London in Modern Times

ich the city even now possesses, namely, the Excise Office and Newgate. The end of the last century was, howeve

ption of St. Peter-le-poor, 1791, and St. Martin Outwich, 1796, not one church was built from the commencement of the reign of George III., till the regency."-Penny Cyclop?dia, art. London. This remark applies to the city. Paddington church was built during that period, and opened in 1791. The chief public buildings of the period, besides those noticed, are the

circus, somewhere by the New-road, in the via lactea, where the cows used to feed; I believe you will think the town cannot hold all its inhabitants, so prodigiously the population is augmented." "There will be one street from London to Brentford, ay, and from London to every village ten miles round; lord

provement in the great thoroughfares. The old signs, posts, water-spouts, and similar

t to be in general requisition. In 1760, names began to be placed on people's doors, and four years subsequently, the plan of numbering houses

ense of an opposite character. John Wilkes appeared on the stage of public life in 1754-a man utterly destitute of virtue and principle, but possessed of certain qualities likely to render him popular, especially an abundance of humor, and a wonderful degree of assurance. By attacking Lord Bute, the favorite of the king, but no favorite with the people, he gained applause, and was set down as a patriot. In No. 45 of the "North Briton," a newspaper which he edited, a violent attack on his majesty appeared; indeed, it went so far as to charge him with the utterance of a falsehood in his speech from the throne. The house of Wilkes was searched, and his person seized for this political offence; but sheltering himself under his parliamentary privileges, he obtained his dismissal from custody. Upon an information being filed against him by the attorney-general, he declined to appear, when the House of Commons took the matter in hand, and declared Wilkes's paper to be a false, seditious, and scandalous libel, and ordered it to be burned by the common hangman. The sympathies of many in London being with Wilkes, a riot ensued upon the attempt which the sheriffs made to execute the parliamentary sentence. Wilkes's disgrace was turned into a triumph, and the metropolis rang with the applause of this worthless individual. Unhappily, the proceedings against him had involved unconstitutional acts, which are sure to produce the indignation of a free people, and to transform into a martyr a man who is really criminal. He was next convicted of publishing an indecent poem; but again the improper means adopted to secur

earnestly resisted such opposition, and encouraged the citizens to maintain their stand against what was considered an exercise of arbitrary power on the part of government. The mayor summoned the livery, and delivered a speech just adapted to the assembly. Another remonstrance was drawn up, to be presented to his majesty by the lord mayor and sheriffs. To this the king replied, that he should have been wanting to the public and himself, if he had not expressed his dissatisfaction at their address. Beckford, who must have been a bold and eloquent man, breaking through all the rules of court etiquette, delivered an extempore speech to the sovereign, which he concluded by saying, "Permit me, sire, to observe, that whoever has already dared, or shall hereafter endeavor, by false insinuations and suggestions, to alienate your majesty's affections from your loyal subjects in general, and from the city of London in particular, and to withdraw your confidence in, and regard for, your people, is an enemy to your majesty's person and family, a violator of public peace, and a betrayer of our happy constitution, as it was established a

uence in that respect, was repealed soon after it was passed, the whole city beamed with gladness and satisfaction. When, however, America asserted her independence, many in London, as well as in other parts of the country, felt their national pride so much wounded, that they encouraged the war, till finding the conflict with so distant and powerful a colony all in vain, they were

er, being reinforced at Charing Cross by great numbers on horseback and in carriages. The then narrow avenues to the houses of parliament were thronged by these crowds, and such members of the legislature as they disliked were treated with insult, as they made their way through the dense concourse. The petition was presented; but when that business was finished for which the populace had been invited by the foolish nobleman, he found it impossible to disperse them. Harangues, so potent in convening the host, were utterly powerless when employed for their separation. Nor did the magistracy attempt a timely interference; but the mob was left to its own wild will, and like a swollen torrent, which bursts its banks, it poured over the city with destructive havoc. The chapels of the Bavarian and Sardinian embassy were pulled down that night. On the next day, Saturday, they committed no violence; but on Sunday they assailed a popish chapel and some houses in Moorfields, within sight of the military, who stood by unable to do anything, because they had no commands from the chief magistrate, who alone could authorize them to act. All that was done was to take a few of

