Excerpt from The City of London Within this area we shall discover many objects of surpassing interest a cathedral of world-wide fame whose golden cross, Shining in the sunlight, greets the wanderers as they return home sailing up the Thames; a fortress of great strength, each stone of which seems to tell some story connected with London and England's annals; many churches that proclaim the renown of a great architect; the Guildhall, the centre of the municipal life; the Exchange with its story Of successful commerce; great schools and monasteries; the halls of the City Gild to which London owed so much of its trade and com mercial prosperity; the Inns of Court, the houses of the lawyers. Moreover the names of the streets record the memories of the old City life, and are full of interest for observant and inquiring minds. In this City we will wander, and while we muse upon the past we will not forget the present and the future. The Londoner is the heir of the ages. His ancestors struggled hard for freedom and settled government. They had a keen sense of duty to the brethren Of their gilds, to their City, their Church, and God. Their keenness in trade, their vivacity, their indomitable determination to over come misfortunes, made their City what it is, the central feature of a world-wide Empire and those same qualities will enable the modern Londoner to maintain and uphold the heritage he has received from his forefathers, and preserve the glory that is London. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

Excerpt from Stories of the City of London: Retold for Youthful Readers Stories either has been or might be made the subject of a separate instructive volume; but elaborations of History, with all their wide spread ramifications, are only really acceptable to the mature and already well-informed reader. To the young there must ever be a gradual acquirement of all sorts of knowledge, and those histories which are most diffuse, and those biographies which are most ample, do not always make the deepest impression on youthful minds. Remembering this, my aim has been to retell these true stories graphically, yet succinctly. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

Excerpt from London City With this volume we begin what may be called the second part of the Survey. All that has preceded it has dealt with the history of London as a whole; now we turn to London in its topographical aspect and treat it street by street, with all the historical associations interwoven in a continuous narrative with a running commentary of the aspect of the streets as they were at the end of the nineteenth century, for the book is strictly a Survey of London up to the end of the nineteenth century. Sir Walter Besant himself wrote the greater part of the volume now issued, calling it "The Antiquities of the City," and it is exclusively confined to the City. For the topographical side of the great work, however, he employed assistants to collect material for him and to help him; for though, as he said, he had been walking about London for the last thirty years and found something fresh in it every day, he could not himself collect the mass of detail requisite for a fair presentation of the subject. In the present volume, therefore, embedded in his running commentary, will be found detailed accounts of the City Companies, the City churches and other buildings, which are not by his hand. A word as to the plan on which the volume is made may be helpful. In cases where the City halls are standing, accounts of the Companies they belong to are inserted there in the course of the perambulation; but where the Companies possess no halls, the matter concerning them is relegated to an Appendix. The churches, however, being peculiarly associated with the sites on which they are standing, or stood, are considered to be an integral part of the City associations, and churches, whether vanished or standing, are noted in course of perambulation. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

Excerpt from Liber Albus: The White Book To this transcript, in the moments of its pristine freshness, and amid the bloom perhaps of Mr. Robert Smith's popularity - who was very handsomely rewarded by the Court of Aldermen with a fee of thirty pounds - the name of Liber Albus, or 'White Book, ' was transferred from the old volume; and to this day the Liber Albus of John Carpenter is distinguished by the officials at Guildhall from its more modern and less sullied antitype as the Liber Niger, or 'Black Book.' In this copy, however, executed as it evidently was by scribes who knew little about Anglo-Norman, the errors of the original have been more than doubled in amount, and in no instance has a single omission in it been rectified, or difficulty noticed or elucidated. Of John Carpenter, Common Clerk, or Town Clerk, of the City of London, under whose auspices the Liber Albus was compiled, but few particulars are known; and of those few the majority have been but recently brought to light by the industrious research of Mr. Thomas Brewer; to the pages of whose ably-written Memoir of the Life and Times of John Carpenter (London, 1856), after borrowing therefrom the following facts, those who desire further information upon the subject must of necessity be referred. Carpenter was born probably about the close of the reign of Edward III., was brought up to the legal profession, and, after serving the City in an inferior capacity, in April 1417 was elected to the office of Common Clerk. His title of 'Secretary' to the City seems to have been peculiar to himself, and borne by no other civic dignitary either before his time or since. To his high credit, as being at once a man of integrity and distinguished for his ability and business habits, he was nominated one of the four executors of the will of Richard Whitington, the well-known hero of popular, but fabulous, narrative; and the original Ordinances of Whitington's Almshouses, still in the possession of the Mercers' Company, Mr. Brewer says, there is reason to believe were drawn up by his hand. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

Excerpt from The Soul of London: A Survey of a Modern City Similarly, in touching upon moral ideas, a book about places must be passionate in its attempt after truth Of rendering; it must be passionless in the deduc tions that it draws. It must let neither pity for the poor nor liking for established reputations and clean floors, warp its presentations where they bear, say, upon the Housing Question. Its business is to give a picture of the place as its author sees it; its reader must seek in other books, statistics, emotional views, or facts handy for political propaganda. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.