CHAPTER I
THE GEOLOGY

By Prof. T. G. Bonney, F.R.S.

The buildings of a town often succeed in masking the minor physical features of its site—irregularities are levelled, brooks are hidden beneath arches and find ignominious ends in sewers; canals, quays, and terrace walls may be wholly artificial. To realise completely the original contours of the ground is often a laborious process, demanding inductive reasoning on the evidence obtained in sinking wells, in digging the foundations of the larger buildings, or in making cuttings and tunnels. Still the broader and bolder features cannot be obscured, however thick the encrusting layer of masonry may be. What, then, are these in the case of Greater London? Its site is a broad valley, along the bed of which a tidal river winds in serpentine curves as its channel widens and deepens towards the sea. On either side of this valley the ground slopes upwards, though for a while very gently, towards a hilly district, which rises, sometimes rather steeply, to a height of about 400 feet above sea-level. Towards the north this district passes into an undulating plateau, the chalky uplands of Hertfordshire; on the south it ends in a more sharply defined range, which occasionally reaches an elevation of about 800 feet above the sea—the North Downs. The upland declines a little, the valley broadens towards the sea, as the river changes into an estuary. Between the one and the other there is no very hard and fast division; the ground by the side of each is low, but as a rule by the river it is just high enough to be naturally fit for cultivation, while by the estuary it is a marsh. But as the ground becomes more salubrious, the channel becomes more shallow, and at one place, a short distance above the confluence of a tributary stream from the north—the Lea—this change in the character of the valley is a little more rapid than elsewhere.

These conditions seem to have determined the site of the city—the original nucleus of the vast aggregate of houses which forms the London of to-day. Air and water are among the prime requisites of life; no important settlement is likely to be established where the one is insalubrious, the other difficult to obtain. Thus men, in the days before systems of drainage had been devised, would shun the marshes of Essex and Kent, and, in choosing a less malarious site, would seek one where they could get water fit to be drunk, either from brooks which descended from the uplands, or from shallow wells. These conditions, as we shall see, were fulfilled in the site of ancient London; these for long years determined its limits and regulated its expansion.

Let us imagine London obliterated from the valley of the Thames; let us picture that valley as it was more than two thousand years ago, when the uplands north of the river were covered by a dense forest, and the Andreds Wald (as it was afterwards named) extended from the Sussex coast to the slopes of the Kentish Downs. We gaze, as we have said, upon a broad valley, through which the tidal Thames takes its winding course, receiving affluents from either side. These are sometimes mere brooks, sometimes rivers up which the salt water at high tide makes its way for short distances. The brooks generally rise among the marginal hills; the rivers on the northern side start far back on the undulating plateau; but on the southern the more important have cut their way completely through the range of the North Downs and are fed by streams which began their course in the valley of the Weald. Of the latter, however, probably not one is directly connected with the earliest history of London; of the former, only the Fleet, which, rising on the southern scarp of Hampstead Heath, ultimately enters the Thames near Blackfriars Bridge. But both the one and the other at later stages in the development of London may require a passing word of notice.

What, then, do we see at this earliest phase in the history of the future metropolis? At once we are impressed with the fact that the Thames formerly must have flowed in a channel broader but straighter than its present one; a channel which is now indicated by a tract of alluvial land a few feet below the general level of the valley, and but little above high-water mark. Traces of this may be seen here and there between Chelsea and London Bridge, in the low ground about Millbank and along the river-side at Westminster, and in that which runs from Lambeth along the right bank of the Thames. But the most marked indication of this alluvial plain begins about a mile below London Bridge. Here the left bank of the river is formed, as it has been from the bend at Hungerford Bridge, by a terrace ranging at first from about 25 feet to 40 feet above mean tide level, a most important physical feature, for it determined, as we shall see, the site of London. But on the opposite shore, the strip of lower ground—often about four or five hundred yards wide—on which river-side Southwark is built, continues until, at Bermondsey, it widens rather suddenly to about a mile and a half. So it goes on past the junction of the Lea, now widening, now contracting slightly, as, for instance, opposite to Purfleet and above Greenwich, but always a broad lowland through which the present tidal river takes a wholly independent and sinuous course. This plain is formed of silt which the Thames itself has deposited over the debatable region where river and sea begin to meet. It is but little above high-water mark; much of it less than a dozen feet above ordnance datum. A similar low plain, about half a mile wide, may be traced for a few miles up the valley of the Lea, and indications of this may be found here and there by the side of the Thames above Chelsea; but commonly they are wanting, and always are limited in extent. In their absence, the river bank is higher, for it is formed by the scarp of that terrace to which we have already referred. The difference in elevation between these plains is not great, for the second begins at about 20 to 25 feet above ordnance datum; but it shelves from this gently upwards, forming the remainder of the more obvious bed of the valley, till it reaches a height of about 100 feet. At about this level, though it is impossible to be quite precise, the steeper slopes, more especially on the northern side of the river, and the hills, continue to rise till sometimes—as at Hampstead and at Highgate—they reach an elevation of rather over 400 feet. We cannot, however, do more than speak in general terms, for in a valley like that of the Thames—mainly excavated in a soft and tenacious clay—a large part of the rainfall runs off, forming numerous brooklets and small streams, which carve out many minor undulations and shallow ramifying valleys.

The lowest alluvial plain, in olden days, must have been a desolate marshland, the haunt of wildfowl and the home of ague; so we pass it by, to describe more particularly the ground which overlooks it. The valley as a whole—in the neighbourhood of London—is carved out of strata assigned by geologists to the earlier part of the Tertiary era, the period called the Eocene. These rest upon a mass of chalk some 650 feet thick beneath the junction of Tottenham Court Road with Oxford Street—which rises to the surface towards the Kentish Downs on the one side and in the Hertfordshire hills on the other. Near London this rock is not exposed, but it begins to show itself near Deptford and Charlton, and is yet more conspicuous about Dartford and Purfleet, so that it evidently forms a true basin beneath London. Of what lies beneath it we shall speak hereafter, for this is a matter of more importance to the future history of London than at first might be supposed. The Eocene strata take the same basin-like form as the underlying chalk, so that while the lowest of them rises to the surface north and south of London, it is rather more than 200 feet below sea-level at Hungerford Bridge. This rock, called the Thanet Sand, is a marine deposit; it is a very light grey or buff-coloured sand, formed almost entirely of quartz grains, and it occupies a more limited area than the overlying strata, its thickness beneath London commonly varying from about 20 to 40 feet. The Thanet Sand seldom, if ever, reaches the surface to the north or the south-west of London, but it may be seen to the south-east, as about Woolwich and Croydon.

Over the Thanet Sand comes a rather variable group of clays and sands called the Woolwich and Reading Beds. They extend over a larger area and generally run a little thicker than it does, for beneath London they are usually about 50 or 60 feet, and occasionally rather more. The fossils are sometimes fresh-water forms, sometimes estuarine or marine, so that the deposit probably marks the embouchure of one or possibly two large rivers. Next comes that brownish clay which is so constantly turned up in digging sewers or foundations, especially on the lower slopes of the hills. Its name—the London Clay—is taken from the metropolis; but it covers, or at any rate has covered, a much more extensive area, for it can be traced at intervals (large masses having been removed by denudation in some districts) as far as Marlborough on the west, the Isle of Wight on the south, and Great Yarmouth on the north. The same cause has reduced its thickness in parts of the metropolitan districts. Beneath Trafalgar Square, for example, it is 142 feet, and in some wells even less, but the total thickness must have been—indeed in some places it still is—rather more than 400 feet. At the base a band of pebbles commonly occurs. This, under the central part of London, is inconspicuous; but farther away, especially towards the south and the east, it is often 20 to 30 feet thick, and sometimes more. It consists of well-rounded flint pebbles, generally not so big as a hen’s egg, mixed with quartz sand. This gravel lies at or near the surface over a considerable area about Blackheath, Charlton, and Chiselhurst, and is now generally distinguished from the London Clay by a separate name—the Blackheath or the Oldhaven Beds. Both this formation and the London Clay contain fossils, sometimes rather abundantly, which indicate a marine origin, though the deposit cannot have been formed at a long distance from land, for estuarine species occur in it; while fossil fruits and pieces of wood are sometimes common in the London Clay, the latter being often riddled by the borings of teredines (a bivalve mollusc which still exists and makes great havoc in timber). So that in all probability both the gravel and the clay were connected with the rivers already mentioned.

Above the London Clay comes a group of sands, occasionally containing intercalated beds of clay, which once must have had almost as wide an extent as it, but in the London area it is reduced to isolated fragments, capping the clay hills at Hampstead, Highgate, and Harrow. Here the deposit is less than 100 feet in thickness, for so much has been washed away, but it often reaches quite 300 feet on the dry moorland about Chobham, Aldershot, and Weybridge.

Then comes a great gap in the geological record. The beds just mentioned belong to the Eocene, but after these nothing more is found till we are very near the end, if not actually out of, the Pliocene period. This long interval, in the district with which we are concerned, was occupied by earth-movements, the result of which was denudation rather than deposition. As we have already said, the chalk and the overlying Eocene strata are bent into the form of an elongated basin, which is related to the long dome-like elevation from which the hills and valleys of the Weald have been sculptured. Basin and dome alike are the results of wave-like movements which began to affect a large portion of Europe soon after the latest Eocene deposits in the London area were formed, movements of which the Alps and the Pyrenees are more conspicuous monuments. But these folds first began at a still earlier epoch—that which separates the newest part of the chalk from the oldest beds of the Eocene. Even then the London basin and the Wealden dome must have been outlined, though less boldly than now; for beneath the City the Thanet Sand and the Woolwich and Reading Beds are pierced in borings, and are together about 90 feet in thickness. But high up on the North Downs the pebble bed at the bottom of the London Clay may be seen resting on the chalk. So this district in early Eocene times must have been higher than the former one by at least the above-named amount; or, in other words, the basin of the Thames and the dome of the Weald must have been already indicated.

The later earth-movements, however, were on a much grander scale. Under London Bridge the base of the London Clay is about 90 feet below the sea-level, while on the North Downs it is about 750 feet above it, so the displacement since it was laid down has been at least 840 feet. The uplift in the central part of the Weald was doubtless much greater, but as denudation must have begun as soon as ever dry land appeared, we cannot say to what height the hills in this part may have risen. Still, when we remember that the valleys of the Wey, the Mole, and the Medway, which drain the northern half of the Weald, have cut completely through the range of the North Downs on their course towards the Thames, and are the makers of the valleys in which they flow, we can understand the magnitude of the work of denudation. But that work was far too complicated, the subject is far too difficult and full of controversies, to be discussed in these pages; we must content ourselves with mentioning a few facts which have more or less affected the history of the metropolis.

