iii. 14,) that all that behold him, by a lively faith, may not perish,

but have everlasting life. This is the cognizance or crest of every true believer.”[380]

The idea was no doubt borrowed from the Biblia Pauperum. The BALAAM’S ASS, again, was one of the _dramatis personæ_ in the Whitsuntide mystery of the company of cappers, (cap-makers,) and this is the only reason we can imagine for his having found his way to the signboard. It occurs in 1722 in a newspaper paragraph, concerning a child born without a stomach, the details of which are too nauseous to be introduced here.[381]

The TWO SPIES is the last sign belonging to the history of Moses; it represents two of the spies that went into Canaan, “and cut down from thence a branch with one cluster of grapes, and they bare it between two upon a staff,” (Num. xiii. 23.) This bunch of grapes made it a favourite with publicans; at many places it may still be seen, as in Catherine Street, Strand, (a house of old standing;) in Long Acre, &c. In Great Windmill Street, Leicester Square, it has been corrupted into the THREE SPIES.

After Moses there is a blank until we come to SAMSON, to whom our national admiration for athletic sports and muscular strength has given a prominent place on the signboard. SAMSON AND THE LION occurs on the sign of various houses in London in the seventeenth century, as appears from the trades tokens. It is still of frequent occurrence in country towns, as at Dudley, Coventry, &c. It was also used on the Continent. In Paris there is, or was, not many years ago, a _della Robbia_ ware medallion sign in the Rue des Dragons, with the legend “_le Fort Samson_,” representing the strong man tearing open the lion. To a sign of SAMSON at Dordrecht, in the seventeenth century, the following satirical inscription had been added:--

“Toen Samson door zyn kracht de leeuw belemmen kon, De Philistynen sloeg, de vossen overwon. Wiert hy nog door een Vrouw van zyn gezigt beroofd, Gelooft geen vrouw dan of zy moet zyn zonder hoofd.”[382]

This admiration of strong men, which procured the signboard honours to Samson, also made GOLIAH, or GOLIAS, a great favourite. In the Horse Market, Castle Barnard, he is actually treated just like a duke, admiral, or any other public-house hero, for there the sign is entitled the GOLIAH HEAD. Some doubts, however, may be entertained whether by Golias or Goliah, (for the name is spelt both ways,) the Philistine giant and champion was always intended. Towards the end of the twelfth century there lived a man of wit, with the real or assumed name of Golias, who wrote the “Apocalypsis Goliæ,” and other burlesque verses. He was the leader of a jovial sect called Goliardois, of which Chaucer’s Miller was one. “He was a jangler and a goliardeis.” Such a person might, therefore, have been a very appropriate tutelary deity for an alehouse.[383]

Goliah’s conqueror, KING DAVID, liberally shared the honours with his victim, and he still figures on various signboards. There is a KING DAVID’S inn in Bristol, and a DAVID AND HARP in Limehouse; whilst in Paris, the Rue de la Harpe is said to owe its name to a sign of King David playing on the harp. David’s unfortunate son, ABSALOM, was a peruke-maker’s very expressive emblem, both in France and in England, to show the utility of wigs. Thus a barber at a town in Northamptonshire used this inscription:

“ABSALOM, hadst thou worn a perriwig, thou hadst not been hanged.”

Which a brother peruke-maker versified, under a sign representing the death of Absalom, with David weeping. He wrote up thus:

“Oh Absalom! oh Absalom! Oh Absalom! my son, If thou hadst worn a perriwig, Thou hadst not been undone.”

Psalm xlii. seems to be very profanely hinted at in the sign of the WHITE HART AND FOUNTAIN, Royal Mint Street, which, if not a combination of two well-known signs, apparently alludes to the words, “As the hart panteth after the water brooks, so panteth my soul after thee, O God.” THE PANTING HART (_het dorstige Hert_, or _het Heigent Hert_,) was formerly a very common beer-house sign in Holland. In the seventeenth century there was one with the following inscription at Amsterdam:--

“Gelyk het hert by frisch water sig komt te verblyden, Komt also in myn huys om u van dorst te bevryden.”[384]

Another one at Leyden had the following rhyme:--

“Gelyk een hart van jagen moe lust te drinken water rein, Also verkoopt men hier tot versterking van de maag, toebak, bier en Brandewyn.”[385]

The wise king Solomon does not appear to have ever been honoured with a signboard portrait, but his enthusiastic admirer, the QUEEN OF SABA, figured before the tavern kept by Dick Tarlton the jester, in Gracechurch Street. This Queen of Saba, or Sheba, was a usual figure in pageants. There is a letter of Secretary Barlow, in “Nugæ Antiquæ,” telling how the Queen of Sheba fell down and upset her casket in the lap of the King of Denmark--when on his drunken visit to James I.--who “got not a little defiled with the presents of the queen; such as wine, cream, jelly, beverages, cakes, spices, and other good matters.”

Douce, in his “Illustrations to Shakespeare,” has a very ingenious explanation for the sign of the BELL SAVAGE, as derived from the QUEEN OF SABA, which though _non è vero, ma ben trovato_. He bases his argument on a poem of the fourteenth century, the “Romaunce of Kyng Alisaundre,” wherein the Queen of Saba is thus mentioned:--

“In heore lond is a cité, On of the noblest in Christianté, Hit hotith Sabba in langage, Thence cam _Sibely Savage_. Of all the world the fairest queene, To Jerusalem Salomon to seone. For hire fair head and for hire love, Salomon forsok his God above.”[386]

ELISHA’S RAVEN, represented with a chop in his mouth, is the sign of a butcher in the Borough,--a curious conceit, and certainly his own invention; at least we do not remember any other instance of the sign. This tribute is certainly very disinterested in the butcher, for if there were any such ravens now, it is probable that they would sadly interfere with the trade.

