XXVI. CHEAPSIDE--INTRODUCTORY AND HISTORICAL…

XXVI. CHEAPSIDE--INTRODUCTORY AND HISTORICAL

Ancient Reminiscences of Cheapside--Stormy Days therein--The Westchepe Market--Something about the Pillory--The Cheapside Conduits--The Goldsmiths' Monopoly--Cheapside Market--Gossip anent Cheapside by Mr. Pepys--A Saxon Rienzi--Anti-Free-Trade Riots in Cheapside--Arrest of the Rioters--A Royal Pardon--Jane Shore.

What a wealth and dignity there is about Cheapside; what restless life and energy; with what vigorous pulsation life beats to and fro in that great commercial artery! How pleasantly on a summer morning that last of the Mohicans, the green plane-tree now deserted by the rooks, at the corner of Wood Street, flutters its leaves! How fast the crowded omnibuses dash past with their loads of young Greshams and future rulers of Lombard Street! How grandly Bow steeple bears itself, rising proudly in the sunshine! How the great webs of gold chains sparkle in the jeweller's windows! How modern everything looks, and yet only a short time since some workmen at a foundation in Cheapside, twenty-five feet below the surface, came upon traces of primeval inhabitants in the shape of a deer's skull, with antlers, and the skull of a wolf, struck down, perhaps, more than a thousand years ago, by the bronze axe of some British savage. So the world rolls on: the times change, and we change with them.

The engraving which we give on page 307 is from one of the most ancient representations extant of Cheapside. It shows the street decked out in holiday attire for the procession of the wicked old queen-mother, Marie de Medici, on her way to visit her son-in-law, Charles I., and her wilful daughter, Henrietta Maria.

The City records, explored with such unflagging interest by Mr. Riley in his "Memorials of London," furnish us with some interesting gleanings relating to Cheapside. In the old letter books in the Guildhall--the Black Book, Red Book, and White Book--we see it in storm and calm, observe the vigilant and jealous honesty of the guilds, and become witnesses again to the bloody frays, cruel punishments, and even the petty disputes of the middle-age craftsmen, when Cheapside was one glittering row of goldsmiths' shops, and the very heart of the wealth of London. The records culled so carefully by Mr. Riley are brief but pregnant; they give us facts uncoloured by the historian, and highly suggestive glimpses of strange modes of life in wild and picturesque eras of our civilisation. Let us take the most striking seriatim.

In 1273 the candle-makers seem to have taken a fancy to Cheapside, where the horrible fumes of that necessary but most offensive trade soon excited the ire of the rich citizens, who at last expelled seventeen of the craft from their sheds in Chepe. In the third year of Edward II. it was ordered and commanded on the king's behalf, that "no man or woman should be so bold as henceforward to hold common market for merchandise in Chepe, or any other highway within the City, except Cornhill, after the hour of nones" (probably about two p.m.); and the same year it was forbidden, under pain of imprisonment, to scour pots in the roadway of Chepe, to the hindrance of folks who were passing; so that we may conclude that in Edward II.'s London there was a good deal of that out-door work that the traveller still sees in the back streets of Continental towns.

Holocausts of spurious goods were not uncommon in Cheapside. In 1311 (Edward II.) we find that at the request of the hatters and haberdashers, search had been made for traders selling "bad and cheating hats," that is, of false and dishonest workmanship, made of a mixture of wool and flocks. The result was the seizure of forty grey and white hats, and fifteen black, which were publicly burnt in the street of Chepe. What a burning such a search would lead to in our less scrupulous days! Why, the pile would reach half way up St. Paul's. Illegal nets had been burnt opposite Friday Street in the previous reign. After the hats came a burning of fish panniers defective in measure; while in the reign of Edward III. some false chopins (wine measures) were destroyed. This was rough justice, but still the seizures seem to have been far fewer than they would be in our boastful epoch.

There was a generous lavishness about the royalty of the Middle Ages, however great a fool or scoundrel the monarch might be. Thus we read that on the safe delivery of Queen Isabel (wife of Edward II.), in 1312, of a son, afterwards Edward III., the Conduit in Chepe, for one day, ran with nothing but wine, for all those who chose to drink there; and at the cross, hard by the church of St. Michael in West Chepe, there was a pavilion extended in the middle of the street, in which was set a tun of wine, for all passers-by to drink of.

The mediæval guilds, useful as they were in keeping traders honest (Heaven knows, it needs supervision enough, now!), still gave rise to jealousies and feuds. The sturdy craftsmen of those days, inured to arms, flew to the sword as the quickest arbitrator, and preferred clubs and bills to Chancery courts and Common Pleas. The stones of Chepe were often crimsoned with the blood of these angry disputants. Thus, in 1327 (Edward III.), the saddlers and the joiners and bit-makers came to blows. In May of that year armed parties of these rival trades fought right and left in Cheapside and Cripplegate. The whole city ran to the windows in alarm, and several workmen were killed and many mortally wounded, to the great scandal of the City, and the peril of many quiet people. The conflict at last became so serious that the mayor, aldermen, and sheriffs had to interpose, and the dispute had to be finally settled at a great discussion of the three trades at the Guildhall, with what result the record does not state.

In this same reign of Edward III. the excessive length of the tavern signs ("ale-stakes" as they were then called) was complained of by persons riding in Cheapside. All the taverners of the City were therefore summoned to the Guildhall, and warned that no sign or bush (hence the proverb, "Good wine needs no bush") should henceforward extend over the king's highway beyond the length of seven feet, under pain of a fine of forty pence to the chamber of the Guildhall.

In 1340 (Edward III.) two more guilds fell to quarrelling. This time it was the pelterers (furriers) and fishmongers, who seem to have tanned each other's hides with considerable zeal. It came at last to this, that the portly mayor and sheriffs had to venture out among the sword-blades, cudgels, and whistling volleys of stones, but at first with little avail, for the combatants were too hot. They soon arrested some scaly and fluffy misdoers, it is true; but then came a wild rush, and the noisy misdoers were rescued; and, most audacious of all, one Thomas, son of John Hansard, fishmonger, with sword drawn (terrible to relate), seized the mayor by his august throat, and tried to lop him on the neck; and one brawny rascal, John le Brewere, a porter, desperately wounded one of the City serjeants: so that here, as the fishmongers would have observed, "there was a pretty kettle of fish." For striking a mayor blood for blood was the only expiation, and Thomas and John were at once tried at the Guildhall, found guilty on their own confession, and beheaded in Chepe; upon hearing which Edward III. wrote to the mayor, and complimented him on his display of energy on this occasion.

Chaucer speaks of the restless 'prentices of Cheap (Edward III.):--

"A prentis dwelled whilom in our citee-- At every bridale would he sing and hoppe; He loved bet the taverne than the shoppe-- For when ther eny riding was in Chepe Out of the shoppe thider wold he lepe, And til that he had all the sight ysein, And danced wel, he wold not come agen." (The Coke's Tale.)

In the luxurious reign of Richard II. the guilds were again vigilant, and set fire to a number of caps that had been oiled with rank grease, and that had been frilled by the feet and not by the hand, "so being false and made to deceive the commonalty." In this same reign (1393), when the air was growing dark with coming mischief, an ordinance was passed, prohibiting secret huckstering of stolen and bad goods by night "in the common hostels," instead of the two appointed markets held every feast-day, by daylight only, in Westchepe and Cornhill. The Westchepe market was held by day between St. Lawrence Lane and a house called "the Cage," between the first and second bell, and special provision was made that at these markets no crowd should obstruct the shops adjacent to the open-air market. To close the said markets the "bedel of the ward" was to ring a bell (probably, says Mr. Riley, the bell on the Tun, at Cornhill) twice--first, an hour before sunset, and another final one half an hour later. Another civic edict relating to markets occurs in 1379 (Richard II.), when the stands for stalls at the High Cross of Chepe were let by the mayor and chamberlain at 13s. 4d. each. At the same time the stalls round the brokers' cross, at the north door of St. Paul's (erected by the Earl of Gloucester in Henry III.'s reign) were let at 10s. and 6s. 8d. each. The stationers, or vendors in small wares, on the taking down of the Cross in 1390, probably retired to Paternoster Row.

The punishment of the pillory (either in Cheapside or Cornhill, the "Letter Book" does not say which) was freely used in the Middle Ages for scandal-mongers, dishonest traders, and forgers; and very deterring the shameful exposure must have been to even the most brazen offender. Thus, in Richard II.'s reign, we find John le Strattone, for obtaining thirteen marks by means of a forged letter, was led through Chepe with trumpets and pipes to the pillory on "Cornhalle" for one hour, on two successive days.

For the sake of classification we may here mention a few earlier instances of the same ignominious punishment. In 1372 (Edward III.) Nicholas Mollere, a smith's servant, for spreading a lying report that foreign merchants were to be allowed the same rights as freemen of the City, was set in the pillory for one hour, with a whetstone hung round his neck. In the same heroic reign Thomas Lanbye, a chapman, for selling rims of base metal for cups, pretending them to be silver-gilt, was put in the pillory for two hours; while in 1382 (Richard II.) we find Roger Clerk, of Wandsworth, for pretending to cure a poor woman of fever by a talisman wrapped in cloth of gold, was ridden through the City to the music of trumpets and pipes; and the same year a cook in Bread Street, for selling stale slices of cooked conger, was put in the pillory for an hour, and the said fish burned under his rascally nose.

Sometimes, however, the punishment awarded to these civic offenders consisted in less disgraceful penance, as, for instance, in the year 1387 (Richard II.), a man named Highton, who had assaulted a worshipful alderman, was sentenced to lose his hand; but the man being a servant of the king, was begged off by certain lords, on condition of his walking through Chepe and Fleet Street, carrying a lighted wax candle of three pounds' weight to St. Dunstan's Church, where he was to offer it on the altar.

In 1591, the year Elizabeth sent her rash but brave young favourite, Essex, with 3,500 men, to help Henry IV. to besiege Rouen, two fanatics named Coppinger and Ardington, the former calling himself a prophet of mercy and the latter a prophet of vengeance, proclaimed their mission in Cheapside, and were at once laid by the heels. But the old public punishment still continued, for in 1600 (the year before the execution of Essex) we read that "Mrs. Fowler's case was decided" by sentencing that lady to be whipped in Bridewell; while a Captain Hermes was sent to the pillory, his brother was fined £100 and imprisoned, and Gascone, a soldier, was sentenced to ride to the Cheapside pillory with his face to the horse's tail, to be there branded in the face, and afterwards imprisoned for life.

In 1578, when Elizabeth was coquetting with Anjou and the French marriage, we find in one of those careful lists of the Papists of London kept by her subtle councillors, a Mr. Loe, vintner, of the "Mitre," Cheapside, who married Dr. Boner's sister (Bishop Bonner?). In 1587, the year before the defeat of the Armada, and when Leicester's army was still in Holland, doing little, and the very month that Sir William Stanley and 13,000 Englishmen surrendered Deventer to the Prince of Parma, we find the Council writing to the Lord Mayor about a mutiny, requiring him "to see that the soldiers levied in the City for service in the Low Countries, who had mutinied against Captain Sampson, be punished with some severe and extraordinary correction. To be tied to carts and flogged through Cheapside to Tower Hill, then to be set upon a pillory, and each to have one ear cut off."

In the reign of James I. the same ignominious and severe punishment continued, for in 1611 one Floyd (for we know not what offence) was fined £5,000, sentenced to be whipped to the pillories of Westminster and Cheapside, to be branded in the face, and then imprisoned in Newgate.

To return to our historical sequence. In 1388 (Richard II.) it was ordered that every person selling fish taken east of London Bridge should sell the same at the Cornhill market; while all Thames fish caught west of the bridge was to be sold near the conduit in Chepe, and nowhere else, under pain of forfeiture of the fish.

The eleventh year of Richard II. brought a real improvement to the growing city, for certain "substantial men of the ward of Farringdon Within" were then allowed to build a new water-conduit near the church of St. Michael le Quern, in Westchepe, to be supplied by the great pipe opposite St. Thomas of Accon, providing the great conduit should not be injured; and on this occasion the Earl of Gloucester's brokers' cross at St. Paul's was removed.

Early in the reign of Henry V. complaints were made by the poor that the brewers, who rented the fountains and chief upper pipe of the Cheapside conduit, also drew from the smaller pipe below, and the brewers were warned that for every future offence they would be fined 6s. 8d. In the fourth year of this chivalrous monarch a "hostiller" named Benedict Wolman, under-marshal of the Marshalsea, was condemned to death for a conspiracy to bring a man named Thomas Ward, alias Trumpington, from Scotland, to pass him off as Richard II. Wolman was drawn through Cornhill and Cheapside to the gallows at Tyburn, where he was "hanged and beheaded."

Lydgate, that dull Suffolk monk, who followed Chaucer, though at a great distance, has, in his ballad of "Lackpenny," described Chepe in the reign of Henry VI. The hero of the poem says--

"Then to the Chepe I gan me drawn, Where much people I saw for to stand; One offered me velvet, silk, and lawn; Another he taketh me by the hand, 'Here is Paris thread, the finest in the land.' I never was used to such things indeed, And, wanting money, I might not speed."

In 1622 the traders of the Goldsmiths' Company began to complain that alien traders were creeping into and alloying the special haunts of the trade, Goldsmiths' Row and Lombard Street; and that 183 foreign goldsmiths were selling counterfeit jewels, engrossing the business and impoverishing its members.

City improvements were carried with a high hand in the reign of Charles I., who, determined to clear Cheapside of all but goldsmiths, in order to make the eastern approach to St. Paul's grander, committed to the Fleet some of the alien traders who refused to leave Cheapside. This unfortunate monarch seems to have carried out even his smaller measures in a despotic and unjustifiable manner, as we see from an entry in the State Papers, October 2, 1634. It is a petition of William Bankes, a Cheapside tavern-keeper, and deposes:--

"Petition of William Bankes to the king. Not fully twelve months since, petitioner having obtained a license under the Great Seal to draw wine and vent it at his house in Cheapside, and being scarce entered into his trade, it pleased his Majesty, taking into consideration the great disorders that grew by the numerous taverns within London, to stop so growing an evil by a total suppression of victuallers in Cheapside, &c, by which petitioner is much decayed in his fortune. Beseeches his Majesty to grant him (he not being of the Company of Vintners in London, but authorised merely by his Majesty) leave to victual and retail meat, it being a thing much desired by noblemen and gentlemen of the best rank and others (for the which, if they please, they may also contract beforehand, as the custom is in other countries), there being no other place fit for them to eat in the City."

The foolish determination to make Cheapside more glittering and showy seems again to have struck the weak despot, and an order of the Council (November 16) goes forth that--"Whereas in Goldsmith's Row, in Cheapside and Lombard Street, divers shops are held by persons of other trades, whereby that uniform show which was an ornament to those places and a lustre to the City is now greatly diminished, all the shops in Goldsmith's Row are to be occupied by none but goldsmiths; and all the goldsmiths who keep shops in other parts of the City are to resort thither, or to Lombard Street or Cheapside."

The next year we find a tradesman who had been expelled from Goldsmiths' Row praying bitterly to be allowed a year longer, as he cannot find a residence, the removal of houses in Cheapside, Lombard Street, and St. Paul's Churchyard having rendered shops scarce.

In 1637 the king returns again to the charge, and determines to carry out his tyrannical whim by the following order of the Council:--"The Council threaten the Lord Mayor and aldermen with imprisonment, if they do not forthwith enforce the king's command that all shops should be shut up in Cheapside and Lombard Street that were not goldsmiths' shops." The Council "had learned that there were still twenty-four houses and shops that were not inhabited by goldsmiths, but in some of them were one Grove and Widow Hill, stationers; one Sanders, a drugster; Medcalfe, a cook; Renatus Edwards, a girdler; John Dover, a milliner; and Brown, a bandseller."

In 1664 we discover from a letter of the Dutch ambassador, Van Goch, to the States-General, that a great fire in Cheapside, "the principal street of the City," had burned six houses. In this reign the Cheapside market seems to have given great vexation to the Cheapside tradesmen. In 1665 there is a State Paper to this effect:--

"The inquest of Cheap, Cripplegate, Cordwainer, Bread Street, and Farringdon Within wards, to the Lord Mayor and Court of Aldermen of London. In spite of orders to the contrary, the abuses of Cheapside Market continue, and the streets are so pestered and encroached on that the passages are blocked up and trade decays. Request redress by fining those who allow stalls before their doors except at market times, or by appointing special persons to see to the matter, and disfranchise those who disobey; the offenders are 'marvellous obstinate and refractory to all good orders,' and not to be dealt with by common law."

Pepys, in his inimitable "Diary," gives us two interesting glimpses of Cheapside--one of the fermenting times immediately preceding the Restoration, the other a few years later--showing the effervescing spirit of the London 'prentices of Charles II.'s time:--

"1659.--Coming home, heard that in Cheapside there had been but a little before a gibbet set up, and the picture of Huson hung upon it in the middle of the street. (John Hewson, who had been a shoemaker, became a colonel in the Parliament army, and sat in judgment on the king. He escaped hanging by flight, and died in 1662 at Amsterdam.)

"1664.--So home, and in Cheapside, both coming and going, it was full of apprentices, who have been here all this day, and have done violence, I think, to the master of the boys that were put in the pillory yesterday. But Lord! to see how the trained bands are raised upon this, the drums beating everywhere as if an enemy were upon them--so much is this city subject to be put into a disarray upon very small occasions. But it was pleasant to hear the boys, and particularly one very little one, that I demanded the business of. He told me that that had never been done in the City since it was a city--two 'prentices put in the pillory, and that it ought not to be so."

Cheapside has been the scene of two great riots, which were threatening enough to render them historically important. The one was in the reign of Richard I., the other in that of Henry VIII. The first of these, a violent protest against Norman oppression, was no doubt fomented, if not originated, by the down-trodden Saxons. It began thus:--On the return of Richard from his captivity in Germany, and before his fiery retaliation on France, a London citizen named William with the Long Beard (alias Fitzosbert, a deformed man, but of great courage and zeal for the poor), sought the king, and appealing to his better nature, laid before him a detail of great oppressions and outrages wrought by the Mayor and rich aldermen of the city, to burden the humbler citizens and relieve themselves, especially at "the hoistings" when any taxes or tollage were to be levied. Fitzosbert, encouraged at gaining the king's ear, and hoping too much from the generous but rapacious Norman soldier, grew bolder, openly defended the causes of oppressed men, and thus drew round him daily great crowds of the poor.

"Many gentlemen of honour," says Holinshed, "sore hated him for his presumptious attempts to the hindering of their purposes; but he had such comfort of the king that he little paused for their malice, but kept on his intent, till the king, being advertised of the assemblies which he made, commanded him to cease from such doings, that the people might fall again to their sciences and occupations, which they had for the most part left off at the instigation of this William with the Long Beard, which he nourished of purpose, to seem the more grave and manlike, and also, as it were, in despite of them which counterfeited the Normans (that were for the most part shaven), and because he would resemble the ancient usage of the English nation. The king's commandment in restraint of people's resort unto him was well kept for a time, but it was not long before they began to follow him again as they had done before. Then he took upon him to make unto them certain speeches. By these and such persuasions and means as he used, he had gotten two and fifty thousand persons ready to have taken his part."

How far this English Rienzi intended to obtain redress by force we cannot clearly discover; but he does not seem to have been a man who would have stopped at anything to obtain justice for the oppressed--and that the Normans were oppressors, till they became real Englishmen, there can be no doubt. The rich citizens and the Norman nobles, who had clamped the City fast with fortresses, soon barred out Longbeard from the king's chamber. The Archbishop of Canterbury especially, who ruled the City, called together the rich citizens, excited their fears, and with true priestly craft persuaded them to give sure pledges that no outbreak should take place, although he denied all belief in the possibility of such an event. The citizens, overcome by his oily and false words, willingly gave their pledges, and were from that time in the archbishop's power. The wily prelate then, finding the great demagogue was still followed by dangerous and threatening crowds, appointed two burgesses and other spies to watch Fitzosbert, and, when it was possible, to apprehend him.

These men at a convenient time set upon Fitzosbert, to bind and carry him off, but Longbeard was a hero at heart and full of ready courage. Snatching up an axe, he defended himself manfully, slew one of the archbishop's emissaries, and flew at once for sanctuary into the Church of St. Mary Bow. Barring the doors and retreating to the tower, he and some trusty friends turned it into a small fortress, till at last his enemies, gathering thicker round him and setting the steeple on fire, forced Longbeard and a woman whom he loved, and who had followed him there, into the open street.

