CHAPTER I

MANNERS AND CUSTOMS

In this chapter we can make a large use of contemporary literature. Thus, the first consideration in treating of the manners and customs of the people is naturally the position of the wife and the consideration shown to her. I do not think that in any country could either the position of the wife or the consideration for her surpass what was then in vogue in London. This point Emanuel van Meteren, writing in 1575, makes abundantly clear, even while he contends the exact opposite, viz. that the wife is entirely in the power of the husband. For he shows that whatever the law may be—he does not quote the law—the practice is that the wife has entire liberty; and custom, _i.e._ public opinion, against which no husband would dare to move, secures her that liberty. This is what he says:—

“Wives in England are entirely in the power of their husbands, their lives only excepted. Therefore when they marry, they give up the surname of their father and of the family from which they are descended, and take the surname of their husbands, except in the case of duchesses, countesses, and baronesses, who, when they marry gentlemen of inferior degree, retain their first name and title, which, for the ambition of the said ladies, is rather allowed than commended. But although the women are entirely in the power of their husbands except for their lives, yet they are not kept so strictly as they are in Spain, or elsewhere. Nor are they shut up, but they have the free management of the house or housekeeping, after the fashion of those of the Netherlands and others their neighbours. They go to market to buy what they like best to eat. They are well-dressed, fond of taking it easy, and commonly leave the care of household matters and drudgery to their servants. They sit before their doors, decked out in fine clothes, in order to see and be seen by the passers-by. In all banquets and feasts they are shown the greatest honour; they are placed at the upper end of the table, where they are the first served; at the lower end they help the men. All the rest of their time they employ in walking and riding, in playing at cards or otherwise, in visiting their friends and keeping company, conversing with their equals (whom they term gossips) and their neighbours, and making merry with them at child-births, christenings, churchings, and funerals; and all this with the permission and knowledge of their husbands, as such is the custom. Although the husbands often recommend to them the pains, industry, and care of the German or Dutch women, who do what the men ought to do both in the house and in the shops, for which services in England men are employed, nevertheless the women usually persist in retaining their customs. This is why England is called the Paradise of married women. The girls who are not yet married are kept much more rigorously and strictly than in the Low Countries. The women are beautiful, fair, well-dressed and modest, which is seen there more than elsewhere, as they go about the streets without any covering either of mantle, hood, veil, or the like. Married women only wear a hat both on the street and in the house; those unmarried go without a hat, although ladies of distinction have lately learnt to cover their faces with silken masks or vizards, and feathers,—for indeed they change very easily, and that every year, to the astonishment of many.”

If this was the ordinary life of the London merchant’s wife, the following is the contemporary ideal (Gervase Markham):—

“Next unto her sanctity and holiness of life, it is meet that our English Housewife be a woman of great modesty and temperance, as well inwardly as outwardly; inwardly, as in her behaviour and carriage towards her husband, wherein she shall shun all violence of rage, passion and humour, coveting less to direct than to be directed, appearing ever unto him pleasant, amiable and delightful; and tho’ occasion of mishaps, or the mis-government of his will may induce her to contrary thoughts, yet vertuously to suppress them, and with a mild sufferance rather to call him home from his error, than with the strength of anger to abate the least spark of his evil, calling into her mind, that evil and uncomely language is deformed, though uttered even to servants; but most monstrous and ugly, when it appears before the presence of a husband; outwardly, as in her apparel, and dyet, both which she shall proportion according to the competency of her husband’s estate and calling, making her circle rather strait than large; for it is a rule, if we extend to the uttermost, we take away increase; if we go a hair’s breadth beyond, we enter into consumption; but if we preserve any part, we build strong forts against the adversaries of fortune, provided that such preservation be honest and conscionable; for as lavish prodigality is brutish, so miserable covetousness is hellish. Let therefore the Housewife’s garments be comely and strong, made as well to preserve the health, as to adorn the person, altogether without toyish garnishes, or the gloss of bright colours, and as far from the vanity of new and fantastick fashions, as near to the comely imitation of modest matrons. Let her dyet be wholesome and cleanly, prepared at due hours, and cook’d with care and diligence, let it be rather to satisfie nature, than her affections, and apter to kill hunger than revive new appetites; let it proceed more from the provision of her own yard, than the furniture of the markets; and let it be rather esteemed for the familiar acquaintance she hath with it, than for the strangeness and rarity it bringeth from other countries.

To conclude, our English Housewife must be of chaste thoughts, stout courage, patient, untired, watchful, diligent, witty, pleasant, constant in friendship, full of good neighbourhood, wise in discourse, but not frequent therein, sharp and quick of speech, but not bitter or talkative, secret in her affairs, comfortable in her counsels, and generally skilful in the worthy knowledges which do belong to her vocation.”

But to set against this is the testimony of the Elizabethan satirist Philip Stubbes.

The principal occupation of the women, he tells us—their daily life—is to lie in bed till nine or ten in the morning; to spend two hours in dressing themselves; then to go to dinner; then, “their heads pretely mizzeled with wine,” they walk abroad for a time; or they sit at their open doors showing their braveries to passers-by; or they pretend business in the town and carry a basket, “under what pretence pretie concerts are practised.” Or again they have those gardens in the fields outside already alluded to, whither they repair with a boy and a basket and meet their lovers.

A WOMAN’S DAY

“Daily till ten a clocke a bed she lyes, And then againe her Lady-ship doth rise, Her Maid must make a fire, and attend To make her ready; then for wine sheele send, (A morning pinte), she sayes her stomach’s weake, And counterfeits as if shee could not speake, Vntill eleuen, or a little past, About which time, euer she breakes her fast; Then (very sullen) she wil pout and loure, And sit down by the fire some halfe an houre. At twelue a clocke her dinner time she keepes, Then gets into her chaire, and there she sleepes Perhaps til foure, or somewhat thereabout; And when that lazie humour is worne out, She cals her dog, and takes him in her lap, Or fals a beating of her maid (perhap) Or hath a gossip come to tell a tale, Or else at me sheele curse, and sweare, and rale, Or walk a turne or two about the Hall, And so to supper and to bed: heeres all This paines she takes; and yet I do abuse her: But no wise man, I thinke, so kind would vse her....” STUBBES, _Anatomie of Abuses_, Part ii. p. 274.

