resent mansion, a little E. from the ruins, was commenced in 1778
by James third Viscount Grimston; it has been considerably altered, but
retains the grand N. portico; the pediment, supported by ten Corinthian
columns, reaches to the roof. The hall is very large, and contains
portraits of Francis Bacon, George Villiers, Duke of Buckingham, and
other worthies. There are numerous pictures in other apartments,
including portraits of Sir Nicholas Bacon, Thomas Wentworth, Earl of
Stafford, Queen Elizabeth, Robert Devereux, Catherine of Braganza and
William Pitt.

[Illustration: RUINS OF LORD BACON'S HOUSE]

There were three monastic institutions on the outskirts of the town:--

(1) The Leper Hospital of _St. Julian_, founded by Geoffrey de Gorham,
sixteenth Abbot of St. Albans, on a spot close to St. Stephen's Church.
Of this no vestige remains.

(2) The Hospital of _St. Mary de Pre_, for women-lepers, founded about
fifty years after the above by Warren de Cambridge, twentieth abbot, on
either side of the old Watling Street. Some of the graves in the
churchyard attached to the hospital were visible so recently as 1827,
and the cottages known as the "Three Chimnies," originally part of the
hospital itself, were pulled down in 1849.[8]

[Footnote 8: _Vide_ _Historical Records of St. Albans_, by A. E. Gibbs,
F.L.S., etc.; a most interesting little volume.]

(3) _Sopwell Nunnery_, founded by Abbot Geoffrey de Gorham about 1140,
at a spot a little S. from the Old London Road, on the river Ver. The
masses of ivy-mantled ruins still to be seen, and usually called the
"ruins of Sopwell Nunnery," are, at least for the most part, the remains
of the house built by Sir Richard Lee, to whom the manor was granted at
the Dissolution.

ST. ALBANS ABBEY.--The Abbey has been so repeatedly altered and restored
that it may be said to illustrate every style of ecclesiastical
architecture from Norman to the present time. Opinions differ widely as
to the merits of that scheme of renovation and innovation completed
under the direction and by the munificence of Lord Grimthorpe, and no
attempt will be here made to criticise or extol the work of so great an
expert. Such a description of the venerable Abbey as an architect might
love to write would fill a volume in this series. After careful
consideration I have decided to sketch its history in such a way as to
show, however imperfectly, how it came to be what it is. I have been
careful to comp