Few signs have undergone so many changes as the well-known SALUTATION. Originally it represented the angel saluting the Virgin Mary, in which shape it was still occasionally seen in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, as appears from the tavern token of Daniel Grey of Holborn. In the times of the Commonwealth, however, “sacrarum ut humanarum rerum, heu! vicissitudo est,” the Puritans changed it into the SOLDIER AND CITIZEN, and in such a garb it continued long after, with this modification, that it was represented by two citizens politely bowing to each other. The Salutation Tavern in Billingsgate shows it thus on its trades token, and so it was represented by the Salutation Tavern in Newgate Street, (an engraving of which sign may still be seen in the parlour of that old established house.) At present it is mostly rendered by two hands conjoined, as at the Salutation Hotel, Perth, where a label is added with the words, “You’re welcome to the city.” That Salutation Tavern in Billingsgate was a famous place in Ben Jonson’s time; it is named in “Bartholomew Fayre” as one of the houses where there had been

“Great sale and utterance of wine, Besides beere and ale, and ipocras fine.”

During the civil war there was a Salutation Tavern in Holborn, in which the following ludicrous incident happened,--if we may believe the Royalist papers:--

“A hotte combat lately happened at the Salutation Taverne in Holburne, where some of the Commonwealth vermin, called soldiers, had seized on an Amazonian Virago, named Mrs Strosse, upon suspicion of being a loyalist, and selling the Man in the Moon; but shee, by applying beaten pepper to their eyes, disarmed them, and with their own swordes forced them to aske her forgiveness; and down on their mary bones, and pledge a health to the king, and confusion to their masters, and so honourablie dismissed them. Oh! for twenty thousand such gallant spirits; when you see that one woman can beat two or three.”[387]

At the end of the last century there was a Salutation Tavern in Tavistock Row, called also “Mr Bunch’s,” which was one of the elegant haunts, patronised by “the first gentleman of Europe,” otherwise the Prince Regent. Lord Surrey and Sheridan were generally his associates in these _escapades_. The trio went under the pseudonyms of Blackstock, Greystock, and Thinstock, and disguised in bob wigs and smockfrocks. The night’s entertainment generally concluded with thrashing the “Charlies,” wrenching off knockers, breaking down signboards, and not unfrequently with being taken to the roundhouse.

The Salutation in Newgate Street, some time called the SALUTATION AND CAT, (a combination of two signs,) was haunted by many of the great authors of the last century. There is a _poetical_ invitation extant to a social feast held at this tavern, January 19, 1735/6, issued by the two stewards, Edward Cave (of the _Gentleman’s Magazine_,) and William Bowyer, the antiquary and printer:--

“Saturday, January 17, 1735/6.

“SIR,

You’re desired on Monday next to meet, At _Salutation Tavern_, Newgate Street, Supper will be on table just at eight. (Stewards) one of St John, [Bowyer,] t’other of St John’s Gate, [Cave.]”

Richardson the novelist was one of the _invités_. He returned a poetical answer, too long to quote at length: the following is part of it:--

“For me, I’m much concern’d I cannot meet At _Salutation Tavern_, Newgate Street. Your notice, like your verse, (so sweet and short!) If longer I’d sincerely thank’d you for it. Howev’r, receive my wishes, sons of verse! May every man who meets your praise rehearse! May mirth as plenty crown your cheerful board! And every one part happy, ---- as a lord! That when at home by such sweet verses fir’d, Your families may think you all inspir’d. So wishes he, who, pre-engag’d can’t know The pleasures that would from your meeting flow.”

In this tavern Coleridge the poet, in one of his melancholy moods, lived for some time in seclusion, until found out by Southey, and persuaded by him to return to his usual mode of life. Sir T. N. Talfourd, in his Life of Charles Lamb, informs us that here Coleridge was in the habit of meeting Lamb when in town on a visit from the University. Christ’s Hospital, their old school, was within a few paces of the place:--

“When Coleridge quitted the University and came to town, full of mantling hopes and glorious schemes, Lamb became his admiring disciple. The scene of these happy meetings was a little public-house called the _Salutation and Cat_, in the neighbourhood of Smithfield, where they used to sup, and remain long after they had ‘heard the chimes of midnight.’ There they discoursed of Bowles, who was the god of Coleridge’s poetical idolatry, and of Burns and Cowper, who of recent poets--in that season of comparative barrenness--had made the deepest impression on Lamb; there Coleridge talked of ‘fate, free-will, foreknowledge absolute,’ to one who desired ‘to find no end’ of the golden maze; and there he recited his early poems with that deep sweetness of intonation which sunk into the heart of his hearers. To these meetings Lamb was accustomed, at all periods of his life, to revert, as the season when his finer intellects were quickened into action. Shortly after they had terminated, with Coleridge’s departure from London, he thus recalled them in a letter:--‘When I read in your little volume your nineteenth effusion, or what you call “The Sigh,” I think I hear _you_ again. I imagine to myself the little smoky room at the _Salutation and Cat_, where we have sat together through the winter nights, beguiling the cares of life with poesy.’ This was early in 1769, and in 1818, when dedicating his works--then first collected--to his earliest friend, he thus spoke of the same meetings:--’Some of the sonnets, which shall be carelessly turned over by the general reader, may happily awaken in you remembrances which I should be sorry should be ever totally extinct--the memory “of summer days and of delightful years,” even so far back as those old suppers at our old inn--when life was fresh and topics exhaustless--and you first kindled in me, if not the power, yet the love of poetry, and beauty, and kindliness.’”

