294 LONDON PARKS © GARDENS 
and the rest of the poor of the parish exceedingly indi¬ 
gent.” In spite of these sentiments, he is believed to 
have had a hand in the Mile End Almshouses, which 
were founded by Captain Henry Mudd of Ratcliffe, 
Captain Sandes or Sanders, and Captain Maples. The 
two last are remembered by statues still standing in the 
little formal gardens. Maples, who appears in the dress 
of a naval officer of the period, left a fortune for the use 
of the guild in diamonds, collected in India, where he 
was an early pioneer, and where he died in 1680. A 
similar endowment in Hull is described in a poem in 
1662 :— 
“ It is a comely built, well-ordered place, 
But that which most of all the house doth grace 
Are rooms for widowes, who are old and poore, 
And have been wives to mariners before.” 
Certainly Trinity Hospital, Mile End, is comely and 
well ordered. The pensioners take a pride in keeping 
every nook and corner scrupulously clean. Everything 
is, in fact, in “ ship-shape ” order. The grass is neatly 
mown, the trees on either side well trimmed and clipped. 
Outside each little house a few plants are carefully 
tended, the pots arranged with precision, and every 
flower looked after with pride. It is indeed a peaceful 
place for these old people to pass their declining years 
in, and the sight makes the regret for St. Katharine’s and 
the other vanished charitable buildings all the more keen. 
The site of another benevolent institution near is 
fulfilling a useful and delightful task, although the 
old houses attached to it have disappeared. It was 
a row of almshouses founded by a member of the 
Brewers’ Company, named Baker, about 150 years ago, 
