Part 30
It was now nine o'clock in the evening. In the neighborhood of the Mall they saw a great block of carriages on their way to Lady H--'s Sunday routs. The explorers then visited certain houses frequented by the baser sort, and were rewarded in the manner that might have been expected--namely, with ribaldry and blasphemy. As the clock struck ten they arrived at the Dog and Duck, St. George's Fields. From the Dog and Duck they repaired to The Temple of Flora, a place of the same description as Bagnigge Wells. Here, as the magistrates had refused a wine license, they kept a citizen and vintner on the premises. He, by virtue of his livery, had the right to sell wine without a license. Our friends took a bottle here. The Apollo Gardens, the Thatched House, the Flora Tea-garden, were also places of resort of the same kind, all with a garden, tea and music rooms, and a company of doubtful morals. They drove next to the Bermondsey Spa Gardens, described as an elegant place of entertainment, two miles from London Bridge, with a walk hung with colored lamps not inferior to that of Vauxhall. There was also a lovely pasteboard castle and a museum of curiosities. They had another bottle here, and a comfortable glass of cherry-brandy before getting into the carriage. Finally they reached the place whence they started at midnight, and after a final bumper of red port retired to rest. A noble Sunday, lasting from four o'clock in the morning till midnight. They walked twenty miles at least; they drank all day long--port, Lisbon, chocolate, negus, tea, coffee, and cherry-brandy, besides their beer at dinner. On nine different occasions they called for a pint or a bottle. A truly wonderful and improving Sunday!
A chapter on Georgian London would be incomplete indeed which failed to notice the institution which plays so large a part in the literature of the period--the debtors' prison. Strange it seems to us who have only recently reformed in this matter, that a man should be locked up for life because he was unable to pay a trifling debt, or even a heavy debt. Everybody knows the Fleet, with its racquet courts and its prisoners; everybody knows the King's Bench, and the Marshalsea also is familiar to us. Here, however, is a picture of Wood Street Compter, which is not so well known. In this place, one of the two City Compters under the sheriffs, were confined not only debtors, but also persons charged with night assaults--men or women--and felons and common thieves, the latter perhaps when Newgate was full. For these there was the strong room, in which men and women were locked up together, unless they could afford a separate room, for which they paid two shillings a night before commitment, and one shilling a night after. On the master's side, those of the debtors who could afford to pay for them had separate rooms, but miserably furnished; on the common side there were two wards. In one of these, which was nearly dark and called the Hole, shelves were arranged along the wall like the bunks in a cabin; here those who had any beds laid them, those who had none slept on the bare shelf. This was the living-room and the cooking-room, as well as the sleeping-room. The smell of the place, the narrator says, was intolerable. In the second ward of the common side lived those a little removed from destitution, who could pay fifteen pence a week for the accommodation of a bed. Otherwise it was the same as the first ward. The women had a separate ward. There was a drinking-bar here in a kind of cellar--"the place full of ill smells and every inconvenience that man could conceive." Quarrels, fightings, and brawls were punished by black hole. Men in prison on charge of night assaults were called rats; women under similar charges were called mice.
It seems as if life under such conditions must have been intolerable. Never to be alone, never to be clean, never to be quiet, never to be free from the smell of bad cooking, confined rooms, stale tobacco, vile spirits; never to be free from the society of vile men; this was the punishment for those who could not pay their debts. Wood Street Compter was removed to Giltspur Street in 1791.
The subject of Fleet weddings has been treated at length in a certain novel founded on one of them. They did not altogether belong to the baser sort, or to the more profligate sort. Many a young citizen arranged with his mistress to take her secretly to the Fleet, there to marry her, then back again and on their knees to the parents. This saved the expense of the wedding-feast, which was almost as great as that of the funeral-feast.
As to trade, it was marching in giant strides, such as even good old Sir Thomas Gresham had not considered possible. The increase of trade belongs to the historian; we have only to notice the great warehouses along Thames Street, the quays and wharves, the barges and lighters, the ships lying two miles in length in two long lines below bridge, the crowd of stevedores, watermen, lightermen, the never-ending turmoil of those who loaded and unloaded the ships, the solid, sober merchants dressed in brown cloth, with white silk stockings and white lace ruffles and neckerchiefs. They are growing rich--they are growing very rich. London has long been the richest city in the world.
