“Nevertheless, Master Stow, the City is more prosperous than before.”
“I know not; I know not,” he said impatiently. “What do I know about wealth and prosperity? Let us go on.” So he left off talking about the churches and monasteries and pointed to the houses beyond the Wall. “The suburbs,” he said, “have not greatly increased of late years. There has been too much plague among us. And, indeed, it would seem that we are never to be rid of plague. The Queen’s Council forbade the building of new houses. As well forbid the rising of the tide. There are now—as you can plainly see—a line of cottages on both sides of the road as far as Whitechapel Church. But who is to hinder? There is a line of houses along the riverside as far as Ratcliffe and even Limehouse, where once were elms so noble. But who is there to hinder? Masterless men are they, and sea-faring men and common cheats and rogues, who live beside the river, beyond the jurisdiction of the Mayor and safe from the wholesome cart tail and the penance of pillory.
[Illustration: A True and Exact Draught of the TOWER LIBERTIES, survey’d in the Year 1597 by _Gulielmus Haiward_ and _J. Gascoyne_.
“Pleasant it was, in those old days,” he went on, “to overlook the quiet nuns from the Wall. There were no whispers against those holy Sisters, and no scandals. We loved to look upon them in their gardens quiet and peaceful. They prayed for the City, the nuns of St. Clare, of St. Helen’s, and of Holywell. Now every man prays for himself. There were also the monks in their cloisters, walking and reading and meditating. Some there were who called the monks devourers and drones. I know not. Their prayers were asked for the dead and for the living. No one prays now for the dead, and no one asks where they lie or how they fare. Drones and devourers! They were gentlemen all by birth,—why should they work?”
It was, indeed, surprising to see the ruins of the Houses, nor had I understood, until I walked round the Wall and observed the ruins, how many there were, or how great was the destruction when the masterful King turned out the monks and nuns and gave their houses to his favourites and his courtiers. “They have taken” said Stow, “all they wanted of the stones. What are left will vanish little by little.”