Part 103
Littlewit tells his wife, Win, of the great hog, and of a bull with five legs, in the Fair. Zeal-of-the-land loudly declaims against the Fair, and against Trash’s commodities:--“Hence with thy basket of popery, thy nest of images, and whole legend of ginger-work.” He rails against “the prophane pipes, the tinkling timbrels;” and Adam Overdoo, a reforming justice of peace, one of “the court of _Pie-powders_,” who wears a disguise for the better observation of disorder, gets into the stocks himself. Then “a western man, that’s come to wrestle before my lord mayor anon,” gets drunk, and is cried by “the clerk o’ the market all the Fair over here, for my lord’s service.” Zeal-of-the-land Busy, too, is put with others into the stocks, and being asked, “what are you, sir?” he answers, “One that rejoiceth in his affliction, and sitteth here to prophesy the destruction of fairs and may-games, wakes and whitsun-ales, and doth sigh and groan for the reformation of these abuses.” During a scuffle, the keepers of the stocks leave them open, and those who are confined withdraw their legs and walk away.
From a speech by Leatherhead, preparatory to exhibiting his “motion,” or puppet-show, we become acquainted with the subjects, and the manner of the performance. He says, “Out with the sign of our invention, in the name of wit; all the fowl i’ the Fair, I mean all the dirt in Smithfield, will be thrown at our banner to-day, if the matter does not please the people. O! the _motions_ that I, Lanthorn Leatherhead, have given light to, i’ my time, since my master, Pod, died! _Jerusalem_ was a stately thing; and so was _Nineveh_ and _The City of Norwich_, and _Sodom and Gomorrah_; with the _Rising o’ the Prentices_, and pulling down the houses there upon Shrove-Tuesday; but _the Gunpowder Plot_, there was a get-penny! I have presented that to an eighteen or twenty pence audience nine times in an afternoon. Look to your gathering there, good master Filcher--and when there come any gentlefolks take twopence a-piece.” He has a bill of his _motion_ which reads thus: “The Ancient Modern History of _Hero and Leander_, otherwise called, the _Touchstone of True Love_, with as true a Trial of Friendship between _Damon and Pythias_, two faithful Friends o’ the Bank-side.” This was the motion written by Littlewit. Cokes arrives, and inquires, “What do we pay for coming in, fellow?” Filcher answers, “Twopence, sir.”
“_Cokes._ What manner of matter is this, Mr. Littlewit? What kind of actors ha’ you? are they good actors?
“_Littlewit._ Pretty youths, sir, all children both old and young, here’s the master of ’em, Master Lantern, that gives light to the business.
“_Cokes._ In good time, sir, I would fain see ’em; I would be glad to drink with the young company; which is the tiring-house?
“_Leatherhead._ Troth, sir, our tiring-house is somewhat little; we are but beginners yet, pray pardon us; you cannot go upright in’t.
“_Cokes._ No? not now my hat is off? what would you have done with me, if you had had me feather and all, as I was once to-day? Ha’ you none of your pretty impudent boys now, to bring stools, fill tobacco, fetch ale, and beg money, as they have at other houses? let me see some o’ your actors.
“_Littlewit._ Shew him ’em, shew him ’em. Master Lantern; this is a gentleman that is a favourer of the quality.
[_Leatherhead brings the puppets out in a basket._]
“_Cokes._ What! do they live in baskets?
“_Leatherhead._ They do lie in a basket, sir: they are o’ the small players.
“_Cokes._ These be players minor indeed. Do you call these players?
“_Leatherhead._ They are actors, sir, and as good as any, none dispraised, for dumb shows: Indeed I am the mouth of ’em all.--This is he that acts young Leander, sir; and this is lovely Hero; this, with the beard, Damon; and this, pretty Pythias: this is the ghost of king Dionysius, in the habit of a scrivener: as you shall see anon, at large.
“_Cokes._ But do you play it according to the printed book? I have read that.
“_Leatherhead._ By no means, sir.
“_Cokes._ No? How then?