As the deserted demagogue was dragged forth through the fire and smoke, still loth to yield, a son of the burgess whom he had stricken dead ran forward and stabbed him in the side. The wounded man was quickly overpowered, for the citizens, afraid to forfeit their pledges, did not come to his aid as he had expected, and he was hurried to the Tower, where the expectant archbishop sat ready to condemn him. We can imagine what that drum-head trial would be like. Longbeard was at once condemned, and with nine of his adherents, scorched and smoking from the fire, was sentenced to be hung on a gibbet at the Smithfield Elms. For all this, the fermentation did not soon subside; the people too late remembered how Fitzosbert had pleaded for their rights, and braved king, prelate, and baron; and they loudly exclaimed against the archbishop for breaking sanctuary, and putting to death a man who had only defended himself against assassins, and was innocent of other crimes. The love for the dead man, indeed, at last rose to such a height that the rumour ran that miracles were wrought by even touching the chains by which he had been bound in the Tower. He became for a time a saint to the poorer and more suffering subjects of the Normans, and the place where he was beheaded in Smithfield was visited as a spot of special holiness.

But this riot of Longbeard's was but the threatening of a storm. A tempest longer and more terrible broke over Cheapside on "Evil May Day," in the reign of Henry VIII. Its origin was the jealousy of the Lombards and other foreign money-lenders and craftsmen entertained by the artisans and 'prentices of London. Its actual cause was the seduction of a citizen's wife by a Lombard named Francis de Bard, of Lombard Street. The loss of the wife might have been borne, but the wife took with her, at the Italian's solicitation, a box of her husband's plate. The husband demanding first his wife and then his plate, was flatly refused both. The injured man tried the case at the Guildhall, but was foiled by the intriguing foreigner, who then had the incomparable rascality to arrest the poor man for his wife's board.

"This abuse," says Holinshed, "was much hated; so that the same and manie other oppressions done by the Lombards increased such a malice in the Englishmen's hearts, that at the last it burst out. For amongst others that sore grudged these matters was a broker in London, called John Lincolne, that busied himself so farre in the matter, that about Palme Sundie, in the eighth yeare of the King's reign, he came to one Doctor Henry Standish with these words: 'Sir, I understand that you shall preach at the Sanctuarie, Spittle, on Mondaie in Easter Weeke, and so it is, that Englishmen, both merchants and others, are undowne, for strangers have more liberty in this land than Englishmen, which is against all reason, and also against the commonweal of the realm. I beseech you, therefore, to declare this in your sermon, and in soe doing you shall deserve great thanks of my Lord Maior and of all his brethren;' and herewith he offered unto the said Doctor Standish a bill containing this matter more at large.... Dr. Standish refused to have anything to do with the matter, and John Lincolne went to Dr. Bell, a chanon of the same Spittle, that was appointed likewise to preach upon the Tuesday in Easter Weeke, whome he perswaded to read his said bill in the pulpit."

This bill complained vehemently of the poverty of London artificers, who were starving, while the foreigners swarmed everywhere; also that the English merchants were impoverished by foreigners, who imported all silks, cloth of gold, wine, and iron, so that people scarcely cared even to buy of an Englishman. Moreover, the writer declared that foreigners had grown so numerous that, on a Sunday in the previous Lent, he had seen 600 strangers shooting together at the popinjay. He also insisted on the fact of the foreigners banding in fraternities, and clubbing together so large a fund, that they could overpower even the City of London.

Lincoln having won over Dr. Bell to read the complaint, went round and told every one he knew that shortly they would have news; and excited the 'prentices and artificers to expect some speedy rising against the foreign merchants and workmen. In due time the sermon was preached, and Dr. Bell drew a strong picture of the riches and indolence of the foreigners, and the struggling and poverty of English craftsmen.

The train was ready, and on such occasions the devil is never far away with the spark. The Sunday after the sermon, Francis de Bard, the aforesaid Lombard, and other foreign merchants, happened to be in the King's Gallery at Greenwich Palace, and were laughing and boasting over Bard's intrigue with the citizen's wife. Sir Thomas Palmer, to whom they spoke, said, "Sirs, you have too much favour in England;" and one William Bolt, a merchant, added, "Well, you Lombards, you rejoice now; but, by the masse, we will one day have a fling at you, come when it will." And that saying the other merchants affirmed. This tale was reported about London.

The attack soon came. "On the 28th of April, 1513," says Holinshed, "some young citizens picked quarrels with the strangers, insulting them in various ways, in the streets; upon which certain of the said citizens were sent to prison. Then suddenly rose a secret rumour, and no one could tell how it began, that on May-day next the City would rise against the foreigners, and slay them; insomuch that several of the strangers fled from the City. This rumour reached the King's Council, and Cardinal Wolsey sent for the Mayor, to ask him what he knew of it; upon which the Mayor told him that peace should be kept. The Cardinal told him to take pains that it should be. The Mayor came from the Cardinal's at four in the afternoon of May-day eve, and in all haste sent for his brethren to the Guildhall; yet it was almost seven before they met. It was at last decided, with the consent of the Cardinal, that instead of a strong watch being set, which might irritate, all citizens should be warned to keep their servants within doors on the dreaded day. The Recorder and Sir Thomas More, of the King's Privy Council, came to the Guildhall, at a quarter to nine p.m., and desired the aldermen to send to every ward, forbidding citizens' servants to go out from seven p.m. that day to nine a.m. of the next day.

"After this command had been given," says the chronicler, "in the evening, as Sir John Mundie (an alderman) came from his ward, and found two young men in Chepe, playing at the bucklers, and a great many others looking on (for the command was then scarce known), he commanded them to leave off; and when one of them asked why, he would have had him to the counter. Then all the young 'prentices resisted the alderman, taking the young fellow from him, and crying ''Prentices and Clubs.' Then out of every door came clubs and weapons. The alderman fled, and was in great danger. Then more people arose out of every quarter, and forth came serving men, watermen, courtiers, and others; so that by eleven o'clock there were in Chepe six or seven hundred; and out of Paul's Churchyard came 300, which knew not of the other. So out of all places they gathered, and broke up the counters, and took out the prisoners that the Mayor had committed for hurting the strangers; and went to Newgate, and took out Studleie and Petit, committed thither for that cause.

"The Mayor and Sheriff made proclamation, but no heed was paid to them. Herewith being gathered in plumps, they ran through St. Nicholas' shambles, and at St. Martin's Gate there met with them Sir Thomas More, and others, desiring them to goe to their lodgings; and as they were thus intreating, and had almost persuaded the people to depart, they within St. Martin's threw out stones, bats, and hot water, so that they hurt divers honest persons that were there with Sir Thomas More; insomuch as at length one Nicholas Downes, a sergeant of arms, being there with the said Sir Thomas More, and sore hurt amongst others, cried 'Down with them!' and then all the misruled persons ran to the doors and windows of the houses round Saint Martin's, and spoiled all that they found.

"After that they ran headlong into Cornhill, and there likewise spoiled divers houses of the French men that dwelled within the gate of Master Newton's house, called Queene Gate. This Master Newton was a Picard borne, and reputed to be a great favourer of Frenchmen in their occupiengs and trades, contrary to the laws of the Citie. If the people had found him, they had surelie have stricken off his head; but when they found him not, the watermen and certain young preests that were there, fell to rifling, and some ran to Blanch-apelton, and broke up the strangers' houses and spoiled them. Thus from ten or eleven of the clock these riotous people continued their outrageous doings, till about three of the clock, at what time they began to withdraw, and went to their places of resort; and by the way they were taken by the Maior and the heads of the Citie, and sent some of them to the Tower, some to Newgate, some to the counters, to the number of 300.

"Manie fled, and speciallie the watermen and preests and serving men, but the 'prentices were caught by the backs, and had to prison. In the meantime, whilst the hottest of this ruffling lasted, the Cardinall was advertised thereof by Sir Thomas Parre; whereon the Cardinall strengthened his house with men and ordnance. Sir Thomas Parre rode in all haste to Richmond, where the King lay, and informed him of the matter; who incontinentlie sent forth hastilie to London, to understand the state of the Citie, and was truely advertised how the riot had ceased, and manie of the misdoers apprehended. The Lieutenant of the Tower, Sir Roger Cholmeleie (no great friend to the Citie), in a frantike furie, during the time of this uprore, shot off certaine pieces of ordinance against the Citie, and though they did no great harm, yet he won much evil will for his hastie doing, because men thought he did it of malice, rather than of any discretion.

"About five o'clock, the Earls of Shrewsbury and Surrey, Thomas Dockerin, Lord of Saint John's, George Neville, Lord of Abergavenny, came to London with such force as they could gather in haste, and so did the Innes of Court. Then were the prisoners examined, and the sermon of Dr. Bell brought to remembrance, and he sent to the Tower. Herewith was a Commission of Oyer and Determiner, directed to the Duke of Norfolk and other lords, to the Lord Mayor of London, and the aldermen, and to all the justices of England, for punishment of this insurrection. (The Citie thought the Duke bare them a grudge for a lewd preest of his that the yeare before was slaine in Chepe, insomuch that he then, in his fury, said, 'I pray God I may once have the citizens in my power!' And likewise the Duke thought that they bare him no good will; wherefore he came into the Citie with thirteen hundred men, in harnesse, to keepe the oier and determiner.)

"At the time of the examination the streets were filled with harnessed men, who spake very opprobrious words to the citizens, which the latter, although two hundred to one, bore patiently. The inquiry was held at the house of Sir John Fineux, Lord Chief Justice of England, neare to St. Bride's, in Fleet Street.

"When the lords were met at the Guildhall, the prisoners were brought through the street, tied in ropes, some men, and some lads of thirteen years of age. Among them were divers not of the City, some priests, some husbandmen and labourers. The whole number amounted unto two hundred, three score, and eighteen persons. Eventually, thirteen were found guilty, and adjudged to be hanged, drawn, and quartered. Eleven pairs of gallows were set up in various places where the offences had been committed, as at Aldgate, Blanch-appleton, Gratious Street, Leaden Hall, and before every Counter. One also at Newgate, St. Martin's, at Aldersgate, and Bishopsgate. Then were the prisoners that were judged brought to those places of execution, and executed in the most rigorous manner in the presence of the Lord Edward Howard, son to the Duke of Norfolke, a knight marshal, who showed no mercie, but extreme crueltie to the poore yonglings in their execution; and likewise the duke's servants spake many opprobrious words. On Thursday, May the 7th, was Lincolne, Shirwin, and two brethren called Bets, and diverse other persons, adjudged to die; and Lincolne said, 'My lords, I meant well, for if you knew the mischiefe that is insued in this realme by strangers, you would remedie it. And many times I have complained, and then I was called a busie fellow; now, our Lord have mercie on me!' They were laid on hurdels and drawne to the Standard in Cheape, and first was John Lincolne executed; and as the others had the ropes about their neckes, there came a commandment from the king to respit the execution. Then the people cried, 'God save the king!' and so was the oier and terminer deferred till another daie, and the prisoners sent againe to ward. The armed men departed out of London, and all things set in quiet.

"On the 11th of May, the king being at Greenwich, the Recorder of London and several aldermen sought his presence to ask pardon for the late riot, and to beg for mercy for the prisoners; which petition the king sternly refused, saying that although it might be that the substantial citizens did not actually take part in the riot, it was evident, from their supineness in putting it down, that they 'winked at the matter.'

"On Thursday, the 22nd of May, the king, attended by the cardinal and many great lords, sat in person in judgment in Westminster Hall, the mayor, aldermen, and all the chief men of the City being present in their best livery. The king commanded that all the prisoners should be brought forth, so that in came the poore yonglings and old false knaves, bound in ropes, all along one after another in their shirts, and everie one a halter about his necke, to the number of now foure hundred men and eleven women; and when all were come before the king's presence, the cardinall sore laid to the maior and commonaltie their negligence; and to the prisoners he declared that they had deserved death for their offense. Then all the prisoners together cried, 'Mercie, gratious lord, mercie!' Herewith the lords altogither besought his grace of mercie, at whose sute the king pardoned them all. Then the cardinal gave unto them a good exhortation, to the great gladnesse of the hearers.

"Now when the generall pardon was pronounced all the prisoners shouted at once, and altogither cast up their halters into the hall roofe, so that the king might perceive they were none of the discreetest sort. Here is to be noticed that diverse offendors that were not taken, hearing that the king was inclined to mercie, came well apparelled to Westminster, and suddenlie stripped them into their shirts with halters, and came in among the prisoners, willinglie to be partakers of the king's pardon; by which dooing it was well known that one John Gelson, yeoman of the Crowne, was the first that began to spoile, and exhorted others to doe the same; and because he fled and was not taken, he came in with a rope among the other prisoners, and so had his pardon. This companie was after called the 'black-wagon.' Then were all the gallows within the Citie taken downe, and many a good prayer said for the king."

Jane Shore, that beautiful but frail woman, who married a goldsmith in Lombard Street, and was the mistress of Edward IV., was the daughter of a merchant in Cheapside. Drayton describes her minutely from a picture extant in Elizabeth's time, but now lost.

"Her stature," says the poet, "was meane; her haire of a dark yellow; her face round and full; her eye gray, delicate harmony being between each part's proportion and each proportion's colour; her body fat, white, and smooth; her countenance cheerful, and like to her condition. The picture I have seen of her was such as she rose out of her bed in the morning, having nothing on but a rich mantle cast under one arme over her shoulder, and sitting on a chair on which her naked arm did lie. Shore, a young man of right goodly person, wealth, and behaviour, abandoned her after the king had made her his concubine. Richard III., causing her to do open penance in St. Paul's Churchyard, commanded that no man should relieve her, which the tyrant did not so much for his hatred to sinne, but that, by making his brother's life odious, he might cover his horrible treasons the more cunningly."

An old ballad quaintly describes her supposed death, following an entirely erroneous tradition:--

"My gowns, beset with pearl and gold, Were turn'd to simple garments old; My chains and gems, and golden rings, To filthy rags and loathsome things.

"Thus was I scorned of maid and wife, For leading such a wicked life; Both sucking babes and children small, Did make their pastime at my fall.

"I could not get one bit of bread, Whereby my hunger might be fed, Nor drink, but such as channels yield, Or stinking ditches in the field.

"Thus weary of my life, at lengthe I yielded up my vital strength, Within a ditch of loathsome scent, Where carrion dogs did much frequent;

"The which now, since my dying daye, Is Shoreditch call'd, as writers saye;[6] Which is a witness of my sinne, For being concubine to a king."

Sir Thomas More, however, distinctly mentions Jane Shore being alive in the reign of Henry VIII., and seems to imply that he had himself seen her. "He (Richard III.) caused," says More, "the Bishop of London to put her to an open penance, going before the cross in procession upon a Sunday, with a taper in her hand; in which she went in countenance and face demure, so womanly, and albeit she were out of all array save her kirtle only, yet went she so fair and lovely, namely while the wondering of the people cast a comely red in her cheeks (of which she before had most miss), that her great shame was her much praise among those who were more amorous of her body than curious of her soul; and many good folk, also, who hated her living, and were glad to see sin corrected, yet pitied they more her penance than rejoiced therein, when they considered that the Protector procured it more of a corrupt intent than any virtuous intention.

"Proper she was, and fair; nothing in her body that you would have changed, but if you would, have wished her somewhat higher. Thus say they who knew her in her youth; albeit some who now see her (for yet she liveth) deem her never to have been well-visaged; whose judgment seemeth to me to be somewhat like as though men should guess the beauty of one long departed by her scalp taken out of the charnel-house. For now is she old, lean, withered, and dried up--nothing left but shrivelled skin and hard bone. And yet, being even such, whoso well advise her visage, might guess and devine which parts, how filled, would make it a fair face.

"Yet delighted men not so much in her beauty as in her pleasant behaviour. For a proper wit had she, and could both read well and write, merry in company, ready and quick of answer, neither mute nor full of babble, sometimes taunting without displeasure, and not without disport."

FOOTNOTES:

[6] But it had this name long before, being so called from its being a common sewer (vulgarly called shore) or drain. (See Stow.)

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XXVII. CHEAPSIDE SHOWS AND PAGEANTS

A Tournament in Cheapside--The Queen in Danger--The Street in Holiday Attire--The Earliest Civic Show on record--The Water Processions--A Lord Mayor's Show in Queen Elizabeth's Reign--Gossip about Lord Mayors' Shows--Splendid Pageants--Royal Visitors at Lord Mayor's Shows--A Grand Banquet in Guildhall--George III. and the Lord Mayor's Show--The Lord Mayor's State Coach--The Men in Armour--Sir Claudius Hunter and Elliston--Stow and the Midsummer Watch.

We do not hear much in the old chronicles of tournaments and shivered spears in Cheapside, but of gorgeous pageants much. On coronation days, and days when our kings rode from the Tower to Westminster, or from Castle Baynard eastward, Cheapside blossomed at once with flags and banners, rich tapestry hung from every window, and the very gutters ran with wine, so loyal and generous were the citizens of those early days. Costume was bright and splendid in the Middle Ages, and heraldry kept alive the habit of contrasting and mingling colours. Citizens were wealthy, and, moreover, lavish of their wealth.

In these processions and pageants, Cheapside was always the very centre of the show. There velvets and silks trailed; there jewels shone; there spearheads and axe-heads glittered; there breastplates and steel caps gleamed; there proud horses fretted; there bells clashed; there the mob clamoured; there proud, warlike, and beautiful faces showed, uncapped and unveiled, to the seething, jostling people; and there mayor and aldermen grew hottest, bowed most, and puffed out with fullest dignity.

In order to celebrate the birth of the heir of England (the Black Prince, 1330), a great tournament was proclaimed in London. Philippa and all the female nobility were invited to be present. Thirteen knights were engaged on each side, and the tournament was held in Cheapside, between Wood Street and Queen Street; the highway was covered with sand, to prevent the horses' feet from slipping, and a grand temporary wooden tower was erected, for the accommodation of the Queen and her ladies. But scarcely had this fair company entered the tower, when the scaffolding suddenly gave way, and all present fell to the ground with the Queen. Though no one was injured, all were terribly frightened, and great confusion ensued. When the young king saw the peril of his wife, he flew into a tempest of rage, and vowed that the careless carpenters who had constructed the building should instantly be put to death. Whether he would thus far have stretched the prerogative of an English sovereign can never be known (says Miss Strickland), for his angelic partner, scarcely recovered from the terror of her fall, threw herself on her knees before the incensed king, and so effectually pleaded for the pardon of the poor men, that Edward became pacified, and forgave them.

When the young princess, Anne of Bohemia, the first wife of the royal prodigal, Richard II., entered London, a castle with towers was erected at the upper end of Cheapside. On the wooden battlements stood fair maidens, who blew gold leaf on the King, Queen, and retinue, so that the air seemed filled with golden butterflies. This pretty device was much admired. The maidens also threw showers of counterfeit gold coins before the horses' feet of the royal cavalcade, while the two sides of the tower ran fountains of red wine.

On the great occasion when this same Anne, who had by this time supped full of troubles, and by whose entreaties the proud, reckless young king, who had, as it were, excommunicated the City and now forgave it, came again into Chepe, red and white wine poured in fountains from a tower opposite the Great Conduit. The King and Queen were served from golden cups, and at the same place an angel flew down in a cloud, and presented costly golden circlets to Richard and his young wife.

Two days before the opening of Parliament, in 1423, Katherine of Valois, widow of Henry V., entered the city in a chair of state, with her child sitting on her knee. When they arrived at the west door of St. Paul's Cathedral, the Duke Protector lifted the infant king from his chair and set him on his feet, and, with the Duke of Exeter, led him between them up the stairs going into the choir; then, having knelt at the altar for a time, the child was borne into the churchyard, there set upon a fair courser, and so conveyed through Cheapside to his own manor of Kennington.

Time went on, and the weak young king married the fair amazon of France, the revengeful and resolute Margaret of Anjou. At the marriage pageant maidens acted, at the Cheapside conduit, a play representing the five wise and five foolish virgins. Years after, the corpse of the same king passed along the same street; but no huzzas, no rejoicing now. It was on the day after the restoration of Edward IV., when people dared not speak above a breath of what might be happening in the Tower, that the corpse of Henry VI. was borne through Cheapside to St. Paul's, barefaced, on a bier, so that all might see it, though it was surrounded by more brown bills and glaives than torches.

By-and-by, after the fierce retribution of Bosworth, came the Tudors, culminating and ending with Elizabeth.

As Elizabeth of York (Henry VII.'s consort) went from the Tower to Westminster to be crowned, the citizens hung velvets and cloth of gold from the windows in Chepe, and stationed children, dressed like angels, to sing praises to the Queen as she passed by. When the Queen's corpse was conveyed from the Tower, where she died, in Cheapside were stationed thirty-seven virgins, the number corresponding with the Queen's age, all dressed in white, wearing chaplets of white and green, and bearing lighted tapers.