As the rivers flowed, they transported and deposited the dÉbris of the land, and if ever a submergence occurred, the same work would be done by tides and currents of the sea. The earliest deposits, obviously, would be formed in places which are far above the present beds of the streams. Most of these deposits would be washed away, their materials would be sorted out and transferred to lower levels, as the valleys were widened and deepened, and as the surface of the ground approached more nearly to its present contours. Thus gravels, sands, and clays are found at various levels down nearly to the present level of the Thames. The oldest of them, deposited within a radius of about ten miles from London Stone, lie rather more than 300 feet above the sea.1 These last are probably connected with similar sands and gravels which cover considerable areas in the Eastern Counties, and may have been deposited at an epoch when even the outline of the present valley system of the Thames had not been delineated. Upon this question, however, it is needless to enter. The next deposit, supposing these patches of sand and gravel to be of one age—a very doubtful matter,—is the Boulder Clay—a stiff, tenacious clay, often studded with pieces of chalk, from minute grains to biggish lumps, which commonly are fairly well rounded, together with flints, both rounded and angular, and fragments of other rocks. These have been derived, generally speaking, from the north and from various places, often at long distances, either on the eastern side of England, or in Scotland, or occasionally even in Norway. The clay also appears to have been formed from materials which came from the same direction. But little of this Boulder Clay now remains in the neighbourhood of London; the nearest patch is found on the higher ground on either side of the 300 feet contour-line between Whetstone, Finchley, and Muswell Hill—perhaps also at Hendon. To what extent the valley system of the Thames was sculptured when the Boulder Clay was formed; why the latter stops short on the northern slopes; under what circumstances it was deposited—are all subjects of controversy which it is impossible to discuss in these pages. Suffice it to say that the clay indicates, to some extent at least, the action of ice; and that as the patches of it and of the associated gravels occur at different levels (a fact which is still more obvious in other districts) and appear to exhibit a general correspondence in distribution with the present contours of the ground, several valleys must have been by then partially, if not completely, defined. In the main valley—as, for example, near Erith—fine sandy clays or “brick earth” occur, which some geologists consider to be at least as old as this clay. The climate, when this “brick earth” was deposited, certainly must have been much colder than it is at present, for remains of the musk-sheep have been found in it, and at that time the valley of the Thames must have been excavated nearly to its present depth. But on the slopes of this valley, and of its tributaries, beds of gravel are found, containing stones which must have been washed out of the Boulder Clay; and as these gravels often extend to more than a hundred feet above the present level of the river, the changes since they were deposited must have been considerable. They contain the bones of extinct mammals, such as the woolly rhinoceros and the mammoth, with others indicative of a climate distinctly colder than at present. But as these also have been found almost at the present level of the river, the animals must have remained in this country till it had assumed very nearly its present outlines. For instance, the tooth of a mammoth was discovered in 1731, 28 feet below the surface, when a sewer was dug in Pall Mall. Many bones of this and other animals have been found in the “brick earth” of Ilford; and a splendid pair of tusks, obtained in 1864, is now preserved in the British Museum, South Kensington. Here “the ground forms a low terrace, bordering the small river Roding on the one side, and on the other it slopes gradually down to the Thames. The height of the surface at the pits is about 28 feet above the Thames.”2 It is therefore certain that the river valley was cut down nearly to its present level while the climate was still much colder than it is at present, and very probable that its depth was much increased after the chalky Boulder Clay had been deposited; for these gravels, as has been said, are strewn over the lower slopes up to about a hundred feet above the present river. At Highbury Terrace they even reach 154 feet, and at Wimbledon 190 feet.

These gravels have yielded the remains, not only of the mammoth, but also of man. His bones indeed have hardly ever been discovered, but stones chipped into shape by his hands are far from rare. They are almost always made of flint, a material which was abundant, could be readily trimmed, and afforded a good and durable cutting edge. These implements are never smoothed or polished, and exhibit many varieties of form. They range from mere flakes, the artificial origin of which cannot always be proved, but which in all probability were used as knives and scrapers, to instruments which could only have been made at the cost of considerable time and some skill. Similar remains have been found elsewhere in the more eastern and southern counties of England and on the Continent. The people, however, who fashioned such implements hardly can have been so far advanced in civilisation as the wandering tribes of Esquimaux in Northern Greenland.

These worked flints are very rarely found either below 20 or above 100 feet from the sea-level, but between these heights they are not uncommon. About two centuries ago a well-worked flint, something like a spear-head in shape, was found with an elephant’s (mammoth’s) tusk “opposite black Mary’s, near Grayes Inn Lane.”3 Implements of various shapes have been obtained from the gravel near Acton, Ealing, Hackney, Highbury, and Erith, as well as at Tottenham Cross, Lower Edmonton, and other places in the valley of the Lea. But the most interesting localities hitherto investigated are in the neighbourhood of Stoke Newington and of Crayford. The worked flints at the former place are found at more than one level, and indicate a progress in manual skill sufficient to lead observers to the conclusion that they belong to more than one epoch. The newest of these implements, flint flakes with occasional more elaborate specimens, were so abundant and have occurred in such a manner as to suggest to their discoverer (Mr. Worthington Smith) that they lay on the actual surface where they were fashioned by the workers of olden time. “The floor upon which this colony of men lived and made their implements has remained undisturbed till modern times, and the tools, together with thousands of flakes, all as sharp as knives, still rest on the old bank of the brook just as they were left in PalÆolithic times. In some places the tools are covered with sand, but usually with four or five feet of brick earth.... That (the floor) was really a working place where tools were made in PalÆolithic times is proved by the fact of my replacing flakes on to the blocks from which they were originally struck.”4 At Crayford also, a layer of flint chips was found by Mr. F. C. J. Spurrell in “brick earth” at the foot of a buried cliff of chalk. The circumstances under which these flakes occurred led him to the conclusion that this also was the site of an old “workshop” of flint implements.5

These gravels may be assigned to a time—probably towards the conclusion of the Glacial epoch—when the climate of Britain was still cold, when the higher hills were permanently capped by snow, and when glaciers may have lingered in the more mountainous regions. All through the spring and early summer the rivers would be swollen with melting snow, the torrents from the highland districts would be full and strong, and thus denudation would be comparatively rapid—the more rapid because the latest deposits, the Boulder Clay with its associated gravelly sands, would be incoherent and in many places still unprotected by vegetation. Very different would be the brooks and the rivers which then traversed the valley of the Thames from those which now creep through lush water-meadows or glide “by thorpe and town.” The final sculpturing of the valleys—all that has been effected since the date of the Chalky Boulder Clay—may have been accomplished with comparative quickness. Still, since the time when the oldest of these flint implements were lost by their owners, the beds of the valleys have been lowered, in some places by not less than a hundred feet. The district also, until the greater part of this final sculpturing was accomplished, was inhabited by men whose habits of life were throughout substantially the same.

The alluvial deposits, as already stated, rise but little above the surface of the river at high tide. Their thickness varies, but commonly it is from about 12 to 20 feet. The lowest part is generally gravel and sand—materials indicating that the conditions which produced the older deposits of a like nature passed away gradually. This is followed by river silt, with occasional thin beds of peat or with indications of old land surfaces on which flourished woods of oak or even of yew. Below the Port of London, marine shells are rather abundant in the lower part of the silt; these indicate that the general level of the land was a little lower than it had been during the preceding age, perhaps even than it is at present. These alluvial deposits have yielded implements of smoothed or polished stone, of bronze and of iron; also canoes, and even relics of the Roman occupation of Britain. In other words, they have yielded antiquities belonging mainly to prehistoric times, though the record is continued up to a comparatively recent date. Marshy or peaty ground occurs even within the limits of the city,6 as at one corner of St. Paul’s Cathedral, in Finsbury Crescent, and near London Wall, as well as at Westminster. Thorney—the “Isle of Thorns”—the site of the Abbey, was formerly a low insular bank of gravel among marshes. The lake in St. James’s Park indicates the track of the Tyburn, which traversed one of these swamps. It was a brook of some size, and traces of it may be found in the names Marylebone (le-bourne7), and Brook Street. One branch of it passed “through Dean Street and College Street till it fell into the Thames by Millbank Street.”8 The water from the slopes north of Hyde Park made another stream called the Westbourne; this, after following a path still suggested by the Serpentine, found its way to the Thames through a fenny district which is now Belgravia (see also p. 26).

Such, then, is the structure of the valley of the Thames; such are the deposits which form its surface on either side, and on which the metropolis has been built. But we must now look a little more closely at their distribution, for by this the growth of London in ancient times was largely determined. The broad terrace already mentioned on the left bank of the Thames, the site of mediÆval London, consists, for a couple of miles or so inland, mainly of a flint gravel more or less sandy, seldom exceeding 20 feet in thickness, and commonly rather less, which rests upon the tenacious London Clay. Here and there this gravel may be traversed by a small stream, but the most marked break in its level is formed by a brook which, flowing from the slopes of Hampstead and Highgate, at last has cut its bed down to the clay and has broadened out into a creek as it joins the Thames. It was known in its lower reaches as the Fleet (see p. 27). This gravel terrace made London possible; this stream formed its first boundary on the west. The rain-water is readily absorbed by the gravel, but is arrested by the underlying clay. It can escape in springs wherever a valley has been cut down to the level of saturation, but if it is not tapped in this way the gravel will be full of water to within a few feet of the surface, so that a shallow well will yield a good supply. The first settlement was placed upon this gravel, by the river-side, where the channel is still deep at high tide; it was limited on the west by the slopes descending to the Fleet, on the east by the lower ground which shelves downwards towards the mouth of the Lea. From this nucleus, enclosed within the Roman fortification, the town expanded, as times became more peaceful, along the lines of the great roads; and at an early date a tÊte-du-pont would undoubtedly be formed at Southwark.

But without entering into the details of this development, let us pass over some centuries and see how the growth of London was for a long time conditioned and limited by this gravel. The metropolis spread “eastward towards Whitechapel, Bow, and Stepney; north-eastward towards Hackney, Clapton, and Newington; and westward towards Kensington and Chelsea; while northward it came for many years to a sudden termination at Clerkenwell, Bloomsbury, Marylebone, Paddington, and Bayswater: for north of a line drawn from Bayswater, by the Great Western Station, Clarence Gate, Park Square, and along the side of the New Road to Euston Square, Burton Crescent, and Mecklenburg Square, this bed of gravel terminates abruptly, and the London Clay comes to the surface and occupies all the ground to the north. A map of London, as recent as 1817, shows how well defined was the extension of houses arising from this cause. Here and there only beyond the main body of the gravel there were a few outliers, such as those at Islington and Highbury, and there habitations followed. In the same way, south of the Thames, villages and buildings were gradually extended over the valley-gravels to Peckham, Camberwell, Brixton, and Clapham; while, beyond, houses and villages rose on the gravel-capped hills of Streatham, Denmark Hill, and Norwood. It was not until facilities were afforded for an independent water-supply by the rapid extension of the works of the great Water Companies that it became practicable to establish a town population in the clay districts of Holloway, Camden Town, Regent’s Park, St. John’s Wood, Westbourne, and Notting Hill.”9

It is possible that the position of the older parks—St. James’s, the Green Park—and Hyde Park may have been indirectly determined by the fact that over much of them the gravel is thin or the clay actually rises to the surface.

Every old settlement outside the earlier limits of the metropolis marks the presence of sand or gravel. Hampstead and Highgate, which early in the nineteenth century were severed from London by nearly a couple of miles of open fields, stand upon large patches of Bagshot Sand, which caps the London Clay and is sometimes as much as 80 feet thick. This yellowish or fawn-coloured sand may be seen almost anywhere in the old excavations at the top of Hampstead Heath, and the difference of the vegetation on this material and on the clay of the lower slopes cannot fail to be noticed. On the latter, grass abounds; on the former, fern, furze, and even heather. The junction of the sand and the clay is indicated by springs which supply the various ponds. These are occasionally chalybeate, like the once-noted spring which may still be seen in Well Walk, Hampstead. Harrow stands on another outlying patch of Bagshot Sand. Enfield, Edmonton, Barnet, Totteridge, Finchley, Hendon, and other old villages are built upon the high-level gravels which have been already mentioned.

The shallow wells are no longer used in London itself. Infiltration of sewage, in some cases of the drainage from churchyards, had rendered many of them actually poisonous; clear, sparkling, even palatable, though the water might be, there was often “death in the cup.” There was a terrible illustration of this fact during the visitation of the cholera in 1854. A pump, the water of which was much esteemed, stood by the wall of the churchyard in Broad Street (south of Oxford Street). The water became infected, and the cholera ravaged the immediate neighbourhood. But though most of these pumps were closed barely sixty years ago, some, like that in Great Dean’s Yard, Westminster, were in use for quite another quarter of a century. It has now disappeared, but that within the precincts of the Charterhouse is still standing. Thus London was limited to the gravel till it was able to obtain water from other sources.10

The first step in this direction was early in the seventeenth century, when the New River Company had its origin, and for many years this was the only Company by which water was supplied to London; but seven others were subsequently founded.11

The New River Company obtains its water from the Lea, the original source being nearly forty miles from London, but the supply has been since increased by sinking wells. The East London draws upon the same river. Five of the other Companies get their water from the Thames, some miles above London, augmenting their supply by means of wells, and the Kent Company draws exclusively from deep wells in the chalk. As these Companies were founded the metropolis began to spread rapidly over the areas which they supplied, but it did so in a regular and systematic fashion. Houses fed by the mains of a Water Company must keep, as it were, in touch with their base of supply, because of the cost of laying a long line of pipes to supply a solitary house. Thus a town which draws its water from mains advances block by block into the surrounding country, and is not encircled by a wide fringe of scattered dwellings.

