Old and New London, A Narrative of its History, its People and its Places. Illustrated with Numerous Engravings from the Most Authentic Sources. vol 4
Thornbury, Walter
1872-78
Piccadilly: Northern Tributaries.
Piccadilly: Northern Tributaries.
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Having already dealt with the various streets abutting on the south side of , and in the preceding chapters described the principal buildings and objects of interest to be met with along the route from the southern to , we now retrace our steps, noting on the way the several streets and outlets on its northern side, or, at least, such as have anything worthy of remark appertaining to them in the way of history and personal associations. | |
, the turning on our way back eastward from Apsley House, brings down to our own times the memory of Colonel James Hamilton, a boon companion of Charles II., who gave him the Rangership of . He was a brother of Anthony Hamilton, the witty-chronicler of the Court of Charles II., but perhaps better known to the world in general as the same Hamilton who was so amusingly duped by the Countess of Chesterfield at Bretby Park. writes Mr. J. Larwood, in his
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The Duke of Wellington was living in in , during the interval of peace consequent on the abdication of Napoleon and his retirement to Elba; and here he received a deputation of the sent to present him with an address of thanks for his services in the field in Spain. Of No. we have already spoken, as the house of old Lord Eldon. No. was the town residence of the Duchess-Countess of Sutherland, who, by her marriage with the Marquis of Stafford, put the coping-stone to the fortunes of the now ducal house of Leveson-Gower. , too, was the last residence of Mr. H. A. J. Munro, of Novar, N.B., who was the owner of a fine gallery of paintings, and also of a valuable library. | |
, in the reign of Queen Anne, was a desolate by-road, generally spoken of as It is now a noble thoroughfare, built only on the eastern side, the other being open to . We shall have more to say of it in a future chapter when making our way to . | |
Passing (which leads to Mayfair], and the narrow thoroughfare called Engine Street, we arrive at . says Mr. Peter Cunningham,
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Halfmoon Street, the next turning eastward, took its name from an inn which stood at the corner, facing . The sign was not an uncommon ; and it may be well here to remind the reader that the lower half of , Strand, was formerly called Halfmoon Street, and for the same reason. The half-moon or crescent, according to Mr. Larwood, was the emblem of the temporal, as the sun was that of the spiritual power. There was another tavern at Upper Holloway, famous for its cheese-cakes, which were hawked about London by a man on horseback, and at time formed of the established Another in , is connected with the name of Ben Jonson. But our business is with the street bearing the name of the Half-moon. The street may be speedily dismissed, for it has but few literary reminiscences, and has for several generations consisted of respectable houses of the middle class, let out in apartments to members of Parliament and others. The east corner house was formerly the residence of Madame d'Arblay. In this street Boswell, as he tells us in his was lodging in , | |
p.292 | when he was visited by the great lexicographer, who, having expressed a dislike of the publication of a portion of of his letters, on being asked by his future biographer whether he forbade his letters to be published after his decease, gave the bluff reply, --a reply to which posterity is deeply indebted. Here, too, died, in , the celebrated actress, Mrs. Pope; she was buried in the cloisters of . |
According to the published in , the Lady Clarges was the owner of a stately new building on the north side of , then in the occupation of the Venetian Ambassador. Its site is now covered by , which was named after Sir Walter Clarges, and was built about the year . At No. in this street Edmund Kean, the tragedian, lived for some few years, and it is said that, in the adjoining house (No. ) Lady Hamilton was residing at the time of Lord Nelson's death. If this statement be correct, she must have removed to this street only a few days before from . In the year , No. was the residence of William Mitford, the historian of Greece, brother of Lord Redesdale. His opinions disqualified him from appreciating the Athenian constitution, and his work has ceased to be valued. He died in the year . | |
It was not till many mansions had been built further west that the ground about May Fair came to be utilised. Towards the end of the century, indeed, a considerable plot of ground adjoining was leased by Sir Thomas Clarges (whose wife was a Berkeley) to Thomas Neale, Groom-Porter to his Majesty (of whom Charles Knight tells us that he was the introducer of lotteries on the Venetian plan, and the builder of the Dials, in ), on the condition that he should lay out in building on it, but the agreement was never carried out, and the lease was forfeited or cancelled. After his son obtained back the lease granted to Neale by Sir Thomas Clarges, the grounds on the slope of the hill in westward, toward , were, as we have already stated, soon covered with buildings. | |
is a dull, narrow, and heavy thoroughfare, with no great interest attaching to its houses. In it, however, lived, in the time of Queen Anne and George I., the [extra_illustrations.4.292.1] , who, as Mr. John Timbs tells us, Pope, however, did not, on this account, object to stay with him here as a guest. The Hon. Mrs. Norton was living here in , before settling in . Hatton, in , speaks of as being But almost every street in this neighbourhood, at time or other, might have had the same thing said of it. | |
Of , which forms a , we have already spoken; and of , which is opposite the north-east corner of the , we have but little to say, beyond the fact that it dates from the year , at which it was the western extremity of , or, as it was then called, , and that it was named from Berkeley House, which it bounded on the east. In this street was the last town apartment occupied by Pope, who came to live here in order to be near his friend, Lord Burlington. side of the street is now occupied entirely by the wall of , and the other by a few respectable houses and the stables belonging to the mansions in . | |
, which was built in the year , was so called after Henry Jermyn, Lord Dover, the of De Grammont's Memoirs; he resided on the east side of the street, and died in . The street stands on a part of the ground that had been for a few years occupied by Clarendon House, the of the populace, and the princely mansion of Lord Chancellor Clarendon. John Evelyn, who had been on that very ground, lived for some time close by Lord Dover's house. | |
On the west side of this street lived Dr. John Arbuthnot, physician to Queen Anne, and the friend of Pope and other literary celebrities of his time. On the death of the queen, Arbuthnot, like the other attendants at Court, was displaced, and had to leave his apartments at St. James's. He removed into , as he said, It is to this that Pope alludes in his well-known apostrophe to Arbuthnot:--
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Dr. Arbuthnot, the son of a nonjuring clergyman in Scotland, was born at Arbuthnot, in Kincardineshire, about the period of the Restoration. Early in life he settled in London, and for some time gained his livelihood as a teacher of mathematics. He had studied medicine in his native country, but a fortunate accident brought him into practice here as a physician. He happened to be at Epsom on occasion, when Prince George, who was also there, was suddenly taken ill. Arbuthnot was called in, and having effected a cure, was soon afterward;; appointed of the physicians in ordinary to the queen. He continued to practise, enjoying considerable professional distinction, till his death, in . | |
No. in this street is the town residence of the Bishops of Ely. It was purchased or built in the year , out of the proceeds of the sale of the ancient Palace of the Bishops of Ely, in Ely Place, . On the front of the house is a mitre, sculptured in stone. In the adjoining house (No. ) resided Lord King, the who wrote a life of his kinsman, John Locke. This work was published in . In , No. was the residence of Lady Byron, widow of the poet. | |
In this street also was the gun-shop of the celebrated who was a favourite with almost all the aristocratic sportsmen of his day. He patented his principal improvements in the manufacture of guns in . | |
Here, too, for many years, was the publishing house of Mr. Edward Moxon, who continued to surround himself as a publisher with such a host of poetical clients, that his shop may be said to have become a modern temple of the Muses. From this shop were issued the successive volumes of Barry Cornwall, Wordsworth, Tennyson, &c. But this passed away about the year , when the business was transferred elsewhere, and the poetic halo disappeared from . | |