As Anne Boleyn, during her short felicity, proceeded from the Tower to Westminster, on the eve of her coronation, the conduit of Cheapside ran, at one end white wine, and at the other red. At Cheapside Cross stood all the aldermen, from amongst whom advanced Master Walter, the City Recorder, who presented the Queen with a purse, containing a thousand marks of gold, which she very thankfully accepted, with many goodly words. At the Little Conduit of Cheapside was a rich pageant, full of melody and song, where Pallas, Venus, and Juno gave the Queen an apple of gold, divided into three compartments, typifying wisdom, riches, and felicity.

When Queen Elizabeth, young, happy and regal, proceeded through the City the day before her coronation, as she passed through Cheapside, she smiled; and being asked the reason, she replied, "Because I have just heard one say in the crowd, 'I remember old King Harry the Eighth.'" When she came to the grand allegory of Time and Truth, at the Little Conduit, in Cheapside, she asked, who an old man was that sat with his scythe and hour-glass. She was told "Time." "Time?" she repeated; "and Time has brought me here!"

In this pageant she spied that Truth held a Bible, in English, ready for presentation to her; and she bade Sir John Perrot (the knight nearest to her, who held up her canopy, and a kinsman, afterwards beheaded) to step forward and receive it for her; but she was informed such was not the regular manner of presentation, for it was to be let down into her chariot by a silken string. She therefore told Sir John Perrot to stay; and at the proper crisis, some verses being recited by Truth, the book descended, "and the Queen received it in both her hands, kissed it, clasped it to her bosom, and thanked the City for this present, esteemed above all others. She promised to read it diligently, to the great comfort of the bystanders." All the houses in Cheapside were dressed with banners and streamers, and the richest carpets, stuffs, and cloth of gold tapestried the streets. At the upper end of Chepe, the Recorder presented the Queen, from the City, with a handsome crimson satin purse, containing a thousand marks in gold, which she most graciously pocketed. There were trumpeters at the Standard in Chepe, and the City waits stood at the porch of St. Peter's, Cornhill. The City companies stretched in rows from Fenchurch Street to the Little Conduit in Chepe, behind rails, which were hung with cloth.

On an occasion when James I. and his wife visited the City, at the Conduit, Cheapside, there was a grand display of tapestry, gold cloth, and silks; and before the structure "a handsome apprentice was appointed, whose part it was to walk backwards and forwards, as if outside a shop, in his flat cap and usual dress, addressing the passengers with his usual cry for custom of, 'What d'ye lack, gentles? What will you buy? silks, satins, or taff--taf--fetas?' He then broke into premeditated verse:--

"'But stay, bold tongue! I stand at giddy gaze! Be dim, mine eyes! What gallant train are here, That strikes minds mute, puts good wits in a maze? Oh! 'tis our King, royal King James, I say! Pass on in peace, and happy be thy way; Live long on earth, and England's sceptre sway,'" &c.

Henrietta Maria, that pretty, wilful queen of Charles I., accompanied by the Duke of Buckingham and Bassompierre, the French ambassador, went to what the latter calls Shipside, to view the Lord Mayor's procession. She also came to a masquerade at the Temple, in the costume of a City lady. Mistress Bassett, the great lace-woman of Cheapside, went foremost of the Court party at the Temple carnival, and led the Queen by the hand.

But what are royal processions to the Lord Mayor's Show?

The earliest civic show on record, writes Mr. Fairholt, who made a specialty of this subject, took place in 1236, on the passage of Henry III. and Eleanor of Provence through the City to Westminster. They were escorted by the mayor, aldermen, and 360 mounted citizens, apparelled in robes of embroidered silk, and each carrying in their hands a cup of gold or silver, in token of the privilege claimed by the City for the lord mayor to officiate as chief butler at the king's coronation. On the return of Edward I. from the Holy Land the citizens, in the wildness of their loyalty, threw, it is said, handfuls of gold and silver out of window to the crowd. It was on the return of the same king from his Scotch victories that the earliest known City pageant took place. Each guild had its show. The Fishmongers had gilt salmon and sturgeon, drawn by eight horses, and six-and-forty knights riding seahorses, followed by St. Magnus (it was St. Magnus' day), with 1,000 horsemen.

Mr. Fairholt proved from papers still preserved by the Grocers' Company that water processions took place at least nineteen years earlier than the usual date (1453) set down for their commencement. Sir John Norman is mentioned by the City poet as the first Lord Mayor that rowed to Westminster. He had silver oars, and so delighted the London watermen that they wrote a ballad about him, of which two lines only still exist--

"Row thy boat, Norman, Row to thy leman."

In the troublous reign of Henry VI. the Goldsmiths made a special stand for their privileges on Lord Mayor's day. They complained loudly that they had always ridden with the mayor to Westminster and back, and that on their return to Chepe they sit on horseback "above the Cross afore the Goldsmiths' Row; but that on the morrow of the Apostles Simon and Jude, when they came to their stations, they found the Butchers had forestalled them, who would not budge for all the prayers of the wardens of the Goldsmiths, and hence had arisen great variance and strife." The two guilds submitted to the Lord Mayor's arbitration, whereupon the Mayor ruled that the Goldsmiths should retain possession of their ancient stand.

The first Lord Mayor's pageant described by the old chroniclers is that when Anne Boleyn "came from Greenwich to Westminster on her coronation day, and the Mayor went to serve her as chief butler, according to ancient custom." Hall expressly says that the water procession on that occasion resembled that of Lord Mayor's Day. The Mayor's barge, covered with red cloth (blue except at royal ceremonies), was garnished with goodly banners and streamers, and the sides hung with emblazoned targets. In the barge were "shalms, shagbushes, and divers other instruments, which continually made goodly harmony." Fifty barges, filled with the various companies, followed, marshalled and kept in order by three light wherries with officers. Before the Mayor's barge came another barge, full of ordnance and containing a huge dragon (emblematic of the Rouge Dragon in the Tudor arms), which vomited wild fire; and round about it stood terrible monsters and savages, also vomiting fire, discharging squibs, and making "hideous noises." By the side of the Mayor's barge was the bachelors' barge, in which were trumpeters and other musicians. The decks of the Mayor's barge, and the sail-yards, and top-castles were hung with flags and rich cloth of gold and silver. At the head and stern were two great banners, with the royal arms in beaten gold. The sides of the barge were hung with flags and banners of the Haberdashers' and Merchant Adventurers' Companies (the Lord Mayor, Sir Stephen Peacock, was a haberdasher). On the outside of the barge shone three dozen illuminated royal escutcheons. On the left hand of this barge came another boat, in which was a pageant. A white falcon, crowned, stood upon a mount, on a golden rock, environed with white and red roses (Anne Boleyn's device), and about the mount sat virgins, "singing and playing sweetly." The Mayor's company, the Haberdashers, came first, then the Mercers, then the Grocers, and so on, the barges being garnished with banners and hung with arras and rich carpets. In 1566-7 the water procession was very costly, and seven hundred pounds of gunpowder were burned. This is the first show of which a detailed account exists, and it is to be found recorded in the books of the Ironmongers' Company.

A curious and exact description of a Lord Mayor's procession in Elizabeth's reign, written by William Smith, a London haberdasher in 1575, is still extant. The day after Simon and Jude the Mayor went by water to Westminster, attended by the barges of all the companies, duly marshalled and hung with emblazoned shields. On their return they landed at Paul's Wharf, where they took horse, "and in great pomp passed through the great street of the city called Cheapside." The road was cleared by beadles and men dressed as devils, and wild men, whose clubs discharged squibs. First came two great standards, bearing the arms of the City and of the Lord Mayor's company; then two drums, a flute, and an ensign of the City, followed by seventy or eighty poor men, two by two, in blue gowns with red sleeves, each one bearing a pike and a target, with the arms of the Lord Mayor's company. These were succeeded by two more banners, a set of hautboys playing; after these came wyfflers, or clearers of the way, in velvet coats and gold chains, and with white staves in their hands. After the pageant itself paced sixteen trumpeters, more wyfflers to clear the way, and after them the bachelors--sixty, eighty, or one hundred--of the Lord Mayor's company, in long gowns, with crimson satin hoods. These bachelors were to wait on the Mayor. Then followed twelve more trumpeters and the drums and flutes of the City, an ensign of the Mayor's company, the City waits in blue gowns, red sleeves, and silver chains; then the honourable livery, in long robes, each with his hood, half black, half red, on his left shoulder. After them came sheriffs' officers and Mayor's officers, the common serjeant, and the chamberlain. Before the Mayor went the swordbearer in his cap of honour, the sword, in a sheath set with pearls, in his right hand; while on his left came the common cryer, with the great gilt club and a mace on his shoulder. The Mayor wore a long scarlet gown, with black velvet hood and rich gold collar about his neck; and with him rode that fallen dignitary, the ex-Mayor. Then followed all the aldermen, in scarlet gowns and black velvet tippets, those that had been mayors wearing gold chains. The two sheriffs came last of all, in scarlet gowns and gold chains. About one thousand persons sat down to dinner at Guildhall--a feast which cost the Mayor and the two sheriffs £400, whereof the Mayor disbursed £200. Immediately after dinner they went to evening prayer at St. Paul's, the poor men aforementioned carrying torches and targets. The dinner still continues to be eaten, but the service at St. Paul's, as interfering with digestion, was abandoned after the Great Fire. In the evening farewell speeches were made to the Lord Mayor by allegorical personages, and painted posts were set up at his door.

One of the most gorgeous Lord Mayor's shows was that of 1616 (James I.) devised by Anthony Munday, one of the great band of Shakesperean dramatists, who wrote plays in partnership with Drayton. The drawings for the pageant are still in the possession of the Fishmongers' Company. The new mayor was John Leman, a member of that body (knighted during his mayoralty). The first pageant represented a buss, or Dutch fishing-boat, on wheels. The fishermen in it were busy drawing up nets full of live fish and throwing them to the people. On the mast and at the head of the boat were the insignia of the company--St. Peter's keys and two arms supporting a crown. The second pageant was a gigantic crowned dolphin, ridden by Arion. The third pageant was the king of the Moors riding on a golden leopard, and scattering gold and silver freely round him. He was attended by six tributary kings in gilt armour on horseback, each carrying a dart and gold and silver ingots. This pageant was in honour of the Fishmongers' brethren, the Goldsmiths. The fourth pageant was the usual pictorial pun on the Lord Mayor's name and crest. The car bore a large lemon-tree full of golden fruit, with a pelican in her nest feeding her young (proper). At the top of the tree sat five children, representing the five senses. The boys were dressed as women, each with her emblem--Seeing, by an eagle; Hearing, by a hart; Touch, by a spider; Tasting, by an ape; and Smelling, by a dog. The fifth pageant was Sir William Walworth's bower, which was hung with the shields of all lord mayors who had been Fishmongers. Upon a tomb within the bower was laid the effigy in knightly armour of Sir William, the slayer of Wat Tyler. Five mounted knights attended the car, and a mounted man-at-arms bore Wat Tyler's head upon a dagger. In attendance were six trumpeters and twenty-four halberdiers, arrayed in light blue silk, emblazoned with the Fishmongers' arms on the breast and Walworth's on the back. Then followed an angel with golden wings and crown, riding on horseback, who, on the Lord Mayor's approach, with a golden rod awoke Sir William from his long sleep, and the two then became speakers in the interlude.

The great central pageant was a triumphal car drawn by two mermen and two mermaids. In the highest place sat a guardian angel defending the crown of Richard II., who sat just below her. Under the king sat female personifications of the royal virtues, Truth, Virtue, Honour, Temperance, Fortitude, Zeal, Equity, Conscience, beating down Treason and Mutiny, the two last being enacted "by burly men." In a seat corresponding with the king's sat Justice, and below her Authority, Law, Vigilance, Peace, Plenty, and Discipline.

Shirley, the dramatist (Charles I.) has described the Show in his "Contention for Honour and Riches" (1633). Clod, a sturdy countryman, exclaims, "I am plain Clod; I care not a beanstalk for the best what lack you on you all. No, not the next day after Simon and Jude, when you go a-feasting to Westminster with your galley-foist and your pot-guns, to the very terror of the paper whales; when you land in shoals, and make the understanders in Cheapside wonder to see ships swim on men's shoulders; when the fencers flourish and make the king's liege people fall down and worship the devil and St. Dunstan; when your whifflers are hanged in chains, and Hercules Club spits fire about the pageants, though the poor children catch cold that shone like painted cloth, and are only kept alive with sugar-plums; with whom, when the word is given, you march to Guildhall, with every man his spoon in his pocket, where you look upon the giants, and feed like Saracens, till you have no stomach to go to St. Paul's in the afternoon. I have seen your processions, and heard your lions and camels make speeches, instead of grace before and after dinner. I have heard songs, too, or something like 'em; but the porters have had all the burden, who were kept sober at the City charge two days before, to keep time and tune with their feet; for, brag what you will of your charge, all your pomp lies upon their back." In "Honoria and Memoria," 1652, Shirley has again repeated this humorous and graphic description of the land and water pageants of the good citizens of the day; he has, however, abridged the general detail, and added some degree of indelicacy to his satire. He alludes to the wild men that cleared the way, and their fireworks, in these words: "I am not afeard of your green Robin Hoods, that fright with fiery club your pitiful spectators, that take pains to be stifled, and adore the wolves and camels of your company."

Pepys, always curious, always chatty, has, of course, several notices of Lord Mayors' shows; for instance:--

"Oct. 29th, 1660 (Restoration year).--I up early, it being my Lord Mayor's day (Sir Richard Browne), and neglecting my office, I went to the Wardrobe, where I met my Lady Sandwich and all the children; and after drinking of some strange and incomparably good clarett of Mr. Remball's, he and Mr. Townsend did take us, and set the young lords at one Mr. Nevill's, a draper in Paul's Churchyard; and my lady and my Lady Pickering and I to one Mr. Isaacson's, a linendraper at the 'Key,' in Cheapside, where there was a company of fine ladies, and we were very civilly treated, and had a very good place to see the pageants, which were many, and I believe good for such kind of things, but in themselves but poor and absurd. The show being done, we got to Paul's with much ado, and went on foot with my Lady Pickering to her lodging, which was a poor one in Blackfryars, where she never invited me to go in at all, which methought was very strange. Lady Davis is now come to our next lodgings, and she locked up the lead's door from me, which puts me in great disquiet.

"Oct. 29, 1663.--Up, it being Lord Mayor's Day (Sir Anthony Bateman). This morning was brought home my new velvet cloak--that is, lined with velvet, a good cloth the outside--the first that ever I had in my life, and I pray God it may not be too soon that I begin to wear it. I thought it better to go without it because of the crowde, and so I did not wear it. At noon I went to Guildhall, and, meeting with Mr. Proby, Sir R. Ford's son, and Lieutenant-Colonel Baron, a City commander, we went up and down to see the tables, where under every salt there was a bill of fare, and at the end of the table the persons proper for the table. Many were the tables, but none in the hall but the mayor's and the lords of the privy council that had napkins or knives, which was very strange. We went into the buttry, and there stayed and talked, and then into the hall again, and there wine was offered and they drunk, I only drinking some hypocras, which do not break my vowe, it being, to the best of my present judgment, only a mixed compound drink, and not any wine. If I am mistaken, God forgive me! But I do hope and think I am not. By-and-by met with Creed, and we with the others went within the several courts, and there saw the tables prepared for the ladies, and judges, and bishops--all great signs of a great dining to come. By-and-by, about one o'clock, before the Lord Mayor come, came into the hall, from the room where they were first led into, the Chancellor, Archbishopp before him, with the Lords of the Council, and other bishopps, and they to dinner. Anon comes the Lord Mayor, who went up to the lords, and then to the other tables, to bid wellcome; and so all to dinner. I sat near Proby, Baron, and Creed, at the merchant strangers' table, where ten good dishes to a messe, with plenty of wine of all sorts, of which I drank none; but it was very unpleasing that we had no napkins nor change of trenchers, and drunk out of earthen pitchers and wooden dishes. It happened that after the lords had half dined, came the French ambassador up to the lords' table, where he was to have sat; he would not sit down nor dine with the Lord Mayor, who was not yet come, nor have a table to himself, which was offered, but, in a discontent, went away again. After I had dined, I and Creed rose and went up and down the house, and up to the ladies' room, and there stayed gazing upon them. But though there were many and fine, both young and old, yet I could not discern one handsome face there, which was very strange. I expected musique, but there was none, but only trumpets and drums, which displeased me. The dinner, it seems, is made by the mayor and two sheriffs for the time being, the Lord Mayor paying one half, and they the other; and the whole, Proby says, is reckoned to come to about seven or eight hundred at most. Being wearied with looking at a company of ugly women, Creed and I went away, and took coach, and through Cheapside, and there saw the pageants, which were very silly. The Queene mends apace, they say, but yet talks idle still."

In 1672 "London Triumphant, or the City in Jollity and Splendour," was the title of Jordan's pageant for Sir Robert Hanson, of the Grocers' Company. The Mayor, just against Bow Church, was saluted by three pageants; on the two side stages were placed two griffins (the supporters of the Grocers' arms), upon which were seated two negroes, Victory and Gladness attending; while in the centre or principal stage behind reigned Apollo, surrounded by Fame, Peace, Justice, Aurora, Flora, and Ceres. The god addressed the Mayor in a very high-flown strain of compliment, saying--

"With Oriental eyes I come to see, And gratulate this great solemnitie. It hath been often said, so often done, That all men will worship the rising sun. (He rises.) Such are the blessings of his beams. But now The rising sun, my lord, doth worship you." (Apollo bows politely to the Lord Mayor.)

Next was displayed a wilderness, with moors planting and labouring, attended by three pipers and several kitchen musicians that played upon tongs, gridirons, keys, "and other such like confused musick." Above all, upon a mound, sat America, "a proper masculine woman, with a tawny face," who delivered a lengthy speech, which concluded the exhibition for that day.

In 1676 the pageant in Cheapside, which dignified Sir Thomas Davies' accession as Lord Mayor, was "a Scythian chariot of triumph," in which sat a fierce Tamburlain, of terrible aspect and morose disposition, who was, however, very civil and complimentary upon the present occasion. He was attended by Discipline, bearing the king's banner, Conduct that of the Mayor, Courage that of the City, while Victory displayed the flag of the Drapers' Company. The lions of the Drapers' arms drew the car, led by "Asian captive princes, in royal robes and crowns of gold, and ridden by two negro princes." The third pageant was "Fortune's Bower," in which the goddess sat with Prosperity, Gladness, Peace, Plenty, Honour, and Riches. A lamb stood in front, on which rode a boy, "holding the banner of the Virgin." The fourth pageant was a kind of "chase," full of shepherds and others preparing cloth, dancing, tumbling, and curvetting, being intended to represent confusion.

In the show of 1672 two giants, Gogmagog and Corineus, fifteen feet high (whose ancestors were probably destroyed in the Great Fire), appeared in two chariots, "merry, happy, and taking tobacco, to the great admiration and delight of all the spectators." Their predecessors are spoken of by Marston, the dramatist, Stow, and Bishop Corbet. In 1708 (says Mr. Fairholt) the present Guildhall giants were carved by Richard Saunders. In 1837 Alderman Lucas exhibited two wickerwork copies of Gog and Magog, fourteen feet high, their faces on a level with the first-floor windows of Cheapside, and these monstrosities delighted the crowd.

In 1701 (William III.) Sir William Gore, mercer, being Lord Mayor, displayed at his pageant the famous "maiden chariot" of the Mercers' Company. It was drawn by nine white horses, ridden by nine allegorical personages--four representing the four quarters of the world, the other five the retinue of Fame--and all sounding remorselessly on silver trumpets. Fourteen pages, &c., attended the horses, while twenty lictors in silver helmets and forty attendants cleared a way for the procession. The royal virgin in the chariot was attended by Truth and Mercy, besides kettle-drummers and trumpeters. The quaintest thing was that at the Guildhall banquet the virgin, surrounded by all her ladies and pages, dined in state at a separate table.

