In the year [extra_illustrations.1.494.2] , a munificent merchant of , who traded largely with Antwerp, carrying out a scheme of his father, offered the City to erect a Bourse at his own expense, if they would provide a suitable plot of ground; the great merchant's local pride having been hurt at seeing Antwerp with a stately Exchange, and London without .

A short sketch of the Gresham family is here necessary, to enable us to understand the antecedents of this great benefactor of London. The family derived its name from Gresham, a little village in Norfolk; and of the early Greshams appears to have been clerk to Sir William Paston, a judge. The family afterwards removed to Holt, near the sea. John Gresham married an heiress, by whom he had sons, William, Thomas, Richard, and John. Thomas became Chancellor of Lichfield, the other brothers turned merchants, and of them were knighted by Henry VIII. Sir Richard, the father of Sir Thomas Gresham, was an eminent London merchant, elected Lord Mayor in . Being a trusty foreign agent of Henry VII., and a friend of Cromwell and Wolsey, he received from the king several gifts of church lands. Sir Richard died at , -. He was buried in the church of St. Lawrence Jewry. Thomas Gresham was sent , Cambridge, apprenticed probably before that to his Uncle Sir John, a Levant merchant, years. In we find the young merchant applying to Margaret, Regent of the Low Countries, for leave to export gunpowder to England, for King Henry, who was then preparing for his attack on France, and the siege of Boulogne. In Gresham married the daughter of a Suffolk gentleman, and the widow of a London mercer. By her he had several children, none of whom, however, reached maturity.

It was in or that Gresham's real fortune commenced, by his appointment as king's merchant factor, or agent, at Antwerp, to raise private loans from German and Low Country merchants to meet the royal necessities, and to keep the privy council informed in the local news. The wise factor borrowed in his own name, and soon raised the exchange from Flemish for the pound sterling to , at which rate he discharged all the king's debts, and made money plentiful. He says, in a letter to the Duke of Northumberland, that

Later in Queen Mary's reign Gresham was frequently displaced by rivals. He made trips to England, sharing largely in the dealings of the Mercers' Company, of which he was a member, and shipping vast quantities of cloth to sell to the Italian merchants at Antwerp, in exchange for silks. A few years later the Mercers are described as sending forth, twice a year, a fleet of or ships, laden with cloth, for the Low Countries. Gresham is mentioned, in as presenting Queen Mary, as a new year's gift, with

a bolt of fine Holland,

Gresham, like a prudent courtier, seems to have been of the persons of celebrity who visited Queen Elizabeth on her accession. She gave the wise merchant her hand to kiss, and told him that she would always keep ear ready to hear him;

which,

made me a young man again, and caused me to enter on my present charge with heart and courage.

The young Queen also promised him on her faith that if he served her as well as he had done her brother Edward, and Queen Mary, her sister, she would give him as much land as ever they both had. This gracious promise Gresham reminded the Queen of years after, when he had to complain to his friend Cecil that the Marquis of Winchester had tried to injure him with the Queen.

Gresham soon resumed his visits to Flanders, to procure money, and send over powder, armour, and weapons. He was present at the funeral of Charles V., seems to have foreseen the coming troubles in the Low Countries, and commented on the rash courage of Count Egmont.

The death of Gresham's only son Richard, in the year , was the cause, Mr. Burgon thinks, of Gresham's determining to devote his money to the benefit of his fellow-citizens. had long become too small for the business of London. Men of business were exposed there to all weathers, and had to crowd into small shops, or jostle under the pent-houses. As early as or the citizens had deliberated in common council on the necessity of a new place of resort, and had been proposed. In the year certain houses in , in the ward of , and alleys-Swan Alley, ; New Alley, , near St. Bartholomew's Lane; and St. Christopher's Alley, comprising in all fourscore householders--were purchased for , and the materials sold for . The amount was subscribed for in small sums by about citizens, the Ironmongers' Company giving . The brick was laid by Sir Thomas, . A Flemish architect superintended the sawing of the timber, at Gresham's estate at Ringshall, near Ipswich, and on Battisford Tye (common) traces of the old sawpits can still be seen. The slates were bought at Dort, the wainscoting and glass at Amsterdam, and other materials in Flanders. The building, pushed on too fast for final solidity, was slated in by , and shortly after finished. The Bourse, when erected, was thought to resemble that of Antwerp, but there is also reason to believe that Gresham's architect closely followed the Bourse of Venice.

