A History of the Cries of London Part 3

The evil, as the citizens term it, seems to have increased; for in 1694 the common council threatened the pedlars and petty chapmen with the terrors of the laws against rogues and st.u.r.dy beggars, the least penalty being whipping, whether for male or female. The reason for this terrible denunciation is very candidly put: the citizens and shopkeepers are greatly hindered and prejudiced in their trades by the hawkers and pedlars. Such denunciations as these had little share in putting down the itinerant traders. They continued to flourish, because society required them; and they vanished from our view when society required them no longer. In the middle of the last century they were fairly established as rivals to the shopkeepers. Dr. Johnson, than whom no man knew London better, thus writes in the "Adventurer:"--"The attention of a new-comer is generally first struck by the multiplicity of cries that stun him in the streets, and the variety of merchandise and manufactures which the shopkeepers expose on every hand." The shopkeepers have now ruined the itinerants--not by putting them down by fiery penalties, but by the compet.i.tion amongst themselves to have every article at hand for every man's use, which shall be better and cheaper than the wares of the itinerant. Whose ear is now ever deafened by the cries of the broom-man?

He was a st.u.r.dy fellow in the days of old "Morose," carrying on a barter which in itself speaks of the infancy of civilization. His cry was "_Old Shoes for some Brooms_." Those proclamations for barter no doubt furnished a peculiar characteristic of the old London Cries. The itinerant buyers were as loud, though not so numerous, as the sellers.

[Ill.u.s.tration: NEW BROOMS FOR OLD SHOES!]

[Ill.u.s.tration: OLD CLOWZE, ANY OLD CLO', CLO'.]

The familiar voice of "_Old Clowze, any old Clo' Clo_," has lasted through some generations; but the glories of Monmouth-street were unknown when a lady in a peaked bonnet and a laced stomacher went about proclaiming "_Old Satin, old Taffety, or Velvet_." And a singular looking party of the Hebrew persuasion, with a c.o.c.ked hat on his head, and a bundle of rapiers and sword-sticks under his arm, which he was ready to barter for:--

[Ill.u.s.tration: OLD CLOAKS, SUITS, OR COATS.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: HATS OR CAPS--BUY, SELL, OR EXCHANGE.]

While another of the tribe proclaimed aloud from east to west--and back again, "From morn to noon, from noon to dewy eve," his willingness to "_Buy, sell, or exchange Hats or Caps_." Why should the Hebrew race appear to possess a monopoly in the purchase and sale of dilapidated costumes? Why should their voices, and theirs alone, be employed in the constant iteration of the talismanic monosyllables "Old Clo'?" Is it because Judas carried the bag that all the children of Israel are to trudge through London streets to the end of their days with sack on shoulder? Artists generally represent the old clothesman with three, and sometimes four, hats, superposed one above the other. Now, although we have seen him with many hats in his hands or elsewhere, we never yet saw him with more than one hat on his head. The three-hatted clothesman, if ever he existed, is obsolete. According to Ingoldsby, however, when "Portia" p.r.o.nounced the law adverse to "Shylock":

"Off went his three hats, and he look'd as the cats Do, whenever a mouse has escaped from their claw."

[Ill.u.s.tration: ANY KITCHEN-STUFF HAVE YOU MAIDS?]

There was trading then going forward from house to house, which careful housewifery and a more vigilant police have banished from the daylight, if they have not extirpated it altogether. Before the shops are open and the chimneys send forth their smoke, there may be now, sometimes, seen creeping up an area a sly-looking beldam, who treads as stealthily as a cat. Under her cloak she has a pan, whose unctuous contents will some day a.s.sist in the enlightenment or purification of the world, in the form of candles or soap. But the good lady of the house, who is a late riser, knows not of the transformation that is going forward. In the old days she would have heard the cry of a maiden, with tub on head and pence in hand, of "_Any Kitchen-stuff have you Maids?_" and she probably would have dealt with her herself, or have forbidden her maids to deal.

