This company is governed by a Master, two Wardens, and twenty-one Assistants, to whom belong a livery of 144 members, whose fine is 16l. The Apothecaries have the privilege of being exempt from parish and ward offices.
Apothecaries Hall. This edifice is situated in Blackfriars, and has a pair of gates leading into an open court handsomely paved with broad stones, at the upper end of which is the hall built with brick and stone, and adorned with columns of the Tuscan order. The ceiling of the court room and hall is ornamented with fret work, and the latter wainscotted fourteen feet high. In the hall room is the portraiture of King James I. and also the bust of Dr. Gideon Delaun, that King’s apothecary, who was a considerable benefactor to the company. In this building are two large laboratories, one chemical, and the other for galenical preparations, where vast quantities of the best medicines are prepared, for the use of apothecaries and others, and particularly of the Surgeons of the royal navy, who here make up their chests.
The Apothecaries company have a spacious and beautiful physic garden at Chelsea, which contains almost four acres, and is enriched with a vast variety of plants both domestic and exotic. This was given by Sir Hans Sloane, Bart. on condition of their paying a quit rent of 5l. per annum, and annually delivering to the President and Fellows of the Royal Society, at one of their public meetings, fifty specimens of different sorts of plants, well cured, and of the growth of this garden, till the number of specimens amounts to 2000.
Appleby’s court, Barnaby street.†
Applebee’s School is kept in St. Saviour’s churchyard in Southwark, and was founded in 1681 by Mrs. Dorothy Applebee, who endowed it with 20l. per annum, for instructing thirty poor boys in reading, writing and arithmetic.
Appletree yard, York street, St. James’s square.‡
Arch row, the west side of Lincoln’s inn fields.
Archbishop’s wall, near Lambeth.
Arch yard, Harrison’s court, near Brook street.
Archdeacon. As the bishopric of London includes the ancient kingdom of the East Saxons, which contained the counties of Middlesex, Essex, and part of Hertfordshire, it has five archdeaconries, viz. those of London, Essex, Middlesex, Colchester, and St. Alban’s. It is the office of these Archdeacons to visit annually the several cures in their respective archdeaconries, in order to enquire into the deportment of the several incumbents, as well as parish officers; to advise them gravely to reform what is amiss, and in case of contumacy to inflict pains and penalties, for which they receive procuration from every parish priest within their jurisdiction.