The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1901-12-22
STORY OF ST. PAUL's.
.Checkered Career of Great
Cathedral.
St. James Gazette.

ST. James Gazette.
St. Paul's, which is at present exciting
attention, has had a checkered story.
Three times fire has brought ii TO the
ground, and the cracks in the walls which
are just now being talked about bring 10
mind the sight which good Samuel Pepys
years ago. i stopped at st. Pauls,' he
says in mis- diary, and did see a hideous
sight OF the walls of the church ready 10
fail, that l was In fear as long as L was IL
it," The very sight OF the stones falling
from the top of the steeple do make me
seasick," the famous diarist wrote again.
We are not likely TO see st. Pauls as fepys
saw 1t, but any peril In Its condition Is d
legitimate cause or national anxiety.
Those who know their London can find
few places so inspiring, that carry the
mind back so far in history as underneath
the great DOME. Christianity mas been
represented by a church on this site since
Augustine brought the gospel 10 England
and all through the centuries a national in
terest has been taken in the Cathedral of
ST. Paufs. After the destruction by fire
in the reign or the COnqueror the new st.
Pauls was built from the offerings of thou
sands of people, TO whom the bishops
granted special indulgences in return tor
their subscriptions. Then the spire was
struck by lightning In the middle OF the
ntteenth century. and a hundred years
later-in 156l-the tall Steeple became d
ruin. Divers persons, in time of the
tempest, being in the fields near adjoining
to the city, affirmed that they saw a long
and spear-pointed flame of fire run through
the top of the shaft of ST. Paul's steeple,"
and il was natural that the journalists OF
that day should set down the calamity to
the lightning. If a later writer Is TO be be-
lieved, however, a plumber afterward con-
fessed that the destruction was caused
through his careleSSneSS in leaving a pan
of burning coal in the steeple while he
went home to dinner.
A hundred thousand pounds was spent in
restoring the cathedral. and the work was
finished in time TO allow the great Oliver to
stable his horses there in comfort. Twenty
years after the great fire burned St. Pauls
once more to ashes. The ground was so
hot, says Evelyn, that Ii burned the soles
of his shoes. Half London had schemes
for rebuilding the famous church. st.
Pauls was still smoldering when Wren
submitted his ideas to the King, within
two days of the confagration. He had
little hope. The cost, he said, would
brighten the age But at last the work
was begun, and the pulling down of the
ruin was for days one of the sights of the
metropolis. The heaps of rubbish were so
great that scaffolds had to be erected over
them to save delay while the men were
clearing it away, and when it became
necessary to remove the high tower the
workmen quailed before the task OF mount
ing 200 feet to cast it down, and gunpowder
was reSOrted to.
A box containing eighteen pounds of pow
Ger was placed in a hole under the pier, and
the explosion caused the tower To rise visi-
bly,, in the mass, for quite nine inches be-
fore 1t fell. By an accident a piece of stone
was shot into a room in which two women
VIZ ~ WI n aANa Inns Ata ~ 1ht AAl
ton of the use of powder. Wren provided
an ingenious substitute in the form Of an
ancient batterlng ram, with which he kept
thirty men beating against the same part
of one of the great walls for a whole day.
On the second day the wall trembled at
the top, and in a few hours the last ruin
OF old st. Paufs fell with a crash like an
earthquake.
With it passed a strange phase of life in
ancient London. For generations st. Paul's
had been the rendezvous of all sorts and
| conditions of men The benches at tho door
of the choir were the common resort of
beggarS and ~drunkardS, and a large dung
mn lay within one OF the doors; The aisle
through the center of the cathedral was
known as PauIs Walk; and Rotton row is
not more popular in our day than Paulis
Walk was then. A dramatist has left us
the picture. AT one time" he says, 'in one
and the same rank, yea foot by foot and
elbow by elbow, you shall see walking the
knight, the gull, the gallant. the upstart,
the gentleman, the clown, the captain, the
apple squire, the lawyer, the Insurer, the
citizen, the bankroot, the scholar, the beg
gar, the doctor. the idiot. the ruffian, the
highwayman, the low men, the true man,
and the thief; of all trades and professions
some, of all countries some. Thus, while
Devotion kneels at her prayers doth Pro
family walk under her nose in contempt OF
religion
Old st. Paul's, indeed, must nave had
WITHIN It's walls a veritable city More thar
twenty private houses were built at one
time against the walls, and the owners OF
several of these cut doorways through into
the church, parts of which they made use
of as their own rooms. The very vaults
were turned into private cellars, with door
ways from the houses outside. Somewhere
in the records of the cathedral is a report OF
a faithful verger who protested that 'tht
shrouds and cloisters under the convOca.
ton house are made a common lay stall fol
boards, trunks and chests, being let ouf
unto trunkmakers, where, by means OF
their daily knocking and noise, the church
is greatly disturbed" Thus it came about
that one part of st. Pauls was used as z
playhouse, that a baker baked his bread IN
an oven cut out of one of the buttresses
and that another of these privileged house
holders found a way from his home int
the steeple, where he managed TO set up
Storeroom.