o a hospital for
sailors who had been wounded or crippled in one of the great
sea-fights. So it came to pass that, instead of Placentia, we now have
Greenwich Palace; you will find a picture of it facing p. 48.

Perhaps you are thinking, "At any rate the Tower has not changed, and
London still has a Lord Mayor." But even the Tower has changed, for in
Queen Elizabeth's time it was a royal palace as well as a prison. She
did not use it often; perhaps she did not like it, for she had been a
prisoner there herself when her sister Mary was Queen. Now our Kings
never live there; and prisoners are not kept there; and for more than a
hundred and fifty years no one has been beheaded there. I must tell
you of one other change, for I am sure it will interest all children.
In Queen Elizabeth's reign, if you had gone to see the Tower, you would
have been shown also the lions and other wild animals which, from very
early times, had been kept there in dens near the part which is called,
after them, the Lion Tower. Now you must go to the Zoological Gardens
{56} to see wild animals; there are none in the Tower; they were all
sent away to the Zoo not long before Queen Victoria began to reign.

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[Illustration: NO. 15. THE FIRE OF LONDON]

From the Fresco by Stanhope A. Forbes, R.A., in the Royal Exchange

_By permission of the Artist and the Sun Insurance Office_

_See page_ 61

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As for the Lord Mayor, he is still the first magistrate of London, and
he still takes the leading place in all London's affairs, just as he
did in Queen Elizabeth's reign. No, his work and duties have not
changed, except that, as London has grown greater and more important,
they have grown greater and more important also.

{57}

VII.

ST. PAUL'S CATHEDRAL

The Cathedral of the City of London is called St. Paul's. In the
picture beside this page you can see its great dome and golden cross,
the top of which is nearly as many feet above the ground as there are
days in the year. For more than thirteen hundred years God has been
worshipped on the spot where St. Paul's now stands; before that, many
people think, a Roman temple stood there; and before that, again,
perhaps the ancient Londoners worshipped there the God Lud, of whom I
have told you; since that time the number of the years has grown from