archway which is all that remains above ground of the great Priory of St. John of Jerusalem.  Here dwelt the Knights Hospitallers, in days when Clerkenwell was a rural parish, distant by a long stretch of green country from the walls of London.  But other and nearer memories are revived by St. John’s Arch.  In the rooms above the gateway dwelt, a hundred and fifty years ago, one Edward Cave, publisher of the Gentleman’s Magazine, and there many a time has sat a journeyman author of his, by name Samuel Johnson, too often impransus.  There it was that the said Samuel once had his dinner handed to him behind a screen, because of his unpresentable costume, when Cave was entertaining an aristocratic guest.  In the course of the meal, the guest happened to speak with interest of something he had recently read by an obscure Mr. Johnson; whereat there was joy behind the screen, and probably increased appreciation of the unwonted dinner.  After a walk amid the squalid and toil-infested ways of Clerkenwell, it impresses one strangely to come upon this monument of old time.  The archway has a sad, worn, grimy aspect.  So closely is it packed in among buildings which suggest nothing but the sordid struggle for existence, that it looks depressed, ashamed, tainted by the ignobleness of its surroundings.  The wonder is that it has not been swept away, in obedience to the great. law of traffic and the spirit of the time.

St. John’s Arch had a place in Sidney Kirkwood’s earliest memories.  From the window of his present workshop he could see its grey battlements, and they reminded him of the days when, as a lad just beginning to put questions about the surprising world in which he found himself, he used to listen to such stories as his father could tell him of the history of Clerkenwell.  Mr. Kirkwood occupied part of a house in St. John’s Lane, not thirty yards from the Arch; he was a printers’ roller maker, and did but an indifferent business.  A year after the birth of Sidney, his only child, he became a widower.  An intelligent, warm-hearted man, the one purpose of his latter years was to realise such moderate competency as should place his son above the anxieties which degrade.  The boy had a noticeable turn for drawing and colouring; at ten years old, when (as often happened) his father took him for a Sunday in the country, he carried a sketch-book and found his delight in using it.  Sidney was to be a draughtsman of some kind; perhaps an artist, if all went well.  Unhappily things went the reverse of well.  In his anxiety to improve his business, Mr. Kirkwood invented a new kind of ‘composition’ for printers’ use; he patented it, risked capital upon it, made in a short time some serious losses.  To add to his troubles, young Sidney was giving signs of an unstable character; at fifteen he had grown tired of his drawing, wanted to be this, that, and the other thing, was self-willed, and showed no consideration for his father’s difficulties.  It was necessary to take a decided step, and, though against his will, Sidney was apprenticed to an uncle, a Mr. Roach, who also lived in Clerkenwell, and was a working jeweller.  Two years later the father died, all but bankrupt.  The few pounds realised from his effects passed into the hands of Mr. Roach, and were soon expended in payment for Sidney’s board and lodging.