The ANGEL was derived from the Salutation, for that it originally represented the angel appearing to the Holy Virgin at the Salutation or Annunciation, is evident from the fact that, even as late as the seventeenth century on nearly all the trades tokens of houses with this sign, the Angel is represented with a scroll in his hands; and this scroll we know, from the evidence of paintings and prints, to contain the words addressed by the angel to the Holy Virgin: “Ave Maria, gratia plena, Dominus tecum.” Probably at the Reformation it was considered too Catholic a sign, and so the Holy Virgin was left out, and the angel only retained. Among the famous houses with this sign, the well-known starting-place of the Islington omnibuses stands foremost. It is said to have been an established inn upwards of two hundred years. The old house was pulled down in 1819; till that time it had preserved all the features of a large country inn, a long front, overhanging tiled roof, with a square inn-yard having double galleries supported by columns and carved pilasters, with caryatides and other ornaments. It is more than probable that it had often been used as a place for dramatic entertainments at the period when inn-yards were customarily employed for such purposes. “Even so late as fifty years since it was customary for travellers approaching London, to remain all night at the Angel Inn, Islington, rather than venture after dark to prosecute their journey along ways which were almost equally dangerous from their bad state, and their being so greatly infested with thieves.”[388] On the other hand, persons walking from the city to Islington in the evening, waited near the end of John Street, in what is now termed Northampton Street, (but was then a rural avenue planted with trees,) until a sufficient party had collected, who were then escorted by an armed patrol appointed for that purpose. Another old tavern with this sign is extant in London, behind St Clement’s Church in the Strand. To this house Bishop Hooper was taken by the Guards, on his way to Gloucester, where he went to be burnt, in January 1555. The house, until lately, preserved much of its ancient aspect: it had a pointed gable, galleries, and a lattice in the passage. This inn is named in the following curious advertisement:--

“To be sold, a Black Girl, the property of J. B----, eleven years of age, who is extremely handy, works at her needle tolerably, and speaks French perfectly well; is of excellent temper and willing disposition. Inquire of W. Owen, at the _Angel Inn_, behind St Clement’s Church, in the Strand.”--_Publick Advertiser_, March 28, 1769.

Older than either of these is the Angel Inn, at Grantham. This building was formerly in the possession of the Knights Templars, and still retains many remains of its former beauty, particularly the gateway, with the heads of Edward III. and his queen Philippa of Hainault on either side of the arch; the soffits of the windows are elegantly groined, and the parapet of the front is very beautiful. Kings have been entertained in this house; but it seemed to bring ill luck to them, for the reigns of those that are recorded as having been guests in it, stand forth in history as disturbed by violent storms--King John held his court in it on February 23, 1213; King Richard III. on October 19, 1483; and King Charles I. visited it May 17, 1633.

Ben Jonson, it is said, used to visit a tavern with the sign of the Angel, at Basingstoke, kept by a Mrs Hope, whose daughter’s name was Prudence. On one of his journeys, finding that the house had changed both sign and mistresses, Ben wrote the following smart but not very elegant epigram:--

“When _Hope_ and _Prudence_ kept this house, the _Angel_ kept the door, Now _Hope_ is dead, the _Angel_ fled, and _Prudence_ turned a w----.”

The Angel was the sign of one of the first coffee-houses in England, for Anthony Wood tells us that, “in 1650 Jacob, a Jew, opened a coffee-house at the Angel, in the parish of St Peter, Oxon; and there it [coffee] was by some, who delight in noveltie, drank.” Finally, there was an Angel Tavern in Smithfield, where the famous Joe Miller, of joking fame--a comic actor by profession--used to play during Bartholomew Fair time. A playbill of 1722 informs the public in large letters that--

“MILLER is not with PINKETHMAN, but by himself, AT THE ANGEL TAVERN, next door to the King’s Bench, who acts a new Droll, called the FAITHFUL COUPLE OR THE ROYAL SHEPHERDESS, with a very pleasant entertainment between OLD HOB and his WIFE, and the comical humours of MOPSY and COLLIN, with a variety of singing and dancing.

“The only Comedian now that dare, Vie with the world and challenge the Fair.”

