convent. The warlike Templars
came here in their white cloaks and red crosses from their first
establishment in Southampton Buildings, and they held it during all the
Crusades, in which they fought so valorously against the Paynim, till
they grew proud and corrupt, and were suspected of worshipping idols and
ridiculing Christianity. Their work done, they perished, and the Knights
of St. John took possession of their halls, church, and cloisters. The
incoming lawyers became tenants of the Crown, and the parade-ground of
the Templars and the river-side terrace and gardens were tenanted by
more peaceful occupants. The manners and customs of the lawyers of
various ages, their quaint revels, fox-huntings in hall, and dances
round the coal fire, deserve special notice; and swarms of anecdotes and
odd sayings and doings buzz round us as we write of the various denizens
of the Temple--Dr. Johnson, Goldsmith, Lamb, Coke, Plowden, Jefferies,
Cowper, Butler, Parsons, Sheridan, and Tom Moore; and we linger at the
pretty little fountain and think of those who have celebrated its
praise. Every binn of this cellar of lawyers has its story, and a volume
might well be written in recording the toils and struggles, successes
and failures, of the illustrious owners of Temple chambers.

Thence we pass to Ludgate, where that old London inn, the "Belle
Sauvage," calls up associations of the early days of theatres,
especially of Banks and his wonderful performing horse, that walked up
one of the towers of Old St. Paul's. Hone's old shop reminds us of the
delightful books he published, aided by Lamb and Leigh Hunt. The old
entrance of the City, Ludgate, has quite a history of its own. It was a
debtors' prison, rebuilt in the time of King John from the remains of
demolished Jewish houses, and was enlarged by the widow of Stephen
Forster, Lord Mayor in the reign of Henry VI., who, tradition says, had
been himself a prisoner in Ludgate, till released by a rich widow, who
saw his handsome face through the grate and married him. St. Martin's
church, Ludgate, is one of Wren's churches, and is chiefly remarkable
for its stolid conceit in always getting in the way of the west front of
St. Paul's.

The great Cathedral has been the scene of events that illustrate almost
every age of English history. This is the third St. Paul's. The first,
falsely supposed to have been built on the site of a Roman temple of
Diana, was burnt down in the last year of Will