And gazing, murmured, ‘Ah, the hills are fair,
But not the hills of Rome.’”
Mary E. Coleridge.
CHAPTER III
WALLS, GATES AND BRIDGE
“Gem of all Joy and Jasper of Jocundity, Strong be thy walls that about thee stand; London, thou art the flower of cities all.”
William Dunbar.
THE walls, gates and bastions of the City may be traced by the record of early maps such as that of Braun and Hogenberg. The bastions of the east side are particularly shown on a plan of Holy Trinity Priory made in the sixteenth century; the west side from Ludgate to Cripplegate plainly appears in Hollar’s plan after the fire, 1667. There were two bastions between Ludgate and Newgate, then an angle bastion to the north; three more on the straight length to Aldersgate, then one beyond that gate at the angle where the wall turned north again; two bastions occurred between this angle and the bastion at the corner where the wall again turned east, which now exists in Cripplegate Churchyard.
Several of the gates stood until 1760. In an old MS. book of notes I find under the heading “Remarkable Transactions in ye Mayoralty of Sir J. Chitty.”—“In July, ye gates of Aldgate, Cripplegate and Ludgate were sold by public auction in ye council chamber, Guildhall, and were accordingly taken down without obstructing either ye foot or cartway, and their sites laid into ye streets. Aldgate for £157, 10s.; Cripplegate, £93; and Ludgate for £148.” Many old drawings of parts of the wall are preserved in the Crace, the Archer and other collections. The exact line of the wall and positions of the bastions has been verified by modern excavations and discoveries. For full description and a plan, see the Victoria County History and Archæologia, lxii. (1912). A good description of what was visible in 1855 is given in The Builder for that year.
