The Other London • 39for a permanent post. Symon altered his career path and was secretly or-
dained as an Anglican priest in the mid- 1650 s, when the Puritans still had a
monopoly over religion. He immediately became the household chaplain of
Sir Walter St. John, son-in-law of the chief justice. Through St. John’s pa-
tronage he was appointed vicar of the church of Battersea, in rural Surrey
across the Thames from Westminster, in 1658.
Patrick had been flattered by the invitation from the earl of Bedford,
whose father had developed the Piazza area of Covent Garden, to move to
Saint Paul Covent Garden as its minister in 1662. His delicate health was
holding up well despite his concern at leaving the fresh country air of Batter-
sea, and the new courtier congregation was almost as friendly as his old pa-
rishioners, easing his fears that they might not take to him. To be sure, he
missed dropping in at his younger brother’s Battersea home. And no one
could replace his closest friends at the old church, Denis and Elizabeth
Gauden, and their beautiful manor house in nearby Clapham. Patrick went
back to Clapham to see Denis and Elizabeth now and then, but his new con-
gregation was taking virtually all his time and energy these days.^1
As he stepped out of his church on the Piazza and headed for Maiden
Lane and Ward Alley for the day’s pastoral calls, Patrick knew what to ex-
pect. Here at the crossroads of privilege and poverty, two Londons met. The
London most familiar to Samuel Pepys and Sir William Turner was found in
places like the Piazza, where Pepys’ pleasure-loving associate on the Navy
Board, Lord Brouncker, and the good-hearted Lady Abergavenny owned
splendid townhouses. Uncomfortably close by was the “other London” in
shabby spots like Maiden Lane and Ward Alley. Here Patrick encountered
the one-hearth homes of Goody Cocke and Goodman Hall, whose first
names were likely known to a few neighbors but were omitted by the parish’s
churchwardens from their accounts of payments to the neighborhood poor.
In good times the Goody Cockes and Goodman Halls of this other London
made up a quarter of the metropolitan population; in times of great want,
sickness, or economic downturn, their numbers approached one-half of the
population. The proportion could grow quickly because many unskilled la-
borers and workers in specialized crafts lived on extremely low wages or in
seasonal jobs that left them perpetually on the edge of subsistence.
The easiest gauge of poverty in the capital was the royal hearth tax, an in-
genious, basic direct levy on Charles II’s subjects at the rate of two shillings a
year for every fireplace in a dwelling. The rationale was simple: the number
of hearths gave a rough idea of the size of the dwelling and, by inference, the
financial status of the occupying renter or owner. The lowest rate of two shil-