was so called after Christopher Monk, Duke of Albemarle, who purchased the mansion of the Earl of Clarendon which stood partly on its site. The street was built towards the close of the or beginning of the eighteenth century by Sir Thomas Bond, of Peckham, Comptroller of the Household to Henrietta Maria, the Queen of Charles II., and a loyal friend of James II., whom he accompanied in his exile to St. Germains. Evelyn tells us, in his that this Sir Thomas Bond bought part of the grounds of Clarendon House, Clarendon House was sold by the Duke of Albemarle, when in difficulties, soon after he had purchased it. Hatton, in , describes as
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At No. A, on the west side of this street, is the shop of John Murray, publisher. It is scarcely necessary here to do more than just remind our readers of the connection of this house with Lord Byron, whose poems were issued hence to the public, as they came fresh from the anvil of his brain, between and his death in . Nor will they forget how the poet's fondness for his publisher stands recorded in his lordship's verses and letters. With Byron he was In appeared the cantos of and so eminently successful were they, that, as Byron himself briefly described in his memoranda, he awoke morning and found himself famous. The copyright money paid by Mr. Murray, , his lordship presented to his friend, Mr. Robert C. Dallas, saying, that he never would receive money for his writings, as Moore tells us in his
We learn from Alibone, that Mr. Murray paid, at different times, for copyrights of his lordship's poems, certainly over . As we have already mentioned in another place, the publishing business was established in by the grandfather of the present head of the house, Mr. John McMurray, a Scotchman, who came to London after the Jacobite troubles to push his fortunes. It was a bold step of John Murray the elder to venture so far west, and so far not only from , but from that highway of literature, and ; but it was amply justified by the result. | |
The elder Mr. John Murray died in , and was succeeded by his son of the same name, of whose earliest was Mrs. Rundell's the sale of which, we are told, proved even more remunerative, perhaps, than Becoming connected with Thomas Campbell and Sir Walter Scott, in Mr. Murray projected the , as the recognised organ of the Tory party. The new review soon acquired a hold on the mind of the educated classes, which it had hardly lost at the end of half a century, in spite of the progress made by the cheaper monthly, weekly, and now daily press. The editor | |
p.294 | of the was William Gifford; and among its earliest contributors were George Canning, John Hookham Frere, Sir Walter Scott, Byron, Dean Milman, and Jonathan Croker. says Mr. Cyrus Redding, in his
Gifford, like many others who have risen in life, was extremely vain; he would even go so far as to boast that he had the power of distributing literary reputations. observed Sheridan,
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It was in Mr. Murray's establishment in that Byron and Scott met, and here Southey made the acquaintance of Crabbe; indeed, it has been said that almost all the literary magnates of the day were
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in . Byron himself has thus described the scene:--
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Mr. Murray's dinner-parties included politicians and statesmen, as well as authors and artists. The Mr. John Murray died in , and was succeeded by his son, John Murray the , Under his the house has published many of the greatest works in history, travel, biography, art, and science of the present age, among which may be mentioned Dr. Livingstone's Smiles's and Darwin's and the Handbooks of English Counties and Continental travel of late years brought out by this firm owe much to the personal assistance and superintendence of the head of the house. Mr. Murray has counted among his clients, besides the writers named above, Colonel Leake, Dean Milman, Sir Henry Holland, Henry Hallam, George Grote, Mrs. Somerville, Dean Stanley, and nearly all the most distinguished authors of the present century. We may add that the sign-board of Mr. MacMurray, or Murray, in , was the a sign probably assumed by him in opposition to that of Messrs. Longman, a
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No. , on the opposite side of the street, now the Royal Thames Yacht Club, was formerly Grillon's Hotel. Here Louis XVIII. of France stayed in , on his journey from Hartwell to France, to take his seat on the throne of the Bourbons, to which he had been restored mainly by the intervention of England. He was escorted from London to Dover by the Prince Regent himself. Out of this hotel grew a private club, called which used to hold its meetings here. It was formed in by some members of both Houses of Parliament, who wished for some neutral ground on which they might meet, politics being strictly excluded. differed from most of the other clubs of the half of the present century in having nothing to | |
do with politics. To it belonged most of the distinguished public men of the Regency, and of the reigns of George IV. and William IV. Here, every Wednesday during the Parliamentary season, its members dined together, ZZZ | |
Here, and at the Clarendon Hotel, in , were held for many years the Roxburghe Club Dinners. In , there was sold at the rooms of Messrs. Puttick and Simpson a | |
p.296 | collection of nearly portraits of members of Grillon's Club, almost all of them members of Parliament and of various Governments, mostly engravings from private plates, after drawings by Slater, George Richmond, and other artists. [extra_illustrations.4.296.1] |
In this street are several large hotels, such as the Pulteney, the York, the Queen's Head, and the Albemarle. In the days of the Regency, when the club system was as yet in its infancy, the hotels at the West-end were much more frequented than now-a-days is the case. There was then a very large class of men, including Wellington, Nelson, Collingwood, Sir John Moore, and some few others, who seldom frequented the clubs. The persons to whom we refer, and amongst whom were many members of the sporting world, used to congregate at a few hotels, of which the
and were the most fashionable. The mentioned above, was at that time kept by a French cook, Jacquiers, who contrived to amass a large sum of money in the service of Louis XVIII. in England, and subsequently with Lord Darnley. This was the only public hotel where a genuine French dinner could be obtained, but the sum charged seldom amounted to less than or ; a bottle of champagne or of claret in the year usually cost a guinea. | |
No. has been for many years the home of different clubs, more or less successful. In the was established here; it is described by Lord Dudley in his time, as Lord Byron was a member of this club, and he tells us that On the break--up of the another club was started here, called the but its career does not appear to have been altogether a flourishing . At the Albemarle Hotel, at the junction of the street with , another club was inaugurated towards the close of , and called It was established for the accommodation of both gentlemen and ladies. observes of the daily papers,
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At No. are the rooms of the Royal Asiatic Society, the London Mathematical Society, and the British Association for the Advancement of Science. The -mentioned of these societies was founded in , for the investigation and encouragement of arts, science, and literature in connection with Asia. Its museum contains, , a choice collection of Persian, Chinese, and Sanskrit MSS., with Oriental arms and armour, and various other illustrations of the history, arts, and antiquities of the Eastern world. The British Association was established in , for the purpose of affording scientific men, both of this and other countries, an opportunity of assembling together and discussing on scientific subjects, and for which purpose meetings of a week's duration are held annually in different parts of England. | |
The Royal Institution, near the north-east corner of this street, was established in , mainly through the exertions of Count Rumford, the most able practical philosopher of the day, for the purpose of encouraging improvements in arts and manufactures. Its meetings were commenced in , shortly before which time the proprietors of the original shares obtained a charter of incorporation for the purpose of helping on the introduction of useful and mechanical inventions and improvements, and for teaching, by courses of philosophical lectures and experiments, the application of science to the common purposes of life, whence the motto of the institution- The building is spacious and well adapted for the purposes to which it is applied; it originally consisted of private houses, which having been purchased by the institution, an imposing architectural front was added, from the designs of Mr. L. Vulliamy, consisting of fluted halfcolumns, of the Corinthian order, placed upon a stylobate; and occupying the height of floors, support an entablature and the attic storey. On the fascia is inscribed, The lectures delivered here are of a very popular class, and are well attended. In the reading room are deposited choice or rare specimens of art, taste, and | |
