The Sun.
London, England, 1823-04-04 00:00:00

I'TM) PARENTS and 'GUARDIANS.—The
WIDOW of a PROTESTANT CLERGYMAN, of
the most respectable Character' Is willing to take CHARGE of
ONE or TWO YOUNG PERSONS, whose Parents may be
deceased or abroad, or of any Lady or Gentleman whose nunds
may be affected by age, infirmity, or natural weakness. The
Advertiser has always been accustomed to a genteel Establish•
mein, and, being of domestic habits, will readily devote her
time to the care and comfort of any Persons of the above de.
scription. Her residence is in an airy part of the town, in the
vicinity of Portland place..—N.ll. The use of a Carriage, if the
rank and situation of the person may require such an accom.
modation.--Letters from real parties, addressed to A. 8., Sun
Office, Strand, will be duly attended to.

HAYMARKET and—NEIGHBOUItIIOOD.

CONSTRAST .DETWEEN THEM ANC;EXT AND PRESENT

STATE.

The Haymarket and its neighbourhood, on
part of which such magnificent improvements are now carrying
forward, it appears, was only partially built on, and that in a
very indifferent manner, as late as the reign of Charles 111
Colonel Thomas Penton, from whom Panton-street, on this
spot, received its name, was one of the first builders who be-
gan to cover tle site with regular handsome houses, and other-
wise to improve its It the petition of this gentleman, present-
ed to the Privy Council soon atter the Fire of London, " rela-
tive to the plot of ground near the Haymarket, called Penton.
square,"" several curious particulars are stated illustrative of
the topographical history of that and the adjoining neighbour-
hood.

In this petition It is set forth, " that the petitioner had been
at great charge in purchasing a parcell of ground laying at
Pickadilly, part of it being the two bowling-greens fronting the
Haymarket ; the other part lyni,T on the north of the Tennis
Court; upon which severall old 'houses were standing, which
the petitioner demolished to improve the same and wake the
place more uniform° : in reference to which he had set oat the
ground, laid severall foundations, and built part thereof before
his Majesty's Prolamation as to building was issued ; and
praying permission that he might proceed in his said intended
building, according to the draught delivered to his Majesty's
Sarveighor-Generall."
The matter: of this petition being submitted to the Ding's
Surveyor-General, who was to examine and inquire whether
(should the request be granted) " the buildings would cure
the nnysamenees of the place, and how the ditches and sewers
could be kept sweet ; and to report thereon,"---he, on the
24th of May, 1674, returned for answer, " that having reviewed
the said place, he found the petitioner`e assertions, as far as be
could judge, to he true, and that the design of building shewn
to him might be very useful to the publique, especially by open-
ing a new street from the Haymarket into Leicester-fields;
which would in some measure ease the eat passage of the
Strand, and would cure the nonsamen i ess o that part, and, he
presumed, might not be unfit for his Majesty's licence, pro-
vided the said Thomas Panton built regularly, according to
direction! and according to a design to which his said licence
migh refer; and that he be obliged to build with brick, with
party-walls, with sufficient scantlings, good paving in the
streets, and sufficient sewers and conveyances for the water, and
other good and reasonable recommendations."
Having, in consequence of this report, obtained the Royal
permisinon to proceed with his buildings here, Colonel Panton,
in a subsequent petition, craved leave " to build and finish
certain houses, in continuation of a certain street, named Wind-
mill-street, from the upper end of the Haymarket, to the high-
way leading from Soho to Ayre-street and Paddington ; on the
east-corner towards the Haymarket, about 100 foot in front;
also on the same side, about 200 foot in front, opposite
Windmill-yard towards St. Oiles's on the west side of Wind-
mill-street, in the two bowling-greens between the Haymarket
and Leicester-fields, and to build " a faire street of good build. between the Haymarket and Hedge-lane (marked in the
MS. to be called Fantail-street, after the propneton, and other
faire building" fronting the Haymarket, upon the said ground."
All of which improvements the Colonel had leave to complete,
upon condition of building as before directed, and allowing of
no brewhouses, melting-houses, or other noisome trades.
Another eminent land proprietor, Sir Malin' Hydolfe, an
inhabitant and owner of large estates in St. Giles's parish, pre-
sented his petition near the same time, praying " that certain
buildings erected by him in the rear of St. Gilea's ChUrch,
leading from thence to Piccadilly, built contrary, but prior to his
Majesty's Proclamation, might be finished," who-liltewise ob-
tained his request, on similar conditions with Col.Penton. And
the Surveyor-General himself (Sir Christopher Wren), by way
of furthering these improvements, also petitioned the King and
Council, as to "divers buildings lately erected, and many
foundations laid; and more contrived, in Doe t Field;, Wind-
mill- and the fields adjoining to Site several
other places without the suburbs of London and Westminster,
the builders thereof having no grant nor allowance from the
King, and which'had therefore been prohibited and hindered by
the petitioner as far as he could. But that, notwithstanding,
they proceeded to erect small and mean habitations which wool,'
prove only receptacles for the poorer sorts, and ofrensive trades,.
to the annoyance of the better inhabitants, the damage of the
parishes (already too much burdened with poor), the rendering
the Arovernthent of these places more unmanageable, thereat
hindrance of perfecting thercity buildings, and others allowed by

