head of the porter of Clement's Inn presented itself to me. It was the
first of January, and he gravely gave me an orange and a lemon. He had a
basketful on his arm. I asked for some explanation. The only
information forthcoming was that from time immemorial every tenant on New
Year's Day was presented with an orange and a lemon, and that I was
expected, and that every tenant was expected, to give half-a-crown to the
porter. Further inquiries from the steward gave me this explanation,
that in old days when the river was not used merely as a sewer, the fruit
was brought up in barges and boats to the steps from below the bridge and
carried by porters through the Inn to Clare Market. Toll was at first
charged, and this toll was divided among the tenants whose convenience
was interfered with; hence the old lines beginning "Oranges and lemons
said the bells of St. Clement's." I have often wondered whether the rest
of the old catch had reason as well as rhyme.

Dickens loved the old Inns and squares. Traddles lived in Gray's Inn:
Traddles who was in love with "the dearest girl in the world"; Tom Pinch
and his sister used to meet near the fountain in the Middle Temple; Sir
John Chester had rooms in Paper Buildings; Pip lived in Garden Court at
the time of the collapse of Great Expectations; Mortimer Lightwood and
Eugene Wrayburn had their queer domestic partnership in the Temple. The
scene of the murderous plot in "Hunted Down" is also laid in the Temple,
"at the top of a lonely corner house overlooking the river," probably the
end house of King's Bench Walk. Mr. Grewgious, Herbert Pocket, and Joe
Gargery are associated with Staple Inn and Barnard's Inn.

Lincoln's Inn has not been forgotten; for though Mr. Tulkinghorn lived in
the Fields, yet Serjeant Snubbin was to be found in Lincoln's Inn Old
Square.

I never could understand why Dickens located the Serjeant in the realms
of Equity; but what should interest us more to-night is the fact that the
greater part of "Pickwick" was written in Furnival's Inn, which, as
Dickens describes it, was "a shady, quiet place echoing to the footsteps
of the stragglers there, and rather monotonous and gloomy on summer
evenings."

But to know the Inns as Dickens knew them, let us accompany Mr. Pickwick
to the Magpie and Stump in search of Mr. Lowten, Mr. Perker's clerk.

"Is Mr. Lowten here, ma'am?" inquired Mr. Pickwick.

"Yes, he is, sir," replied the landlady. "Here