So it is with the old cry of "_Any Old Iron take Money for?_" The fellow who then went openly about with sack on back was a thief, and an encourager of thieves; he now keeps a marine-store.

[Ill.u.s.tration: ANY OLD IRON TAKE MONEY FOR?]

[Ill.u.s.tration: OLD LONDON SHOP.]

Sir Walter Scott, in his _Fortunes of Nigel_, has left us a capital description of the shop of a London tradesman during the reign of King James in England, the shop in question being that of David Ramsay, maker of watches and horologes, within Temple-bar--a few yards eastward of St.

Dunstan's church, Fleet-street, and where his apprentice, Jenkin Vincent--abbreviated to Jin Vin, when not engaged in 'prentices-riots--is crying to every likely pa.s.ser-by:--

"What d'ye lack?--What d'ye lack?--Clocks--watches--barnacles?--What d'ye lack?--Watches--clocks--barnacles?--What d'ye lack, sir? What d'ye lack, madam?--Barnacles--watches--clocks? What d'ye lack, n.o.ble sir?--What d'ye lack, beauteous madam?--G.o.d bless your reverence, the Greek and Hebrew have harmed your reverence's eyes. Buy a pair of David Ramsay's barnacles. The king, G.o.d bless his sacred Majesty!

never reads Hebrew or Greek without them. What d'ye lack? Mirrors for your toilets, my pretty madam; your head-gear is something awry--pity, since it so well fancied. What d'ye lack? a watch, Master Sargeant?--a watch that will go as long as a lawsuit, as steady and true as your own eloquence? a watch that shall not lose thirteen minutes in a thirteen years' lawsuit--a watch with four wheels and a bar-movement--a watch that shall tell you, Master Poet, how long the patience of the audience will endure your next piece at the Black Bull."

The verbal proclaimers of the excellence of their commodities, had this advantage over those who, in the present day, use the public papers for the same purpose, that they could in many cases adapt their address to the peculiar appearance and apparent taste of the pa.s.sengers. This direct and personal mode of invitation to customers became, however, a dangerous temptation to the young wags who were employed in the task of solicitation during the absence of the princ.i.p.al person interested in the traffic; and, confiding in their numbers and civic union, the 'prentices of London were often seduced into taking liberties with the pa.s.sengers, and exercising their wit at the expense of those whom they had no hopes of converting into customers by their eloquence. If this were resented by any act of violence, the inmates of each shop were ready to pour forth in succour; and in the words of an old song which Dr. Johnson was used to hum,--

"Up then rose the 'prentices all, Living in London, both proper and tall."

Desperate riots often arose on such occasions, especially when the Templars, or other youths connected with the aristocracy, were insulted, or conceived themselves so to be. Upon such occasions, bare steel was frequently opposed to the clubs of the citizens, and death sometimes ensued on both sides. The tardy and inefficient police of the time had no other resource than by the Alderman of the ward calling out the householders, and putting a stop to the strife by overpowering numbers, as the Capulets and Montagues are separated upon the stage.

[Ill.u.s.tration: ST. PAUL'S CATHEDRAL.]

It must not be imagined that these 'prentices of the City of London were of mean and humble origin. The sons of freemen of the City, or country boys of good and honourable families, alone were admitted to the seven years' apprentices.h.i.+p. The common people--the _ascripti glebae_--the poor rustics who were bound to the soil, had little or no share in the fortunes of the City of London. Many of the burgesses were as proud of their descent as of their liberties.

[Ill.u.s.tration: A STREET AT NIGHT--SHAKESPEARE'S LONDON.]

Once apprenticed, and having in a few weeks imbibed the spirit of the place, the lad became a Londoner. It is one of the characteristics of London, that he who comes up to the City from the country speedily becomes penetrated with the magic of the golden pavement, and falls in love with the great City. And he who has once felt that love of London can never again be happy beyond the sound of Bow Bells, which could formerly be heard for ten miles and more. The greatness of the City, its history, its a.s.sociations, its ambitions, its pride, its hurrying crowds--all these things affect the imagination and fill the heart. There is no place in the world, and never has been, which so stirs the heart of her children with love and pride as the City of London.

