Here ends the romantic portion of the Thames. The beauty of Nature is no
longer present, being overtopped by the stir and roar of the great
Babel, for the metropolis has reached out and swallowed up the suburban
villages, although some of the picturesque scenes remain. Many bridges
span the river, which on either hand gradually transforms its
garden-bordered banks into the city buildings, and the Thames itself
bears on its bosom the valuable commerce that has chiefly made the great
capital. When King James I. threatened recalcitrant London with the
removal of his court to Oxford, the lord mayor sturdily yet
sarcastically replied, "May it please Your Majesty, of your grace, not
to take away the Thames too?" This river, so beautiful in its upper
loveliness, stands alone in the far-reaching influence of the commerce
that its lower waters bear. It has borne us from the Cotswolds to
London; while to properly describe the great city would take volumes in
itself. Without attempting such a task, we will only give a brief
summary of some of the more striking objects of interest that the great
British metropolis presents.
[Illustration: THE MONUMENT.]
The origin of the vast city whose population now approximates four
millions is obscure. It was a British settlement before the Romans came
to England, and its name of Llyn Dyn, the "City of the Lake," was
transformed by the conquerors into Londinium. When Caesar crossed the
Thames he thought the settlement of too little importance for mention,
and it does not seem to have been occupied as a Roman station until a
century afterwards, and was not walled round until A.D. 306. The old
wall was about three miles in circumference, beginning near the present
site of the Tower, and some slight traces of it remain. The "London
Stone" on Cannon Street was the central stone or _milliarium_ from which
distances were measured and the great Roman highways started. A worn
fragment of this stone, protected by iron bars, now stands against the
wall of St. Swithin's Church. When Jack Cade entered London, Shakespeare
tells us, he struck his sword on this stone and exclaimed, "Now is
Mortimer lord of this city." Wren caused it to be encased, for
protection, with a new stone hollowed for the purpose; it now stands
very near its original position. London in the sixth century became the
capital of the Saxon kingdom of Essex, and in the ninth century the
Danes destroyed it. King Alfred a few years afterwards rebuilt London,
but it stood barely seven years when it was burned. Finally, it was
again rebuilt, and again captured by the Danes, Canute setting himself
up as king there. Some relics of these Danes remain. St. Olaf was their
saint, and Tooley Street is but a corruption of his name. They had a
church and burial-place where now St. Clement-Danes stands awry on the
Strand--a church that is of interest not only on its own account, but
for the venerable antiquity it represents. The Saxons drove out the
Danes, and the Normans in turn conquered the Saxons, the Tower of London
coming down to us as a relic of William the Conqueror, who granted the
city the charter which is still extant. Henry I. gave it a new charter,
which is said to have been the model for _Magna Charta_. In the twelfth
century London attained the dignity of having a lord mayor. It sided
with the House of York in the Wars of the Roses, and in Elizabeth's
reign had about one hundred and fifty thousand population, being then
about two miles south of Westminster, with fields between, and having
the Tower standing apart from the city farther down the Thames. The
plague devastated it in 1665, carrying off sixty thousand persons, and
next year the Great Fire occurred, which destroyed five-sixths of the
city within the walls, and burned during four days. This fire began at
Pudding Lane, Monument Yard, and ended at Pie Corner, Giltspur Street.
To commemorate the calamity the Monument was erected on Fish Street
Hill, on the site of St. Margaret's Church, which was destroyed. It is a
fluted Doric column of Portland stone, erected by Wren at a cost of
$70,000, and is two hundred and two feet high. The inscriptions on the
pedestal record the destruction and restoration of the city; and down to
the year 1831 there was also an inscription untruthfully attributing the
fire to "the treachery and malice of the popish faction;" this has been
effaced, and to it Pope's couplet alluded:
"Where London's column, pointing to the skies,
Like a tall bully lifts its head and lies."
A vase of flames forty two feet high, made of gilt bronze, crowns the
apex, up to which leads a winding staircase of three hundred and
forty-five steps. The structure has often been compared to a lighted
candle, and the balcony at the top, having been selected as a favorite
place for suicides to jump from, is now encaged with iron-work to
prevent this.
London was rebuilt in four years after the Great Fire, and the first
stone of the new St. Paul's was laid in 1675, when the city had, with
the outlying parishes, a half million population. Its growth was slow
until after the American Revolution, and it began the present century
with about eight hundred thousand people. The past seventy years have
witnessed giant strides, and it has made astonishing progress in the
elegance of its parks and new streets and the growth of adornments and
improvements of all kinds. London has become, in fact, a world within
itself.