “Cockney,” a term now applied particularly to the dialect of the lower classes in London. Wren occasionally followed the Gothic model, as in St Antholin. The Later churches. classic style, however, was generally adopted in the period succeeding his own. Some fine churches belong to this period, such as St Martin’s-in-the-Fields (1726), the Corinthian portico of which rises on the upper part of Trafalgar Square; but other examples are regrettable. While the architecture of the City churches, with the exceptions mentioned, is not as a rule remarkable, many are notable for the rich and beautiful wood-carving they contain. A Gothic style has been most commonly adopted in building modern churches; but of these the most notable, the Roman Catholic Westminster Cathedral (see Westminster), is Byzantine, and built principally of brick, with a lofty campanile. The only other ecclesiastical building to be specially mentioned is Lambeth Palace, opposite to the Houses of Parliament across the Thames. It has been a seat of the archbishops of Canterbury since 1197, and though the present residential portion dates only from the early 19th century, the chapel, hall and other parts are of the 13th century and later (see Lambeth).
Among secular buildings, there is none more venerable than the Tower of London (q.v.), the moated fortress which overlooks the Thames at the eastern boundary of the City. It presents fine examples of Norman architecture; its historical associations areTower of London. of the highest interest, and its armoury and the regalia of England, which are kept here, attract great numbers of visitors.
The Houses of Parliament, with Westminster Abbey and St Margaret’s Church, complete the finest group of buildings which London possesses; a group essentially Gothic, for the Houses of Parliament, completed in 1867 from the designs Government buildings. of Barry, are in a late Perpendicular style. They cover a great area, the east front giving immediately upon the Thames. The principal external features are the huge Victoria Tower at the south, and the clock tower, with its well-known chimes and the hour-bell “Big Ben,” on the north. Some of the apartments are magnificently adorned within, and the building incorporates the ancient Westminster Hall, belonging to the former royal palace on the site (see Westminster). The government offices are principally in Whitehall, the fine thoroughfare which connects Parliament Square, in the angle between the Houses and the Abbey, with Trafalgar Square. Somerset House (1776–1786), a massive range of buildings by Sir William Chambers, surrounding a quadrangle, and having its front upon the Strand and back upon the Victoria Embankment, occupies the site of a palace founded by the protector Somerset, c. 1548. It contains the Exchequer and Audit, Inland Revenue, Probate, Registrar-General’s and other offices, and one wing houses King’s College. Other offices are the New Record Office, the repository of State papers and other records, and the Patent Office in Chancery Lane. The Heralds’ College or College of Arms, the official authority in matters of armorial bearings and pedigrees, occupies a building in Queen Victoria Street, City, erected subsequently to the great fire (1683). The Royal Courts of Justice or Law Courts stand adjacent to the Inns of Court, facing the Strand at the point where a memorial marks the site of Old Temple Bar (1672), at the entrance to the City, removed in 1878 and later re-erected at Theobald’s Park, near Cheshunt, Hertfordshire. The Law Courts (1882) were erected from the designs of G. E. Street, in a Gothic style.
The buildings connected with local government in London are with one exception modern, and handsome town-halls have been erected for some of the boroughs. The exception is the Guildhall (q.v.) of the City Corporation, with its splendid hall, the scene of meetings and entertainments of the corporation, its council chamber, library and crypt (partly opened to the public in 1910). In 1906 the London County Council obtained parliamentary sanction for the erection of a county hall on the south bank of the Thames, immediately east of Westminster Bridge, and in 1908 a design submitted by Mr Ralph Knott was accepted in competition. The style prescribed was English Renaissance. Several of the great livery companies or gilds of the City possess fine halls, containing portraits and other collections of high interest and value. Among the more notable of these halls are those of the Mercers, Drapers, Fishmongers, Clothworkers, Armourers and Stationers.
The former royal palaces of Westminster and of Whitehall, of which the fine Jacobean banqueting hall remains, are described under Westminster. The present London residence of the sovereign is Buckingham Palace, on the west side of St Royal palaces. James’s Park, with beautiful gardens behind it. Buckingham House was built in 1705 for the duke of Buckinghamshire, and purchased by George III. in 1762. The existing palace was finished by John Nash in 1835, but did not meet with approval, and was considerably altered before Queen Victoria occupied it in 1837. As regards its exterior appearance it is one of the least satisfactory of London’s great buildings, though the throne room and other state apartments are magnificent within. The picture gallery contains valuable works of Dutch masters and others. The front of the palace forms the background to the public memorial to Queen Victoria, at the head of the Mall. Provision was made in the design, by Sir Aston Webb, for the extension of the Mall to open upon Trafalgar Square, through gateways in a semicircular range of buildings to be occupied by government offices, and for a wide circular space in front of the Palace, with a statue of the Queen by Thomas Brock in its centre. St James’s Palace, at the north side of St James’s Park, was acquired and rebuilt by Henry VIII., having been formerly a hospital founded in the 12th century for leprous maidens. It was the royal residence after the destruction of Whitehall by fire in the time of William III. until a fire in 1809 destroyed the greater part. Only the gateway and certain apartments remain of the Tudor building. Marlborough House, adjacent to the palace, was built by the first duke of Marlborough in 1710 from the designs of Wren, came into possession of the Crown in 1817, and has been occupied since 1863 by the prince of Wales. In Kensington (q.v.), on the west side of Kensington Gardens, is the palace acquired by William III. as a country seat, and though no longer used by the sovereign, is in part occupied by members of the royal family, and possesses a deeper historical interest than the other royal palaces, as the birth-place of Queen Victoria and her residence in youth.
There are few survivals of ancient domestic architecture in London, but the gabled and timbered front of Staple Inn, Holborn (q.v.) is a picturesque fragment. In Bishopsgate Street, City, stood Crosby Hall, which belonged to Crosby Place, the mansion of Sir John Crosby (d. 1475). Richard III. occupied the mansion as duke of Gloucester and Lord Protector (cf. Shakespeare’s Richard III., Act i. Sc. 3, &c.) The hall was removed in 1908, in spite of strong efforts to preserve it, which resulted in its re-erection on a site in Chelsea. The hall of the Middle Temple is an admirable example of a refectory of later date (1572).
A fine though circumscribed group of buildings is that in the heart of the City which includes the Bank of England, the Royal Exchange and the Mansion House. The Bank is a characteristic building, quadrilateral, massive and low, but covering a large area, without external windows, and almost wholly unadorned; though the north-west corner is copied from the Temple of the Sibyl at Tivoli. The building is mainly the work of Sir John Soane (c. 1788). The first building for the Royal Exchange was erected and presented to the City by Sir Thomas Gresham (1565–1570) whose crest, a grasshopper, appears in the wind-vane above the present building. Gresham’s Exchange was destroyed in the great fire of 1666; and the subsequent building was similarly destroyed in 1838. The present building has an imposing Corinthian portico, and encloses a court surrounded by an ambulatory adorned with historical paintings by Leighton, Seymour Lucas, Stanhope Forbes and others. The Mansion House was erected c. 1740.
The only other public buildings, beyond those at Westminster, which fall into a great group are the modern museums, the Imperial Institute, London University and other institutions, and Albert Hall, which lie between Kensington Gore and Brompton and Cromwell Roads, and these, together with the National Gallery (in Trafalgar Square) and other art galleries, and the principal scientific, educational and recreative institutions, are considered in Section V.
