cent. From 1600 to 1700 children are born every week, and from 1000 to 1100 persons die during that time. The annual rate of mortality is about 2.2 per cent, that is, out of every 45 persons one dies in the course of the year- -a rate lower than that of any other large city in Europe, and to be ascribed to our superior sanitary regulations, in which, however, there is still much room for improvement. It has been ascertained that one in six of those who leave the world dies in one of the public institutions, a poor-house, hospital, asylum, or prison. The relief of the poor during a severe winter costs about £40,000 a-week.

HISTORICAL SUMMARY.

LONDON was a British settlement before the Romans came to the island, and its etymology is thought to be LLYN DYN, the city of the lake, transformed by the Roman conquerors into LONDINIUM. Cæsar, not foreseeing its future importance, has not mentioned it, though he arrived at the valley of the Thames, which he crossed at Oatlands. The first mention of London in a Roman writer occurs in Tacitus, who speaks of it as a place of great resort by merchants, although it had not attained the dignity of a colonia, which it did at a later date under the name of Augusta. Suetonius, who commanded the foreign troops, was obliged to abandon the place when Boadicea raised the standard of revolt (A.D. 62). Colchester and Verulam were both made Roman stations before Londinium, which it is believed was not occupied until 105 years after Cæsar's invasion, and not walled round until A.D. 306. The ancient wall commenced near the spot where the Tower now stands, and was carried by the Minories to Cripplegate, Newgate, and Ludgate, inclosing an area of rather more than 3 miles in circumference. On the wall, which was 22 feet in height, there stood 15 towers 40 feet high. It is conjectured that the prætorium and its adjuncts were on the site of the Poultry and Cornhill, and LONDON STONE, now in Cannon Street, is supposed to have been the central stone or milliarium from which distances were measured. A hundred years ago some towers of the Roman wall still existed, but now it has all disappeared with the exception of two or three fragments. The curious may still, however, gaze on a little of the work of those stern conquerors in Cripplegate Churchyard and at Barber-Surgeons' Hall, which was partly formed out of a bastion by Inigo Jones. The name of "London

Wall," a city street, perpetuates the site of another portion. Roman remains have frequently been discovered in laying the foundation of modern houses, and in the British Museum, the City of London Museum, Guildhall, the museum of the Society of Antiquaries, Somerset House, and in some private museums, they may still be seen. A hypocaust well and other Roman structures were come upon when the Coal Exchange in Lower Thames Street was built. The depth at which these and other remains have been found from the surface, from 11 to 20 feet, shews on what a mass of ruin and rubbish modern London stands.

Of Anglo-Saxon London we know very little. It was made the capital of the so-called kingdom of Essex in the sixth century, and in the next it became a bishop's see.

In 851 those restless robbers, the Danes, while on a second visit to the island, sailed up the Thames with 300 vessels, and burned London, as well as ravaged Canterbury. Although rebuilt by Alfred in 886, it was totally destroyed by an accidental fire seven years later. The Danes continued their attacks, until at last Canute established himself as king of England and made London his residence, it having been again rebuilt. Some names still exist to keep us in mind of the dominion of those fierce northmen. They had a church and burial-place where St. ClementDanes now stands; St. Olaf was one of their saints, and St. Olave's church in Southwark occupies the spot where the original edifice stood (the name Tooley Street is but a corruption of that of the saint); there are two other churches dedicated to the same saint in the city; again, St. Magnus was another of their saints, and his name still survives in connection with a church near London Bridge.

The time, however, came when the Danish power was put an end to by the Anglo-Saxons, whom in turn William the Conqueror subdued. Of him the great white Tower still speaks, and there are a few crypts of his time still existing, but buried under modern edifices.

It has been pointed out that three of the great landmarks of the present day stand on the sites where the original edifices were placed many hundred years since. St. Paul's minster, founded by the Cantian Ethelbert in 610; Westminster Abbey, commenced by Sebert on Thorny Island in 616; and the White Tower of the first William-the last in great part the very build

ing of the Conqueror. These all testify that modern London has not shifted its position like some cities that could be named ; it has only grown larger.

There are traces of ancient Roman Catholic establishments left in the names of several places, although the buildings themselves have long since disappeared, viz., Black-Friars, WhiteFriars, Crutched-Friars, Austin-Friars, the Minories, the Chartreuse (now the Charter-House), with various priories and nunneries. With the exception of Westminster Abbey, the Temple Church, and the church of St. Saviour (or Mary Overy), Southwark, there is nothing of ancient ecclesiastical architecture on a large scale now to be seen; still the chapel in the White Tower, the church of St. Bartholomew-the-great, Smithfield, and the crypt under St. Stephen's Chapel, Westminster, are well worth the notice of the man of taste. (See the chapter on churches.) Westminster Hall, Lambeth Palace, and Crosly Hall, Bishopsgate Street, lately restored, are examples of ancient royal, baronial, or domestic architecture.

