THE MIRROR
OF
LITERATURE, AMUSEMENT, AND INSTRUCTION.
| Vol. 19. No. 546.] | SATURDAY, MAY 12, 1832 | [PRICE 2d. |
ST. PANCRAS (OLD) CHURCH.
ST. PANCRAS (OLD) CHURCH.This humble village fane is situated to the north of London,somewhat more than a mile from Holborn Bars. Persons unacquaintedwith the site, may hitherto have considered it as part and parcelof this vast metropolis: but, lo! here it stands amidst much of itsprimitive, peaceful rusticity.
Pancras is still, by courtesy, called a village, thoughits charms may be of the rus-in-urbe description. It derivesits name from the saint to whom the church is dedicated:1 it was called St. Pancras when theSurvey of Domesday was taken. The parish is of great extent. Mr.Lysons states it at 2,700 acres of land, including the site ofbuildings. It is bounded on the north by Islington, Hornsey, andFinchley; and on the west by Hampstead and Marybone. On the southit meets the parishes of St. Giles's in the Fields, St. George theMartyr, St. George, Bloomsbury, and St. Andrew's, Holborn.2 On the east it is bounded by St.James's, Clerkenwell. Kentish Town, part of Highgate, Camden Town,and Somer's Town,3 arecomprised within this parish as hamlets. Mr. Lysons supposes it tohave included the prebendal manor of Kentish Town,4 or Cantelows, which now constitutes astall in St. Paul's Cathedral. Among the prebendaries have been meneminent for their learning and piety: as Lancelot Andrews, bishopof Winchester, Dr. Sherlock, Archdeacon Paley, and the Rev. WilliamBeloe, B.D. well known by his translation of Herodotus.
It would occupy too much space to detail the progressiveincrease of this district. When a visitation of the church[pg290] was made in the year 1251, there were only forty housesin the parish. The desolate situation of the village in the latterpart of the sixteenth century is emphatically described by Norden,in his Speculum Britanniæ. After noticing the solitarycondition of the church, he says, "yet about this structure havebin manie buildings now decaied, leaving poore Pancras withoutcompanie or comfort." In some manuscription additions to his work,the same writer has the following observations:—"Althoughthis place be, as it were, forsaken of all; and true men seldomfrequent the same, but upon devyne occasions; yet it is visyted bythieves, who assemble there not to pray, but to wait for praye; andmanie fell into their handes, clothed, that are glad when they areescaped naked. Walk not there too late." Newcourt, whose work waspublished in 1700, says that houses had been built near the church.The first important increase of the parish took place in theneighbourhood of Tottenham Court Road.
"Pancras Church," says Norden, "standeth all alone, as utterlyforsaken, old and wether-beten, which,