PECKHAM, a hamlet in the parish of CAMBERWELL, eastern division of the hundred of BRIXTON, county of SURREY, 4 miles (S. E. by S.) from London. The population is returned with the parish. This pleasant village contains many spacious and excellent houses, forming one principal street, which is lighted with gas; a branch of the Surrey canal approaches within a short distance of it, Peckham Rye, was formerly the scene of a popular fair annually in August, which has been suppressed; a little beyond this point is Forest Hill, commanding many varied and beautiful prospects. A silkfactory has been recently established. There are two proprietary episcopal chapels, one in Hill-street, which is in the later style of English architecture, and is surmounted by a spire; the other has been recently erected, and is in the same style, with a tower. There are places of worship for Baptists and Independents, A National school, for children of both sexes, amounting to two hundred and eighty in mimber; a Laucasterian school, for one hundred and forty children and an infant school, are severally supported by voluntary contributions. In that part of the hamlet called Peckham New Town is the asylum for decayed victuallers, instituted in 1827, under the patronage of His Royal Highness the Duke of Sussex, who laid the first stone of the building, which, when completed, will consist of a spacious range, occupying three sides of a quadrangular area enclosed with a handsome palisade, and tastefully laid out in parterres of flowers and shrubs; the north and south wings are not yet above the foundation, but the centre forms a noble range of building, comprising the committee-room and other offices, fronted with a handsome portico of six pillars of the Ionic order, supporting an entablature and triangular pediment, in the tympanum of which is a clock, and surmounted by a handsome cupola, surrounded with Ionic pillars supporting a dome j the whole number of tenements will be one hundred and one, of which fortythree are at present occupied; the grounds surrounding the asylum comprise more than six acres, commanding a pleasing view of the Surrey hills on the south, and of the metropolis to the north.