A year or two later on, the boy would learn, with his fellow-'prentices that he must betake himself to the practice of bow and arrow, "pellet and bolt," with a view to what might happen. Moorfields was convenient for the volunteers of the time. There was, however, never any lack of excitement and novelty in the City of London. But this is a digression.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

Amongst the earliest of the Cries of London we must cla.s.s the "cry" of the City watchman; although it essentially differed from the "cries" of the shopkeepers and the hawkers; for they, as a rule, had something to exchange or sell--_copen or buy?_ as Lydgate puts it--then the watchmen were wont to commence their "cry" at, or about, the hour of night when all others had finished for the day. After that it was the business of the watchman to make his first call, or cry after the manner inscribed over the figure here given.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

He had to deal with deaf listeners, and he therefore proclaimed with a voice of command, "Lanthorn!" but a lanthorn alone was a body without a soul; and he therefore demanded "a _whole_ candle." To render the mandate less individually oppressive, he went on to cry, "Hang out your Lights!"

And, that even the sleepers might sleep no more, he ended with "Heare!" It will be seen that he carries his staff and lanthorn with the air of honest old Dogberry about him,--"A good man and true," and "the most desartless man to be constable."

The making of lanthorns was a great trade in the early times. We clung to King Alfred's invention for the preservation of light with as reverend a love, during many centuries, as we bestowed upon his civil inst.i.tutions.

The horn of the favoured utensil was a very dense medium for illumination, but science had subst.i.tuted nothing better; and, even when progressing people carried about a neat gla.s.s instrument with a brilliant reflector, the watchman held to his ponderous and murky relic of the past, making "night hideous" with his voice, to give news of the weather, such as: "Past eleven, and a starlight night;" or "Past one o'clock, and a windy morning;" in fact, disturbed your rest to tell you "what's o'clock."

We are told by the chroniclers that, as early as 1416, the mayor, Sir Henry Barton, ordered lanthorns and lights to be hanged out on the winter evenings, betwixt Allhallows and Candlema.s.s. For three centuries this practice subsisted, constantly evaded, no doubt through the avarice or poverty of individuals, sometimes probably disused altogether, but still the custom of London up to the time of Queen Anne. The cry of the watchman, "Hang out your Lights," was an exhortation to the negligent, which probably they answered only by snores, equally indifferent to their own safety and the public preservation. A worthy mayor in the time of Queen Mary provided the watchman with a bell, with which instrument he accompanied the music of his voice down to the days of the Commonwealth.

The "Statutes of the Streets," in the time of Elizabeth, were careful enough for the preservation of silence in some things. They prescribed that, "no man shall blow any horn in the night, or whistle after the hour of nine o'clock in the night, under pain of imprisonment;" and, what was a harder thing to keep, they also forbade a man to make any "sudden outcry in the still of the night, as making any affray, or beating his wife." Yet a privileged man was to go about knocking at doors and ringing his alarum--an intolerable nuisance if he did what he was ordered to do.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE WATCH--SHAKESPEARE'S LONDON.]

But the watchmen were, no doubt, wise in their generation. With honest Dogberry, they could not "see how sleeping should offend;" and after the watch was set, they probably agreed to "go sit upon the church bench till two, and then all to bed."

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE BELLMAN--FROM DEKKER, 1608.]

We have observed in our old statutes, and in the pages of authors of various kinds, that separate mention is made of the Watchman and the Bellman. No doubt there were several degrees of office in the ancient Watch and Ward system, and that part of the office of the old Watch, or Bellman, was to bless the sleepers, whose door he pa.s.sed, which blessing was often sung or said in verse--hence Bellman's verse. These verses were in many cases, the relics of the old incantations to keep off elves and hobgoblins. There is a curious work by Thomas Dekker--otherwise Decker,--ent.i.tled: "The Bellman of London. Bringing to light the most notorious Villanies that are now practised in the Kingdom, Profitable for Gentlemen, Lawyers, Merchants, Citizens, Farmers, Masters of Households and all sortes of servants to Marke, and delightful for all men to Reade, _Lege, Perlege, Relege_." Printed at London for Nathaniel b.u.t.ter, 1608.

