CHAIRS TO MEND.

THE business of mending Chairs is generally conducted by a family or a partnership; one carries the bundle of rush, and collects old Chairs, while the workman, seating himself in some convenient corner on the pavement, exercises his trade.  For small repairs they charge from fourpence to one shilling; and for new covering a chair from eighteen pence to half a crown, according to the fineness of the rush required, and the neatness of the workmanship.  It is necessary to bargain for price previous to the delivery of the Chairs, or the Chair-mender, like other itinerant artists, will not fail to demand an exorbitant compensation for his time and labour.

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Soho Square stands on the south side and near the eastern extremity of Oxford-street.  It has a square enclosure, with a shrubbery in the centre.  This square was begun in the time of Charles the Second.  The Duke of Monmouth lived in the centre house facing the statue, from which circumstance it was originally called Monmouth Square; and, after the execution of that unfortunate nobleman, received the name of King's Square.  The admirers of the Duke however had the art to get it changed to Soho, which was the word of the day at the fatal field of Sedgemoore.  In this square is the residence of Sir Joseph Banks, the President of the Royal Society, whose library and collection of natural curiosities are well known.  On the south side of the Square, in the right-hand corner leading from Greek-street, stands a house in which Fashion once revelled in all its splendour and dissipation.  It was the residence of the once celebrated Mrs. Cornelys, who for taste, wit, vivacity, and elegance of manners, was unrivalled in her day.  In this house she established her coteries, which were supported by the subscriptions of all the first persons in the country.  The entertainments consisted of concerts, dancing, cards, &c. which were followed by Pic Nic suppers.  Mrs. Cornelys' taste for magnificence and variety of decoration was unbounded; and the magistrates discovered that her entertainments required a license.  Her expenses exceeded her subscriptions, and Fashion led to some more novel scene of amusement.  Hence this unfortunate lady was doomed to a prison, where, after a confinement of several years, she, who had been the life of the fashionable world, and "the soul of pleasure," ended her days in poverty and distress.  This house was also the residence of Field Marshal Conway, but is now divided into two dwellings.  A Roman catholic chapel, much frequented, stands in Sutton-street, on the east side of the Square.