In France, also, the sign of the Angel is and was at all times, very common. The Hotel de _l’Ange_, Rue de la Huchette, appears to have been the best hotel in Paris in the sixteenth century. It was frequently visited by foreign ambassadors: those sent by Emperor Maximilian to Louis XII. took up their abode here; so did the ambassadors from Angus, King of Achaia, who, in 1552, came to see France, much in the same way as various ambassadors from all sorts of high and low latitudes occasionally honour our Court with a visit. Chapelle, a French poet of the seventeenth century, thus celebrates a tavern with this sign in Paris, frequented by the wits of the period:--

“Je n’ay pas vu vostre theâtre Qu’aussitot je ressors de là, Pour un Ange que j’idolâtre, A cause du bon vin qu’il a.”[389]

There being, then, such a profusion of Angels everywhere, it became necessary to make some distinctions, and the usual means were adopted; the Angel was gilded, and called the GOLDEN ANGEL; this, for instance, was the sign of Ellis Gamble, a goldsmith in Cranbourn Alley, Hogarth’s master in the art of engraving on silver; shop-bills engraved for this house by Hogarth are still in existence. Another variety was the GUARDIAN ANGEL, which is still the sign of an ale-house at Yarmouth. This, too, was used in France, as we find _l’Ange Gardien_, the sign of Pierre Witte, a bookseller in the Rue St Jacques, Paris, in the seventeenth century.

Very common, also, were the THREE ANGELS, which may have been intended for the three angels that appeared to Abraham, or simply the favourite combination of three,[390] so frequent on the signboard and in heraldry. That three angels were thought to possess mysterious power, is evident from the following Devonshire charm for a burn:--

“Three Angels came from the north, east, and west, One brought fire, another ice, And the third brought the Holy Ghost, So out fire--and in frost-- In the name of Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.”

The THREE ANGELS was a very general linen-draper’s sign, for which there seems no reason other than that the long flowing garments in which they are generally represented, suggest their having been good customers to the drapery business.

Angels appear in combination with various heterogenous objects, in many of which, however, the so-called Angel is simply a Cupid. The ANGEL AND BIBLE was a sign in the Poultry in 1680.[391] The ANGEL AND CROWN was a not uncommon tavern decoration. The following stanza from a pamphlet, entitled, “The Quack Vintners,” London, 1712, p. 18, shows the way in which this sign was represented:--

“May Harry’s ANGEL be a sign he draws Angelick nectar, that deserves applause, Such that may make the city love the Throne, And, like his _Angel_, still _support the Crown_.”

From this we learn it was a Cupid or Amorino supporting a crown; the sign of the house had doubtless originally been the Crown, and the Cupid, so common in the Renaissance style, had been added by way of ornament, but was mistaken by the public as a constituent of the sign. The verses probably applied to the Angel and Crown, a famous tavern in Broad Street, behind the Royal Exchange. There was another ANGEL AND CROWN in Islington, where convivial dinners were held in the olden time. It was a common practice in the last and preceding centuries for the natives of a county or parish to meet once a year and dine together. The ceremony often commenced by a sermon, preached by a native, after which the day was spent in pleasant conviviality, after-dinner speeches, and mutual congratulations. The custom now has almost died out; but this is one of the invitation tickets:

ST MARY, ISLINGTON.

SIR,

You are desidered to meet many other NATIVES of this place on Tuesday y^{e} 11th day of April 1738 at Mrs Eliz. Grimstead’s y^{e} ANGEL AND CROWN, in y^{e} Upper Street, about y^{e} hour of One; Then and there w^{th} FULL DISHES, GOOD WINE AND GOOD HUMOUR to improve and make lasting that HARMONY and FRIENDSHIP which have so long reigned among us.

_Walter Sebbon._ _John Booth._ _Bourchier Durrell._ _James Sebbon._

STEWARDS.

N.B. THE DINNER will be on the table peremptorily at Two.

_Pray pay the Bearer Five Shillings._

That same year, another Angel and Crown Tavern in Shire Lane obtained an unenviable notoriety, for it was there that a Mr Quarrington was murdered and robbed by Thomas Carr, an attorney from the Temple, and Elisabeth Adams. They were hanged at Tyburn, January 18, 1738.

The ANGEL AND GLOVES at first sight seems a whimsical combination, but is easily explained when we advert to the woodcut above the shop-bill of Isaac Dalvy, in Little Newport Street, Soho, who, in the reign of Queen Anne, sold gloves, &c., under this sign, which simply represented two Cupids, each carrying a glove,--in fact, exactly the same conceit as that of the Herculanese shoemaker, noticed in a former chapter. It is more difficult to find a rational explanation for the ANGEL AND STILLIARDS. The Steelyard, or Stilliard, in Upper Thames Street, was the place where the Hanse merchants exposed their goods for sale, and was so called from the king’s _steelyard_, or _beam_, there erected for weighing the tonnage of goods imported into London.[392] Whether this sign represented a Cupid with such a weighing machine, or a view of the hall of the Hanse merchants, with a Fame flying over it, is now impossible to decide. It may be suggested that a variation of the well-known figure of Justice, with steelyards in place of the usual scales, was the origin. Be this as it may, the only mention we have found of the sign is in the following advertisement:--

“William Deval, at the ANGEL & STILLIARDS, in St Ann’s Lane, near Aldersgate, London, maketh Castle (Castille), Marble, and white Sope as good as any Marseilles Sope; Tryed and Proved and sold at very Reasonable Rates.”[393]--_Domestic Intelligencer_, January 2d, 1679.

A few years later we find the ANGEL AND STILL noticed, as in the following advertisement:--

“A well-set NEGRO, commonly called Sugar, aged about twenty years, teeth broke before, and several scars in both his cheeks and forehead, having absented from his Master, whosoever secures him and gives notice to Benjamin Maynard, at the ANGEL AND STILL, at Deptford, shall have a Guinea Reward and reasonable charges.”--_Weekly Journal_, October 18, 1718.

In this case the still was simply added to intimate the sale of spirituous liquors.

