out, with streets
running diagonally from the corners as well as rectangularly from the
sides. It had formerly a watch-house at each corner, as well as the
obelisk in the centre. It is at present lined by brick houses of uniform
aspect and unequal heights, with here and there a conspicuously modern
building. The centre is laid out as a public garden, and forms a green
and pleasant oasis in a very poor district.

St. John the Evangelist's Church, of red brick, designed by Pearson,
stands at the south-west corner. It was built 1876-1878, and is very
conspicuous, with two pointed towers and a handsome, deeply-recessed
east window. Next door is the clergy house. There are in the Square
various associations and societies, including the Mendicity Society,
Indigent Blind Visiting Society, St. Paul's Hospital, and others. Milton
had a house which overlooked Red Lion Fields, the site of the Square,
and Jonas Hanway, traveller and philanthropist, also a voluminous
writer, but who will be best remembered as the first man in England to
carry an umbrella, died here in 1786. Sharon Turner, historian, came
here after his marriage in 1795, and Lord Chief Justice Raymond, who
held his high office in the reign of the first and second Georges, lived
in the Square. But a later association will, perhaps, be more
interesting to most people: for about three years previously to 1859 Sir
E. Burne-Jones and William Morris lived in rooms at No. 17, before
either was married.

Of the surrounding streets, those at the south-east and north-east
angles are the most quaint. An old house with red tiles stands at each
corner, and the remaining houses, though not so picturesque, are of
ancient date. The streets are mere flagged passages lined by open stalls
and little shops.

Kingsgate Street is so named because it had a gate at the end through
which the King used to pass to Newmarket. It is mentioned by Pepys, who
under date March 8, 1669, records that the King's coach was upset here,
throwing out Charles himself, the Dukes of York and Monmouth, and Prince
Rupert, who were "all dirt, but no hurt." Near the end of this street in
Holborn was the Vine Inn, important as having kept alive the only
reference in Domesday Book to this district, "a vineyard in Holborn"
belonging to the Crown.

Part of Theobald's Road was once King's Way; it was the direct route to
King James I.'s hunting-lodge, Theobald's, in Hertfordshire. It was in
this part, at what is