Mr. Birch notes with much praise the fine old mansions of St. Helen’s, their fine design and material, of “cut brick.” The date 1646 is on one of the pilasters. He thinks--and is probably right--that it is the work of Inigo Jones, who was employed on the church, where some of the screens and also the doorways are of his design. In No. 9 is to be seen a good fire-place. To the same architect also, Mr. Birch attributes “a very noble chimney-piece” in the house No. 25, Bishopsgate Street--Crosby Hall Chambers. It is a duty of rather mixed experience, the hunting up these relics, and the request to be admitted to see a room or hall upstairs is sometimes received suspiciously, but often enough very cordially. In some cases the City mind cannot understand the taste that prompts such inquiries. But on the whole there is a courtesy and cordiality of reception which is gratifying, the owner seeming flattered that his property should attract the notice of the curious. Mr. Birch, always a sympathetic observer, describes an old chamber in the Ward Schools of St. Botolph, Billingsgate, as a perfect gem, with its fine oak panels running round, in each panel an excellent painting in _chiaro oscuro_. Another imposing chamber is that one at Islington where the Directors of the New River Company meet, with its fine ceiling wrought with an oval in Inigo Jones’s manner. But in truth there is an abundance of these old apartments in London, stately, dignified, but comparatively unknown and difficult to find. In Hanover Square and George Street there is quite a Dutch tone, as any one will see who pauses and glances from one house to the other. Removing the shops, in imagination, as well as the plaster with which the old brickwork has been encrusted, and peopling them with fine company, carriages waiting at the door, we can see what the old pattern was. Many are rich in pilasters and cornices, and it will be noted that most of the windows are slightly arched. They are, in fact, of the same pattern as some of the stately mansions in Grosvenor Square inhabited by the “nobility and gentry,” and would have the same effect if occupied by such tenants. A curious and elaborately adorned house stands on the right of the church--the fashionable St. George’s. [Illustration: ROOM IN SIR PAUL PINDAR’S HOUSE.]