honours of the table to all that were desolate and oppressed. There went richly-attired cavaliers, and there went the light-fingered fraternity with an eye and a finger to enriching themselves at other people's expense. There went the painted women, and there went those who constituted the prey of the painted women. There went the merchants who talked of nothing but stocks. There went the gulls to read swindling advertisements, and there went those who decoyed the gulls, and concocted the swindling advertisements. There went the hangers-on by the side of those on whom they hung, flattering them with highly-spiced compliments by the hour together. Contemporary literature bears its testimony to the truth of our remarks. Rare Ben Jonson fixes the scene of the third act of his comedy, "Every Man out of his Humour," in Paul's Walk. All the insolence, rascality, and immodesty of the resort is limned in this play. Shift, "a threadbare shark," who is the knave of the comedy, posts bills on the walls of the Cathedral without his being noticed. The bills reflect very little credit on the poster, and the first of them runs to the following effect: "If there be any lady or gentlewoman of good carriage that is desirous to entertain, to her private uses, a young, straight, and upright gentleman, of the age of five or six and twenty at the most, who can serve in the nature of a gentleman usher, and hath little legs of purpose, and a black satin suit of his own to go before her in; which suit for the more sweetening now lies in lavender; and can hide his face with her fan, if need require; or sit in the cold at the stair foot for her, as well as another gentleman: let her subscribe her name and place, and diligent respect shall be given." And the second is like unto it.

Thomas Dekker, the dramatist, was another writer who took up his parable against Paul's Walk. Dekker's curious pamphlet, entitled "The Gull's Hornbook," published in 1609, contains many amusing illustrations of the manners and customs of the English people in the days of our Elizabeth and our James. The writer, who assumes the character of a guide to the fashionable follies of the town, but, really, in order to expose them, enlarges as follows upon "How a gallant should behave himself in Paul's Walks":"Your Mediterranean isle (i.e., the middle aisle of St. Paul's) is the only gallery wherein the pictures of all your true, fashionable, and complementall gulls are, and ought to be, hung up. . . . Be circumspect and wary what pillar you come in at ; and take heed, in any case, as you love the reputation of your honour, that you avoid the serving man's log, and approach not within five fathom of that pillar; but bend your course directly in the middle line, that the whole body of the church may

appear to be yours, where, in view of all, you may publish your suit in what manner you affect most, either with the slide of your cloak from one shoulder; and then you must, as 'twere in anger, suddenly snatch at the middle of the inside, if it be taffeta at the least; and so by that means your costly lining is betrayed, or else by the pretty advantage of compliment. But one note, by the way, do I specially woo you to, the neglect of which makes many of our gallants cheap and ordinary, that by no means you be seen above four turns; but in the fifth make yourself away, either in some of the seamster's shops, the new tobacco office, or amongst the booksellers, where, if you cannot read, exercise your smoke, and inquire who has writ against this divine weed, &c. For this withdrawing yourself a little will much benefit your suit. . . if by chance you either encounter or aloof off, throw your inquisitive eye upon any knight or squire, being your familiar, salute him, not by his name of Sir Such-a-one, or so; but call him Ned or Jack, &c. This will set off your estimation with great men; and if, though there be a dozen companies between you 'tis the better, he call aloud to you, for that is most genteel, to know where he shall find you at two o'clock, tell him at such an ordinary, or such; and be sure to name those that are dearest, and whither none but your gallants resort. After dinner you may appear again, having transiated yourself out of your English cloth cloak into a light Turkey grogram; and then be seen for a turn or two, to correct your teeth with some quill or silver instrument, and to cleanse your gums with a wrought handkerchief. . . . Now, if you chance to be a gallant not much crossed among citizens; that is, a gallant in the mercer's books, exalted for satins and velvets, your Paul's Walk is your only refuge; the Duke's tomb is a sanctuary, and will keep you alive from worms, and land rats that long to be feeding on your carcass; there you may spend your legs in winter a whole afternoon; converse, plot, laugh, and talk anything; jest at your creditor, even to his face; and, in the evening, even by lamplight, steal out; and so cozen a whole covey of abominable catchpoles."

Other writers beside Ben Jonson and Dekker advert to what, for the want of a more expressive term, we may call the "humours " of Paul's Walk. Thomas Nash, in his "Supplication of Pierse Pennilesse to the Devil," a satirical poem published in 1592, says, "Marvell how the masterlesse men that set up their bills in Paul's for services, and such as paste up their papers on every post for arithmetique and writing scholes, escape eternitie amongst them." So, again, Richard Corbett, the witty Bishop of Norwich, in his "Elegy "on Dr. Ravis, Bishop of London, quoted by Archdeacon Dares in his "Glossary," has the following lines:

When I pass Paul's, and travel in the walk
Where all our Brittish sinners swear and talk,
Old hairy ruffins, bankrupts, soothsayers,

And youth whose cousenage is as old as theirs ;
And there behold the body of my lord

Trod under foot by vice, which he abhorr'd,

It wounded me.

Shakespeare alludes to the fact that business of a secular character was transacted in Paul's when he causes a character in his tragedy of "Richard the Third" to say

Here is the indictment of the good Lord Hastings,

Which in a set hand fairly is engross'd,

That it may be to-day read o'er in Paul's.