In the streets a lady of condition was preceded by a lackey carrying a stick or wand. Gentlemen were followed by their servants carrying the master’s sword. The servants were dressed in blue with the master’s badge in silver on the left arm. The men kept on their hats indoors except in warm weather. The nobles, who were mostly poor, joined with the merchant adventurers in their foreign enterprises; many of the merchants were consulted by the Sovereign and held positions of trust—for example, Gresham; yet the separation of City and Court was already beginning, as is shown by the repeated sneers of the dramatists at the vulgarity and ostentation of the City Madams. We get occasional glimpses of the lower class women and girls; they were rough in their manners and coarse in their conversation; we find them dancing in the street to the music of the tabor and the pipe; we also see them playing at ball up and down the street, like the ’prentices. They lived, like the men, on strong meat and beer; they were therefore physically strong, perhaps as strong as the young men their lovers. The richer sort of citizens had country gardens, generally small enclosures, either in or north of Moorfields, whither they resorted in the long summer evenings; their wives, it is said, used the gardens in the morning for assignations and the carrying on of intrigues.

In the morning the haunt of the gallants was St. Paul’s Cathedral. (_See_ Appendix VIII.) They walked up and down the middle of the nave, called then the “Mediterranean,” exhibiting their new cloaks and their new feathers. After a few turns up and down, or when the clock struck eleven, they left the place and disappeared, going to some of the shops, the tobacconist’s, or the bookseller’s, where they took tobacco and talked about the new books. They then repaired to an ordinary and spent two or three hours over dinner, after which they went back to St. Paul’s and spent there the whole afternoon.

The merchant had his Exchange; the citizen his tavern; the gallant had the apothecary’s shop, where he bought and smoked his tobacco. For daily discourse and business the scholar, the divine, the poet, the wit, had the bookseller’s shop. “He will sit you,” said Ben Jonson, “a whole afternoon in a bookseller’s shop, reading the Greek, Italian, and Spanish.” He would read, and he would talk. Remember that in the year 1590 or thereabouts the art of printing had only been in use a hundred years; all the books were new books; every poet was printed or translated for the first time; the booksellers’ shops contained editions, always new, of ancient classics; of living poets; of foreign writers; there was far greater interest in a new book than our age can understand: as we have seen there were in London alone at least 240 poets, known and acknowledged, whose names are still remembered, and whose poems still remain Anthologies, and there was interest among the reading world in every one of them. There may have been jealousies: poets have always been a jealous folk; but there was appreciation, and there was generosity. And the bookseller’s shop was the place where all who valued new books could meet and talk of books—what talk is more delightful? What criticism more sincere than that between those who themselves belong to letters in an age when literature knows not yet the meaning of the words exhaustion or decay?

Mr. Ordish (_Shakespeare’s London_, p. 233) has compiled a list of Elizabethan booksellers from the title-pages of the Shakespeare quartos. Such a list was well worth making, though it cannot be considered more than a small instalment. Indeed, the literary output was so enormous during the latter half of the sixteenth century, that the number of booksellers must have been proportionately greater than at present.

The following were some of the signs:—

I. In St. Paul’s Churchyard—

At the sign of the Angel, the Fox, the Flower de Luce and the Crown, the Greyhound, the Green Dragon, the Holy Ghost, the Gun (Edward White), the Pied Bull, the Spread Eagle.

II. By St. Dunstan’s in the West—

At the sign of the White Hart; at the shop under the Dial.

III. In Paternoster Row—

At the sign of the Sun.

IV. Cornhill—

At the sign of the Cat and Parrots.

V. In Carter Lane, near the Paul Head.

Plays and masques were performed on Sunday as well as any other day; the feeling, however, was growing rapidly in favour of a stricter attention to the Sunday, which was confused with the Sabbath. In other words, the Puritans were fast increasing in numbers and in importance.

If amusement was wanted it might also be sought in the street, where the juggler with his music and his tumbler had his regular round. He was distinguished by his thin, coloured cloak and his yellow breeches trimmed with blue. For a modest fee he performed for any who summoned him. Another form of amusement, suitable to those who could not afford to pay the itinerant juggler, and had to consider the expenditure in candles, was to sit round the fire in the evening and tell stories.

“... some mery fit Of Mayde-Marian, or else of Robin Hood.”

As for the girls:—

“Then is it pleasure the yonge maides amonge, To watch by the fier the winter-nights longe; And in the ashes some playes for to marke, And cover wardes for fault of other warke; To taste white shevers, to make prophet-roles; And, after talke, oft times to fille the boles.”

In the private houses there was a great deal of whipping; gentlemen had their servants whipped in the porter’s lodge; to be whipped was no disgrace, but a natural part of servitude, no more to be deplored than the necessity of death; ladies whipped their maid-servants, their sons and their daughters; when a child had been whipped the rod was tied to her girdle, with what we should perhaps consider an excess of admonition. Children knelt before their parents until bidden to rise. On their knees, too, they asked for their father’s blessing. If we may believe Caxton, who died in 1491, and therefore hardly belongs to the Tudor period, there was a great falling off in the behaviour of children in his own recollection. It is a mark of increasing years to compare things of the present with things of the past to the disparagement of the former.

“I see that the children ben borne within the sayd cyte encrease and prouffyte not like their faders and olders; but for mooste parte, after that they ben comeyn to theyr perfight yeres of discretion and rypnes of age, kno well that theyre faders haue lefte to them grete quantite of goodes, yet scarcely among ten two thrive. O blessed Lord! when I remember this, I am al abashed; I cannot judge the cause; but fayrer ne wyser, ne bet bespeken children in theyre youth ben no wher than ther ben in London; but at ther ful ryping, there is no carnel, ne good word found en, but chaff for the most part.”

As for the boys of the household, they either went to one of the City schools or they were instructed by a tutor at home. Probably the latter was unusual when schools were ready to hand. In country places the tutor was common, and his position was anything but pleasant.

“Such is the most base and ridiculous parsimony of many of our Gentlemen (if I may so terme them) that if they can procure some poore Batchelor of Art from the Universitie to teach their children to say grace, will be content upon the promise of ten pounds a yeere at his first comming, to be pleased with five; the rest to be set off in hope of the next advouson (which perhaps was sold before the young man was born). Or if it chance to fall in his time, his lady or master tels him, ‘Indeed, Sir, we are beholden unto you for your paines; such a living is lately falne, but I had before made a promise of it to my butler or bailiffe, for his true and extraordinary service.’

Is it not commonly seen, that the most Gentlemen will give better wages, and deale more bountifully with a fellow who can but a dogge, or reclaime a hawke, than upon an honest, learned, and well qualified man to bring up their children? It may be, hence it is, that dogges are able to make syllogismes in the fields, when their young masters can conclude nothing at home, if occasion of argument or discourse be offered at the table.”

Did the great City merchant ever maintain the domestic chaplain? I have found no instance of such a servant in the household of a citizen. Bishop Hall assigns the domestic chaplains to the country gentleman:—

“A gentle squire would gladly entertain Into his house some trencher-chappelain; Some willing man that might instruct his sons, And that would stand to good conditions. First, that he lie upon the truckle-bed, While his young maister lieth o’er his head; Second, that he do, on no default, Ever presume to sit above the salt; Third, that he never change his trencher twice; Fourth, that he use all common courtesies; Sit bare at meals, and one half rise and wait; Last, that he never his young master beat; But he must aske his mother to define, How manie jerks she would his breech should line. All these observ’d he could contented be, To give five markes, and winter livery.” JOSEPH HALL, _Satires_.

