Before the end of July Havre was lost.[1504] The garrison had been attacked by a plague, which for more than a twelvemonth had been rampant in London,[1505] and the Earl of Warwick, the commander of the town, found himself compelled to accept such terms as he could obtain. The garrison was allowed to leave with all munitions of war. Whilst proclaiming to her subjects the surrender of the town—not through any cowardice on the part of the garrison, but owing to a "plage of infectuous mortall sickness"[pg 492] inflicted by the Almighty—Elizabeth pleaded for tender care and charity to be shown to the soldiers on their return, due precaution being taken by the principal officers of every city, town and parish against the spread of infection.[1506]
Peace between England and France signed, 13 April, 1564.
The approaching end of the war with France is foreshadowed by an order of the Court of Aldermen (25 Nov., 1563) touching the re-delivery to the various civic companies of the "harness" which they severally provided for the war, and which had been forwarded from Portsmouth and was lying in the Guildhall Chapel.[1507] Peace was signed on the 13th April, 1564, and on the 31st July a proclamation was issued for disbanding the navy.[1508] Throughout the war Elizabeth had been careful to keep on good terms with Spain, and English vessels found molesting Spanish ships under pretext of searching for French goods were ordered to be arrested.[1509] An interruption of commerce with Flanders had been threatened, owing to the Duchess of Parma having forbidden the importation of English woollen cloth into the Low Countries for fear of infection from the plague, but Elizabeth retaliated by closing English ports to all Flemish vessels, and matters were accommodated.[1510]
The restoration of St. Paul's Cathedral, 1561-1565.
The period of peace and tranquillity which ensued enabled the citizens to bestow more attention on their own affairs. Their cathedral stood in urgent need of repairs. Its steeple had been struck by lightning in 1561, and 3,000 marks had already been[pg 493] expended on its restoration.[1511] An application to the City from the lord treasurer in 1565 for a sum of £300 towards roofing one of the aisles of the cathedral came as a surprise to the Court of Aldermen, who caused enquiries to be made as to the receipt and delivery of contributions already made, and returned for answer that the City of London had long ago delivered "all such mony as the sayd cyty dyd at eny tyme grant or agree to geve or paye towards the sayd work." His lordship was desired "no further to charge or burden the sayd cytye wth the payment of any more mony towards the sayd work."[1512] Nevertheless the City was called upon for a further contribution two years later (June, 1567), when negotiations were entered into between the City, the Bishop of London and the Dean and Chapter of Saint Paul's, which ended in the Corporation agreeing to find forty foders of lead for roofing the south aisle of the cathedral, and lending a sum of £150 to the bishop and the dean and chapter, on condition the latter granted a further lease to the City of the manor of Finsbury for a term of 200 years beyond the term yet unexpired.[1513] Whilst repairs were being carried out in the cathedral itself, something was also being done outside the building to render the accommodation for hearing the sermons preached at Paul's Cross more convenient for the mayor and aldermen and municipal officers. A gutter[pg 494] which conducted rainwater upon the heads of the lord mayor's suite at sermon time was removed; the bench on which the civic officials sat was enlarged for their better convenience, and places erected for the accommodation of aldermen's wives.[1514]
Sir Thomas Gresham and the City Burse. 1565-1566.
