The area devastated by the fire may be estimated, if we fancy a line drawn from Temple Bar to the bottom of Holborn-hill, then through Smithfield across Aldersgate-street to the end of Coleman-street, then sweeping round by the end of Bishopsgate and Leadenhall-streets, and taking a curve till it touches the Tower, the river forming the southern boundary of this large space. Within these limits, after the fire, there arose a new London, of nobler aspect, and formed for grander destinies than the old one, relieved by that very fire, under the blessing of Divine Providence, from liability to the recurrence of the dreadful plague, which had from time to time recruited its death-dealing energy from the filth of old crowded streets, with all their noxious exhalations. If a panic seized the citizens when the first alarm of the conflagration spread among them, they redeemed their character by the self-possession and activity which they evinced in repairing the desolation. Not desponding, but inspired with the hope of the future prosperity of their venerable city, they concurred with king and parliament in the zeal and diligence requisite for the emergency. Scarcely were the flames extinguished, when they set to work planning the restoration. "Everybody," observes Evelyn, "brings in his idea; amidst the rest, I presented his majesty my own conceptions, with a discourse annexed. It was the second that was seen within two days after the conflagration, but Dr. Wren had got the start of me." This Dr. Wren had been spoken of by the same writer, fourteen years before, as a miracle of a youth. Having made wonderful attainments in science, he had devoted himself with enthusiasm to the study of architecture, and now, in the wide space in which at once a full-grown city was to appear, a field presented itself worthy of the exercise of the greatest powers of art--a field, indeed, which could rarely in the world's history be looked for. Doubtless Wren's mind was all on fire with the grand occasion, and put forth all its marvelous ability to meet so unparalleled a crisis. Before the architect's imagination there rose the view of a city, built with scientific proportions, with a broad street running in a perfect line from a magnificent piazza, placed where St. Dunstan's church stands, to another piazza on Tower-hill, with an intermediate piazza corresponding with these, from each of which streets should radiate. Then, on the top of Ludgate-hill, over which the broad highway was to run, the new cathedral was to rise, in the midst of a wide open space, displaying to advantage its colossal form; and on its northern side there was to branch out, at a narrow angle with the other main thoroughfare, an avenue of like dimensions, leading to the Royal Exchange--the site, in fact, (but intended to cover a wider space,) of our present Cheapside. The Royal Exchange was to be an additional grand centre, adorned with