and cup between two leopards faces, or. crest a demi-lion rampant gu. spotted, or. holding in his paws a sheaf of arrows, ar.

The floor of the church is very considerably elevated, affording room for spacious burial vaults; on the staircase leading down to which is a leaden coffin found in digging the foundation of the present church.

The family of Vyner resided in the parish of St. Mary, Woolnoth, and were buried in the ancient church, in which there was a monument of touchstone, with the effigies in marble of sir Thomas Vyner, bart. erected by his son Robert, 1672.

The principal streets in this ward are Fenchurch-street, and Lombard-street; the latter of which obtained its name from the Lombards, or Italian merchants, who settled there; and by this name it was known, so early as the reign of Edward II. In this street are several principal lanes and courts, which are filled with the houses of bankers, merchants, and eminent traders: those on the south side, are, St. Swithin's-lane, Sherbourn-lane, Abchurchlane, St. Nicholas-lane, and St. Clement's-lane; those on the north side, are, Pope's-head-alley, Exchange-alley, Birchin-lane, and George-yard.

In Lombard-street are the Phoenix Fire-office and the Pelican Life Insurance-office, both handsome buildings, particularly the last.

In Fenchurch-street are, also, several principal streets and lanes, which are well inhabited.

Adjoining to St. Mary Woolnoth church, is the

General Post Office.

A spacious brick building, but undeserving of praise as a national edifice. It stands behind the houses, in Lombard-street, from which there is a passage, under an arched gateway, leading into a small paved court; there are also passages into Abchurch-lane, and Sherbourn-lane.. It was originally the residence of sir Robert Vyner, lord mayor, in 1675, who built it on the site of a much frequented tavern, which was burnt in the great fire; but a great part of it was rebuilt, and considerable improvements made in it, in 1804.

Posts appear to have been established in England so early as the reign of Richard III., but they must have been an object of comparatively little importance; as the first mention we find of a post-master in England, is in the year 1581, when sir Thomas Randolph, an able diplomatist, who had been employed in no less than eighteen distinct embassies, filled the office.

Previous to this period, the foreign merchants settled in London had been permitted to select from among themselves, an individual to whom the management of the foreign mails was given; but in 1568 a dispute arose between the Flemings and the Spaniards, when each chose a postmaster of their own. The inconvenience of such a procedure was obvious, and was so much felt, that on the

petition of the citizens, queen Elizabeth appointed a postmastergeneral from one of her English subjects; but in the reign of her successor the business of the foreign post was for some time under the direction of a foreigner, Matthew de Quester, or de l'Equester. In 1635 a letter-office, which communicated with most of the principal roads, was opened, under the direction of Thomas Witherings, who was superseded for abuses in his office five years afterwards. The plan was very ill organized, until, during the civil war, when Prideaux, attorney-general to the commonwealth, became postmaster, and established a weekly conveyance of letters to all parts of the nation; the emoluments soon became so obvious that the common council attempted an opposition post-office, but the House of Commons, as ambitious and as jealous of power as any sovereign could be, declared that the office of postmaster is and ought to be in the sole power and disposal of parliament.

The post-office, which in 1653 was farmed of parliament for 10,000l., received its first organization from Cromwell, as a general post-office, three years afterwards; and Charles II., confirming the regulations of the Protector, settled the revenue arising from it on his brother James, duke of York, the produce being, in 1663, 21,500l. Ten years afterwards this amount was doubled, and it still continued to increase until the reign of William III., when it was considerably influenced by the hostile or tranquil state of the country. The post-office revenue, which, during the eight years of war only averaged 67,2227. a year, produced in the succeeding four years of peace on an average 82,3197. annually. This disproportion has of late years been reversed; and the last years of war were those in which the post-office has been most productive.*

On the union of Scotland with England, in 1710, a general postoffice was established by act of parliament, which included not only Great Britain and Ireland, but our West India and American colonies. This extension of the post-office increased the revenue te 111,4617. What portion of this sum was produced by the respective countries does not appear, but there is reason to believe that it was almost entirely inland, and even English; for even so late as the years between 1730 and 1740 the post was only transmitted three days a week between Edinburgh and London; and the metropolis, which now sends between two and three thousand letters a day to Edinburgh, on one occasion during the period just mentioned only sent a single letter, which was for an Edinburgh banker, of the name of Ramsay.

The most rema: kable event in the history of the Post-office is the plan first suggested by Mr. Palmer, in 1784, of sending the letters by the coaches, instead of the old custom of transmitiing them by post-boys on horse-back. From this moment the prosperity of the post-office commenced; and the revenue, which, after the progress of nearly two centuries, in 1783 only produced 146,400/.

Percy Histories, London, vol. iii. p. 45.

annually, thirty years afterwards yielded a net revenue of nearly one million seven hundred thousand pounds.

The post-office consists of three branches; the general or inland, the foreign, and the two-penny post-offices. The general post-office is necessarily the most extensive and the most important, and some idea may be formed of the number of letters that pass through it, when it is known that the amount of postage on the letters delivered in London from this office sometimes exceeds 2,500l. in a single morning. Numerous as the letters are, such is the admirable arrangement that the whole business of the day is done in about six hours. Three hours in the morning, from six to nine o'clock, when the letters are received by the mails, the amount taken, stamped, sorted, and distributed by the several postmen, who deliver them in every part of the metropolis. The business of the evening, which is the most difficult, is transacted between the hours of five and eight o'clock, when all the letters are sorted and despatched with the most surprising rapidity. On the day that a committee of the house of commons attended at the general post-office to examine the details of the business, the number of letters amounted to forty-four thousand, the whole of which were sorted and charged by one hundred and five persons in the space of forty-five minutes. The office has as many divisions as there are distinct mails, and the business of the junior clerks is to sort the letters and hand them to the chief clerk of each of these divisions, who examines the letter to see whether it is single or double, franked, or properly charged if paid for, and then marks the proper charge of postage; and all this is done at the rate of from sixty to seventy letters in a minute. They are then made up into distinct bags for the respective post-masters, sealed up, and the amount charged, when they are handed to the guards of the coaches, and are in a few hours dispersed over all parts of the kingdom.