In the London area, however, there is a way in which the occupant of an isolated house can obtain a supply of water, though it is not a cheap one. He may bore through the London Clay into the underlying sands and gravels. When a porous stratum rests on one that is impervious, the former becomes saturated with water up to a certain level, dependent on local circumstances, and in this case a well sunk sufficiently deep into it will be filled. But if the porous stratum be also covered by one which is impervious; if all three be bent into a basin-like form; and if the porous one crop out at a considerably higher level than the place where a well is needed, then it may be water-logged to a height sufficient to force the water up the bore-hole, perhaps even to send up a jet like a fountain. Wells of this kind are termed Artesian, from Artois in France, where they have been in use for several centuries, and they began to be sunk in England about a century ago. The London Clay was pierced, and the water-logged sands and gravels belonging to the lowest part of the Tertiary series were tapped. These basin-formed beds crop out at an elevation generally of about one hundred feet above the Thames; thus they were charged with water to a considerable height above the level of the river, and it very commonly at first spouted up above the surface of the ground; but as the wells increased in number, its level was gradually lowered, for the area over which these beds are exposed is not very extensive, and a stratum cannot supply more water than it receives by percolation from the rainfall. At first everything went well; consumers were like heirs who had succeeded to the savings of a long minority, for water had been accumulating in this subterranean basin-like reservoir during myriads of years; but after a time the expenditure began to exceed the income, and the water-level sank slowly, till now it is many yards below the surface of the ground.

But when this source of supply evidently was becoming overtaxed, another was found in the underlying chalk. This rock absorbs water rapidly, but parts with it very slowly. Professor Prestwich found by experiment that a slab of chalk measuring 63 cubic inches drank up 26 cubic inches of water (all it could hold) in a quarter of an hour; yet when left to drain for twelve hours it parted with only one-tenth of a cubic inch.12 So that an ordinary well is useless. But the upper part of the chalk, generally to a depth of rather more than 300 feet, is traversed by fissures, and these are full of water. So a bore-hole is carried down till one of them is struck, and they are so abundant that failures are rare. In this way the water-supply of London is materially augmented.

This source also—at any rate in the immediate neighbourhood of London—is becoming overtaxed, so an effort has been made to obtain water from yet greater depths. Below the chalk is an impervious clay (Gault), and beneath this comes a brownish sand, followed by some other beds not quite so porous (called the Lower Greensand), which are succeeded by thick clays. These sandy rocks crop out at the surface to the north of London in Buckinghamshire and Bedfordshire, and to the south in Surrey and Kent. So they reasonably might be expected to pass beneath the metropolis, to be saturated with water, and to yield a large supply as they do at Paris, the geological position of which bears a considerable resemblance to that of London. Bore-holes have been put down in search of these sands at Kentish Town, Meux’s Brewery (Tottenham Court Road), Richmond, Streatham, and Crossness. They have also been sunk beyond the metropolitan area at Ware, Cheshunt, Harwich, and Chatham. At the last place the Lower Greensand is only about 40 feet thick, instead of 400 feet as it is south of the North Downs.13 It was expected to occur under London at a depth of about 1000 feet in round numbers, but in every case it was found to be either wholly absent or so thin as to be worthless. This is true even so far away as Ware and Harwich on the northern side, and perhaps as Croydon on the southern. In the days when this Lower Greensand, and even a considerable thickness of strata which elsewhere comes beneath it, were deposited, a large island or peninsula composed of much older rocks must have risen above the sea in the region over which London and all its environs now stand. So there is no hope of increasing the supply of water from any beds older than the upper part of the chalk. But a good deal more may be obtained from this rock, if it be tapped at longer distances from the metropolis. To this process, however, there are two objections: one, that the number of wells and of conduits which will be required in order to collect the water will probably make it a rather costly source of supply; the other, that if large demands be made on the water stored up beneath the chalk hills, the level of the surface of saturation in this rock will be appreciably lowered, many springs will be dried up, and the streams will be seriously diminished, which will greatly injure thousands of acres of water-meadows and many important industries. Large sums would have to be paid as compensation, and this would add greatly to the cost of any scheme. It is doubtful whether more water ought to be withdrawn from the Thames and its tributaries; and rivers which flow through a thickly populated country can hardly be regarded as safe from sewage contamination. It is therefore not improbable that, within a few years, the metropolis will have to follow the example of Liverpool and of Manchester, and seek another source of water-supply at a yet greater distance than has been done by those cities.

T. G. Bonney.

CHAPTER II
THE SITE

It is due to the respect with which all writers upon London must regard the first surveyor and the collector of its traditions and histories that we should quote his words as to the origin and foundation of the City. He says (Strype’sStow, vol. i. book i.):—

“As the Roman Writers, to glorify the City of Rome, drew the Original thereof from Gods, and Demi-gods, so Geoffrey of Monmouth, the Welsh historian, deduceth the Foundation of this famous City of London, for the greater Glory thereof, and Emulation of Rome, from the very same original. For he reporteth, that Brute, lineally descended from the Demi-god Eneas, the son of Venus, Daughter of Jupiter, about the Year of the World 2855, and 1108 before the Nativity of Christ, builded the City near unto the River now called Thames, and named it Troynovant, or Trenovant. But herein, as Livy, the most famous Historiographer of the Romans, writeth, ‘Antiquity is pardonable, and hath an especial Privilege, by interlacing Divine Matters with Human, to make the first Foundations of Cities more honourable, more Sacred, and as it were of greater Majesty.’

This Tradition concerning the ancient Foundation of the City by Brute, was of such Credit, that it is asserted in an ancient Tract, preserved in the Archives of the Chamber of London; which is transcribed into the Liber Albus, and long before that by Horn, in his old Book of Laws and Customs, called Liber Horn. And a copy of this Tract was drawn out of the City Books by the Mayor and Aldermen’s special Order, and sent to King Henry the VI., in the Seventh year of his reign; which Copy yet remains among the Records of the Tower. The Tract is as followeth:—

‘Inter Nobiles Urbes Orbis, etc. 1. Among the noble Cities of the World which Fame cries up, the City of London, the only Seat of the Realm of England, is the principal, which widely spreads abroad the Rumour of its Name. It is happy for the Wholesomeness of the Air, for the Christian religion, for its most worthy Liberty, and most ancient Foundation. For according to the Credit of Chronicles, it is considerably older than Rome: and it is stated by the same Trojan Author that it was built by Brute, after the Likeness of Great Troy, before that built by Romulus and Remus. Whence to this Day it useth and enjoyeth the ancient City Troy’s Liberties, Rights, and Customs. For it hath a Senatorial Dignity and Lesser Magistrates. And it hath Annual Sheriffs instead of Consuls. For whosoever repair thither, of whatsoever condition they be, whether Free or Servants, they obtain there the refuge of Defence and Freedom. Almost all the Bishops, Abbots, and Nobles of England are as it were Citizens and Freemen of this City, having their noble Inns here.’

These and many more matters of remark, worthy to be remembered, concerning this most noble City, remain in a very old Book, called Recordatorium Civitatis; and in the Book called Speculum.

King Lud (as the same Geoffrey of Monmouth noteth) afterward (about 1060 Years after) not only repaired this City, but also increased the same with fair Buildings, Towers, and Walls; which after his own Name called it Caire-Lud, or Luds-Town. And the strong Gate which he builded in the west Part of the City, he likewise, for his own honour, named Ludgate.

And in Process of Time, by mollifying the Word, it took the Name of London, but some others will have it called Llongdin; a British word answering to the Saxon word Shipton, that is, a Town of Ships. And indeed none hath more Right to take unto itself that Name of Shipton, or Road of Ships, than this City, in regard of its commodious situation for shipping on so curious a navigable River as the Thames, which swelling at certain Hours with the Ocean Tides, by a deep and safe Channel, is sufficient to bring up ships of the greatest Burthen to her Sides, and thereby furnisheth her inhabitants with the Riches of the known World; so that as her just Right she claimeth Pre-eminency of all other Cities. And the shipping lying at Anchor by her Walls resembleth a Wood of Trees, disbranched of their Boughs.

This City was in no small Repute, being built by the first Founder of the British Empire, and honoured with the Sepulchre of divers of their Kings, as Brute, Locrine, Cunodagius, and Gurbodus, Father of Ferrex and Porrex, being the last of the Line of Brute.

Mulmutius Dunwallo, son of Cloton, Duke of Cornwall, having vanquished his Competitors, and settled the Land, caused to be erected on, or near the Place, where now Blackwell-Hall standeth (a Place made use of by the Clothiers for the sale of their Cloth every Thursday), a Temple called the Temple of Peace; and after his Death was there interred. And probably it was so ordered to gratify the Citizens, who favoured his Cause.

Belinus (by which Name Dunwallo’s Son was called) built an Haven in this Troynovant, with a Gate over it, which still bears the Name of Belingsgate [now Billingsgate]. And on the Pinnacle was a brazen Vessel erected, in which was put the ashes of his Body burnt after his Death.

The said Belinus is supposed to have built the Tower of London, and to have appointed three Chief Pontiffs to superintend all Religious Affairs throughout Britain; whereof one had his See in London, and the other Sees were York and Carleon. But finding little on Record concerning the actions of those Princes, until we come to the reign of King Lud, it is thought unnecessary to take any further Notice of them. He was eldest son of Hely, who began his Reign about 69 years before the Birth of Jesus Christ. A Prince much praised by Historians for his great Valour, noble Deeds, and Liberality (for amending the Laws of the Country, and forming the State of his Common-weal). And in particular, for repairing this City, and erecting many fair Buildings, and encompassing it about with a strong stone Wall. In the west Part whereof he built a strong Gate, called Ludgate, as was shewed before, where are now standing in Niches, over the said Gate, the Statues of this good King, and his two Sons on each side of him, as a lasting Monument of his Memory, being, after an honourable Reign, near thereunto Buried, in a Temple of his own Building.

This Lud had two Sons, Androgeus and Theomantius [or Temanticus], who being not of age to govern at the death of their father, their Uncle Cassivelaune took upon him the Crown; about the eighth Year of whose reign, Julius CÆsar arrived in this Land, with a great power of Romans to conquer it. The Antiquity of which conquest, I will summarily set down out of his own Commentaries, which are of far better credit than the Relations of Geoffrey of Monmouth.

The chief Government of the Britons, and Administration of War, was then by common advice committed to Cassivelaune, whose borders were divided from the Cities on the sea coast by a river called Thames, about fourscore miles from the sea. This Cassivelaune before had made continual Wars with the other Cities; but the Britons, moved with the coming of the Romans, had made him their Sovereign and General of their Wars (which continued hot between the Romans and them). [CÆsar having knowledge of their intent, marched with his army to the Thames into Cassivelaune’s Borders. This River can be passed but only in one place on Foot, and that with much difficulty. When he was come hither, he observed a great power of his enemies in Battle Array on the other side of the River. The Bank was fortified with sharp stakes fixed before them; and such kind of Stakes were also driven down under water, and covered with the river. CÆsar having understanding thereof by the Prisoners and Deserters, sent his Horse before, and commanded his Foot to follow immediately after. But the Roman Soldiers went on with such speed and force, their Heads only being above water, that the Enemy not being able to withstand the Legions, and the Horse, forsook the Bank and betook themselves to Flight. Cassivelaune despairing of Success by fighting in plain battle, sent away his greater forces, and keeping with him about Four Thousand Charioteers, watched which way the Romans went, and went a little out of the way, concealing himself in cumbersome and woody Places. And in those Parts where he knew the Romans would pass, he drove both Cattle and People out of the open Fields into the Woods. And when the Roman Horse ranged too freely abroad in the Fields for Forage and Spoil, he sent out his Charioteers out of the Woods by all the Ways and Passages well known to them, and encountered with the Horse to their great Prejudice. By the fear whereof he kept them from ranging too far; so that it came to this pass, that CÆsar would not suffer his Horse to stray any Distance from his main Battle of Foot, and no further to annoy the enemy, in wasting their Fields, and burning their Houses and Goods, than their Foot could effect by their Labour or March.]

But in the meanwhile, the Trinobants, in effect the strongest City of those Countries, and one of which Mandubrace, a young Gentleman, that had stuck to CÆsar’s Party, was come to him, being then in the Main Land [viz. Gaul], and thereby escaped Death, which he should have suffered at Cassivelaune’s Hands (as his Father Imanuence who reigned in that city had done). The Trinobants, I say, sent their Ambassadors, promising to yield themselves unto him, and to do what he should command them, instantly desiring him to protect Mandubrace from the furious tyranny of Cassivelaune, and to send some into the City, with authority to take the Government thereof. CÆsar accepted the offer and appointed them to give him forty Hostages, and to find him Grain for his Army, and so sent he Mandubrace to them. They speedily did according to the command, sent the number of Hostages, and the Bread-Corn.