“_Leatherhead._ A better way, sir; _that_ is too learned and poetical for our audience: what do they know what _Hellespont_ is? _guilty of true love’s blood_? or what _Abydos_ is? or the other _Sestos_ height?--No; I have entreated master Littlewit to take a little pains to reduce it to a more familiar strain for our people.
“_Littlewit._ I have only made it a little easy and modern for the times, sir, that’s all: as for the Hellespont, I imagine our Thames here; and then Leander, I make a dyer’s son about Puddle-wharf; and Hero, a wench o’ the Bank-side, who going over one morning to Old Fish-street, Leander spies her land at Trig’s-stairs, and falls in love with her: now do I introduce Cupid, having metamorphosed himself into a drawer, and he strikes Hero in love with a pint of sherry.”
While “Cokes is handling the puppets” the doorkeepers call out “Twopence a-piece, gentlemen; an excellent _motion_.” Other visitors enter and take their seats, and Cokes, while waiting with some of his acquaintance, employs the time at the “game of _vapours_, which is nonsense; every man to oppose the last man that spoke, whether it concerned him or no.” The audience become impatient, and one calls out, “Do you hear puppet-master, these are tedious _vapours_; when begin you?” Filcher, Leatherhead’s man, with the other doorkeepers, continue to bawl, “Twopence a-piece, sir; the best _motion_ in the Fair.” Meanwhile the company talk, and one relates that he has already seen in the Fair, the eagle; the black wolf; the bull with five legs, which “was a calf at Uxbridge Fair two years agone;” the dogs that dance the morrice; and “the hare o’ the taber.”
* * * * *
Ben Jonson’s mention of the hare that beat the tabor at Bartholomew Fair in his time, is noticed by the indefatigable and accurate Strutt; who gives the following representation of the feat itself, which he affirms, when he copied it from a drawing in the Harleian collection, (6563,) to have been upwards of four hundred years old.
* * * * *
For an idea of Leatherhead’s _motion_ take as follows: it commences thus:--
_Leatherhead._
Gentiles, that no longer your expectations may wander, Behold our chief actor, amorous Leander; With a great deal of cloth, lapp’d about him like a scarf, For he yet serves his father, a dyer at Puddle-wharf. Which place we’ll make bold with to call it our _Abidus_, As the Bank-side is our _Sestos_; and let it not be denied us Now as he is beating, to make the dye take the fuller, Who chances to come by, but fair Hero in a sculler; And seeing Leander’s naked leg, and goodly calf, Cast at him from the boat a sheep’s eye and an half, Now she is landed, and the sculler come back, By and by you shall see what Leander doth lack.
_Puppet Leander._ Cole, Cole, old Cole. _Leatherhead._ That is the sculler’s name without controul. _Pup. Leander._ Cole, Cole, I say, Cole. _Leatherhead._ We do hear you. _Pup. Leander._ Old Cole. _Leatherhead._ Old Cole? is the dyer turn’d collier?-- _Pup. Leander._ Why Cole, I say, Cole. _Leatherhead._ It’s the sculler you need. _Pup. Leander._ Aye, and be hang’d. _Leatherhead._ Be hang’d! look you yonder, Old Cole, you must go hang with master Leander. _Puppet Cole._ Where is he? _Puppet Leander._ Here Cole. What fairest of fairs Was that fare that thou landest but now at Trig’s-stairs? _Puppet Cole._ It is lovely Hero. _Puppet Leander._ Nero? _Puppet Cole._ No, Hero. _Leatherhead._ It is Hero Of the Bank-side, he saith, to tell you truth, without erring, Is come over into Fish-street to eat some fresh herring. Leander says no more but as fast as he can, Gets on all his best clothes, and will after to the swan.
