Page:VCH London 1.djvu/109

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ROMANO-BRITISH LONDON The southward course of the wall is marked by the buildings abutting on a narrow strip of the churchyard which lies between the houses of Well Street and Monkwell Street. This portion terminates at a projecting rounded warehouse built on part of the old Barber Surgeons' Hall (Plan C, 38), the size and form of which at once suggest an underlying bastion, and this inference is confirmed by the following entry in the records of the Barber Surgeons' Company : — ' 5th February 1607. This day it is ordered that a Courthouse be erected upon the Bulwarke behind the Hall of this Company for the Mrs. or Governors to kepe the Courte at the charge of this Company.' This bastion is marked on Ogilby and Morgan's map, which also shows, built against the inside of the wall about midway between it and the one last mentioned, a structure of similar shape, but somewhat larger, of which no later record has been found (Plan C, 89) ; it may have been a tower for a ballista or other engine of war, such as that of which remains are still to be seen at Colchester. About 1 20 ft. south of the Barber Surgeons' Hall another bastion, which had been built up between the houses of Castle Street and Monkwell Street, was uncovered in 1865 during some repairs to No. 7, Castle Street*' (Plan C, 40). It was found to be about 40 ft. in height, being built of rough flints and ragstone. In the upper part was a row of tiles or bricks, but there is no reason to suppose that this was a bond ; more probably it was due to later patching, a very similar thing having been found in the undoubtedly mediaeval portion of the bastion under Allhallows Church. The site of this discovery is marked by the building called ' Bastion House,' 2A, Windsor Court, Monkwell Street, where the lower portion of the bastion is said to have been built into the basement. The wall next crosses Falcon Square and runs behind the west side of Noble Street until at a point about 200 ft. south of the Square it takes a sharp turn to the west in the direction of Aldersgate. At this re-entrant angle Ogilby and Morgan's map shows a bastion, which probably still exists under ground with some portions of the wall, in the cellars between Noble Street and Aldersgate Street (Plan C, 14). No actual remains of the Roman Aldersgate have been recorded, but there is satisfactory evidence that there was a gate here at that period, as will be shown later (Plan C, 42). Westward of Aldersgate Street the wall forms the southern boundary of the graveyard of the adjacent church of St. Botolph (Plan C,43), which with the burial ground of Christ Church is now a public recreation ground. A piece of the wall adjoining the gate is recorded by W. D. SauU as having been found in 1841^" during excavations for the French Protestant Church in Bull and Mouth Street. Both the church and the street were absorbed by the Post Office buildings in 1887, when a stretch of 131 ft. of the wall was exposed. The interest taken in this discovery induced the authorities to take steps for its preservation ; it was carefully underpinned and built in, so that its inner face formed the side of the basement area, and although somewhat smoke- begrimed it is still to be seen. Its general character is much the same as that already described, only differing in minor detail. The height varied according as it had been made up by mediaeval repairs or cut into by the basements of modern houses. From a very careful account in T&e Builder " " Illus. Lond. News, a,7 (19 Aug. 1865), 157. '" Jrch. xxx, 522-4. " 5 May 1888. 63