Picturesque Sketches of London, Past and Present — John Stuart Mill — John Shaqi
Picturesque Sketches of London, Past and Present
John Stuart Mill · en
At the foot of Southwark Bridge stands Vintners' Hall. We can readily
imagine that the old company of Vintners have ever been "right royal,"
and great advocates for processions; that, when the City conduits ran
wine, a great portion of the cost found its way into their coffers.
Pepys tells us that, when Charles II. rode through the City the day
before his coronation, "Wadlow the vintner, at the sign of the Devil, in
Fleet-street, did lead a fine company of soldiers, all young comely men,
in white doublets;" and we now find in the hall portraits of Charles
II., James II., and others. That prince of rough wits, Tom Brown, in a
bantering letter "from a vintner in the City to a young vintner in
Covent Garden," says, "You desire to know whether a vintner may take an
advantage of people when they are in their cups, and reckon more than
they have had? To which I answer in the affirmative, that you may,
provided it be done in the way of trade, and not for any sinister end.
This case has been so adjudged, many years ago, in Vintners' Hall, and
you may depend upon it."
Bow-lane is the only place to obtain a good view of the beautiful tower
of St. Mary, Aldermanbury, one of the finest, in our opinion, in the
City. This is another of Wren's edifices, erected after the Fire. It is
said to be a model of the former building, and that the great architect
was compelled to adopt the style through the conditions of a bequest,
according to Malcolm's statement, of "Henry Rogers, Esq., who,
influenced by sincere motives of piety, and affected with the almost
irreparable loss of religious buildings, left the sum of 5000_l._ to
rebuild a church in the City of London." He died before the building was
commenced, and left his lady executrix of his will; and so the present
church was erected after the model of the one built by Henry Kebles, it
is said, who died at the commencement of the fifteenth century. Stowe
says it was called Aldermary, because it was the oldest church in the
City dedicated to St. Mary. It is said that the crypt of the old church
still remains under two of the houses now standing in Bow-lane. The
tower, as seen from Bow-lane, is splendid, but little of the church is
visible from Watling-street; nor have we any thing further to notice in
this old Roman highway, for such, no doubt, it formerly was, saving the
church of St. Anthony, or Antholin, rebuilt by Wren, the dome of which
is supported by columns. The early prayers at St. Antholin's are alluded
to by our old dramatists. Here we have only to turn up a court, a little
farther on, and we are at once in Bow Churchyard, and under the very
shadow of the tower in which swing the far-famed bells. Our engraving is
a view of Bow Church as seen from Cheapside, one of the busiest
thoroughfares in the whole City of London. Old Bow Church would of
itself form a history, but, as we have not even described old St.
Paul's, and as we wish to make our readers acquainted with the London of