In this way Leatherhead proceeds with his _motion_; he relates part of the story himself, in a ribald manner, and making the puppets quarrel, “the puppet Cole strikes him over the pate.” He performs _Damon_ and _Pythias_ in the same way, and renders the “gallimaufry” more ridiculous, by a battle between the puppets in _Hero_ and _Leander_, and those of _Damon_ and _Pythias_. Zeal-of-the-land Busy interferes with the puppet Dionysius, who had been raised up by Leatherhead--
“Not like a monarch but the master of a school, In a scrivener’s furr’d gown which shows he is no fool; For, therein he hath wit enough to keep himself warm: O Damon! he cries, and Pythias what harm Hath poor Dionysius done you in his grave, That after his death, you should fall out thus and rave,” &c.
Zeal-of-the-land contends that Dionysius hath not a “lawful calling.” That puppet retorts by saying he hath; and inquires--“What say you to the feather makers i’ the Fryers, with their peruques and their puffs, their fans and their huffs? what say you? Is a bugle-maker a lawful calling? or the confect-makers? such as you have there? or your French fashioner? Is a puppet worse than these?”--Whereto Zeal-of-the-land answers--“Yes, and my main argument against you is, that you are an abomination; for the male among you putteth on the apparel of the female, and the female of the male.” The puppet Dionysius triumphantly replies, “You lie, you lie, you lie abominably. It’s your old stale argument against the _players_; but it will not hold against the _puppets_: for we have neither male nor female amongst us.” Upon this point, which persons versed in dramatic history are familiar with, Zeal-of-the-land says, “I am confuted, the _cause_ hath failed me--I am changed, and will become a beholder.”
* * * * *
These selections which are here carefully brought together may, so far as they extend, be regarded as a picture of Bartholomew Fair in 1614, when Jonson wrote his comedy for representation before king James I. We learn too from this play that there was a tooth-drawer, and “a jugler with a well educated ape, to come over the chain for the king of England, and back again for the prince, and to sit still on his hind quarters for the pope and the king of Spain;” that there was a whipping-post in the Fair, and that Smithfield was dirty and stinking. Beside particulars, which a mere historiographer of the scene would have recorded, there are some that are essentially illustrative of popular manners, which no other than an imaginative mind would have seized, and only a poet penned.
* * * * *
A little digression may be requisite in explanation of the term _arsedine_, used by Trash to Leatherhead in Jonson’s play; the denomination _costermonger_; the tune _Paggington’s-pound_; and the _Pie-pouldres_, or _Pie Powder Court_.
_Arsedine._
This is also called _arsadine_, and sometimes _orsden_, and is said to be a colour. Mr. Archdeacon Nares says, that according to Mr. Lysons, in his “Environs of London,” and Mr. Gifford in his note on this passage, it means _orpiment_ or _yellow_ arsenic. The archdeacon in giving these two authorities, calls the word a “vulgar corruption” of “arsenic:” but arsenic yields _red_, as well as _yellow_ orpiment, and both these colours are used in the getting up of shows. Possibly it is an Anglo-Saxon word for certain pigments, obtained from minerals and metals: the _ore_ oꞃe or oꞃa is pure Saxon, and pluralizes _ores_; to _die_ in the sense of _dying_, or colouring, is derived from the Saxon ðeaᵹ or ðeah. The conjecture may be worth a thought perhaps, for dramatic exhibitions were in use when the Anglo-Saxon was used.
_Costermonger._
This is a corruption of costard-monger; Ben Jonson uses it both ways, and it is noticed of his costermonger by Mr. Archdeacon Nares, that “he cries only _pears_.” That gentleman rightly defines a _costard_-monger, or _coster_-monger, to be “a seller of _apples_;” he adds, “one generally who kept a stall.” He says of _costard_, that, “as a species of apple, it is enumerated with others, but it must have been a very common sort, as it gave a name to the dealers in apples.” In this supposition Mr. Nares is correct; for it was not only a very common sort, but perhaps, after the crab, it was our oldest sort: there were three kinds of it, the white, red, and grey costard. That the costard-monger, according to Mr. Nares, “_generally_ kept a stall;” “and that they were general fruit-sellers,” he unluckily has not corroborated by an authority; although from his constant desire to be accurate, and his general accuracy, the assertions are to be regarded with respect. Randle Holme gives this figure of
Holme, in his heraldic language, says of this representation, “He beareth _gules_ a man _passant_, his shirt or shift turned up to his shoulder, breeches and hose _azure_, cap and shoes _sable_, bearing on his back a bread basket full of fruits and herbs, and a staff in his left hand, _or_. This may be termed either a _huxter_ or a _gardiner_, having his fruits and herbs on his back from the market. This was a fit crest for the company of _Fruiterers_ or _Huxters_.” This man is a _costard-monger_ in Mr. Archdeacon Nares’s view of the term; for doubtless the huckster pitched his load in the market and sold it there; yet Holme does not give him that denomination, as he would have done if he had so regarded him; he merely calls him “the _hutler_ or _huxter_.”