his Majesty; the choaking up the airof his Majesty's Palace and
Park, and the houses of Nobility.uthe infecting or total loss of the
waters, which, by many expenceful drains and conduits, for-
merly derived from these.fields ' the palace of 'Whitehall and
to the Mewes ; a manifest decay of which water, on complaint
of his Majesty's serjean t-plu ber,
and Office of Works, he,
the petitioner, by frequent views and experiments had lbund."
In consequence of this petition, so replete with foresight and
good sense, and the check it gave to these sort of buildings, the
public now owe the healthy district of Soho and the Hay-
market. * Amongst other curious statements in the first of
these petitions, that respecting the noisomeness of the ditches
about the Haymarket appears particularly atriking, seeing it
as we now do, open, airy, and covered with line buildings.—
This sort of nuisance, however, it seems, was common to vari-
ous other places in the suburbs Hear this time, and partly ex-
isted in the metropolis itself; a proof how much we have in-
creased, amongst other things, over our ancestors, in the article
of cleanliness.

In a tract printed IBA intitled " Certain Rules, Directions,
and Advertisements ns to the Plague" (which that year raged
violently iu Londou), the author says, " Let not carkasses of
horses, dogs, cats, &c. lye rotting and poisoning the aire, as
they have done in More and Finsbury 1 fields, -and elsewhere
round about the cittie."

. .
" Let the ditches towards the suburbs, especially towards
Islington, . and Pick Hatch, 61de-street, and towards Shore-
ditch and Whitechapel, be.. well ; and it it might be,
the water of the New River to rtinne through theme ; as also
the like to be done through the Burrough of Southworke."
" Let care be taken that the streetes, especially the narrow
lanes and alleys, to be kept from annoyance of dunghills, vaults,
or houses of offices; the common sewers and canals be well
purged and scoured ; the dung farmers tied to their stint of
time in winter, and not sutrerisl (vnlesse vrgent necessitie re-
quire), to perfume the streetes all summer long, especially at
this time of contagion."
And a second tract, called " Medula Pestilently'," publish.
ed at the beginning of the great plague, year Iti6s, adverting to
the same subject, observes—.-." other causes there are of this
putrid plague, namely—all sorts of unsavory stenches, proceed-
ing either from carrion, ditches, rotten dunghills, vaults, sinks,
nasty kennels and streets (strewed with all manner of filth)
seldom cleansed. These fetid smells are the maintaining cause
of the contagion."

Another," Reflections on the Bills of Mortality, UM, in
stating one supposed cause of the plague, acquaints us still fur-
ther with the state of the metropolis at that time, and its de-
feets,—" that it was increased by turning Noblemen's houses
there to tenements, as the Lord of Winchester's, Alderman
Freeman's, and be ]let; the be Mot; the Earl of Arundell's,
the Bishop of London's Palace, and the Dean of Paula, the
Lord lliver,'B3 and Dukes Place." The increase, however, he
goes on to nonce, was removing " into' more open and free air ;
and the trade from the 'dirty and narrow places in Canning
street and Watling•-atreet, to Paul's, Ludgate, and Fleet-
street; from Bishopsgate and Fenchurch, to the Strand —men
avoiding those places that were crammcd with old and dark
houses, and building more new and lightsome ones, near and
nearer to 111/4/trhall, in tt more convenient and healthful ti:r."
These removals from the heart of the city, near to Whitehall,
account for the " diver buildings lately . erected, and many
foundations laid and contrived, in Dog's Fields, • Windmill Fields, the Fields adjoining Soho," &c , stated in Sir Christo-
pher's petition ; anti acquaints us with the fact of this whole
district's beginning to be built on just before the Fire of Lon-
don. The improvements subsequently made have been noticed,
and with those now making, render the -contrast between the
ancient and present states of this neignbenrhood more striking.
than that of any other spot in town.
Of the appearance of the Ilaymarket, Hedge-lane, the site
of Coventry.street (formerly called " the waye to %%tinge ;"
and the whole Of the adjoining land, before it was arcelled oft
into the different fields mentioned, we are furnished with a tol-
erable representation in the large plan of London, WO. This,
with various particulars of the very early state of the spot, has
been noticed in a former paper, and need not be•repeated,—
Great part of it was then called " Le Won" (the Down,) and
used as pasture.