The ANGEL AND SUN, apparently a combination of two signs, is named as a shop or tavern near Strandbridge, in 1663,[394] and is still the name of a public-house in the Strand. The ANGEL AND WOOLPACK, at Bolton, is the same sign which, near London Bridge, is called the NAKED BOY AND WOOLPACK. A woolpack, with a negro seated on it, was at one time very common; for a change or distinction, this negro underwent the reputed impossible process of being washed white, and thus became a naked boy, which, in signboard phraseology, is equivalent to an angel.

The VIRGIN was unquestionably a very common sign before the Reformation, and it may be met with even at the present day, as, for instance, at Ebury Hill, Worcester, and in various other places. In France it was, and is still, much more common than in England, as might be expected. Tallemant des Réaux tells of a miraculous tavern sign of NOTRE DAME, on the bridge of that name, in Paris, which was observed by the faithful to cry and shed tears, probably on account of the bad company she had to harbour. It was taken down by order of the archbishop. At the end of the seventeenth century there was, in the Rue de la Seine, Paris, a quack doctor, who pretended to cure a great variety of complaints. He put up a holy Virgin for his sign, with the words, “REFUGIUM PECCATORUM,” which is one of the usual epithets of the holy Virgin in the Roman Catholic Church service, very wittily, although profanely, applied in this instance. The sign of the Virgin was also called OUR LADY, as: “Newe Inne was a guest Inne, the sign whereof was the picture of our Lady, and thereupon it was also called _Our Lady’s_ Inne.”[395] OUR LADY OF PITY was the sign of Johan Redman, a bookseller in Paternoster Row, in 1542. Johan Byddell, also a bookseller, had introduced this sign in the beginning of that century. This Byddell, or Bedel, (who lived in Fleet Street, next to Fleet Bridge,) had evidently borrowed it from a nearly similar figure in Corio’s History of Milan, 1505. He afterwards lived at the SUN, in Fleet Street, the house formerly occupied by Wynkyn de Worde.

The prevalence of the BAPTIST’S HEAD probably dated from the time when pilgrimages across the sea were considered good works, and the head of St John the Baptist at Amiens Cathedral came in for a large share of visits from English worshippers. The old monkish writers say that in 448 after Christ, the head was found in Jerusalem; in 1206 it was transferred to Amiens, where it was kept in a salver of gold, surrounded with a rim of pearls and precious stones.[396] Various other reasons may be adduced for the prevalence of this sign, as the conspicuous place occupied by St John in the Roman Catholic hagiology, and hence in mediæval plays and mysteries; the festivities of Midsummer, (a day of great moment in London for setting the watch;) and, finally, his being the patron saint of the Knights of Jerusalem. It was doubtless in compliment to those knights that the Baptist’s Head in St John’s Lane, Clerkenwell, was named. This house seems to be the remainder of some noble mansion of Queen Elizabeth’s time; it contains many Elizabethan ornaments, particularly a chimney-piece, with the coats of arms of the Radcliff and Forster families. When the house was adapted to its present purpose, it was distinguished by the head of St John the Baptist in a charger, now gone. Doctor Johnson is said to have been an occasional visitor here, when returning from Edward Cave’s, the editor of the _Gentleman’s Magazine_, whose office was close by at St John’s Gate. Goldsmith is also reported to have made frequent calls here, when business of a similar nature led him to the same spot. In later years it became the _house of call_ of the prisoners on their way to the new prison in the parish--a circumstance commemorated by Dodd in the “Old Bailey Registers.” Another St John’s Head is mentioned by Stow in the following accident:--

“The 11th of July (1553) Gilbert Pot, drawer to Ninion Saunders, vintner, dwelling at St John’s Head within Ludgate, who was accused by the said Saunders, his maister, was set on the pillory in Cheape, with both his ears nailed and cleane cut off, for wordes speaking at the time of the proclamation of Lady Jane; at which execution was a trumpet bloune and a herault in his coat of armes redd his offence, in presence of William Garrard, one of the Sheriffes of London. About 5 of the clocke the same day, in the afternoone, Ninion Saunders, master to the said Gilbert Pot, and John Owen, a gunmaker, both gunners of the Tower, comming from the Tower of London by water in a whirrie and shooting London Bridge, towards the Black Fryers, were drowned at S. Mary Loch[397] and the whirry-man saved by their oars.”

To this same saint also refers the JOHN OF JERUSALEM, a sign at the present day in Rosoman Street, Clerkenwell, put up, like the Baptist Head, in remembrance of the Knights of St John of Jerusalem, who formerly had their priory in this locality.