The business of the foreign post office, the inland letter-carrier's office for newspapers, and the ship letter-office in Abchurch-lane, is conducted in a similar manner, with a difference as to the days on which letters are made up, and the hours of attendance, as on foreign post days the office is open for receiving letters until twelve o'clock at night.

The twopenny post office, for the transmission of letters from one part of the metropolis and its environs to another, was projected by Mr. David Murray, an upholsterer, of Paternoster-row, in the year 1683, and the plan was sometime acted upon as a private speculation by William Dockwray, to whom Murray communicated it. The postage was at first only a penny; when the business became an object of importance to the government, who took the business into their own hands, allowing Dockwray a pension of 2001. per annum for life. The two principal offices for the twopenny post are in Lombard-street, and Gerrard-street; there are also upwards of 120 receiving houses in various parts of the metropolis, which are

continually adding to their number as new buildings are erected. The number of letters circulating in a population of a million and a quarter, may readily be conceived to be immense; but there is one day in the year in which they are increased beyond any thing that imagination could calculate-this is St. Valentine's day; it appears by the official returns, that on the 14th Feb. 1821, the number of letters which passed through the twopenny post office in London, exceeded the usual daily average by two hundred thousand!

The whole business of the post office is under the direction of a nobleman, who fills the office of post-master general; but the general management is confided to the secretary and resident surveyor, who has under him inspectors, comptrollers, a receiver-general, and numerous other officers-all places of great trust and confidence.

As a source of revenue, the post-office is one of the most fertile and least objectionable of imposts, since no person can begrudge a shilling for having his letter transmitted four hundred miles in the short period of forty hours. The amount produced annually by the post-office is also of importance, even in a country where the revenues are greater than any ancient or modern country. It appears by the official returns, that the gross amount of the revenue from the post office, for the year ending the 5th January 1821, was 2,310,5991. 1s. 101d., from which deducting a sum of 617,962l. 38. 11 d. leaves a net produce of 1,692,636/. 17s. 103d. applicable to national objects-exhibiting in itself a monument of the extensive commerce and active intercourses of Great Britain.

The present situation of the general post office in Lombard-street, though possessing the advantage of being in a centrical situation, is inconvenient for business so extensive; and more than fifteen years ago it was determined to erect a new post-office on a larger scale, and more worthy of this great city, on the site of St. Martin's-leGrand.*

Lombard-street has always been celebrated as a place of traffic and resort for merchants from all parts of the world. From an old book printed in 1545, it appears that the Pope's merchants frequented this place and sold their wafer cakes (i. e. the host) sanctified at Rome, their pardons, &c. this fine flower have they made the chiefest of all their trish trash. I pray thee, gentle reader, were not his pardoners merchants to them? Yea, it is well known, that their pardons, and other of their trumpery, hath been bought and sold in Lombard-street, and other places, as thou wilt buy and sell a horse in Smithfield.'+

In the middle of Fenchurch-street, before the fire of London in 1666, stood the small church of St. Gabriel Fenchurch, which was not rebuilt, but the parish united to St. Margaret Pattens. On the north side of this street is Cullum-street, which takes

Vide, ante, p. 53

+ Lament against the city of London.

its name from an ancient mansion, or large house, the property of the honourable family of the Cullums, which took up the whole site of this street.

In this ward, on the south side of Fenchurch-street, but backward from the street, is the hall belonging to the Hudson's Bay company. It is an extensive brick building, adorned with pilasters, architraves, &c. In the hall is a vast pair of horns, of the Moose deer, weighing fifty-six pounds, and various canoes; and in another room, the picture of an elk, killed in the presence of Charles XI. of Sweden, which weighed twelve hundred and twenty nine pounds. In the court room is a portrait of prince Rupert, by sir W. Lely.

On the same side of Fenchurch-street is Lime-street; on the west side of which is Pewterers'-hall, a very good and convenient building, now let as a hat manufactory. In the court-room, which is a small apartment in a private house adjoining, is a portrait of Mr. William Smallwood, who was master of the company in the reign of Henry VII. and gave them the hall with a garden, and six tenements adjoining. His portrait represents him in a black furred gown and hat, with his will in his left hand and his gloves in his right. In the window is a dial in stained glass, with the motto Sic vita, and a representation of a spider and fly.

CHAPTER XXI.

History and Topography of Lime-street Ward.

Lime-street ward, is so called from the street, which is supposed to have received this name from making or selling lime there. It is bounded on the east and north by Aldgate ward, on the west by Bishopsgate ward, and on the south by Langbourn ward. It is divided into four precincts, numbered from one to four, and is under the government of an alderman, and four common councilmen. Though this ward runs through several parishes, there is not any church in it, neither is there a whole street throughout it.

The most prominent edifice in ancient times in this ward, was Leadenhall, which was situated on the south side, and near the west end of the street of that name. It was originally a manor-house, belonging to sir Hugh Neville, in the year 1309, and was purchased by the munificent Whittington in 1408, who afterwards presented it to the city. In 1419, sir Simon Eyre erected a public granary here, built with stone, at his own expense. He also built a chape! within the square, which he intended to apply to the uses of a foundation for a warden, six secular priests, six clerks, and two choristers; and also for three schoolmasters; and he left three