These notes are wholly insufficient to show the London of George, the Second. They illustrate the daily life of the citizens; they also show something of the brutality, the drunkenness, and the rough side of the lower levels. The better side of London--that of the scholars, divines, writers, and professional men--comes out fully in the memoirs and letters of the period, which are fortunately abundant. There we can find the stately courtesy of the better sort, the dignity, the respect to rank, the exaction of respect, the social gradations which were recognized by those above as well as those below, the religion which was partly formal and partly touched with the old Puritanic spirit, the benevolence and the charity of the upper class, coupled with their determination that those below shall never be allowed to combine, the survival of old traditions, and all the other points which make us love this century so much. If any notes on London of this period omitted mention of these points, they would be inadequate indeed.
These notes--these chapters--to conclude, make no pretence to show more than the City life; which was decorous at all times, and especially during the last century. Of the wickedness, goodness, vice, and virtue that went on at the court, and among the aristocracy from age to age, nothing has been said. The moralist has plenty to say on this subject. Unfortunately, the moralist always picks out the worst cases, and wants us to believe that they are average specimens. A good deal might be said, I am of opinion, on the other side, in considering the many virtues; the courage, loyalty, moderation, and the sense of honor which has always distinguished the better sort among the nobility.
* * * * *
We have seen London from age to age. It has changed indeed. Yet in one thing it has shown no change. London has always been a city looking forward, pressing forward, fighting for the future, using up the present ruthlessly for the sake of the future, trampling on the past. As it has been, so it is. The City may have reached its highest point; it may be about to decline; but as yet it shows no sign, it has sounded no note of decay, or of decline, or of growing age. The City, which began with the East Saxon settlement among the forsaken streets thirteen hundred years ago, is still in the full strength and lustihood of manhood--perhaps as yet it is only early manhood. For which, as in private duty bound, let us laud, praise, and magnify the Providence which has so guided the steps of the citizens, and so filled their hearts, from generation to generation, with the spirit of self-reliance, hope, and courage.
INDEX
Abergavenny House, 177
"Abram Man," the, 416
Agas, Ralph, map of, 274
Ale-houses, number of, in 1736, 476
Alfune, founder of Church of St. Giles, Cripplegate, 63
Alien priories suppressed, 240
Alleyn, 364
All Hallows the Great, Church of, Thames Street, 441
Almshouses in the City, 238
Alphege, Archbishop of Canterbury, 85
Alsatia, 120
Amusements in Saxon and Norman times, 90
Anderida destroyed, 29
"Angler," the, 416
_Angliæ Metropolis, or, The Present State of London_, 1690, quoted, 400
_Anglo-Saxon Chronicle_, 1, 8, 13; London not mentioned in, 13
Antwerp at commencement of Elizabeth's reign, 293
Apothecaries, 474
Apprentices, London, 334
Assessment of London in 1397, 184
Augusta, fate of, after the Romans left, 8
Aulaf and Swegen, 85
Austin Friars Monastery, 112; distinguished persons buried there, 264
Bagnigge Wells, 492
Baltic Coffee-house, 477
Bank Side, 356
Barber-surgeons, 474
Barnard's Castle, 288
Bartholomew's Fair, 457
Bassing Hall, 83
