We know that wherever the agents of the League settled they seem to have accustomed the people to the use of brick, and taught them the mysteries of brick-making. This was the case at Hull, a branch of the London Kontor, where, although in a stone-producing country, its great church of Holy Trinity, as well as its walls, were built of brick; and in other branches, such as Yarmouth, Boston, and Lynn, we find early examples of brick-work. Old engravings of portions of the Steel-yard buildings show that they were of brick, and with their Guildhall vied in importance and beauty with the great brick buildings of Luebeck and Bruges. During the Lancastrian supremacy the German merchants were under a cloud in this country, and many of their privileges were withdrawn; and indeed, for a time, the Steel-yard was closed, whilst the fleets of the League were actively supporting the Yorkist cause. But with the accession of Edward IV. all this was changed, and in 1474 they were reinstated in all their privileges, and embarked on a new era of prosperity in London. The close connection of the King with the house of Burgundy interested him in the fortunes of the League in Flanders. His sister, Margaret of York, was married to Charles the Bold at Damme, one of the principal Kontors of the League, at which ceremony he was present; and he attended, later on, a great Chapter of the Knights of the Golden Fleece in Bruges, as the stall-plate bearing his arms in the choir of Notre Dame testifies to this day. He granted the Flemish merchants special privileges of exemption from taxation--as, for instance, to the makers of dinanderie at Middleburg by Bruges, that the goods sent from hence to England should be admitted free. In 1479 the guild rebuilt Bishopsgate, which had again fallen into bad repair, and this time we know that it was built of brick, although the image of the bishop on the side towards the city was carved in stone; and this date synchronises with that great period of brick building in England which included the halls of Gifford, Hargraves, Oxburg, and West Stow, and portions of the college at Eton. The Guildhall of the Steel-yard seems also to belong to this date, for it was just then the area of the enclosure was much extended. We have, unfortunately, but very inadequate accounts of what must have been a very important structure, although remains of it existed to the middle of the last century; but we know that its gable was surmounted by the imperial eagle. The interior, no doubt, was of a magnificence which would bear comparison with the halls of the League in Flanders and Germany, and we know that it contained two large paintings by Holbein of the triumphs of Poverty and Riches, which, later, found their way into the collection of Henry, Prince of Wales, and were destroyed in the fire at Whitehall.