residence of a canon or prior was built here-bury or burg meaning "dwelling." Having been rebuilt by Prior Bolton, the last Prior but one, it was granted, after the dissolution, to Cromwell, Earl of Essex. On his attainder, it reverted to the crown, and again on the attainder of the Duke of Northumberland, to whom it afterwards fell. It was then given by Mary to Thomas, Lord Wentworth, who sold it, in

Под

Canonbury Tower.

1570, to the Sir John Spencer whose daughter and heiress eloped with the first Earl of Northampton and brought her vast property into the Compton family.

Canonbury is a wonderfully still, quiet, picturesque spot. Beyond the modern squares, rises, unaltered, the rugged brick tower, called Canonbury Tower, fifty-eight feet high, which was probably built by Prior Bolton, though it was restored by Sir John Spencer. At the end of the last

century it was let in lodgings to various literary men who resorted thither for economy and the purity of the air. The most remarkable of these was Oliver Goldsmith, who stayed here with Mr. John Newbury, the publisher of many popular children's books. Washington Irving says

"Oliver Goldsmith, towards the close of 1762, removed to Merry Islington,' then a country village, though now swallowed up in omnivorous London. In this neighbourhood he used to take his solitary rambles, sometimes extending his walks to the gardens of the • White Conduit House,'* so famous among the essayists of the last century. While strolling one day in these gardens he met three daughters of a respectable tradesman, to whom he was under some obligation. With his prompt disposition to oblige, he conducted them about the garden, treated them to tea, and ran up a bill in the most open-handed manner imaginable. It was only when he came to pay that he found himself in one of his old dilemmas. He had not the wherewithal in his pocket. A scene of perplexity now took place between him and the waiter, in the midst of which up came some of his acquaintances in whose eyes he wished to stand particularly well. When, however, they had enjoyed their banter, the waiter was paid, and poor Goldsmith was enabled to carry off the ladies with flying. colours.”—Life of Goldsmith.

Ephraim Chambers, the author of the Cyclopædia, was. one of those who took lodgings here, and here he died in the autumn of 1739, and was buried in the cloister of Westminster Abbey. The Tower is now let to the "Young Men's Christian Association." Several of its old rooms are panelled, and are glorious both in colour and in the delicacy of their carving.

Behind the Tower is Canonbury Place, where Nos. 6, 7, 8 were once united as Canonbury House. In No. 6

The first cricket club in London met at the White Conduit House, and Thomas Lord, who established the famous cricket ground, was one of the attendants there.

1

(now called "Northampton House"), over a doorway, is a curious carved and painted coat of arms of "Sir Walter Dennys, of Gloucestershire, who was made a knight by bathing at the creation of Arthur, Prince of Wales, in November, 1489." A passage at the back of the house is of Prior Bolton's time, and his famous "rebus" forms one of the ornaments of a low arched doorway. Ben Jonson alludes to " Old Prior Bolton with his bolt and ton."

In the two neighbouring houses are most magnificent stucco ceilings of Sir John Spencer's time, very richly ornamented. Some of them belonged to a great banqueting hall, ninety feet long, now divided between the two houses. The initials E. R. for Queen Elizabeth, who is said to have stayed here between her accession and her coronation, appear amongst the ornaments. Three splendid chimneypieces were removed by the late Lord Northampton to Castle Ashby and Compton Winyates.

We may, if we like, return to the west end of London through the miserable modern streets of Pentonville, a district of Clerkenwell which takes its name from Henry Penton, member for Winchester, who died in 1812. The Pentonville Model Prison, with cells for solitary imprisonment, was built 1840-42, and is managed on the most extravagant footing, with a cost to the country for each prisoner of £50 annually.

King's Cross, so called from a miserable statue of George IV. which is now removed, was called Battle Bridge, from a small bridge over the Fleet, before the statue was erected. Some say that a battle was fought here between Alfred and the Danes; others consider this to have been the scene of the great battle in A.D. 61, in

which the Romans under Paulinus Suetonius gained their great victory over the unfortunate Boadicea, and in which eighty thousand Britons were put to the sword.

North-west of King's Cross extends the modern Somers Town, so called from John, first Earl Somers, Lord Chancellor in the reign of Queen Anne, to whom the estate belonged. Farther north is Camden Town, which takes its name from the first Earl Camden, who acquired large property here by his marriage with Miss Jeffreys. Farther north still is Kentish Town, a corruption of "Cantilupe Town," a name which records its possession by Walter de Cantilupe, Bishop of Worcester, 1236-66, and St. Thomas de Cantilupe, Bishop of Hereford, 1275-82.

J

CHAPTER VI.

CHEAPSIDE.

UST outside St. Paul's Churchyard on the north-east, we are in the sanctuary of St. Martin's-le-Grand, founded in the reign of Edward the Confessor by Ingelric, Earl of Essex, and his brother Girard. It had a collegiate church with a Dean and Chapter. When Henry VII, built his famous chapel, the estates of St. Martin's were conferred upon the Abbey of Westminster for its support, and the Abbots of Westminster became Deans of St. Martin's. Here the curfew tolled, at the sound of which the great gates of the city were shut and every wicket closed till sunrise.* The rights of sanctuary filled this corner of London with bad characters, who for the most part employed themselves in the manufacture of false jewellery. "St. Martin's Lace" was made of copper; t "St. Martin's beads" became a popular expression, and they are alluded to in Hudibras. It is in the sanctuary

of St. Martin's that Sir Thomas More describes Miles Forest, one of the murderers of the princes in the Tower, as "rotting away piecemeal." The privileges of the place ↑ Strype.

• Riley, p. 92.