Until quite recently a little narrow and dirty passage to the river, known as Coldharbour Lane, commemorated the site of a great Palace, known as the Cold Harbour, which stood here overlooking the river with many gables.  It was already standing in the reign of Edward II.  It belonged successively to Sir John Poultney; to John Holland, Duke of Exeter—­that Duke who was buried in St. Katherine’s Hospital; to Henry V., who lived here for a brief period when Prince of Wales; to Richard III.; to the College of Heralds; and to Henry VIII.  Finally, it was burned in the Great Fire, but during the last hundred years of its life the old Palace fell into decay and was let out in tenements to poor people.  The City Brewery now stands on the site of Cold Harbour.

Close beside this great house—­the site itself now entirely covered by the railway—­was the Steelyard.  This was the centre of the German trade; here the merchants of the Hanseatic League were permitted to dwell and to store the goods which they imported.  The history of the German merchants in London is a very important chapter in that of London.  They came here in the year 1250, they formed a fraternity of their own, living together, by Royal permission, in a kind of college, with a great and stately hall, wharves, quays, and square courts.  The building is represented, before it was burned down in the Great Fire, as picturesque, with many gables crowded together like the whole of London.  Their trade was extremely valuable to them; they imported Rhenish wines, grain of all kinds, cordage and cables, pitch, tar, flax, deal timber, linen fabrics, wax, steel, and many other things.  They obtained concession after concession until practically they enjoyed a monopoly.  For this they had to pay certain tolls or duties.  They were made, for instance, to maintain one of the City gates.  They were compelled to live together in their own quarters.  Their monopoly lasted for 300 years, during which the London merchants, especially the Association called Merchant Adventurers, who belonged principally to the Mercers’ Company, continued to besiege the Sovereign with petitions and complaints.  It was not until the reign of Queen Elizabeth that they were finally turned out and expelled the Kingdom.  Their house and grounds were converted into a store-house for the Royal Navy.  At the same time the old Navy Office, which had formerly stood in Mark Lane, was transferred to the suppressed college and chapel belonging to All Hallows, Barking, in Seething Lane, where you may still see, if you go to look for them, the old stone pillars of the gates and the old courtyard which was originally the court of the college, then the court of the Navy Office, and now the court of the warehouse belonging to the London Docks.  As for the unfortunate Steelyard, that, as I said, is now completely covered by the Cannon Street Railway.  As you walk under the railway arch you may now look southward and say, ’Here for 300 years lived