Between the Hospital and the street, Sir John Allen, Mercer and Mayor in 1525, built a very beautiful Chapel, and on his death in 1544 was buried in it. Over the Chapel was a Hall—Newcourt says the Mercers’ Hall. The Chapel was clearly along the line of the street—if the north side of Chepe was yet in alignment—because, some years after the Dissolution, the body and tomb of Sir John Allen were removed to the Church itself, and the Chapel was divided into shops, and so let out for rent; after the Fire, which consumed the whole, the shops were rebuilt on the same site. Among the names of those who were buried in this church, we find those of the Butlers—Earls of Ormond; Cavendish, of the fourteenth century; Frowyk; Leigh; and many others. The church is said to have been a “large and noble structure, consisting of a choir and the body of a church with side aisles.” (Newcourt.) The House was surrendered in 1539, the last master being one Lawrence Gospeller, who received a pension of £66: 13: 4. The annual income was estimated at £277: 3: 4. Through the offices of Sir Richard Gresham, the Mercers purchased the site and opened the church again in 1541 as the Mercers’ Chapel. Here was kept a Free Grammar School, removed after the Fire to the site of St. Mary Colechurch. CHAPTER VIII ST. ANTHONY’S The Hospital of St. Anthony stood in Threadneedle Street, exactly opposite Finch Lane. It was originally a cell to the House of St. Anthony in Vienne, and was founded as such in the reign of Henry the Third. According to Stow, the Jews had built a synagogue there, which was taken from them and converted into a church dedicated to the Virgin. This church became the Chapel of the Hospital. The House consisted of a master, two priests—afterwards enlarged to fourteen,—and twelve poor men. To the ground thus occupied there was afterwards added a Messuage, with a garden which, under the mastership of John Carpenter (1441), was made into a school and an almshouse. The school received from Henry the Sixth certain manors for the maintenance of five poor scholars at Oxford, allowing ten pence a week for every scholar. This, making allowance for the present value of money, would not mean more than ten shillings a week, which would make a very bare subsistence for a young and hungry student. The general stipend of a chantry priest, which, I suppose, was the lowest form of preferment, was £6 a year, or about 28d. a week.