The new Bourse, Flemish in character, was a long -storeyed building, with a high double balcony. A bell-tower, crowned by a huge grasshopper, stood on side of the chief entrance. The bell in this tower summoned merchants to the spot at o'clock at noon and o'clock in the evening. A lofty Corinthian column, crested with a grasshopper, apparently stood outside the north entrance, overlooking the quadrangle. The brick building was afterwards stuccoed over, to imitate stone. Each corner of the building, and the peak of every dormer window, was crowned by a grasshopper. Within [extra_illustrations.1.495.1]  were piazzas for wet weather, and the covered walks

Many of the shops in the Bourse remained unlet till Queen Elizabeth's visit, in , which gave them a lustre that tended to make the new building fashionable. Gresham, anxious to have the Bourse worthy of such a visitor, went round twice in day to all the shopkeepers in

the upper pawn,

Unto which place,

Wren's Plan For Rebuilding London. (see page 501.)

on

January 23, 1570

, Queen Elizabeth came from

Somerset House

through

Fleet Street

past the north side of the Bourse to Sir Thomas Gresham's house in

Bishopsgate Street

, and there dined. After the banquet she entered the Bourse on the south side, viewed every part; especially she caused the building, by herald's trumpet, to be proclaimed

the Royal Exchange,

so to be called from henceforth, and not otherwise.

Such was the vulgar opinion of Gresham's wealth, that Thomas Heywood, in his old play, , makes Gresham crush an invaluable pearl into the wine-cup in which he drinks his queen's health-

Here fifteen hundred pounds at one clap goes.

Instead of sugar, Gresham drinks the pearl

Unto his queen and mistress. Pledge it, lords!

The new Exchange, like the nave of , soon became a resort for idlers. In the Inquest Book of Ward, (says Mr. Burgon), there is a presentment against the Exchange, because on Sundays and holidays great numbers of boys, children, and

young rogues,

amusing themselves in cursing and swearing, to the great annoyance and grief of the inhabitants and passers-by.

No person frequenting the Bourse was allowed to wear any weapon, and in it was ordered that no should walk in the Exchange after

Tattelius, the new-come traveller, with his disguised coat and new-ringed ear [Shakespeare wore earrings], tramping the Bourse's marble twice a day.

And Hayman, in his (), has the following epigram on a

loafer

Sir Pierce Penniless,

Though little coin thy purseless pockets line,

Yet with great company thou'rt taken up;

For often with Duke Humfray thou dost dine,

And often with Sir Thomas Gresham sup.

Here, too, above all, the monarch of English poetry must have often paced, watching the Antonios and Shylocks of his day, the anxious wistful faces of the debtors or the embarrassed, and the greedy anger of the creditors. In the Bourse he may have thought over to himself the beautiful lines in the (act i.), where

My wind, cooling my broth,

Would blow me to an ague, when I thought

What harm a wind too great might do at sea.

I should not see the sandy hour-glass run,

But I should think of shallows and of flats,

And see my wealthy Andrew dock'd in sand,

Vailing her high top lower than her ribs,

To kiss her burial. Should I go to church,

And see the holy edifice of stone,

And not bethink me straight of dangerous rocks?

Which, touching but my gentle vessel's side,

Would scatter all her spices on the stream;

Enrobe the roaring waters with my silks;

And, in a word, but even now worth this,

And now worth nothing? Shall I have the thought

To think on this; and shall I lack the thought,

That such a thing, bechanced, would make me sad?