The institution has, since its foundation, undergone a very considerable change in constitution. Some years ago, in consequence of the low state of the funds, the majority of proprietors relinquished their proprietary claim, and became shareholders for life only; the dissentients from such terms selling their respective shares to the institution for a stipulated sum. By this means and by some personal bequests, the funds were materially improved. About the year the Royal Institution acquired fresh fame as the scene of Professor Faraday's experimental researches in electricity, the success of which has few parallels in the records of modern science. | |
p.297 [extra_illustrations.4.297.1] [extra_illustrations.4.297.2] | |
A native of , Surrey, and the son of a working smith, Michael Faraday, as a boy, was apprenticed to a bookseller and bookbinder;--and during his term of apprenticeship a few scientific works had occasionally fallen into his hands, among them being the treatise on in the and Mrs. Marcet's The perusal of the led to the construction of his electrical machine with a glass phial, and this he speedily followed up by a variety of experiments. Through the kindness of Mr. Dance, a member of the Royal Institution and a customer of his master, young Faraday was enabled to attend the last lectures delivered by Sir Humphry Davy, in the early part of . In the following year he was appointed Chemical Assistant at the Royal Institution, under Sir Humphry as Honorary Professor, and Mr. Brande as Professor of Chemistry; and shortly afterwards he went abroad, as assistant and amanuensis to his patron, Sir Humphry Davy. On his return, after an absence of years, [extra_illustrations.4.297.3] resumed his duties, and took up his residence at the Royal Institution, where he remained almost till the day of his death. In he appeared at the lecture-table in the great theatre, and he continued to [extra_illustrations.4.297.4] every year from that time. In he commenced the series of experimental researches in electricity which have been published from time to time in the of the Royal Society. In the year , when Mr. Fuller founded the chair of chemistry called after his name in the Royal Institution, he nominated Mr. Faraday the professor; and years later Professor Faraday received from Lord Melbourne's Government a pension, as a recognition of the importance of his scientific discoveries. In he was appointed scientific adviser on lights at sea to the Trinity House, and in the same year became a member of the Senate of the University of London; and he was subsequently scientific adviser on the same subject to the Board of Trade. Professor Faraday was a corresponding member of the Academy of Sciences at Paris, a fellow of the Royal Society, and a member of several learned and scientific bodies, not only in this country, but also on the Continent, and in America. The University of Oxford conferred upon him the honorary degree of Doctor of Civil Laws. Late in life he settled down in retirement at Green, where he died in the year . The in recording his death, observes that and that his great talents were
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Among the members of the scientific world who have lectured within the walls of the institution with which Faraday was so long and so honourably connected, have been Murchison, Lyell, Sedgwick, Whewell, Tyndall, and Huxley. The scientific world has likewise been benefited by a published at the expense of the Royal Institution, in a less costly, and consequently more available, form than that of the average of and
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Opposite to the Royal Institution is Chapel, a private chapel of ease; it is a building with little or no architectural pretensions. In fact, the religious edifices in this neighbourhood take the shape of proprietary chapels rather than of parish churches. says Pennant, with dry humour,
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Lord Orkney and Lord Paulet were living in in . Here, too, in , died Richard Glover, the poet, the author of and
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In the Roman Catholics established, at Crawley's Hotel, in , a club, which they called the from its entrance being in that thoroughfare, which crosses about midway. This was the and only instance of a London club named from a street, though such a practice is common in Dublin; but, according to Mr. John Timbs, it was common in the last century, in the early part of which many were formed, composed of members all living in the same thoroughfare, so that a man had but to stir a few houses from his own door to enjoy his club and the society of his neighbours. observes Mr. Timbs, The therefore, arose out of the instinct of mutual protection. It may be added that occupies as nearly as possible the site of Clarendon House, already mentioned by us under . | |
At the northern end of , connecting and , is , which consists of spacious and oldfashioned mansions. At the house of Sir Ralph Payne (afterwards better known as the eccentric Lord Lavington) the leaders of the Opposition in Pitt's days frequently met. Erskine, having day dined there, found himself so indisposed as to be obliged to retire after dinner to another apartment. Lady Payne, who was incessant in her attentions to him, inquired, when he returned to the company, how he found himself. Erskine took out a piece of paper, and wrote on it-
writes Sir Nathaniel William Wraxall,
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At No. in this street Henry, Lord Brougham, resided during the last or years of his life. He was born at Edinburgh in , and coming to London to push his fortunes at the Bar, made himself known to the political world by his advocacy of Queen Caroline, and afterwards by his zeal in the cause of Reform and Education. He was suddenly raised to the woolsack by the Whig party on their attaining to place and power under Lord Grey in ; but, for reasons never yet fully explained, he was not re-appointed after the Conservative interregnum years later. He died somewhat suddenly at his residence at Cannes, in the south of France, in . He was a mathematician, a man of science, a linguist, and an orator, as well as a lawyer and statesman; indeed, his general knowledge was so extensive that it was said of him in satire, that His house was afterwards the Turf Club. | |
Here, at No. , lived for the last half century of his life Sir Alleyne Fitzherbert, a distinguished diplomatist, afterwards known as Lord St. Helen's, who, after having tried in early life nearly all the capitals of Europe, used to maintain that there was no other place but London that was worth living in. He was true to his principles, and he seldom if ever quitted the West-end, either winter or summer. He died in I. | |
Sir William Scott, afterwards Lord Stowell, who, in his year, married the Dowager Marchioness of Sligo, lived for some time in this street. In our description of will be found a detailed account of Sir William's marriage with this lady, as well as an anecdote referring more particularly to his residence in . | |
No. was for many years the residence of Mr. William Holmes, M.P. for Berwick, and the of the Tories in the . He was an especial favourite of the Great Duke and of Sir Robert Peel, who used often to upon him here. | |
, on account of its retired situation and the absence of a direct thoroughfare, has for several years been, as it were, an offshoot of At the present time there are the Grafton and the Junior Oxford and Cambridge, the latter occupying what was formerly the home of the Marlborough. The Turf Club, mentioned above, removed in - to their new quarters in . In the south-east corner of this street Benjamin Tabart, the publisher, for some time had his shop; his picture-books for children are well known. | |
, which we now enter, dates from the year , when it was built by Sir Thomas Bond. says Pennant, was at that time an open field, called the Conduit Mead, from of the conduits which supplied this part of the town with water. Hatton, writing in , describes it as
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The of , observes, | |