In France this sign was equally common. Jean Carcain, one of the early Parisian publishers and printers, (1487,) adopted it for his shop. One of his books has the following quaint impress:--

“Parisii Sancti Pons est Michaelis in Urbe; Multae illic aedes; notior una tamen; Hanc cano, quae _Sacri Baptistae fronte_ notata est Hic respondebit Bibliopola tibi; Vis impressoris nomen quoque nosse? Joannis Carcain nomen ei est. Ne pete plura, Vale.”[398]

It was an old signboard jocularity in France to represent St John the Baptist by a monkey with cambric (_batiste_) ruffles and wristbands, (_singe en batiste_.) From the parables the sign of the GOOD SAMARITAN was borrowed, which, even at the present day, may be seen in Turner Street, Whitechapel; Grimshaw Park, Blackburn, &c. When barbers combined with their trade the practice of letting blood--otherwise than by “easy shaving,”--of drawing teeth, and setting bones, they frequently adopted this sign. In the seventeenth century, a barber-surgeon at Leeuwarden, in Holland, wrote under his device of the Good Samaritan the following poetical effusion:--

“Gelyk den Wyn, fyn, Dryft zorgen uit der herten Zoo geneest Medicyn, pyn, En ontlast van Smarten.”[399]

The SAMARITAN WOMAN (_la Samaritaine_) is the French version of our JACOB’S WELL, and was a common sign in Paris; everybody knows the Bains de la Samaritaine, in which the luxurious Parisian indulges in a _fresh_ water bath in his Seine, which at that place is about as clear as the Thames at Blackwall. In the Rue Caquerel at Rouen there is a stone bas-relief of the Samaritan woman at the well, with the date 1580. Jacques Dupuy, a bookseller in the Rue St Jacques, also used the Samaritan woman as his sign, evidently because it was a subject in which he could introduce a well, and so have the satisfaction of punning on his name. This kind of pun was none the less relished for being far-fetched; thus there is a stone bas-relief in the Rue Froid, at Caen, of the MIRACULOUS DRAUGHT OF FISHES, (_la Pêche Miraculeuse_,) which, in the early part of the seventeenth century, was placed there by a bookseller of the name of Poisson, (Fish,) who, being an “odd fish,” adopted this sign as a pun on his own name. At the present day, the house is still inhabited by a bookseller of the same name and family.

Christ’s Passion does not seem to have suggested any signs in England, although the great symbol of His death, the CROSS, was comparatively common. In Paris there was, in 1640, a bookseller, George Josse, in the Rue St Jacques, who had the CROWN OF THORNS (_la Couronne d’Epine_) for his sign, probably on account of the original Crown of Thorns being one of the relics kept at Paris. Coryatt’s remarks on this relic are rather amusing:--

“They report in Paris that the Thorny Crown, wherewith Christ was crowned on the Crosse, is kept in the Palace, which vpon Corpus Christi Day, in the afternoone, was publickly shewed, as some told me; but it was not my chance to see it. Truely, I wonder to see the contrarieties amongst the Papists, and most ridiculous varieties concerning their reliques, but especially about this of Christ’s Thorny Crowne. For whereas I was after that at the Citie of Vicenza in Italy, it was told me that in the monastery of the Dominican Fryers of that Citie, this Crowne was kept, which Saint Lewes, King of France, bestowed upon his brother Bartholomew, Bishop of Vicenza, and before one of the Dominican family. Wherefore I went to the Dominican Monastery and made suit to see it, but I had the repulse; for they told me that it was kept vnder three or four lockes, and neuer shewed to any by any favour whatsoeuer, but only upon Corpus Christi Day. If this Crowne of Paris, whereof they so much bragge, be true, that of Vicenza is false. Ho! the truth and certainty of Papistical reliques.”[400]

CROSSES of various colours were probably amongst the first signs put up by the newly-converted Christians, (as soon as they could effect this with impunity,) on account of the recommendation of the early fathers, and for their beneficial influence. Father Lactantius, who lived in the fourth century, writes--“As Christ, whilst He lived amongst men, put the devils to flight by His words, and restored those to their senses whom these evil spirits had possessed; so now His followers in the name of their Master, and by the sign of His passion, even exercise the same dominion over them.” St Ephrem says--“_Let us paint and imprint on our doors_ the life-giving cross; thus defended no evil will hurt you.” St Chrysostom says the same--“_Wherefore let us with earnestness impress this cross on our houses, and on our walls, and our windows._” St Cyril of Alexandria introduces the Emperor Julian the apostate saying, “You Christians adore the wood of the cross, _you engrave it on the porches of your houses_,” &c. Hence the still prevalent custom in Roman Catholic places of painting crosses on the walls of houses, to drive away witches, as it is said; and these crosses being painted in different colours, might easily serve as a sign by which to designate the house. At the Crusades the popularity of this emblem increased: a red cross was the badge of the Crusader, and would be put up as a sign by men who had been to the Holy Land, or wished to court the patronage of those on their way thither. Finally, the different orders of knighthood settled each upon a particular colour as their distinctive mark. Thus the knights of St John wore _white crosses_, the Templars _red crosses_, the knights of St Lazarus _green crosses_, the Teutonic knights _black crosses_, embroidered with gold, &c. But the most common in England was the _red cross_, which was the cross of St George, and also of the red cross knights, who acted as a sort of police on the roads between Europe and the Holy Land to protect pilgrims. This badge, therefore, could not fail to be very popular.

In France it used to be, and in all probability is still, a common rebus to see _le signe de la croix_ represented by a swan with a cross on his back, (_cygne de la croix_.)

Only very few signs of the cross are now remaining. The GOLDEN CROSS in the Strand is one of these, and has been in that locality for centuries. It was one of the first upon which the Puritans brooked their ill-humour and hatred of popery; for in 1643 it was taken down by order of a committee from the House of Commons, as “superstitious and idolatrous.” This was the precursor of the fall of old Charing Cross itself. The sign, however, was put up again at the Restoration, and figures prominently in Canaletti’s well-known view of Charing Cross, in the Northumberland Collection. The tavern was probably pulled down at the formation of Trafalgar Square.