Where he describes the Bellman as a person of some activity--"the child of darkness; a common nightwalker; a man that had no man to wait upon him, but only a dog; one that was a disordered person, and at midnight would beat at men's doors, bidding them (in mere mockery) to look to their candles, when they themselves were in their dead sleeps." Stow says that in Queen Mary's day one of each ward "began to go all night with a bell, and at every lane's end, and at the ward's end, gave warning of fire and candle, and to help the poor and pray for the dead." Milton, in his "Il Penseroso," has:--

"Far from the resort of mirth, Save the cricket on the hearth, Or the bellman's drowsy charm, To bless the doors from nightly harm."

In "A Bellman's Song" of the same date, we have:--

"Maidens to bed, and cover coal, Let the mouse out of her hole, Crickets in the chimney sing, Whilst the little bell doth ring; If fast asleep, who can tell When the clapper hits the bell?"

Herrick, also, has given us a verse of Bellman's poetry in one of the charming morsels of his "Hesperides:"--

"From noise of scare-fires rest ye free, From murders Benedicite; From all mischances that may fright Your pleasing slumbers in the night, Mercy secure ye all, and keep The goblin from ye while ye sleep.

Past one o'clock, and almost two, My masters all, 'Good day to you!'"

But, with or without a bell, the real prosaic watchman continued to make the same demand as his predecessors for lights through a long series of years; and his demand tells us plainly that London was a city without lamps. But though he was a prosaic person, he had his own verses. He addressed himself to the "maids." He exhorted them to make their lanthorns "bright and clear." He told them how long their candles were expected to burn. And, finally, like a considerate lawgiver, he gave reason for his edict:--

"That honest men that walk along, May see to pa.s.s safe without wrong."

Formerly it was the duty of the bellman of St. Sepulchre's parish, near Newgate, to rouse the unfortunates condemned to death in that prison, the night before their execution, and solemnly exhort them to repentance with good words in bad rhyme, ending with

"When St. Sepulchre's bell to-morrow tolls, The Lord above have mercy on your souls."

It was customary for the bellman to present at Christmas time to each householder in his district "A Copy of Verses," and he expected from each in return some small gratuity. The execrable character of his poetry is indicated by the contempt with which the wits speak of "Bellman's verses"

and the comparison they bear to "Cutler's poetry upon a knife," whose poesy was--"_Love me, and leave me not_." On this subject there is a work ent.i.tled--"The British Bellman. Printed in the year of Saint's Fear, Anno Domini 1648, and reprinted in the _Harleian Miscellany_." "The Merry Bellman's Out-Cryes, or the Cities O Yes! being a mad merry Ditty, both Pleasant and Witty, to be cry'd in p.r.i.c.k-Song[3] Prose, through Country and City. Printed in the year of Bartledum Fair, 1655." Also--"The Bell-man's Treasury, containing above a Hundred several Verses fitted for all Humours and Fancies, and suited to all Times and Seasons. London, 1707." It was from the riches of this "treasury" that the predecessors of the present parish Bellman mostly took their _own_ (!) "Copy of Verses."

In the Luttrell Collection of Broadsides (Brit. Mus.) is one dated 1683-4, ent.i.tled, "A Copy of Verses presented by Isaac Ragg, Bellman, to the Masters and Mistresses of Holbourn Division, in the Parish of St.

Giles's-in-the-Fields." It is headed by a woodcut representing Isaac in his professional accoutrements, a pointed pole in his left hand, and in the right a bell, while his lanthorn hangs from his jacket in front; below is a series of verses, the only specimen worth giving here being the expression of Mr. Ragg's official duty; it is as follows:--

"Time Masters, calls your bellman to his task, To see your doors and windows are all fast, And that no villany or foul crime be done To you or yours in absence of the sun.