Generations ago “the City” was a very small place, surrounded by a wall with gates, through which the green fields and suburbs—then the pleasant villages of Southwark, Charing, St. Giles, Clerkenwell, Islington, Shoreditch, and the Tower Hamlets and Stepney—could be reached. These gates stood at or near the entrances of the present streets known as Moorgate, Cripplegate, Aldersgate, Newgate, Ludgate, Billingsgate, Aldgate, and Bishopsgate, so that the reader can judge what the size of old London was. On the south side there was the River Thames with its Dowgate, and between this water-gate and Billingsgate was the entrance across the only bridge that then spanned the river, which existed close to where St. Magnus Church now stands—a few yards east of the present London Bridge. In the suburbs were many excellent springs of water, known as Holywells, and at one of these the parish clerks of the City assembled periodically and held their festivals. The well existed till late years in Ray Street, close to the Middlesex Sessions House, and the district is now known as Clerkenwell. The Parish Clerks’ Company, although not a livery guild, still exists, and is one of the oldest of the Guilds. It was long before the time of famous John Stow that London found a contemporary topographer, for as early as the year 1179—now 710 years ago—William Fitzstephen tells us the citizens everywhere “are esteemed the politest of all others in their manners, their dress, and the elegance and splendour of their tables,” and he pictures us the City in all its primitive grandeur, while the citizens themselves were dignified by the name of barons, a fact borne out by their description in King John’s charter. Speaking of this charter reminds us that a brief epitome of the principal grants, from the Conquest to the reign of Edward IV., when the Ironmongers’ Company received its incorporation, will help the reader to more easily comprehend the progress of the citizens and the Guilds. There is no document more treasured at Guildhall than the diminutive parchment which William the Conqueror gave to the citizens 800 years ago, and upon which we all base our rights and privileges. I will that ye be worthy of all those laws which ye were in King Edward’s day; and I will that each child be his father’s heir after his father’s day, and I will not suffer that any man do you wrong. God preserve you. In the Confessor’s time “the burgesses” of London had obtained the king’s warrant for their freedom, and their children’s heirship, so that their lives and their goods should be protected from the rapacity of the Lords. The foreign merchant was only permitted in the City as a lodger, and was strictly forbidden from selling his wares by retail and underselling and infringing the rights of his entertainer, the citizen. Thus do we see nearly a thousand years ago a precaution taken which we to-day are still clamouring for!