Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 8.djvu/130

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NOTES AND QUERIES. [io s. vni. AUG. 10,

most irreverently styled the Lord Mayor of London

Conservator of Thames from mud to mud. The bad odours emanating from it culminated in 1858, and during the summer of that year I had a bowl of chloride of lime on my desk at the office in Wellington Street as a dis- infectant. Fortunately the stench reached the House of Commons, and an Act was passed empowering the Metropolitan Board of Works to undertake the purification of the river.

As regards the rateable value of the City of London, the growth has been enormous. In 1861 it was 1,279,887L, to-day it is 5, 000,OOOL The statistics of population are most interesting. In 1861 the residents were 112,063 ; in 1871 they fell to 74,897 ; in 1881 these decreased to 50,652 ; in 1891 to 26,923 ; and now the number is only slightly over 21,000. The day population has increased from 170,133 in 1866 to 374,730 last year. The day census taken in May, 1891, showed that 1,186,000 persons a,nd 92,000 vehicles entered and left the City on the day the counting took place ; and from further statistics compiled in 1903 it was estimated that 108,00,000 vehicles passed to and from London in the course of twelve months.

London's roll of fame during the last half century contains, among other illustrious men upon whom the freedom of the City lias been conferred, David Livingstone (May 21st, 1857), Sir John Lawrence (July 3rd, 1859), Capt. Sir Francis Leopold McClintock {May 19th, 1860), Lord Clyde (December 20th, 1860), Sir James Outram (on the same day), Cobden (June 6th, 1861), George Peabody (July 10th, 1862), Earl Canning (June 26th, 1862), Garibaldi (April 20th, 1864), Lord Napier (July 21st, 1868), De Lesseps (July 20th, 1870), Sir George Airy, Astronomer Royal (November 4th, 1875), General Ulysses Grant (June 15th, 1877), Sir Rowland Hill (June 12th, 1879), General Booth, of the Salvation Army (October 26th, 1905), and Lord Lister (June 28th, 1907).

As regards the Guilds, The City Press claims that these have been "born again, or, in other words, returned to their former activities, and become once more closely associated with the crafts from which they sprang." The Guilds were formerly en- trusted with far-reaching powers ; gradually these in many cases fell into desuetude ; but there are five Companies still exercising some of the responsibilities conferred upon them : the Goldsmiths, who are the hall-

marking authority ; the Fishmongers, who control Billingsgate ; the Apothecaries, who are one of the examining bodies in medicine, and have been endowed with further powers of late years ; the Gun- makers, who are still the legal authority for the marking of gun barrels ; and the Stationers, as the copyright authority. The year 1877 " witnessed the reawakening of the Companies," for the City and Guilds of London Institute was then formed " for the purpose of promoting manual training, and associating the Guilds once again with London craft life." Three-quarters of a million have been devoted to this end, and " the Institute has to-day assumed a world-wide importance, being regarded the Empire over as the great examining body for technology in all its branches." Three years after its formation the appointment of the Royal Commission on the Guilds served as another stimulus. The Companies, it is true, emerged triumphantly from that ordeal, and gave practical proof to the Commissioners of their bona fides. In order to make the position of the Guilds abso- lutely invulnerable it is suggested that

" they should with one consent place themselves at the head of their respective trades, encouraging the crafts by apprenticeship, acting as the arbitration authority in cases of dispute, ministering to the necessities of the aged, and in other ways per- petuating the conditions of centuries since. This reform can only be fully effected through the practical reunion of the Companies with their trades by the former inviting the co-operation of the leaders of these industries."

The financial history recorded by The City Press includes the establishment of limited liability ; and it is just fifty years since the members of the Stock Exchange first as- sembled in their " new house " in Throg- morton Street. In the same year, owing to American failures, the Bank rate reached 10 per cent, the Bank Act was suspended, and Palmerston authorized an additional issue of notes during the panic. The failures on the Exchange exceeded seventy, and the committee granted time to all who could pay 10. in the pound. In 1866 came the Overend-Gurney crash ; the bank's capital was 5, 000,0002., and its engagements ex- ceeded 19,000,OOOZ. The 501. shares, at one time at 10Z. premium, relapsed on " Black Friday," the llth of May, 1866, to 10Z. discount, and the 3 per Cents fell on that day to 84. In the article mention is made of the marvellous recovery of French wealth since 1870, until " Paris is now the strongest gold-hoarder in the world." In 1873, when France was paying to Germany