Looking at an old map of London, prepared soon after Elizabeth began her reign, and at a time when there were about 145,000 inhabitants, we perceive the tower standing apart from the city on the east, Finsbury and Spitalfields on the north, with fields and trees; on the west beyond Temple Bar, there are various scattered hamlets, including St. Giles' and Charing, whilst Westminster is far away as a separate city. The Strand, the road connecting London and Westminster, has between it and the river, the houses and gardens of bishops and noblemen.

Previous to the census of 1801, we are left to conjecture what the population of London was at any given period. By Graunt it was estimated in 1661 to be 384,000, which number would be probably brought up to 460,000, by adding the population of Westminster, Lambeth, Stepney, and other neighbouring places. Gregory King, a careful writer, thought that the population of the city and the out parishes amounted in 1696 to 527,560. Between 1740 and 1750 the population is known to have decreased, and at no time during the first seventy or eighty years of the last century did it increase rapidly. Dr. Price calculated that in 1777 it was 543,420, but there is reason for supposing that this estimate was too little by 100,000.

It is amusing to find Sir William Petty, a clever man in his day, calculating in 1683 that the metropolis could not possibly

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increase any more after the year 1800, at which time it would contain 5,359,000 persons (in point of fact, there were about 830,000 people in it); but that if we were to suppose for a moment that the population would still extend after that date, it would amount in 1840 to 10,718,880 persons.

LOCAL DIVISIONS.

NORTH OF THE RIVER.

The nucleus of London is the City, bounded on the north and east by the borough of Finsbury, on the west by the city of Westminster, to which Marylebone adjoins on the north.

In the west there are the districts of Pimlico, Brompton, Chelsea, Kensington, Bayswater, and Notting Hill.

In the north-west, St. John's Wood, Portland Town, St. Pancras, Somer's Town, Camden Town, Kentish Town, Islington, Holloway, and Highbury, with Hampstead and Highgate on the hill behind.

In the north-east, Kingsland, Stoke Newington, Dalston, Hackney, and Clapton.

In the east, Bethnal Green, Whitechapel, Stepney, Limehouse, Poplar, Oldford, Boro', and Bromley.

SOUTH OF THE RIVER.

In the east Southwark, known as "The Boro'," including Bermondsey and Rotherhithe; population, 193,942.

In the west, Lambeth, with the adjacent districts of Kensington, Walworth, Newington, Wandsworth, and Camberwell; population, 386,027.

Several of these divisions must have a few words of further description. THE CITY will have a chapter to itself.

WESTMINSTER derives its name from the abbey minster, and was made a city in the reign of Henry VIII. In Domesday book, it is styled a village with fifty holders of land, and "pannage for a hundred hogs." In 1174, the royal palace stood about two miles westward from the City of London, with gardens and orchards between. In 1560, an old plan shews that a double line of buildings connected London and Westminster,

whilst a town had grown up around the hall and abbey. The present city with the adjacent districts, called the Liberties of Westminster, has a population of 213,383 persons. It is governed by a high steward and a high bailiff.

MARYLEBONE, now one of the most populous parishes in London, was at the beginning of the last century a small place, separated from London by a mile of open ground. A brook or bourne ran by the village, and the church being dedicated to St. Mary, it came to be called St. Mary-on-the-bourne, which has been corrupted into its present designation. The parish has a circumference of eight miles and a quarter, an area of 1700 acres, and a population of 161,609 persons. Two-thirds of its area were pasture fields until 1760.

PIMLICO, a name of uncertain origin, applied to the district between Hyde Park and the Thames. It is now covered with streets and houses, but so late as 1763, it is said that Buckingham House had an uninterrupted view south and west to the river, there being only a brewery and some scattered cottages between it and the Thames. It was a district of public gardens, much frequented on holidays, all of which have given way to buildings. Here are Belgrave, Lowndes, Eaton, Chester, Eccleston, and Warwick Squares, with many streets, and the new Victoria railway station.

CHELSEA, a large parish with 63,423 inhabitants, extending by the river side westward from Pimlico. The place is mentioned in Domesday book. Henry VIII. gave the manor to Katherine Parr on her marriage with him. It afterwards came into the possession of Sir Hans Sloane, from whom it went to an ancestor of the present Earl Cadogan. This will explain the names of some of the streets, etc. At the end of the seventeenth century, there was established a china manufactory, which existed for some time, the work having obtained celebrity, but it has now disappeared. Chelsea can boast of having been selected as a residence by many eminent persons, within the last two hundred years. It is connected by two bridges with the opposite bank of the river. Here are the Hospital for old soldiers, the Botanical Garden of the Apothecaries, and Cremorne Gardens, so wellknown to pleasure-seekers.

KENSINGTON, including Brompton, lies north and north-west of Chelsea. In the interval between the last two censuses, it has made an immense stride in population. In 1861 it had 186,463