exterior, of red brick and stone, consists of a succession of recessed arches between Tuscan pilasters, and is of an equal elevation throughout, except at the angles, from which rise octagonal turrets. A main road, 56 feet wide and 54 high, runs north and south through the centre of the building; and six avenues, each 25 feet wide, traverse it from east to west. On the ground floor are 162 shops; an upper storey carried on iron columns contains rooms and offices for the salesmen. The angle towers are appropriated as taverns and restaurants, and there are post-office and telegraph stations. The underground portion is in some respects more remarkable than the market itself. The entire floor of the market is sustained on enormous iron girders, which are borne on 180 wrought-iron columns. This underground basement, an area of 3 acres, serves as a great railway provisions depôt, with sidings, platforms, and stages for delivering the meat, and hydraulic hoists for lifting it to the floor of the market; and the Metropolitan Railway (carrying also the City traffic of the Great Northern, the Midland, and the London, Chatham, and Dover Railways) passes through it from end to end. The market is said to have cost the City over £800,000. The quantity of meat delivered at the market now amounts to 235,000 tons per annum.

The Central Poultry and Provisions Market, opened 1870, on the west of the Meat Market, is a similar but smaller block-like it in materials and style, and the work of the same architect. It has an area of 49,000 superficial feet; is divided by four avenues, 25 feet wide, running north and south, and as many running east and west, and contains seventy-four shops. The Corporation receive an annual rental of over £70,000 from the markets, and £2000 a year from the Railway Companies for the substructure of the Meat Market. The New Vegetable and Fruit Market was opened by the Lord Mayor on December 11, 1889.

The London Central Fish Market is in Farringdon Street.

London, Chatham, and Dover Railway was opened as the East Kent line in 1858. It was subsequently extended, and took its present name in 1859. Besides the places named in its title its lines run to Sevenoaks, Canterbury, Margate, Ramsgate, etc., and it has considerable local traffic. Its first London terminus was on the south side of Blackfriars Bridge; it was then carried across the Thames by a costly bridge to a new terminus (now the Ludgate Station) in Bridge Street, Blackfriars, designed, like the bridge, by Mr. Cubitt. Finally, it was in 1876 carried forward to the Holborn Viaduct, where a handsome terminus and hotel were constructed by Mr. L. H. Isaacs. There is a West-end branch, and it shares the Victoria Terminus with the London, Brighton, and South Coast Railway. It has also Continental traffic by a line of steamers from Dover, as well as one from Queensborough to Flushing.

London Coffee-house, LUDGATE HILL, between St. Martin's Church and the Old Bailey, opened January 5, 1771. Famed of old for quiet social dinners and good wine. In the early years of the London Coffee-house there was held in it a Club, where social and philosophical questions were discussed, of which Dr. Priestley was President, and Dr. Price, Benjamin Franklin, and "other honest ingenious friends" were members.1 Franklin frequently refers to the Club in his Correspondence. The London Coffee-house was at one time a great resort of Americans. Later they met at the British Coffee-house in Cockspur Street, and now at Morley's or the Langham. Leslie when he came to London as a young art-student in December 1811 stopped "for a few days at the London Coffee-house on Ludgate Hill, with Mr. Inskeep and other Americans." 2 Charles Bell, the eminent anatomist, came here on his arrival in London to push his fortunes. The father of the late John Leech was at one time landlord of the London. At one time the great room was much used for public sales. Here Old Bailey juries when detained on protracted trials were "locked-up" for the night, but allowed cigars, etc., in the great room. They are now taken to the Cannon Street Hotel. The London was closed in August 1867, and the site purchased by the Corporation of London in January 1868 for £38,500, and has since been rebuilt and reopened as an ordinary tavern. There are also other shops. A mounment to a Roman soldier, an inscribed pedestal, and other sepulchral remains have been found at the rear of the London Coffee-house.

