CHAPTER V.
In our last interview you saw me firmly and proudly established in my new home in Threadneedle[1]-street.
By this move I became a parishioner of St. Christopher le Stocks, whose church and burial-ground were quite close to my new house.
It was but a small parish of ninety-two houses at the time of my entering it.
The church was old, for mention is made of it as early as 1368. I cannot give you many particulars about it except that it was rebuilt or renovated in 1462, and that it was slightly injured by the Great Fire in 1666.
It had a certain sort of melancholy interest for me, for it was the burial-place of many who had been my early friends, among others, the Houblon family.
The living, which was in the gift of the bishops of London, was worth only £120 per annum; not a very rich one, you will say.
To save returning to the subject of this parish again, I will tell you now how it is that at the present moment you see neither church nor churchyard, neither parish nor parishioner of St. Christopher le Stocks.
The increase in my duties and the variety of work put upon me, rendered the size of my house wholly insufficient for the purpose, therefore, from time to time, as opportunity offered, I purchased houses in the parish, power to do so being granted me by Acts of Parliament, and so rapidly were my purchases made that in fifty years from the time of my settling in Threadneedle-street, I owned the whole parish of St. Christopher le Stocks, save and except seven houses on the west side of Princes-street and the church and burial ground. And of the rates and taxes of the parish I paid five-sixths of the whole.
Even with this extension of room I could not get on, and an Act was passed vesting the glebe land and parsonage belonging to the rector of the parish in the governor and directors of the Bank of England.