“The edifice was begun accordingly, in 1566, and finished within three years. It was a quadrangle of bricks, with walks on the ground-floor for merchants, (who now ceased to transact their business in the middle aisle of St. Paul’s Cathedral,) with vaults for warehouses beneath, and a row of shops above; from the rent of which the proprietor sought some remuneration for his great charges. But the shops did not immediately find customers; and it was partly with a view of bringing them into vogue, that the queen promised to give her countenance to the undertaking, in January, 1571. Holinshed gives the following particulars of this visit. On the twenty-third of January, the queen, accompanied by her nobility, came from Somerset House, and entered the city by Temple Bar, Fleet-street, and by the north side of the Burse, to Sir Thomas Gresham’s in Bishopsgate-street, where she dined. After dinner, her grace, returning through Cornhill, entered the Burse on the south side; and, after she had viewed every part thereof, above the ground, especially the Pawne, which was richly furnished with all sorts of the finest wares in the city, she caused proclamation to be made by the sound of trumpet, that it should henceforth be called the Royal Exchange. “Gresham offered the shops rent-free, for a year, to such as would furnish them with wares and wax-lights, against the coming of the queen; and the proposal produced a very sumptuous display. Afterwards, the shops of the Exchange became the favourite resort of the fashionable of both sexes. The building was destroyed by the fire of 1666; and the divines of that day, according to their custom, pronounced this catastrophe a judgment on the avarice and unfair dealing of the merchants, and the pride, prodigality, and luxury of the purchasers and idlers, by which it was frequented and maintained.” “Then the present Exchange is not the building erected by Sir Thomas?” said Ann. “No, my dear,” replied Mr. Wilmot: “the first stone of the second fabric was laid by Charles the Second, who rode in state into the city for this purpose, in 1667. It bears the original title, and was erected in about three years, at the expence of £80,000.” Mrs. Spencer remarked, that Gresham was a splendid benefactor to the city of London; for, besides the Royal Exchange, he left his magnificent residence in Bishopsgate-street, as a college for the benefit of the citizens of London. He thought that, as the inhabitants of that city possessed much money, a proportionate quantity of knowledge and learning should be diffused among them. He bequeathed annuities for public lectures in divinity, law, physic, and astronomy, geometry, music, and rhetoric: his house was appointed for the residence of the lecturer, and there the lectures were to be read. But Gresham College is now turned into the Excise Office.