The last Lord Mayor's pageant of the old school was in 1702 (Queen Anne), when Sir Samuel Dashwood, vintner, entertained her Majesty at the Guildhall. Poor Elkanah Settle (Pope's butt) wrote the libretto, in hopes to revive a festival then "almost dropping into oblivion." On his return from Westminster, the Mayor was met at the Blackfriars Stairs by St. Martin, patron of the Vintners, in rich armour and riding a white steed. The generous saint was attended by twenty dancing satyrs, with tambourines; ten halberdiers, with rustic music; and ten Roman lictors. At St. Paul's Churchyard the saint made a stand, and, drawing his sword, cut off half his crimson scarf, and gave it to some beggars and cripples who importuned him for charity. The pageants were fanciful enough, and poor Settle must have cudgelled his dull brains well for it. The first was an Indian galleon crowded by Bacchanals wreathed with vines. On the deck of the grape-hung vessel sat Bacchus himself, "properly drest." The second pageant was the chariot of Ariadne, drawn by panthers. Then came St. Martin, as a bishop in a temple, and next followed "the Vintage," an eight-arched structure, with termini of satyrs and ornamented with vines. Within was a bar, with a beautiful person keeping it, with drawers (waiters), and gentlemen sitting drinking round a tavern table. On seeing the Lord Mayor, the bar-keeper called to the drawers--

"Where are your eyes and ears? See there what honourable gent appears! Augusta's great Prætorian lord--but hold! Give me a goblet of true Orient mould. And with," &c.

In 1727, the first year of the reign of King George II., the king, queen, and royal family having received a humble invitation from the City to dine at Guildhall, their Majesties, the Princess Royal, and her Royal Highness the Princess Carolina, came into Cheapside about three o'clock in the afternoon, attended by the great officers of the court and a numerous train of the nobility and gentry in their coaches, the streets being lined from Temple Bar by the militia of London, and the balconies adorned with tapestry. Their Majesties and the princesses saw the Lord Mayor's procession from a balcony near Bow Church. Hogarth has introduced a later royal visitor--Frederick, Prince of Wales--in a Cheapside balcony, hung with tapestry, in his "Industrious and Idle Apprentices" (plate xii.). A train-band man in the crowd is firing off a musket to express his delight.

Sir Samuel Fludyer, Lord Mayor of London in the year 1761, the year of the marriage of good King George III., appears to have done things with thoroughness. In a contemporary chronicle we find a very sprightly narrative of Sir Samuel's Lord Mayor's show, in which the king and queen, with "the rest of the royal family," participated--their Majesties, indeed, not getting home from the Guildhall ball until two in the morning. Our sight-seer was an early riser. He found the morning foggy, as is common to this day in London about the 9th of November, but soon the fog cleared away, and the day was brilliantly fine--an exception, he notes, to what had already, in his time, become proverbial that the Lord Mayor's day is almost invariably a bad one. He took boat on the Thames, that he might accompany the procession of state barges on their way to Westminster. He reports "the silent highway" as being quite covered with boats and gilded barges. The barge of the Skinners' Company was distinguished by the outlandish dresses of strange-spotted skins and painted hides worn by the rowers. The barge belonging to the Stationers' Company, after having passed through one of the narrow arches of Westminster Bridge, and tacked about to do honour to the Lord Mayor's landing, touched at Lambeth and took on board, from the archbishop's palace, a hamper of claret--the annual tribute of theology to learning. The tipple must have been good, for our chronicler tells us that it was "constantly reserved for the future regalement of the master, wardens, and court of assistants, and not suffered to be shared by the common crew of liverymen." He did not care to witness the familiar ceremony of swearing in the Lord Mayor in Westminster Hall, but made the best of his way to the Temple Stairs, where it was the custom of the Lord Mayor to land on the conclusion of the aquatic portion of the pageant. There he found some of the City companies already landed, and drawn up in order in Temple Lane, between two rows of the train-bands, "who kept excellent discipline." Other of the companies were wiser in their generation; they did not land prematurely to cool their heels in Temple Lane, while the royal procession was passing along the Strand, but remained on board their barges regaling themselves comfortably. The Lord Mayor encountered good Samaritans in the shape of the master and benchers of the Temple, who invited him to come on shore and lunch with them in the Temple Hall.

Every house from Temple Bar to Guildhall was crowded from top to bottom, and many had scaffoldings besides; carpets and rich hangings were hung out on the fronts all the way along; and our friend notes that the citizens were not mercenary, but "generously accommodated their friends and customers gratis, and entertained them in the most elegant manner, so that though their shops were shut, they might be said to have kept open house."

The royal procession, which set out from St. James's Palace at noon, did not get to Cheapside until near four, when in the short November day it must have been getting dark. Our sight-seer, as the royal family passed his window, counted between twenty and thirty coaches-and-six belonging to them and to their attendants, besides those of the foreign ambassadors, officers of state, and the principal nobility. There preceded their Majesties the Duke of Cumberland, Princess Amelia, the Duke of York, in a new state coach; the Princes William Henry and Frederic, the Princess Dowager of Wales, and the Princesses Augusta and Caroline in one coach, preceded by twelve footmen with black caps, followed by guards and a grand retinue. The king and queen were in separate coaches, and had separate retinues. Our friend in the window of the "Queen's Arms" was in luck's way. From a booth at the eastern end of the churchyard the children of Christ Church Hospital paid their respects to their Majesties, the senior scholar of the grammar school reciting a lengthy and loyal address, after which the boys chanted "God Save the King." At last the royal family got to the house of Mr. Barclay, the Quaker, from the balcony of which, hung with crimson silk damask, they were to see, with what daylight remained, the civic procession that presently followed; but in the interval came Mr. Pitt, in his chariot, accompanied by Earl Temple. The great commoner was then in the zenith of his popularity, and our sight-seer narrates how, "at every step, the mob clung about every part of the vehicle, hung upon the wheels, hugged his footmen, and even kissed his horses. There was an universal huzza, and the gentlemen at the windows and the balconies waved their hats, and the ladies their handkerchiefs."

The Lord Mayor's state coach was drawn by six beautiful iron-grey horses, gorgeously caparisoned, and the companies made a grand appearance. Even a century ago, however, degeneracy had set in. Our sight-seer complains that the Armourers' and Braziers', the Skinners' and Fishmongers' Companies were the only companies that had anything like the pageantry exhibited of old on the occasion. The Armourers sported an archer riding erect in his car, having his bow in his left hand, and his quiver and arrows hanging behind his left shoulder; also a man in complete armour. The Skinners were distinguished by seven of their company being dressed in fur, having their skins painted in the form of Indian princes. The pageant of the Fishmongers consisted of a statue of St. Peter finely gilt, a dolphin, two mermaids, and a couple of seahorses; all which duly passed before Georgius Rex as he leaned over the balcony with his Charlotte by his side.

Our chronicler understood well the strategic movements indispensable to the zealous sight-seer. As soon as the Lord Mayor's procession had passed him, he "posted along the back lanes, to avoid the crowd," and got to the Guildhall in advance of the Lord Mayor. He had procured a ticket for the banquet through the interest of a friend, who was one of the committee for managing the entertainment, and also a "mazarine." It is explained that this was a kind of nickname given to the common councilmen, on account of their wearing mazarine blue silk gowns. He learned that the doors of the hall had been first opened at nine in the morning for the admission of ladies into the galleries, who were the friends of the committee men, and who got the best places; and subsequently at twelve for the general reception of all who had a right to come in. What a terrible spell of waiting those fortunate unfortunates comprising the earliest batch must have had! The galleries presented a very brilliant show, and among the company below were all the officers of state, the principal nobility, and the foreign ambassadors. The Lord Mayor arrived at half-past six, and the sheriffs went straight to Mr. Barclay's to conduct the royal family to the hall. The passage from the hall-gate to steps leading to the King's Bench was lined by mazarines with candles in their hands, by aldermen in their red gowns, and gentlemen pensioners with their axes in their hands. At the bottom of the steps stood the Lord Mayor and the Lady Mayoress, with the entertainment committee, to receive the members of the royal family as they arrived. The princes and princesses, as they successively came in, waited in the body of the hall until their Majesties' entrance. On their arrival being announced, the Lord Mayor and the Lady Mayoress, as the chronicler puts it, advanced to the great door of the hall; and at their Majesties' entrance, the Lord Mayor presented the City sword, which being returned, he carried before the King, the Queen following, with the Lady Mayoress behind her. "The music had struck up, but was drowned in the acclamations of the company; in short, all was life and joy; even the giants, Gog and Magog, seemed to be almost animated." The King, at all events, was more than almost animated; he volubly praised the splendour of the scene, and was very gracious to the Lord Mayor on the way to the council chamber, followed by the royal family and the reception committee. This room reached, the Recorder delivered the inevitable addresses, and the wives and daughters of the aldermen were presented. These ladies had the honour of being saluted by his Majesty, and of kissing the Queen's hand, then the sheriffs were knighted, as also was the brother of the Lord Mayor.

After half an hour's stay in the council chamber, the royal party returned into the hall, and were conducted to the upper end of it, called the hustings, where a table was provided for them, at which they sat by themselves. There had been, it seems, a knotty little question of etiquette. The ladies-in-waiting on the Queen had claimed the right of custom to dine at the same table with her Majesty, but this was disallowed; so they dined at the table of the Lady Mayoress in the King's Bench. The royal table "was set off with a variety of emblematic ornaments, beyond description elegant," and a superb canopy was placed over their Majesties' heads at the upper end. For the Lord Mayor, aldermen, and their ladies, there was a table on the lower hustings. The privy councillors, ministers of state, and great nobles dined at a table on the right of this; the foreign ministers at one on the left. For the mazarines and the general company there were eight tables laid out in the body of the hall, while the judges, serjeants, and other legal celebrities, dined in the old council chamber, and the attendants of the distinguished visitors were regaled in the Court of Common Pleas.

George and his consort must have got up a fine appetite between noon and nine o'clock, the hour at which the dinner was served. The aldermen on the committee acted as waiters at the royal table. The Lord Mayor stood behind the King, "in quality of chief butler, while the Lady Mayoress waited on her Majesty" in the same capacity, but soon after seats were taken they were graciously sent to their seats. The dinner consisted of three courses, besides the dessert, and the purveyors were Messrs. Horton and Birch, the same house which in the present day supplies most of the civic banquets. The illustration which we give on the previous page is from an old print of the period representing this celebrated festival, and is interesting not merely on account of the scene which it depicts, but also as a view of Guildhall at that period.

The bill of fare at the royal table on this occasion is extant, and as it is worth a little study on the part of modern epicures, we give it here at full length for their benefit:--

FIRST SERVICE.

Venison, turtle soups, fish of every sort, viz., dorys, mullets, turbots, tench, soles, &c., nine dishes.

SECOND SERVICE.

A fine roast, ortolans, teals, quails, ruffs, knotts, peachicks, snipes, partridges, pheasants, &c., nine dishes.

THIRD SERVICE.

Vegetables and made dishes, green peas, green morelles, green truffles, cardoons, artichokes, ducks' tongues, fat livers, &c., eleven dishes.

FOURTH SERVICE.

Curious ornaments in pastry and makes, jellies, blomonges, in variety of shapes, figures, and colours, nine dishes.

In all, not including the dessert, there were placed on the tables four hundred and fourteen dishes, hot and cold. Wine was varied and copious. In the language of the chronicler, "champagne, burgundy, and other valuable wines were to be had everywhere, and nothing was so scarce as water." When the second course was being laid on, the toasts began. The common crier, standing before the royal table, demanded silence, then proclaimed aloud that their Majesties drank to the health and prosperity of the Lord Mayor, aldermen, and common council of the City of London. Then the common crier, in the name of the civic dignitaries, gave the toast of health, long life, and prosperity to their most gracious Majesties. After dinner there was no tarrying over the wine-cup. The royal party retired at once to the council chamber, "where they had their tea." What became of the rest of the company is not mentioned, but clearly the Guildhall could have been no place for them. That was summarily occupied by an army of carpenters. The tables were struck and carried out. The hustings, where the great folks had dined, and the floor of which had been covered with rich carpeting, was covered afresh, and the whole hall rapidly got ready for the ball, with which the festivities were to conclude. On the return of their majesties, and as soon as they were seated under the canopy, the ball was opened by the Duke of York and the Lady Mayoress. It does not appear that the royal couple took the floor, but "other minuets succeeded by the younger branches of the royal family with ladies of distinction."

About midnight Georgius Rex, beginning probably to get sleepy with all this derangement of his ordinarily methodical way of living, signified his desire to take his departure; but things are not always possible even when kings are in question. Such was the hurry and confusion outside--at least that is the reason assigned by the chronicler--that there was great delay in fetching up the royal carriages to the Guildhall door. Our own impression is that the coachmen were all drunk, not excepting the state coachman himself. Their Majesties waited half an hour before their coach could be brought up, and perhaps, after all the interchange of civilities, went away in a tantrum at the end. It is clear the Princess Dowager of Wales did, for she waited some time in the temporary passage, "nor could she be prevailed on to retire into the hall." There was no procession on the return from the City. The royal people trundled home as they best might, and according as their carriages came to hand. But we are told that on the return journey, past midnight as it was, the crowd in some places was quite as great as it had been in the daytime, and that Mr. Pitt was vociferously cheered all the way to his own door. The King and Queen did not get home to St. James's till two o'clock in the morning, and it is a confirmation of the suggestion that the coachman must have been drunk, that in turning under the gate one of the glasses of their coach was broken by the roof of the sentry-box. As for the festive people left behind in the Guildhall, they kept the ball up till three o'clock, and we are told that "the whole was concluded with the utmost regularity and decorum." Indeed, Sir Samuel Fludyer's Lord Mayor's day appears to have been a triumphant success. His Majesty himself, we are told, was pleased to declare "that to be elegantly entertained he must come into the City." The foreign ministers in general expressed their wonder, and one of them politely said in French, that this entertainment was only fit for one king to give to another.

One of the Barclays has left a pleasant account of this visit of George III. to the City to see the Lord Mayor's Show:--"The Queen's clothes," says the lady, "which were as rich as gold, silver, and silk could make them, was a suit from which fell a train supported by a little page in scarlet and silver. The lustre of her stomacher was inconceivable. The King I think a very personable man. All the princes followed the King's example in complimenting each of us with a kiss. The Queen was upstairs three times, and my little darling, with Patty Barclay and Priscilla Bell, were introduced to her. I was present, and not a little anxious, on account of my girl, who kissed the Queen's hand with so much grace, that I thought the Princess Dowager would have smothered her with kisses. Such a report of her was made to the King, that Miss was sent for, and afforded him great amusement by saying, 'that she loved the king, though she must not love fine things, and her grandpapa would not allow her to make a curtsey." Her sweet face made such an impression on the Duke of York, that I rejoiced she was only five instead of fifteen. When he first met her, he tried to persuade Miss to let him introduce her to the Queen, but she would by no means consent, till I informed her he was a prince, upon which her little female heart relented, and she gave him her hand--a true copy of the sex. The King never sat down, nor did he taste anything during the whole time. Her Majesty drank tea, which was brought her on a silver waiter by brother John, who delivered it to the lady in waiting, and she presented it kneeling. The leave they took of us was such as we might expect from our equals--full of apologies for our trouble for their entertainment, which they were so anxious to have explained, that the Queen came up to us as we stood on one side of the door, and had every word interpreted. My brothers had the honour of assisting the Queen into her coach. Some of us sat up to see them return, and the King and Queen took especial notice of us as they passed. The King ordered twenty-four of his guard to be placed opposite our door all night, lest any of the canopy should be pulled down by the mob, in which" (the canopy, it is to be presumed) "there were 100 yards of silk damask."

"From the above particulars we learn," says Dr. Doran, "that it was customary for our sovereigns to do honour to industry long before the period of the Great Exhibition year, which is erroneously supposed to be the opening of an era when a sort of fraternisation took place between commerce and the Crown. Under the old reign, too, the honour took a homely, but not an undignified, and if still a ceremonious, yet a hearty shape. It may be questioned, if Royalty were to pay a visit to the family of the present Mr. Barclay, whether the monarch would celebrate the brief sojourn by kissing all the daughters of 'Barclay and Perkins.' He might do many things not half so pleasant."

The most important feature of the modern show, says Mr. Fairholt very truly, is the splendidly carved and gilt coach in which the Lord Mayor rides; and the paintings that decorate it may be considered as the relics of the ancient pageants that gave us the living representatives of the virtues and attributes of the chief magistrate here delineated. Cipriani was the artist who executed this series of paintings, in 1757; and they exhibit upon the panel of the right door, Fame presenting the Mayor to the genius of the City; on the left door, the same genius, attended by Britannia, who points with her spear to a shield, inscribed "Henry Fitz-Alwin, 1109." On each side of the doors are painted Truth, with her mirror; Temperance, holding a bridle; Justice, and Fortitude. The front panel exhibits Faith and Hope, pointing to St. Paul's; the back panel Charity, two female figures, typical of Plenty and Riches, casting money and fruits into her lap--while a wrecked sailor and sinking ship fill up the background. By the kind permission of the Lord Mayor we are enabled to give a representation of the ponderous old vehicle, which is still the centre of attraction every 9th of November.

The carved work of the coach is elaborate and beautiful, consisting of Cupids supporting the City arms, &c. The roof was formerly ornamented in the centre with carved work, representing four boys supporting baskets of fruit, &c. These were damaged by coming into collision with an archway leading into Blackwall Hall, about fifty years ago; some of the figures were knocked off, and the group was entirely removed in consequence. This splendid coach was paid for by a subscription of £60 from each of the junior aldermen, and such as had not passed the civic chair--its total cost being £1,065 3s. Subsequently each alderman, when sworn into office, contributed that sum to keep it in repair; for which purpose, also, each Lord Mayor gave £100, which was allowed to him in case the cost of the repairs during his mayoralty rendered it requisite. This arrangement was not, however, complied with for many years; after which the whole expense fell upon the Lord Mayor, and in one year it exceeded £300. This outlay being considered an unjust tax upon the mayor for the time being, the amount over £100 was repaid to him, and the coach became the property of the corporation, the expenses ever since being paid by the Committee for General Purposes. Even so early as twenty years after its construction it was found necessary to repair the coach at an expense of £335; and the average expense of the repairs during seven years of the present century is said to have been as much as £115. Hone justly observes, "All that remains of the Lord Mayor's Show to remind the curiously-informed of its ancient character, is the first part of the procession. These are the poor men of the company to which the Lord Mayor belongs, habited in long gowns and close caps of the company's colour, bearing shields on their arms, but without javelins. So many of these lead the show as there are years in the Lord Mayor's age."

Of a later show "Aleph" gives a pleasant account. "I was about nine years old," he says, "when from a window on Ludgate Hill I watched the ponderous mayor's coach, grand and wide, with six footmen standing on the footboard, rejoicing in bouquets as big as their heads and canes four feet high, dragged slowly up the hill by a team of be-ribboned horses, which, as they snorted along, seemed to be fully conscious of the precious freight in the rear. Cinderella's carriage never could boast so goodly a driver; his full face, of a dusky or purple red, swelled out on each side like the breast of a pouting pigeon; his three-cornered hat was almost hidden by wide gold lace; the flowers in his vest were full-blown and jolly, like himself; his horsewhip covered with blue ribbons, rising and falling at intervals merely for form--such horses were not made to be flogged. Coachee's box was rather a throne than a seat. Then a dozen gorgeous walking footmen on either hand; grave marshalmen, treading gingerly, as if they had corns; and City officers in scarlet, playing at soldiers, but looking anything but soldierly; two trumpeters before and behind, blowing an occasional blast....

"How that old coach swayed to and fro, with its dignified elderly gentlemen and rubicund Lord Mayor, rejoicing in countless turtle feeds--for, reader, it was Sir William Curtis!...

"As the ark of copper, plate glass, and enamel crept slowly up the incline, a luckless sweeper-boy (in those days such dwarfed lads were forced to climb chimneys) sidled up to one of the fore horses, and sought to detach a pink bow from his mane. The creature felt his honours diminishing, and turned to snap at the blackee. The sweep screamed, the horse neighed, the mob shouted, and Sir William turned on his pivot cushion to learn what the noise meant; and thus we were enabled to gaze on a Lord Mayor's face. In sooth he was a goodly gentleman, burly, and with three fingers' depth of fat on his portly person, yet every feature evinced kindliness and benevolence of no common order."

The men in armour were from time immemorial important features in the show, and the subjects of many a jest. Hogarth introduces them in one of his series, "Industry and Idleness," and Punch has cast many a missile at those disconsolate warriors, who all but perished under their weight of armour, degenerate race that we are!

The suits of burnished mail, though generally understood to be kindly lent for the occasion by the custodian of the Tower armoury, seem now and then to have been borrowed from the playhouse, possibly for the reason that the imitation accoutrements were more showy and superb than the real.