At a point on the road between Dunchurch and Daventry, where three roads meet, there was formerly an inn with the sign of the THREE CROSSES, in allusion to the three roads. Swift, in one of his pedestrian excursions, happened to stop at that inn. Not being very elegantly dressed, and rather importunate to be served, the landlady told him that she could not leave her customers for “such as he,” upon which the Dean, who was not the most modest, nor the most patient of men, wrote the following epigram on one of the windows:--

“TO THE LANDLORD. There hang three crosses at thy door, Hang up thy wife and she’ll make four.”

The RESURRECTION was the sign of John Day, a bookseller, who, in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, dwelt in St Sepulchre’s parish, a little above Holbourne Conduit. It was a sort of conundrum or charade on his name, which was carried out by his colophon, representing a man asleep, who is wakened by another with the words, “Arise, for it is _day_.” This, although somewhat profane, according to our present notions of such things, was nothing strange in a time when the people, though Protestants by name, were still strongly imbued with Roman Catholic ideas. John Cawoode, also a printer and publisher of St Paul’s Churchyard in 1558, had a still more profane sign--viz., the HOLY GHOST. And this even continued till the beginning of the seventeenth century, for in 1602 we find this identical sign used by another printer, William Leake, who was probably his successor, and published in that year Shakespeare’s “Venus and Adonis.” Worse still was the sign of another bookseller in St Paul’s Churchyard in 1520, which was the _Trinity_.[401] We must bear in mind, however, that in Roman Catholic countries conversation upon matters of religion is not nearly so strict and guarded as amongst believers in Protestant nations. An amusing instance of this once occurred to the writer in Jerusalem, the great head-quarters of Christianity. Usually the pilgrims or travellers staying at the Latin convent there, which serves as an hotel, dine all together in a kind of _table-d’hôte_ fashion; but for some reason it so fell out that our party one day dined in private. The holy brother who attended us happened to be a Spaniard, and as we had visited that country, and were tolerably acquainted with Valladolid, his native town, worldly recollections began to overcome the sanctity of the good monk, and he became inexhaustible in reminiscences of his younger days. Whilst talking with him, and refreshing ourselves with a meal of salad, grown in the garden of Gethsemane, we had indulged in two tumblers of a pithy white wine, quite strong enough to justify our resisting the pressing invitations of the reverend butler to take a third glass; but the jovial monk was not to be beaten, and finally convinced us with the following argument: “Oh come, brother, you must take another glass, remember you are in Jerusalem, and so take one for the Father, one for the Son, and one for the Holy Ghost!”

Although the English ale and refreshment houses continue to select fresh signs from the notabilities of the hour, the Palmerston’s Head and the Gladstone Arms for instance, they rarely choose anything of a religious or devotional cast. One instance, however, occurs to us, and that in the neighbourhood of London, which deserves mention. In Kentish Town, under the Hampstead hills, the noisiest and most objectionable public-house in the district bears the significant sign of the GOSPEL OAK. It is the favourite resort of navvies and quarrelsome shoemakers, and took its name, not from any inclination to piety on the part of the landlord, but from an old oak tree in the neighbourhood, near the boundary line of Hampstead and St Pancras parishes, a relic of the once general custom of reading a portion of the gospel under certain trees in the parish perambulations, equivalent to “beating the bounds.” “The boundaries and township of the parish of Wolverhampton are,” says Shaw, in his “History of Staffordshire,” (vol. ii., p. 165,) “in many points marked out by what are called _Gospel Trees_;” and Herrick, in his “Hesperides,” (Ed. 1859, p. 26,) says:--

“Dearest, bury me Under that _holy oak_, or _gospel tree_; Where, though thou see’st not, thou may’st think upon Me, when _thou yeerly go’st procession_.”

The old Kentish Town Gospel Oak was removed a short time since, but not until it had given a name to the surrounding fields, to a village, (Oak village,) and to a chapel, as well as to the public-house alluded to.

[366] New Essays and Characters, by John Stephens the younger, of Lincoln’s Inn, Gent. London, 1631, p. 221.

[367] Randle Holme, “Academy of Armour and Blazon,” p. 52.

[368] _Postman_, Feb. 1-3, 1711.

[369] “Notandum quoq. eius (pavonis) carnem quod D. Augustinus quoq., lib. xxi. de civitate Dei, cap. iii., et Isidorus, lib. xii., affirmant non putrescere.”--_Camerarius, Centur._, iii. 20, 1697. How to make this agree with Skelton’s idea it is not very easy to explain--

“Then sayd the Pecocke, All ye well wot, I sing not musycal, For my breast is decay’d.”--_Skelton’s Armory of Birds._

[370] See Fosbrooke’s Encyclopædia of Antiquities, vol. ii., p. 673.

[371] For particulars of Topham, the Strong Man, see under HISTORICAL SIGNS.

[372] This statement is made on the authority of Hone, in his “Ancient Mysteries.” Doubts, however, have been expressed as to the accuracy of his data upon this particular subject.

[373] Diary of John Evelyn, Feb. 3, 1684.

[374] Bagford Collection, Bib. Harl., 5931.

[375]

“The wood is cut in order to be burned, Therefore is this Abraham’s sacrifice.”

[376] JACOB’S INN is mentioned by Hatton, 1708, “on the east side of Red Cross Street near the middle.”

[377] “Amusements for the Meridian of London,” 1706.