But perhaps the most curious illustration of the manners and morals of the walkers in St. Paul's during the sixteenth century is furnished by the learned John Earle in his curious work entitled the "Microcosmography," which was published about 1628. Earle was a priest of the English church, and died in 1665 Bishop of Salisbury, having been appointed to that See for his loyalty after the Restoration. "Paul's Walk," he says, "is the land's epitome, as you may call it the lesser isle of Great Britain. It is more than this. The whole world's map, which you may here discern in its perfectest motion, justling and turning. It is a heap of stones and men, with a vast confusion of languages; and were the steeple not sanctified nothing like Babel. The noise in it is like that of bees, a strange hum, mixed of walking tongues and feet; it is a kind of still roar or loud whisper. It is the great exchange of all discourse, and no business whatsoever but is here stirring and afoot. It is the synod of all parties politick, jointed and laid together, in most serious position, and they are not half so busy at the Parliament. . . . It is the market of young lecturers, whom you may cheapen here at all rates and sizes. It is the general mint of all famous lies, which are here, like the legends of Popery, first coined and stamped in the church. All inventions are emptied here, and not a few pockets. The best sign of a temple in it is, that it is the thieves' sanctuary, which rob more safely in a crowd than a wilderness, whilst every searcher is a bush to hide them. It is the other expense of the day after plays, taverns, and men have still some oaths left to swear here. . . . The visitants are all men without exceptions, but the principal inhabitants and possessors are stale knights and captains out of service; men of long rapiers and breeches, which after all turn merchants here, and traffick for news. Sɔme make it a preface to their dinner, and travel for a stomach ; but thriftier men make it their ordinary, and board here very cheap.

Of all such places it is least haunted with hobgoblings, for if a ghost would walk more, he could not." 1 Thus it will be seen that St. Paul's Cathedral, in the olden time-those times which certain people are everlastingly extolling at the expense of the present-was pervaded by every species of profanation, by the basest of words as well as by the basest of deeds.

During the second half of the sixteenth century fire, neglect, violence, decay, and a variety of other causes wrought untold havoc on the once peerless fabric of Old St. Paul's. In due course Elizabeth died, and James the First ascended the throne. Seeing the melancholy state of dilapidation into which the Cathedral had fallen, James appointed a commission to inquire into its revenues, and subsequently headed a subscription list for its repair. But subscriptions only dribbled in, and of the total sum that was neededtwenty-two thousand pounds odd-only a mite was raised. Under Charles the First matters slightly mended. Laud was appointed Bishop of London, and instantly threw himself with heart and soul into the projects for the restoration of the Cathedral, availing himself of the talents of Inigo Jones, who was now in the zenith of his fame. Subscriptions, owing to the energy of Laud, poured in from far and near. Jones went with a mind to work, and the consequence was that he disfigured what he ought to have adorned. His performances were nothing more nor less than those of a ruthless reformer. The west entrance of the church he faced with a cold and formal Roman portico, and did his best to obliterate every trace of the former Gothic beauties which it had once displayed in rich abundance. He was like those Italian artists who, in painting the heroes of classical antiquity, invariably invested them with the fashionable garb of the eighteenth century. "In the restoration of St. Paul's," wrote Horace Walpole, "Inigo made two capital faults. He first renewed the sides with very bad Gothic, and then added a Roman portico, magnificent and beautiful indeed, but which had no affinity with the ancient parts that remained, and made the Gothic appear ten times heavier." On the internal embellishment of the Cathedral a wealthy London citizen, who had made a large fortune as a Turkey merchant, expended the sum of ten thousand pounds. Among the other contributors was Sir Paul Pindar, sometime Ambassador at Constantinople, who, as Dugdale says, "is especially to be remembered, who, having at his own charge first repaired that goodly partition made at the west end of the quire, adorning the part thereof outwards with four pillars of black marble, and statues of those Saxon kings who had been 'Bishop Earle's Microcosmography, ed. Bliss, 1811, p. 117.

founders or benefactors to the church, beautified the inner part thereof with figures of angels, and all the wainscot was of excellent carving-viz. of cherubims and other images richly gilded; adding costly suits of hangings for the upper end thereof, and afterwards bestowed 4,000l. in repairing of the Cross." So the church was restored after a fashion, and gave satisfaction to all who beheld it. Laud, as may be supposed, was assailed during the progress of the work; but Laud was not a man to be deterred from any purpose which he was bent on carrying through, by popular clamour. Edmund Waller, the Court poet, celebrated the triumph of the restorer in his verse, and among other pretty things declared that-

Nor aught which Sheba's wondering Queen beheld,
Amongst the work of Solomon, excell'd

This shape and building, emblems of a heart
Large both in magnanimity and art.2

At the downfall of Monarchy St. Paul's, in common with all other important ecclesiastical edifices in London, entered on a period of neglect, defilement, and wanton mischief. The Saints committed untold depredations in their zeal for the extermination of the worship of Baal and the rags of Popery. Dean Milman quotes a contemporary rumour that Cromwell had it in intention to hand over the Cathedral to the Jews, for a synagogue-which may or may not be correct. The east end was set apart for a congregation of psalm-singing knaves, whose spiritual necessities, if indeed they had any, which we very much doubt, were supplied by the anti-dean Cornelius Burgess, a tub-thumping rascal, who was never so happy as when banging a cushion in a conventicle, and mouthing his scraps of bad Hebrew before the members of the House of Commons. Two fine statues of kings which stood on Inigo Jones's portico were dragged down and dashed to pieces by these wretched fanatics, who were content with nothing but what was hammered on their own anvil. The portico itself was let out for booths to hucksters and to sempstresses. The interior of the Cathedral was converted into a cavalry barrack, which Sir William Dugdale, pained and grieved, as he well might be, saw with his own eyes. Horses littered the pavement, and soldiers made seats of the tombs. The eastern part of the choir was partitioned off by a wall, and converted into a preaching shop for Dr. Burgess, the approach to it being made through the uppermost window on the north side eastwards.3 "Since my last," wrote

1 Dugdale's History of St. Faul's, ed. Ellis, 1818, pp. 107-108.

2 Works.

Sparrow Simpson's Old St. Paul's, p. 267.