p.299 | It is obvious to remark that as Old and New Bond Streets are street, it is the latter to which allusion is evidently made in the above extract. Even a century and a half ago was a region of fashion; or, to use the words of Pennant, in spite of the loose expression, The same writer remarks, however, in , that if its builder had been able to foresee the extreme fashion in reserve for the street, he would have made it wider. he philosophises, Indeed, even down to the days of the Regency and the opening of , the chief fashionable lounge in the West-end was along Old and ; and as lately as the year , the morning was the correct time for putting in an appearance there during
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The reader will be amused, we think, with the following extract from in the year :-- How little could the writer of these lines imagine that in the course of a few years [extra_illustrations.4.299.1] , Old and New, would become of the most fashionable streets of the district, and that its shops would be the chief emporium of articles of beauty and taste, only, at a later period, outdone by those of I | |
writes Sir Walter Scott, In vain did the female attendant, a lodging-house servant, chafe his cold feet, in order to restore his circulation. He complained that the cold came up higher, and he died without a groan. Dr. Ferrier, however, adds, Mr. P. Cunningham, in his identifies the house in which he died as No. on the west side, His death, the date of which most writers fix as , was somewhat sudden, for he had only just (writes Thackeray)
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In we read that
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Sterne was among the frequenters of in the days of Garrick. Mr. Cradock day meeting him there, asked him why he did not try his hand on a comedy, especially as he was so intimate with the great actor. With tears in his eyes, Sterne replied, that there were reasons which prevented him: firstly, that he had not the gifts of the comic muse; and secondly, that he was wholly unacquainted with the business of the stage. Possibly he was right; but we cannot help regretting that the author of never made an effort in that direction. | |
Poor Sterne was interred in the burial-ground belonging to , , where, curiously enough, a wrong date was cut upon his tombstone. He died poor, if not actually in debt, A letter addressed by him (probably from his | |
p.300 | lodgings) to Garrick, asking for a loan of , just before leaving town on his is printed in in Smith's
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In this street, in , lodged Pascal Paoli, the patriot of Corsica, and here he was constantly visited by Boswell, who, if the truth must be told, made himself somewhat foolishly conspicuous by dancing attendance upon him-so much so, indeed, as to be nicknamed Here, too, Boswell introduced Dr. Johnson to the General, thereby realising a proud feeling of hope which he thus expressed in his --
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Here, too, Boswell had lodgings, where he would often entertain Dr. Johnson, Reynolds, and the rest of the literary circle of his time. It was stated in the of , that a picture of the interior of these lodgings, with portraits of the guests, a fancy scene, painted by Mr. W. P. Frith, was sold at Messrs. Christie and Manson's rooms, a few days before the above date, for upwards of --a larger sum than ever | |
| was paid for the painting of an English artist during his life-time. | |
Among the other eminent inhabitants of this street were Sir Thomas Lawrence, the distinguished President of the Royal Academy, and the Countess of Macclesfield, mother of the poet, Richard Savage. says Mr. Peter Cunningham,
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At No. are the offices of the Artists' General Benevolent Institution, Artists' Orphan Fund, and the Arundel Society for Promoting the Knowledge of Art. The -named of these institutions was founded in , and incorporated in ; it affords relief to artists, whether members or not, as well as to their widows and children. The Arundel Society, which has for its object the promotion of the knowledge of art, by copying, reproducing, and publishing the most important works of the ancient masters, was founded in , and is called after Thomas Howard, the celebrated Earl of Arundel in the reigns of James I. and Charles I., who has deservedly been called and whom we have | |
p.301 | already introduced to our readers in our account of Arundel House in . Its members are divided into classes-associates, life and annual subscribers, and honorary members-and its funds are applied to the publication of essays on art subjects, chromo-lithographs, engravings, photographs, &c., of the highest order of mediaeval art; and it may safely be asserted that no society has done more than the Arundel in reviving a general appreciation of mediaeval art. A minute account of the results achieved by the society may be found in works issued by its secretary, Mr. F. W. Maynard, and entitled respectively and
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In this neighbourhood a club of gentlemen, mostly members of or other of the Houses of Parliament, calling themselves still hold their musical Sunday gatherings, though their exact is kept a secret from the outer world. , in fact, has long ranked high in the musical world for its devotion to the divine art. | |
The keepers of music-shops, it is well known, have usually adhered to the primitive practice of taking for signs some or other of the instruments in which they deal, as, for instance, the
and Messrs. Novello, the great musical publishers in , have so far adhered to the custom as to carry on their trade under the sign of the While on the subject of signs | |
we may add, on the authority of Mr J. Larwood, in his that the sign of the was borne by a mercer in at the end of the eighteenth century, this particular sign evidently being chosen on account of the silk ribbons manufactured in that town. | |
Of the librarians at different times inhabiting this street was Ebers, who lived at No. , and who, as Mr. John Timbs tells us, Of Hookham's Library, of the fashionable lounges towards the close of the last century, mention is thus made in George Colman's
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In , although, perhaps, not so ostentatious as those in the more general thoroughfares, such as or , many of the shops are, nevertheless, extremely elegant, and the articles exhibited for sale are of the most description. At the corner of is the shop of Mr. C. Hancocks, the great manufacturing jeweller. At are the show-rooms of Messrs. Hunt and Roskell, formerly Storr and Mortimer, who succeeded to a large part of the connection of Mr. Hamlet. At No. are the extensive show-rooms of Messrs. Copeland and Co. (formerly Messrs. Copeland and Spode), the eminent porcelain manufacturers, of Stoke-upon- Trent, almost the only rivals of Messrs. Wedgwood, | |
p.302 | whom we have already mentioned in our account of the neighbourhood of . Mr. Alderman Copeland, formerly Lord Mayor of London, was head of this firm. [extra_illustrations.4.302.1] |
At No. in this street, Miss Clark, the greatgranddaughter of Theodore, King of Corsica (who was buried at St. Anne's Church, Soho, and of whom we have already given some account in a former chapter ), was established as a miniature-painter early in the present century. Her card of address, with her modest prices and hours of attendance, is given in John Timbs'
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Dealers in pictures and other branches of the fine arts are numerous in this street; besides which the picture-galleries offer opportunities for a pleasing promenade for such as care to avail themselves of them. Foremost among these is the Dore Gallery, situated at No. . This exhibition, which includes some of the choicest productions of the distinguished French artist, M. Gustave Dore, is open daily all the year round. Among the pictures exhibited here are the the the and Of the last-named work the thus observes:--
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At No. is the Exhibition of the Society of French Artists. And scores of exhibitions of pictures and other curiosities, too numerous to particularise, have at various times existed in and its neighbourhood. The following curious notice of such exhibition, quoted from the , of , may be of interest to our readers in connection with this street:--
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Cromwell's head, it appears, was exhibited here by an individual named Cox, who kept a museum of curiosities, and who had purchased it from of the Russell family, in whose hands it had been for a century. When Cox parted with his museum, he sold the head to individuals who all in their turn met with sudden deaths, and the head became the property of the daughters or nieces of the last survivor. These ladies, as we have mentioned in a previous chapter, being nervous at the idea of keeping in their house a relic so fatal, sold it to a medical man named Wilkinson. | |