Gresham seems to have died before the Exchange was thoroughly furnished, for in (James I.) Mr. Nicholas Leete, Ironmonger, preferred a petition to the Court of Aldermen, lugubriously setting forth that pictures of English kings and queens had been intended to have been placed in the Exchange rooms, and praying that a fine, in future, should be put on every citizen, when elected an alderman, to furnish a portrait of some king or queen at an expense of not exceeding nobles. The pictures were

to be graven on wood, covered with lead, and then gilded and paynted in oil cullors.

In Gresham's Exchange great precautions were taken against fire. Feather-makers and others were forbidden to keep pans of fire in their shops. Some care was also taken to maintain honesty among the shopkeepers, for they were forbidden to use blinds to their windows, which might obscure the shops, or throw false lights on the articles vended.

On the sudden death of Sir Thomas Gresham, in , it was found that he had left, in accord- Dance with his promise, the jointly to the City of London and the Mercers' Company after the decease of his wife. Lady Gresham appears not to have been as generous, singleminded, and large-hearted as her husband. She contested the will, and was always repining at the thought of the property passing away from her at death. She received per annum from the rent of the Exchange, but tried hard to be allowed to grant leases for years, or lives, keeping the fines to herself; and this was pronounced by the Council as utterly against both her husband's will and the Elizabeth, to which she had been privy. She complained querulously that the City did not act well. The City then began to complain with more justice of Lady Gresham's parsimony. The Bourse, badly and hastily built, began to fall out of repair, gratings by the south door gave way in , and the clock was always out of order. Considering Lady Gresham had been left-- a year, these

The Eye of London,

Contemporary allusions to Gresham's Exchange are innumerable in old writers. Donald Lupton, in a little work called

London and the Country Carbonadoed and Quartered into Severall Characters,

Here are usually more coaches attendant than at church doors. The merchants should keep their wives from visiting the upper rooms too often, lest they tire their purses by attiring themselves

here's many gentlewomen come hither that, to help their faces and complexion, break their husbands' backs; who play foul in the country with their land, to be fair and play false in the city.

I do not look upon the structure of this Exchange to be comparable to that of Sir Thomas Gresham in our City of London,

yet in

one

respect it exceeds that ships of considerable burthen ride at the very key contiguous to it.

I went to the Exchange; the late addition to the buildings is very noble; but the gallerys, where they sell their pretty merchandize, are nothing so stately as ours in London, no more than the place is where they walk below, being only a low vault.

I went to their Exchange--a place like ours, frequented by merchants, but nothing so magnificent.

During the Civil War the Exchange statue of Charles. I was thrown down, on the , and the premature inscription,

Exit tyrannorum ultimus,

Samuel Rolle, a clergyman who wrote on the Great Fire, has left the following account of this edifice as it appeared in his day:--

How full of riches,

was that

Royal Exchange

Rich men in the midst of it, rich goods both above and beneath! There men walked upon the top of a wealthy mine, considering what Eastern treasures, costly spices, and such-like things were laid up in the bowels (I mean the cellars) of that place. As for the upper part of it, was it not the great storehouse whence the nobility and gentry of England were furnished with most of those costly things wherewith they did adorn either their closets or themselves? Here, if anywhere, might a man have seen the glory of the world in a moment. What artificial thing could entertain the senses, the fantasies of men, that was not there to be had? Such was the delight that many gallants took in that magazine of all curious varieties, that they could almost have dwelt there (going from shop to shop like bee from flower to flower), if they had but had a fountain of money that could not have been drawn dry. I doubt not but a Mohamedan (who never expects other than sensual delights) would gladly have availed himself of that place, and the treasures of it, for his heaven, and have thought there was none like it.