_Packington’s Pound._
Concerning the air of this old song, “Hawkins’s History of Music” may be consulted. The tune may also be found in the “Beggar’s Opera,” adapted to the words--“The gamesters united in friendship are found.”[275]
_Court of Pie Powder._
This is the lowest, and at the same time the most expeditious, court of justice known to the law of England. It is a court of record incident to every fair and market; its jurisdiction extends to administer justice for all commercial injuries done in that very fair or market, and not in any preceding one; and to every fair and market, the steward of him who owns the toll is the judge. The injury, therefore, must be done, complained of, and redressed, within the compass of one and the same day, unless the fair continues longer. It has cognizance of all matters of contract that can possibly arise within the precinct of that fair or market; and the plaintiff must make oath that the cause of an action arose there. This court seems to have arisen from the necessity of doing justice expeditiously, among persons resorting from distant places to a fair or market, without leaving them to the remedy of an inferior court, which might not be able to serve its process, or execute its judgments on both, or perhaps either of the parties; and therefore without such a court as this, the complaint must necessarily have resorted to, in the first instance, some superior judicature. It is said to be called the court of _pie-poudre_, _curia pedis pulverizati_, from the dusty feet of the suitors; or, as sir Edward Coke says, because justice is there done as speedily as dust can fall from the feet: but Blackstone, who says thus much of this court, inclines to the opinion of Daines Barrington, who derives it from _pied puldreaux_, (a pedlar, in old French,) and says, it signifies, therefore, the court of such petty chapmen as resort to fairs or markets.
Courts similar to pie-powder courts were usual both with Greeks and Romans, who introduced fairs into Germany and the north.[276]
This is his figure from Randle Holme, who describes him thus:--“He beareth _argent_, a crate carrier, with a crate upon his back, _or_; cloathed in _russed_, with a staffe in his left hand; hat and shoes _sable_.” He observes, that “this is also termed a pedlar and his pack,” and he carefully notes that the difference between a _porter_ and a pedlar consists in this, that “the _porter’s_ pack reacheth over his head and so answerable below; but the _pedlar’s_ is a small truss, bundle, or _fardel_, not exceeding the middle of his head as in this figure.” Every reader of Shakspeare knows the word “fardel:”--
“Who would _fardels_ bear To groan and sweat under a weary life,” &c.
_Fardel_ means a burden, or bundle, or pack, and so Holme has called the pedlar’s pack. The word is well known in that sense to those acquainted with our earlier language. An Act of common council of the first of August, 1554, against “Abuses offered to Pauls,” recites, that the inhabitants of London, and others, were accustomed to make their common carriage of “_fardels_ of stuffe, and other grosse wares and things thorow the cathedrall church of Saint Pauls,” and prohibits the abuse. There is an old book entitled, “a _Fardel_ of Fancies;” that is, a variety of fancies fardelled or packed together in a bundle or burthen.
“_Fancies_” was a name for pleasant ballads, or poetical effusions;--and hence, because Orlando “hangs odes upon hawthorns, and elegies on brambles, all, forsooth, deifying the name of Rosalind,” she calls him a “_fancy_ monger.”