At No. , in , was exhibited, in , Haydon's picture of painted for Sir Robert Peel, and upon which Wordsworth wrote of his most beautiful sonnets. | |
Among the distinguished residents of this street Mr. Cunningham enumerates General Sir Thomas Picton, who fell at Waterloo, and Lord Nelson, who, as Southey tells us in his charming biography, was lodging here in , after the battle of St. Vincent, and at the time when the news reached London of Lord Duncan's victory off Camperdown. By some accident or other the house was not illuminated; but when the mob was told that Admiral Nelson lay there in bed, badly wounded, it went off without breaking the windows. | |
At Long's Hotel, as we learn from his by Tommy Moore, Byron dined in company with Sir Walter Scott; and another hotel in this same street, is mentioned by the same authority as of Byron's
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At No. , over a grocer's shop, the eccentric Lord Camelford had lodgings, preferring them to his magnificent mansion of Camelford House. It is recorded of him that in , when all London was lit up with a general illumination on account of no persuasion of friends, or of his landlord, could induce him to suffer a candle to be put in his windows. The mob, of course, attacked the house, and saluted his windows with a shower of stones. Lord Camelford rushed out with a pistol in his hand, and it seemed as if the day of public rejoicing was about to be stained with bloodshed. At last a friend and companion induced him to exchange his pistol for a good stout cudgel, which he laid about him right and left, till at length, overpowered by numbers, he was rolled over and over in the gutter, and glad to beat a retreat indoors, for once in his life crest-fallen. A year or later we find his lordship still living here, when he fought with Captain Best that | |
p.303 | memorable duel in which he fell mortally wounded The interior of Lord Camelford's lodgings is thus described in a note to the -- No doubt its walls were decorated with portraits of the of the day, and of the heroes of the which then were still in vogue. |
In this street, too, were the lodgings of a personage familiar to every reader of Fielding's and many of the most touching scenes in that novel are laid in this thoroughfare. | |
Between and , on the site of a part of the gardens of Clarendon House (already described by us in our walk along ), stood, till , the Clarendon Hotel, of the largest establishments of the kind in London. It had a frontage to either street, and contained large suites of apartments where royal and noble personages used to put up during their stay in London. Official banquets, too, were often held here in the decade of Her Majesty's reign. Here were held the meetings of the Association of Baronets, instituted by the late amiable visionary, Sir Richard Broun, for the purpose of asserting the right of members of that order to the use of heraldic supporters, a coronet, the prefix of and other more tangible and substantial advantages; but the association quietly died a natural death. | |
Among the records of the house was the of a dinner given by the late Lord Chesterfield in the year , on resigning his office as Master of the Buckhounds. It is a curiosity in its way--the way of costly luxury; it is printed in the volume of the
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The mansion, before its conversion into an hotel, was occupied for or seasons by the Earl of Chatham as his town residence. | |
Stevens's Hotel, in , was fashionable in the days of the Regency as the head-quarters for officers in the army, and Captain Gronow tells us in his that if a stranger wanted to dine there, he would be He adds that it was no uncommon thing to see or even saddle-horses or tilburies waiting outside the doors of this hotel; and that of his old Welsh friends who resided here in qualified themselves for residence within its walls--in the eyes of at all events-by It is to be hoped that the gallant captain meant to add but his phrase is a little ambiguous. | |
In this street, on its eastern side, about the year , was a bazaar, called the Western Exchange, consisting of only large room, well furnished with a variety of stalls. It had an entrance in the rear into the . The bazaar did not, however, prove a success, and soon passed away. | |
, which connects the north end of Savile Row with , cutting at right angles, was built about the year , and perpetuates the name of the Cliffords, Earls of Cumberland, the daughter and heiress of the last holder of that title having been the mother of the Lord Burlington. | |
The house No. was inhabited by Dr. Anthony Addington, a physician in good practice, and the father of Henry Addington, the Lord Sidmouth, who was born in , and who succeeded Pitt as Premier in . It will be remembered that the latter, in some of the squibs of the day, was dubbed partly, perhaps, owing to his parentage, partly to the story that it was by his advice that a pillow of hops was provided to cure the sleeplessness of George III. At No. in this street Robert Liston, the celebrated surgeon, was living in the year . | |
In this street, towards the end of the last century, was a debating society which lasted some few years. It was styled the Club, and met at the Among its members were Lord Charles Townshend, and George Canning in his early prime. Political questions were here discussed, generally from a Liberal point of view, while foaming jugs of porter crowned the tables; and it was here that Canning practised his tongue in political debate, on such subjects as the French Revolution. During the of this club, porter was the only beverage indulged in by its members; and on occasion, as John Timbs tells us, Canning compared a pot of this liquor to the eloquence of Mirabeau
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On the north side is the shop of Messrs. Stulz, the fashionable tailors of the days of the Regency, who are said to have had half the members of the clubs of St. James's on their books. | |
At right angles with , and forming, | |
p.304 | together with , a direct communication into , is the thoroughfare known as . Built about the year , it consisted at of small houses, scattered irregularly up and down. At the south-west corner, where join , and extending back to the Arcade, is the large warehouse of Messrs. Atkinson, the perfumers, established here in . The opposite corner is occupied by the fashionable haircutters, Messrs. Truefitt, who have held it since . [extra_illustrations.4.304.1] |
On the south side of , between the Arcade and the , are the new buildings of the [extra_illustrations.4.304.2] . The building, which is from the designs of Mr. Pennethorne, and was opened by Her Majesty in person early in the year , occupies a site of about feet long by feet in depth, on which formerly grew lines of tall poplars, which threw a graceful and grateful shadow over . The elevation is in the ornate Italian style, such as would have gladdened the heart of so great an admirer of classical architecture as the old Earl of Burlington, if he could wake up to life again. | |
As regards its ground-plan, it consists of oblong blocks, the smaller of which stands behind and to the south of the principal . The front presents a central portion of feet long, flanked by square towers, and extended further east and west by wings storeys in height. These towers carry a clock and a sun-dial, and between them is a projecting portico, with entrances. The portico, the centre, and the wings are all surmounted by ornate balustrades, on the pedestals of which are placed statues of eminent men, selected as fitting representatives of the various forms of academic culture. The statues over the portico are seated, those on the roof are standing, and there are also other standing figures in niches on the ground floor of each wing. The principal figures are those on the balustrade of the portico. These are by Mr. Joseph Durham-viz., Newton, Bentham, Milton, and Harvey, as representatives of the Faculties of Science, Law, Arts, and Medicine. The figures on the central roof represent ancient culture in the persons of Galen, Cicero, Aristotle, Plato, Archimedes, and Justinian, the by Westmacott, and the last by Woodington. The eastern wing is devoted to illustrious foreigners. On the roof-line are Galileo, Goethe, and Laplace, by Wyon; in the niches are Leibnitz, Cuvier, and Linnaeus, by MacDowell. The balustrade of the west wing is adorned with English worthies-Hunter, Hume, and Davy, by Noble; the niches being occupied by Adam Smith, John Locke, and Bacon, by Theed. The individuals chosen to be represented, and also the sculptors, were selected by the joint action of the Senate of the University and the Metropolitan Board of Works. It was at proposed to put Shakespeare in the place occupied by Milton, but the idea was overruled on the ground that the genius of the great dramatist was quite independent of academic instruction or rules. A statue of Shakespeare, however, has since been placed in the interior of the building. | |