As regards the ’prentices, they were considered as servants not only in the shop and warehouse, but also at home, where they waited at dinner, and followed the ladies to church and when they went abroad in the evening, carrying a lantern and a stout cudgel. For the servants, properly so called, the following regulations will show the manner of their service (Drake, ii.):—

“Imprimis, That no servant bee absent from praier, at morning or evening, without a lawfull excuse, to be alledged within one day after, upon payne to forfeit for every tyme 2d.

2. Item, that none sweare any othe, uppon paine for every othe 1d.

3. Item, That no man leave any doore open, that he findeth shut, without there bee cause, upon payne for every time 1d.

4. Item, That none of the men be in bed, from our Lady-day to Michaelmas, after 6 of the clock, in the morning; nor out of his bed after 10 of the clock at night; nor, from Michaelmas till our Lady-day, in bed after 7 in the morning; nor out after 9 at night, without reasonable cause, on paine of 2d.

5. Item, That no man’s bed be unmade, nor fire or candle-box uncleane, after 8 of the clock in the morning, on paine of 1d.

• • • • •

7. Item, That no man teach any of the children any unhonest speeche, or bandie word, or other, on paine of 4d.

8. Item, That no man waite at the table, without a trencher in his hand, except it be uppon some good cause, on paine of 1d.

9. Item, If any man breake a glasse, hee shal answer the price thereof out of his wages and, if it bee not known who breake it, the buttler shall pay for it on paine of 12d.

10. Item, The table must be covered halfe an hour before 11 at dinner, and 6 at supper, or before, on paine of 2d.

11. Item, That meate bee readie at 11, or before, at supper, on paine of 6d.

12. That none be absent, without leave or good cause, the whole day, or any part of it, on paine of 4d.

13. Item, that no man strike his fellow, on paine of losse of service; nor revile or threaten, or provoke another to strike, on paine of 12d.

14. Item, That no man come to the kitchen without reasonable cause, on paine of 1d. and the cook likewyse to forfeit 1d.

15. Item, That none toy with the maids on paine of 4d.

16. Item, That no man weare foule shirt on Sunday, nor broken hose or shooes, or dublett without buttons, on paine of 1d.

17. Item, That when any strainger goeth hence, the chamber be drest up againe within 4 hours after, on paine of 1d.

18. Item, That the hall bee made cleane every day, by eight in the winter, and seaven in the sommer, on paine of him that should do it to forfet 1d.

19. That the court-gate bee shutt each meale, and not opened during dinner and supper, without just cause, on paine the porter to forfet for every time 1d.

20. Item, That all stayrs in the house, and other rooms that neede shall require, bee made cleane on Fryday after dinner, on paine of forfeyture of every one on whome it shall belong unto 3d.

All which sommes shalbe duly paide each quarter-day out of their wages, and bestowed on the poore or other godly use.”

The London merchant’s house in the sixteenth century steadily improved in solid comfort and even in magnificence. No one will ever be able to restore completely, or even approximately, the London of that century. We do not know the numbers of the great houses; we know only in part their constitutions, their pictures; their art; their carved work. In the streets lying off the main avenues of retail trade, especially in those streets near the riverside, a house was frequently at once a place of residence and a warehouse. One may look upon a street in Hildesheim, for instance, and be reminded of Bishopsgate Street, Aldgate, or Leadenhall Street in the time of Queen Elizabeth. That is to say, the greater number of houses were timbered with tiled roofs; the fronts all covered with carvings painted and gilded; there were scattered here and there substantial stone houses; there were still many houses whose gateway opened from some narrow city lane upon a spacious court, above which stood the hall; the lady’s bower; the rooms for apprentices and servants; and, behind all, the garden. Such a house on a large scale was Gray’s Inn; on a lesser scale Barnard’s Inn and the smaller inns. The College of Heralds still shows the general size of the court; Doctor’s Commons until fifty years ago also illustrated the old fashion of building. Bricks were coming into use, but, in the City of London, slowly. There were still many narrow and noisome courts where the hovels were of wood—making a constant danger of fire and filled with all manner of decaying abominations—a constant cause of disease.

By this time all the windows were provided with glass; many of the poorer sort, however, were furnished with the cheap glass which contained the round lumps called bull’s eyes. The shops in the market-places had glass in the upper part, but the lower part still remained open, and was shut at night with a shutter. The goods were exposed outside the window, and the ’prentices stood beside them bawling, “What d’ye lack? What d’ye lack?”

In the more important houses the old custom of living in the great hall was still kept up. In all houses the servants and apprentices sat down with the master and his family.

The floors were still strewn with rushes, but these, on account of the cost of renewing, were seldom changed, so that underneath them, as Erasmus discovered, lay unmolested an “ancient collection of beer, grease, fragments of fish, and everything that is nasty.”

The furniture of the rooms was very different from that of our own times. The following account is taken from _Archæologia_ (vol. xxx. p. 2):—

“The Furniture of the different rooms is very similar, varying principally in number and quality of the articles; consisting of sets of hangings, tables with tressels, joined forms, joined stools, court-cupboards, carpets, cushions, and a few chairs; also andirons, and other fire utensils, and several pairs of virginals in different rooms, besides a pair of organs in the chapel, and ‘an instrument musicall’ in the chamber of presence. The carpets, which are numerous, would scarcely appear to have been used according to modern custom for the floors of the apartments, Hentzner having informed us, that the presence-chamber of Queen Elizabeth herself was strewed with hay (_i.e._ rushes) but they were principally coverings for the tables, stools, and court-cupboards; though they may have been occasionally used to cover some select part of a room, as in the presence-chamber, for instance, where a Turkey carpet is mentioned, five yards and a half long, and two yards and three-quarters broad.

The court-cupboards, which are generally considered to have been moveable closets, answering the purpose of a sideboard, were frequently much ornamented, and such an article may still be seen in old mansions, and in collections of old furniture. They were covered with carpets or cupboard cloths, and set out with cups, salvers, and plate. Some of these carpets were very handsome. In one of the inventories in that valuable authority for researches of this nature, the _History of Hengrave_, is mentioned, ‘One carpet of black velvet, for the little bord, laced and fringed with silver and gould, lyned with taffita.’ Some of these carpets also had cloths to lay over them, probably, when not in use, in order to protect them. In the same Inventory cushions are mentioned which in richness exceed those of the Archbishop, as ‘two long cushions of plain black velvet, embroidered with roses, with gould and pearle all over, with tassels of gold and silk’; but the nature of his archi-episcopal office probably induced him to avoid too much splendour in his household. There is, however, in the chamber of presence a cushion of cloth of baudkin,[9] and in other apartments, several cushions of velvet and damask. The chair of cloth of gold and silver in the gallery was probably a State chair; and, indeed, from the paucity of these articles, they would seem to be intended only for persons of higher rank. From the ‘latten andirons’ in the chamber of presence being valued at forty shillings, it may be inferred that they were ornamented, and in some cases we know they were richly carved. Iachimo, describing the chamber of Imogen, says:—

‘Her andirons— I had forgot them—were two winking Cupids Of silver, each on one foot standing, nicely Depending on their brands.’

