Photo by A. W. Cutler 



AT THE LOXDOX ZOO 

 Baby Elephant: "Hurry up. kid, if you've got anything for me!" 



But if it be a morning hour, we leave 

 the boat at Charing Cross and go a-foot 

 to Westminster, not by the embankment. 

 but by Northumberland avenue and 

 Y\ nitehall. We will come thereby to 

 Trafalgar Square, the official center, the 

 tourist heart of London, and perhaps 

 glimpse the beautiful cross in Charing 

 Cross Station yard — that is. if taxis, mo- 

 tors, hansoms, paper "boys" and flower 

 "girls" of all ages will let you think and 

 see. The cross is but a replica, but it 

 does credit "to the sweetest thought King 

 ever had" and to a nation. 



A king's sweetest thought 



When, in 1290. Eleanor of Castile, wife 

 of the first Edward, died at Harby. the 

 long, slow funeral train started for West- 

 minster. At each place where her bier 

 rested for the night Edward raised a 

 cross, and this, the stateliest of them all. 

 stood here from 1291 : the restoration is 

 of our own time. Just why the bearers 

 halted here within a half mile of the 

 Abbey, when they had already tarried a 

 night in the city. Ave can only surmise. 

 There was an especially revered chapel 

 here, and thence a stately entry could be 

 made to the precincts of palaces and 

 abbev : is that it ? It has been a popular 



and pretty custom to derive Charing 

 from chere reine. Edward's "dear 

 queen :" but. like all prettinesses, his- 

 torians will have none of it. claiming a 

 village of Charing (Sax.. C erring) here 

 between London and Westminster long 

 before her time. But so Eleanor came 

 to the Abbey and her beautiful tomb 

 there, where she slept, let us hope, con- 

 tent, knowing herself remembered. 



And now we may turn into Whitehall, 

 the broad street named for an ancient 

 palace where the business of the British 

 Empire is administered — a very busy, 

 very grave, street today, carrying the 

 weight of war. The Admiralty, the 

 Horse Guards, the Treasury. Downing 

 street, the foreign and colonial offices 

 are upon one side : great Scotland Yard. 

 the War Offices, the "Banqueting Hall." 

 sole relic of the Palace of Whitehall, on 

 the other, and beyond, reached by Derby 

 street, new Scotland Yard, headquarters 

 of the Metropolitan police. 



The Admiralty dates from 1722. but 

 the larger part is quite modern : the War 

 Offices are entirely so. The Government 

 Offices, beyond the Treasury, are of 186S- 

 1908, the Treasury of the time of George 

 I. Here is the office of the Prime Min- 

 ister (First Lord of the Treasury), and 



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