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these pence are said to have amounted to £400 per annum,
and a visit was paid to Bethlehem in much the same way as
to the lions at the Tower. The lunacy laws and the administration
of the hospitals and asylums are not yet perfect, but
the unfortunate lunatics are certainly now treated with a
humanity which was unthought of two hundred years ago.
County Lunatic Asylums, and Poor Law Infirmaries and
Dispensaries, are growths of almost the present generation.
Closely allied to the public health is the question of the
water supply. The only water company then existing was the
New River Company, which had completed the grand scheme
of Sir Hugh Myddleton in 1613, but was not able to supply
private houses more than twice a week as late as 1682. Before
Sir Hugh Myddleton's project was carried into effect, the
inhabitants received no better supply than could be obtained
from a conduit or the River Thames, and for this purpose the
apprentices, who then formed a noteworthy, if not an important,
portion of the community, were each provided with a
tankard for conveying water from one of these sources to
their masters' houses. The wells and streams from which
the Londoners anciently derived their supply of water are in
many instances commemorated in the localities, such as
Clerkenwell, Holborn, Tyburn, Marylebone, &c. One of the
earliest, if not the first, of the conduits in the City was
supplied with water from Tyburn.
The fashionable promenades were mainly confined to St.
James's Park and Hyde Park. The following extract from
"Tom Brown's Amusements of London" (1700) will give
some idea of the appearance of St. James's Park at that time.
The Green Walk, it may be mentioned, lay between the Mall
and the park wal :—
The Green Walk afforded a variety of discourses from persons of both
sexes. Here walked a beau bareheaded, here a French fop with both his
hands in his pockets, carrying all his pleated coat before to shew his silk