to the shops was by spacious staircases of black marble, the colonnade beneath was paved with white and black marble, and the open area with Turkey stones of a small size, the gift, according to tradition, of a merchant trading to that country, whose heart perhaps was opened by some unusually fortunate venture, which he thus fitly recorded. The long cessation of the business of the shops appears to have wrought no permanent injury to their occupiers, for but a very short time after the rebuilding we find them in full activity, and paying continually increasing rents, in spite of the great addition to their number. Some of these shops were at one period let for as much as sixty pounds a-year. The old characteristics were also revived in full force. In the satirical ballad of "Robin Conscience, or Conscionable Robin, in his progress through Court, City, and Country' (1683), the hero walks into the Exchange, but the merchants tell him It is remarkable enough to notice in connection with the line printed in italics, that above seventy years before the authorities of the Old Exchange had ordered “That none of the shopkeepers in the Exchange be hereafter permitted to draw or hang any curtains or cloths before the windows or lights of their shops, to diminish, obscure, or shadow their lights, whereby such as have come to buy their wares have been much wronged and deceived." Down to the time of Sir Richard Steele, and The Spectator,' the attractions of this part continued undiminished, for in his day's ramble, described in No. 454 of that work, he makes a point of calling in at the Exchange, where, he says, "It was not the least of my satisfaction in my survey to go up stairs, and pass the shops of agreeable females. To observe so many pretty hands busy in the folding of ribbons, and the utmost eagerness of agreeable faces in the sale of patches, pins, and wires, on each side of the counters, was an amusement in which I could longer have indulged myself, had not the dear creatures called to me, to ask what I wanted, when I could not answer, Only to look at you.'" "I went," continues the genial and light-hearted philosopher, "to one of the windows which opened to the area below, where all the several voices lost their distinction, and rose up in a confused humming; which created in me a reflection that could not come into the mind of any but of one a little too studious: for I said to myself, with a kind of pun in thought, What nonsense is all the hurry of this world to those who are above it!" But the scene commanded by the spot on which the writer now stood was calculated to arouse reflections of a higher nature in his mind than he has here recorded. Putting aside the merely picturesque, he could not have viewed so many mer chants of so many different nations, bound together in one common pursuit, without thinking of the moral grandeur exhibited in that potential assemblage to those who could penetrate beneath its superficial aspect, who could understand what was going on for the general good of mankind beneath that incessant allpervading struggle for self-interest and self-aggrandisement. Why Steele contented himself with the brief but pleasant notice we have transcribed is easy of explanation: he had been anticipated. His friend and fellow-essayist Addison, who has not only recorded his frequent visits to the Exchange, but also says there was no place in town which he so much loved to frequent, had previously published in The Spectator' one of his most delightful papers. Literary memories of this kind appear to us to give to old buildings one of their greatest charms, and belong, indeed, as much to them as the very stones of their foundation. Before we transcribe the passage in question, let us first see what the satirist has to say on the subject: the contrast will be neither unamusing nor uninstructive. In a clever poem, entitled The Wealthy Shopkeeper,' published in 1700, we read "For half an hour he feeds; and when he 's done, From thence to 'Change he hurries in a heat Remains among the hen-peck'd herd till three; How much more there is in heaven and earth than is dreamt of in the philosophy of such writers is finely illustrated by Addison's reflections on the same scene: "There is no place in the town," says he, "which I so much love to frequent as the Royal Exchange. It gives me a secret satisfaction, and in some measure gratifies my vanity, as I am an Englishman, to see so rich an assembly of countrymen and foreigners consulting together upon the private business of mankind, and making this metropolis a kind of emporium for the whole earth. I must confess I look upon high-'change to be a great council, in which all considerable nations have their representatives. Factors in the trading world are what ambassadors are in the politic world: they negotiate affairs, conclude treaties, and