This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1879 Excerpt: ...on the same side of the way, at the corner of Catherine Street, is the Gaiety Theatre, opened in 1868. It is a large and handsome theatre, famous for burlesques; and there are frequent day performances. The Gaiety Restaurant attached to the theatre, and recently enlarged and decorated, is one of the most elegant and ...
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This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1879 Excerpt: ...on the same side of the way, at the corner of Catherine Street, is the Gaiety Theatre, opened in 1868. It is a large and handsome theatre, famous for burlesques; and there are frequent day performances. The Gaiety Restaurant attached to the theatre, and recently enlarged and decorated, is one of the most elegant and commodious in London. Somerset House, one of the finest and largest buildings in the metropolis, entirely occupied by public offices, is so named in consequence of occupying the site of the palace begun in 1547 by Protector Somerset, who, however, did not live to see its completion, for the headsman of Tower Hill stayed his career. The proud and unscrupulous duke provided some of the material for the use of his architect, John of Padua, by pulling down the cloisters of St. Paul's, with the charnelhouse and chapel, flinging the bones to rot in Finsbury Fields; and it is said that he even cast his irreverent eyes on Westminster Abbey as a possible stone quarry. To make room for the palace and gardens, the town houses of the Bishops of Lichfield, Coventry, Worcester, and Llandaff, --pleasant places with lawns sloping to the broad Thames--and two churches were cleared away. After Somerset's death, the palace became royal property, and was assigned as the residence of the young Princess Elizabeth, who, when she became the queen of famous memory, gave it to her cousin, Lord Hunsdon. In the time of James the First it was named Denmark House, in honour of his queen, Anne of Denmark, and when the king died, his body lay there in state. The queens of Charles the First and Second afterwards lived here. In 1766, the old building was demolished, and Sir William Chambers was commissioned to furnish designs for a new and extensive building. It encloses a quadra..
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