Opposite to the centre of the portico is the principal entrance, with rooms to the right and left; beyond these is a fine and spacious corridor, running east and west. At the extreme west is the great library, used also as an examination hall, occupying the whole of that wing. To the east is the great theatre, or lecture hall, used for the purpose of conferring degrees, and capable of seating persons, the benches rising behind another after the fashion of an amphitheatre. It is well planned as to its acoustic properties. It is used occasionally, however, for other besides strictly academic purposes, such as for the meetings of the Royal Geographical Society. At each end of the corridor above mentioned are passages leading to the smaller examination halls and private rooms for the use of the examiners. The great staircase occupies a lofty hall, and leads to the floor, where there is a library and common room for the use of the graduates. The staircase has marble balusters and hand-rails, and the floor of the main landing also is of polished marble. On this floor are also the senate-room and the offices of the registrar of the University. | |
The building is, perhaps, the finest modern example in England of the most refined and enriched style of Italian or architecture. The decorations are elaborate, abundant, and massive, and remarkable for a general character of flatness which is without a parallel in our time, and helps to subordinate mere ornamentation to the main outlines of form. | |
It is important to note here that the University of London is an examining, not strictly a teaching body. Its essential function is the bestowal of academical degrees on qualified candidates from all classes and denominations of Her Majesty's subjects, without distinction of caste or creed; and it was long without a home. For many years, in fact, since its commencement in , when it grew out of the University, now University College, in , it lived, so to speak, in furnished apartments, and, as a matter of course, had to shift its quarters from time to time. In consequence, it | |
p.305 | did not hold the position which it deserved in the republic of art, science, and the . It is now, however, fairly at the head of all the higher education of the kingdom which is not given at Oxford and Cambridge; not, however, conferring it, but testing it from time to time. The number of candidates seeking to pass its examinations has now risen from in the year of Her Majesty's reign to about annually; and it is honourably distinguished by the firmness with which it has insisted on a high standard being maintained by all who seek to become graduates of it. The Council comprises, or has comprised, many of the most eminent scholars and statesmen of the age, such as Grote, Thirlwall, Brougham, and Macaulay. Its board of examiners consists of men of high standing in the several branches of learning, who hold their appointments from year to year, when they are usually re-elected. |
It is not a little singular to record the fact that in the instance, when the Liberal party were in power, Mr. Pennethorne prepared a classical design for the university, being commissioned by Mr. Cowper-Temple, then Chief Commissioner of Public Buildings, but that when the Conservatives came into office in , Lord John Manners insisted on an ecclesiastical structure being substituted, and that this was carried up some or feet above the ground, when another change of Ministry revived the former commission, and the Palladian style conquered and prevailed. | |
Opposite, and extending northward to , is . If there is to be found in the West-end a dull, heavy, and unattractive street, it is this; and yet, in , the author of speaks of it as containing houses He adds, It is evident that the standard of architectural merit and beauty has considerably altered since the reign of George II. Mr. Planche tells us, in his agreeable that he remembers seeing blood running in kennels in , into which men, and women too, were dipping sticks and handkerchiefs, in front of the residence of Mr. F. Robinson ( afterwards Lord Goderich and Earl of Ripon), during the corn-law riots in . | |
At the north end of this street, facing , a small and unimportant thoroughfare which connects the north end of Savile Row with that of , stands a large, heavy, and gloomy building, apparently almost without windows or doors. It is a school founded by Lady Burlington It covers part of what was originally called the A new scheme for the remodelling of this institution has lately (-) been propounded, and in all probability its endowment will be made available for the education of boys as well as girls. The name of serves to perpetuate yet another title of the house of Burlington. | |
Adjoining this building on the east is the office of Messrs. Rushworth and Jarvis, the house agents and auctioneers. It is said to occupy the site of a summer-house which stood at the north-east corner of the gardens of Lord Burlington's mansion. At No. lived Mr. Samuel Pepys Cockerell, F.S.A., father of the late Professor Cockerell, R.A. | |
At the corner of this street is the Burlington Hotel. Here [extra_illustrations.4.305.1] used to stay when in London, before and after the Crimean war, when her name became known on account of her exertions in the cause of the sanitary condition of the British army. | |
On the north side of , occupying the space between Savile Row and , stands a handsome building used as the western branch of the , and known as Uxbridge House. It was built by Vardy, assisted by Joseph Bonomi, for the Earl of Uxbridge, the father of Field-Marshal, the Marquis of Anglesey, who lost his leg at Waterloo. It was sold by his son and successor about the year . It stands upon the site of a still earlier mansion, known as Queensberry House, which was built by Leoni for the celebrated Duke of Queensberry, the father of the already mentioned. The [extra_illustrations.4.305.2] lived for many years as an inmate of its hospitable halls, enjoying the patronage and friendship of the duke, and of his [extra_illustrations.4.305.3] , so well known to our readers as the friend of Pope, and celebrated in song as
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If we may believe Pope, who knew him well, Gay was quite a child of nature, wholly without art or design; who spoke just what he thought and as he thought it. He dangled for years about the Court, and at last obtained the offer of being made usher to the young princess. Secretary Craggs made Gay a present of stock in the South Sea year; and he was once worth , but lost it all again. He got about by the , and or by the . Like most literary men, he was negligent | |
p.306 | of ways and means, and a bad manager. Latterly, however, the Duke of Queensberry took his money into his own hands, letting him have only what was necessary out of it, and as he lived at the duke's table, he could not have occasion for any large outlay; consequently he died worth upwards of . |
Thackeray accuses the Duke and Duchess of Queensberry of having over-fed the poetical Gay, who, he says, Congreve testifies that Gay was a great eater. It is not often now-a-days that literature finds itself so liberally rewarded in the persons of its followers. | |
The high-spirited Duchess of Queensberry, to whose kind intervention with Lord Bute even Thurlow was indebted for his silk gown, was Catherine Hyde, grand-daughter of the great Lord Clarendon. In order to promote the services of Gay, induced by her extraordinary friendship for him, the duchess sacrificed even the favour of the | |
. Court. Lord Hervey, in his has thus characteristically described this :-- | |
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It was exactly eighteen years after penning the above protocol, that the Duchess of Queensberry found her way back to Court. | |
The author of the in the year , speaks of Queensberry House as having no other faults but its bad situation, and the fact that no wings can ever be added to it. The criticism, however, no longer holds good. adds the writer,
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The large house fronting , extending from to , long occupied by a younger branch of the Cavendish family, has lately been converted into an hotel. | |
(formerly called Vigo Lane), which, as we have said, connects with , was named after a town in the northwest of Spain attacked and captured by the English forces under Drake, by Ormond, Rooke, and Stanhope, and also by Lord Cobham at various dates in the and eighteenth centuries. It was probably built about the year . | |
