The column itself is about thirty feet high and two feet in diameter, displaying no great architectural taste. It is surmounted by a coronet, and the base is enclosed by a light iron railing. An appropriate inscription on one side of the base indicates its erection in the year 1822, on the others are some lines to the memory of the Duchess. Relics undergo strange transpositions. The obelisk from the mystic solitudes of the Nile to the centre of the Place de la Concorde, in bustling Paris--the monuments of Nineveh to the regions of Great Russell Street--the frescoes from the long, dark, and silent Pompeii to the bright and noisy Naples--all these are odd changes. But in proportion to their importance, not much behind them is that old column from the crowded dismal regions of St. Giles to the sunny tranquil Green of Weybridge." We are now approaching--"The beginning of the end"--of our history. We were not taken by surprise as we know that "coming events cast their shadows before," and that:-- Often do the spirits Of great events stride on before the events, And in to-day already walks to-morrow. Therefore we were well prepared to read in the newspapers of October, 1883, the following paragraph:-- The old-established printing and publishing house formerly occupied by James Catnach, 2, Monmouth-court, Seven Dials, will soon be amongst the lost landmarks of London. The Metropolitan Board of Works have purchased the house, and it is to be pulled down to make the new street from Leicester-square to New Oxford-street. The business of the literature of the street was founded by James Catnach in 1813, who retired in 1840. The ballads and broadsides he printed, many of them illustrated with cuts by Bewick, helped to furnish the people with news and political and social ballads for generations. All that is fortold in the above has since taken place, Monmouth-court and the house and shop wherein old Jemmy Catnach established the "Catnach Press" in the year 1813 has disappeared to make way for the "New Thoroughfare" from Leicester-square to New Oxford street, and:-- THE CATNACH PRESS removed by Mr. W. S. Fortey--Catnach's successor--to Great St. Andrew-street, Bloomsbury, W.C. _O tempora! O mores!_ [Illustration: THE HISTORY OF THE CATNACH PRESS, AND THE TWO CATNACHS, JOHN & JAMES, FATHER & SON, _Printers_, 1769-1841.] [Illustration] THOMAS BEWICK, Thomas Bewick died at his house on the Windmill-Hills, Gateshead, November the 8th, 1828, in the seventy-sixth year of his age, and on the 13th he was buried in the family burial-place at Ovingham, where his parents, wife, and brother were interred. [Illustration] THE CATNACH PRESS.