The pictures are chiefly portraits of royal personages, the principal noblemen and officers of state, and the promoters of the Reformation, but the list is interesting to shew the Archbishop’s selection. In some of the bed-rooms are truckle-beds (trundle-beds as they are called in some of the inventories of this age); these would seem to have been small beds generally appropriated to attendants, and placed at the foot or side of the standing or principal bed, and occasionally made to run under it during the day. The Host in the _Merry Wives of Windsor_, in answer to an inquiry after Sir John Falstaff, says, ‘There’s his chamber, his house, his castle, his standing-bed and truckle-bed.’ Hudibras also makes the distinction:—

‘If he that in the field is slain, Be in the bed of honour lain. He that is beaten may be said, To lie in honour’s truckle-bed.’

In my Lord’s chamber the bed is a field-bed, but this sort of bed may have been so called from being a folding-bed, as field-stool from fauld-stool, and not as being a camp-bed or _lit de champ_. The ‘grene satten of bridgs’ in the vestrye was satin of Bruges; and ’dornix,’ of which there are some articles mentioned, is used for ‘Tournay,’ and applied to the manufacture of that place. The ‘Grene saie,’ in the ‘Grene Galery,’ and elsewhere, was probably not silk, but a species of fine cloth (sagum), one of the earliest productions of our woollen manufacture, the material of stockings, which were objected to by William Rufus, as being, from the price, too common for a king.”

We may supplement this account by Harrison’s description (Holinshed, i. 317):—

“The furniture of our houses also exceedeth, and is growne in maner even to passing delicacie; for herein I doo not speake of the nobilitie and gentry onlie, but likewise of the lowest sort in most places of our south countrie, that have aniething at all to take to. Certes in noblemen’s houses it is not rare to see abundance of Arras, rich hangings of tapistrie, silver vessell, and so much other plate, as may furnish sundry cupbords, to the summe often times of a thousand or two thousand pounds at the least: whereby the value of this and the rest of their stuffe dooth grow to be almost inestimable. Likewise in the houses of knights, gentlemen, merchantmen, and some other wealthie citizens, it is not geson to behold generallie their great provision of tapistrie, Turkie worke, pewter, brasse, fine linen, and thereto costlie cupbords of plate, worth five or six hundred or a thousand pounds, to be deemed by estimation. But as herein all these sorts doo far exceed their elders and predecessors, and in neatnesse and curiositie the merchant all other; so in time past, the costlie furniture staied there, whereas now it is descended yet lower even unto the inferior artificers and manie farmers, who by vertue of their old and not of their new leases have for the most part learned also to garnish their cupbords with plate, their joined beds with tapestrie and silke hangings, and their tables with carpets and fine naperie, whereby the wealth of our countrie (God be praised therefore and give us grace to imploie it well) dooth infinetlie appeare. Neither doo I speak this in reprooch of anie man, God is my judge, but to showe that I do rejoise rather to see how God has blessed us with His good gifts; and whilest I behold how that in a time wherein all things are growen to most excessive prices, and what commoditie soever is to be had is daily plucked from the communaltie by such as looke into every trade, we do yet find the meanes to obtein and achive such furniture as heretofore hath beene unpossible. There are old men yet dwelling in the village where I remaine, which hath noted three things to be marvellously altered in England within their sound remembrance; and other three things too much increased. One is, the multitude of chimnies lately erected, whereas in their yoong daies there were not above two or three, of so many in most uplandish towns of the realme (the religious houses and manour places of their lordes alwaies excepted, and peradventure some great personages), but each one made his fire against a reredosse in the hall where he dined and dressed his meat.

The second is the great (although not generall) amendment of lodging, for (said they) our fathers (yea and we ourselves also) have lien full oft upon straw pallets, on rough mats covered onlie with a sheet under coverlets made of dagswain or hopharlots (I use their owne terms) and a good round log under their heads insteed of a bolster or pillow. If it were so that our fathers or the good man of the house, had within seven yeares after his marriage purchased a matteres or flockebed, and thereto a sacke of chaffe to reste his head upon, he thought himselfe to be well lodged as the lord of the towne, that peradventure laie seldom in a bed of downe or whole fethers: so well were they contented, and with such base kind of furniture: which also is not verie much amended as yet in some parts of Bedfordshire, and elsewhere further off from our southerne parts. Pillowes (said they) were thought meet onelie for women in childbed. As for servants, if they had anie sheet above them it was well, for seldom had they anie under their bodies, to keep them from the pricking straws that ran oft through the canvas of the pallet and rased their hardened hides.

The third thing they tell of, is the exchange of vessell, as of treene[10] platters into pewter, and wooden spoones into silver or tin. For so common were all sorts of treene stuffe in old time, that a man should hardlie find foure peeces of pewter (of which one was peradventure a salt) in a good farmer’s house and yet for all this frugalitie (if it may so be justly called) they were scarse able to live and paie their rents at their daies without selling of a cow, or an horsse, or more, although they paid but foure pounds at the uttermost by the year. Such also was their povertie that if some one od farmer or husbandman had beene at the alehouse a thing greatlie used in those daies, amongst six or seven of his neighbours, and there in a braverie to show what store he had, did cast downe his pursse, and therein a noble or six shillings in silver unto them (for few such men then cared for gold bicause it was not so readie paiment and they were oft inforced to give a penie for the exchange of an angell), it was verie likelie that all the rest could not laie downe so much against it; whereas in my time, although peradventure foure pounds of old rent be improved to fortie, fiftie, or an hundred pounds, yet will the farmer as another palme or date tree thinke his gaines verie small toward the end of his terme, if he have not six or seven yeares rent lieng by him, therewith to purchase a new lease, beside a faire garnish of pewter on his cupbord, with so much more in od vessel going about the house, three or foure featherbeds, so many counterlids and carpets of tapistrie, a silver salt, a bowle for wine (if not an whole neast) and a dozzen of spoones to furnish up the sute.”

