|
|
VIEWS FROM A TRIP AROUND THE WORLD
#1 - LONDON, ENGLAND
Size: 3" x 5"
Copyrighted: 1891
Lithographer: Joseph P. Knapp
  
Illustrations: Westminster Abbey; View of London; Parliament; Tower of London
| Reverse - Text |
Left section:
GRIND
YOUR COFFEE AT HOME
Right section: |
| LONDON, ENGLAND. |
| The site of this
commanding city was anciently a
trading place between the Britons
and their Gallic neighbors. At
the close of the stormy periods
of vicissitude, begun with the
Roman conquest and ended with the
Norman retreat, it became the
Capital of the Kingdom. The
original city is of moderate
extent, probably included within
the old Roman walls. The rapid
accumulation of dwellings now
constituting the metropolis, is
shown by the fact that maps of
the Elizabethan date give fields
and open country north and west
of the Strand, and on the south
bank of the river. The dwellings
of the nobility were then
principally on the Strand--these
localities being still preserved
in the names of streets leading
toward the river, such as
Arundel, and Surrey. |
| Waterloo
Bridge, with its grandeur of form
and massive solidity, suggestive
of Roman dignity, is a most
impressive sight to a stranger.
Prior to Westminister Bridge,
commenced in 1739, London Bridge
was the only fixed connection
between the north and south banks
of the Thames. The change in the
city's streets and buildings
compelled by the ravages of the
great fire in 1666, and lesser
ones since that date, have
wrought their present solid and
permanent character. At the
commencement of the present
century the squares of which the
British Museum is the nucleus
were not in existence.
Westminister Abbey, the noted
shrine of the ashes of England's
illustrious dead, is on the site
of a church built by Sebert, King
of the East Saxons (or Essex) in
the seventh century. After
several demolishings and
reconstructions, it assumed its
present outline under Henry III,
and was further developed until
the erection of the superb Chapel
of Henry VII, and the western
towers by Sir Christopher Wren,
also the architect of St. Paul's.
St. Paul's is, without exception,
the grandest building of its kind
in the kingdom. The height of the
dome to the top of the cross is
404 feet. The Houses of
Parliament are in the new Palace
at Westminister, where stands the
famous Victoria Tower. |
| Population 1890, 4,421,661. |
|
|