Of its marshy nature originally, and inter Section by ditches,
evidences were found in digging the foundation for rebuilding
St. Martin's Church. On this occasion a Roman brick arch
was discovered at the bottom, laid with a strong cement of un-
usual composition. In the whole length Of each wall was a
duct, nine inches square, and several others side by side. 'Vida
building was below the springs, upon a gravel. Among other
antiquities, a brass seal was found In digging near the spot,
with a tree and squirrel, and an inscription round it. Gibbs,
the architect, mentions likeWae his discovering of laillidoese
heads. And Sir Hans Sloane had a glass vase shaped like a
bell, which was found ammo; ashes in a stone coffin, taken up
in digging up the foundation of the portico of the church, four-
teen feet under ground.
A trench traveller, over here in IG3B (be Scent), speaks of
the inunediate vicinity of :it. James's Palace as being then cul-
tivated and partly built on. " year its- avennet,' says he,
"is a large meadow, always green, in which the ladies walk
In summer. Its great gate ham a long street in front, reach-
seemingly joining to the fields ; al-
thou igon almost
oostitti otsilttleorofldigth, ist,bounded by' houses, and on the other
side by the Royal Tennis Court. The two gardens of. the
Niue, arc bounded by a great Park, with many walks, all
around covered by the shade of an infinite number of oaks, of
ancient growth, anti which are impervious to the- rays of the
suit."

The Tennis Court here mentioned was nrobitbly the same al-
hided to in Colonel Panton's petition. The bowling-greens at
the top of the Ilaymarket, noticed in the same decument, were,
a little before that period, great places of fashionable resort.—
Sir John Suckling, the poet, was one among the distinguished
bowlers hero. Aubrey, in his " Irivek," mentions his sisters,
whose fortunes he had partly gambled away, "coming to the
Peccadillo Bowling Green (which name it was then called by),
crying, for feare he should lose all their portions."

Elmees Life of Sir C'hristopher Wren.

CORONERS' INQUESTS.

Yesterday evening an Inclust was taken at St. Bartholo-
mew's tospital on Biunem.,-Ildw.Hoodchat, 11.1,Shoc-
lane, Fleet-street, stated, that last Wednesday-week he saw the
deceased on the top of a ladder, in Stonecutter-street, cleaning
the windows, when the ladder Suddenly gave way, and the
deceased was precipitated to the grond ; he was taken up sense.
less and conveyed to a surgeon's in Fleet Alarketi and thence
he was removed to St. Bartholomew's Hospital. Richard
Stallbrd, Forrgeon to the Hospital, stated he saw the deceased
last Wednesday week ; when brought to the Hospital, he hod
a dreadful contusion on the eye, which produced inliamation on
the brain, of which he expired on Tuesday last. Verdict._Ac.
eillental Death.

An Inquisition was taken on Virednestley, at the Golden
Lion, Dean-street, Soho, on the body of ~Mrs. Penny Bur.
cher, aged tifty-six, who fell dOwn and suddenly ex peed in
the street. Mrs. Elizabeth Pinion,. Soho-square, mud that
the deceased came to her on Sunday morning, about nine
o'clock. She observed, that she. , complained much of a
pain in her head, and evidently, laboured under an asth.
Ittlit:tibeedeo,:rwiphliacihnts.belid
I;iitt:ess advised her to to and rest on
and remained there all the day.—
A bout nine o'clock in the evening she went on' to
_go home,
NVitness accom_panied her, and m going through WardOur-
street, the fill down on the steps of the door et the Two ),Irewers.
Witness called to the landlady, who came, but never expressed
any wish to affbrd assistance; and when witness asked for a
little water, refused to give it, and said there was none in the
house f 'anti further desired that the deceased might he remov-
ed; for the should not be brought into her Rousts. A yottng man
passeti byet
the time
assisted in supporting the deceased, and
sent fur a surgeon ; hilt before he could arrive the vital
spark
had fled.---'Thomas Illinchinton, No. I, Sloane-street, Chelsea,
corroborated the aforesaid testimony, adding, that his attention
was first drawn by 'the crowd of spectators. Ile sent for the
beadle, and she (deceased) removed to the Golden Li0n.....
After a short address from the Coroner, the Jury returned a ver-
dict—" Died by the Visitation of Gad."
An Inquest him been held before the Coroner for Kent, at
the Red Lion Inn, Shooter's-hill, on the body of Cecile Jiletn Duvelt a French Lady, who died on Monday last, at the above
piece, in consequence of the dreadful injury she had received by
the upsetting of the Swallow Dover coech, the pertioulare of
which accident have -been already inserted In Tux Sox. Jt
appearing that the melancholy occurrence was accidental, the
Jury returned a verdict accordingly.