The public buildings in this ward are, the Cathedral of St. Paul, St. Paul’s School, the King’s Printing House, the Scotch Hall, Apothecaries’ Hall, Stationers’ Hall, the College of Physicians, Butchers’ Hall, Saddlers’ Hall, Embroiderers’ Hall, the church of St. Martin Ludgate, Christ’s Church and Hospital, the church of St. Matthew, Friday Street, St. Austin’s Church, the church of St Vedast, and the Chapter House. Austin the monk was sent to England by Pope Gregory the Great, to endeavour the conversion of the Saxons, about the year 596, and being favourably received by Ethelbert, then King of Kent, who soon after became his proselyte, was by the authority of the Roman see constituted Archbishop of Canterbury, the capital of King Ethelbert’s dominions. The archbishop being thus established in Kent, sent his missionaries into other parts of England, making Melitus, one of his assistants, Bishop of London; and King Ethelbert, to encourage that city to embrace Christianity, it is said, founded the Cathedral of St. Paul about the year 604. This Cathedral stands upon an eminence in the middle of the town, disengaged from all other buildings, so that its beauties may be viewed on every side; whereas we see only one front of St. Peter’s at Rome, the palace of the Vatican, and other buildings contiguous to it, rendering the rest invisible; and though the riches and furniture of the several chapels in St. Peter’s are the admiration of all that view them, yet they spoil the prospect of the fabric. If we regard only the building, divested of the rich materials and furniture which hide the beauties of the structure, St. Paul’s, in the opinion of many travellers, makes a better appearance than St. Peter’s: nor does the white Portland stone, of which St. Paul’s is built, at all give place to the marble St. Peter’s is lined or incrusted with; for the numerous lamps and candles that are burnt before the altars at St. Peter’s so blacken and tarnish the marble, that it is not easy to distinguish it from common stone. As to the outside of St. Paul’s, it is adorned by two ranges of pilasters, one above the other; the lower consist of 120 pilasters at least, with their entablature of the Corinthian order, and the upper of as many with entablament of the Composite order, besides twenty columns at the west and four at the east end, and those of the porticoes and spaces between the arches of the windows; and the architrave of the lower order, &c., are filled with great variety of curious enrichments, consisting of cherubims, festoons, volutas, fruit, leaves, car-touches, ensigns of fame, as swords and trumpets in saltier crosses, with chaplets of laurel, also books displayed, bishops’ caps, the dean’s arms, and, at the east end, the cypher of W.R. within a garter, on which are the words _Honi soit qui mal y pense_, and this within a fine compartment of palm-branches, and placed under an imperial crown, &c., all finely carved in stone.