London County Council, SPRING GARDENS. By the provisions of the Local Government Act of 1888 the Metropolitan area which had been defined by the Act of 1855 forming the Metropolitan Board of Works was constituted a county by itself; and by this same Act of 1888 the election of a Council for the administration of this newlyformed county was ordered, and all the administrative duties of the Justices of the Peace, together with all the duties belonging to the Metropolitan Board of Works, were transferred to the London County Council. The new county is carved out of portions of the counties of Middlesex, Kent, and Surrey, and these three counties are now less in area in respect to the portions respectively contributed by the new County of London. The City of London is not materially affected by the new arrangement, but the old powers of the Sheriffs of London and Middlesex, which formerly extended over the whole of Middlesex, are now curtailed. The Council was elected in December 1888, and existed at first as a Provisional Council, with the Earl of Rosebery as Chairman, and Sir John Lubbock, Bart., M.P., as Vice-Chairman. On March 21, 1889, the Metropolitan Board of Works ceased to exist, and the London County Council took over the offices in Spring Gardens and the official staff of the Metropolitan Board of Works.

1 Bigelow's Franklin, vol. ii. p. 542, etc.

2 C. R. Leslie, R.A., Autob. Recollections, vol. i. p. 29.

The Council consists of a Chairman (Lord Rosebery), a Vice-Chairman (Sir John Lubbock), a Deputy-Chairman (the latter office having a salary attached to it), 118 elected Councillors, and nineteen Aldermen chosen by the Councillors.

This mag

London Docks (The), situated on the left bank of the Thames, between ST. KATHERINE'S DOCKS and SHADWELL. The first and largest dock (John Rennie, engineer) was opened January 30, 1805; the entrance from the Thames at Shadwell, Henry R. Palmer, engineer, was made in 1831; and the New Tea Warehouses, capacious enough to receive 120,000 chests, were erected in 1844-1845. nificent establishment comprises an area of 90 acres-35 acres of water, and 12,980 feet of quay and jetty frontage, with three entrances from the Thames, viz., Hermitage, 40 feet in width; Wapping, 40 feet; and Shadwell, 45 feet. The Western Dock comprises 20 acres; the Eastern, 7 acres; and the Wapping Basin 3 acres; the Shadwell Basin and the Hermitage Basin about 5 acres. The entire structure has cost considerably over £4,000,000. The wall alone cost £65,000. Recent outlay has been chiefly on widening and deepening the entrances and other improvements. The walled-in range of dock possesses water-room for nearly 400 vessels, exclusive of lighters; warehouse-room for 220,000 tons of goods; and vault-room for 60,000 pipes of wine. The tobacco warehouse alone covers 5 acres. They are rented by the Government and will contain 24,000 hogsheads of 1200 lbs. each. The "Kiln" at the north-east corner of the warehouses is employed for burning damaged and contraband tobacco, and being constructed with a long chimney for carrying off the smoke is popularly known as "The Queen's Tobacco Pipe," but other condemned and illicit goods-jewellery, watches, gloves, and even hams are indifferently consumed in it. The wine vaults are of great extent. This is the great depôt for the stock of wines belonging to the wine merchants of London. Other warehouses are numerous, extensive, and commodious. They often afford busy and curious scenes, but do not materially differ from those of other docks.

He who wishes to behold one of the most extraordinary and least known scenes of this metropolis should wend his way to the London Dock gates at half-past seven in the morning. There he will see congregated within the principal entrance masses of men of all grades, looks, and kinds. There are decayed and bankrupt master butchers, master bakers, publicans, grocers, old soldiers, old sailors, Polish refugees, broken-down gentlemen, discharged lawyers' clerks, suspended Government clerks, almsmen, pensioners, servants, thieves-indeed, every one who wants a loaf and is willing to work for it. The London Dock is one of the few places in the metropolis where men can get employment without either character or recommendation.— Henry Mayhew, London Labour and the London Poor.

During the summer of 1889 work at the docks was brought to a standstill in consequence of the Dockers' strike.

Prior to 1868 the number of ships which entered the docks averaged upwards of a thousand yearly, with an aggregate burden of

nearly half a million tons. In that year the London and the St. Katherine Dock Companies amalgamated [see St. Katherine Docks], and the accounts of the two docks have not since been kept separately.

Mode of Admission.-The basins and shipping are open to the public, but to inspect the vaults and warehouses an order must be obtained from the Secretary at the London and St. Katherine Dock Company's Office, No. 109 Leadenhall Street, or with a "tasting order," to be obtained of your wine merchant if he has wine in bond in the dock-vaults; but tasting in the vaults should be indulged in discreetly.