When others saw that CÆsar had not only defended the Trinobants against Cassivelaune, but had also saved them harmless from the Pillage of his own Soldiers, the Cenimagues, the Segontiacs, the Ancalites, the Bibrokes, and the Cassians, by their Ambassies, yield themselves to CÆsar. By these he came to know that Cassivelaune’s Town was not far from that Place, fortified with Woods and marshy Grounds; into the which a considerable number of Men and Cattle were gotten together. For the Britains call that a Town, saith CÆsar, when they have fortified cumbersome Woods, with a Ditch and a Rampire; and thither they are wont to resort, to abide the Invasion of their Enemies. Thither marched CÆsar with his Legions. He finds the Place notably fortified both by Nature and human Pains; nevertheless he strives to assault it on two sides. The Enemies, after a little stay, being not able longer to bear the Onset of the Roman Soldiers, rushed out at another Part, and left the Town unto him. Here was a great number of Cattle found, and many of the Britains were taken in the Chace, and many slain.

While these Things were doing in these Quarters, Cassivelaune sent Messengers to that Part of Kent, which, as we showed before, lyeth upon the Sea, over which Countries Four Kings, Cingetorix, Caruil, Taximagul, and Segorax, reigned, whom he commanded to raise all their Forces, and suddenly to set upon and assault their Enemies in their Naval Trenches. To which, when they were come, the Romans sallied out upon them, slew a great many of them, and took Cingetorix, an eminent Leader among them, Prisoner, and made a safe Retreat. Cassivelaune, hearing of this Battle, and having sustained so many Losses, and found his Territories wasted, and especially being disturbed at the Revolt of the Cities, sent Ambassadors along with Comius of Arras, to treat with CÆsar concerning his Submission. Which CÆsar, when he was resolved to Winter in the Continent, because of the sudden insurrection of the Gauls, and that not much of the Summer remained, and that it might easily be spent, accepted, and commands him Hostages, and appoints what Tribute Britain should yearly pay to the People of Rome, giving strait Charge to Cassivelaune, that he should do no Injury to Manubrace, nor the Trinobants. And so receiving the Hostages, withdrew his Army to the Sea again.

Thus far out of CÆsar’s Commentaries concerning this History, which happened in the year before Christ’s Nativity LIV. In all which Process, there is for this Purpose to be noted, that CÆsar nameth the City of the Trinobantes; which hath a Resemblance with Troynova or Trenovant; having no greater Difference in the Orthography than the changing of [b] into [v]. And yet maketh an Error, which I will not argue. Only this I will note, that divers learned Men do not think Civitas Trinobantum to be well and truly translated The City of the Trinobantes: but that it should rather be The State, Communalty, or Seignory of the Trinobants. For that CÆsar, in his Commentaries, useth the Word Civitas only for a People living under one and the self-same Prince and Law. But certain it is, that the Cities of the Britains were in those Days neither artificially builded with Houses, nor strongly walled with Stone, but were only thick and cumbersome Woods, plashed within and trenched about. And the like in effect do other the Roman and Greek authors directly affirm; as Strabo, Pomponius Mela, and Dion, a Senator at Rome (Writers that flourished in the several Reigns of the Roman Emperors, Tiberius, Claudius, Domitian, and Severus): to wit, that before the Arrival of the Romans, the Britains had no Towns, but called that a Town which had a thick entangled Wood, defended, as I said, with a Ditch and Bank; the like whereof the Irishmen, our next Neighbours, do at this day call Fastness. But after that these hither Parts of Britain were reduced into the Form of a Province by the Romans, who sowed the Seeds of Civility over all Europe, this our City, whatsoever it was before, began to be renowned, and of Fame.

For Tacitus, who first of all Authors nameth it Londinium, saith, that (in the 62nd year after Christ) it was, albeit, no Colony of the Romans; yet most famous for the great Multitude of Merchants, Provision and Intercourse. At which time, in that notable Revolt of the Britains from Nero, in which seventy thousand Romans and their Confederates were slain, this City, with Verulam, near St. Albans, and Maldon, then all famous, were ransacked and spoiled.

For Suetonius Paulinus, then Lieutenant for the Romans in this Isle, abandoned it, as not then fortified, and left it to the Spoil.

Shortly after, Julius Agricola, the Roman Lieutenant in the Time of Domitian, was the first that by exhorting the Britains publickly, and helping them privately, won them to build Houses for themselves, Temples for the Gods, and Courts for Justice, to bring up the Noblemen’s Children in good Letters and Humanity, and to apparel themselves Roman-like. Whereas before (for the most part) they went naked, painting their Bodies, etc., as all the Roman Writers have observed.

True it is, I confess, that afterward, many Cities and Towns in Britain, under the Government of the Romans, were walled with Stone and baked Bricks or Tiles; as Richborough, or Rickborough-Ryptacester in the Isle of Thanet, till the Channel altered his Course, besides Sandwich in Kent, Verulamium besides St. Albans in Hertfordshire, Cilcester in Hampshire, Wroxcester in Shropshire, Kencester in Herefordshire, three Miles from Hereford Town; Ribchester, seven Miles above Preston, on the Water of Rible; Aldeburg, a Mile from Boroughbridge, on Watheling-Street, on Ure River, and others. And no doubt but this our City of London was also walled with Stone in the Time of the Roman Government here; but yet very latewardly; for it seemeth not to have been walled in the Year of our Lord 296. Because in that Year, when Alectus the Tyrant was slain in the Field, the Franks easily entered London, and had sacked the same, had not God of his great Favour at that very Instant brought along the River of Thames certain Bands of Roman Soldiers, who slew those Franks in every Street of the City.”

We need not pursue Stow in the legendary history which follows. Let us next turn to the evidence of ancient writers. CÆsar sailed for his first invasion of Britain on the 26th of August B.C. 55. He took with him two legions, the 7th and the 10th. He had previously caused a part of the coast to be surveyed, and had inquired of the merchants and traders concerning the natives of the island. He landed, fought one or two battles with the Britons, and after a stay of three weeks he retired.

The year after he returned with a larger army—an army of five legions and 2000 cavalry. On this occasion he remained four months. We need not here inquire into his line of march, which cannot be laid down with exactness. After his withdrawal certain British Princes, when civil wars drove them out, sought protection of Augustus. Strabo says that the island paid moderate duties; that the people imported ivory necklaces and bracelets, amber, and glass; that they exported corn, cattle, gold and silver, iron, skins, slaves, and hunting-dogs. He also says that there were four places of transit from the coast of Gaul to that of Britain, viz. the mouths of the Rhine, the Seine, the Loire, and the Garonne.

The point that concerns us is that there was before the arrival of the Romans already a considerable trade with the island.

Nearly a hundred years later—A.D. 43—the third Roman invasion took place in the reign of the Emperor Claudius under the general Aulus Plautius. The Roman fleet sailed from Gesoriacum (Boulogne), the terminus of the Roman military road across Gaul, and carried an army of four legions with cavalry and auxiliaries, about 50,000 in all, to the landing-places of Dover, Hythe, and Richborough.

No mention of London is made in the history of this campaign. Colchester and Gloucester were the principal Roman strongholds.

Writing in the year A.D. 61, Tacitus gives us the first mention of London. He says, “At Suetonius mir constanti medios inter hostes Londinium perrexit cognomento quidem coloni non insigne sed copi negotiatorum et commeatuum maxime celebre.”

This is all that we know. There is no mention of London in either of CÆsar’s invasions; none in that of Aulus Plautius. When we do hear of it, the place is full of merchants, and had been so far a centre of trade. The inference would seem to be, not that London was not in existence in the years 55 B.C. or 43 A.D., or that neither CÆsar nor Aulus Plautius heard of it, but simply that they did not see the town and so did not think it of consequence.

If we consider a map showing the original lie of the ground on and about the site of any great city, we shall presently understand not only the reasons why the city was founded on that spot, but also how the position of the city has from the beginning exercised a very important influence on its history and its fortunes. Position affects the question of defence or of offence. Position affects the plenty or the scarcity of supplies. The prosperity of the city is hindered or advanced by the presence or the absence of bridges, fords, rivers, seas, mountains, plains, marshes, pastures, or arable fields. Distance from the frontier, the proximity of hostile tribes and powers, climate—a seaport closed with ice for six months in the year is severely handicapped against one that is open all the year—these and many other considerations enter into the question of position. They are elementary, but they are important.

We have already in the first chapter considered this important question under the guidance of Professor T. G. Bonney, F.R.S. Let us sum up the conclusions, and from his facts try to picture the site of London before the city was built.

Here we have before us, first, a city of great antiquity and importance; beside it a smaller city, practically absorbed in the greater, but, as I shall presently prove, the more ancient; thirdly, certain suburbs which in course of time grew up and clustered round the city wall, and are now also practically part of the city; lastly, a collection of villages and hamlets which, by reason of their proximity to the city, have grown into cities which anywhere else would be accounted great, rich, and powerful. The area over which we have to conduct our survey is of irregular shape, its boundaries following those of the electoral districts. It includes Wormwood Scrubbs on the west and Plaistow on the east. It reaches from Hampstead in the north to Penge and Streatham in the south. Roughly speaking, it is an area seventeen miles in breadth from east to west, and eleven from north to south. There runs through it from west to east, dividing the area into two unequal parts, a broad river, pursuing a serpentine course of loops and bends, winding curves and straight reaches; a tidal river which, but for the embankments and wharves which line it on each side, would overflow at every high tide into the streets and lanes abutting on it. Streams run into the river from the north and from the south: these we will treat separately. At present they are, with one or two exceptions, all covered over and hidden.

Remove from this area every house, road, bridge, and all cultivated ground, every trace of occupation by man. What do we find? First, a broad marsh. In the marsh there are here and there low-lying islets raised a foot or two above high tide; they are covered with rushes, reeds, brambles, and coarse sedge; some of them are deltas of small affluents caused by the deposit of branches, leaves, and earth brought down by the stream and gradually accumulating till an island has been formed; some are islands formed in the shallows of the river by the same process. These islands are the haunt of innumerable wild birds. The river, which now runs between strong and high embankments, ran through this vast marsh. The marsh extended from Fulham at least, to go no farther west, as far as Greenwich, to go no farther east; from west to east it was in some places two miles and a half broad. The map shows that the marsh included those districts which are now called Fulham, West Kensington, Pimlico, Battersea, Kennington, Lambeth, Stockwell, Southwark, Newington, Bermondsey, Rotherhithe, Deptford, Blackwall, Wapping, Poplar, the Isle of Dogs. In other words, the half at least of modern London is built upon this marsh. At high tide the whole of this vast expanse was covered with water, forming exactly such a lovely lake as one may now see, standing at the water-gate of Porchester Castle and looking across the upper stretches of Portsmouth harbour, or as one may see from any point in Poole harbour when the tide is high. It was a lake bright and clear; here and there lay the islets, green in summer, brown in winter; there were wild duck, wild geese, herons, and a thousand other birds flying over it in myriads with never-ending cries. At low tide the marsh was black mud, and on a day cloudy and overcast a dreary and desolate place. How came a city to be founded on a marsh? That we shall presently understand.

Many names still survive to show the presence of the islets I have mentioned. For instance, Chelsea is Chesil-ey—the Isle of Shingle (so also Winchelsea). Battersea has been commonly, but I believe erroneously, supposed to be Peter’s Isle; Thorney is the Isle of Bramble; Tothill means the Hill of the Hill; Lambeth is the “place of mud,” though it has been interpreted as the place where lambs play; Bermondsey is the Isle of Bermond. Doubtless there are many others, but their names, if they had names, and their sites have long since been forgotten.

