A vivid impression of some aspects of life in old
London may be gained from the earlier chapters of the Rev. E. G. O'Donoghue's highly interesting and well illustrated book on Bridewell Hospital (Lane, 21s.), which carries on his history of a once famous institution from 1003 to the present day. The author is the Chaplain of Bethlem Hospital, which is under the same authority as Bridewell, and he has used the official records to excellent purpose. The former palace, standing on the Thames' bank to the west of the Fleet river, was used until Victorian days as a prison for men and women and an asylum for vagrants and children. The prisoners were trans- ferred to Holloway, the vagrants to workhouses. The children are now educated in a fine country school, and the offices alone, in New Bridge Street, occupy part of the old site. One of the Bridewell burial grounds, in Dorset Street, remains vacant, immune from the builder under an Act of Parliament. Unruly prisoners were flogged in public till late in the eighteenth century, and their keepers were often harsh. But our forefathers were kindly and charitable, and this City institution—which was not the only Bridewell—was- well administered on the whole.
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