Bath, ruins of Roman temples at, 6
Baynard's Castle, history of, 163
Bean tansy, 476
Bede's Ecclesiastical History, 1
Beer-drinking, 419
Beer the national drink, 83, 481
Bermondsey, Abbey of, 134, 267
-- Spa Gardens, 496
Bethlehem Hospital, 131
Black Friars Church destroyed, 267
Blackfriars Theatre, 308
Blackwell Hall, 83
Blakeney, William, story of, 249
Blue-coat School, 115, 303
Bonvici, Antonio, 170
Bow Church, Mile End Road, 135
Bowyers' Company, 454
Bradford-on-Avon, description of Church of St. Laurence at, 71
Bread a luxury in time of Charles II., 421
Brewer, Dr., and his estimate of mediæval London, 155
Breweries along the river, 50
Bridewell Palace, 83
Briset, Jordan, and Muriel, his wife, 65, 128
Buildings small and mean until long after the Norman conquest, 47
Bull-baiting, 356, 361, 408
"Bully," the, in the Georgian period, 489
Burghley House, 286
Butcher Row, 446
Calleva Atrebatum destroyed, 29
Card-makers' Company, 454
Card-playing _temp._ Elizabeth, 310
Carmelites, the, 119
Carpenter, John, founder of the City of London School, 193
Carthusians, House of the, 120
Castellan and standard-bearer to the City of London, 164
Cedd, Bishop, 53
Champneys, Sir John, 311
Chapter Coffee-house, 477
Charing Cross, 141
Charles, King, deplorable morals of Court of, 371
Charter House, 128, 266
-- -- School, 303
Chaucer, 149
Chepe, 334, 337
-- East, butchers in, 217
-- of mediæval London, 185
-- the chief market of the City, 50
-- West, mercers and haberdashers in, 217
Chester, battle of, in 607, 111
Chichele, Sir Robert, 194
Christ Church, built by Wren, 115
Christian symbols and emblems found on site of Roman towns, 5
Christ's Hospital, 115
Church of England in time of George II., 436
Churches, the thirteen large conventual, 54
-- penalties for absence from, 442
Cistercian Order, 123
City companies, formation of, 208
-- foreign trade of, 190
-- holidays, 236
-- of London School founded by John Carpenter, 193
-- residences of the nobility, 174
-- wall, 81, 111
-- water supply of, 83
-- wealth of, 184
-- worthies, 194
"Clapperdozen," the, 416
Cloth Fair, 63
Clubs, 477
Cnut, 85
Coals, duty on, to rebuild public buildings after the Great Fire, 400
Cock-fighting on Shrove Tuesday, 224
Cockpit Theatre, 308
Coffee-houses, business carried on at, 477
-- first started _temp._ Charles II., 411
Cold Harborough, house built by Sir John Poultney, 166, 289
Companies, City, formation of, 208
Congreve's "Way of the World," 410
Cordwainer Street, shoemakers in, 217
Cornhill, drapers in, 217
Court of Judicature created after the Great Fire, 399
Craftsmen of London, 215
Cranmer and Waltham Abbey, 139
Cromwell House, 265
-- Lord, 325
Crosby Hall, 170, 289
-- Sir John, 169
Crutched Friars' Church turned into a carpenter's shop and tennis court, 265
-- -- Priory of, 111
Cuneglass, King, 3
Curfew bell, the, 243
Curtain Theatre, Shoreditch, 307
Daily Life, Elizabethan, 303
Dances in time of Elizabeth, 310
Danes, the, 47
Debtors' prison in the Georgian era, 496
Debts, like property, destroyed by the Great Fire, 402
Defoe, Daniel, and his account of the Plague, 377
-- trades enumerated by, 380
Derby House, 163, 289
Dick's Coffee-house, 411
Dominicans, first settlement of, in Chancery Lane, 118
"Dommerer," the, 416
Dover, St. Mary's Church at, 75
Dress of the time of George II., 458
Drinking and fires the pests of London, 52
-- habits in the time of George II., 475
-- in time of Charles II., 407
Dryden, John, on the Great Fire, 404
D'Urfey, Tom, songs of, 412
Durovernum destroyed, 29
East India Company, the, 297
Eastland Company, the, 297
Eastminster, 133
-- pulled down, 263
