furniture, books, etc., from a Literary, Scientific, and
Mechanics' Institute which stood on the east side of the road, a little
to the north of the present library building, and the library was opened
there in 1857. In 1888 the present site was purchased, and the building
was designed by J. F. Smith, F.R.I.B.A.

Dean Stanley presented 2,000 volumes of standard works in 1883, to which
others were added by his sister, Mrs. Vaughan, to whom they had been
left for her lifetime. The library also contains 449 valuable volumes
published by the Record Office. These consist of Calendars of State
Papers, Reports of the Deputy Keeper of the Public Record Office,
Chronicles and Memorials of Great Britain and Ireland during the Middle
Ages, and Records of Great Britain from the Reign of Edward the
Confessor to Henry VIII. The Westminster Public Baths and Wash-houses,
designed by the same architect are next door to the library. The Church
House opposite is a very handsome building in a Perpendicular style; it
is of red brick with stone dressings. The interior is very well
furnished with fine stone and wood carving. The great hall holds 1,500
people, and runs the whole length of the building from Smith Street to
Tufton Street. The roof is an open timber structure of the hammer-beam
type, typical of fourteenth-century work. Near the north end of Great
Smith Street is Queen Anne's Bounty Office, rebuilt 1900.

Orchard Street is so named from the Abbot's Orchard. John Wesley once
lived here. In Old Pye Street a few squalid houses with low doorways
remain to contrast with the immense flats known as Peabody's Buildings,
which have sprung up recently. In 1862 George Peabody gave L150,000 for
the erection of dwellings for the working classes, and to this he
subsequently added L500,000. The first block of buildings was opened in
Spitalfields, 1864. These in the neighbourhood of Old Pye Street were
erected in 1882. Pye Street derives its name from Sir Robert Pye, member
for Westminster in the time of Charles I., who married a daughter of
John Hampden. St. Matthew Street was Duck Lane until 1864, and was a
very malodorous quarter. Swift says it was renowned for second-hand
bookshops. The Westminster Bluecoat School was first founded here.

St. Ann's Street and Lane are poor and wretched quarters. The name is
derived from a chapel which formerly stood on the spot (see p. 37).
Herrick lodged in the street when, ejected from his living in the