This was at any rate the case (says Mr. Dutton Cook) in 1812, when Sir Claudius Hunter was Lord Mayor, and Mr. Elliston was manager of the Surrey Theatre. A melodramatic play was in preparation, and for this special object the manager had provided, at some considerable outlay, two magnificent suits of brass and steel armour of the fourteenth century, expressly manufactured for him by Mr. Marriott of Fleet Street. No expense had been spared in rendering this harness as complete and splendid as could be. Forthwith Sir Claudius applied to Elliston for the loan of the new armour to enhance the glories of the civic pageant. The request was acceded to with the proviso that the suit of steel could only be lent in the event of the ensuing 9th of November proving free from damp and fog. No such condition, however, was annexed to the loan of the brass armour; and it was understood that Mr. John Kemble had kindly undertaken to furnish the helmets of the knights with costly plumes, and personally to superintend the arrangement of these decorations. Altogether, it would seem that the mayor stood much indebted to the managers, who, willing to oblige, yet felt that their courtesy was deserving of some sort of public recognition. At least this was Elliston's view of the matter, who read with chagrin sundry newspaper paragraphs, announcing that at the approaching inauguration of Sir Claudius some of the royal armour from the Tower would be exhibited, but ignoring altogether the loan of the matchless suits of steel and brass from the Surrey Theatre. The manager was mortified; he could be generous, but he knew the worth of an advertisement. He expostulated with the future mayor. Sir Claudius replied that he did not desire to conceal the transaction, but rather than it should go forth to the world that so high a functionary as an alderman of London had made a request to a theatrical manager, he thought it advisable to inform the public that Mr. Elliston had offered the use of his property for the procession of the 9th. This was hardly a fair way of stating the case, but at length the following paragraph, drawn up by Elliston, was agreed upon for publication in the newspapers:--"We understand that Mr. Elliston has lent to the Lord Mayor elect the two magnificent suits of armour, one of steel and the other of brass, manufactured by Marriott of Fleet Street, and which cost not less than £600. These very curious specimens of the revival of an art supposed to have been lost will be displayed in the Lord Mayor's procession, and afterwards in Guildhall, with some of the royal armour in the Tower." It would seem also, according to another authority, that the wearers of the armour were members of the Surrey company.

On the 9th Elliston was absent from London, but he received from one left in charge of his interests a particular account of the proceedings of the day:--

"The unhandsome conduct of the Lord Mayor has occasioned me much trouble, and will give you equal displeasure. In the first place, your paragraph never would have appeared at all had I not interfered in the matter; secondly, cropped-tailed hacks had been procured without housings, so that I was compelled to obtain two trumpeters' horses from the Horse Guards, long-tailed animals, and richly caparisoned; thirdly, the helmets which had been delivered at Mr. Kemble's house were not returned until twelve o'clock on the day of action, with three miserable feathers in each, which appeared to have been plucked from the draggle tail of a hunted cock; this I also remedied by sending off at the last moment to the first plumassier for the hire of proper feathers, and the helmets were ultimately decorated with fourteen superb plumes; fourthly, the Lord Mayor's officer, who rode in Henry V. armour, jealous of our stately aspect, attempted to seize one of our horses, on which your rider made as gallant a retort as ever knight in armour could have done, and the assailer was completely foiled."

This was bad enough, but in addition to this the narrator makes further revelation of the behind-the-scenes secrets of a civic pageant sixty years ago. On the arrival of the procession it was found that no accommodation had been arranged for "Mr. Elliston's men," nor were any refreshments proffered them. "For seven hours they were kept within Guildhall, where they seem to have been considered as much removed from the necessities of the flesh as Gog and Magog above their heads." At length the compassion, or perhaps the sense of humour, of certain of the diners was moved by the forlorn situation of the knights in armour, and bumpers of wine were tendered them. The man in steel discreetly declined this hospitable offer, alleging that after so long a fast he feared the wine would affect him injuriously. It was whispered that his harness imprisoned him so completely that eating and drinking were alike impracticable to him. His comrade in brass made light of these objections, gladly took the proffered cup into his gauntleted hands, and "drank the red wine through the helmet barred," as though he had been one of the famous knights of Branksome Tower. It was soon apparent that the man in brass was intoxicated. He became obstreperous; he began to reel and stumble, accoutred as he was, to the hazard of his own bones and to the great dismay of bystanders. It was felt that his fall might entail disaster upon many. Attempts were made to remove him, when he assumed a pugilistic attitude, and resolutely declined to quit the hall. Nor was it possible to enlist against him the services of his brother warrior. The man in steel sided with the man in brass, and the two heroes thus formed a powerful coalition, which was only overcome at last by the onset of numbers. The scene altogether was of a most scandalous, if comical, description. It was some time past midnight when Mr. Marriot, the armourer, arrived at Guildhall, and at length succeeded in releasing the two half-dead warriors from their coats of mail.

After all, these famous suits of armour never returned to the wardrobe of the Surrey Theatre, or gleamed upon its stage. From Guildhall they were taken to Mr. Marriott's workshop. This, with all its contents, was accidentally consumed by fire. But the armourer's trade had taught him chivalry. At his own expense, although he had lost some three thousand pounds by the fire, he provided Elliston with new suits of armour in lieu of those that had been destroyed. To his outlay the Lord Mayor and the City authorities contributed--nothing! although but for the procession of the 9th of November the armour had never been in peril.

The most splendid sight that ever glorified mediæval Cheapside was the Midsummer Marching Watch, a grand City display, the description of which makes even the brown pages of old Stow glow with light and colour, seeming to rouse in the old London chronicler recollections of his youth.

"Besides the standing watches," says Stow, "all in bright harness, in every ward and street in the City and suburbs, there was also a Marching Watch, that passed through the principal streets thereof; to wit, from the Little Conduit, by Paul's Gate, through West Cheap by the Stocks, through Cornhill, by Leaden Hall, to Aldgate; then back down Fenchurch Street, by Grasse Church, about Grasse Church Conduit, and up Grasse Church Street into Cornhill, and through into West Cheap again, and so broke up. The whole way ordered for this Marching Watch extended to 3,200 taylors' yards of assize. For the furniture whereof, with lights, there were appointed 700 cressets, 500 of them being found by the Companies, the other 200 by the Chamber of London. Besides the which lights, every constable in London, in number more than 240, had his cresset; the charge of every cresset was in light two shillings four pence; and every cresset had two men, one to bear or hold it, another to bear a bag with light, and to serve it; so that the poor men pertaining to the cressets taking wages, besides that every one had a strawen hat, with a badge painted, and his breakfast, amounted in number to almost 2,000. The Marching Watch contained in number about 2,000 men, part of them being old soldiers, of skill to be captains, lieutenants, serjeants, corporals, &c.; whifflers, drummers and fifes, standard and ensign bearers, demi-launces on great horses, gunners with hand-guns, or half hakes, archers in coats of white fustian, signed on the breast and back with the arms of the City, their bows bent in their hands, with sheafs of arrows by their side; pikemen, in bright corslets, burganets, &c.; halbards, the like; the billmen in Almain rivets and aprons of mail in great number.

"This Midsummer Watch was thus accustomed yearly, time out of mind, until the year 1539, the 31st of Henry VIII.; in which year, on the 8th of May, a great muster was made by the citizens at the Mile's End, all in bright harness, with coats of white silk or cloth, and chains of gold, in three great battels, to the number of 15,000; which passed through London to Westminster, and so through the Sanctuary and round about the Park of St. James, and returned home through Oldborn.

"King Henry, then considering the great charges of the citizens for the furniture of this unusual muster, forbad the Marching Watch provided for at midsummer for that year; which being once laid down, was not raised again till the year 1548, the second of Edward the Sixth, Sir John Gresham then being Maior, who caused the Marching Watch, both on the eve of Saint John Baptist, and of Saint Peter the Apostle, to be revived and set forth, in as comely order as it had been accustomed.

"In the months of June and July, on the vigil of festival days, and on the same festival days in the evenings, after the sun-setting, there were usually made bonefires in the streets, every man bestowing wood or labour towards them. The wealthier sort, also, before their doors, near to the said bonefires, would set out tables on the vigils, furnished with sweet bread and good drink; and on the festival days, with meat and drink, plentifully; whereunto they would invite their neighbours and passengers also, to sit and be merry with them in great familiarity, praising God for his benefits bestowed on them. These were called Bonefires, as well of good amity amongst neighbours, that being before at controversie, were there by the labours of others reconciled, and made of bitter enemies loving friends; as also for the virtue that a great fire hath to purge the infection of the air. On the vigil of Saint John Baptist, and on Saint Peter and Paul, the apostles, every man's door being shadowed with green birch, long fennel, St. John's wort, orpin, white lillies, and such-like, garnished upon with beautiful flowers, had also lamps of glass, with oyl burning in them all the night. Some hung out branches of iron, curiously wrought, containing hundreds of lamps, lighted at once, which made a goodly show, namely, in New Fish Street, Thames Street, &c."

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XXVIII. CHEAPSIDE: CENTRAL

Grim Chronicles of Cheapside--Cheapside Cross--Puritanical Intolerance--The Old London Conduits--Mediæval Water-carriers--The Church of St. Mary-le-Bow--"Murder will out"--The "Sound of Bow Bells"--Sir Christopher Wren's Bow Church--Remains of the Old Church--The Seldam--Interesting Houses in Cheapside and their Memories--Goldsmiths' Row--The "Nag's Head" and the Self-consecrated Bishops--Keats' House--Saddler's Hall--A Prince Disguised--Blackmore, the Poet--Alderman Boydell, the Printseller--His Edition of Shakespeare--"Puck"--The Lottery--Death and Burial.

The Cheapside Standard, opposite Honey Lane, was also a fountain, and was rebuilt in the reign of Henry VI. In the year 1293 (Edward I.) three men had their right hands stricken off here for rescuing a prisoner arrested by an officer of the City. In Edward III.'s reign two fishmongers, for aiding a riot, were beheaded at the Standard. Here also, in the reign of Richard II., Wat Tyler, that unfortunate reformer, beheaded Richard Lions, a rich merchant. When Henry IV. usurped the throne, very beneficially for the nation, it was at the Standard in Chepe that he caused Richard II.'s blank charters to be burned. In the reign of Henry VI. Jack Cade (a man who seems to have aimed at removing real evils) beheaded the Lord Say, as readers of Shakespeare's historical plays will remember; and in 1461 John Davy had his offending hand cut off at the Standard for having struck a man before the judges at Westminster.

Cheapside Cross, one of the nine crosses erected by Edward I., that soldier king, to mark the resting-places of the body of his beloved queen, Eleanor of Castile, on its way from Lincoln to Westminster Abbey, stood in the middle of the road facing Wood Street. It was built in 1290 by Master Michael, a mason, of Canterbury. From an old painting at Cowdray, in Sussex, representing the procession of Edward VI. from the Tower to Westminster, an engraving of which we have given on page 313, we gather that the cross was both stately and graceful. It consisted of three octangular compartments, each supported by eight slender columns. The basement story was probably twenty feet high; the second, ten; the third, six. In the first niche stood the effigy of probably a contemporaneous pope; round the base of the second were four apostles, each with a nimbus round his head; and above them sat the Virgin, with the infant Jesus in her arms. The highest niche was occupied by four standing figures, while crowning all rose a cross surmounted by the emblematic dove. The whole was rich with highly-finished ornament.

Fox, the martyrologist, says the cross was erected on what was then an open spot of Cheapside. Some writers assert that a statue of Queen Eleanor first stood on the spot, but this is very much doubted. The cross was rebuilt in 1441, and combined with a drinking-fountain. The work was a long time about, as the full design was not carried to completion till the first year of Henry VII. This second erection was, in fact, a sort of a timber-shed surrounding the old cross, and covered with gilded lead. It was, we are told, re-gilt on the visit of the Emperor Charles V. On the accession of Edward VI., that child of promise, the cross was altered and beautified.

The generations came and went. The 'prentice who had played round the cross as a newly-girdled lad sat again on its steps as a rich citizen, in robes and chain. The shaven priest who stopped to mutter a prayer to the half-defaced Virgin in the votive niche gave place to his successor in the Geneva gown, and still the cross stood, a memory of death, that spares neither king nor subject. But in Elizabeth's time, in their horror of image-worship, the Puritans, foaming at the mouth at every outward and visible sign of the old religion, took great exception at the idolatrous cross of Chepe. Violent protest was soon made. In the night of June 21st, 1581, an attack was made on the lower tier of images--i.e., the Resurrection, Virgin, Christ, and Edward the Confessor, all which were miserably mutilated. The Virgin was "robbed of her son, and the arms broken by which she stayed him on her knees, her whole body also haled by ropes and left ready to fall." The Queen offered a reward, but the offenders were not discovered. In 1595 the effigy of the Virgin was repaired, and afterwards "a newe sonne, misshapen (as borne out of time), all naked, was laid in her arms; the other images continuing broken as before." Soon an attempt was made to pull down the woodwork, and substitute a pyramid for the crucifix; the Virgin was superseded by the goddess Diana--"a woman (for the most part naked), and water, conveyed from the Thames, filtering from her naked breasts, but oftentimes dried up." Elizabeth, always a trimmer in these matters, was indignant at these fanatical doings; and thinking a plain cross, a symbol of the faith of our country, ought not to give scandal, she ordered one to be placed on the summit, and gilt. The Virgin also was restored; but twelve nights afterwards she was again attacked, "her crown being plucked off, and almost her head, taking away her naked child, and stabbing her in the breast." Thus dishonoured the cross was left till the next year, 1600, when it was rebuilt, and the universities were consulted as to whether the crucifix should be restored. They all sanctioned it, with the exception of Dr. Abbot (afterwards archbishop), but there was to be no dove. In a sermon of the period the following passage occurs:--"Oh! this cross is one of the jewels of the harlot of Rome, and is left and kept here as a love-token, and gives them hope that they shall enjoy it and us again." Yet the cross remained undisturbed for several years. At this period it was surrounded by a strong iron railing, and decorated in the most inoffensive manner. It consisted of only four stones. Superstitious images were superseded by grave effigies of apostles, kings, and prelates. The crucifix only of the original was retained. The cross itself was in bad taste, being half Grecian, half Gothic; the whole, architecturally, much inferior to the former fabric.

The uneasy zeal of the Puritanical sects soon revived. On the night of January 24th, 1641, the cross was again defaced, and a sort of literary contention began. We have "The Resolution of those Contemners that will no Crosses;" "Articles of High Treason exhibited against Cheapside Cross;" "The Chimney-sweepers' Sad Complaint, and Humble Petition to the City of London for erecting a Neue Cross;" "A Dialogue between the Cross in Chepe and Charing Cross." Of these here is a specimen--

Anabaptist. O! idol now, Down must thou! Brother Ball, Be sure it shall.

Brownist. Helpe! Wren, Or we are undone men. I shall not fall, To ruin all.

Cheap Cross. I'm so crossed, I fear my utter destruction is at hand.

Charing Cross. Sister of Cheap, crosses are incident to us all, and our children. But what's the greatest cross that hath befallen you?

Cheap Cross. Nay, sister; if my cross were fallen, I should live at more heart's ease than I do.

Charing Cross. I believe it is the cross upon your head that hath brought you into this trouble, is it not?

These disputes were the precursors of its final destruction. In May, 1643, the Parliament deputed Robert Harlow to the work, who went with a troop of horse and two companies of foot, and executed his orders most completely. The official account says rejoicingly:--

"On the 2nd of May, 1643, the cross in Cheapside was pulled down. At the fall of the top cross drums beat, trumpets blew, and multitudes of caps were thrown into the air, and a great shout of people with joy. The 2nd of May, the almanack says, was the invention of the cross, and the same day at night were the leaden popes burnt (they were not popes, but eminent English prelates) in the place where it stood, with ringing of bells and great acclamation, and no hurt at all done in these actions."

The 10th of the same month, the "Book of Sports" (a collection of ordinances allowing games on the Sabbath, put forth by James I.) was burnt by the hangman, where the Cross used to stand, and at the Exchange.

"Aleph" gives us the title of a curious tract, published the very day the Cross was destroyed:--"The Downfall of Dagon; or, the Taking Down of Cheapside Crosse; wherein is contained these principles: 1. The Crosse Sicke at Heart. 2. His Death and Funerall. 3. His Will, Legacies, Inventory, and Epitaph. 4. Why it was removed. 5. The Money it will bring. 6. Noteworthy, that it was cast down on that day when it was first invented and set up."

It may be worth giving an extract or two:--"I am called the 'Citie Idoll;' the Brownists spit at me, and throw stones at me; others hide their eyes with their fingers; the Anabaptists wish me knockt in pieces, as I am like to be this day; the sisters of the fraternity will not come near me, but go about by Watling Street, and come in again by Soaper Lane, to buy their provisions of the market folks.... I feele the pangs of death, and shall never see the end of the merry month of May; my breath stops; my life is gone; I feel myself a-dying downwards."

Here are some of the bequests:--"I give my iron-work to those people which make good swords, at Hounslow; for I am all Spanish iron and steele to the back.

"I give my body and stones to those masons that cannot telle how to frame the like againe, to keepe by them for a patterne; for in time there will be more crosses in London than ever there was yet.

"I give my ground whereon I stood to be a free market-place.

"JASPER CROSSE, HIS EPITAPH.

'I look for no praise when I am dead, For, going the right way, I never did tread; I was harde as an alderman's doore, That's shut and stony-hearted to the poore. I never gave alms, nor did anything Was good, nor e'er said, God save the King. I stood like a stock that was made of wood, And yet the people would not say I was good; And if I tell them plaine, they're like to mee-- Like stone to all goodnesse. But now, reader, see Me in the dust, for crosses must not stand, There is too much cross tricks within the land; And, having so done never any good, I leave my prayse for to be understood; For many women, after this my losse, Will remember me, and still will be crosse-- Crosse tricks, crosse ways, and crosse vanities, Believe the Crosse speaks truth, for here he lyes.

"I was built of lead, iron, and stone. Some say that divers of the crowns and sceptres are of silver, besides the rich gold that I was gilded with, which might have been filed and saved, yielding a good value. Some have offered four hundred, some five hundred; but they that bid most offer one thousand for it. I am to be taken down this very Tuesday; and I pray, good reader, take notice by the almanack, for the sign falls just at this time, to be in the feete, to showe that the crosse must be laide equall with the grounde, for our feete to tread on, and what day it was demolished; that is, on the day when crosses were first invented and set up; and so I leave the rest to your consideration."

Howell, the letter writer, lamenting the demolition of so ancient and visible a monument, says trumpets were blown all the while the crowbars and pickaxes were working. Archbishop Laud in his "Diary" notes that on May 1st the fanatical mob broke the stained-glass windows of his Lambeth chapel, and tore up the steps of his communion table.

"On Tuesday," this fanatic of another sort writes, "the cross in Cheapside was taken down to cleanse that great street of superstition." The amiable Evelyn notes in his "Diary" that he himself saw "the furious and zelous people demolish that stately crosse in Cheapside." In July, 1645, two years afterwards, and in the middle of the Civil War, Whitelocke (afterwards Oliver Cromwell's trimming minister) mentions a burning on the site of the Cheapside cross of crucifixes, Popish pictures, and books. Soon after the demolition of the cross (says Howell) a high square stone rest was "popped up in Cheapside, hard by the Standard," according to the legacy of Russell, a good-hearted porter. This "rest and be thankful" bore the following simple distich:--

"God bless thee, porter, who great pains doth take; Rest here, and welcome, when thy back doth ache."

There are four views of the old Cheapside cross extant--one at Cowdray, one at the Pepysian library, Cambridge. A third, engraved by Wilkinson, represents the procession of Mary de Medicis, on her way through Cheapside; and another, which we give on page 331, shows the demolition of the cross.

The old London conduits were pleasant gathering places for 'prentices, serving-men, and servant girls--open-air parliaments of chatter, scandal, love-making, and trade talk. Here all day repaired the professional water-carriers, rough, sturdy fellows--like Ben Jonson's Cob--who were hired to supply the houses of the rich goldsmiths of Chepe, and who, before Sir Hugh Middleton brought the New River to London, were indispensable to the citizen's very existence.

The Great Conduit of Cheapside stood in the middle of the east end of the street near its junction with the Poultry, while the Little Conduit was at the west end, facing Foster Lane and Old Change. Stow, that indefatigable stitcher together of old history, describes the larger conduit curtly as bringing sweet water "by pipes of lead underground from Tyburn (Paddington) for the service of the City." It was castellated with stone and cisterned in lead about the year 1285 (Edward I.), and again new built and enlarged by Thomas Ham, a sheriff in 1479 (Edward IV.). Ned Ward (1700), in his lively ribald way describes Cheapside conduit (he does not say which) palisaded with chimney-sweepers' brooms and surrounded by sweeps, probably waiting to be hired, so that "a countryman, seeing so many black attendants waiting at a stone hovel, took it to be one of Old Nick's tenements."

