LOMBARD STREET 



destroyed by the Great Fire. Similarly, in Lombard 

 Street, a great conflagration may have destroyed 

 buildings left by the early settlers. 



Against the probability of the Lombard Street 

 discovery pointing to the existence, in the period of 

 the Eoman occupation, of a paved city, may be set the 

 fact that when, towards the end of the eleventh 

 century, beams were blown by a tempest from the 

 roof of St. Mary-le-Bow — a church only a furlong or 

 two from Lombard Street — they sank in the soft 

 earth of Cheapside for twenty feet or more, there 

 being neither British pavement above ground nor 

 Roman pavement below to check their descent. 



The most recent excavation that I know of near Sir 

 Robert's dwelling was one in 1894, occasioned by 

 digging out the foundations for the new building now 

 in course of construction for the Guardian Fire 

 Insurance Society ; but although the workmen dug 

 down far deeper than sixteen feet, no fresh discovery 

 of note was made. 



Viner's mansion did not long remain a centre of 

 civic hospitality. There was quickly an end to 

 entertaining monarchs, whether merry or otherwise, 

 or, indeed, guests of any condition. For Sir Robert's 

 convivial visitor saw fit very shortly to play the lively 

 jest of closing the Exchequer, whereby his host 

 lost the not insignificant sum of four hundred and 

 sixteen thousand pounds. No wonder that the 

 ' Prince of Goldsmiths ' had to call his creditors 

 together in 1683, at the sign of the Vine, No. 77, 



