"When I have been upon the 'Change" (such are the concluding words of the paper), "I have often fancied one of our old kings standing in person where he is represented in effigy, and looking down upon the wealthy concourse of people with which that place is every day filled. In this case, how would he be surprised to hear all the languages of Europe spoken in this little spot of his former dominions, and to see so many private men, who in his time would have been the vassals of some powerful baron, negotiating, like princes, for greater sums of money than were formerly to be met with in the royal treasury! Trade, without enlarging the British territories, has given us a kind of additional empire. It has multiplied the number of the rich, made our landed estates infinitely more valuable than they were formerly, and added to them an accession of other estates as valuable as the land themselves." (Spectator, No. 69.)
It appears, from one of Steele's contributions to the Spectator, that so late as the year 1712 the shops continued to present undiminished attraction. They were then 160 in number, and, letting at £20 or £30 each, formed, in all, a yearly rent of £4,000: so, at least, it is stated on a print published in 1712, of which a copy may be seen in Mr. Crowle's "Pennant." Steele, in describing the adventures of a day, relates that, in the course of his rambles, he went to divert himself on 'Change. "It was not the least of my satisfaction in my survey," says he, "to go upstairs and pass the shops of agreeable females; to observe so many pretty hands busy in the folding of ribbons, and the utmost eagerness of agreeable faces in the sale of patches, pins, and wires, on each side of the counters, was an amusement in which I could longer have indulged myself, had not the dear creatures called to me, to ask what I wanted."
"On evening 'Change," says Steele, "the mumpers, the halt, the blind, and the lame; your vendors of trash, apples, plums; your ragamuffins, rake-shames, and wenches—have jostled the greater number of honourable merchants, substantial tradesmen, and knowing masters of ships, out of that place. So that, what with the din of squallings, oaths, and cries of beggars, men of the greatest consequence in our City absent themselves from the Royal Exchange."
The cost of the second Exchange to the City and Mercers' Company is estimated by Strype at £80,000, but Mr. Burgon calculates it at only £69,979 11s. The shops in the Exchange, leading to a loss, were forsaken about 1739, and eventually done away with some time after by the unwise Act of 1768, which enabled the City authorities to pull down Gresham College. From time to time frequent repairs were made in Jerman's building. Those effected between the years 1819 and 1824 cost £34,390. This sum included the cost of a handsome gate tower and cupola, erected in 1821, from the design of George Smith, Esq., surveyor to the Mercers' Company, in lieu of Jerman's dilapidated wooden tower.
The clock of the second Exchange, set up by Edward Stanton, under the direction of Dr. Hooke, had chimes with four bells, playing six, and latterly seven tunes. The sound and tunable bells were bought for £6 5s. per cwt. The balconies from the inner pawn into the quadrangle cost about £300. The signs over the shops were not hung, but were over the doors.
Caius Gabriel Cibber, the celebrated Danish sculptor, was appointed carver of the royal statues of the piazza, but Gibbons executed the statue of Charles II. for the quadrangle. Bushnell, the mad sculptor of the fantastic statues on Temple Bar, carved statues for the Cornhill front, as we have before mentioned. The statue of Gresham in the arcade was by Cibber; George III., in the piazza, was sculptured by Wilton; George I. and II. were by Rysbrach.
The old clock had four dials, and chimed four times daily. The chimes played at three, six, nine, and twelve o'clock—on Sunday, "The 104th Psalm;" Monday, "God save the King;" Tuesday, "The Waterloo March;" Wednesday, "There's nae Luck aboot the Hoose;" Thursday, "See the Conquering Hero comes;" Friday, "Life let us cherish;" Saturday, "Foot Guards' March."
The outside shops of the second Exchange were lottery offices, newspaper offices, watchmakers, notaries, stockbrokers, &c. The shops in the galleries were superseded by the Royal Exchange Assurance Offices, Lloyd's Coffee-house, the Merchant Seamen's Offices, the Gresham Lecture Room, and the Lord Mayor's Court Office. "The latter," says Timbs, "was a row of offices, divided by glazed partitions, the name of each attorney being inscribed in large capitals upon a projecting board. The vaults were let to bankers, and to the East India Company for the stowage of pepper."