Edmund, Earl of Lancaster, founds Holywell Nunnery, 132
Education of girls, thorough, _temp._ Elizabeth, 314
Edward II. and the City, 205
Edward IV. and Baynard's Castle, 164
Elbing, merchants of, 296
Eleanor, Queen, a benefactor of St. Katherine's by the Tower, 66
Elizabethan Daily Life, 303
-- house, the, 286
-- pageants, 304
Elsing's Spital, founded in 1329, 144
Elsing, William, 197, 238
England, Conquest of, completed, 10
Epping Forest, 233
Erber House, history of, 169
Ermyn Street, 23
Estfield, Sir William, 197
Ethelbald, King, grant of, to Bishop of Rochester, 47
Etheling, Edmund, 85
Ethelwerd, 1
Falcon Tavern, Bank Side, 362
Famines in London, 240
Fire, Great, of London, 394
-- -- John Dryden on, 404
-- -- destruction caused by, 397
Fires, great, of London, 394
Fitz-Stephen, William, 48, 51
Fleet weddings, 483, 498
Flemings, the, 44
Fletchers' Company, 454
Flogging in the army and navy, 484
Food in the time of George II., 475
-- of the citizens, 236
Fortune Theatre, Whitecross Street, 308
Foxe's _Book of Martyrs_, written at Waltham Abbey, 139
Franciscans, the, 113
Franklin, Benjamin, on beer-drinking in a London printing-house, 420
Fraternities, the, 147
_Fratres de Saccâ_, 139
Froissart on the Londoners, 205
Fuller, Thomas, wrote his _Church History_ at Waltham Abbey, 139
Funerals, 484
Furniture in mediæval times, 181
Fustarers' Company, 453
Gaming _temp._ Elizabeth, 310
Gambling in the time of Charles II., 415
Gardens in Saxon and Norman times, 89
Garraway's Coffee-house, 477
Gascony wine, ingredients of, 473
Gates of the City closed at sunset until 1760, 433
Gay's _Trivia_, description of London in, 436
Geoffrey of Monmouth, 1
Gerrard's Hall in Basing Lane, 179
Gildas, 1-3, 25, 43
Gin-shops, number of, in 1736, 476
Girls, education of, thorough, in time of Elizabeth, 314
Gisors, John, 179
Glasse, Mrs., and her book on cookery, 475
Globe Theatre, Bank Side, 307, 356
Glovers' Company, laws and regulations of, 209
Government situations bought in time of George II., 482
Greenstead Church, Essex, 71
Greenwich Fair, 457
Gresham College, 301
-- House, 288
-- Sir Thomas, account of, 290, 301; builds the Royal Exchange, 294; crest of, 294
Grey Friars, foundation of, 113
-- -- Church, celebrated persons buried here, 267
Guildhall, remains of Roman London in, 48
Guilds, 50, 208
Guthrun's Lane, goldsmiths in, 217
Haberdashers' Company, 452
Hainault Forest, 233
Hampton Court, 288
Hanseatic League, 182
Harding, Stephen, founder of the Cistercian Order, 123
Harold at Waltham Abbey, 138
Hengist and Horsa, 9
Henry VI. erects new grammar-schools, 240, 303
Heraclius, Patriarch of Jerusalem, 129
Heralds' College, 162, 174
Herbalist, 474
Holy Trinity, Aldgate, founded by Queen Matilda, 64, 111
-- -- Church, Minories, 132
Holywell Nunnery, 132
Horsa, Hengist and, 9
Household accounts of a family, 1677-79, 416
-- in time of George II., 465
-- furniture, inventory of, of newly-married pair, _temp._ 14th century, 253
Hudson's Bay Company, 375
"Huffs," 415
Hutchinson, Lucy, 314
Ironmongers' Lane, ironmongers in, 217
Jamaica Coffee-house, 477
Jerusalem Coffee-house, 478
Jesus Commons, foundation of, 144
Jonathan's Coffee-house, 478
Jonson, Ben, 363, 365
Justice under the Plantagenets, 245
Jutes, the, 9, 27, 28
Kidnappers of the Georgian era, 486
Kingston-on-Hull, Trinity House at, 87
Knights Hospitallers, Church of, blown up with gunpowder, 266
Ladies' Bower, the, 89
-- occupation of, in time of George I., 478
_Latroon, Meriton, Life of_, 414
Lepers, lazar-house established in St. Giles in the Fields for, 141
Life in the time of George II., 460
"Limitour," the, in Chaucer, 149
Lloyd's Coffee-house, 478
