UNTIL the beginning of this century, I may almost say till the development of our railway system some fifty years ago, though London was continually spreading in all directions, its heart—the City—remained very much as Wren had left it. Here many a well-to-do trader was content to dwell in the substantial house in which his business was carried on, and to pray in the neighbouring parish church where his father had prayed before him. Now the church has, likely enough, disappeared, the monuments of his ancestors are bundled off no one knows where; perhaps the very street in which he lived is changed out of all power of recognition. In short, to meet our modern requirements, the City has become a mere mass of offices, warehouses, and gigantic railway-stations, whence issue each morning myriads of human beings who spend the day in struggling for wealth or a livelihood, and at night return to their homes, which are spread over an area some sixty miles in diameter, leaving the centre to be protected by a few porters and caretakers. The decrease in the resident population has now extended a considerable distance west.

To the observing eye, however, traces of a former state of things are still to be seen, not only in important buildings such as the City halls, the parish churches and the old merchants’ houses still existing; but in objects less conspicuous, for instance, the sculptured house and street signs which came into fashion after the Great Fire. These have no little artistic merit, and almost all are interesting from their associations. The greater part of my book is devoted to a careful description of such signs; not only the existing ones, but all of which I can find any mention. This description I have tried to make as complete as possible, and I have allowed myself some latitude, recording not only facts which appeared to me of interest concerning the particular house, court, or alley to which the sign belonged, but also its probable origin, and any story or legend that might be connected with it.

Sculptured signs are often heraldic, and from them the transition is natural to still existing crests and coats of arms carved on buildings in various parts of the town. A cognate subject is that of old dates and inscriptions, suggestive as they are of the former ownership of property, of changes in the names of streets, sometimes even giving us glimpses of family history; as in the inscription to Denzil Lord Holles.

My researches naturally led me into the Guildhall Museum, where the need of a suitable catalogue (soon, I hear, to be supplied), induced me to put together a few suggestive notes on the curiosities relating to London which there find a home. I have added a short account of some half dozen of the painted signs still existing in the Metropolis which seemed to have more than common interest.

I have already referred to the extraordinary decrease of City inhabitants. On the other hand, in outlying districts the converse process has taken place. The little towns and villages of three hundred years ago, then some distance from London, and numbering among their inhabitants people of high birth unconnected with trade, became by degrees half rural suburbs, where well-to-do citizens sought amusement and repose. Folks of this class have now gone further afield, and for many years the speculative builder has been at work, providing for a humbler and far more numerous population. The space is covered with miles upon miles of dull monotonous streets; pleasant gardens have disappeared, hills are levelled, valleys filled up, wells choked, the clear streams turned into sewers, nothing remaining to remind us of what has gone before except the names, and here and there an old house, a carving or inscription. The existence of a few of these mementoes has attracted me to Islington and Clerkenwell, and must be my excuse for describing in detail several of the spas and places of entertainment with which in the eighteenth century this region abounded. Thence I make my way back to the City, and while exploring the picturesque districts of Great St. Helen’s and Austin Friars, I give an account of two remarkable old City mansions lately destroyed, which may fairly claim a place; for one was distinguished by an elaborate coat of arms, and the other by an interesting date and initials. This latter was of no small architectural merit, while both were the homes of eminent citizens.

Perhaps I should add that the subject of sculptured signs has been briefly treated by me in the pages of the Antiquary, and that for the English Illustrated Magazine, of Christmas, 1891, I wrote and illustrated an article on old City mansions, including those which are here more completely described.

In the course of the text I have indicated sources of information, and have acknowledged help from several good friends. I wish here in an especial manner to thank Mr. Henry B. Wheatley, F.S.A. As I am indebted to him for an introduction to this volume, it would perhaps not be becoming to dwell over-much on the merits of his great work, ‘London Past and Present,’ based on Peter Cunningham’s Handbook; I find myself constantly referring to it, and always with advantage. Lord Tennyson has kindly allowed me to quote four lines dictated by his illustrious father, which have not before appeared in print.

The illustrations I venture to commend, for few of them are the work of my hand. They have at least one great merit, that of being scrupulously accurate.

Allusion is made in the text to Mr. Tarbolton’s valuable contribution. There is a fine drawing by Mr. F. E. Cox; while Mr. E. M. Cox contributes a whole series, the merits of which speak for themselves. The Three Kings, the Bell, and the Boar’s Head may be named as specimens. Mr. Fletcher did the charming little sketch of an inscription formerly over the entrance to Bagnigge Wells, with its grotesque head; and the editors of the Strand Magazine and the Builder have allowed me the use of blocks from their respective publications.

In conclusion, let me express a hope that the kind reader will not class this volume in the category of ‘books which are no books,’ as Charles Lamb puts it, or even as one ‘which no gentleman’s library should be without,’ but that he will find here some useful and curious information, put together in a form sufficiently agreeable to make him wish for more.