Thus we read in one of the "News Letters" of Charles the Second's time, under date of 1666: "Last Monday week in Holborn Fields, while several gentlemen were travelling to Newmarkett, to the Races there, a Highway Man very politely begg'd their Purses, for he said he was advis'd that he should win a great Sum if he adventur'd some guineas with the Competers at New-Market on a certain horse call'd 'Boopeepe,' which my Lord Excetter was to run a match. He was so pressing that they resign'd their Money to his keeping (not without sight of his pistols); he telling them that, if they would give him their names and the names of the places where they might be found, he would return to them that had Lent, at usury. It is thought that his Venture was not favourable, for the Gentlemen have not receiv'd neither Principle nor Interest. It is thought that it was Monsieur Claud Du Vall, or one of his knot, that Ventur'd the Gentlemen's money for them."
Not only have all those lanes disappeared in the long ago, but even such comparatively late landmarks as Kingsgate Street are no more: Kingsgate Street, the home of Sairey—"which her name is well beknownst is S. Gamp."
A little distance further westward, the Londoner not deeply versed in the ancient lore of the metropolis is greatly surprised at finding High Holborn curving boldly to the left and departing in the most marked manner from that straight line to the west traced nowadays by New Oxford Street. He does not know, or does not stop to consider, that New Oxford Street really is new, as newness in streets goes. It is, in fact, not older than 1847. Before it was made, there was no good through-route between the City and Tyburn, and the line of road went by a circuitous course, still easily traced—by High Holborn, Broad Street, and High Street, Bloomsbury. Passing under the very shadow of the Church of St. Giles—anciently "St. Giles-in-the-Fields"—the road again fell into the straight line opposite Tottenham Court Road.
The reason for this curious departure from the direct course is thought to have been the existence in ancient times of a lake, or marsh—a certain "Rugmere" mentioned in old records—covering the site of what is now New Oxford Street. However that may have been, this marsh must in course of centuries have dried up, for the site was built upon in later ages.
It was not an idyllic village that by degrees came into existence here. It formed an annexe to St. Giles's, a village itself associated from remote times with undesirables. A leper hospital was one of the early features of the place, and poverty and crime in later years came to roost by natural selection there; until, in fact, the proverbial conjunction of St. James's and St. Giles's, indicating the opposite extremes of aristocratic elegance and unredeemed vulgar squalor, was coined out of its flagrant raggedness and dirt. The particular spot through which New Oxford Street runs, was the deepest deep of that foul slum. Drink and depravity met there and flourished. It was generally known, this very microcosm of criminal life, as "The Rookery," but satirists called it, in obvious contrast with its real character, the "Holy Land." None dared venture into that select purlieu, except under police protection; and London breathed more freely when, in 1844, it was at last decided to remove this long-threatened plague-spot. Three years later, the new thoroughfare was opened; the improvement had cost no less a sum than £290,227 4s. 10d., of which £113,963 went to the Duke of Bedford, as compensation, although the work had the effect of increasing the value of his adjoining property. The transaction is an eloquent instance of the marvellous and continued success of the Russell family in feeding fat upon the body politic, like lice upon the corporeal body. It does not appear that, although His Grace was advantaged thus enormously, both by betterment and by compensation, the unfortunate owners and occupiers of houses and business premises in those highways suddenly converted into byways received any of the much-needed compensation for the "worsement" they suffered. For when New Oxford Street was made, the fortunes of High Street, Bloomsbury, of Broad Street, and of the circuitous part of High Holborn were at once shattered, and they at one stroke became the byways they have ever since remained.
Swift, in his ballad of "Clever Tom Clinch," mentions the "Bowl" inn, at which the convict called "for a bottle of sack." This was a house that stood at the corner of what is now Endell Street and Broad Street. For "sack," which Swift probably used for the sake of the rhyme with "come back," read ale, and the verse is true to facts; for the processions halted at the "Bowl" ale house, and the criminals were offered a drink of ale; and it does not seem ever to be recorded of them that they refused it. Perhaps they took with them memories of the old saying, that "the saddler of Bawtry was hanged for leaving his ale": an unfortunate occurrence directly attributable to his ill-humour. No one knows what the saddler had done, but he was to die for it, and being led out to York's execution place, on Knavesmire, turned from the drink offered him on the way. He had been effectually hanged only a minute or two, when an unexpected reprieve came by a hurried messenger; too late.
All the good-plucked ones on their way to Tyburn, were not only expected to take their ale, but to make that joke about "coming back" to pay for it. It was as essential and as conventional as the clown's, "Here we are again!" Some surly ruffian might be moved, once in a way, to drain the bowl, fling it empty at the landlord, and bid him "wait for payment till he met him in H—ll"; but that was ungentlemanly, and the assignation not certain of fulfilment. Sometimes it would happen that one of these travellers going on to dance upon nothing at Tyburn would make variations upon the old theme; but nothing seems to have been quite so neat as the last remark of an atrocious villain, Tom Austin, who, when he stood with the rope round his neck, replied to the Ordinary's query if he had anything to say before he died: "Nothing: only there's a woman yonder with some curds and whey, and I wish I could have a pennyworth of them before I am hanged, because I don't know when I shall see any again."