Loftie's _History of London_, 13, 22
Lombard Street, drapers in, 217
-- -- Gresham's shop in, 301
London a city of ruins, _temp._ Elizabeth, 263
-- commercial centre of the world, _temp._ Elizabeth, 293
-- conquest of, by the men of Essex, compared with that of Jerusalem by Titus, 40
-- conversion of, A.D. 604, 45
-- craftsmen of, 215
-- described by William Fitz-Stephen, 48
-- desolate state of, after the Roman period, 34
-- drinking and fires the pests of, 52
-- found deserted by the East Saxons, 34
-- mediæval, description of, 157, 185
-- merchant generally a gentleman, 200
-- municipal history of, 91
-- not mentioned in _Anglo-Saxon Chronicle_, 12
-- population of, _temp._ Richard II., 49
-- rebuilding of, after Great Fire, 398
-- Saxon and Norman, described, 92
-- veritable mother of saints, 45
London Bridge, chapel on, 78
-- -- first stone, 77
-- -- songs on, 81
Londoners in the time of Elizabeth, 278
Long Bowstring-makers' Company, 454
Loriners' Company, 454
Mail-coaches, 464
Malpas, Philip, 238
Manners, City, in time of Charles II., 407
Manny, Sir Walter, 120
Matilda, Queen of Henry I., 65
-- wife of King Stephen, founds St. Katherine's by the Tower, 65
Maurice, Bishop, 53
May-day in the City, 231
May Fair, 457
May-pole, the, 332
Mediæval furniture, 181
-- London, description of, 157
-- names, survival of, 19
Megusers' Company, 453
Mellitus, first Bishop of London, 39
Mercers' Chapel, 142
Merchant adventurers, the, 295, 296
-- London, generally a gentleman, 200
-- Taylors' School, 303
Misrule, feast of, 309
"Mithridate" water, 473
Mitre Tavern, 351
Monastery towns grow rapidly and prosper, 46
Monk in Chaucer, 150
Moorfields, people camped in, after the Great Fire, 399
More, Sir Thomas, and Crosby Hall, 170
Morris-dancing, 233
Mughouse, a kind of music-hall, 480
"Mumpus," the, 416
Municipal London, history of, 91
Mystery plays, 94
Nennius, 1
New Abbey, 133
-- -- pulled down, 263
Newspapers about 1750, 465
Nobility, residences of, in City, 177
Norman House, description of, 86
-- London, monuments of, 52
Northumberland House, 288
-- -- site originally of Hospital of St. Mary Rounceval, 141
Nunneries in Saxon times, 93
Old Jewry, branch of the _Fratres de Saccâ_ established in, 139
"Oxford Clerk" in Chaucer, 150
Pads, 415
Pageants, City, 224
-- Elizabethan, 305
Palaces of the nobility in the City, 174
Papey College, 144
Pardon Church-yard, 121
"Pardoner" in Chaucer, 153
Parish organization in time of George II., 439
Patten-makers' Company, 454
Pattens, 484
Pecock, Reginald, Bishop of Chichester, 194
Pembroke, Earl, and Baynard's Castle, 166
Pepys' _Diary_, 417
Pepys on the Great Fire of London, 395
-- on the Plague, 377
Perranazabuloe Church, 75
Pewterers' Company, 454
Philippa, Queen, a benefactor of St. Katherine's by the Tower, 66
"Philo Puttonists," 415
Philpot, Sir John, 190
Picard, Sir Henry, 179
Pilgrims, 57
-- consecration of, 60
-- office of, 58
Pillory, the, 247
"Pimpinios," 415
Plague, the, 376
-- at Astrakhan in 1879, 387
-- at Marseilles in 1720, 387
-- Daniel Defoe on, 377
-- loss caused to trade by, 384
-- Pepys on, 377
-- remedies for, advertised, 408
-- water, 473
Plagues, 376
-- of London, 120
Plagues of 1603 and 1625, 387
Plantagenet London, religious houses the most conspicuous feature of, 107
Poisoning, men boiled and women burned for, 318
Population of London according to Fitz-Stephen, 84
Post-office rates about 1750, 464
Prentice, London, _temp._ Charles II., 414
Prices of food about 1750, 462
-- -- in time of Charles II., 462
"Prioress," the, in Chaucer, 149
Punishments under the Plantagenets, 318
Quacks, 474
Queen's wardrobe, 174