_The Porter._
It is to be noted too, that a porter is clearly described by Holme. “He beareth _vert_, a porter carrying of a pack, _argent_, corked, sable; cloathed in tawney, cap and shoes _sable_. This is the badge and cognizance of all porters and carriers of burthens;” but that there may be no mistake, he adds, “they have ever a leather girdle about them, with a strong rope of two or three fouldings hanging thereat, which they have in readiness to bind the burdens to their backs whensoever called thereunto.”
did not exist in Randle Holme’s time. This subsequent invention consists of a strong fillet to encircle the head, attached to a curiously stuffed cushion of the width of the shoulders, whereon it rests, and is of height sufficient to bear thereon a box, or heavy load of any kind, which, by means of this knot, is carried on the head and shoulders; the weight thereof being borne equally by the various powers of the body capable of sustaining pressure, no muscles are distressed, but the whole are brought to the porter’s service in his labour of carrying.
* * * * *
“Bartholomew Faire,” a rare quarto tract printed in 1641, under that title states, that “Bartholomew Faire begins on the twenty-fourth day of August, and is then of so vast an extent, that it is contained in no lesse than four several parishes, namely, Christ Church, Great and Little St. Bartholomewes, and St. Sepulchres. Hither resort people of all sorts and conditions. Christ Church cloisters are now hung full of pictures. It is remarkable and worth your observation to beholde and heare the strange sights and confused noise in the Faire. Here, a knave in a foole’s coate, with a trumpet sounding, or on a drumme beating, invites you to see his puppets: there, a rogue like a wild woodman, or in an antick shape like an Incubus, desires your company to view his motion: on the other side, Hocus Pocus, with three yards of tape, or ribbin, in’s hand, shewing his art of legerdemaine, to the admiration and astonishment of a company of cockoloaches. Amongst these, you shall see a gray Goose-cap, (as wise as the rest,) with a what do ye lacke in his mouth, stand in his boothe, shaking a rattle, or scraping on a fiddle, with which children are so taken, that they presentlie cry out for these fopperies: and all these together make such a distracted noise, that you would thinck Babell were not comparable to it. Here there are also your gamesters in action: some turning of a whimsey, others throwing for pewter, who can quickly dissolve a round shilling into a three halfepeny saucer. Long-lane at this time looks very faire, and puts out her best cloaths, with the wrong side outward, so turn’d for their better turning off: and Cloth Faire is now in great request: well fare the ale-houses therein, yet better may a man fare, (but at a dearer rate,) in the pig-market, alias Pasty-Nooke, or Pye-Corner, where pigges are al houres of the day on the stalls piping hot, and would cry, (if they could speak,) ‘come eate me.’”
_Pye Corner._
This is the place wherein Ben Jonson’s Littlewit, the proctor, willed that his wife Win-the-fight should not eat Bartholomew pig:--“Long to eat of a pig, sweet Win, i’ the Fair; do you see? i’ the heart o’ the Fair; not at, Pye-corner.”
“Pye-corner was so called” says Dr. (James) Howel, “of such a sign, sometimes a fair Inne, for receipt of travellers, but now devided into tenements.” It was at Pye-corner as observed before, that the Fire of London ended: the houses that escaped were taken down in October, 1809, and upon their site other dwelling-houses have been erected, together with an engine-house, belonging to the Hope Fire Assurance company,[277] where it stands at present (in 1825). It was estimated in the year 1732, that “the number of sucking pigs then annually consumed in this city, (of London) amounted to fifty-two thousand[278].”
~Roast Pig.~
“_A flower_--cropped in its prime.”
ELIA, author of the incomparable volume of “Essays,” published “under that name,” by Messrs. Taylor and Hessey, indulges in a “Dissertation upon Roast Pig.” He cites a Chinese MS. to establish its origin, when flesh was eaten uncooked, and affirms that “the period is not obscurely hinted at by the great Confucius, in the second chapter of his ‘Mundane Mutations,’ where he designates a kind of golden age by the term Cho-fang, literally the cooks’ holiday.” He premises “broiling to be the elder brother of roasting,” and relates on the authority of the aforesaid MS. that “roast pig” “was accidentally discovered in the manner following”--viz.