In , during the Plague, great fires were made at the north and south entrances of the Exchange, to purify the air. The stoppage of public business was so complete that grass grew within the area of the . The strange desertion thus indicated is mentioned in Pepys' Having visited the Exchange, where he had not been for a good while, the writer exclaims:

How sad a sight it is to see the streets empty of people, and very few upon the 'Change, jealous of every door that

one

sees shut up, lest it should be the Plague, and about us

two

shops in

three

, if not more, generally shut up.

At the Great Fire the King and the Duke of York, afterwards James II., attended to give directions for arresting the calamity. They could think of nothing calculated to be so effectual as blowing up or pulling down houses that stood in its expected way. Such precautions were used in ; but in the confusion that prevailed, the timbers which they had contained were not removed, and when the flames reached them,

they,

quickly cross the way, and so they lick the whole street up as they go; they mount up to the top of the highest houses; they descend down to the bottom of the lowest vaults and cellars, and march along on both sides of the way with such a roaring noise as never was heard in the City of London: no stately building so great as to resist their fury; the

Royal Exchange

itself, the glory of the merchants, is now invaded with much violence.

When the fire was entered, how quickly did it run around the galleries, filling them with flames; then descending the stairs, compasseth the walks, giving forth flaming vollies, and filling the court with sheets of fire. By and by the kings fell all down upon their faces, and the greater part of the stone building after them (the founder's statue alone remaining), with such a noise as was dreadful and astonishing.

In Wren's great scheme for rebuilding London, he proposed to make the the centre nave of London, from whence the great -feet wide streets should radiate like spokes in a huge wheel. The Exchange was to stand free, in the middle of a great piazza, and was to have double porticoes, as the Forum at Rome had. Evelyn wished the new building to be at , to be nearer the water-side, but eventually both his and Wren's plan fell through, and Mr. Jerman, of the City surveyors, undertook the design for the new Bourse.

For the east end of the new building the City required to purchase or fresh superficial feet of ground from a Mr. Sweeting, and more for a passage. It was afterwards found that the City only required feet, and the improvement of the property would benefit Mr. Sweeting, who, however, resolutely demanded . The refractory, greedy Sweeting declared that his tenants paid him a year, and in fines ; and that if the new street cut near St. Benet Fink Church, another would not satisfy him for his damage. It is supposed that he eventually took for the feet inches of ground, and for an area feet long by wide.

Jerman's design for the new building being completed, and the royal approbation of it obtained, together with permission to extend the south-west angle of the new Exchange into the street, the building (of which the need was severely felt) was immediately proceeded with; and the foundation was laid on the . On the , Charles II. laid the base of the column on the west side of the north entrance; after which he was plentifully regaled

with a chine of beef, grand dish of fowle, gammons of bacon, dried tongues, anchovies, caviare, & c., and plenty of several sorts of wine. He gave

twenty pounds

in gold to the workmen. The entertainment was in a shed, built and adorned on purpose, upon the Scotch Walk.

Sir W. Pen and I back to London, and there saw the King with his kettle-drums and trumpets, going to the Exchange, which, the gates being shut, I could not get in to see. So, with Sir W. Pen to Captain Cockes, and thence again towards

Westminster

; but, in my way, stopped at the Exchange, and got in, the King being nearly gone, and there find the bottom of the

first

pillar laid. And here was a shed set up, and hung with tapestry, and a canopy of state, and some good victuals, and wine for the King, who, it seems, did it.

James II.

, then Duke of York, laid the

first

stone of the eastern column on the

31st of October

. e was regaled in the same manner as the King had been; and on the

8th of November

following, Prince Rupert laid the

first

stone of the east side of the south entrance, and was entertained by the City and company in the same place.

