pot of mild porter, and take off the chill,'
A damsel came smirking, in curls, cap, and frill.
I started! she scream'd! 'twas my Dora! off flew
Flank, buttock, greens, carrots, and peas-pudding too!
'Yes, I am your true love!' she curtsey'd, and said,
'At home I'ma widow, but here I'm a maid!
My spouse kick'd the bucket last Sunday at Leeds,
And left me, a rose-bud, all cover'd with weeds.'
'For all your fine speeches, a widow, in fine,
Is an article madam, I mean to decline I
Though wedlock's a bolus to physic and fright,
A black draught—a widow! would finish me quite.”
“A vile stave! Commend me to 'fonde Elderton,' * and the troop of 'metre ballad-mongers' that sleep among the dull of ancient days; but save me from that doleful doggrel of which, I shrewdly suspect, thou, Benjamin Bosky, art the perpetrator.
* The following is a description of Elderton by a
contemporary writer in 1582. See “Reporte of the Death and
Martyr-dome of M. Campion, Jesuit, &c.”
“Fonde Elderton, call in thy foolish rhime,
Thy scurill balates are to bad to sell;
Let good men rest, and mende thy self in time,
Confesse in prose thou hast not metred well;
Or if thy folly cannot chuse but fayne
Write alehotise toys, blaspheme not in thy vain.”
It smells woundily of thy peculiar locality, and might have befringed the walls of Bedlam and Soho. Henceforth be the Magnus Apollo of thy native Little Britain, and divide the crown with Thomas Delony, of huck-ster-fame! Jack of Newbery, the Gentle Craft, garlands, strange histories,
'And such small deer,
Had been Tom's food for many a year,'
and may serve for thine, Benjamin; for, in poetical matters, thou hast the maw of a kite and the digestion of an ostrich.”
“A sprat to catch a herring!”
“A tittlebat! thou triton of the minnows!”
“But the Bull-Feather! Uncle Timothy, the Bull-Feather
'Must not be forgotten
Until the world's rotten.'
Let me refresh thy memory. Once upon a time——”
“Peace, babbler! If I must take the bull by the horns, it shall be without thy jockeyship. I will not ride double. 'Tis an idle tale, gentlemen; but there are charms in association that may render it interesting.”
Uncle Tim regaled with a fragrant pinch his satirical nose, and began
“A MIRTHFUL PAGEANT OF THE BULL-FEATHERS TO THE HORNS AT HIGHGATE.
“The ancient brethren of Bull-Feathers-Hall were a club of warm citizens; 'rich fellows enough! fellows that have had losses, with everything handsome about them.' Their place of rendezvous was the Chequer-Yard in Whitechapel, every Tuesday and Thursday at seven o'clock. The intent of their meeting was to solace themselves with harmless merriment, and promote good fellowship * among neighbours.
* How good fellowship had declined a century before this
will be seen by the following extract from a black-letter
ballad, intituled, “A balade declaryng how neybourhed loue,
and trew dealyng is gone. Imprinted at London by Richard
Lant.” (Circa 1560.)
“Where shall one fynde a man to trust,
Alwaye to stande in tyme of neede;
Thee most parte now, they are unjust,
Fayre in wordes, but false in deede:
Neybourhed nor loue is none,
True dealyng now is fled and gone.”
The president, arrayed in his crimson satin gown, with his cap furred and surmounted by a pair of antlers, and seated in a chair of state beneath a canopy, commanded (by the crier of the court) every member to be covered; and in the twinkling of an eye their horns were exalted. On a velvet cushion before him lay the comuted sceptre and sword. The brethren drank out of horn-cups, and made oath upon a book of statutes bound in horn. Their revenues were derived from a toll upon all the gravel carried up Highgate Hill and Hornsey;—Cow-lane; and beyond sea, Crook-horn; Leg-horn; and Ox-mantown paying them yearly tribute! On Monday, the 2nd May, 1664, a deputation of the fraternity met at Busby's Folly, * near Sadler's Wells, ** Islington, from whence they marched in grand order, headed by their Captain of Pioneers, with between thirty and forty of his men, with pick-axes and spades to level the hill, and baskets to carry the gravel;
* A print of Busbys Folly occurs in a rare volume, called
“Views of divers noted places near London, 1731,” of which
Gough, the antiquary never saw hut one copy. Its site is
particularly pointed out in Ogilby's map of London to
Holyhead.
* “Sadler's Wells being lately opened, there is likely to be
a great resort of strolling damsels, half-pay officers,
peripatetic tradesmen, tars, butchers, and others, musically
inclined.”—Weekly Journal, 16th March 1718.
It is curious to read at the bottom of the old bills and
advertisements of Sadler's Wells the following alarming announcements:—“A horse patrol will be sent in the New Road that night for the protection of the nobility and gentry who go from the squares and that end of the town. The road also towards the city will be properly guarded.” “June 1783. Patroles of horse and foot are stationed from Sadler's Wells' gate along the New Road to Tottenham Court turnpike; likewise from the City Road to Moorfields; also to St. John Street, and across the Spafields to Rosoman Row, from the hours of eight to eleven.”
After which followed the standard, an enormous pair of horns mounted on a lofty pole, borne by three officers, and attended by the master of the ceremonies, the mace-bearer, the herald at-arms, the sword-bearer and the crier, their footsteps keeping time to a flourish of trumpets and horns. *
* “On Tuesday next, being Shrove Tuesday, there will be a
fine hog bar-byqu'd whole, at the house of Peter Brett, at the Rising Sun, in Islington Road, with other diversions.— Note. It is the house where the ox was roasted whole at Christmas last.” Mist's Journal, Feb. 9, 1726. A hog barbecu'd is a West Indian term, and means a hog roasted whole, stuffed with spice, and basted with Madeira wine. Oldfield, an eminent glutton of former days, gormandised away a fortune of fifteen hundred pounds a-year. Pope thus alludes to him— “Oldfield, with more than harpy throat endu'd, Cries, 'Send me, gods, a whole hog barbecu'd!'” “On Thursday next, being 13th March 1718, the Bowling- Greens will be opened at the Prospect House, Islington, where there will be accommodation for all gentlemen bowlers.” Bowling-greens were among the many amusements of Merrie England. The author of “Night Thoughts” established a bowling-green in the village confided to his pastoral care, for innocent and healthful recreation. “True piety is cheerful as the day.” “May 1757. To be bowl'd for on Monday next, at the Red Cow, in St. George's Fields, a pair of Silver Buckles, value fourteen shillings, at five pins, each pin a yard apart. He that brings most pins