Sir Christopher Wren completed Temple Bar, March 1672-3, and in 1684 the first ghastly trophy was fixed upon it. Sir Thomas Armstrong was accused of being connected with the Rye House Plot, but made his escape to Holland, and was outlawed. He, however, within a year surrendered himself, demanding to be put on his trial. Jefferies in a most brutal manner refused the request, declaring that he had nothing to do but to award death. Armstrong sued for the benefit of the law, but without avail. The judge ordered his execution "according to law," adding, "You shall have full benefit of the law." On June 24th, 1683, Armstrong was executed, and his head set up on Westminster Hall; his quarters were divided between Aldgate, Aldersgate, and Temple Bar, and the fourth sent to Stafford, the borough he had formerly represented in Parliament. [Illustration: MARGARET ROPER TAKING LEAVE OF HER FATHER, SIR THOMAS MORE, 1535.] Sir John Friend and Sir William Perkins, on April 9th, 1696, suffered death at Tyburn for complicity in a conspiracy to assassinate William III., and on the next day their heads crowned Temple Bar. John Evelyn in his Diary wrote, "A dismal sight which many pitied." In May, 1716, the head of Colonel Henry Oxburg was spiked above the Bar. He had taken part in the rising of Mar. The head of Councillor Layer was placed on the Bar in 1723, for plotting to murder King George. For more than thirty years Layer's head looked sorrowfully down on busy Fleet Street. A stormy night at last sent it rolling into the Strand, and it is recorded it was picked up by an attorney, and taken into a neighbouring tavern, and according to Nicholls, it found a resting place under the floor. It is stated that Dr. Rawlinson "paid a large sum of money for a substitute foisted upon him as a genuine article." He died without discovering that he had been imposed upon, and, according to his directions, the relic was placed in his right hand and buried with him. The Rebellion of '45 brought two more heads to Temple Bar. On July 30th, 1746, Colonel Towneley and Captain Fletcher were beheaded on Kennington Common, and on the following day their heads were elevated on the Bar. Respecting their heads Walpole wrote on August 15th, 1746, "I have been this morning to the Tower, and passed under the new heads at Temple Bar, where people made a trade of letting spying-glasses at a halfpenny a look." The fresh heads were made the theme of poetry and prose. One of the halfpenny loyal sightseers penned the following doggerel:-- "Three heads here I spy, Which the glass did draw nigh, The better to have a good sight; Triangle they are placed, And bald and barefaced; Not one of them e'er was upright."