London Female Penitentiary, No. 166 PENTONVILLE ROAD. Founded 1807, "to afford an asylum to fallen young women, who are themselves anxious to return to a good and useful life." The number of inmates ranges between seventy and eighty, who are trained with a view to their becoming qualified to earn a respectable maintenance on leaving the asylum.

London Fever Hospital, LIVERPOOL ROAD, ISLINGTON, instituted 1801, for the gratuitous admission of poor persons (not being paupers) labouring under contagious fever, and residing in London or its neighbourhood. Working men or their families are immediately admitted and treated gratuitously without a letter of recommendation. It is "the only hospital in London for the special treatment and prevention of contagious fevers amongst persons who are not paupers." There are 200 beds, and 982 patients were under treatment in the hospital in 1887.

London Fire Brigade, the name borne by the Fire Brigade until it was transferred from the Fire Insurance Companies to the Metropolitan Board of Works. [See Metropolitan Fire Brigade.] The Salvage Corps was connected with the London Fire Brigade, but was not transferred to the Metropolitan Board of Works. It continues to be maintained by the Fire Insurance Companies, and there are several stations in different parts of London.

London Gazette Office, No. 45 ST. MARTIN'S LANE. The London Gazette-the only official organ of the Government-for notices, promotions, appointments, declarations of bankruptcy, etc.-is published every Tuesday and Friday. It was first established at Oxford in 1665, when the Court was in that city, during the Great Plague of London. It was continued on the return of the Court to town, the title being changed from the Oxford to the London Gazette. The first number of the London Gazette was No. 24 of the Oxford Gazette.

London Hospital, WHITECHAPEL ROAD, for the medical and surgical relief of the sick and injured poor, and especially workmen, seamen in the merchant service, and their wives and children. It was instituted November 2, 1740, as the London Infirmary, in a large house

in Prescot Street, Goodman's Fields (afterwards the Magdalen Hospital), but outgrowing the capacity of that building, a new site was purchased "in an airy situation, near the Mount in Whitechapel Road," and the first stone of a more capacious and more commodious building was laid on June 10, 1752, when the front portion was erected; it was added to from 1758 to 1760, when £18,000 was expended. Boulton Mainwaring was the surveyor, 1761-1771, when another £18,500 was expended. £23,000 was expended in 1781-1783 under John Spiller. The London Hospital is now one of the largest and most efficient of these valuable institutions in London. The latest additions to the building have been the West or Alexandra Wing, of which the Prince of Wales (accompanied by the Princess, after whom it was named) laid the first stone on July 4, 1864; this was designed by Charles Barry, architect; and the Grocers' Company's Wing-so named from the company having commenced the subscription for its erection with the handsome donation of £25,000-was opened by the Queen on March 7, 1876. The hospital now maintains no fewer than 776 beds, yet being "the only large general hospital for the eastern division of the metropolis," the governors assure us that "its resources are constantly taxed to the utmost." The hospital has some special features. Standing in the midst of a manufacturing and commercial district, the cases of "accidents received are more numerous than at any three other large metropolitan hospitals combined. It is also the largest hospital for children in London, about 1000 being annually admitted as in-patients, and a very much larger number being treated as out-patients. There is likewise a Hebrew Ward, for treatment of sick and injured persons of the Jewish faith. The hospital is virtually free; no accident or urgent case is ever refused admission, and while patients are admitted by governors' and subscribers' tickets, nearly three-fourths of the in-patients are admitted without any such recommendation. The number of in-patients treated in 1887 was 8260. The out-patients numbered 95,760. The yearly cost of maintenance is over £40,000; the funded and other property produces less than £14,000, leaving nearly £30,000 to be provided annually by subscriptions and donations. Connected with and to the south of the hospital is a large medical school.

Attached as an appendage to the hospital is a most valuable institution called the Samaritan Society, which sends to a convalescent home, or provides with other suitable assistance, "domestic servants, mechanics, labourers and others, who through sickness or accident have been obliged to quit their places to go into the hospital, and on being discharged have no home to go to or friends to receive them. It assists other discharged patients who have lost their furniture, or through sickness been compelled to sell or pawn their clothes or tools; in cases of amputation supplies wooden legs, etc., and takes care that no patient who requires a truss shall leave the hospital without being supplied with one."