Scilly Islands. A Spanish Ambassador was among the later residents, and afterwards the house was for a time an hotel. In the large drawing-room the ceiling was painted by Angelica Kauffmann. The Duke of Argyll, the Earl of Bradford, and Speaker Onslow, were among its tenants. This house is now the offices of Messrs. Crosse and Blackwell. The painted ceiling was carefully taken down and saved from destruction by one of the heads of the firm. The chief articles of interest remaining are a handsome overmantel in one of the private rooms of the firm, and a curious ceiling. The former is of wood, and is varnished and painted in various tones of bronze and gold. The carving upon it is very elaborate and enigmatical. The panelled ceiling has some affinity with it, but has been modernized, and is not so interesting. The front of the house remains as it was, and claims to be the only original frontage in the square.

The centre of the square, when first laid out, was occupied by a fountain surmounted by a statue of Charles II. in armour, the work of Colley Cibber. Clinch in "Soho and its Associations" mentions a document of 1748, still extant, in which are recorded the subscriptions made by the inhabitants to replace the wooden palisades round the square by iron railings. This is headed by £300 from the Duke of Portland, and among the names are those of many titled and influential people, showing that fashion had not then migrated westward. It was on the doorstep of a house in the square that De Quincey sank dying of exhaustion and starvation during his first novitiate of London life, and he was only saved by his faithful companion Ann.

PART II
PICCADILLY AND ST. JAMES'S SQUARE

Returning from Soho Square to Piccadilly Circus, we find ourselves in the parish of St. James's, Piccadilly, which takes in all the now fashionable shopping locality of Regent Street, and is bounded on the east and south by St. Anne's, Soho, and St. Martin's-in-the-Fields, and on the west by St. George's, Hanover Square.

St. James's parish was separated from St. Martin's in 1685, but before that epoch it had begun to have an existence of its own. Faithorne and Newcourt's map of London, 1658, shows us open ground from a double row of trees at Pall Mall to Piccadilly; Piccadilly is marked "from Knightsbridge unto Piccadilly Hall." Opposite the palace, at the foot of the present St. James's Street, are a few houses, including Berkshire (now Bridgewater) House, and there are a few more at the eastern extremity of Pall Mall. At the north-eastern corner of what we call the Haymarket is the "Gaming House," and at the corners adjacent one or two more buildings. This is St. James's in its earliest stage, before the tide of fashion had moved so far westward. Henry Jermyn, Earl of St Albans, in the reign of Charles II. obtained a building lease of forty-five acres in St. James's Fields and projected the square, which became the nucleus of the parish.

Piccadilly.—There is no authentic derivation for this curious name, though many fancy suggestions have been made. The most probable of these is that which connects it with the peccadilloes or ruffs worn by the gallants of Charles II.'s time. Pennant traced the name to piccadillas, turnovers or cakes which were sold at Piccadilla Hall, at the upper end of the Haymarket.

In Thomas Blount's "Glossographia" we read: "Pickadil ... the round hem or the several divisions set together about the skirt of a garment or other thing; also a kinde of stiff collar made in fashion of a Bande. Hence perhaps that famous ordinary near St. James called Peckadilly took denomination because it was then the utmost or skirt house of the suburbs that way, others say it took its name from this, that one Higgins a tailor who built it got most of his estate by Pickadilles, which in the last age were much worn in England." There seems to be no other foundation than Mr. Blount's lively imagination for "Higgins a tailor."

There is as much confusion about the first date at which the name was used as there is about its derivation. Whether the hall took its name from its situation or the district from the hall will probably ever remain in doubt. The earliest occurrence of the name is in 1636, by which time the hall was built. The gaming-house was at a later time also known as Piccadilly, which has increased the confusion. Some writers have identified the hall and the gaming-house, but there seems to be no doubt that these were two separate buildings. The former was a private house standing at the corners of Windmill and Coventry Streets. The latter seems to have been built by Robert Baker, and sold by his widow to Colonel Panton, who built Panton Street. It was otherwise known as Shaver's Hall, and had a tennis-court and upper and lower bowling-green, and was a very fashionable place of resort. The secondary name probably emanated from the proprietor's former trade, but it is said to have stuck to the place after Lord Dunbar lost £3,000 at one sitting, when people said a Northern lord had been shaved here.

Sir John Suckling was among the habitués of the place, and his sisters will ever be remembered from Aubrey's pathetically humorous description of their coming "to the Peccadillo bowling-green crying for feare he should lose all [their] portions," as he was a great gamester.

The name Piccadilly appears to have begun at the east end, near the circus, and spread over the whole, a fact which is in favour of its being derived from the house, not the name of the house from the locality.

Regent Street is Nash's great memorial. The conception is undoubtedly fine, namely, a vast avenue to lead from Carlton House to a country mansion to be built for George IV. in Regent's Park. Nash's great idea, the combining of many separate buildings into one uniform façade, is here seen at its best. At first a lengthy colonnade supported by columns 16 feet high ran on either side of the quadrant, but this darkened the shops, so it was removed. The street is famous for its shops, which line it from end to end; it has also the merit of being wider than most of the London streets.

The part of the parish lying to the east of Regent Street is quite uninteresting except for Golden Square, which has been well described by Hatton as "not exactly in anybody's way, to or from anywhere." The square is mentioned in both "Humphrey Clinker" and "Nicholas Nickleby." Here Henry St. John, Lord Bolingbroke, lived, 1704-1708, and Mrs. Cibber in 1746. Angelica Kauffman lived in the centre house on the south side for many years. It was in the vicinity of the square that the great burial-ground for the plague-stricken dead was formed in the reign of Charles II. It was chosen as being well away from the town. Pennant says: "Golden Square, of dirty access, was built after the Revolution or before 1700. It was built by that true hero Lord Craven, who stayed in London during the whole time: and braved the fury of the pestilence with the same coolness as he fought the battles of his beloved mistress, Elizabeth, Queen of Bohemia." It was in Golden Square that De Quincey took leave of Ann, whom he was never to see again.

Piccadilly Circus was formed at the same time as Regent Street, though it has been altered since. The Criterion Theatre and Restaurant are on the south-east side. On this site formerly stood a well-known coaching inn called the White Bear. One of Shepherd's charming sketches in the Crace Collection illustrates the courtyard of the inn. Benjamin West, afterwards P.R.A., put up here on the night of his first sojourn in London. In the centre of the circus is a fountain