WHITTINGTON'S HOUSE (LOOKING FROM THE COURT), HART STREET, CRUTCHED FRIARS. EVERYBODY knows the bio Cat Dick Whittington and his Cat; -how the little fellow, at the age of seven, ran away from a home where there was nothing to make him happy, was a beggar-boy for some years, and then, hearing that the streets of London were paved with gold and silver, worked his way thither to be saved from starvation by the good-nature of a merchant of Leadenhall Street, named Fitzwarren;-how he was for a long time scullion in the merchant's house, much favoured by Mistress Alice, the merchant's daughter, but much persecuted by the vile jade of a cook,' whose bidding he had to follow ;how at length his master, sending a shipfull of merchandize to Barbary, permitted each one of his servants to venture something, and poor Whittington had nothing to venture save a cat which he had bought for a penny, and set to destroy the rats and mice that infested his garret ;how, while the ship was on its voyage, the cook-maid's tyranny so troubled him that he ran away, and had gone as far as Bunhill Fields, when the bells of Bow Church seemed to call to him Turn again, Whittington, Thrice Lord Mayor of London;' and how, when, in obedience to this warning, he went back to Leadenhall Street, it was to learn that his cat had been bought by the King of Barbary for treasures worth 100,000l.; so that he was all at once almost the richest commoner in England, fit to marry good Mistress Alice, his patron's daughter, to become a famous merchant and, as Bow bells had promised, thrice |