Or, again, to take another contemporary authority (Hall, _Society in the Elizabethan Age_):—

“The furniture of an Elizabethan House is illustrated by an inventory of the Household ‘stuffe, goodes and cattelles’ belonging to Sir Henry Parker knight (1557–60). This inventory shows two chairs only for the whole house; eight stools and forms; two square framed tables; one joined table to say mass on; a pair of ‘playing tables’; twelve bedsteads; tapestry and hangings; featherbeds; blankets; bolsters; testors; curtains; counterpoints (counterpanes); seven cupboards; three carpets; andirons, fire shovels, tongs; thirteen candlesticks; certain cushions of tapestry, velvet, white satin and ‘Brydges’ satin; three great chests; utensils for the kitchen; the Brewhouse and the Bargehouse. The Hall was hung round with tapestry; its permanent furniture consisted of two square tables and one great chair of black velvet in which the Justice of the Peace heard cases. When the tables were spread for dinner or supper, forms were brought in. The ‘Great Chamber,’ formerly called the Lady’s Bower, contained the forms used at meals in the Hall, one stool of black velvet for my Lady; and nothing else! In the bedrooms there were the beds and their blankets and nothing else; not a chair or a table; nothing but the bed—what does one want in a bedroom but the bed to sleep upon? For decorations one room had over the chimney a ‘steyned cloth with Marie and Gabriell.’ Another had curtains of sarcenet; another, of red and green say; another, ‘old tapestrye worke of imagery.’ In one chamber we find a bason and ewer of pewter—was this the only means of washing in the whole house? In the buttery were a dozen of fine trenchers ‘cased’; six glasses; six plates for fruits; a ‘garnish’ of pewter vessels; two pewter plates for tarts. Nothing is said of knives—did each person still carry his own? Even then there must have been carving knives. Forks were not as yet in common use, and nothing is said about spoons.”

The inventory of a farmer’s goods about the same time, given in the same work, shows among the household gear, two pewter dishes, three pewter platters, two saucers, four trencher platters, six trencher dishes, two brass kettles, two candlesticks and a chafing dish, eight bowls of wood, twelve trenchers, and twelve trencher spoons; but still nothing about knives. Nor in any of the numerous inventories and accounts given in this book is any mention made of knives. We see, however, in the tables laid upon trestles, the single chair, the forms and stools, the fine tapestry of the Hall, the carpets of the Great Chamber, the testers and the curtains of the bed which stands alone in the bedroom, a compound of state and simplicity; of meanness and richness. Furniture in the modern sense had not yet appeared in the house.

To quote from Shakespeare, Gremio, in the _Taming of the Shrew_, thus speaks of his furniture:—

“My house within the city Is richly furnished with plate and gold; Basins and ewers to lave her dainty hands; My hangings all of Tyrian tapestry; In ivory coffers I have stuff’d my crowns; In cypress chests my arras counterpoints, Costly apparel, tents, and canopies, Fine linen, Turkish cushions boss’d with pearl, Valance of Venice gold in needlework, Pewter and brass and all things that belong To house or housekeeping.”

Or take the following note of a lady’s room:—

“Her bed-chamber was garnished with such diversities of sweete herbes, such varietie of fragrant flowers, such chaunge of odoriferous smelles, so perfumed with sweete odours, so stored with sweete waters, so beautified with tapestry, and decked so artificially, that I want memorie to rehearse it, and cunning to expresse it, so that it seemed her Chamber was rather some terresstriall Paradise, than a mansion for such a matelesse mystresse; rather a tabernacle for some Goddesse, than a lodging for such a loathsome carcase.”

The Tudor age was strong in small points of ceremony and etiquette, which descended even to details of housework. For instance, the ceremony to be observed in making the King’s Bed, a thing which we might suppose left to a housemaid, was carefully laid down:—

“Furste a groome or a page to take a torche and to goo to the warderobe of the kynges bedd, and brynge theym of the warderobe with the kynges stuff unto the chambr for makyng of the same bedde. Where as sught to be a gentylman-usher iiij yeomen of the chambr for to make the same bedde. The groome to stande at the bedds feete with his torche. They of the warderobe opennyng the kinges stuff of hys bedde upon a fayre sheets betwen the sayde groome and the bedds fote, iij yeomen or two at the lefte in every syde of the bedde. The gentylman usher and parte commaundyng theym what they shall doo. A yoman with a dagger to searche the strawe of the kynges bedde that there be none untreuth therin. And this yoman to caste up the bedde of downe upon that, and oon of theym to tomble over yt for the serche thereof. Then they to bete and tufte the sayde bedde, and to laye oon then the bolster without touchyng of the bedd where as it aught to lye. Then they of the warderobe to delyver theym a fusty and takyng the saye thereof. All theys yomen to laye theyr hands theroon at oone, that they touch not the bedd, tyll yt be layed as it sholde be by the commaundement of the usher. And so the furste sheet in lyke wyse, and then to trusse in both sheete and fustyan rownde about the bedde of downe. The warderoper to delyver the second sheete unto two yomen, they to crosse it over theyr arme, and to stryke the bedde as the ussher shall more playnly sheweun to theym. Then every yoman layeing hande upon the sheete to laye the same sheete upon the bedde. And so the other fustyan upon or ij with suche coverynge as shall content the kynge. Thus doon the ij yomen next to the bedde to laye down agene the overmore fustyan, the yoman of the warderobe delverynge theym a pane sheete, the sayde yoman therewythall to cover the sayde bedde: and so then to laye down the overmost sheets from the beddes heed. And then the say ij yomen to lay all the overmost clothes of a quarter of the bedde. Then the warderoper to delyver unto theym such pyllowes as shall please the kynge. The sayd yoman to laye theym upon the bolster and the heed sheet with whych the sayde yoman shall cover the sayd pyllowes. And so to trusse the endes of the said sheete under every end of the bolster. And then the sayd warderoper to delyver unto them ij lytle small pyllowes werwythall the squyres for the bodye or gentylman usher shall give te saye to the warderoper, and to the yoman whyche have layde on hande upon the sayd bedde. And then the sayd ij yomen to lay upon the sayde bedde toward the bolster as yt was bifore. They makyng a crosse and kissynge yt where there handes were. Then ij yomen next to the feete to make the seers as the usher shall teche theym. And so then every one of them sticke up the aungel about the bedde, and to lette downe the corteyns of the sayd bedde or sparver.

Item, a squyer for the bodye or gentylman-usher aught to sett the kynges sword at hys beddes heede.

Item, a squyer for the bodye aught to charge a secret groome or page to have the kepynge of the sayde bedde with a lyght, unto the tyme the kynge be disposed to goo to yt.

Item, a groome or page aught to take a torche whyle the bedde ys yn makyng to feche a loof of brede, a pott with ale, a pott wyth wine for them that maketh the bedde, and every man.