[extra_illustrations.1.501.2]  we read in Britton and Pugin's presented nearly a regular quadrangle, including a spacious open court with porticoes round it, and also on the north and south sides of the building. The front towards was feet in extent. The central part was composed of a lofty archway, opening from the middle intercolumniation of Corinthian -quarter columns, supporting a bold entablature, over the centre of which were the royal arms, and on the east side a balustrade, & c., surmounted by statues emblematical of the quarters of the globe. Within the lateral intercolumniations, over the lesser entrance to the arcade, were niches, containing the statues of Charles I. and II., in Roman habits, by Bushnell. The tower, which rose from the centre of the portico, consisted of storeys. In front of the lower storey was a niche, containing a statue of Sir Thomas Gresham; and over the cornice, facing each of the cardinal points, a bust of Queen Elizabeth; at the angles were colossal griffins, bearing shields of the City arms. Within the storey, which was of an octagonal form with trusses at the angles, was an excellent clock with dials; there were also wind-dials. The upper storey (which contained the bell) was circular, with Corinthian columns supporting an entablature, surmounted by a dome, on which was a lofty vane of gilt brass, shaped like a grasshopper, the crest of the Gresham family. The attic over the columns, in a line with the basement of the tower, was sculptured with alto-relievos, in panels, representing Queen Elizabeth, with attendant figures and heralds, proclaiming the original building, and the other Britannia, seated amidst the emblems of commerce, accompanied by the polite arts, manufactures, and agriculture.

[extra_illustrations.1.502.1]  there was a spacious area, measuring feet by feet, surrounded by a wide arcade, which, as well as the area itself, was, for the general accommodation, arranged into several distinct parts, called

walks,

In the centre, on a pedestal, surrounded by an iron railing, was a statue of Charles II., in a Roman habit, by Spiller.. At the intersections of the groining was a large ornamented shield, displaying either the City arms, the arms of the Mercers' Company, viz., a maiden's head, crowned, with dishevelled hair; or those of Gresham, viz., a chrevron, ermine, between mullets.

On the centre of each cross-rib, also in alternate succession, was a maiden's head, a grasshopper, and a dragon. The piazza was formed by a series of semi-circular arches, springing from columns. In the spandrils were tablets surrounded by festoons, scrolls, and other enrichments. In the wall of the back of the arcade were niches, only of which were occupied by statues, viz., that toward the north-west, in which was [extra_illustrations.1.502.2] ; and that toward the south-west, in wch was Sir John Barnard, whose figure was placed here, whilst he was yet living, at the expense of his fellow-citizens,

in testimony of his merits as a merchant, a magistrate, and a faithful representative of the City in Parliament.

Over the arches of the portico of the piazza were large niches with enrichments, in which were the statues of our sovereigns. Many of these statues were formerly gilt, but the whole were latterly of a plain stone colour. Walpole says that the major part were sculptured by Cibber.

We append a few allusions to [extra_illustrations.1.502.3]  in Addison's works, and elsewhere.

In , the following idle verses appeared, forming part of Robin Conscience's :--

Now I being thus abused below, Did walk up-stairs, where on a row, Brave shops of ware did make a shew Most sumptious.

The gallant girls that there sold knacks, Which ladies and brave women lacks, When they did see me, they did wax In choler.

Quoth they, We ne'er knew Conscience yet, And, if he comes our gains to get, We'll banish him; he'll here not get One scholar.

There is no place in the town,

which I so much love to frequent as the

Royal Exchange

. It gives me a secret satisfaction, and in some measure gratifies my vanity, as I am an Englishman, to see so rich an assembly of countrymen and foreigners consulting together upon the private business of mankind, and making this metropolis a kind of emporium for the whole earth. I must confess I look upon High 'Change to be a great council in which all considerable nations have their representatives. Factors in the trading world are what ambassadors are in the politic world; they negociate affairs, conclude treaties, and maintain a good correspondence between those wealthy societies of men that are divided from

one

another by seas and oceans, or live on the different extremities of a continent. I have often been pleased to hear disputes adjusted between an inhabitant of Japan and an alderman of London; or to see a subject of the great Mogul entering into a league with

one

of the Czar of Muscovy. I am infinitely delighted in mixing with these several ministers of commerce, as they are distinguished by their different walks and different languages. Sometimes I am jostled among a body of Armenians; sometimes I am lost in a crowd of Jews; and sometimes make

one

in a group of Dutchmen. I am a Dane, Swede, or Frenchman at different times; or rather, fancy myself like the old philosopher, who, upon being asked what countryman he was, replied that he was a citizen of the world.