The rapid increase of commerce under the fostering care of Elizabeth rendered the erection of a Burse or Exchange for the accommodation of merchants "to treate of their feate of merchandyzes" a pressing necessity. The matter had been mooted thirty years before, but little had been done beyond ascertaining the opinion of merchants as to the most convenient site.[1515] The project, however, took root in the mind of Sir Richard Gresham, an alderman of the city, whose business had occasionally carried him to Antwerp, where he became familiar with the Burse that had been recently set up there, and in 1537 (the year that he was elected mayor) he forwarded to Thomas Cromwell, then lord privy seal, a design for a similar Burse to be erected in London. Finding little or no attention paid to his communication he again (25 July, 1538) wrote to Cromwell suggesting the erection of a Burse in Lombard Street—the site favoured by city merchants—at a cost of £2,000. If the lord privy seal would but bring pressure to bear upon Sir George Monoux, a brother alderman but a man of "noe gentyll nature," to part with certain property at cost price, he (Gresham) would undertake[pg 495] to raise £1,000 towards the building before he went out of office, and he would himself carry Cromwell's letter to Monoux and "handle him" as best he could.[1516] This application had the desired effect. On the 13th August Henry VIII addressed a letter to Monoux desiring him to dispose of certain tenements about Lombard Street which were required for the commonweal of merchants of the city, and to come to terms with Gresham as to the amount to be paid for them. Both parties having referred the matter to Sir Richard Rich, Chancellor of the Court of Augmentations of the Crown, as arbitrator, the City agreed to pay a yearly sum of twenty marks for the houses that were required. Monoux refusing to accept this sum, another letter was despatched to him from the king urging him not to stand in the way of a project so useful to merchants and tending so much to the "beautifitye" of the city. To this second appeal Monoux gave way, and received the cordial thanks of Henry by letter dated the 25th November.[1517] Nothing more was done in the matter until it was taken up many years later by Sir Thomas Gresham, son of Sir Richard.[1518] Acting, as he did for a long succession of years, as Queen Elizabeth's agent in Flanders, Sir Thomas spent much of his time in Antwerp.[1519] When he was not there himself he[pg 496] employed a factor in the person of Richard Clough to conduct his affairs. In 1561 this Richard Clough, in a letter addressed to his principal from Antwerp (31 Dec.),[1520] expressed much astonishment at the City of London being so far behind continental towns:—"Consideryng what a sittey London ys, and that in so many yeres they have nott founde the menes to make a bourse! but must walke in the raine, when ytt raineth, more lyker pedlers then marchants; and in thys countrie, and all other, there is no kynde of pepell that have occasion to meete, butt they have a plase meete for that pourpose." Indeed, Clough got quite excited over the thought that London, of all cities in the world, possessed no decent accommodation for merchants transacting their everyday business, and declared his readiness to build "so fere a bourse in London as the grett bourse is in Andwarpe" and that "withhoutt molestyng of any man more than he shulld be well dysposyd to geve."
It was not long before Gresham made up his mind that London should have a Burse, and in May, 1563, the Court of Aldermen deputed Lionel Duckett, who was also a mercer, to sound Gresham as to "his benevolence towards the makyng of a burse."[1521] But however desirous Gresham might be to prosecute the work, he was prevented from doing so by stress of business. Commercial difficulties arose between England and the Low Countries owing to the proclamation of the Duchess of Parma. Up to the year 1564 Gresham was forced to make Antwerp his place of abode, and could only occasionally visit London;[pg 497] since that time, however, his business allowed him to look upon London as his permanent residence, and he only crossed over to Antwerp when special circumstances rendered it necessary. An additional reason for the delay in carrying out Gresham's project may perhaps be found in the fact that, during his absence on the queen's business in 1563, Elizabeth had, with her usual parsimony, cut down Gresham's allowance of twenty shillings a day for "his diets." Gresham complained bitterly of this abridgment of his income in a letter to Secretary Cecil, and also in another letter couched in more guarded terms to the queen herself.[1522] In both letters he set out the sum total of the money (£830,000) which he had negotiated for the queen, and referred to his having broken a leg in her majesty's service and to his declining years. Whatever may have been the cause of the delay, it was not until the 4th January, 1565, that a definite offer was made by Gresham to erect a "comely burse" at his own cost and charge, provided the City would furnish a suitable site. This offer was accepted.[1523]
Difficulties of obtaining a site.
Difficulties at once presented themselves in finding a site. It was originally proposed to obtain from the Merchant Taylors' Company a plot of land between Lombard Street and Cornhill, but the company refused to part with the property and a new site had to be chosen.[1524] No sooner was this done, and a place selected to the north of Cornhill, than a difficulty arose between the City and the Dean and Chapter of Canterbury as to the terms of purchase.[1525] This having been successfully overcome and the site purchased,[pg 498] the next step was to invite subscriptions, not only from members of the livery companies, but from merchant adventurers beyond the sea.[1526] Such a liberal response was made to this invitation[1527] that on the 7th June, 1566, Sir Thomas Gresham was able to lay the first stone of the new building, a deed of trust between the City and Gresham having previously (14 May) been executed.[1528]