Lloyds

H. M. the King, accompanied by Queen Mary and Prince Henry, drove in semi-state to "the city" followed by a troop of the Royal Household Cavalry. At the Temple Bar, the Lord Mayor met their Majesties, surrendered to the King the keys of the City and the emblematic pearl sword of privileges. The royal party drove on to Leadenhall Street, where the King alighted from his carriage, smote a stone with a mallet, tested the stone's lie with a spirit-level, declared it "well and truly laid." The occasion was the laying of the foundation stone of a new building to be occupied by Lloyd's,* the world-famed insurance company and underwriters. Before laying the stone, the King said in the course of a speech: "I have been impressed, as everyone must be, by the extraordinary and romantic history of Lloyd's and by its evolution from an ordinary 17th Century coffee house to a great public and international institution familiar to us all. Cromwell said: 'No one rises so high as he who does not know whither he is going,' and this has held good in our organizations as well as in men.

"The history of the corporation is an embodiment of the highest qualities of British commerce. Lloyd's policy has never been the one-sided pursuit of gain, but a combination of keenness and efficiency in business with a real and deep public spirit."

*Lloyd's was started by one Edward Lloyd, in the 17th Century, in a London coffee house where merchants and sailors used to assemble to discuss voyages and transact business.