[378]

“Moses was found in the water. Whosoever purchases his bread here shall have yeast for nought, Besides a currant-loaf at Easter, and a spice-cake at Christmas time.”

[379] “A Step to Stirbitch Fair,” 1708.

[380] Randle Holme, B. ii., ch. xviii.

[381] _Weekly Journal_, August 4, 1722.

[382]

“Though Samson by his strength could overcome the lion, Defeat the Philistines and master the foxes, Yet a woman deprived him of his sight; Never, therefore, believe a woman unless she has no head.”

This alludes to the GOOD WOMAN, described elsewhere in this work.

Samson’s history was not only painted on the signboard, but also sung in ballads, “to the tune of the Spanish Pavin.” Amongst the Roxburgh ballads (vol. i. fol. 366) there is one entitled “A most excellent and famous ditty of Sampson, judge of Israel, how hee wedded a Philistyne’s daughter, who at length forsooke him; also how hee slew a lyon and propounded a riddle, and after how hee was falsely betrayed by Dalila, and of his death.”

[383] See Bibliographia Britannica, voce Golias, and Wright’s History of Caricature.

[384]

“Like to the hart which comes to the water brook to refresh himself, So you enter my house to quench your thirst.”

[385] The first six words are literally the beginning of the psalm in the Dutch version,--

“Like a hart the hunt escaped, wishes for the limpid water brooks, So there is here tobacco, beer, and brandy for sale to strengthen the stomach.”

[386] For the true origin of this sign, see under MISCELLANEOUS SIGNS.

[387] A Royalist paper, entitled, “The Man in the Moon discovering a world of wickedness under the Sun,” July 4, 1649.

[388] Cromwell’s History of Clerkenwell, p. 32.

[389] “As soon as I had seen your theatre I left it, to go to an Angel whom I adore on account of his good wine.”

[390] Even in the most remote periods of history _three_ was considered a mystic number, and regarded with reverence. The Assyrians had their triads. In Ancient Egypt every town or district had its own triad, which it worshipped, and which was a union of certain attributes, the third member proceeding from the other two. Sir Gardiner Wilkinson, in his “Ancient Egyptians,” vol. iv., ch. xii., p. 230, mentions a stone with the words “one Bail, one Athor, one Akori, hail father of the world, hail triformous God.” Thoms, in his “Dissertation on Ancient Chinese Vases,” says:--“The Chinese have a remarkable preference for the number three; they say one produced two, two produced three, and three produced all things. There is something remarkable in this last phrase; perhaps it conveys an indistinct idea of the Trinity. The Buddhists, who are of modern date in China, use the term ‘the three precious ones’--‘the Deity that has ruled, the ruling Deity, and the Deity that shall rule.’ The Taore sect have also their ‘three pure ones.’ The number three has many associations, as the three bonds--a prince and minister, father and son, husband and wife; the three superintendents--the treasurer, judge, and collector of customs; the three powers--heaven, earth, and man,” &c. In the Hindoo religion combinations of three are equally frequent: they have several trimustis or trinities; three principal deities, Brahma, Vishnu, and Mahadeva; another triad is Brahma, Vishnu, and Siva, or matter, spirit, and destruction; there are three plaited locks on the head of Radha, representing a mystical union of three principal rivers, Ganges, Yamuna, and Sarawati. Siva has three eyes; the sun is called three-bodied; the triangle with the Hindoos is a favourite type for the triune co-equality, hence the pentagram (a figure composed of two equilateral triangles, placed with the apex of the one towards the base of the other, and so forming six triangles by the intersections of their sides) is in great favour with them; further, they use three mystic letters to denote their deity; have 3 × 7 hells, (seven is also a mystic number with them and other ancient races,) and many other combinations of three. The same preference for this number is observable in the Greek and Roman mythology, which mentions three theocraties, three graces, three fates, three harpies, three syrens, three heads of Cerberus, three eggs of Leda, &c. And, taking 3 as a unit, 3 × 3 muses, 3 × 4 principal gods, (Dii Majores,) 3 × 4 labours of Hercules, &c.

[391] _London Gazette_, Nov 8 to 11, 1680.

[392] Cunningham’s Handbook to London, p. 470.

[393] Soap, wax, tallow, and similar articles were part of the merchandise in which the Hanse merchants dealt.

[394] _Kingdom’s Intelligencer_, April 6-13, 1663.

[395] Stow’s Survey of London.

[396] See a woodcut of an Amiens pilgrim’s token in the Journal of Brit. Arch. Assoc., vol. i., Oct. 1848; also a detailed account of this venerable relic in Coryatt’s Crudities vol. i, p. 17.

[397] Name of one of the arches of old London Bridge.

[398]

“In the town of Paris there is a bridge named St Michael, On which there are many houses; but one of them is more known than the others. That is the house I mean, which is known by the sign of the Baptist Head. There the bookseller will answer you. Would you also like to know the name of the printer? John Carcain is his name. Now, do not ask any more. Farewell.”

[399]

“Like wine, fine, Driveth away care; So medicine cureth pain, And delivers us from suffering.”

[400] Coryatt’s Crudities, vol i., p. 41.

[401] From his colophon we see that the Trinity on his sign was represented by a triangle with a circle at each angle, respectively containing the words PATER, FILIUS, SPIRITUS, and, between the circles, on each of the sides of the triangle, the words NON EST, a mystical way of representing the Trinity, very common in the middle ages.