Several streams fell into the river. Those on the north were afterwards called Bridge Creek, the Westbourne, the Tybourne, the Fleet or Wells River, the Walbrook, and the Lea. Those on the south were the Wandle, the Falcon, the Effra, the Ravensbourne, and other brooks without names. Of the northern streams the first and last concern us little. The Bridge Creek rose near Wormwood Scrubbs, and running along the western slope of Notting Hill, fell into the Thames a little higher up than Battersea Bridge. The Westbourne, a larger stream, is remarkable for the fact that it remains in the Serpentine. Four or five rills flowing from Telegraph Hill, at Hampstead, unite, and after running through West Hampstead receive the waters of another stream formed of two or three rills rising at Frognal. The junction is at Kilburn. The stream, thus increased in volume, runs south and enters Kensington Gardens at the head of the Serpentine, into which it flows, passing out at the south end. It crosses Knightsbridge at Albert Gate, passes along Cadogan Place, and finally falls into the Thames at Chelsea Embankment. Of the places which it passed, especially Kilburn Priory, we shall have more to say later on. Meantime we gather that Kilburn, Westbourne Terrace, Knightsbridge, and Westbourne Street, Chelsea, owe their names to this little stream.

The Tyburn, a smaller stream, but not without its importance, took its rise from a spring called the Shepherd’s Well, which formed a small pool in the midst of the fields called variously the Shepherd’s Fields, or the Conduit Fields, but later on the Swiss Cottage Fields. The site is marked by a drinking-fountain on the right hand rather more than half way up FitzJohn’s Avenue. The water was remarkable for its purity, and as late as fifty or sixty years ago water-carts came every morning to carry off a supply for those who would drink no other. The stream ran down the hill a little to the east of FitzJohn’s Avenue, crossed Belsize Lane, flowed south as far as the west end of King Henry’s Road, then turning west, crossed Avenue Road, and flowed south again till it came to Acacia Road. Here it received an affluent from the gardens and fields of Belsize Manor and Park. Thence south again with occasional deflections, east and west, across the north-west corner of Regent’s Park, receiving another little affluent in the Park; then down a part of Upper Baker Street, Gloucester Road, taking a south-easterly course from Dorset Street to Great Marylebone Lane. It crossed Oxford Street at the east corner of James Street, ran along the west side of South Molton Street, turned again to the south-west, crossed Piccadilly at Brick Street, and running across Green Park it passed in front of Buckingham Palace. Here the stream entered upon the marsh, which at high tide was covered with water. Then, as sometimes happens with marshes, the stream divided. One—the larger part—ran down College Street into the Thames; the other, not so large, turned to the north-east and presently flowed down Gardener’s Lane and across King’s Street to the river.

The principal interest attaching to this little river is that it actually created the island which we now call Westminster. The island was formed by the detritus of the Tyburn. How many centuries it took to grow one need not stop to inquire: it is enough to mark that Thorney Island, like the Camargue, or the delta of the Nile, was created by the deposit of a stream.

The Fleet River—otherwise called the River of Wells, or Turnmill Brook, or Holebourne—the fourth of the northern streams, was formerly, near its approach to London, a very considerable stream. Its most ancient name was the “Holebourne,” i.e. the stream that flows in a hollow. It was called the River of Wells on account of the great number of wells or springs whose waters it received; and the “Fleet,” because at its mouth it was a “fleet,” or channel covered with shallow water at high tide. The stream was formed by the junction of two main branches, one of which rose in the Vale of Health, Hampstead, and the other in Ken Wood between Hampstead and Highgate. There were several small affluents along the whole course of the stream. The spot where the two branches united was in a place now called Hawley Road, Kentish Town Road. Its course then led past old St. Pancras Church, on the west, between St. Pancras and King’s Cross Stations on the east side of Gray’s Inn Road, down Farringdon Road, Farringdon Street, and New Bridge Street, into the Thames. The wells which gave the stream one of its names were—Clerkenwell, Skinnerswell, Fagswell, Godwell (sometimes incorrectly spelt Todwell), Loderswell, Radwell, Bridewell, St. Chad’s Well. At its mouth the stream was broad enough and deep enough to be navigable for a short distance. It became, however, in later times nothing better than an open pestilential sewer. Attempts were made from time to time to cleanse the stream, but without success. All attempts failed, for the simple reason that Acts of Parliament without an executive police and the goodwill of the people always do fail. Three hundred years later Ben Jonson describes its condition:—

The banks continued to be encumbered with tenements, lay-stalls, and “houses of office,” until the Fire swept all away. After this they were enclosed by a stone embankment on either side, and the lower part of the river became a canal forty feet wide, and, at the upper end, five feet deep, with wharves on both sides. Four bridges were built over the canal—viz. at Bridewell, at Fleet Street, at Fleet Lane, and at Holborn. But the canal proved unsuccessful, the stream became choked again and resumed its old function as a sewer. Everybody remembers the Fleet in connection with the Dunciad—

In the year 1737 the canal between Holborn and Fleet Street was covered over, and in 1765 the lower part between Fleet Street and the Thames was also covered.

So much for the history of the stream. Its importance to the city was very great. It formed a natural ditch on the western side. Its eastern bank rose steeply, much more steeply than at present, forming originally a low cliff; its western bank was not so steep. Between what is now Fleet Lane and the Thames there was originally a small marsh covered with water at high tide, part, in fact, of the great Thames marsh; above Fleet Lane the stream became a pleasant country brook meandering among the fields and moors of the north. The Fleet determined the western boundary, and protected the city on that side.

The Walbrook, like the Westbourne, was formed by the confluence of several rills; its two main branches rose respectively in Hoxton and in Moorfields. It entered the city through a culvert a little to the west of Little Bell Alley, London Wall. It ran along the course of that alley; crossed Lothbury exactly east of St. Margaret’s Church; passed under the present Bank of England into Princes Street; and next under what is now the Joint Stock Bank, down St. Mildred’s Court, and so across the Poultry. It did not run down the street called “Walbrook,” but on the west side of it, past two churches which have now vanished—St. Stephen’s, which formerly stood exactly opposite its present site; and St. John, Walbrook, on the north-east corner of Cloak Lane,—and it made its way into the river between the lanes called Friars’ Alley and Joiners’ Hall. The outfall has been changed, and the stream now runs under Walbrook, finding its way into the Thames at Dowgate Dock.

When the City wall was built the water was conducted through it by means of a culvert; when the City ditch was constructed the water ceased, or only flowed after a downfall of heavy rain. But the Walbrook did not altogether cease; it continued as a much smaller stream from a former affluent rising under the south-east angle of the Bank of England. The banks of the Walbrook were a favourite place for the villas of the wealthier people in Roman London; many Roman remains have been found there; and piles of timber have been uncovered. A fragment of a bridge over the stream has also been found, and is in the Guildhall Museum.

It has been generally believed that the Walbrook was at no time other than a very small stream. The following passage, then, by Sir William Tite (Antiquities found in the Royal Exchange) will perhaps be received with some surprise. The fact of this unexpected discovery seems to have been neglected or disbelieved, because recent antiquaries make no reference to it. Any statement, however, bearing the name of Sir William Tite deserves at least to be placed on record.

“With respect to the width of the Walbrook, the sewerage excavations in the streets called Tower-Royal and Little St. Thomas Apostle, and also in Cloak Lane, discovered the channel of the river to be 248 feet wide, filled with made-earth and mud, placed in horizontal layers, and containing a quantity of black timber of small scantling. The form of the banks was likewise perfectly to be traced, covered with rank grass and weeds. The digging varied from 18 feet 9 inches in depth, but the bottom of the Walbrook was of course never reached in those parts, as even in Princes Street it is upwards of 30 feet below the present surface. A record cited by Stow proves that this river was crossed by several stone bridges, for which especial keepers were appointed; as also that the parish of St. Stephen-upon-Walbrook ought of right to scour the course of the said brook. That the river was navigable up to the City wall on the north is said to have been confirmed by the finding of a keel and some other parts of a boat, afterwards carried away with the rubbish, in digging the foundations of a house at the south-east corner of Moorgate Street. But whether such a discovery were really made or not, the excavations referred to appear at least to remove all the improbability of the tradition that ‘when the Walbrook did lie open barges were rowed out of the Thames or towed up to Barge yard.’ As the Church of St. Stephen-upon-Walbrook was removed to the present site in the year 1429, it is probable that the river was ‘vaulted over with brick and paved level with the streets and lanes through which it passed’ about the same period; the continual accumulation of mud in the channel, and the value of the space which it occupied, then rapidly increasing, equally contributing to such an improvement.”

Whether Sir William’s inference is correct or no, the river in early times, like the Fleet, partook of the tidal nature of the Thames.

Attempts have been made to prove that a stream or a rivulet at some time flowed along Cheapside and fell into the Walbrook. It is by no means impossible that there were springs in this place, just as there is, or was, a spring under what is now the site of the Bank of England. The argument, or the suggestion, is as follows:—

Under the tower of St. Mary-le-Bow were found the walls and pavement of an ancient Roman building, together with a Roman causeway four feet in thickness. The land on the north side of London was all moorish, with frequent springs and ponds. The causeway may have been conducted over or beside such a moorish piece of ground. Of course, in speaking of Roman London we must put aside altogether West Chepe as a street or as a market. Now it is stated that in the year 1090, when the roof of Bow Church was blown off by a hurricane, the rafters, which were 26 feet long, penetrated more than 20 feet into the soft soil of Cheapside. The difficulty of believing this statement is very great. For if the soil was so soft it must have been little better than a quagmire, impossible for a foot-passenger to walk upon, and it would have been beyond the power of the time to build upon it. But if the rafters were hurled through the air for 400 feet or so, they might fall into the muddy banks of the Walbrook.14 A strange story is told by Maitland:—

“At Bread Street Corner, the North-east End, in 1595, one Thomas Tomlinson causing in the High Street of Cheap a Vault to be digged and made, there was found, at 15 feet deep, a fair Pavement, like that above Ground. And at the further End, at the Channel, was found a Tree, sawed into five Steps, which was to step over some Brook running out of the West, towards Walbrook. And upon the Edge of the said Brook, as it seemeth, there were found lying along the Bodies of two great Trees, the Ends whereof were then sawed off; and firm Timber, as at the first when they fell: Part of the said Trees remain yet in the Ground undigged. It was all forced Ground, until they went past the Trees aforesaid; which was about seventeen Feet deep, or better. Thus much hath the Ground of this City (in that Place) been raised from the Main.” (Maitland, vol. ii. pp. 826-827.)

It would seem as if at some remote period there had been at this spot either a marsh, or a pond, or a stream. If a stream, when was it diverted, and how? Or when did it dry up, and why? And did the stream, if there was one, run north, west, south, or east? There is no doubt that the ground has been raised some 18 feet since Roman times, for not only were the buildings under Bow Church at that depth, but opposite, under Honey Lane Market, Milk Street, and Mercers’ Hall, Roman remains have been found at the same depth.

In any case, West Chepe could not have come into existence as a market on the site of a running stream or on a quagmire, and the diversion or the digging up of the stream, if there was one, must have taken place before the settlement by the Saxons.

The Lea can hardly be considered as belonging to London. It is within the memory of men still living that suburbs of London have grown up upon its banks. But the marshes which still remain formed anciently an important defence of the City. They were as extensive, and, except in one or two places, without fords. The river which ran through them was broad and deep. It was probably in these marshes that the Roman legions on one occasion fell into difficulties. And except for the fords the Lea remained impassable for a long way north—nearly as far as Ware.

As regards the streams of the south, they have little bearing upon the history of the City. The essential point about the south was the vast extent of the marsh spread out before the newly founded town. Until the causeway from Stonegate Lambeth to the rising ground at Deptford was constructed these marshes were absolutely impassable. Four or five streams crossed them. The most westerly of these, the Wandle, discharges its waters opposite to Fulham; it is a considerable stream, and above Wandsworth is still dear to anglers. At its mouth a delta was formed exactly like that at Thorney; this was called afterwards Wandsworth Island. The Falcon Brook ran into the Thames above Battersea; it seems to have been an inconsiderable brook. No antiquary, so far as I know, has ever explored its course. The Effra is an interesting stream, because until quite recently—that is, within the last fifty years—it ran, an open, clear, and very beautiful brook, through the Dulwich Fields and down the Brixton Road past Kennington Church. In Rocque’s map it is made to rise about half a mile west of Dulwich College, near a spot called Island Green, which now appears as Knights’ Hill; but I am informed by a correspondent that this is wrong, and that it really rose in the hills of Norwood. It was a pretty stream flowing in front of cottages to which access was gained by little wooden bridges. The stream was overhung by laburnums, hawthorns, and chestnut trees. I myself remember seeing it as a boy in Dulwich Fields, but it was by that time already arched over lower down. There was a tradition that ships could formerly sail up the Effra as far as Kennington Church. It falls into the Thames nearly opposite Pimlico Pier. Had it kept its course without turning to the west it might have formed part of King Cnut’s trench, which would have accounted for the tradition of the ships. Another and a nameless stream is represented on old maps as flowing through the marsh into the Thames opposite the Isle of Dogs. The most easterly stream is the Ravensbourne, which at its mouth becomes Deptford Creek. This, like the Wandle and the Lea, was higher up a beautiful stream with many smaller affluents.

