the stones of the churches he had pulled down. Henrietta Maria (Charles I.'s Queen) and poor neglected Catherine of Braganza dwelt at Somerset House; and it was here that Sir Edmondbury Godfrey, the zealous Protestant magistrate, was supposed to have been murdered. There is, too, the history of Lord Burleigh's house (in Cecil Street) to record; and of Northumberland House, with the recollections of its many noble inmates. On the other side of the Strand we have to note Butcher Row (now pulled down), where the Gunpowder Plot conspirators met; Exeter House, where Lord Burleigh's wily son lived ; and, finally, Exeter 'Change, where the poet Gay lay in state. Nor shall we forget Cross's menagerie and the elephant Chunee ; nor omit mention of many of the eccentric old shopkeepers who once inhabited the 'Change. At Charing Cross we shall stop to see the old Cromwellians die bravely, and to stare at the pillory, where in their time many incomparable scoundrels ignominiously stood. The Nelson Column and the surrounding statues have stories of their own; and St. Martin's Lane is specially interesting as the haunt of half the painters of the early Georgian era. There are anecdotes of Hogarth and his friends to be picked up here in abundance, and the locality generally deserves exploration, from the quaintness and cleverness of its former inhabitants.
In Covent Garden we break fresh ground. We found St. Martin's Lane full of artists, Guildhall full of aldermen, the Strand full of noblemen — the old monastic garden will prove to be crowded with actors. We shall trace the market from the first few sheds under the wall of Bedford House to the present grand temple of Flora and Pomona. We shall see the house long known as "Evans's," inhabited by Ben Jonson's friend and patron, Sir Kenelm Digby, alternately tenanted by Sir Harry Vane, Denzil Holies (one of the five refractory members whom Charles I. went to the House of Commons so imprudently to seize), and Admiral Russell, who defeated the French at La Hogue. The ghost of Parson Ford, in which Johnson believed, awaits us at the doorway of the Hummums. There are several duels to witness in the Piazza; Dryden to call upon as he sits, the arbiter of wits, by the fireside at Will's Coffee House; Addison is to be found at Button's; at the "Bedford" we shall meet Garrick and Quin, and stop a moment at Tom King's, close to St. Paul's portico, to watch Hogarth's revellers fight with swords and shovels, that frosty morning when the painter sketched the prim old maid going to early service. We shall look in at the Tavistock, to see Sir Peter Lely and Sir Godfrey Kneller at work on portraits of beauties of the Carolean and Jacobean Courts; remembering that in the same rooms Sir James Thornhill afterwards painted, and poor Richard Wilson produced those fine landscapes which so few had the taste to buy. The old hustings deserve a word; and we shall have to record the lamentable murder of Miss Ray by her lover, at the north-east angle of the square. The neighbourhood of Covent Garden, too, is rife with stories of great actors and painters, and nearly every house furnishes its quota of anecdote.
The history of Drury Lane and Covent Garden theatres supplies us with endless anecdotes of actors, and with humorous and pathetic narratives that embrace the whole region both of tragedy and comedy. Quin's jokes, Garrick's weaknesses, the celebrated 'O.P.' riots, contrast with the miserable end of some popular favourites and the caprices of genius. The oddities of Munden, the humour of Liston, only serve to render the gloom of Kean's downfall more terrible, and to show the wreck and ruin of many unhappy men, equally wilful though less gifted. There is a perennial charm about theatrical stories, and the history of these theatres must be illustrated by many a sketch of the loves and rivalries of actors, their fantastic tricks, their practical jokes, their gay progress to success or ruin. Changes of popular taste are marked by the changes of character in the pieces that have been performed in various ages; and the history of the two theatres will include various illustrative sketches of dramatic writers, as well as actors. There was a vast interval in literature between the tragedies of Addison and Murphy and the comedies of Holcroft, O'Keefe, and Morton; the descent to modern melodrama and burlesque must be traced through various gradations, and the reasons shown for the many modifications both classes of entertainments have undergone.
Westminster, from the night St. Peter came over from Lambeth in the fisherman's boat, and chose a site for the Abbey in the midst of Thorney Island, to the present day, has been a spot where the pilgrim to historic shrines loves to linger. Need we remind our readers that Edward the Confessor built the Abbey, or that William the Conqueror was crowned here, the ceremony ending in tumult and blood? How vast the store of facts from which we have to cull! We see the Jews being beaten nearly to death for daring to attend the coronation of Richard I.; we observe Edward I. watching the sacred stone of Scotland being placed beneath his coronation chair; we behold for the first time, at Richard II.'s coronation, the champion riding into the Hall, to challenge all who refuse
