stically replied, "May it please Your Majesty, of your grace, not
to take away the Thames too?" This river, so beautiful in its upper
loveliness, stands alone in the far-reaching influence of the commerce
that its lower waters bear. It has borne us from the Cotswolds to
London; while to properly describe the great city would take volumes in
itself. Without attempting such a task, we will only give a brief
summary of some of the more striking objects of interest that the great
British metropolis presents.

[Illustration: THE MONUMENT.]

The origin of the vast city whose population now approximates four
millions is obscure. It was a British settlement before the Romans came
to England, and its name of Llyn Dyn, the "City of the Lake," was
transformed by the conquerors into Londinium. When Caesar crossed the
Thames he thought the settlement of too little importance for mention,
and it does not seem to have been occupied as a Roman station until a
century afterwards, and was not walled round until A.D. 306. The old
wall was about three miles in circumference, beginning near the present
site of the Tower, and some slight traces of it remain. The "London
Stone" on Cannon Street was the central stone or _milliarium_ from which
distances were measured and the great Roman highways started. A worn
fragment of this stone, protected by iron bars, now stands against the
wall of St. Swithin's Church. When Jack Cade entered London, Shakespeare
tells us, he struck his sword on this stone and exclaimed, "Now is
Mortimer lord of this city." Wren caused it to be encased, for
protection, with a new stone hollowed for the purpose; it now stands
very near its original position. London in the sixth century became the
capital of the Saxon kingdom of Essex, and in the ninth century the
Danes destroyed it. King Alfred a few years afterwards rebuilt London,
but it stood barely seven years when it was burned. Finally, it was
again rebuilt, and again captured by the Danes, Canute setting himself
up as king there. Some relics of these Danes remain. St. Olaf was their
saint, and Tooley Street is but a corruption of his name. They had a
church and burial-place where now St. Clement-Danes stands awry on the
Strand--a church that is of interest not only on its own account, but
for the venerable antiquity it represents. The Saxons drove out the
Danes, and the Normans in turn conquered the Saxons, the Tower of London
coming down to us as a relic of Willi