on the doors. Before night, even the Bank was assailed, but not without a dreadful and destructive repulse from the military who garrisoned it, and were ordered to act. It is stated that the king, alarmed at the danger of his capital, and indignant at the inaction of the magistrates, took upon himself to command the services of the military for putting down the riot. While thirty fires were blazing in the streets, and the inhabitants passed a sleepless night, full of anguish, a large body of soldiers was engaged in the terrible, though necessary work of suppressing the riot by force. This was accomplished at the expense of not less than five hundred lives. By Friday, quietude was restored. Lord George Gordon was apprehended, but was acquitted upon trial, his conduct not coming within the limits of the statute of treason. Sixty of the deluded creatures, who at first were exc

of the occurrence which produced it. This was the trial of Warren Hastings, for his alleged mal-administration of Indian affairs. But the great length to which it was extended wearied out the public patience, and ere t

and throughout the nation, by the melancholy mental illness of George III., but the next year his sud

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took place not long after my entrance on college life, agitated London to an extent which I have never seen equaled, though my life has fallen on times and events of the most prodigious and portentous character."-Autobiography of the Rev. W. Walford. Clubs were formed of a more than questionable description, of which we remember to have received an illustrative anecdote from a citizen of London, now gray-headed, but then in the flower of his youth. Invited by a person of about his own age to attend a meeting, held in some obscure street, he was surprised on entrance to find a number of men, ranged on either side a room, sit

England suspended its cash payments. But after all these storms, which severely tested its strength, the vessel of the state, under the bl

ow-heath or Finchley-common after sunset was a daring enterprise; nor did travelers venture on it without being armed, and even ball-proof carriages were used by some. At Kensington and other places in the vicinity of London, it was customary on Sunday evenings to ring a bell at intervals, to summon those who were returning to town to form themselves into a band, affording mutual protection, as they wended their way homewards. Town itself did not afford security; for George IV. and the Duke of York, when very young men, were stopped one night in a hackney-coach and robbed on Hay-hill, Berkeley-square. The state of the police, as these facts indicate, was most inefficient; but when the law seized on its transgressor

ket, there were many houses in each of which there were more books than all the tradesmen's houses in the streets contained when I was a youth." He mentions, also, the open departure of thieves from certain public-houses, wishing one another success-"In Gray's-inn-lane," he remarks, "was the Blue Lion, commonly called the Blue Cat. I have seen the landlord of this place come into the room with a large lump of silver in his hand, which he had melted for the thieves, and pay them for it. There was no disguise about it. It was done openly." "

the fashionables; while gossiping calls in the morning, and gay parties at night, were the common and every-day incidents of West-end life-a very obvious improvement arose in the morals and general tone of feeling of people about court, in consequence of the exemplary and virtuous character of George III. and Queen Caroline. Fond of quiet and domestic repose, retiring into the bosom of their family, surrounded by a few favorite dependents, encouraging a taste for reading and music, and ever frow

opolis, produced a deep impression on the multitudes who, in chapels or the open air, were eager to hear him. Whitefield died in America, but a monument is erected to his memory in Tottenham-court Chapel, the walls of which often echoed

s, and bearing a faithful testimony to her Divine Master in the presence of royalty itself." She has left behind her in the metropolis two remarkable proofs of her religious