In the reign of Edward III. the supply of water for the City seems to have been derived chiefly from the river, the local conduits being probably insufficient. The carters, called "water-leders" (24th Edward III.), were ordered by the City to charge three-halfpence for taking a cart from Dowgate or Castle Baynard to Chepe, and five farthings if they stopped short of Chepe, while a sand-cart from Aldgate to Chepe Conduit was to charge threepence.

The Church of St. Mary-le-Bow, the sound of whose mellow bells is supposed to be so dear to cockney ears, is the glory and crown of modern Cheapside. The music it casts forth into the troubled London air has a special magic of its own, and has a power to waken memories of the past. This chef-d'oeuvre of Sir Christopher Wren, whose steeple--as graceful as it is stately--rises like a lighthouse above the roar and jostle of the human deluge below, stands on an ecclesiastical site of great antiquity. The old tradition is that here, as at St. Paul's and Westminster, was a Roman temple, but of that there is no proof whatever. The first Bow Church seems, however, to have been one of the earliest churches built by the conquerors of Harold; and here, no doubt, the sullen Saxons came to sneer at the masse chanted with a French accent. The first church was racked by storm and fire, was for a time turned into a fortress, was afterwards the scene of a murder, and last of all became one of our earliest ecclesiastical courts. Stow, usually very clear and unconfused, rather contradicts himself for once about the origin of the name of the church--"St. Mary de Arcubus or Bow." In one place he says it was so called because it was the first London church built on arches; and elsewhere, when out of sight of this assertion, he says that it took its name from certain stone arches supporting a lantern on the top of the tower. The first is more probably the true derivation, for St. Paul's could also boast its Saxon crypt. Bow Church is first mentioned in the reign of William the Conqueror, and it was probably built at that period.

There seems to have been nothing to specially disturb the fair building and its ministering priests till 1090 (William Rufus), when, in a tremendous storm that sent the monks to their knees, and shook the very saints from their niches over portal and arch, the roof of Bow Church was, by one great wrench of the wind, lifted off, and wafted down like a mere dead leaf into the street. It does not say much for the state of the highway that four of the huge rafters, twenty-six feet long, were driven (so the chroniclers say) twenty-two feet into the ground.

In 1270 part of the steeple fell, and caused the death of several persons; so that the work of mediæval builders does not seem to have been always irreproachable.

It was in 1284 (Edward I.) that blood was shed, and the right of sanctuary violated, in Bow Church. One Duckett, a goldsmith, having in that warlike age wounded in some fray a person named Ralph Crepin, took refuge in this church, and slept in the steeple. While there, certain friends of Crepin entered during the night, and violating the sanctuary, first slew Duckett, and then so placed the body as to induce the belief that he had committed suicide. A verdict to this effect was accordingly returned at the inquisition, and the body was interred with the customary indignities. The real circumstances, however, being afterwards discovered, through the evidence of a boy, who, it appears, was with Duckett in his voluntary confinement, and had hid himself during the struggle, the murderers, among whom was a woman, were apprehended and executed. After this occurrence the church was interdicted for a time, and the doors and windows stopped with brambles.

The first we hear of the nightly ringing of Bow bell at nine o'clock--a reminiscence, probably, of the tyrannical Norman curfew, or signal for extinguishing the lights at eight p.m.--is in 1315 (Edward II.). It was the go-to-bed bell of those early days; and two old couplets still exist, supposed to be the complaint of the sleepy 'prentices of Chepe and the obsequious reply of the Bow Church clerk. In the reign of Henry VI. the steeple was completed, and the ringing of the bell was, perhaps, the revival of an old and favourite usage. The rhymes are--

"Clarke of the Bow bell, with the yellow lockes, For thy late ringing, thy head shall have knockes."

To this the clerk replies--

"Children of Chepe, hold you all still, For you shall have Bow bell rung at your will."

In 1315 (Edward II.) William Copeland, churchwarden of Bow, gave a new bell to the church, or had the old one re-cast.

In 1512 (Henry VIII.) the upper part of the steeple was repaired, and the lanthorn and the stone arches forming the open coronet of the tower were finished with Caen stone. It was then proposed to glaze the five corner lanthorns and the top lanthorn, and light them up with torches or cressets at night, to serve as beacons for travellers on the northern roads to London; but the idea was never carried out.

By the Great Fire of 1666, the old church was destroyed; and in 1671 the present edifice was commenced by Sir C. Wren. After it was erected the parish was united to two others, Allhallows, Honey Lane, and St. Pancras, Soper Lane. As the right of presentation to the latter of them is also vested in the Archbishop of Canterbury, and that of the former in the Grocers' Company, the Archbishop nominates twice consecutively, and the Grocers' Company once. We learn from the "Parentalia," that the former church had been mean and low. On digging out the ground, a foundation was discovered sufficiently firm for the intended fabric, which, on further examination, the account states, appeared to be the walls and pavement of a temple, or church, of Roman workmanship, entirely buried under the level of the present street. In reality, however (unless other remains were found below those since seen, which is not probable), this was nothing more than the crypt of the ancient Norman church, and it may still be examined in the vaults of the present building; for, as the account informs us, upon these walls was commenced the new church. The former building stood about forty feet backwards from Cheapside; and in order to bring the new steeple forward to the line of the street, the site of a house not yet rebuilt was purchased, and on it the excavations were commenced for the foundation of the tower. Here a Roman causeway was found, supposed to be the once northern boundary of the colony. The church was completed (chiefly at the expense of subscribers) in 1680. A certain Dame Dyonis Williamson, of Hale's Hall, in the county of Norfolk, gave £2,000 towards the rebuilding. Of the monuments in the church, that to the memory of Dr. Newton, Bishop of Bristol, and twenty-five years rector of Bow Church, is the most noticeable. In 1820 the spire was repaired by George Gwilt, architect, and the upper part of it taken down and rebuilt. There used to be a large building, called the Crown-sild, or shed, on the north side of the old church (now the site of houses in Cheapside), which was erected by Edward III., as a place from which the Royal Family might view tournaments and other entertainments thereafter occurring in Cheapside. Originally the King had nothing but a temporary wooden shed for the purpose, but this falling down, as already described (page 316), led to the erection of the Crown-sild.

"Without the north side of this church of St. Mary Bow," says Stow, "towards West Chepe, standeth one fair building of stone, called in record Seldam, a shed which greatly darkeneth the said church; for by means thereof all the windows and doors on that side are stopped up. King Edward caused this sild or shed to be made, and to be strongly built of stone, for himself, the queen, and other estates to stand in, there to behold the joustings and other shows at their pleasure. And this house for a long time after served for that use--viz., in the reigns of Edward III. and Richard II.; but in the year 1410 Henry IV. confirmed the said shed or building to Stephen Spilman, William Marchfield, and John Whateley, mercers, by the name of one New Seldam, shed, or building, with shops, cellars, and edifices whatsoever appertaining, called Crownside or Tamersilde, situate in the Mercery in West Chepe, and in the parish of St. Mary de Arcubus, in London, &c. Notwithstanding which grant the kings of England and other great estates, as well of foreign countries repairing to this realm, as inhabitants of the same, have usually repaired to this place, therein to behold the shows of this city passing through West Chepe--viz., the great watches accustomed in the night, on the even of St. John the Baptist and St. Peter at Midsummer, the example whereof were over long to recite, wherefore let it suffice briefly to touch one. In the year 1510, on St. John's even at night, King Henry VIII. came to this place, then called the King's Head in Chepe, in the livery of a yeoman of the guard, with a halbert on his shoulder, and there beholding the watch, departed privily when the watch was done, and was not known to any but whom it pleased him; but on St. Peter's night next following he and the queen came royally riding to the said place, and there with their nobles beheld the watch of the city, and returned in the morning."

The Builder, of 1845, gives a full account of the discovery of architectural remains beneath some houses in Bow Churchyard:--

"They are," says the Builder, "of a much later date than the celebrated Norman crypt at present existing under the church. Beneath the house No. 5 is a square vaulted chamber, twelve feet by seven feet three inches high, with a slightly pointed arch of ribbed masonry, similar to some of those of the Old London Bridge. There had been in the centre of the floor an excavation, which might have been formerly used as a bath, but which was now arched over and converted into a cesspool. Proceeding towards Cheapside, there appears to be a continuation of the vaulting beneath the houses Nos. 4 and 3. The arch of the vault here is plain and more pointed. The masonry appears, from an aperture near to the warehouse above, to be of considerable thickness. This crypt or vault is seven feet in height, from the floor to the crown of the arch, and is nine feet in width, and eighteen feet long. Beneath the house No. 4 is an outer vault. The entrance to both these vaults is by a depressed Tudor arch, with plain spandrils, six feet high, the thickness of the walls about four feet. In the thickness of the eastern wall of one of the vaults are cut triangular-headed niches, similar to those in which, in ancient ecclesiastical edifices, the basins containing the holy water, and sometimes lamps, were placed. These vaultings appear originally to have extended to Cheapside; for beneath a house there, in a direct line with these buildings and close to the street, is a massive stone wall. The arches of this crypt are of the low pointed form, which came into use in the sixteenth century. There are no records of any monastery having existed on this spot, and it is difficult to conjecture what the building originally was. Mr. Chaffers thought it might be the remains of the Crown-sild, or shed, where our sovereigns resorted to view the joustings, shows, and great marching matches on the eves of great festivals."

The ancient silver parish seal of St. Mary-le-Bow, of which we give an engraving on page 337, representing the tower of the church as it existed before the Great Fire of 1666, is still in existence. It represents the old coronetted tower with great exactitude.

The first recorded rector of Bow Church was William D. Cilecester (1287, Edward I.), and the earliest known monument in the church was in memory of Sir John Coventry, Lord Mayor in 1425 (Henry VI.). The advowson of St. Mary-le-Bow belongs to the Archbishop of Canterbury, and is the chief of his thirteen peculiars, or insulated, livings.

Lovers of figures may like to know that the height of Bow steeple is 221 feet 8-1/2 inches. The church altogether cost £7,388 8s. 7d.

It was in Bow parish, Maitland thinks, that John Hare, the rich mercer, lived, at the sign of the "Crown," in the reign of Henry VIII. He was a Suffolk man, made a large fortune, and left a considerable sum in charity--to poor prisoners, to the hospitals, the lazar-houses, and the almsmen of Whittington College--and thirty-five heavy gold mourning rings to special friends.

Edward IV., the same day he was proclaimed, dined at the palace at Paul's (that is, Baynard's Castle, near St. Paul's), in the City, and continued there till his army was ready to march in pursuit of King Henry; during which stay in the City he caused Walter Walker, an eminent grocer in Cheapside, to be apprehended and tried for a few harmless words innocently spoken by him--viz., that he would make his son heir to the Crown, inoffensively meaning his own house, which had the crown for its sign; for which imaginary crime he was beheaded in Smithfield, on the eighth day of this king's reign. This "Crown" was probably Hare's house.

The house No. 108, Cheapside, opposite Bow Church, was rebuilt after the Great Fire upon the sites of three ancient houses, called respectively the "Black Bull," leased to Daniel Waldo; the "Cardinalle Hat," leased to Ann Stephens; and the "Black Boy," leased to William Carpenter, by the Mercers' Company. In the library of the City of London there are MSS. from the Surveys of Wills, &c., after the Fire of London, giving a description of the property, as well as the names of the respective owners. It was subsequently leased to David Barclay, linendraper; and has been visited by six reigning sovereigns, from Charles II. to George III., on civic festivities, and for witnessing the Lord Mayor's show. In this house Sir Edward Waldo was knighted by Charles II., and the Lord Mayor, in 1714, was created a baronet by George I. When the house was taken down in 1861, the fine old oak-panelled dining-room, with its elaborate carvings, was purchased entire, and removed to Wales. The purchaser has written an interesting description (privately printed) of the panelling, the royal visits, the Barclay family, and other interesting matters.

In 1861 there was sold, says Mr. Timbs, amongst the old materials of No. 108, the "fine old oak-panelling of a large dining-room, with chimney-piece and cornice to correspond, elaborately carved in fruit and foliage, in capital preservation, 750 fee superficial." These panels were purchased by Mr. Morris Charles Jones, of Gunrog, near Welshpool, in North Wales, for £72 10s. 3d., including commission and expenses of removal, being about 1s. 8d. per foot superficial. It has been conveyed from Cheapside to Gunrog. This room was the principal apartment of the house of Sir Edward Waldo, and stated, in a pamphlet by Mr. Jones, "to have been visited by six reigning sovereigns, from Charles II. to George III., on the occasion of civic festivities and for the purpose of witnessing the Lord Mayor's show." (See Mr. Jones's pamphlet, privately printed, 1864.) A contemporary (the Builder) doubts whether this carving can be the work of Gibbons; "if so, it is a rare treasure, cheaply gained. But, except in St. Paul's, a Crown and ecclesiastical structure, be it remembered, not a corporate one, there is not a single example of Gibbons' art to be seen in the City of London proper."

Goldsmiths' Row, in Cheapside, between Old Change and Bucklersbury, was originally built by Thomas Wood, goldsmith and sheriff, in 1491 (Henry VII.). Stow, speaking of it, says: "It is a most beautiful frame of houses and shops, consisting of tenne faire dwellings, uniformly builded foure stories high, beautified towards the street with the Goldsmiths' arms, and likeness of Woodmen, in memorie of his name, riding on monstrous beasts, all richly painted and gilt." Maitland assures us "it was beautiful to behold the glorious appearance of goldsmith's shops, in the south row of Cheapside, which reached from the Old Change to Bucklersbury, exclusive of four shops."

The sign in stone of a nag's head upon the front of the old house, No. 39, indicates, it is supposed, the tavern at the corner of Friday Street, where, according to Roman Catholic scandal, the Protestant bishops, on Elizabeth's accession, consecrated each other in a very irregular manner.

Pennant thus relates the scandalous story:--"It was pretended by the adversaries of our religion, that a certain number of ecclesiastics, in their hurry to take possession of the vacant sees, assembled here, where they were to undergo the ceremony from Anthony Kitchen, alias Dunstan, Bishop of Llandaff, a sort of occasional conformist, who had taken the oaths of supremacy to Queen Elizabeth. Bonner, Bishop of London, then confined in prison, hearing of it, sent his chaplain to Kitchen, threatening him with excommunication in case he proceeded. The prelate, therefore, refused to perform the ceremony; on which, say the Roman Catholics, Parker and the other candidates, rather than defer possession of their dioceses, determined to consecrate one another, which, says the story, they did without any sort of scruple, and Story began with Parker, who instantly rose Archbishop of Canterbury. The simple refutation of this lying story may be read in Strype's 'Life of Archbishop Parker.'" The "Nag's Head Tavern" is shown in La Serre's print, "Entrée de la Reyne Mère du Roy," 1638, of which we gave a copy on page 307 of this work.

"The confirmation," says Strype, "was performed three days after the Queen's letters commissional above-said; that is, on the 9th day of December, in the Church of St. Mary de Arcubus (i.e. Mary-le-Bow, in Cheapside), regularly, and according to the usual custom; and then after this manner:--First, John Incent, public notary, appeared personally, and presented to the Right Reverend the Commissaries, appointed by the Queen, her said letters to them directed in that behalf; humbly praying them to take upon them the execution of the said letters, and to proceed according to the contents thereof, in the said business of confirmation. And the said notary public publicly read the Queen's commissional letters. Then, out of the reverence and honour those bishops present (who were Barlow, Story, Coverdale, and the suffragan of Bedford), bore to her Majesty, they took upon them the commission, and accordingly resolved to proceed according to the form, power, and effect of the said letters. Next, the notary exhibited his proxy for the Dean and Chapter of the Metropolitan Church, and made himself a party for them; and, in the procuratorial name of the said Dean and Chapter, presented the venerable Mr. Nicolas Bullingham, LL.D., and placed him before the said commissioners; who then exhibited his proxy for the said elect of Canterbury, and made himself a party for him. Then the said notary exhibited the original citatory mandate, together with the certificate on the back side, concerning the execution of the same; and then required all and singular persons cited, to be publicly called. And consequently a threefold proclamation was made, of all and singular opposers, at the door of the parochial church aforesaid; and so as is customary in these cases.

"Then, at the desire of the said notary to go on in this business of confirmation, they, the commissioners, decreed so to do, as was more fully contained in a schedule read by Bishop Barlow, with the consent of his colleagues. It is too long to relate distinctly every formal proceeding in this business; only it may be necessary to add some few of the most material passages.

"Then followed the deposition of witnesses concerning the life and actions, learning and abilities of the said elect; his freedom, his legitimacy, his priesthood, and such like. One of the witnesses was John Baker, of thirty-nine years old, gent., who is said to sojourn for the present with the venerable Dr. Parker, and to be born in the parish of St. Clement's, in Norwich. He, among other things, witnessed, 'That the same reverend father was and is a prudent man, commended for his knowledge of sacred Scripture, and for his life and manners. That he was a freeman, and born in lawful matrimony; that he was in lawful age, and in priest's orders, and a faithful subject to the Queen;' and the said Baker, in giving the reason of his knowledge in this behalf, said, 'That he was the natural brother of the Lord Elect, and that they were born ex unis parentibus' (or rather, surely, ex una parente, i.e., of one mother). William Tolwyn, M.A., aged seventy years, and rector of St. Anthony, London, was another witness, who had known the said elect thirty years, and knew his mother, and that he was still very well acquainted with him, and of his certain knowledge could testify all above said.

"The notary exhibited the process of the election by the Dean and Chapter; which the commissioners did take a diligent view of, and at last, in the conclusion of this affair, the commissioners decreed the said most reverend lord elected and presently confirmed, should receive his consecration; and committed to him the care, rule, and administration, both of the temporals and spirituals of the said archbishopric; and decreed him to be inducted into the real, actual, and corporal possession of the same archbishopric.

"After many years the old story is ventured again into the world, in a book printed at Douay, anno 1654, wherein they thus tell their tale. 'I know they (i.e., the Protestants) have tried many ways, and feigned an old record (meaning the authentic register of Archbishop Parker) to prove their ordination from Catholic bishops. But it was false, as I have received from two certain witnesses. The former of them was Dr. Darbyshire, then Dean of St. Paul's (canon there, perhaps, but never dean), and nephew to Dr. Boner, Bishop of London; who almost sixty years since lived at Meux Port, then a holy, religious man (a Jesuit), very aged, but perfect in sense and memory, who, speaking what he knew, affirmed to myself and another with me, that like good fellows they made themselves bishops at an inn, because they could get no true bishops to consecrate them. My other witness was a gentleman of honour, worth, and credit, dead not many years since, whose father, a chief judge of this kingdom, visiting Archbishop Heath, saw a letter, sent from Bishop Boner out of the Marshalsea, by one of his chaplains, to the archbishop, read, while they sat at dinner together; wherein he merrily related the manner how these new bishops (because he had dissuaded Ogelthorp, Bishop of Carlisle, from doing it in his diocese) ordained one another at an inn, where they met together. And while others laughed at this new manner of consecrating bishops, the archbishop himself, gravely, and not without tears, expressed his grief to see such a ragged company of men come poor out of foreign parts, and appointed to succeed the old clergy.'

"Which forgery, when once invented, was so acceptable to the Romanists, that it was most confidently repeated again in an English book, printed at Antwerp, 1658, permissione superiorum, being a second edition, licensed by Gulielmo Bolognimo, where the author sets down his story in these words:--'The heretics who were named to succeed in the other bishops' sees, could not prevail with Llandaff (whom he calls a little before an old simple man) to consecrate them at the "Nag's Head," in Cheapside, where they appointed to meet him. And therefore they made use of Story, who was never ordained bishop, though he bore the name in King Edward's reign. Kneeling before him, he laid the Bible upon their heads or shoulders, and bid them rise up and preach the word of God sincerely. 'This is,' added he, 'so evident a truth, that for the space of fifty years no Protestant durst contradict it.'"

"The form adopted at the confirmation of Archbishop Parker," says Dr. Pusey in a letter dated 1865, quoted by Mr. Timbs, "was carefully framed on the old form used in the confirmations by Archbishop Chichele (which was the point for which I examined the registers in the Lambeth library). The words used in the consecration of the bishops confirmed by Chichele do not occur in the registers. The words used by the consecrators of Parker, 'Accipe Spiritum sanctum,' were read in the later pontificals, as in that of Exeter, Lacy's (Maskell's 'Monumenta Ritualia,' iii. 258). Roman Catholic writers admit that only is essential to consecration which the English service-book retained--prayer during the service, which should have reference to the office of bishop, and the imposition of hands. And, in fact, Cardinal Pole engaged to retain in their orders those who had been so ordained under Edward VI., and his act was confirmed by Paul IV." (Sanders, De Schism. Angl., l. iii. 350.)

