Vanessa Harding

He understands the city very well, but he's quite resistant to the changes that he's seen in his lifetime.

And he's certainly not particularly happy about the way London has evolved.

So he goes on, for example, I mean, he comments on...

numerous occasions on the sprawl of the metropolis over green fields and pleasant suburbs.

He's notable for talking about how he used to go and get milk hot from the cow in what subsequently became Goodman's Fields.

Absolutely, absolutely.

Hog Lane outside Bishopsgate had, within these 40 years, been a road hedged with elm trees between pleasant fields with a wholesome air.

Now, within a few years, it was made a continual building throughout of garden houses and small cottages.