ings?" Mr. Romaine was strongly opposed by some who disapproved of his sentiments, and was soon turned out of St. George's Church; after which the countess of Huntingdon made him her chaplain for awhile, in which office he preached in her drawing-room to the nobility, in her kitchen to the poor. Her house, where these services were performed, was in Park-street. Settled, at length, as the rector of the two churches above-named, this eminent servant of Christ-of whom it has been said that he was a diamond, rough often, but very pointed, and the more he was broken by years the more he appeared to shine-pursued uninterruptedly his holy and edifying ministrations till the time of his death in 1795. He was interred in St. Andrew's Church, where a monument, not devoid of artistic beauty, and executed by

ities, occupies a distinguished place among the men who devoted themselves to the faithful preaching of the Gospel in the metropolis. Surrey Chapel, which has proved

r, who was translated to London in 1777; and Dr. Porteus, who succeeded him on his death in 1786, and though inferior in talents and learning, earned for himsel

￡20,000, which was ￡30,000 less than they cost him. An act of parliament was passed for their purchase, and Montague House, Bloomsbury, was taken and fitted up for the reception of Sloane's treasures, and other collections, scientific and literary, upon which great sums of money were expended.

earlier. Three years later, the Magdalen Hospital, for the reformation and relief of penitent females, was opened in Prescott-street, Goodman-fields, and afterwards transferred to an appropriate building, erected for the purpose in St. George's-fields, in 1709. The foundation-stone of the Lying-in

as 1795. The declaration of the Society was signed at the Castle and Falcon, Aldersgate-street. In the year 1709 was formed, also, the institution by which the present volume is issued-the Religious Tract Society. Commencing with small beginnings, it has, through the prosperi

rison of the past and present; and when we consider the great change wrought in half a century, it inspires encouragement in relation to the future. The impulse which things have received of late has been so mighty, that there is no calculating the acceleration of their future progress. Thus the remembrance of the past yields advantage, and we pluck hopes, "like beautiful wild flowers from the ruined tombs that border the highways of antiquity, to make a garland for the living forehead."-Coleridge. On taking a longer reach of comparison, an amount of wonder is inspired not to be adequately expressed. Had some sage in the Roman senate, two thousand years ago, proclaimed that the day would come, when an obscure town, situated on the Thames, a river scarcely known then to the Latin geographer, would vie with the city i

lish character, in their metropolis of the nineteenth century, as the spirit of war was stamped upon the character of the Romans in their metropolis before the Christian era. Rome had her trade as well as her army-her Ostia, whither her vessels brought for her use the luxuries of the East; but it was not there, but to the Campus Martius, where their legions performed their evolutions, that the stranger would have been taken to see the greatness of the republic. So the metropolis of the British empire is the rendezvous of a great military establishment, as well as an emporium of merchandise; but it is to the scenes on the borders of the Thames, to her spacious docks, her crowded shipping, her stores and warehouses, with all the accompaniments of busy commerce, presenting a spectacle which perfectly overpowers the mind with wonder-it is to those scenes that we should take the stranger, to impress him with an idea of the greatness of our chief city. The Hyde Park re

itudes, and which has indirectly exercised a most beneficial reflex influence upon the character of others, who have little regard for its doctrinal principles. The richest forms of modern civilization in London are founded on our religion. The elevation of woman to her proper rank, the improved character of the judicial code, the extinction of domestic slavery, the elevation of serfs of the soil to freemen having an estate in their own labor, the value set on life, the philanthropic institutions which abound-are all the results of evangelic

ver, equally indescribable, we turn to the steady, the sober, the virtuous, the enlightened-those who labor after mental improvement, and especially those who seek spiritual excellence, who ask and practically answer the question, "While I am attending to the intellectual culture of the mind, ought I not to prepare for that eternity to which I am hastening, where moral and spiritua

ous things in the chief city of England is the citizen himself. Man, out of whose intellect, energy, and power, all the rest has grown-man, in whose capacities are found the germs of a greatness, the cultivation of which will a thousand times repay the toil it involves. The noblest of enterprises, be it remembered, is to be found, not in commercial speculation, or political reform, or even literary and scientific knowledge, but in the promotion of Chri

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