Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 11.djvu/198

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NOTES AND QUERIES, p* B. XL MIBOH 7,

"Round Head Conduit," but the latter building, which is said to have been situated in the eastern corner of " Ox Close," belonged to the Westminster system. This is evident from the entry in the Patent Rolls, dated 1 March, 1439, 18 Hen. VI., in which the Abbot of Westminster gives a head of water, " in quodam clause vocato Oxlese infra Terrain et Procinctum Manerii nostri de Padyngton." We see here the name of a meadow surviving through three centuries. According to Rowley and Dance's plan, which is cited by MR. RUTTON, the conduit was divided into two branches at the spot where we now find Stanhope Place, Connaught Square. One of these branches was carried through Hyde Park, and a surviving witness of it still exists in the little round conduit house which is situated just within the palings of the park where the buildings of Knightsbridge begin. The other branch pursued the course indi- cated by MR. RUTTON.

The pipes which have recently been dis- covered in New Bond Street belonged to a third system, which was under the control of the City of London. In a little pamphlet in my possession, entitled * An Examination of the Conduct of Several Comptrollers of the City of London, in Relation to the City's Estate, call'd Conduit-Mead, now New Bond- Street, &c.,' 1743, it is stated the City was seized of this estate in fee, " which they hold by a Possession from Time out of Mind." I cannot speak positively, but I have a strong impression that the City's holding in this Quarter dates from the grant made by Alicia de Chabham on 20 February, 1353/4, 28 Ed- ward III., of which a copy will be found in Rymer's ' Fcedera,' xi. 29. This lady, who had

ay, -

ende in Villa de Tyborne inter TerramMagistri Hospitalis Sancti Egidii ex parte occidentali et Viam Regiam ex parte Orientali." I can find no grant to the City of London which seems to suit the geographical conditions of the case more closely than this. From the time of Henry VIIL, however, the chief source of supply appears to have lain in Marylebone fart. The connexion of the Mayor and Corporation of London with the

w,>htr h of Stratford

with the Conduit Mead, and with the

was made in front of a public-house at the east corner of the street, at the depth of about six feet below the pavement. There is an engraving of it in the Transactions of the London and Middlesex Archaeological Society, i. 329. At the time the accompanying descrip- tion was written the boss was in the Mary- lebone stoneyard, in Richmond Street, Maida Hill, and, considering the wanton manner in which such relics were often destroyed forty or fifty years ago, it is satisfactory to know that it has found a permanent resting-place in the building which possesses the best claim to preserve it.

I feel some doubt whether the dirty stream of water which is stated by MR. MAcMiCHAEL to have been found under a house in Conduit Street in 1877 belonged to the City's water system. I think it more probable that it was some tributary of the Tyburn, like the brook which is mentioned in ' Old and New London,' v. 184 :

"Apropos of the ancient streams in this locality, it may be added that it is said there was in the olden days very good fishing in the trout stream which ran from Netting Hill Manor towards Hay Hill, Berkeley Square, taking its course through Brook Street, Grosvenor Square, which was built on the high banks of the said stream, where it ceased to blend with the Tye."

Mr. Walford gives no authority for this statement, and though we all know that General Oglethorpe, who died in 1785, shot woodcock in the meadows on which Conduit Street now stands, the pursuit of the wily trout in Brook Street involves a somewhat longer stretch of the imagination. The old name of the locality Brookfield as well as the designation of the street, would, however, seem to presuppose a natural stream rather than an artificial conduit.

W. F. PRIDEAUX.

Towards the end of 1899 or beginning of 1900 I saw wooden pipes, similar to those described by your correspondents, unearthed in James Street (or possibly Panton Street) and Whitcomb Street. I mention this because it may help to trace the precise line the con- duits took. W. R. B. PRIDEAUX.

It may be well for ' N. & Q.' to place on record the existence of a scarce if not rare pamphlet entitled : " An | examination | of the | conduct | of several

I comptrollers | of the | City of London, | In rela- tion to the City's Estate call'd | Conduit-Mead | now

I New Bond-Street, &c. | Wherein the | Reasoning of those Officers to induce the City to | let new Leases thereof now, being upwards of | twenty Yeares before the Expiration of the present | Lease, is refuted, and the true Design of the | whole dis- closed. | By a Person acquainted with the Estate