As for the land north and south of this marsh, it rises out of the marsh as a low cliff from twenty to forty feet high. On the south side this cliff is a mile, two miles, and even three miles from the river. On the north side, while there are very extensive marshes where now are Fulham, South and West Kensington, the Isle of Dogs, and the Valley of the Lea, further eastward the cliff approaches the river, touches it and overhangs it at one point near Dowgate, and runs close beside it as far as Charing Cross, whence it continues in a westerly direction, while the river turns south.

Behind the cliff on the south rose in long lines, one behind the other, a range of gentle hills. They were covered with wood. Between them, on high plateaux, extended heaths of great beauty clothed with gorse, heather and broom, bramble and wild flowers.

On the north the ground also rose beyond the first ridge of cliff, but slowly, till it met the range of hills now known as Hampstead and Highgate. All the ground was moorland waste and forest, intersected with rivulets, covered with dark ponds and quagmires: a country dangerous at all times, and sometimes quite impassable. On the northern part was the great forest called afterwards the Middlesex Forest.

Such in prehistoric days was the site of London. A more unpromising place for the situation of a great city can hardly be imagined. Marsh in front, and moor behind; marsh to right, and marsh to left; barren heath on the south to balance waste moorland on the north. A river filled with fish; islets covered with wild birds; a forest containing wild cattle, bear, and wolf; but of arable land, not an acre. A town does not live by hunting; it cannot live upon game alone; and yet on this forbidding spot was London founded; and, in spite of these unpromising conditions, London prospered.

CHAPTER III
THE EARLIEST INHABITANTS

Who were the earliest settlers and inhabitants of London?

Those who have seen the lake-dwellings of Glastonbury—to take a familiar illustration—and have considered the conditions necessary to such a colony, will come to the conclusion that there, at all events, lake-dwellers would find everything that Nature could give them. Thus, at Glastonbury the huts of the inhabitants were planted on wooden foundations in a marshy place, covered with water at high tide, perhaps at low tide as well. There was land within reach where the people could keep cattle, or could plough and sow and reap. That they did keep cattle and grow corn there is evidence in the things found beside and around the huts. Again, at Glastonbury there were many islets and a large extent of low-lying ground which were the homes and the resting-places of countless wild birds. And at Glastonbury the people were on a creek of the sea, and, by rowing a mile or two down the creek they could find themselves in deep water abounding with fish. All these conditions were also present at London: a deep and broad stream containing fish in abundance; an extensive marsh covered with islets where were wild birds in multitudes; and raised lands, such as that lying between Ludgate Hill and Charing Cross, which might be used for pasture or for tillage. If any remains of lake-dwellings were ever found among the marshes and shallow backwaters of London, it must have been long before such things were understood, so that they were swept away without so much as a record of their existence. It is not certain that there were such settlements here. If vestiges of them had ever been found among the marshes and tidal lagoons of the Essex coast, it would strengthen the theory that this prehistoric people had villages here. I believe, however, that no such remains have been found in Essex. My theory wants confirmation. I cannot prove, though I believe, that lake-dwellings were the first settlements on the London marshes: that the people drove piles into the mud and laid beams across—there was plenty of wood either on the Surrey hills or on the northern heights; that they made a floor or foundation of clay; that they carried uprights round the circular foundation; that they made their cottages wind and rain proof, with wattle and daub at the sides, and thatch for the roof; that every house had its boat, its net, its slings; that they grew corn on the land around; that they had flocks and herds; that they lived in such comfort as they knew or desired.

Whence they came, how long they stayed, why they departed or disappeared, I know not.

What I surmise, however, is theory. Whether it is true or not matters little; what happened next is more certain.

If you consider the site of London once more you will realise—I have already called attention to the point—that the cliff on the north side closes in and overhangs the river in two little hillocks beside the Walbrook. Between the feet of the two hills there is no marsh; the stream running down between the hills forms a natural port; either hillock is fit for the construction of a fort, such as forts were then. Hunters in the forest discovered these two hill-tops, with the moorland and the woods behind, and the river and the marsh in front. They came; they built their fort, protected partly by the steeply sloping sides to south and east, partly by stockade and trench; and they called the place Llyn Din, the Lake-Fortress. Why they came, when they came, how they dispossessed the lake-dwellers, against what real or imaginary foe they constructed their fort, I know not.

Nor do I know how long the people continued to occupy peacefully the fortress they had constructed. It may have been a period of many hundreds of years. The fort may have been besieged and taken a hundred times. Meantime there began, either before or after the construction of this fort or settlement of Llyn Din, some communication between the people of the island and those of the Continent. Trade was opened up; the islanders learned that there were many things which they could exchange and sell. There were Phoenicians who came for tin; there were Germans and Gauls who came for iron, skins, and slaves.

Trade began, but not yet in London, where the fisherman’s coracle was the only boat upon the river, and the cry of the wild duck, the song of the lark, and the swish of the water or the whistle of the wind among the reeds were the only sounds.

Higher up the Thames, as we know, there was an island, named, long afterwards, Thorney. It was a very large island, considering its position, being about a quarter of a mile in length and rather less in breadth. On the west side of this island was a branch of the great marsh already described; on the east side the river was broad and shallow and could be forded at low water, the ford conducting the traveller to another low island, afterwards called Lamb Hythe, probably meaning the Place of Mud. This was the lowest ford on the river, and the most convenient for those desirous of passing from Dover or the districts of Kent and Surrey to the north, or from the north and midland to Dover, then the principal, perhaps—unless Southampton had been founded already—the only trading port. So that the great highway which ran right through the country from Dover to Chester, with branches or affluents on either side, crossed the Thames at this point, passing straight through the marsh and ford. In other words, before the Port of London came into existence at all, Thorney was a stage or station on the highway up and down which flowed the whole trade of the island. Again, in other words, while London was as yet only a rude hill fortress, perhaps while it was only a village of lake-dwellers in the marsh, perhaps before it came into existence at all, Thorney was a place thronged with those who daily went across the ford and marsh, a busy and a populous place. This statement may not be readily accepted. Let us therefore examine more closely into the reasons which support it.

ArchÆological conclusions of every kind rest upon evidences which may be classified under five heads: (1) the evidence of situation; (2) the evidence of excavation; (3) the evidence of ancient monuments; (4) the evidence of tradition; and (5) the evidence of history, to which may be added the evidence of coins.

1. The Evidence of Situation.—This we have seen already. Thorney was a stepping-stone lying between a marsh and a tidal river fordable at low tide. It was on the great highway of trade from the north to the south. At high tide the marsh was covered with water and extended from the site of the future Abbey to the site of the future Buckingham Palace; it covered the sites of St. James’s Park, Tothill Fields, the Five Fields, part of Chelsea, Earl’s Court, and Victoria. At low tide it was a broad expanse of mud, relieved by patches of sedge and rush. One could wade across the marsh either at high or low tide. The way was marked by stakes, and by large stones laid in the mud. On the other side, the river, here much broader than below, was fordable at low water. The way, also marked by stakes, conducted the traveller from Thorney to Lamb Hythe, afterwards called Lambeth.

2. Evidence of Excavation.—Excavation has shown, what nothing else could have disclosed, the presence on this spot of the Romans. In 1869, a date at which the Roman occupation of Thorney had not been surmised, a very fine sarcophagus was found in the nave of the Abbey with the name of Valerius Amandinus upon it. A cross is cut upon the cover, so that the occupant—perhaps not the first—was a Christian. Probably he was a Christian of the third or fourth century. The sarcophagus is now placed at the entrance of the Chapter-House (see p. 67). Ten years ago another discovery was made: in digging a grave under the pavement of the nave a fine mosaic pavement was discovered. There was therefore a Roman villa on this spot. And during the last few years, which have witnessed a great deal of digging at Thorney, Roman fragments have been found in great quantities. There was therefore, most certainly, a Roman settlement upon this island.

3. Evidence of Ancient Monuments.—The evidence of monuments is simply this. The great high road through the Midlands to Chester and to York, found here as a beaten track by the Romans, converted by them into a Roman road after the customary fashion, named afterwards by the Saxons Watling Street, ran formerly straight along what is now the Edgware Road; when it reached the spot now covered by the Marble Arch it continued down Park Lane, or, as it was once called, Tyburn Lane, till it reached the end of the marsh already described. There it broke off abruptly. At this point the traveller began to wade through the marsh. Arrived at Thorney, he made of it a resting-place for the night. In the morning, when he proceeded with his journey, he forded the river at low tide, and presently found himself once more upon a solid road, the memory of which is still preserved in Stangate Street, Lambeth.

4. We have next the Evidence of Tradition.—According to this authority we learn that the first Christian king was one Lucius, who in the year 178 addressed a letter to the then Pope, Eleutherius, begging for missionaries to instruct his people and himself in the Christian faith. The Pope sent two priests named Ffagan and Dyfan, who converted the whole island. Bede tells this story; the old Welsh chroniclers also tell it, giving the British name of the king, Lleurwg ap Coel ap Cyllin. He it was who erected a church on the Isle of Thorney, in place of a temple of Apollo formerly standing there. We are reminded, when we read this story, that St. Paul’s Cathedral was said to have been built on the site of a temple of Diana.

This church, it is said, continued in prosperity until the arrival, two hundred and fifty years later, of the murderous Saxon. First, news came up the river that the invader was on the Isle of Rum, which we call Thanet; next, that he held the river on both banks; then that he had overrun Essex, that he had overrun Kent. And when that happened the procession of merchandise stopped suddenly, for the ports of Kent were in the hands of the enemy. There was no more traffic on Watling Street. The travellers grew fewer daily, till one day a troop of wild Saxons came across the ford, surprised the priests and the fisher-folk who still remained, and left the island as desolate and silent as could be desired for the meditation of holy men. This done, the Saxons went on their way. They overran the midland country; they drove the Britons back—still farther back—till they reached the mountains. No more news came to Thorney, for, though the ford continued, the island, like so many of the Roman stations, remained waste.

In fulness of time the Saxon himself settled down, became a man of peace, obeyed the order of the convert king to be baptized and to enter the Christian faith; and when King Sebert had been persuaded to build a church to St. Paul on the highest ground of London, he was further convinced that it was his duty to restore the ruined church of St. Peter on the Isle of Thorney beside the ford. Scandal, indeed, would it be for the throng that once more daily passed through the ford and over the island to see, in a Christian country, the neglected ruins of a Christian church. Accordingly the builders soon set to work, and before long the church rose tall and stately. The Miracle of the Hallowing, often told, may be repeated here. On the eve of the day fixed by the Bishop of London for the hallowing and dedication of the new St. Peter’s, one Edric, a fisherman, who lived in Thorney, was awakened by a loud voice calling him by name. It was midnight. He arose and went forth. The voice called him again from the opposite side of the river, which is now Lambeth, bidding him put out his boat to ferry a man across the river. He obeyed. He found on the shore a venerable person whose face and habiliments he knew not. The stranger bore in his hands certain vessels which, as Edric perceived, could only be intended for church purposes. However, he said nothing, but received this mysterious visitor into his boat and rowed him across the river. Arrived in Thorney, the stranger directed his steps to the church and entered the portal. Straightway—lo! a marvel—the church was lit up as by a thousand wax tapers, and voices arose chanting psalms—sweet voices such as no man had ever heard before. He stood and listened. The voices, he understood, could be none other than those of angels come down from heaven itself to sing the first service in the new church. Then the voices fell, and he heard one voice loud and solemn; and then the heavenly choir uplifted their voices again. Presently all was still: the service was over; the lights went out as suddenly as they had appeared; and the stranger came forth.