Item, the gentylman-ussher aught to forbede that no manner of man do sett eny dysshe uppon the kinge’s bedde for fere of hurtyng of the kyng’s ryche counterpoynt that lyeth therupon. And that the sayd ussher take goode heede, that noon man wipe or rubbe their handes uppon none arras of the kynges, wherby they myght be hurted, in the chambr where the kyng ys specially, and in all other.”

The wealth of the English was not so much illustrated, as it was proved, by their immense stores of silver and silver-gilt plate. The people bought all the plate that they could afford; they put their savings, so to speak, in silver plate, as we put them in stocks and shares. Polydore Vergil says that there were few whose tables were not loaded with spoons, cups, and salt-cellars of silver. At the marriage feast of Prince Arthur there was in the great hall a cupboard five stages in height, set with plate valued at £1200, say £15,000 of our money; while in the chamber where the Princess dined there was a cupboard of gold plate valued at £20,000 or £240,000 in our money. Cardinal Wolsey must have spent enormous sums upon plate. There were two banqueting rooms, in each of which was a cupboard extended along the whole length of the apartment, piled to the top with plate, and every guest chamber was provided with silver ewers, basins, and candlesticks. Of silver spoons or dishes there were none; the dishes were of pewter and the plates of wood, even in the greatest houses.

Lastly, on the subject of furniture, let me quote from another paper in _Archæologia_, vol. xxxvi. p. 284:—

“The furniture of the hall is excessively scanty and plain, consisting of but a single table and two forms, of the total value of 4s. 6d. In the parlour, however, is a much greater abundance of furniture, as, in addition to the main table, there is the side table and another small table, a chair and six stools with embroidered cushions, besides footstools; while for the decoration of the room we find a portrait of Henry VIII. and hangings of green saye, and, for the amusement of the family and guests, a pair of virginals, a base lute, and a guitar, with chess and backgammon boards for those not musically inclined. The children’s chamber, or nursery as we should call it, is comfortably provided with bedding and nursery requisites, and contains a cupboard, two coffers, and a great wicker hamper, as receptacles for the clothes, etc. The allowance of blankets appears but small, being only one pair to a bed, either in the nursery or in the bedroom of the master of the house. The latter room is provided with a walnut-tree bedstead, adorned with green fringe, and having a coverlet of tapestry, a walnut table, chairs and stools, curtains for the windows of green saye, a warming-pan, and, as a ready means of defence against thieves or intruders, a pole-axe. In an inner closet, leading out of this room, are four stills, for the use of the lady of the house.

Sir William More’s own closet is so well appointed that it might almost serve as a model for the morning-room of a country squire of the present day. On the walls hang maps of the World, of France, of England, and of Scotland, and a picture of Judith, a little chronicle, and a perpetual almanac in frames. Among the accessories are a globe, a slate to write on, and a counterboard and cast of counters, with which to make calculations and cast accounts, in the manner then in vogue. On the desk are a pair of scales and a set of weights, a pair of scissors, a penknife, a whetstone, a pair of compasses, a foot-rule, a hammer, a seal of many seals, and an inkstand of pewter, with a pounce-box, and pens both of bone and steel. Around the room is a collection of about 120 volumes of books; among them are some of the best chronicles of the time, as Fabyan, Langton, Harding, Carion, etc.; translations from the classics, as well as some in their original language; for magisterial business there are the statutes of Henry VIII., Edward VI., and Mary, and all the statutes before, as well as the _New Book of Justices_, and other legal works; for medical use we find a _Book of Physic_, the _Glass of Health_, and a book against the Sweat, as well as a _Book of Medicines for Horses_; while for lighter reading there are such books as Chaucer, Lydgate, Skelton, and others, not only in English but also in French and Italian; and for religious study, besides a Bible and Testaments in various languages, the _Scala Perfectionis_, _Flores Bibliae_, etc. The whole catalogue is worthy of attentive perusal by the bibliographical antiquary, and affords the titles of some English works which are not, I believe, at present known.

In the closet of the lady of the house are a few more books, principally of prayers, a large collection of trunks and boxes, a number of glass vessels of various forms and uses, and a few of enamel or china, with trenchers, knives, shears, graters, snuffers, moulds, brushes, and other miscellaneous properties of a good housewife.”

Water was carried about the City from the conduits by water-carriers called “Cobbs,” who carried it in large tankards, each holding about three gallons.

The palmy time of tobacco extended over the fifty years after its introduction. During this time the use of tobacco penetrated all ranks and classes of society. The grave divine, the soldier, the lawyer, the gallant about town, the merchant, the craftsman, the ’prentice, all used pipes. At the theatre the young fellow called for his pipe and for tobacco and began to smoke: presently he rose and walking over to the boxes presented his pipe to any lady of his acquaintance.

People went to bed with tobacco box and pipe and candle on a table by the bedside in case they might wake up in the night and feel inclined for tobacco. After supper in a middle-class family, all the men and women smoked together. Nay, it is even stated that the very children in school took a pipe of tobacco instead of breakfast, the master smoking with them and instructing them how to bring the smoke through the nostrils in the fashion of the day. Tobacco was bought and sold in pennyworths.

Every man carried a “tobacco box, steel, and touch.” Early in the seventeenth century there are said to have been 7000 tobacconists’ shops in London. This seems incredible; perhaps there were 7000 shops in which tobacco was sold. For instance, all apothecaries sold tobacco. Many of the tobacco shops were of handsome appearance. A tobacco shop had a maple block for cutting the leaf; tongs for holding the coals, and a fire of juniper at which the pipes were lighted. Tobacco was so cheap that a man might fill his pocket with it for twopence. Yet over £300,000 a year was spent in London on tobacco, while there were some—but this is impossible—who were reported to spend, habitually, £400 a year upon tobacco alone; that is, 48,000 pocketsful every year, or 130 pocketsful every day; which is absurd.

Expletives and oaths are changed with every generation. The Elizabethans had, no doubt, a great many, of which the following represent but a few. The old Catholic oaths “By’r Lady,” “By the Mass,” and so forth, vanished with the Reformation. We now find a lot of meaningless ejaculations, such as “God’s Wounds,” “God’s Fools,” “God’s Dines,” “Cocke’s Bones,” “Deuce take me,” “Bones a God,” and “Bones a me.” The now familiar “Damn” makes its appearance in literature; but indeed it had flourished in the mouths of the people for many generations. There is nothing really remarkable about the swearing of the Elizabethan period.

Every merchant formerly carried a signet-ring, on which was engraved, not his coat-of-arms, but his mark or signet. Thus, a curious signet-ring was found lying in the bed of the river while digging the foundations of London Bridge. At first it was believed to be Sir Thomas Gresham’s, but that seems now to be impossible. It is engraved in _The London and Middlesex Notebook_ (p. 195). The device contains the initials of the owner, with an arrangement of lines probably not intended to have any meaning except that they should be recognised as forming part of Sir Thomas Gresham’s signet. Armed with this ring as an introduction, a messenger could buy and sell for the merchant—it being presumed that the ring never left its owner save to be used as a letter of recommendation and introduction. Sometimes the signet-ring was worn on the thumb. Other merchants’ devices are figured in the “Notebook.”

