icipality arose, gaining one liberty after another,
and letting go of none, but all the more jealously guarding each as a
sacred inheritance; how the trade of the City grew more and more; how
the Companies were formed, one after the other, for the protection of
trade interests. Then he should learn how the Sovereign and great
nobles have always kept themselves in close connection with the City,
even in the proudest times of the Barons, even in the days when the
nobles were supposed to have most despised the burgesses and the men
of trade. He should learn, besides, how the City itself, its houses,
and its streets, grew and covered up the space within the wall, and
spread itself without; he should learn the meaning of the names--why
one street is called College Hill and another Jewry and another
Minories. Armed with such knowledge as this, every new ramble will
bring home to him more and more vividly the history of the past. He
will never be solitary, even at noon on Sunday morning even in Suffolk
Street or Pudding Lane, because all the streets will be thronged with
figures of the dead, silent ghosts haunting the scenes where they
lived and loved and died, and felt the fierce joys of venture, of
risk, and enterprise.

But let no man ramble aimlessly. It is pleasant, I own, to wander from
street to street idly remembering what has happened here; but it is
more profitable to map out a walk beforehand, to read up all that can
be ascertained about it before sallying forth, and to carry a notebook
to set down the things that may be observed or discovered.

Or, which is another method, he may consider the City with regard to
certain divisions of subjects. He may make, for instance, a special
study of the London churches. The City, small as it is, formerly
contained nearly 150 parishes, each with its church, its
burying-ground, and its parish charities. Some of these were not
rebuilt after the Great Fire, some have been wickedly and wantonly
destroyed in these latter days. A few yet survive which were not
burned down in that great calamity. These are St. Helen and St.
Ethelburga; St. Katherine Cree, the last expiring effort of Gothic,
consecrated by Archbishop Laud; All Hallows, Barking, and St. Giles.
Most of the existing City churches were built by Wren, as you know. I
think I have seen them nearly all, and in every one, however
externally unpromising, I have found something curious, Interesting,
and unexpected--some wealth