When I have been upon the 'Change

I have often fancied

one

of our old kings standing in person where he is represented in effigy, and looking down upon the wealthy concourse of people with which that place is every day filled. In this case, how would he be surprised to hear all the languages of Europe spoken in this little spot of his former dominions, and to see so many private men, who in his time would have been the vassals of some powerful baron, negotiating, like princes, for greater sums of money than were formerly to be met with in the royal treasury! Trade, without enlarging the British territories, has given us a kind of additional empire. It has multiplied the number of the rich, made our landed estates infinitely more valuable than they were formerly, and added to them an accession of other estates as valuable as the land themselves.

It appears, from of Steele's contributions to , that so late as the year the shops continued to present undiminished attraction. They were then in number, and, letting at or each, formed, in all a yearly rent of so, at least, it is stated on a print published in , of which a copy may be seen in Mr. Crowle's Steele, in describing the adventures of a day, relates that, in the course of his rambles, he went to divert himself on 'Change.

It was not the least of my satisfaction in my survey,

to go up-stairs and pass the shops of agreeable females; to observe so many pretty hands busy in the folding of ribbons, and the utmost eagerness of agreeable faces in the sale of patches, pins, and wires, on each side of the counters, was an amusement in which I could longer have indulged myself, had not the dear creatures called to me, to ask what I wanted.

On evening 'Change,

the mumpers, the halt, the blind, and the lame; your vendors of trash, apples, plums; your ragamuffins, rake-shames, and wenches--have jostled the greater number of honourable merchants, substantial tradesmen, and knowing masters of ships, out of that place. So that, what with the din of squallings, oaths, and cries of beggars, men of the greatest consequence in our City absent themselves from the

Royal Exchange

.

The clock of the Exchange, set up by Edward Stanton, under the direction of Dr. Hooke, had chimes with bells, playing , and latterly tunes. The sound and tunable bells were bought for per cwt. The balconies from the inner pawn into the quadrangle cost about . The signs over the shops were not hung, but were over the doors.

Caius Gabriel Cibber, the celebrated Danish sculptor, was appointed carver of the royal statues of the piazza, but Gibbons executed the statue of Charles II. for the quadrangle. Bushnell, the mad sculptor of the fantastic statues on , carved statues for the front, as we have before mentioned. The statue of Gresham in the arcade was by Cibber; George III., in the piazza, was sculptured by Wilton; George I. and II. were by Rysbrach.

The old clock had dials, and chimed times daily. The chimes played at , , , and o'clock on Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday,

The outside shops of the Exchange were lottery offices, newspaper offices, watchmakers, notaries, stock-brokers, & c. The shops in the galleries were superseded by the Assurance Offices, Lloyd's Coffee-house, the Merchant Seamen's Offices, the Gresham Lecture Room, and the Lord Mayor's Court Office.

The latter,

was a row of offices, divided by glazed partitions, the name of each attorney being inscribed in large capitals upon a projecting board. The vaults were let to bankers, and to the East India Company for the stowage of pepper.

[extra_illustrations.1.494.2] Sir Thomas Gresham

[extra_illustrations.1.495.1] Gresham's Bourse

[extra_illustrations.1.501.2] The ground-plan of Jerman's Exchange

[extra_illustrations.1.502.1] Within the quadrangle

[extra_illustrations.1.502.2] Sir Thomas Gresham, by Cibber

[extra_illustrations.1.502.3] the second 'Change

[extra_illustrations.1.503.1] Exterior with new Tower

[extra_illustrations.1.503.2] Interior with New Tower