‘Most readable and interesting.... It is a mine in which the student alike of topography and of manners and customs may dig and dig again with the certainty of finding something new and interesting.’—The Times.

‘No lover of London can fail to be grateful to the late Sir Walter for his many carefully studied pictures of its ancient life, pictures often quaint and amusing, and bearing always the mark of earnest and minute research.... The general reader will find in this volume a world of interesting suggestion.’—The Daily Chronicle.

‘We are again reminded of the vast debt which London owes to the late Sir Walter Besant by the appearance of this sumptuously printed and beautifully illustrated book, the second volume of his great Survey of London—unquestionably his magnum opus, upon which his fame will chiefly rest.... A book which should be in the library of every one who takes an intelligent interest in the history and development of London.’—The Daily Telegraph.

‘A work of great interest, eminently readable, and full of curious, interesting, and original matter.’—Westminster Gazette.

‘The pen of the ready writer here is fluent; the picture wants nothing in completeness. The records of the city and the kingdom have been ransacked for facts and documents, and they are here marshalled with consummate skill. In surveying the political history of London from James I. to Queen Anne, Sir Walter Besant reveals himself as an unsparing and impartial historian, and in this respect alone the work must command our admiration and our praise. But there is also included the most vivid presentation of the story of the Great Plague and the Great Fire that has ever been brought between the covers of one book.’—The Pall Mall Gazette.

‘It is impossible to speak too highly of this endeavour to say all that is worth saying about London, and to say it in a manner which shall at once satisfy the historical student and attract public attention.’—Yorkshire Post.

‘Much has hitherto been written, both by way of fact and fiction, as well as by a blend of each, to describe London in its grievous trials of pestilence and flame; but Sir Walter Besant has here gathered together by far the most graphic and the most trustworthy accounts that have hitherto been penned.’—The Guardian.

‘The whole work is one of singular interest because the subject is treated with the lightness of touch and descriptive power not always attained by antiquarian writers.’—The Record.

‘This handsome volume furnishes a fascinating record, both pictorial and literary, of seventeenth century London, such as can be found nowhere else. To the student it will be invaluable; to the general reader with antiquarian interests and a taste for social history, a never-failing source of delight.’—The Contemporary Review.

‘There is not a dull page in the book, and the fact that the treatment is somewhat discursive makes the volume more delightful. We can give no idea of its variety and its charm, but every one who wishes to know the London of two hundred and fifty years ago will feel, as he opens this volume, that he has stepped back into that world of great events, and will live again through its civil discord, its Plague, and Fire, and its strange superstitions.’—The London Quarterly Review.

‘Turn where you will in his pages, you get some interesting glimpse which opens up the past and illumines the present.’—The Contemporary Review.

‘A handsome and very interesting book is the result, for which the curious reader and the student will alike be grateful.... Gives an admirable impression of the times.’—The Spectator.

‘It is excellently planned and very ably and agreeably executed.... The chief charm of this work is the pleasantness of the style in which it is written—easy, clear, and individual. To the accuracy of the ideal historian Sir Walter added the picturesqueness of the popular novelist.’—The Globe.

‘It forms a sumptuous volume, and is marked, of course, by minute research and enthusiastic interest. Will be a thoroughly engrossing study for all those—and they are now many—to whom the past of the Empire’s capital is a subject of the keenest fascination.’—St. James’s Gazette.

‘To praise this book were superfluous. Sir Walter was ideally suited for the task which he set himself. He was an antiquarian, but not a Dryasdust; he had the topographical sense, but he spares us measurements; he was pleasantly discursive; if he moralised he was never tedious; he had the novelist’s eye for the romantic. Above all, he loved and reverenced London. Though only a Londoner by adoption, he bestowed upon the capital a more than filial regard. Besant is the nineteenth century Stow, and something more.... This remarkable volume.... It is a monument of faithful and careful research.’—The Daily Telegraph.

‘Will be of the utmost value to every student of the life and history of London.’—The Standard.

‘Altogether this posthumous work of the historian of London is one of the most fascinating books which he ever wrote.’—The Municipal Journal.

‘It is a wonderfully complete history.... Will probably stand to all time as the brightest and most authoritative book on a period which is bound, by its very evils, to have a fascination for the student of customs and manners, and for the student of national development.’—The Liverpool Post.

‘The book is engrossing and its manner delightful.’—The Times.

‘A work of great value and interest; ... profoundly interesting.’—The Westminster Gazette.

‘Of facts and figures such as these this valuable book will be found full to overflowing, and it is calculated, therefore, to interest all kinds of readers, from the student to the dilettante, from the romancer in search of matter to the most voracious student of “Tit-Bits.”’—The Athenæum.

‘Stimulating, edifying, interesting, horrifying, in turns, the book has not a dull moment.... As it is the best, it will surely prove the most prized and popular of modern books on London.’—Notes and Queries.

‘The work is copiously illustrated with reproductions of old prints, and is altogether a delightful and fascinating guide to the Metropolis at an eventful period of its history.’—Pall Mall Gazette.

‘Of the present lordly quarto volume it may be said that it fairly represents that “Survey” which Sir Walter Besant conceived, and which he used to refer to as his magnum opus. It is a worthy literary monument to his deep knowledge and love of London.’—The Academy.

‘Besant’s interesting and valuable book.’—Manchester Guardian.

‘It is assuredly a delightful book to lose oneself in, and so to think one’s way back into a simpler and perhaps, after all, a merrier England.’—The Bookman.

‘A book to be treasured and studied.... The work as a whole is a notable achievement, and will stand as the classical authority on eighteenth century London.’—The Speaker.