Foreigners have revealed to us some very curious and rather startling peculiarities of the custom of kissing as practised by our ancestors. Thus as early as 1466 a Bohemian nobleman named Leo von Rozmital visited England, and in the Journal of his Travel (1577) it is noted that “it is the custom there, that on the arrival of a distinguished stranger from foreign parts, maids and matrons go to the inn and welcome him with gifts. Another custom is observed there, which is that, when guests arrive at an inn, the hostess with all her family go out to meet and receive them; and the guests are required to kiss them all, and this among the English was the same as shaking hands among other nations.” Erasmus, in 1499, wrote a Latin letter from England to his friend Fausto Anfrelini, an Italian poet, exhorting him in a strain of playful levity to think no more of his gout, but to betake himself to England; for (he remarks) “here are girls with angels’ faces, so kind and obliging, that you would far prefer them to all your Muses. Besides, there is a custom here never to be sufficiently recommended. Wherever you come you are received with a kiss by all; when you take your leave you are dismissed with kisses; you return, kisses are repeated. They come to visit you, kisses again; they leave you, you kiss them all round. Should they meet you anywhere, kisses in abundance; in fine, wherever you move, there is nothing but kisses.” In 1527 Cardinal Wolsey was appointed Ambassador Extraordinary to France. He was accompanied by George Cavendish, his gentleman usher, who wrote a Life of the Cardinal. Cavendish had gone forward to prepare his lord’s lodging. He says: “And I being there (at the Sire de Créqui’s Castle at Moreuil, about twelve miles from Amiens) tarrying a while, my lady Créqui issued out of her chamber into her dining chamber, where I attended her coming, who received me very gently like her noble estate, having a traine of twelve gentlewomen. And when she and her traine was come all out, she saide unto me, ‘For as much,’ quoth she, ‘as ye be an Englishman whose custome is to kisse all ladies and gentlemen in your country without offense, although it is not soe here with us in this realme, yet I will be so bould as kisse you, and soe ye shall doe all my maids.’ By meanes whereof I kissed her and all her maides.” In the narrative of the visit of the Spanish nobleman, the Duke de Najera, in 1543–44, we are told that “after the dancing was finished (which lasted several hours) the Queen entred again into her chamber, having previously called one of the noblemen who spoke Spanish, to offer in her name, some presents to the Duke, who again kissed her hand; and on his requesting the same favour of the Princess Mary, she would by no means permit it, but offered him her lips, and the Duke saluted her, and did the same to all the other ladies.” A Greek traveller, Nicander Nucius, came to England in 1545, and remarks: “They display great simplicity and absence of jealousy in their usages towards females. For not only do those who are of the same family and household kiss them on the mouth with salutations and embraces, but even those too who have never seen them. And to themselves this appears by no means indecent.” Again, when the Constable of Castile appeared at the Court of Whitehall on Saturday afternoon, 18th August 1604, after kissing Her Majesty’s hands he requested permission to salute the ladies of honour (twenty in number, standing in a row, and beautiful exceedingly) according to the custom of the country, and any neglect of which is taken as an affront. Whereupon the Queen having given him leave, His Excellency complied with the custom, much to the satisfaction of the ladies.

In Shakespeare’s _Henry VIII._, at the Cardinal’s banquet, the King says to Anne Bullen:—

“Sweetheart, I were unmannerly, to take you out, And not to kiss you.”

In dancing it appears to have been the customary fee of a lady’s partner. A further illustration of the custom may be seen. Foreigners of the male sex, and especially Frenchmen, are in the more frequent habit of kissing each other, and probably not the ladies. Misson, a Frenchman who travelled in England about 1697, says: “The people of England, when they meet, never salute one another, otherwise than by giving one another their hands, and shaking them heartily; they no more dream of pulling off their hats, than the women do of pulling off their headcloths.”

The sin of great cities we may pass over; that of early marriage is still, as it was in Stubbes’ time, a very terrible evil; the sin of drunkenness is with us still, and is present in every country. The side of charity that consists in giving doles to the poor was then neglected, and is now destroyed. We still suffer from money-lenders, though they can no longer conduct us to a life-long prison.

“Beleeve mee,” says Stubbes, “it greeveth mee to heare (walking in the streats) the pitiful cryes, and miserable complaints of poore prisoners in durance for debt, and like so to continue all their life, destitute of libertie, meat, drink (though of the meanest sorte), and clothing to their backs, lying in filthie strawe, and lothsome dung, wursse than anie dogge, voide of all charitable consolation and brotherly comfort in this World, wishing and thyrsting after death to set them at libertie, and loose them from their shackles, giues, and yron bands.” (Stubbes.)

As for the boys of this century, I have always thought their favourite haunt was the river, or the river-side. On the river they rowed about among the fishermen, and the swans above Bridge; the Queen’s Barge swept past them with its trumpets and its hangings gorgeous to behold; the Lord Mayor and the Companies were borne along before them in state and splendour such as we have forgotten—surely nothing could have been more splendid than these barges with their long lines of flashing oars and their bows gilt and carved, and the carved work of the covered seat of state, and the servants in their green and gold. Below Bridge, in the Port, they rowed in and out among the ships as boys will about Portsmouth Harbour now; the name of each ship with her port was written on her lofty stern. The figure-head of each was bright as paint and gold would make it. If they were allowed to go on board there were sailors full of yarns, with strange things to show as well as to tell. If they went as far down as Deptford, there was Drake’s ship, the ship which had gone all round the world—all round the world! If they stayed ashore, there were taverns in Wapping and St. Katherine’s, where they could snatch the fearful joy of seeing the sailors drink and fight, the foreign sailors and the English sailors, and the sailors from the North Country, and those of London and the Cinque Ports. The river and the river-side were famous schools to fill the minds of London boys with an ardour for adventure; a yearning for the way of war; a burning desire to cross the seas and visit far countries; and a thirst for geography; and all the London boys of every class regularly attended the classes of this Academy.

The theatre, of course, offers a fine field for the Elizabethan satirist, Stubbes. He cannot find words strong enough to condemn the playgoer. Then there is that other source and fount of laughter, the Lord of Misrule.