The house No. 73, Cheapside, shown in our illustration on page 343, was erected, from the design of Sir Christopher Wren, for Sir William Turner, Knight, who served the office of Lord Mayor in the year 1668-9, and here he kept his mayoralty.

At the "Queen's Arms Tavern," No. 71, Cheapside, the poet Keats once lived. The second floor of the house which stretches over the passage leading to this tavern was his lodging. Here, says Cunningham, he wrote his magnificent sonnet on Chapman's "Homer," and all the poems in his first little volume. Keats, the son of a livery-stable keeper in Moorfields, was born in 1795, and died of consumption at Rome in 1821. He published his "Endymion" (the inspiration suggested from Lempriere alone) in 1818. We annex the glorious sonnet written within sound of Bow bells:--

ON FIRST LOOKING INTO CHAPMAN'S "HOMER."

"Much have I travell'd in the realms of gold, And many goodly states and kingdoms seen; Round many western islands have I been, Which bards, in fealty to Apollo, hold. Oft of one wide expanse had I been told That deep-brow'd Homer ruled as his demesne; Yet did I never breathe its pure serene Till I heard Chapman speak out loud and bold; Then felt I like some watcher of the skies When a new planet swims into his ken; Or like stout Cortez when with eagle eyes He stared at the Pacific--and all his men Look'd at each other with a wild surmise-- Silent, upon a peak in Darien."

Behnes' poor bald statue of Sir Robert Peel, in the Paternoster Row end of Cheapside, was uncovered July 21st, 1855. The Builder at the time justly lamented that so much good metal was wasted. The statue is without thought--the head is set on the neck awkwardly, the pedestal is senseless, and the two double lamps at the side are mean and paltry.

Saddlers' Hall is close to Foster Lane, Cheapside. "Near unto this lane," says Strype, "but in Cheapside, is Saddlers' Hall--a pretty good building, seated at the upper end of a handsome alley, near to which is Half Moon Alley, which is but small, at the upper end of which is a tavern, which gives a passage into Foster Lane, and another into Gutter Lane."

"This appears," says Maitland, "to be a fraternity of great antiquity, by a convention agreed upon between them and the Dean and Chapter of St. Martin's-le-Grand, about the reign of Richard I., at which time I imagine it to have been an Adulterine Guild, seeing it was only incorporated by letters patent of Edward I., by the appellation of 'The Wardens, or Keepers and Commonalty of the Mystery or Art of Sadlers, London.' This company is governed by a prime and three other wardens, and eighteen assistants, with a livery of seventy members, whose fine of admission is ten pounds.[7] At the entrance is an ornamental doorcase, and an iron gate, and it is a very complete building for the use of such a company. It is adorned with fretwork and wainscot, and the Company's arms are carved in stone over the gate next the street."

In 1736, Prince Frederick of Wales, that hopeless creature, being desirous of seeing the Lord Mayor's show privately, visited the City in disguise. At that time it was the custom for several of the City companies, particularly for those who had no barges, to have stands erected in the streets through which the Lord Mayor passed on his return from Westminster, in which the freemen of companies were accustomed to assemble. It happened that his Royal Highness was discovered by some of the Saddlers' Company, in consequence of which he was invited to their stand, which invitation he accepted, and the parties were so well pleased with each other that his Royal Highness was soon after chosen Master of the Company, a compliment which he also accepted. The City on that occasion formed a resolution to compliment his Royal Highness with the freedom of London, pursuant to which the Court of Lord Mayor and Aldermen attended the prince, on the 17th of December, with the said freedom, of which the following is a copy:--

"The most high, most potent, and most illustrious Prince Frederick Lewis, Prince of Great Britain, Electoral Prince of Brunswick-Lunenburg, Prince of Wales, Duke of Cornwall, Duke of Rothsay, Duke of Edinburgh, Marquis of the Isle of Ely, Earl of Eltham, Earl of Chester, Viscount Launceston, Baron of Renfrew, Baron of Snowdon, Lord of the Isles, Steward of Scotland, Knight of the most noble Order of the Garter, and one of his Majesty's most honourable Privy Council, of his mere grace and princely favour, did the most august City of London the honour to accept the freedom thereof, and was admitted of the Company of the Saddlers, in the time of the Right Honourable Sir John Thompson, Knight, Lord Mayor, and John Bosworth, Esq., Chamberlain of the said City." In his "Industry and Idleness," Hogarth shows us the prince and princess on the balcony of Saddler's Hall.

That dull poet, worthy Sir Richard Blackmore, whom Locke and Addison praised and Dryden ridiculed, lived either at Saddlers' Hall or just opposite. It was on this weariful Tupper of his day that Garth wrote these verses:--

"Unwieldy pedant, let thy awkward muse, With censures praise, with flatteries abuse. To lash, and not be felt, in thee's an art; Thou ne'er mad'st any but thy schoolboys smart. Then be advis'd, and scribble not agen; Thou'rt fashioned for a flail, and not a pen. If B----l's immortal wit thou wouldst descry, Pretend 'tis he that writ thy poetry. Thy feeble satire ne'er can do him wrong; Thy poems and thy patients live not long."

And some other satirical verses on Sir Richard began:--

"'Twas kindly done of the good-natured cits, To place before thy door a brace of tits."

Blackmore, who had been brought up as an attorney's clerk and schoolmaster, wrote most of his verses in his carriage, as he drove to visit his patients, a feat to which Dryden alludes when he talks of Blackmore writing to the "rumbling of his carriage-wheels."

At No. 90, Cheapside lived Alderman Boydell, engraver and printseller, a man who in his time did more for English art than all the English monarchs from the Conquest downwards. He was apprenticed, when more than twenty years old, to Mr. Tomson, engraver, and soon felt a desire to popularise and extend the art. His first funds he derived from the sale of a book of 152 humble prints, engraved by himself. With the profits he was enabled to pay the best engravers liberally, to make copies of the works of our best masters.

"The alderman assured me," says "Rainy Day Smith," "that when he commenced publishing, he etched small plates of landscapes, which he produced in plates of six, and sold for sixpence; and that as there were very few print-shops at that time in London, he prevailed upon the sellers of children's toys to allow his little books to be put in their windows. These shops he regularly visited every Saturday, to see if any had been sold, and to leave more. His most successful shop was the sign of the 'Cricket Bat,' in Duke's Court, St. Martin's Lane, where he found he had sold as many as came to five shillings and sixpence. With this success he was so pleased, that, wishing to invite the shopkeeper to continue in his interest, he laid out the money in a silver pencil-case; which article, after he had related the above anecdote, he took out of his pocket and assured me he never would part with. He then favoured me with the following history of Woollett's plate of the 'Niobe,' and, as it is interesting, I shall endeavour to relate it in Mr. Boydell's own words:--

"'When I got a little forward in the world,' said the venerable alderman, 'I took a whole shop, for at my commencement I kept only half a one. In the course of one year I imported numerous impressions of Vernet's celebrated "Storm," so admirably engraved by Lerpinière, for which I was obliged to pay in hard cash, as the French took none of our prints in return. Upon Mr. Woollett's expressing himself highly delighted with the "Storm," I was induced, knowing his ability as an engraver, to ask him if he thought he could produce a print of the same size which I could send over, so that in future I could avoid payment in money, and prove to the French nation that an Englishman could produce a print of equal merit; upon which he immediately declared that he should like much to try.

"'At this time the principal conversation among artists was upon Mr. Wilson's grand picture of "Niobe," which had just arrived from Rome. I therefore immediately applied to his Royal Highness the Duke of Gloucester, its owner, and procured permission for Woollett to engrave it. But before he ventured upon the task, I requested to know what idea he had as to the expense, and after some consideration, he said he thought he could engrave it for one hundred guineas. This sum, small as it may now appear, was to me,' observed the alderman, 'an unheard-of price, being considerably more than I had given for any copper-plate. However, serious as the sum was, I bade him get to work, and he proceeded with all cheerfulness, for as he went on I advanced him money; and though he lost no time, I found that he had received nearly the whole amount before he had half finished his task. I frequently called upon him, and found him struggling with serious difficulties, with his wife and family, in an upper lodging in Green's Court, Castle Street, Leicester Square, for there he lived before he went into Green Street. However, I encouraged him by allowing him to draw on me to the extent of twenty-five pounds more; and at length that sum was paid, and I was unavoidably under the necessity of saying, "Mr. Woollett, I find we have made too close a bargain with each other. You have exerted yourself, and I fear I have gone beyond my strength, or, indeed, what I ought to have risked, as we neither of us can be aware of the success of the speculation. However, I am determined, whatever the event may be, to enable you to finish it to your wish--at least, to allow you to work upon it as long as another twenty-five pounds can extend, but there we must positively stop." The plate was finished; and, after taking very few proofs, I published the print at five shillings, and it succeeded so much beyond my expectations, that I immediately employed Mr. Woollett upon another engraving, from another picture by Wilson; and I am now thoroughly convinced that had I continued publishing subjects of this description, my fortune would have been increased tenfold.'"

"In the year 1786," says Knowles, in his "Life of Fuseli," "Mr. Alderman Boydell, at the suggestion of Mr. George Nicol, began to form his splendid collection of modern historical pictures, the subjects being from Shakespeare's plays, and which was called 'The Shakespeare Gallery.' This liberal and well-timed speculation gave great energy to this branch of the art, as well as employment to many of our best artists and engravers, and among the former to Fuseli, who executed eight large and one small picture for the gallery. The following were the subjects: 'Prospero,' 'Miranda,' 'Caliban,' and 'Ariel,' from the Tempest; 'Titania in raptures with Bottom, who wears the ass's head, attendant fairies, &c.;' 'Titania awaking, discovers Oberon at her side, Puck is removing the ass's head from Bottom' (Midsummer Night's Dream); 'Henry V. with the Conspirators' (King Henry V.); 'Lear dismissing Cordelia from his Court' (King Lear); 'Ghost of Hamlet's Father' (Hamlet); 'Falstaff and Doll' (King Henry IV., Second Part); 'Macbeth meeting the Witches on the Heath' (Macbeth); 'Robin Goodfellow' (Midsummer Night's Dream). This gallery gave the public an opportunity of judging of Fuseli's versatile powers.

"The stately majesty of the 'Ghost of Hamlet's Father' contrasted with the expressive energy of his son, and the sublimity brought about by the light, shadow, and general tone, strike the mind with awe. In the picture of 'Lear' is admirably portrayed the stubborn rashness of the father, the filial piety of the discarded daughter, and the wicked determination of Regan and Goneril. The fairy scenes in Midsummer Night's Dream amuse the fancy, and show the vast inventive powers of the painter; and 'Falstaff with Doll' is exquisitely ludicrous.

"The example set by Boydell was a stimulus to other speculators of a similar nature, and within a few years appeared the Macklin and Woodmason galleries; and it may be said with great truth that Fuseli's pictures were among the most striking, if not the best, in either collection."

"A.D. 1787," says Northcote, in his "Life of Reynolds," "when Alderman Boydell projected the scheme of his magnificent edition of the plays of Shakespeare, accompanied with large prints from pictures to be executed by English painters, it was deemed to be absolutely necessary that something of Sir Joshua's painting should be procured to grace the collection; but, unexpectedly, Sir Joshua appeared to be rather shy in the business, as if he thought it degrading himself to paint for a printseller, and he would not at first consent to be employed in the work. George Stevens, the editor of Shakespeare, now undertook to persuade him to comply, and, taking a bank-bill of five hundred pounds in his hand, he had an interview with Sir Joshua, when, using all his eloquence in argument, he, in the meantime, slipped the bank-bill into his hand; he then soon found that his mode of reasoning was not to be resisted, and a picture was promised. Sir Joshua immediately commenced his studies, and no less than three paintings were exhibited at the Shakspeare Gallery, or at least taken from that poet, the only ones, as has been very correctly said, which Sir Joshua ever executed for his illustration, with the exception of a head of 'King Lear' (done indeed in 1783), and now in possession of the Marchioness of Thomond, and a portrait of the Hon. Mrs. Tollemache, in the character of 'Miranda,' in The Tempest, in which 'Prospero' and 'Caliban' are introduced.

"One of these paintings for the Gallery was 'Puck,' or 'Robin Goodfellow,' as it has been called, which, in point of expression and animation, is unparalleled, and one of the happiest efforts of Sir Joshua's pencil, though it has been said by some cold critics not to be perfectly characteristic of the merry wanderer of Shakespeare. 'Macbeth,' with the witches and the caldron, was another, and for this last Mr. Boydell paid him 1,000 guineas; but who is now the possessor of it I know not.

"'Puck' was painted in 1789. Walpole depreciates it as 'an ugly little imp (but with some character) sitting on a mushroom half as big as a milestone.' Mr. Nicholls, of the British Institution, related to Mr. Cotton that the alderman and his grandfather were with Sir Joshua when painting the death of Cardinal Beaufort. Boydell was much taken with the portrait of a naked child, and wished it could be brought into the Shakspeare. Sir Joshua said it was painted from a little child he found sitting on his steps in Leicester Square. Nicholls' grandfather then said, 'Well, Mr. Alderman, it can very easily come into the Shakspeare if Sir Joshua will kindly place him upon a mushroom, give him fawn's ears, and make a Puck of him.' Sir Joshua liked the notion, and painted the picture accordingly.

"The morning of the day on which Sir Joshua's 'Puck' was to be sold, Lord Farnborough and Davies, the painter, breakfasted with Mr. Rogers, and went to the sale together. When the picture was put up there was a general clapping of hands, and yet it was knocked down to Mr. Rogers for 105 guineas. As he walked home from the sale, a man carried 'Puck' before him, and so well was the picture known that more than one person, as they were going along the street, called out, 'There it is!' At Mr. Rogers' sale, in 1856, it was purchased by Earl Fitzwilliam for 980 guineas. The grown-up person of the sitter for 'Puck' was in Messrs. Christie and Manson's room during the sale, and stood next to Lord Fitzwilliam, who is also a survivor of the sitters to Sir Joshua. The merry boy, whom Sir Joshua found upon his doorstep, subsequently became a porter at Elliot's brewery, in Pimlico."

In 1804, Alderman Boydell applied through his friend, Sir John W. Anderson, to the House of Commons, for leave to dispose of his paintings and drawings by lottery. In his petition he described himself, with modesty and pathos, as an old man of eighty-five, anxious to free himself from debts which now oppressed him, although he, with his brethren, had expended upwards of £350,000 in promoting the fine arts. Sixty years before he had begun to benefit engraving by establishing a school of English engravers. At that time the whole print commerce of England consisted in importing a few foreign prints (chiefly French) "to supply the cabinets of the curious." In time he effected a total change in this branch of commerce, "very few prints being now imported, while the foreign market is principally supplied with prints from England." By degrees, the large sums received from the Continent for English plates encouraged him to attempt also an English school of pictorial painting, the want of such a school having been long a source of opprobrium among foreign writers on England. The Shakespeare Gallery was sufficient to convince the world that English genius only needed encouragement to obtain a facility, versatility, and independence of thought unknown to the Italian, Flemish, or French schools. That Gallery he had long hoped to have left to a generous public, but the recent Vandalic revolution in France had cut up his revenue by the roots, Flanders, Holland, and Germany being his chief marts. At the same time he acknowledged he had not been provident, his natural enthusiasm for promoting the fine arts having led him after each success to fly at once to some new artist with the whole gains of his former undertaking. He had too late seen his error, having increased his stock of copper-plates to such a heap that all the print-sellers in Europe (especially in these unfavourable times) could not purchase them. He therefore prayed for permission to create a lottery, the House having the assurance of the even tenor of a long life "that it would be fairly and honourably conducted."

The worthy man obtained leave for his lottery, and died December 11, a few days after the last tickets were sold. He was buried with civic state in the Church of St. Olave, Jewry, the Lord Mayor, aldermen, and several artists attending. Boydell was very generous and charitable. He gave pictures to adorn the City Council Chamber, the Court Room of the Stationers' Company, and the dining-room of the Sessions House. He was also a generous benefactor to the Humane Society and the Literary Fund, and was for many years the President of both Societies. The Shakespeare Gallery finally fell by lottery to Mr. Tassie, the well-known medallist, who thrived to a good old age upon the profits of poor Boydell's too generous expenditure. This enterprising man was elected Alderman of Cheap Ward in 1782, Sheriff in 1785, and Lord Mayor in 1790. His death was occasioned by a cold, caught at the Old Bailey Sessions. His nephew, Josiah Boydell, engraved for him for forty years.

It was the regular custom of Mr. Alderman Boydell (says "Rainy Day" Smith), who was a very early riser, to repair at five o'clock immediately to the pump in Ironmonger Lane. There, after placing his wig upon the ball at the top, he used to sluice his head with its water. This well known and highly respected character was one of the last men who wore a three-cornered hat, commonly called the "Egham, Staines, and Windsor."

FOOTNOTES:

[7] I regret that, relying upon authorities which are not corrected up to the present date, I was led into some errors in my account of the Stationers' Company on pp. 229--233 of this work. The table of planetary influences has been for several years discontinued in Moore's Almanack; and the Company are not entitled to receive for themselves any copies of new books.--W.T.

Spotted a typo or a problem in this chapter? Tell us

XXIX. CHEAPSIDE TRIBUTARIES--SOUTH

The King's Exchange--Friday Street and the Poet Chaucer--The Wednesday Club in Friday Street--William Paterson, Founder of the Bank of England--How Easy it is to Redeem the National Debt--St. Matthew's and St. Margaret Moses--Bread Street and the Bakers' Shops--St. Austin's, Watling Street--The Fraternity of St. Austin's--St. Mildred's, Bread Street--The Mitre Tavern--A Priestly Duel--Milton's Birthplace--The "Mermaid"--Sir Walter Raleigh and the Mermaid Club--Thomas Coryatt, the Traveller--Bow Lane--Queen Street--Soper's Lane--A Mercer Knight--St. Bennet Sherehog--Epitaphs in the Church of St. Thomas Apostle--A Charitable Merchant.

Old Change was formerly the old Exchange, so called from the King's Exchange, says Stow, there kept, which was for the receipt of bullion to be coined.

The King's Exchange was in Old Exchange, now Old 'Change, Cheapside. "It was here," says Tite, "that one of those ancient officers, known as the King's Exchanger, was placed, whose duty it was to attend to the supply of the mints with bullion, to distribute the new coinage, and to regulate the exchange of foreign coin. Of these officers there were anciently three--two in London, at the Tower and Old Exchange, and one in the city of Canterbury. Subsequently another was appointed, with an establishment in Lombard Street, the ancient rendezvous of the merchants; and it appears not improbable that Queen Elizabeth's intention was to have removed this functionary to what was pre-eminently designated by her 'The Royal Exchange,' and hence the reason for the change of the name of this edifice by Elizabeth."

"In the reign of Henry VII.," says Francis, in his "History of the Bank of England," "the Royal prerogative forbade English coins to be exported, and the Royal Exchange was alone entitled to give native money for foreign coin or bullion. During the reign of Henry VIII. the coin grew so debased as to be difficult to exchange, and the Goldsmiths quietly superseded the royal officer. In 1627 Charles I., ever on the watch for power, re-established the office, and in a pamphlet written by his orders, asserted that 'the prerogative had always been a flower of the Crown, and that the Goldsmiths had left off their proper trade and turned exchangers of plate and foreign coins for our English coins, although they had no right.' Charles entrusted the office of 'changer, exchanger, and ante-changer' to Henry Rich, first Earl of Holland, who soon deserted his cause for that of the Parliament. The office has not since been re-established."

No. 36, Old 'Change was formerly the "Three Morrice Dancers" public-house, with the three figures sculptured on a stone as the sign and an ornament (temp. James I.). The house was taken down about 1801. There is an etching of this very characteristic sign on stone. (Timbs.)

The celebrated poet and enthusiast, Lord Herbert of Cherbury, lived, in the reign of James I., in a "house among gardens, near the old Exchange." At the beginning of the last century, the place was chiefly inhabited by American merchants; at this time it is principally inhabited by calico printers and Manchester warehousemen.