maintain a good correspondence between those wealthy societies of men that are divided from one another by seas and oceans, or live on the different extremities of a continent. I have often been pleased to hear disputes adjusted between an inhabitant of Japan and an alderman of London; or to see a subject of the Great Mogul entering into a league with one of the Czar of Muscovy. I am infinitely delighted in mixing with these several ministers of commerce, as they are distinguished by their different walks and different languages. Sometimes I am jostled among a body of Armenians; sometimes I am lost in a crowd of Jews; and sometimes make one in a group of Dutchmen. I am a Dane, Swede, or Frenchman at different times; or rather fancy myself like the old philosopher, who, upon being asked what countryman he was, replied that he was a citizen of the world. . . . . This grand scene of business gives me an infinite variety of solid and substantial entertainment. As I am a great lover of mankind, my heart naturally overflows with pleasure at the sight of a prosperous and happy multitude, insomuch that at many public solemnities I cannot forbear expressing my joy with tears that have stolen down my cheeks. For this reason I am wonderfully delighted to see such a body of men thriving in their own private fortunes, and at the same time promoting the public stock. . . . "If we consider our own country in its natural prospect, without any of the benefits and advantages of commerce, what a barren and uncomfortable spot of earth falls to our share! Natural historians tell us that no fruit grows originally among us besides hips and haws, acorns and pig-nuts, with other delicacies of the like nature; that our climate, of itself, and without the assistance of art, can make no further advance towards a plum than to a sloe, and carries an apple to no greater perfection than a crab; that our melons, our peaches, our figs, our apricots, and cherries are strangers among us, imported in different ages, and naturalized in our English gardens; and that they would all degenerate and fall away into the trash of our own country, if they were wholly neglected by the planter, and left to the mercy of the sun and soil. Nor has traffic more enriched our vegetable world than it has improved the whole face of Nature among us. Our ships are laden with the harvest of every climate; our tables are stored with spices, and oils, and wines; our rooms are filled with pyramids of china, and adorned with the workmanship of Japan; our morning draught comes to us from the remotest corners of the earth; we repair our bodies by the drugs of America, and repose ourselves under Indian canopies. My friend Sir Andrew calls the vineyard of France our gardens; the Spice Islands our hot-beds; the Persians our silk-weavers; and the Chinese our potters. Nature indeed furnishes us with the bare necessaries of life, but traffic gives us a great variety of what is useful, and at the same time supplies us with everything that is convenient and ornamental. Nor is it the least part of this our happiness that, whilst we enjoy the remotest products of the North and South, we are free from those extremities of weather which gave them birth; that our eyes are refreshed with the green fields of Britain, at the same time that our palates are feasted with fruits that rise between the tropics. For these reasons there are not more useful members in a commonwealth than merchants. They knit mankind together in a mutual intercourse of good offices, distribute the gifts of Nature, find work for the poor, and wealth to the rich, and magnificence to the great. Our English merchant converts the tin of his own country into gold, and exchanges his wool for rubies. The Mahometans are clothed in our British manufacture, and the inhabitants of the Frozen Zone warmed with the fleeces of our sheep. When I have been upon the 'Change," he concludes, "I have often fancied one of our old kings standing in person where he is represented in effigy, and looking down upon the wealthy concourse of people with which that place is every day filled. In this case how would he be surprised to hear all the languages of Europe spoken in this little spot of his former dominion, and to see so many private men, who, in his time would have been the vassals of some powerful baron, negotiating, like princes, for greater sums of money than were formerly to be met with in the royal treasury. Trade, without enlarging the British territories, has given us a kind of additional empire. It has multiplied the number of the rich, made our landed estates infinitely more valuable than they were formerly, and added to them an accession of other estates as valuable as the land themselves."