“First, all the wilde-heds of the Parish, conuenting togither, chuse them a Graund Captain (of all mischeefe) whome they innoble with the title of ‘my Lord of Mis-rule,’ and him they crowne with great solemnitie, and adopt for their King. This king anointed chuseth forth twentie, fortie, threescore or a hundred lustie Guttes, like to himself, to waighte vppon his lordly Maiestie, and to guarde his noble person. Then, euerie one of these his men, he inuesteth with his liuerues of green, yellow, or some other light wanton colour; And as though that were not baudie (gaudie) enough, I should say, they bedecke them selues with scarfs, ribons, and laces hanged all over with golde rings, precious stones, and other jewels: this doon, they tye about either leg xx. or xl. bels, with rich handkerchiefs in their hands, and sometimes laid a crosse ouer their shoulders and necks, borrowed for the most parte of their pretie Mopsies and loouing Besses, for bussing them in the dark. Thus al things set in order, then haue they their Hobby-horses, dragons and other antiques, togither with their baudie Pipers and thundering Drummers to strike vp the deuils daunce withall. Then marche these heathen company towards the church and Churchyard, their pipers pipeing, their drummers thundring, their stumps dauncing, their bels iyngling, their handkerchiefs swinging about their heds like madmen, their hobbie horses and other monsters skirmishing amongst the route: and in this sorte they go to the Church (I say) and into the Church (though the Minister be at prair or preaching), dancing and swinging their handkerchiefs ouer their heds in the Church, like deuils incarnate, with such a confuse noise, that no man can hear his own voice. Then, the foolish people they looke, they stare, they laugh, they fleer, and mount vpon fourmes and pewes to see these goodly pageants solemnized in this sort. Then, after this, about the Church they goe againe and againe, and so foorth into the churchyard, where they haue commonly their Sommer-haules, their bowers, arbors, and banqueting houses set vp, wherin they feast, banquet and daunce al that day and (peradventure) all the night too. And thus these terrestriall furies spend the Sabaoth day.” (Stubbes, _Anatomie of Abuses_, edit, by Furnivall.)

The custom of church ales is described by Stubbes with his customary vigour:—

“In certaine Townes where drunken _Bachus_ beares all the sway, against a Christmas, an Easter, Whitsonday, or some other time, the Church-wardens (for so they call them) of euery parish, with the consent of the whole Parish, prouide half a score of twenty quarters of mault, wherof some they buy of the Church-stock, and some is giuen them of the Parishioners them selves, euery one conferring somewhat, according to his abilitie; which mault, beeing made into very strong ale or beere, it is set to sale, either in the Church, or some other place assigned to that purpose.

Then, when the _Nippitatum_, this Huf-cap (as they call it) and this _nectar_ of lyfe, is set abroche, wel is he that can get the soonest to it, and spend the most at it; for he that fitteth the closest to it, and spends the moste at it, he is counted the godliest man of all the rest; but who either cannot, for pinching pouertie, or otherwise, wil not stick to it, he is counted one destitute bothe of vertue and godlynes. In so much as you shall haue many poor men make hard shift for money to spend ther at, for it beeing put into this _Corban_, they are perswaded it is meritorious, and a good seruice to God. In this kinde of practise they continue six weeks, a quarter of a year, yea, half a year togither, swilling and gulling, night and day, till they be as drunke as Apes, and as blockish as beasts.” (Stubbes, _Ibid._)

They pretend, he says, to repair their churches with money so got:—

“But who seeth not that they bestow this money vpon nothing lesse than in building and repayring of Churches and Oratories? For in most places lye they not like swyn coates? their windowes rent, their dores broken, their walles fall downe, the roofe all bare, and what not out of order? Who seeth not the booke of God, rent, ragged, and all betorn, couered in dust, so as this _Epitaphe_ may be writ with ones finger vppon it, _ecce nunc in puluere dormio_? (Alas;) behold I sleep in dust and oblyuion, not once scarse looked vppon, much less red vpon, and the least of all preached vppon.” (Stubbes, _Ibid._)

Of wakes and feasts and “the horrible vice of pestiferous dancing” we need say little. Nor of music, “how it allureth to vanitie”; nor of cards, dice, tennis, and bowls, all of which we still practise; nor of the bear-baiting which we have now discontinued. Of the reading of bad books we may still complain after the manner of Stubbes. In a word, his _Book of Lamentations_ would serve with slight alterations for to-day as well as his own age.

On the exchange of English goods for foreign trifles, I find a note in Furnivall’s edition of Stubbes’ _Anatomy_:—

“Thou must carry beside, leather, tallow, beef, bacon, bell-metal and everything: And for these good commodities, trifles into England thou must bring, As bugles to make bables, coloured bones, glass beads to make bracelets withal, For every day gentlewomen of England do ask for such trifles from stall to stall: And you must bring more, as amber, jet, coral, crystal, and every such bable That is slight, pretty, and pleasant: they care not to have it profitable. And if they demand wherefore your wares and merchandise agree, You must say ‘jet will take up a straw: amber will make one fat: Coral will look pale when you be sick, and crystal staunch blood,’ So with lying, flattering and glosing, you must utter your ware, And you shall win me to your will, if you can deceitfully swear.

• • • • •

_Lucre._ Then, Signor Mercatore, I am forthwith to send ye From hence to search for some new toys in Barbary and in Turkey; Such trifles as you think will please wantons best, For you know in this country ’tis their chiefest request.

_Mercatore._ Indeed, de gentlewomans here buy so much vain toys Dat we strangers laugh-a to tink wherein dey have their joys.”

The suppressing of the Religious Houses produced, for a time, a great deal of hardship and difficulty. For not only were the friars turned out into the streets, but all the people living upon the monasteries were deprived of their daily bread; many of these unfortunates took to the road and became tramps, vagabonds, masterless men and thieves; many took refuge in those parts of London which were outside the jurisdiction of the City. London, indeed, was the place which the masterless man regarded as a veritable Paradise. They flocked up to London from all quarters; they were constantly being turned out and as constantly coming back again. When Queen Elizabeth once drove out to the country cottage of Islington, she was mobbed by a gang of vagabonds who accosted her with clamours; they harboured in the brick kilns there. In some parts close to London, as Hyde Park Corner and Lincoln’s Inn Fields, no one would venture after dark. Men took arms into their bedrooms at night, ready for use. Generally it seems that they hung a drawn sword at the bedside. The ’prentices, however, were the best protectors to a house. They slept in the shop, if there were a shop; or if there were no shop they slept somewhere on the ground floor, as is evident from the edifying revelations of “Meriton Latron,” in which it is shown how easily the ’prentices could get out at night for these riotous and profligate meetings and drinkings. I suppose it matters nothing that this writer belongs to the next century. In such small matters the world is conservative. According to this authority, it was common for ’prentices to rob their masters, exchanging with each other or holding a kind of auction in their taverns at night. The time when the City was most free from crimes was when the men had been called out to follow the flag and fight. The worst time was after the war, when they all came back again to their old haunts, thirsting for their old amusements and more disinclined for work than ever.