"Friday Street was so called," says Stow, "of fishmongers dwelling there, and serving Friday's Market." In the roll of the Scrope and Grosvenor heraldic controversy (Edward III.) the poet Chaucer is recorded as giving the following evidence connected with this street:--

"Geffray Chaucere, Esqueer, of the age of forty years, and moreover armed twenty-seven years for the side of Sir Richard Lescrop, sworn and examined, being asked if the arms, azyure, a bend or, belonged or ought to pertain to the said Sir Richard by right and heritage, said, Yes; for he saw him so armed in France, before the town of Petters, and Sir Henry Lescrop armed in the same arms with a white label and with banner; and the said Sir Richard armed in the entire arms azyure a bend or, and so during the whole expedition until the said Geaffray was taken. Being asked how he knew that the said arms belonged to the said Sir Richard, said that he had heard old knights and esquires say that they had had continual possession of the said arms; and that he had seen them displayed on banners, glass paintings, and vestments, and commonly called the arms of Scrope. Being asked whether he had ever heard of any interruption or challenge made by Sir Robert Grosvernor or his ancestors, said No; but that he was once in Friday Street, London, and walking up the street he observed a new sign hanging out with these arms thereon, and enquired what inn that was that had hung out these arms of Scrope? And one answered him, saying, 'They are not hung out, Sir, for the arms of Scrope, nor painted there for those arms, but they are painted and put there by a Knight of the county of Chester, called Sir Robert Grosvernor.' And that was the first time he ever heard speak of Sir Robert Grosvernor or his ancestors, or of any one bearing the name of Grosvernor." This is really almost the only authentic scrap we possess of the facts of Chaucer's life.

The "White Horse," a tavern in Friday Street, makes a conspicuous figure in the "Merry Conceited Jests of George Peele," the poet and playwriter of Elizabeth's reign.

At the Wednesday Club in Friday Street, William Paterson, the founder of the Bank of England, and originator of the unfortunate Darien scheme, held his real or imaginary Wednesday club meetings, in which were discussed proposals for the union of England and Scotland, and the redemption of the National Debt. This remarkable financier was born at Lochnabar, in Dumfriesshire, in 1648, and died in 1719. The following extracts from Paterson's probably imaginary conversations are of interest:--

"And thus," says Paterson, "supposing the people of Scotland to be in number one million, and that as matters now stand their industry yields them only about five pounds per annum per head as reckoned one with another, or five millions yearly in the whole, at this rate these five millions will by the union not only be advanced to six, but put in a way of further improvement; and allowing £100,000 per annum were on this foot to be paid in additional taxes, yet there would still remain a yearly sum of about £900,000 towards subsisting the people more comfortably, and making provision against times of scarcity, and other accidents, to which, I understand, that country is very much exposed (1706)."

"And I remember complaints of this kind were very loud in the days of King Charles II.," said Mr. Brooks, "particularly that, though in his time the public taxes and impositions upon the people were doubled or trebled to what they formerly were, he nevertheless run at least a million in debt."

"If men were uneasy with public taxes and debts in the time of King Charles II.," said Mr. May, "because then doubled or trebled to what they had formerly been, how much more may they be so now, when taxed at least three times more, and the public debts increased from about one million, as you say they then were, to fifty millions or upwards?... and yet France is in a way of being entirely out of debt in a year or two."

"At this rate," said Mr. May, "Great Britain may possibly be quite out of debt in four or five years, or less. But though it seems we have been at least as hasty in running into debt as those in France, yet would I by no means advise us to run so hastily out; slower measures will be juster, and consequently better and surer."

Mr. Pitt's celebrated measure was based upon an opinion that money could be borrowed with advantage to pay the national debt. Paterson proposed to redeem it out of a surplus revenue, administered so skilfully as to lower the interest in the money market. The notion of borrowing to pay seems to have sprung up with Sir Nathaniel Gould, in 1725, when it was opposed.

St. Matthew's was situate on the west side of Friday Street. The patronage of it was in the Abbot and Convent of Westminster. This church, being destroyed by the Fire of London, in 1666, was handsomely rebuilt, and the parish of St. Peter, Cheap, thereunto added by Act of Parliament. The following epitaph (1583) was in this church:--

"Anthony Cage entombed here doth rest, Whose wisdome still prevail'd the Commonweale; A man with God's good gifts so greatly blest, That few or none his doings may impale, A man unto the widow and the poore, A comfort, and a succour evermore. Three wives he had of credit and of fame; The first of them, Elizabeth that hight, Who buried here, brought to this Cage, by name, Seventeene young plants, to give his table light."

"At St. Margaret Moyses," says Stow, "was buried Mr. Buss (or Briss), a Skinner, one of the masters of the hospital. There attended all the masters of the hospital, with green staves in their hands, and all the Company in their liveries, with twenty clerks singing before. The sermon was preached by Mr. Jewel, afterwards Bishop of Salisbury; and therein he plainly affirmed there was no purgatory. Thence the Company retired to his house to dinner. This burial was an. 1559, Jan. 30.

The following epitaph (1569) is worth preserving:--

"Beati mortui qui in Domino moriuntur."--Apoc. 14.

"To William Dane, that sometime was An ironmonger; where each degree He worthily (with praise) did passe. By Wisdom, Truth, and Heed, was he Advanc'd an Alderman to be; Then Sheriffe; that he, with justice prest, And cost, performed with the best. In almes frank, of conscience cleare; In grace with prince, to people glad; His vertuous wife, his faithful peere, MARGARET, this monument hath made; Meaning (through God) that as shee had With him (in house) long lived well; Even so in Tombes Blisse to dwell."

"Bread Street," says Stow, "is so called of bread there in old times then sold; for it appeareth by records, that in the year 1302, which was the 30th of Edward I., the bakers of London were bound to sell no bread in their shops or houses, but in the market here; and that they should have four hall motes in the year, at four several terms, to determine of enormities belonging to the said company. Bread Street is now wholly inhabited by rich merchants, and divers fair inns be there, for good receipt of carriers and other travellers to the City. It appears in the will of Edward Stafford, Earl of Wylshire, dated the 22nd of March, 1498, and 14 Henry VII., that he lived in a house in Bread Street, in London, which belonged to the family of Stafford, Duke of Bucks afterwards; he bequeathed all the stuff in that house to the Lord of Buckingham, for he died without issue."

The parish church of "St. Augustine, in Watheling Street" was destroyed by the Great Fire, but rebuilt in 1682. Stow informs us that here was a fraternity founded A.D. 1387, called the Fraternity of St. Austin's, in Watling Street, and other good people dwelling in the City. "They were, on the eve of St. Austin's, to meet at the said church, in the morning at high mass, and every brother to offer a penny. And after that to be ready, al mangier ou al revele; i.e., to eat or to revel, according to the ordinance of the master and wardens of the fraternity. They set up in the honour of God and St. Austin, one branch of six tapers in the said church, before the image of St. Austin; and also two torches, with the which, if any of the said fraternity were commended to God, he might be carried to the earth. They were to meet at the vault at Paul's (perhaps St. Faith's), and to go thence to the Church of St. Austin's, and the priests and the clerks said Placebo and Dilige, and in matins, a mass of requiem at the high altar."

"There is a flat stone," says Stow, "in the south aisle of the church. It is laid over an Armenian merchant, of which foreign merchants there be divers that lodge and harbour in the Old Change in this parish."

St. Mildred's, in Bread Street, was repaired in 1628. "At the upper end of the chancel," says Strype, "is a fine window, full of cost and beauty, which being divided into five parts, carries in the first of them a very artful and curious representation of the Spaniard's Great Armado, and the battle in 1588; in the second, the monument of Queen Elizabeth; in the third, the Gunpowder Plot; in the fourth, the lamentable time of infection, 1625; and in the fifth and last, the view and lively portraiture of that worthy gentleman, Captain Nicolas Crispe, at whose sole cost (among other) this beautiful piece of work was erected, as also the figures of his vertuous wife and children, with the arms belonging to them." This church, burnt down in the Great Fire, was rebuilt again.

St. Mildred was a Saxon lady, and daughter of Merwaldus, a West-Mercian prince, and brother to Penda, King of the Mercians, who, despising the pomps and vanities of this world, retired to a convent at Hale, in France, whence, returning to England, accompanied by seventy virgins, she was consecrated abbess of a new monastery in the Isle of Thanet, by Theodore, Archbishop of Canterbury, where she died abbess, anno 676.

On the east side of Bread Street is the church of Allhallows. "On the south side of the chancel, in a little part of this church, called The Salter's Chapel," says Strype, "is a very fair window, with the portraiture or figure of him that gave it, very curiously wrought upon it. This church, ruined in the Great Fire, is built up again without any pillars, but very decent, and is a lightsome church."

"In the 22nd of Henry VIII., the 17th of August, two priests of this church fell at variance, that the one drew blood of the other, wherefore the same church was suspended, and no service sung or said therein for the space of one month after; the priests were committed to prison, and the 15th of October, being enjoined penance, they went at the head of a general procession, barefooted and bare-legged, before the children, with beads and books in their hands, from Paul's, through Cheap, Cornhill," &c.

Among the epitaphs the following, given by Stow, is quaint:--

"To the sacred memory of that worthy and faithfull minister of Christ, Master Richard Stocke; who after 32 yeeres spent in the ministry, wherein by his learned labours, joined with wisedome, and a most holy life, God's glory was much advanced, his Church edified, piety increased, and the true honour of a pastor's life maintained; deceased April 20, 1626. Some of his loving parishioners have consecrated this monument of their never-dying love, Jan. 28, 1628.

"Thy lifelesse Trunke (O Reverend Stocke), Like Aaron's rod Sprouts out againe; And after two Full winters past, Yields Blossomes And ripe fruit amaine. For why, this work of piety, Performed by some of thy Flocke, To thy dead corps and sacred urne, Is but the fruit of this old Stocke."

The father of Milton, the poet, was a scrivener in Bread Street, living at the sign of "The Spread Eagle," the armorial ensign of his family. The first turning on the left hand, as you enter from Cheapside, was called "Black Spread Eagle Court," and not unlikely from the family ensign of the poet's father. Milton was born in this street (December 9, 1608), and baptised in the adjoining church of Allhallows, Bread Street, where the register of his baptism is still preserved. Of the house in which he resided in later life, and the churchyard of St. Giles, Cripplegate, where he was buried, we give a view on page 349. Aubrey tells us that the house and chamber in which the poet was born were often visited by foreigners, even in the poet's lifetime. Their visits must have taken place before the fire, for the house was destroyed in the Great Fire, and "Paradise Lost" was published after it. Spread Eagle Court is at the present time a warehouse-yard, says Mr. David Masson. The position of a scrivener was something between a notary and a law stationer.

There was a City prison formerly in Bread Street. "On the west side of Bread Street," says Stow, "amongst divers fair and large houses for merchants, and fair inns for passengers, had they one prison-house pertaining to the sheriffs of London, called the Compter, in Bread Street; but in 1555 the prisoners were removed from thence to one other new Compter in Wood Street, provided by the City's purchase, and built for that purpose."

The "Mermaid" Tavern, in Cheapside, about the site of which there has been endless controversy, stood in Bread Street, with side entrances, as Mr. Burn has shown, with admirable clearness, in Friday Street and Bread Street; hence the disputes of antiquaries.

Mr. Burn, in his book on "Tokens," says, "The site of the 'Mermaid' is clearly defined, from the circumstance of W.R., a haberdasher of small wares, 'twixt Wood Street and Milk Street, adopting the sign, 'Over against the Mermaid Tavern in Cheapside.'" The tavern was destroyed in the Great Fire.

Here Sir Walter Raleigh is, by one of the traditions, said to have instituted "The Mermaid Club." Gifford, in his edition of "Ben Jonson," has thus described the club:--"About this time (1603) Jonson probably began to acquire that turn for conviviality for which he was afterwards noted. Sir Walter Raleigh, previously to his unfortunate engagement with the wretched Cobham and others, had instituted a meeting of beaux esprits at the 'Mermaid,' a celebrated tavern in Friday Street. Of this club, which combined more talent and genius than ever met together before or since, our author was a member, and here for many years he regularly repaired, with Shakespeare, Beaumont, Fletcher, Selden, Cotton, Carew, Martin, Donne, and many others, whose names, even at this distant period, call up a mingled feeling of reverence and respect." But this is doubted. A writer in the Athenæum, Sept. 16, 1865, states:--"The origin of the common tale of Raleigh founding the 'Mermaid Club,' of which Shakespeare is said to have been a member, has not been traced. Is it older than Gifford?" Again:--"Gifford's apparent invention of the 'Mermaid Club.' Prove to us that Raleigh founded the 'Mermaid Club,' that the wits attended it under his presidency, and you will have made a real contribution to our knowledge of Shakespeare's time, even if you fail to show that our poet was a member of that club." The tradition, it is thought, must be added to the long list of Shakespearian doubts.

But we nevertheless have a noble record left of the wit combats here in the celebrated epistle of Beaumont to Jonson:--

"Methinks the little wit I had is lost Since I saw you; for wit is like a rest Held up at tennis, which men do the best With the best gamesters. What things have we seen Done at the 'Mermaid?' Heard words that have been So nimble, and so full of subtle flame, As if that every one from whence they came Had meant to put his whole wit in a jest, And had resolved to live a fool the rest Of his dull life. Then, when there hath been thrown Wit able enough to justify the town For three days past--wit that might warrant be For the whole city to talk foolishly Till that were cancelled; and when that was gone, We left an air behind us, which alone Was able to make the two next companies Right witty; though but downright fools, more wise."

"Many," says Fuller, "were the wit combats betwixt him (Shakespeare) and Ben Jonson, which two I behold like a Spanish great galleon and an English man-of-war. Master Jonson (like the former) was built far higher in learning, solid, but slow in his performances; Shakespeare, with the English man-of-war, lesser in bulk, but lighter in sailing, could turn with all tides, and take advantage of all winds, by the quickness of his wit and invention."

These combats, one is willing to think, although without any evidence at all, took place at the "Mermaid" on such evenings as Beaumont so glowingly describes. But all we really know is that Beaumont and Ben Jonson met at the "Mermaid," and Shakespeare might have been of the company. Fuller, Mr. Charles Knight reminds us, was only eight years old when Shakespeare died.

John Rastell, the brother-in-law of Sir Thomas More, was a printer, living at the sign of the "Mermaid," in Cheapside. "The Pastyme of the People" (folio, 1529) is described as "breuly copyled and empryntyd in Chepesyde, at the sygne of the 'Mearemayd,' next to Pollys (Paul's) Gate." Stow also mentions this tavern:--"They" (Coppinger and Arthington, false prophets), says the historian, "had purposed to have gone with the like cry and proclamation, through other the chiefe parts of the Citie; but the presse was so great, as that they were forced to goe into a taverne in Cheape, at the sign of the 'Mermayd,' the rather because a gentleman of his acquaintance plucked at Coppinger, whilst he was in the cart, and blamed him for his demeanour and speeches."

There was also a "Mermaid" in Cornhill.

In Bow Lane resided Thomas Coryat, an eccentric traveller of the reign of James I., and a butt of Ben Jonson and his brother wits. In 1608 Coryat took a journey on foot through France, Italy, Germany, &c, which lasted five months, during which he had travelled 1,975 miles, more than half upon one pair of shoes, which were only once mended, and on his return were hung up in the Church of Odcombe, in Somersetshire. He published his travels under this title, "Crudities hastily gobbled up in Five Months' Travels in France, Savoy, Italy, Rhetia, Helvetia, some parts of High Germany, and the Netherlands, 1611," 4to; reprinted in 1776, 3 vols., 8vo. This work was ushered into the world by an "Odcombian banquet," consisting of near sixty copies of verses, made by the best poets of that time, which, if they did not make Coryat pass with the world for a man of great parts and learning, contributed not a little to the sale of his book. Among these poets were Ben Jonson, Sir John Harrington, Inigo Jones (the architect), Chapman, Donne, Drayton, and others.

Parsons, an excellent comedian, also resided in Bow Lane.

"A greater artist," says Dr. Doran, in "Her Majesty's Servants," "than Baddeley left the stage soon after him, in 1795, after three-and-thirty years of service, namely, Parsons, the original 'Crabtree' and 'Sir Fretful Plagiary,' 'Sir Christopher Curry,' 'Snarl' to Edwin's 'Sheepface,' and 'Lope Torry,' in The Mountaineers.... His forte lay in old men, his pictures of whom, in all their characteristics, passions, infirmities, cunning, or imbecility, was perfect. When 'Sir Sampson Legand' says to 'Foresight,' 'Look up, old star-gazer! Now is he poring on the ground for a crooked pin, or an old horse-nail with the head towards him!'" we are told there could not be a finer illustration of the character which Congreve meant to represent than Parsons showed at the time in his face and attitude.

In Queen Street, on the south side of Cheapside, stood Ringed Hall, the house of the Earls of Cornwall, given by them, in Edward III.'s time, to the Abbot of Beaulieu, near Oxford. Henry VIII. gave it to Morgan Philip, alias Wolfe. Near it was "Ipres Inn," built by William of Ipres, in King Stephen's time, which continued in the same family in 1377.

Stow says of Soper Lane, now Queen Street:--"Soper Lane, which lane took that name, not of soap-making, as some have supposed, but of Alleyne le Sopar, in the ninth of Edward II."

"In this Soper's Lane," Strype informs us, "the pepperers anciently dwelt--wealthy tradesmen, who dealt in spices and drugs. Two of this trade were divers times mayors in the reign of Henry III., viz., Andrew Bocherel, and John de Gisorcio or Gisors. In the reign of King Edward II., anno 1315, they came to be governed by rules and orders, which are extant in one of the books of the chamber under this title, 'Ordinatio Piperarum de Soper's Lane.'" Sir Baptist Hicks, Viscount Campden, of the time of James I., whose name is preserved in Hicks's Hall, and Campden Hill, Kensington, was a rich mercer, at the sign of the "White Bear," at Soper Lane end, in Cheapside. Strype says that "Sir Baptist was one of the first citizens that, after knighthood, kept their shops, and, being charged with it by some of the aldermen, he gave this answer, first--'That his servants kept the shop, though he had a regard to the special credit thereof; and that he did not live altogether upon the interest, as most of the aldermen did, laying aside their trade after knighthood.'"

The parish church of St. Syth, or Bennet Sherehog, or Shrog, "seemeth," says Stow, "to take that name from one Benedict Shorne, some time a citizen, and stock-fish monger, of London, a new builder, repairer, or benefactor thereof, in the reign of Edward II.; so that Shorne is but corruptly called Shrog, and more correctly Shorehog, or (as now) Sherehog." The following curious epitaph is preserved by Stow:--

"Here lieth buried the body of Ann, the wife of John Farrar, gentleman, and merchant adventurer of this city, daughter of William Shepheard, of Great Rowlright, in the county of Oxenford, Esqre. She departed this life the twelfth day of July, An. Dom. 1613, being then about the age of twenty-one yeeres.

"Here was a bud, Beginning for her May; Before her flower, Death took her hence away. But for what cause? That friends might joy the more; Where there hope is, She flourisheth now before. She is not lost, But in those joyes remaine, Where friends may see, And joy in her againe."

"In the Church of St. Pancras, Soper Lane, there do lie the remains," says Stow, "of Robert Packinton, merchant, slain with a gun, as he was going to morrow mass from his house in Cheape to St. Thomas of Acons, in the year 1536. The murderer was never discovered, but by his own confession, made when he came to the gallows at Banbury to be hanged for felony."

The following epitaph is also worth giving:--

"Here lies a Mary, mirror of her sex, For all that best their souls or bodies decks. Faith, form, or fame, the miracle of youth; For zeal and knowledge of the sacred truth. For frequent reading of the Holy Writ, For fervent prayer, and for practice fit. For meditation full of use and art; For humbleness in habit and in heart. For pious, prudent, peaceful, praiseful life; For all the duties of a Christian wife; For patient bearing seven dead-bearing throws; For one alive, which yet dead with her goes; From Travers, her dear spouse, her father, Hayes, Lord maior, more honoured in her virtuous praise."

"The Church of St. Thomas Apostle stood where now the cemetery is," says Maitland, "in Queen Street. It was of great antiquity, as is manifest by the state thereof in the year 1181. The parish is united to the Church of St. Mary Aldermary. There were five epitaphs in Greek and Latin to 'Katherine Killigrew.' The best is by Andrew Melvin."

"Of monuments of antiquity there were none left undefaced, except some arms in the windows, which were supposed to be the arms of John Barnes, mercer, Maior of London in the year 1371, a great builder thereof. A benefactor thereof was Sir William Littlesbury, alias Horn (for King Edward IV. so named him), because he was most excellent in a horn. He was a salter and merchant of the staple, mayor of London in 1487, and was buried in the church, having appointed, by his testament, the bells to be changed for four new ones of good tune and sound; but that was not performed. He gave five hundred marks towards repairing of highways between London and Cambridge. His dwelling-house, with a garden and appurtenances in the said parish, he devised to be sold, and bestowed in charitable actions. His house, called the 'George,' in Bred Street, he gave to the salters; they to find a priest in the said church, to have six pounds thirteen and fourpence the year. To every preacher at St. Paul's Cross, and at the Spittle, he left fourpence for ever; to the prisoners of Newgate, Ludgate, from rotation to King's Bench, in victuals, ten shillings at Christmas, and ten shillings at Easter for ever," which legacies, however, it appears, were not performed.

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