* Writing like this gives so much interest to a locality as to deserve commemoration in a marked manner. like Soon after the time of the two great essayists a decay in the prosperity of the shops in the upper part of the Exchange took place, caused, probably, by the gradual removal of their wealthier and more fashionable customers towards the west end. That decay too must have been very rapid; for Maitland, writing in 1739, spoke of the shops having, "till of late," been "stored with the richest and choicest sorts of merchandise; but the same being now forsaken, it appears a wilderness." Still busier tenants however began to occupy the vacant place. The Royal Exchange Assurance and other offices, the Gresham Lecture Room, and, above all," Lloyd's" extensive and famous establishment, were all to be found here down to the period of the destruction of the edifice on the night of Wednesday, the 10th of January, 1838. It was from the windows of Lloyd's coffee-room that the flames first became visible to the watchmen of the neighbouring Bank, and to the astonished merchants and others, who quickly came hurrying to the spot, only in time to behold the edifice perish by the same agency as its predecessor. We need not say the spectacle was, as usual with such large edifices, of the most magnificent character; but there was one little circumstance *Spectator, No. 69. * of an interesting nature connected with it, not undeserving mention. Amidst the tumult of the populace, the shouts of the firemen, and the crash of the falling masonry, the bells in the tower began to play their popular air and then to fall one after the other into the common ruin beneath. The damage done by the fire was immense, apart from the loss of the building; as may be well supposed when we consider how closely the Exchange was surrounded by wealthy shops and warehouses, and the vast quantity of papers, deeds, securities, &c., included in its own chambers and vaults. A second time burned out, the merchants had once more to seek a new, though temporary, home. This matter was soon accomplished. The South Sea House received the members of "Lloyd's;" whilst the court of the Excise Office, formerly the court of Sir Thomas Gresham's house, and subsequently of Gresham College, accommodated the general mercantile body, as it had done before, on the occasion of the similar calamity. In this long quadrangle, with its temporary wooden roof down the centre, and its time-stained surrounding walls, one even feels more strongly the natural magnitude of the transactions of the merchants who at the hour of four come pouring daily into it and filling it to overflowing, than when we beheld them surrounded by the architectural magnificence of their proper habitation. Overlooking the character and influence of the ordinary business of the place which Addison has so finely described, few can stand among such a throng without reflecting on the mighty power that lies in the hands of some of these men, perhaps in the very individual leaning by the pillar here at our side,-men who by their loans stop or promote a war, raise or sink a dynasty. The plain walls too have metal more attractive for those who principally look upon them than any the architect or sculptor can afford; as you may see by marking the attention with which those clusters of bills which line the walls are read every now and then. Let us glance over them. They comprise announcements of the departure of "good ships" to almost every noticeable place on the globe that one can well manage to think of; announcements of Bank dividends, new arrangements of the Post Office or Trinity House, mingled with most flattering accounts of new inventions or new speculations-a Glasgow Tontine, for instance, or a Jamaica sugar-estate. No doubt these are all interesting matters to the merchants, and must be treated with respect, but we may be excused dwelling on them; so, amusing ourselves as we take a last walk round the sides of the quadrangle with the thoughts raised by the inscriptions on the boards scattered at intervals upon the face of the walls above our heads, explaining that beneath this one is the "Scotch Walk," beneath that the "Hambro'"; and then, successively, the "Irish," "East Country," "Swedish," "Norway," "American," "Jamaica," " Spanish," Portugal," "French," "Greek," and "Dutch and Jewellers' " Walks-we pass on towards that building which remains to us as the monument of the excesses into which a sedate nation like ourselves can be betrayed by an unnatural development of the principle— speculation-which is the heart of all commerce, and which in its healthy action gives life, vigour, and prosperity to the social body. * The chimes played at 3, 6, 9, and 12 o'clock-on Sunday, the 154th Psalm; Monday, 'God save the King;' Tuesday, 'Waterloo March;' Wednesday, 'There's nae luck about the House ;' Thursday,' See the Conquering Hero comes;' Friday, 'Life let us cherish;' Saturday, 'Foot-Guards' March.' |