ndures as one of
the four great Inns of Court,--went Mr. Pickwick one afternoon, to find no
one at home but the laundress. In Holborn Court, in Gray's Inn, lived also
Traddles and his bride.

Pip was quartered in Barnard's Inn, called by him a "dingy collection of
shabby buildings."

The Temple has ever been prolific in suggestion to the novelist, and
Dickens, like most others who have written of London life, has made
liberal use of it in "Barnaby Rudge," in "The Tale of Two Cities," and in
many other of his novels.

Staple Inn, at "Holborn Bars," is perhaps the most quaint and unmodern of
any considerable structure in all London. Mr. Grewgious and Mr. Tartar
lived here; also Landless, who occupied "some attic rooms in a corner,"
and here Mr. Snagsby was wont to ramble in this old-world retreat.

The "little hall," with "a little lantern in its roof," and its
weathercock, is still there, and the stroller down that most businesslike
thoroughfare, known in its various continuations as "High Holborn,"
"Holborn Bars," and "Holborn Viaduct," will find it difficult to resist
the allurements of the crazy old timbered frontage of Staple Inn, with its
wooden gateway and tiny shops, looking for all the world like a picture
from out of an old book.

In Bishop's Court, leading from Chancery Lane, was Crook's rag and bottle
shop, where its owner met so ghastly a death. A court to the back of this
shop, known as "Chichester Rents," harboured a public house called by
Dickens "Sol's Arms." To-day it exists as the "Old Ship," if supposedly
authoritative opinion has not erred.

Took's Court is to-day unchanged. Dickens was pleased to call it "Cook's
Court." By some it has been called dirty and dingy; it is hardly that, but
it may well have been a more sordid looking place in days gone by. At any
rate, it was a suitable enough environment for Snagsby, identified to-day
as the stationer's shop next the Imperial Chambers.

As vivid a reminiscence as any is that of the old debtors' prison of
Marshalsea. The institution was a court of law and a prison as well, and
was first established in 1376 for the determination of causes and
differences among the king's menials; and was under the control of the
knight marshal, hence its name. Later this court had particular cognizance
of murders and other offences committed within the king's court; and here
also were committed persons guilty of piracies.

In 1381 the Kentish rebels "broke down th