“Know, O Edric,” he said, while the fisherman’s heart glowed within him, “know that I am Peter. I have hallowed the church myself. To-morrow I charge thee that thou tell these things to the Bishop, who will find in the church a sign and a token of my hallowing. And for another token, put forth again upon the river, cast thy nets, and thou shalt receive so great a draught of fishes that there will be no doubt left in thy mind. But give one-tenth to this my holy church.”

So he vanished, and the fisherman was left alone upon the river bank; but he put forth as he was directed, and cast his net, and presently brought ashore a miraculous draught.

In the morning the Bishop with his clergy, and the King with his following, came up from London in their ships to hallow the church. They were received by Edric, who told them this strange story. And within the church the Bishop found the lingering fragrance of incense far more precious than any that he could offer; on the altar were the drippings of wax candles (long preserved as holy relics, being none other than the wax candles of heaven), and written in the dust certain words in the Greek character. He doubted no longer. He proclaimed the joyous news. He held a service of thanksgiving instead of a hallowing. Who would not hold a service of praise and humble gratitude for such a mark of heavenly favour? And after service they returned to London and held a banquet, with Edric’s finest salmon lying on a lordly dish in the midst.

How it was that Peter, who came from heaven direct, could not cross the river except in a boat was never explained or asked. Perhaps we have here a little confusion between Rome and Heaven. Dover Street, we know, broke off at the edge of the marsh, and Dover Street led to Dover, and Dover to Rome.

5. We are now prepared for the Evidence of History, which is not perhaps so interesting as that of tradition. Clio, it must be confessed, is sometimes dull. One misses the imagination and the daring flights of her sister, the tenth Muse—the Muse of Fiction. The earliest document which refers to the Abbey is a conveyance by Offa, King of Mercia, of a manor called Aldenham to “St. Peter and the people of the Lord dwelling in Thorney, that ‘terrible’—i.e. sacred—place which is at Westminster.” The date of this ancient document is A.D. 785; but Bede, who died in 736, does not mention the foundation. Either, therefore, Bede passed it over purposely, or it was not thought of importance enough to be mentioned. He does relate the building of St. Paul’s; but, on the other hand, he does not mention the hundreds of churches which sprang up all over the country. So that we need not attach any importance to the omission. My own opinion is that the church—a rude country church, perhaps—a building like that of Greenstead, Essex, the walls of split trees and the roof of rushes, was restored early in the seventh century, and that it did succeed an earlier church still. The tradition connected with this church is as ancient as anything we know about it, and the legend of Lucius and his church is at least supported by the recent discoveries of Roman remains and the certainty that the place was always of the greatest importance.

There is another argument—or an illustration—in favour of the antiquity of some church, rude or not, upon this place. I advance it as an illustration, though to myself it appears to be an argument. I mean the long list of relics possessed by the Abbey at the Dedication of the year 1065. We are not concerned with the question whether the relics were genuine or not, but merely with the fact that they were preserved by the monks as having been the gifts of various benefactors—Sebert, Offa, Athelstan, Edgar, Ethelred, Cnut, Queen Emma, and Edward himself. A church of small importance and of recent building would not dare to parade such pretensions. It takes time even for pretences to gain credence and for legends to grow. The relics ascribed to Sebert and Offa could easily have been carried away on occasion of attack. As for the nature of these sacred fragments, it is pleasant to read of sand and earth brought from Mount Sinai and Olivet; of the beam which supported the holy manger; of a piece of the holy manger; of frankincense presented by the Magi; of the seat on which our Lord was presented at the Temple; of portions of the holy cross presented by four kings at different times; of bones and vestments belonging to Apostles and Martyrs and the Virgin Mary, and saints without number, whose very names are now forgotten. In the cathedral of Aix-la-Chapelle you may see just such a collection as that which the monks of St. Peter displayed before the reverent and uncritical eyes of the Confessor. We may remember that in the ninth and tenth centuries the rage for pilgrimising extended over the whole of Western Europe; pilgrims crowded every road, they marched in armies, and they returned laden with treasures—water from the Jordan, sand from Sinai, clods of earth from Gethsemane, and bones and bits of sacred wood without number. When Peter the Hermit arose to preach, it was but putting a match to a pile ready to be fired. But for such a list as that preserved by history, there was need of time as well as of credulity.

Roman Britain, we have said, was Christian for at least a hundred and fifty years. Therefore it would be nothing out of the way or unusual to find monastic buildings on Thorney in the fourth century. There was as yet no Benedictine Rule. St. Martin of Tours introduced the Egyptian Rule into Gaul—whence it was taken over to England and to Ireland. It was a simple Rule, resembling that of the Essenes. No one had any property; all things were in common; the only art allowed to be practised was that of writing. The older monks devoted their whole time to prayer; they took their meals together—bread and herbs with salt—and, except for common prayer and common meals, they rarely left their cells; these were at first simple huts constructed of clay and bunches of reeds; their churches were of wood; they shaved their heads to the line of the ears; they wore leather jerkins, probably because these lasted longer than cloth of any kind; many of them wore hair shirts. The wooden church became a stone church; the huts became cells built about a cloister; next, the cells themselves were abolished, and a common dormitory was substituted.

All this evidence very clearly, in my opinion, points to the main fact that Thorney was occupied by the Romans because it was a busy and crowded station on the high road of British trade.

I have dwelt at some length upon this subject, because the theory of the earlier antiquity of a town at Thorney, if it can be proved, brings the foundation of London to a comparatively recent period, though it still leaves us in the dark as to the date.

We have various records as to this trade. We need not suppose that Himilco visited and described the island, but we must not hastily reject the evidence of Pytheas, whose travels took place about the middle of the fourth century B.C. Pytheas coasted round Gaul, landed on the shores of Brittany, and worked up the Channel till he came to a place called “Cantion,” which is perhaps Dover, and perhaps the North Foreland. Here he landed, and here he stayed for some time, namely, during the whole of the summer. He found that a great deal of wheat was raised in the fields; that it was threshed in covered barns instead of unroofed floors as in the south of France; that the climate was cloudy and wet; that the longest day was nineteen hours, and that on the shortest day the sun does not rise more than three cubits above the horizon; that there were cultivated fruits, a great abundance of some domestic animals and a scarcity of others; that the people fed on millet, vegetables, roots, and fruit; and that they made a drink of honey and wheat—a kind of beer.

The next traveller in Britain of whom an account remains was Posidonius, about a hundred years before Christ. He described the tin mines in Cornwall. He says that the tin is made up into slabs shaped like knuckle-bones, and carried to an island named Ictis, “lying in front of Britain”—another account makes this island six days’ sail from Cornwall. The channel between Ictis and Britain was dry at low tide, when the tin was carried over. It was then taken across to Gaul, and carried across the country by thirty days’ journey to Marseilles. The estuary between Thanet and Kent, now silted up, was formerly open for ships at high tide, and fordable at low tide.

The following is the account given by Avienus, a writer of the fourth century (quoted in Charles I. Elton’sOrigins of English History):—

“Beneath this promontory spreads the vast Œstrymnian gulf, in which rise out of the sea the islands Œstrymnides, scattered with wide intervals, rich in metal of tin and lead. The people are proud, clever, and active, and all engaged in incessant cares of commerce. They furrow the wide rough strait, and the ocean abounding in sea-monsters, with a new species of boat. For they know not how to frame keels with pine or maple, as others use, nor to construct their curved barks with fir; but, strange to tell, they always equip their vessels with skins joined together, and often traverse the salt sea in a hide of leather. It is two days’ sail from hence to the Sacred Island, as the ancients called it, which spreads a wide space of turf in the midst of the waters, and is inhabited by the Hibernian people. Near to this again is the broad island of Albion.”

Elton quotes Posidonius on the trade in tin. The merchants, he says, buy the tin from the natives, and carry it over to Gaul.

Here, then, we have proof of an ancient and extensive trade in tin, and of a certain stage in civilisation.

There is, however, more.

In the second century B.C. the people had towns, which were stockaded forts, and villages. They lived in beehive huts, built with wood and wattle, having roofs of fern and thatch. They were skilled in some of the arts. They could make cloth and linen for summer and for winter use; they could dye these materials various colours. They could work in gold, and wore collars, bracelets, and rings of gold. They dyed their hair red. They wore a cuirass of plaited leather or chain mail; for arms they carried sword, pike, bow and arrow, and the sling. They also had scythed war-chariots. Their weapons were of steel, they could therefore work in iron; they used a wheeled plough.

Fifty years before the Roman invasion the King of Soissons, Divitiacus, had made a partial conquest of South Britain, but for generations before this there had been immigration into the island from Belgium and settlements had been made along the coast and the rivers.

The internal and external trade of the country is proved by the evidence of coins.

Where there is a coinage there is trade. That is to say, trade may be carried on without a coinage, but the existence of a coinage is a proof that the art of trading is understood, and has long been carried on. Now the people of this island had their own coinage before Julius CÆsar landed. How long before is quite uncertain. Some of their ancient coins are believed to be of the second century B.C. These are supposed to have been modelled on the coins of the Greeks of the age of Philip of Macedon, but taken from Gaulish patterns. At the same time, some of the coins have the appearance of being “centuries older than CÆsar’s first expedition” (Monumenta Historica Britannica, Introd. 151). In either case they are a proof of long-standing trade, and may have been of very remote antiquity. That the trade was internal is proved by the fact that ancient British coins belonging to the south of the country have been found in the north.

We may, therefore, safely conclude that all these facts point to the existence of a large trade between the island and the Continent. It was not out of charity that the tin mines were worked, and the tin sent to Thanet for exportation.

If now we consider the Roman highways, which were certainly based on the more ancient tracks, we shall find, not only that five of them converge on London, but also that London, considering the vast forests as well as the course of the rivers and the conformation of the coast, was actually the true centre for the reception and distribution of imports, and for the reception and forwarding of exports. And we may further conclude that since Pytheas and Posidonius were evidently received with hospitality and travelled about everywhere without fear of violence, the people of the island were accustomed to visits of foreigners who came to trade. In a word, it is impossible to say when trade first began between Britain and the Continent; impossible to estimate its extent; and impossible to ascertain when the principal centre of trade was found to be most conveniently placed at or near the site of London.

When first we hear of London at all we learn several very suggestive facts. First, that the City was already the resort of merchants; next, that there was a close connection with, and a great intercourse between, Gallia and Britannia; thirdly, that the people of the south, at least, possessed the same arts, the same civilisation, as the Gauls. And the latter had already arrived at that stage when certain things, impossible to be grown or produced on their own soil, had ceased to be luxuries, and had become necessaries. Again, we learn shortly afterwards that the island was thickly populated. Queen Boadicea’s army, raised wholly in the eastern counties, contained many thousands; so many that the scattered bands of her army were able to destroy a great number—history loosely says 70,000, which we may take to stand for a great number—of the inhabitants of Verulam, London, and Camulodunum. Again, another point, never yet considered in this connection, seems also to indicate dense population. All the way from London down to the Nore, round a large part of the coast of Essex, and along the coast of Lincolnshire where the foreshore is a marsh, there runs a great and magnificent embankment. It is not, so far as can be judged, Roman; that is to say, it has none of the Roman characteristics: it is a great solid wall of earth faced with stone which has stood for ages, only giving way at points here and there, as at Barking in the reign of King Stephen, and at Dagenham in the reign of Queen Anne. Now, in order to construct such a work two things are necessary: there must be abundance of labour, also new ground for cultivation must be in demand. Both these requisites point to a large population. Given a large population; given also a demand for foreign commodities among the wealthier class; given, further, the production of goods wanted abroad—slaves, metals, skins, wool—we can have no doubt that the trade of Britain, the northern and midland part of which passed over Thorney, was continuous and very considerable.

In other words, this islet in the midst of marsh and ford, which we have been always assured was in early times a wild and desolate spot; chosen, we are also told, as the site of a monastery on account of its seclusion and remoteness; was, long before any monastery was built there, the scene of a continuous procession of those who journeyed south and those who journeyed north. It was a halting and a resting place for a stream of travellers which flowed continuously all the year round. By way of Thorney passed the merchants, with the wares which they were going to embark at Dover bestowed upon pack-horses. By way of Thorney they drove the long strings of slaves to be sold in Gaul and perhaps carried into Italy. By way of Thorney passed the caravans for the north. Always, day after day, even night after night, there was the clamour of those who came and of those who went: such a clamour as used to belong, for instance, to the courtyard of an old-fashioned inn, in and out of which lumbered the loaded waggon grinding heavily over the stones, the stage-coach, the post-chaise, the merchant rider on his nag—all with noise. The Isle of Thorney was like that courtyard: it was a great inn, a halting-place, a bustling, noisy, frequented place, the centre, and, before the rise of London, the heart of Britain. No quiet, desolate place, but the actual living centre of the traffic of the whole island. Not a fortress or a place of strategic importance, but, as regards the permanent population, a gathering of people drawn together in order to provide for the wants of travellers—a collection of inns and taverns.