At right angles with this street, and opening out into nearly opposite St. James's Church, is , which was built about -, and was probably named after Sackville, the witty Earl of Dorset, by those who were anxious to perpetuate his memory. At all events, no proof can be found of any direct connection of its builders or of the former owners of the land on which it stands with the family which gave birth to a Buckhurst and a Dorset. Mr. Peter Cunningham tells us that it is It is now extensively occupied by wholesale warehouses of cloths and woollen fabrics. | |
The an inn in this street, was of the temporary dining-houses of the Literary Club of Dr. Johnson and his friends after they left the in Soho, and before repairing to the and here the Dilettanti Society met for some time in . | |
In this street the Board of Agriculture, established in by the efforts of Sir John Sinclair and of Mr. Arthur Young, used to hold its meetings in the beginning of the reign of George IV. This board was subsidised by a grant of annually from Parliament, to be dispensed in improving the practical agriculture of the kingdom. | |
No. in this street is a perfect of charitable and other institutions, the bare enumeration of which, as they stand mentioned in the will be sufficient here:-- The British Hairdressers' Benevolent Society, the Church Penitentiary Association, General Domestic Servants' Benevolent Institution, Governesses' Benevolent Institution, Journeymen Tailors' Benevolent Institution, London Aged Christian Society, London Association in Aid of the Moravian Missions, the Metropolitan Convalescent Institution, Milliners' and Dressmakers' Provident and Benevolent Institution, Naval and Military Bible Society, Royal Naval Female School Society, Society for the Relief of Distressed Widows. Several of these institutions rely to a great extent for their support upon the voluntary contributions of the public; whilst others are self-supporting. It may not be out of place to remark here, that when M. Guizot was in this country he observed that nothing struck | |
p.309 | him more forcibly than the number of charitable institutions on the front of which were inscribed the words, and that they impressed him with a most favourable estimate of the English character. Besides the institutions named above, this house is also the head-quarters of the Albert Freehold Land and Building Society, the Irish Society, and the British Archaeological Society. This last-named association is an offshoot of the Archaeological Institute, and holds its own rival meetings and publishes its own
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Of the distinguished residents in this street, in times past, have been Sir Everard Home (at No. ), and Sir Gilbert Blane (at No. ), both members of the medical profession. | |
Between and , at a little distance eastward of , and near St. James's Hall, is Air (or Ayr) Street. It is stated on the authority of the rate-books of St. Martin'sin-the-Fields, that this street was built, at all events, as early as , at which time it must have been quite at the western end of the town. But nothing is known as to the origin of its name, and it is quite innocent of literary or historic associations. | |
Parallel with on its west side, extending from to , is , which perpetuates the name of of distinguished brothers of the House of Boyle, who all held peerages at the same timea fact paralleled only by the Duke of Wellington and his brothers. They were (besides Lord Burlington) Lord Cork, Lord Orrery, and Lord Broghill. A brother was no less distinguished --the Honourable Robert Boyle, the philosopher. This street has only houses on the eastern side. of these belonged to the celebrated Field- Marshal Wade, for whom Lord Burlington built it in a fit of gratitude. It is described by the author of the as small, but chaste and simple in design, though rather overladen with ornament. Yet, he adds, The house was sold by auction in . Horace Walpole tells us that it was regarded by Lord Chesterfield as such a toy that and it was also commonly said of it that Among the other eminent persons who lived in were the haughty and imperious Mrs. (afterwards Lady) Masham, the celebrated bed-chamberwoman of Queen Anne's Court, and Dr. Arbuthnot, the physician, wit, and man of letters of the reign of Queen Anne. They both died here, the latter in . | |
In this street is a public-house known as the for several generations a favourite dining-house for bachelors. Instead of a signboard, and in the absence of a poetical and inventive taste, some innkeepers chose to denote their hostelry by the colour of some external feature of the fabric. Thus we read that there were as well as Indeed, there was an inn rejoicing in that sign close by in , immortalised by Etheredge in his comedy, | |
Savile Row, which extends northward from to and , appears to have been for generations the favoured for the leading members of the medical profession. | |
No. is the home of the Royal Geographical Society, which was founded in for the purposes of cultivating and extending geographical knowledge. It had its head-quarters in at No. , ; it was subsequently for a time settled in , whence it removed to Savile Row in . | |
It was this society which took a leading part in sending out Dr. Livingstone on those travels which have opened up a large portion of Central Africa to commerce and civilisation; and it was here that the embalmed body of David Livingstone (who had died in Africa several months previously), on being brought to London, was deposited prior to its being consigned to its last resting-place in , in . The society has a large and well-selected library of works treating on those subjects which fall within its scope; and it gives an annual gold medal in recognition of services rendered to geographical science. | |
The adjoining house, No. , has been, since the year , the head-quarters of the Roman Catholic body in London, in the shape of a club. It was founded in , as the Stafford Club, so called from its original locality, occupying, as it did, the side of Crawley's Hotel, which faces . This club, however, was dissolved towards the close of the year , after having been in existence for a little more than years. In its place a new club has been established here, called the the Duke of Norfolk was the chief mover of the establishment of the new club, and its success is largely due to the duke's exertions. It started with its full compliment of members. | |
p.310 | |
In Lord Maryborough (brother of the Duke of Wellington) was living at No. ; Sir Charles Mansfield Clarke, at No. ; and the Right Hon. George Tierney, M.P., at No. . No. is the home of the Scientific Club, established in . | |
At No. resided for many years [extra_illustrations.4.310.1] , the distinguished historian of Greece. The eldest son of the late Mr. George Grote, of Badgmoor, Oxon., and a banker in London, he was born at Beckenham, Kent, in . As a youth he entered his father's establishment as a clerk, and his leisure time was for many years afterwards spent in unremitting study. In he was returned to Parliament as of the representatives of the City of London, and he held his seat for years as the champion of the ballot. His publication was a pamphlet in reply to Sir James Mackintosh's in the ; it was printed anonymously in . He afterwards wrote a small work on the
besides numerous essays, &c. His chief work, was published between and . Mr. Grote was a trustee of the , a member of the Institute of France, Vice-Chancellor of the , and a Fellow of the Royal Society. He died here in , and his remains were interred in . His widow, a lady of an old Kentish family, is known as the authoress of &c. | |
At No. lived for many years Sir Benjamin Brodie, the eminent surgeon, and president at time of the Royal Society. Sir Benjamin, who was of Scottish extraction, though the son of a Wiltshire clergyman, was of the staff of the Medical School in , and a pupil of Sir Everard Home, at Hospital. He was Surgeon in Ordinary to George IV., and Serjeant-surgeon to William IV., and also to Her Majesty Queen Victoria. He was created a baronet in , and he was the author of several works of the highest repute in the medical profession, especially on the generation of animal heat, the action of poisons, the nervous affections, &c. He was chosen to fill the presidential chair of the Royal Society in . He died in . | |
The adjoining house (No. ) has been for some time the home of the Savile Club. At No. , formerly the residence of George Basevi, the architect, is the Burlington Fine Arts Club, which till about had its head-quarters at No. , . This club was established in , In the reading-room all periodicals, books, and catalogues, foreign as well as English, having reference to the world of art, are provided, so that the opportunity is afforded of obtaining knowledge of all sales of works of art, and of acquiring information on points relating to the history and condition of the fine arts both at home and abroad. In the gallery and rooms of the club arrangements are made for the exhibition of pictures, rare books, enamels, ceramic wares, coins, &c., and occasionally special exhibitions are held, having for their object the elucidation of some school, master, or specific art. When works of more than usual interest are on view, are held. interesting gatherings of this kind took place in . At of them were exhibited the watercolour paintings of Turner's youthful friend, the artist Girtin (who was cut off at less than years of age), and also the sketch models of the late eminent sculptor, Mr. J. H. Foley, comprising the designs for many of his most important works in London and elsewhere. On another occasion an almost perfect collection of Hollar's etchings were exhibited. In addition to its galleries of artistic objects, the house affords to members the ordinary accommodation and advantages of a London club. | |