Quintain, the, 304
Rahere, 55, 56, 60, 63
Rainbow Coffee-house, 411
Rainwell, Sir John, 197
Ranelagh Gardens, 494
Red Bull Theatre, St. John Street, 307
Red Cross, Order of, 111
Reeds, floors covered with, 87
Reformation, the, and destruction of ecclesiastical buildings, 270
Religious houses the most conspicuous feature of Plantagenet London, 108
Rents about 1750, 461
Richard of Cirencester, 1
Richard II. and the City, 206
Riley's _Memorials of London_, 21
Robins's Coffee-house, 478
Rogues and vagabonds, _temp._ Elizabeth, 314
Roman customs, no trace of in London, 21
-- remains, 42
-- London, City wall about three miles long, 17
-- -- dependent on supplies from without, 24
-- -- description of, 12-18
-- -- probable population of, 17
-- -- the only port in the kingdom, 18
-- street, no trace of, in London, 20
-- town, construction of, 20
Rooks, 415
Royal African Company, the, 297
-- Exchange, 334
-- -- _temp._ Charles II., 410
-- Society, Institution of, 375
"Ruffins," 415
"Rufflers," 415
Russian Company, the, 297
Rutupiæ destroyed, 29
St. Alphege Church, 145
St. Anthony, patron and saint of the grocers, 208
St. Bartholomew's Priory, 267
St. Bartholomew the Great, built by Rahere, 55
St. Botolph, church dedicated to, 46
St. Clare, abbey of, called the Minories, 132, 263
St. Dunstan, church dedicated to, 46
St. Dunstan's in the East, church of, built after the Great Fire, 400
St. Edmund the Martyr, church dedicated to, 46
St. Erkenwald builds Bishopsgate, 45
St. Ethelburga, 45
St. Giles, Cripplegate, founded by Alfune, 63
-- -- in the Fields, church of, 140
St. Giles's Hospital, founded by Queen Matilda, 63
St. Helen, church of, 112
St. Helen's Nunnery becomes the property of the Leathersellers' Company, 266
St. James, Clerkenwell, parish church of, 131
St. John of Jerusalem, priory of, 65, 128; destroyed by rebels under Wat Tyler, 130
St. John's Gate, Clerkenwell, 128
St. Katherine's by the Tower, 65
St. Magnus, church dedicated to, 46
St. Martin, the patron saint of saddlers, 208
-- -- Outwich, church of, 297
St. Martin's le Grand, a house of Augustine Canons, 113
-- -- church of, tavern built on site of, 267
-- -- sanctuary and collegiate church of, 55
St. Mary Axe, 328; skinners in, 217
-- -- of Bethlehem, hospital of, 131
-- -- Overies, legend of, 67
-- -- Rounceval, hospital of, at Charing Cross, 141
St. Mary's, or Bow Church, 135
-- -- Spital, hospital of, 131
-- -- destroyed, 266
St. Michael's Church, choir and aisles rebuilt by Sir William Walworth, 143
-- -- College, Crooked Lane, 143
St. Olaf, church dedicated to, 46
St. Osyth, Queen and Martyr, 45
St. Paul's, Cathedral of, 53, 54, 109, 346
-- -- Cross, 344
-- -- first church of, destroyed by fire, 48
-- -- School, 303
St. Swithin, church dedicated to, 46
St. Thomas of Acon, College of, 142
St. Thomas's Hospital, 134, 146
St. Vedast, church of, 76
Salutation of the Mother of God, house of the, 120
Saxon house, description of, 86
-- London, destroyed by fire 1135, 48
Saxon London, darkest period of any, 48
-- -- foreign merchants in, 44
-- -- no remains of, 53
-- women, employment of, 92
Saxons, East, 35
-- -- before and after conversion to Christianity, 44
-- fond of vegetables, 87
Schools, Grammar, erected by Henry VI., 240, 303
-- -- in time of Elizabeth, 302
-- of the alien priories suppressed, 240
Sebbi, King, 53
Selds, 186
Sernes Tower, 83
Servants, ladies used to beat, 310
-- troop of, a mark of state, 310
"Setter," the, in the Georgian period, 489
Sevenoke, Sir William, 194, 216
"Shabbaroons," 415
Shakespeare, William, 364
Sion College, 269
Smithfield, horse-fair in, 51
"Sompnour" in Chaucer, 150