TORONTO OP OLD. 231 



eyan chapel in King Street ceased to te used in 1833. It was converted afterwards for a time 

 into a "Theatre Royal." 



Jordan Street preserves one of the names of Mr. Jordan Post, owner of the whole frontage 

 extending from Bay Street to Tonge Street. The name of his wife is preserved in "Melinda 

 Street," which ti-averses his lot, or rather hlock, from east to west, south of King Street. Two 

 of his daughters bore respectively the unusual names of Sophronia and Desdemona. Mr. Post 

 was a taU New-Englander of grave address. He was, moreover, a clockmaker by trade, and 

 always wore spectacles. From the formal cut of his apparel and hair, he was, quite errone- 

 ously,, sometimes supposed to be of the Menonist or Quaker persuasion. 



VI.— KING STREET, FROM TONGE STREET TO CHURCH STREET. 

 Where Tonge Street crosses King Street, forming at the present day an unusually noble 

 carrefour, as the French would say, or rectangular intersection of thoroughfares, as we are 

 obliged to word it, there was, for a considerable time, but one solitary house — at the north-east 

 angle ; a longish, low, one-storey, respectable wooden structure, painted white, with paling in 

 front, and large wiUow trees : it was the home of Mr. Dennis, formerly a shipbuilder at King- 

 ston. To the eastward of this, on the same side, at an early period, was an obscure frame 

 building of the most ordinary kind, whose existence is recorded simply for having been tempo- 

 rarily the District Grammar School, before the erection of the regular building on the Grammar 

 School lot. On the opposite side, still passing on towards the east, was the Jail. This was a 

 squat unpainted wooden building, with hipped roof, concealed from persons passing in the 

 street by a tall cedar stockade, such as those which we see surrounding a Hudson's Bay post or 

 a military wood-yard. At the outer entrance hung a biUet of wood suspended by a chain, com- 

 municating with a beU within ; and occasionally Mr. Parker, the custodian of the place, was 

 summoned, through its instrumentality, by persons not there on legitimate business. We have 

 a recollection of a clever youth, an immediate descendant of the great commentator on British 

 Law, and afterwards himself distinguished at the Upper Canadian bar, who was severely handled 

 by Mr. Parker's son, on being caught in the act of pulling at this biUet, with the secret inten- 

 tion of running away after the exploit. 



The English Criminal Code, as it was at the beginning of the century, having been introduced 

 with all its enormities, public hangings were frequent at an early period in the new Province. 

 A shocking scene is described as taking place at an execution in front of the old Jail at Tork. 

 The condemned refuses to mount the scaffold. On this, the moral-suasion efforts of the sheriff 

 amount to the ridiculous, were not the occasion so seriously tragic. In aid of the sheriff, the 

 oflflciating chaplain steps more than once up the plank set from the cart to the scaffold, to shew 

 the faculty of the act, and to induce the man to mount in like manner ; the condemned demurs, 

 and openly remarks on the obvious difference m the two cases. At last the noose is adjusted 

 to the wretched culprit, where he stands. The cart is withdrawn, and a deliberate strangling 

 ensues. 



In a certain existing account of steps taken in 1811 to remedy the dilapidated and comfort- 

 less condition of this Jail, we get a glimpse of York, commercially and otherwise, at that date. 

 In April, 1811, the sheriff, Beikie, reports to the magistrates at Quarter Sessions "that the sUls 

 of the east cells of the Jail of the Home District are completely rotten ; that the ceilings in the 

 debtors' rooms are insufficient ; and that he cannot think himself safe, should necessity oblige 

 him to confine any persons ia said cells or debtors' rooms." An order is given in May to make 

 the necessary repairs ; but certain spike-nails are wanted of a kind not to be had at the local 

 dealers' iu hardware. The chairman is consequently directed to " apply to his Excellency the 

 Lieutenant-Governor, that he wiU be pleased to direct that the spike-nails be furnished from 

 the King's stores, as there are not any of the description required to be purchased at York." A 

 memorandum foUows to the effect that on the communication of this necessity to his Excellency, 

 "the Lieutenant-Governor ordered that the Clerk of the Peace do apply for the spOie-nails offi- 

 cially in the name of the Court : which he did," the memorandum adds, " on the 8th of May, 

 1811, and received an answer on the day following, that an order had been issued that day for 

 1500 spike-nails, for the repair of the Home District Jail: the nails," it is subjoined, "were 

 received by carpenter Leach in the month of July following." — Again : in December, 1811, Mr. 

 Sheriff Beikie sets forth to the magistrates in Session, that "the prisoners in the cells of the 