Thus far we have got. In very early times London was a settlement of lake-dwellers, then it became a British fortress. Meantime, communications were established with Gaul by way of Dover, trade began; the natural highway for trade from the midland and the north was by way of the most easterly ford over the Thames, therefore Thorney became a busy and important place, as lying on the trade route of London.

At some time or other merchants found out that London was a much more convenient and more central place than Dover. The voyage was along the Kentish coast, for a few miles beyond Dover, and passed by the strait which parted Thanet from the mainland into the estuary of the Thames, whence it was safe and easy sailing up the stream to the new trading port of the lake-fortress.

The next development, naturally, was the diversion of a large part of the trade from Thorney to London. This diversion took place at the spot we now call Marble Arch, where the course of the highway was abandoned, and a new road traced along what is now Oxford Street and Holborn into the City of London. And thus, gradually, the importance of Thorney dwindled away. That it remained the stepping-stone for a large part of the trade till the building of London Bridge there can be no reason to doubt. Perhaps a considerable part of the trade would have been carried by the old way still but for the embankment of the river, which destroyed the ford. There remained the Ferry, which continued until the middle of the last century. A good deal of trade, no doubt, still crossed by the Ferry, but when London Bridge was built, and the shipping lay in the river for the reception of the merchandise, the route to Dover became gradually abandoned. This we may readily believe would be some time in the fourth century.

It has been said that no dates can be ascertained which will guide us in assigning any period to these events. There is, however, one fact which gives a negative evidence: when Pytheas made his famous voyage to Britain he does not seem to have seen London. He says nothing about it. It seems from his account that trade with Gaul had not yet assumed considerable proportions; that with the Phoenician ships for tin was confined to the south-western district, and London, which has never been anything but a place of trade, was not even mentioned to this traveller. Perhaps—but I do not think that this was so—London did not yet exist.

Who were the people that built this fortress over the lake and received the merchants? They were Celts, and the name that they gave to their citadel, Llyn Din, is Celtic. Their manners and customs are as well known as those of any ancient people; their religion is described at length by many historians; they had poets, musicians, and priests. They wore on occasion robes embroidered with gold; they had copied the civilisation of their neighbours the Gauls. The evidence of the barrows in which the dead were buried shows a great variety of implements and the knowledge of some arts. Their weapons were mostly of bronze; their swords were of the “leaf” shape; the spear-heads were of bronze, and their long knives also of bronze. They carried shields of bronze. They wore neither helmet nor cuirass; round the neck they placed an iron collar and round the body an iron belt. They had stone clubs and flint-headed arrows; they had bronze trumpets; they knew how to coin money; they practised the art of pottery, making very good vases and pots; and they made, and used, the terrible war-chariot—a piece of one was discovered some time ago in Somersetshire.

Again, it is necessary to clear up our ideas concerning the early trade of London. When we speak on the subject, we are naturally inclined to think of a mediÆval town settled with government residents, a better class, market-places, trade regulations, and all the accessories of a late period. Let us, therefore, with a view to this clearance of understanding, consider the conditions of trade in the centuries—I repeat that I do not consider that the coming of the Romans had anything to do with the foundation of London—before the Roman period.

I. The first trading port of the Thames, as we have seen, was that of Thorney Island—a small place at best, and incapable of enlargement on account of the marsh-land all round it in every direction except the south.

II. The discovery of London—with its high ground overhanging the river, its port of the outflow of the Walbrook, its greater safety, its ease of access by sea and river—diverted much of the trade from Thorney, and gradually all the trade.

III. It is impossible to assign any date for this diversion: only one point is certain, that some importance was attached to Thorney as a trading centre in Roman times, because the islet is full of Roman remains.

IV. We take up the story, therefore, at some indefinite period which began as long before the arrival of the Romans as the reader pleases to assume, and continued until after the massacre by Boadicea’s insurgents.

The first and most important condition to be observed is that the trade of London could only be carried on during the summer months. It was only in the summer that the ships ventured to cross the Channel; crept along the coast of Kent, and passed through the channel between Thanet and the mainland into the river. During the winter months the sailing of the ships was entirely stopped; the ocean was deserted. This condition was observed for many centuries afterwards: no ships ventured to put out for six months at least in the year; even the pirates of the North Sea hauled up their vessels, and when the Danes came, they remained for six months every year in their winter quarters.

It was also only in the summer that inland trade could be carried on. During the winter intercommunications were most difficult, and in many places impossible; towns were isolated and had to depend on their own resources; village was separated from village by fenland, moorland, forest, and trackless marsh: there could be no transport of goods; there were no markets.

The main limitation, therefore, of early trade was that it had to be carried on during the summer months alone: allowing for the time taken up by the voyage to and from the port at either end, the foreign trade on which the inland trade depended was of necessity confined to a few weeks.

What does this mean? That the exports had to be brought to the Port by a certain time: they came on the backs of slaves or by pack-horses. The imports had to be carried into the country for sale and distribution as a return journey by the same slaves and pack-horses. The goods were brought from the country down to the quays, which were rough and rude constructions on piles and baulks of timber on either side of the mouth of the Walbrook, and were there exchanged for the imports. The ships discharged one cargo, then took in another, and sailed away. Nothing was left over; there was no overlapping of one year with another; there was no storage of goods over the winter. When the ships were gone and the caravans had started on their journey through the country, there was nothing more to be done at the Port till the next season. London might fall asleep, if there were any London.

In other words, the trade of London at this period was nothing more than an annual Fair held in the months of July and August, frequented by the foreign merchants bringing their imports and carrying off the exports in their vessels, and by the traders, who led their long processions of pack-horses and slaves from the country to the port, arriving at the time when the ships were due; they exchanged what they brought for the goods that came in the ships, and then went away again. Where they spent the winter it is impossible to say. It is, however, quite certain that they came to London in the summer from north, east, south, and west; that they could not come at any other time. These considerations enable us to understand that London was crowded every summer during the few weeks of trade, but that in winter there was no trade, no communication with any other place, and no communication with abroad. Were there no merchants who stored goods and kept them over who lived in London permanently? None. As yet, none.

The place was, in fact, exactly like Sturbridge beside Cambridge. During the annual Fair in summer Sturbridge was a considerable town; trading of all kinds and from all countries crowded to the place; the shops and booths were arranged in streets; these streets were filled with traders and private persons who came from all parts of the country to the Fair. When the Fair was over the traders disappeared, the booths were swept away, the place became a large common, empty and deserted till the next season.

This was the case with London. The trading season was in July and August, as I read the story: during these months the high ground either on the east or the west of Walbrook was covered with shops and booths made of wattle and clay. When the Fair was over the temporary structures were taken down, or perhaps left to be repaired in the following season; the conflux of people vanished, and there was no Port of London for another year. London had no importance at all except during the short season of the Fair. Nor were there any residents of importance. There were left none others than the humble folk who fished in the river, trapped the birds of the marsh, hunted in the forests, and worked for the ships while they were in the Port.

I think that the annual Fair was held on the west side of Walbrook, for the simple reason that the Romans, when they built their citadel, chose the eastern side—that is to say, they took the eastern hill because they were unwilling to interfere with the trade of the place, which was mainly carried on upon the western hill. There was no bridge as yet—otherwise there could have been no massacre by the offended Queen (see p. 59). As to the time when trade became large, and so continuous as to demand the erection of warehouses and the creation of a body of wholesale merchants, I am not able to offer even an approximate opinion. My conclusions belong to an earlier time, yet partly a Roman time, when London represented nothing but an annual Fair, while there were no public buildings, no municipal institutions, no officers or rulers, except the temporary administrators of a temporary exhibition. And, as at a Fair, when it was over nothing was left in store or warehouse for the next year. The ships left their imports behind them, and brought back exports with them.

It would be interesting to inquire into the continuance of the summer trade and the slackness of the winter long after the character of the annual Fair had left London. Galleys came, we know, from Venice and Genoa every summer; ships laden with wine came every summer from Bordeaux; ships of the Hanseatic League put out and came into port every summer from north Europe and the Baltic. What was done in the twelfth century, for example, during the winter? What amount of trade could have been carried over roads which for two-thirds of the year were practically impassable?

The theory of the Fair explains why CÆsar made no mention of London, and why the Romans at first placed no permanent garrison in the place: they saw it crowded for a few weeks, and then deserted and of no account. The massacre of Boadicea first awakened them to a sense of its strategic as well as its commercial importance. When they built their citadel and their bridge it was not only to defend the trade of a few weeks and the scanty population of fisher-folk, but also to seize and to occupy a stronghold of capital importance as a great military as well as a great commercial centre. It also explains why no remains of pre-Roman buildings have been found on the site of London. Because there were none. The copia mercatorum came, stayed a few weeks or days, and went away. They found inns and booths for their accommodation; when they left, the inns and booths were closed, or left to fall to pieces, for another twelve months.

In the course of time, when the bulk of trade increased and goods of all kinds began to be stored in warehouses and kept over from year to year, the limits of the busy time were naturally extended. There was a great deal to be done in the way of warehousing, arrangement for the next summer, arrangement with retail merchants and the owners of caravans which went about the country. But there still remained the time—six or eight months—during which no ships arrived in port, and the roads of the country were impassable.

The warehousing, with the rise of a class of men who held the warehouses and became wholesale merchants, marks a period of extension and increase in the trade of the Port.

With the Romans came the time of good roads, warehouses, a settled and continuous trade, a class of wholesale merchants, quays of convenient size, new and artificial ports, and the residence for life of a wealthy and highly civilised community who built villas along the banks of the Walbrook, and imitated, though imperfectly, the arts and civilisation of Bordeaux, Marseilles, Treves, and even of Rome.

One point more may be noticed before we step into the open light of history. The position of London from the very first has been that of a town which has had to depend upon outside or distant places for her supplies. In front of her, on either side of her stretched marshes; behind her stretched moorland: she could grow nothing for her own people. Outside other towns lay farms, gardens, and pastures: outside London there was neither farm, nor garden, nor pasture; except the fish in the river and the fowl in the marsh-land, there was nothing. The merchant in the time of Agricola, as much as the merchant in the time of Victoria, lived upon food brought in by private enterprise.

The prehistoric monuments existing in and round London are two in number: they are the river embankment and the Hampstead barrow. The date of the embankment cannot be guessed: there is nothing at all to mark the time of its construction. For trade purposes an embankment must have been made as soon as trade in London began to develop. We shall see presently what happened on the north bank. But it was not enough to improve the river at London Port: it was necessary to reclaim the marsh-land all along the river north and south. The wall so built has often been repaired, but it is substantially the same as that originally constructed. Few know or consider the greatness of the work or the extent of ground it has converted from marsh-land into pasture. Those who wish to see it may walk along it from Barking to Tilbury, or from Tilbury to Southend.

The Hampstead barrow has been called Queen Boadicea’s grave. There is, however, nothing to lead to the belief that the British Queen lies buried here. In November 1894 the barrow was opened and carefully examined. Nothing was found in it—no weapons, no cups, no ornaments, no bones, no human dust; nothing but “pockets” of charcoal. There may have been interments in the barrow; the bodies may have been entirely destroyed so as to leave no trace behind: such things have been known; but they are not customary. Prof. Hales has suggested that the barrow is a simple boundary hillock, a position which he has defended with much learning. However, the question cannot be determined.

There is one name still surviving in London which may possibly belong to the London of pre-Roman times. The Welsh name for London is Caer Ludd—the City of Ludder Lud. Now Lludd among the Welsh was the same as Lir, an ocean-god (Charles Elton, Origins of English History). Can we see in the name Ludgate the survival of the name of a Celtic god to whom perhaps a temple stood on the hillock overlooking the Thames in the south and the Fleet in the west?