At No. lived and died Mr. Robert Vernon- Smith, many years of the most laborious underlings in Lord Melbourne's and Lord John Russell's ministries, and afterwards Lord Lyveden. The house formerly belonged to his father, Mr. Robert Smith, brother of the witty Canon of , Sydney Smith, and known to society, from old Eton days, as He was himself a wit, and deserves mention here as the founder of which used to meet at the in , and which numbered among its members J. P. Curran, James Scarlett (afterwards Lord Abinger), Sam Rogers, the banker-poet, Lord Erskine, and Charles Butler, the Roman Catholic controversialist. Its talk was entirely of books, authors, and literature, politics being rigidly excluded. wife was of the charming Miss Vernons, known as Horace Walpole's the others being Lady Lansdowne and Lady Holland. Then mother was a daughter of the Countess of Ossory. | |
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In this street lived and died Richard Brinsley Sheridan, the dramatist, wit, and politician. The history of the chequered career of this celebrity and boon companion of the Prince Regent has been often told. It has been said that when, by the assistance of his friends, he was installed in his residence in Savile Row, he boasted to of his relations how carefully and regularly he was living --so much so that everything went on like clockwork. was the reply; [extra_illustrations.4.311.1] | |
observes Sir N. W. Wraxall, Sheridan died on the , neglected by all but a few friends, among whom were the poets Rogers and Moore. or days afterwards his body was carried to its last resting-place in , the pall being borne by dukes and other high personages, who had stood aloof from him in his difficulties and even in his last illness. Such is the way of the world! | |
No. , at the north-west corner, now a shop below and a private hotel above, is ambitiously styled Byron House, on account of a traditionwhich, however, lacks verification--that the poet lived here about the time of his ill-starred marriage with Miss Milbanke. | |
At No. in this street is an old-established charitable institution, the objects of which are clearly expressed in its title--the It was founded by the late Mr. Charles Day, of the well-known firm of Day and Martin, of , who died towards the end of , leaving for the benefit of distressed persons suffering under the deprivation of sight. Between and blind persons are in the receipt of pensions of from to each. The entire income is about , and the election of the pensioners rests with the trustees. | |
At the back of Savile Row eastward, and running parallel between it and , is , the entrance to which is on the west side of . It is narrow and tortuous, and can scarcely be dignified with the name of a thoroughfare. The origin of its name is unknown, and its annals are a blank. | |
, which we now enter, is a short thoroughfare, extending from the north end of Savile Row to the west side of . | |
No. , on the north side, now the shop of Messrs. R. Cocks and Co., the eminent music publishers, was formerly the town residence of the Earl of Cork. Here, in the days of the Regency and later, the old eccentric Lady Cork held her which were largely attended by the and the rest of the world of fashion, in spite of her ladyship's well-known vice of --a weakness in which she indulged so extensively and habitually, that her friends used to place pewter spoons and forks in their halls for her to carry off; in fact, all kinds of were resorted to for the purpose of humouring her. says Captain Gronow, And yet she reigned for many years a at the West-end, and, in fact, was the notorious of her age. At time she would bring together such people as Sir Walter Scott; Betty, the Belzoni, the Egyptian explorer; old Joseph Lankester, the schoolmaster; and other persons of note. Here, in , the old countess died at the age of upwards of . She was the last of the of which we shall have more to say when we reach , and was known in her youth as the lively and fascinating Miss Monckton. She
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p.312 | which was of the haunts where that assembled. |
At Messrs. Colburn's, in this street, was published from its commencement, the . It was started as a high Tory rival against the of Sir Richard Phillips. In Thomas Campbell became its nominal editor, the lion's share of the work, however, falling to Mr. C. Redding, on account of the poet's careless and indolent habits. About the same time it began to number among its writers Serjeant Talfourd. In connection with Mr. Colburn and the , Cyrus Redding tells a good story with reference to a writer who subsequently became famous. Mr. Samuel Warren, then unknown to fame, sent for publication in the , to Tom Campbell, or to his colleague, Cyrus Redding, the few sheets of his Redding accepted them, and ordered them to be set up in type, and to appear in the magazine. writes Mr. Redding, But what is the good of a responsible editor if his judgments are thus liable to revision by every ignorant shopman of a publisher? Other contributors afterwards joined the staff-viz., J. P. Curran, Joanna Baillie, Horace and James Smith, Bryan W. Procter ( ), Sir John Bowring, Henry Roscoe, W. M. Praed, Blanco White, Jackson, Miss Mary R. Mitford, Mrs. Hemans, R. L. Shiel. | |
No. is the publishing house of Messrs. Richard Bentley and Son. From this shop were issued the famous by the Rev. R. H. Barham (better known by his literary name of Thomas Ingoldsby); they were sent as contributions to , and afterwards published separately. Mr. R. H. Barham, the witty author of these was a minor Canon of and the vicar of a parish in Kent. He died in . Charles Dickens and other authors frequently met at Mr. Bentley's table, and it was he who was the editor of the At Messrs. Churchill's, the medical publishers (No. II), are the offices of the British Medical Benevolent Fund, founded in , for the relief of medical men, their widows and orphans, in temporary difficulty or distress, granting annuities to those who are incapable of providing for themselves. About cases, it is stated, are relieved during the year. | |
In this street lived Mr. Joseph Planta, who for many years held the office of Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs; and here he used to entertain George Canning, Baron Bulow, Lord Strangford, and other celebrities of that time, as his constant guests. | |
Here, too, lived Admiral Sir Joseph Sydney Yorke, K.C.B., some time M.P. for Sandwich, who was accidentally drowned in . He was the son of the Hon. Charles Yorke, who was appointed Lord High Chancellor in , and who died suddenly, whilst his patent of creation as Lord Morden was in process of completion. | |
At No. is the Royal Archaeological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland. This institution, for many years settled in the , was established in under the title of the British Archaeological Association. Its objects are The society possesses a good library, and a small but valuable collection of antiquities and drawings. The meetings of the members are held monthly during the London season, and the annual general Archaeological Congress takes place in of the cathedral cities or great towns of the kingdom. | |
Footnotes: [extra_illustrations.4.292.1] celebrated Earl of Peterborough [] See Dallas's Recollections of Lord Byron. [] See Vol. I., p. 46. [extra_illustrations.4.296.1] John Tyndall [extra_illustrations.4.297.1] Holiday Lecture for Children at Royal Institution [extra_illustrations.4.297.2] Statue of Faraday [extra_illustrations.4.297.3] Mr. Faraday [extra_illustrations.4.297.4] deliver lectures on scientific subjects [] See Vol. I., p. 290. [extra_illustrations.4.299.1] Bond Street [] See Vol. III., p. 71. [] See Vol. III., p. 20. [extra_illustrations.4.302.1] Grosvenor Gallery--New Bond Street [] See Vol III., p. 182. [extra_illustrations.4.304.1] Burlington Gate--Masquerades, Operas, etc. [extra_illustrations.4.304.2] London University [extra_illustrations.4.305.1] Miss Florence Nightingale [extra_illustrations.4.305.2] poet Gay [extra_illustrations.4.305.3] eccentric wife [extra_illustrations.4.310.1] Mr. George Grote [extra_illustrations.4.311.1] Day and Martin--Universal Blacking |
