Today I had the absolute delight of attending Evensong at St. Paul’s Cathedral. I was finished at the archives a bit early, so I walked there through the city, giving me enough time to city and enjoy the scenery in both Pater Noster Square and St. Paul’s churchyard. St. Paul’s is Christopher Wren’s masterpiece, built after the original St. Paul’s was destroyed in the Great Fire of London in 1666.
Another of Wren’s masterpieces if Temple Bar Gate, completed in 1672, which was originally the gate to the City of London (which confusingly is a small “Square Mile” city at the heart of the present day metropolis that is London) before it was removed in 1878 to make room on the roadway it crossed.
In 1880 the Gate was sold to a local brewer who had it disassembled and rebuilt as a gateway to his estate in Hertfordshire, where by the 1960s it had fallen into a sorry state.
In 2004 the City of London purchased the Gate and has beautifully restored it as a ceremonial entrance to Pater Noster Square.
Evensong itself was glorious! The Choir of St. Paul’s Cathedral sang O Nata Lux by Thomas Tallis, Beati Mundo Corde by William Byrd, and the Service Music was Batten’s Fourth with Responses by Leighton. It was entertaining seeing how seriously St. Paul’s takes security — I’d never seen a nun having her bag and coat checked before! I ended up sitting in the Quire in the same row as the nuns, where we amused ourselves bowing and madly crossing ourselves at all the appropriate (haha) moments, while the rest of the congregation, who had mostly shown up for the “concert”, fumbled along.
After Evensong I had the authentic London experience of dealing with Tube line delays and getting lost on the Tube. What Google suggested would be a 20 minute Tube trip ended up being nearly an hour, after I figured out the detour I’d taken had put on a different (yet parallel) “branch” of the Tube line near the hotel. There’s, of course, no mobile data in the most of the deepest underground stations, nor could I find a full Transport for London Tube map, so it took some fumbling to get my bearings and get home. But all’s well that ends well — I was still riding high off the glorious music by the time I stumbled into my room absolutely exhausted yet filled with gratitude for having this time in London.