The parish of St. Clement Danes has changed very greatly since ancient times, when a large part of it, stretching from Lincoln's Inn Fields to the Strand, was known as Fickett's Field, and was the jousting-place of the Templars. This portion became gradually covered with houses and courts, which were at first fashionable dwelling-places, and were associated with noble names. These degenerated until, at the beginning of the present century, a vast rookery of noisome tenements, inhabited by the poorest and most wretched people, covered the greater part of the parish to the north of the Strand. The erection of the new Law Courts, 1868, entirely swept away numbers of these tenements, and opened out the parish to the north of the church. The change thus effected paved the way for further reformation, and though the streets about the site of Clare Market are poor and squalid, they show a beginning of better things, and no longer own such an evil reputation as they did. Further north, beyond King's College Hospital, is Portugal Street, called by Strype "Playhouse Street." In the times of the later Stuarts it was a very fashionable locality. It is said that women first performed on the stage in public at the King's Theatre, in this street. The players were often patronized by Pepys. In 1717 the first English opera was performed here, and in 1727 the "Beggar's Opera" was produced with unprecedented success; but in 1835 the theatre in Portugal Street was taken down to make room for the enlargement of the museum belonging to the College of Surgeons. Portsmouth Street contains a quaint, low, red-tiled house purporting to be the Old Curiosity Shop of Dickens' novel. The Black Jack Tavern, of some notoriety, stood here. It was the resort of the actors and dramatists of the adjacent theatre, and was the scene of a famous escape of Jack Sheppard from the Bow Street officers. It is said to have been a meeting-place of the Cato Street conspirators. Shear or Shire Lane formerly ran from the east end of Carey Street to the Strand, and formed the parish boundary. This was a narrow, dirty lane of the vilest reputation before its demolition, but it had known better days. A very famous tavern stood in the lane, first called the Cat and Fiddle, later the Trumpet, and still later the Duke of York's. The well-known Kitcat Club met here originally. This was a society of thirty-nine gentlemen or noblemen zealously attached to the Protestant succession in the House of Hanover, and originated about 1700. Addison and Steele, Congreve, Vanbrugh, and others of celebrity, besides the Dukes of Somerset, Devonshire, Marlborough, Newcastle, etc., and many others, titled and untitled, were of the society. The bookseller Tonson was the secretary, and he had his own and all their portraits painted by Sir Godfrey Kneller, who was also a member of the club. Addison dated many of his famous essays from this address. The lane was known in the reign of the first James as Rogues' Lane.