A dozen or more of Wren's churches have been swept off the map of London, in many cases with a wantonness amounting to sacrilege; but we can still rejoice in the possession of such gems as St. Stephen's, Walbrook; St. Nicholas, Cole Abbey; and St. Mary Abchurch, with its flat roof and cupola supported on eight arches. St. Dunstan's in the East, near the Custom House, still stands testifying to the fact that Wren could restore a church without spoiling it. St. Dunstan's, built in the latest style of perpendicular Gothic, was left a mere shell after the fire. Wren added the fine tower, and capped it with the curious and graceful spire supported on flying buttresses. It is said that the architect stood on London Bridge with a telescope anxiously watching the removal of the scaffolding from the spire. It is scarcely credible, however, that such a man should doubt his own powers of building. This legend recalls the story of the building of the Town Hall at Windsor in 1686. The spacious chamber on the street level is used as a corn exchange and above is the great hall. The anxious town councillors declared that the great room above would collapse. Wren knew exactly how much his four walls and great beams could bear, but, to appease the burghers, he promised to place four columns at the intersections of the beams. He purposely built them about two inches short, and, to this day, after the lapse of two hundred and twenty-five years, there is still a two-inch space between the top of each column and the ceiling it is supposed to support. On the exterior of the building are two statues given by Wren in 1707: one of Queen Anne and the other of her Danish consort, Prince George. Our good Christopher could flatter on occasion. The inscription to Prince George in his Roman costume reads, _inter alia_: Heroi omni saeculo venerando. Underneath the figure of Queen Anne is the legend: Arte tua sculptor non est imitabilis Anna Annae vis similem sculpere sculpe Deam. The local rhyming and free translation runs: Artist, thy skill is vain! Thou can'st not trace The semblance of the matchless Anna's face! Thou might'st as well to high Olympus fly And carve the model of some Deity! We admit this is a very free and extended translation, but it passes current locally. To say the least, it is high praise; but Wren had a staunch friend in Queen Anne, and every eye makes its own beauty. The exigencies of the time called for a great architect, and he appeared in the person of Christopher Wren: they called for a great artist to adorn the master's buildings, and he appeared in the guise of Grinling Gibbon.