Its southern boundary extends from the Temple Stairs to Whitehall
Court, along the Thames Embankment. From Whitehall Court, the western
boundary runs through the 'Horse Guards' and through the middle of
Buckingham Palace to the top of Constitution Hill. It includes the
whole of the Green Park, but none of the houses abutting on it, with
the exception, I believe, of Stafford House. From Stafford House the
northern boundary runs south of Pall Mall, and includes Clarence House,
St. James's Palace, the War Office, Marlborough House, and Carlton
House Terrace. Thence the boundary runs up the Haymarket, along the
north side of Leicester Square and Long Acre to Drury Lane and by
Sardinia Street and the south side of Lincoln's Inn Fields to Chancery
Lane, the south end of which constitutes its eastern boundary.
This district includes parts of four royal palaces and also Somerset
House, Horse Guards, Admiralty, War Office, National Gallery, and
National Portrait Gallery. In it are to be found five churches (Temple,
St. Clement, St. Mary, St. Martin, St. Paul, Covent Garden), Exeter
Hall, and more than twenty of the largest and best known theatres and
music-halls. The Constitutional and National Liberal Clubs are within
its boundaries, and its numerous huge hotels are famous throughout the
world.
The worst parts of the district are in the north-east, but one must
mention that it does _not_ include the Seven Dials or the north half of
Drury Lane. Clare Market, the south end of Drury Lane, Drury Court and
Bedfordbury, are the slums of the Strand registration district. It is
not a poor district. The percentage of persons 'in poverty' in London
as a whole is given by Mr. Charles Booth as 30·7, while that for the
Strand is only 23·9.
Many of the labourers employed in Covent Garden Market and in the
theatres earn very good wages, but Mr. Booth specially mentions the
fact that in some of the lowest districts house rent is very dear.
Wages is a relative term, and the potential prosperity of a person is
only to be determined by subtracting from the earnings the cost of the
necessaries of life, inclusive of house rent.
It is obvious, however, that the prime necessary of life (fresh air) is
not to be had in the Strand at any price.
It may be well to add that the Strand _sanitary area_ is not
co-terminous with the Strand _registration district_, which we have
been considering. The chief difference is that the former includes St.
Anne's, Soho, and excludes St. Martin's in the Fields.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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