architectural value,--little more than a point of crossing or
meeting of streets, like Piccadilly and Oxford Circus.

In the "City," the open spaces are of great historical association;
namely, Charterhouse, Bridgewater, Salisbury, Gough, and Warwick Squares.
They show very few signs of life and humanity of a Sunday or a holiday,
but are active enough at other times.

Further west are the quiet precincts of the Temple and Lincoln's Inn
Fields, one of the most ancient and, on the whole, the most attractive of
all, with its famous houses and institutions of a storied past.

While, if not actually to be counted as city squares, they perform in no
small degree many of their functions.

Red Lion Square, to the north of Fleet Street, is gloomy enough, and
reminiscent of the old "Red Lion" Inn, for long "the largest and best
frequented inn in Holborn," and yet more worthily, as being the residence
of Milton after his pardon from King Charles.

Soho Square and Golden Square are quiet and charming retreats, away from
the bustle of the shoppers of Regent and Oxford Streets, though perhaps
melancholy enough to the seeker after real architectural charm and beauty.

It is to Bloomsbury that the heart of the American most fondly turns,
whether he takes residence there by reason of its being "so near to the
British Museum, you know," or for motives of economy, either of which
should be sufficient of itself, likewise commendable.

The museum itself, with its reading-room and collections, is the great
attraction, it cannot be denied, of this section of London, and Bloomsbury
Square, Torrington Square, Queen's Square, and Mecklenburgh Square, where
Dickens lived and wrote much of "Pickwick" in 1837-39, are given over
largely to "board-residence" establishments for the visitor, or he who for
reasons good and true desires to make his abode in historic old
Bloomsbury.

In Dickens' time the region had become the haunt of those who affected
science, literature, or art, by reason of the proximity of the British
Museum and the newly founded University of London.

The wealthy element, who were not desirous of being classed among the
fashionables, were attracted here by its nearness to the open country and
Regent's Park. Thus, clustering around Bloomsbury is a whole nucleus of
squares; "some comely," says a writer, "some elegant," and all with a
middle-class air about them.

Still further west are the aristocratic and exclusive St. Jam