As we are wandering about Pall Mall in a somewhat desultory manner, I make no excuse for turning back from the Athenæum to the large building near by, which up to quite recently, formed an inadequate home for the War Office. That part of it which has a small courtyard in front, in which stood the graceful statue of Sidney Herbert, was rebuilt for the use of the Secretary of State for War; but the most interesting portion is that known as Schomberg House, which was erected in 1650, at the time when Pall Mall was planted with elm trees. It took its name from that Duke of Schomberg who was killed at the Battle of the Boyne, and was much improved by the third and last Duke; but its chief claim to notice lies in the fact that Gainsborough (as Cosway had done before him) lived the last years of his life here, and expired in the second floor room (which is now indicated by a tablet), in 1788, with the well-known exclamation on his lips: “We are all going to heaven, and Vandyck is of the company.” The house next door (to the west), now the Eagle Insurance Office, is interesting from the fact that it stands on the one-time residence of Nell Gwyn, the gardens of which stretched to the Mall, and here took place that “familiar discourse between the King and Mrs. Nellie, as they call an impudent comedian, she looking out of her garden on a terrace, at the top of the wall, and the King standing on the green walk under it,” which Evelyn has thus recorded, and E. M. Ward, R.A., perpetuated on canvas. This site is the only freehold in Pall Mall, and the story goes that on Charles giving “Mrs. Nellie” a lease of the place, she took the parchment and threw it in his face, intimating at the same time that nothing short of “freehold tenure” was good enough for her. The two adjoining houses have been, not long since, converted into one, and now form the London residence of T.R.H. the Prince and Princess Christian.