Transcriber's Notes

The cover image was created by the transcriber and is placed in the public domain.

A complete list of corrections as well as other notes [follows] the text.

ANECDOTES
OF THE
MANNERS AND CUSTOMS
OF
LONDON
DURING THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY;

INCLUDING
THE CHARITIES, DEPRAVITIES, DRESSES, AND AMUSEMENTS,
OF THE CITIZENS OF LONDON,
DURING THAT PERIOD;
WITH A REVIEW
OF THE
STATE OF SOCIETY IN 1807.
TO WHICH IS ADDED,
A SKETCH OF THE DOMESTIC ARCHITECTURE, AND OF
THE VARIOUS IMPROVEMENTS IN THE METROPOLIS.

ILLUSTRATED BY FORTY-FIVE ENGRAVINGS.

By JAMES PELLER MALCOLM, F. S. A.
AUTHOR OF "LONDINIUM REDIVIVUM," &c. &c.

THE SECOND EDITION.
VOLUME II.

LONDON:
PRINTED FOR LONGMAN, HURST, REES, AND ORME.
PATERNOSTER ROW.
1810.

John Nichols and Son, Printers,
Red Lion Passage, Fleet Street, London.

CONTENTS
OF
THE SECOND VOLUME.

PLATES
TO
THE SECOND VOLUME.

CHAP. V.

PUBLIC METHODS OF RAISING MONEY EXEMPLIFIED, IN NOTICES RELATING TO LOTTERIES, BENEFIT SOCIETIES, &C.

The community of London had superior advantages an hundred years past in the State Lotteries, though, if interested Office-keepers could be credited, the Londoners of the present Century enjoy greater gaming privileges than the world ever yet produced. The reader shall judge between the schemes of 1709 and 1807. The Post Boy of December 27 says, "We are informed that the Parliamentary Lottery will be fixed in this manner:—150,000 tickets will be delivered out at 10l. each ticket, making in all the sum of 1,500,000l. sterling; the principal whereof is to be sunk, the Parliament allowing nine per cent. interest for the whole during the term of 32 years, which interest is to be divided

as follows: 3750 tickets will be prizes from 1000l. to 5l. per annum during the said 32 years; all the other tickets will be blanks, so that there will be 39 of these to one prize, but then each blank ticket will be entitled to fourteen shillings a year for the term of 32 years, which is better than an annuity for life at ten per cent. over and above the chance of getting a prize." Such was the eagerness of the publick in subscribing to the above profitable scheme, that Mercers-hall was literally crowded, and the Clerks were found incompetent to receive the influx of names. 600,000l. was subscribed January 21; and on the 28th of February the sum of 1,500,000l. was completed.

The rage for Lotteries reigned uncontrouled; and the newspapers of the day teemed with proposals issued by every ravenous adventurer who could collect a few valuable articles; and from those shopkeepers took the hint, and goods of every description were converted into prizes, even neckcloths, snuff-boxes, toothpick-cases, linen, muslin, and plate. The prices of tickets were generally sixpence, a shilling, half a crown, &c. At the latter end of the year just mentioned, the Magistrates, being alarmed, declared their intention of putting the Act of William and Mary in force, which levied a penalty of 500l. on the proprietor, and 20l. on each purchaser. In the tenth of Queen Anne another Act was passed for suppressing private Lotteries, which was followed

by a second to prevent excessive and deceitful gaming.

Matthew West, a Goldsmith, of Clare-street, Clare-market, appears to have been the man who first divided Lottery-tickets into shares. He advertised in 1712, that he had sold 100 tickets in the million and an half Lottery in twentieths, and purposed pursuing his plan, which was well received.

The Lottery for 1714 contained 50,000 tickets at 10l. each, with 6982 prizes and 43,018 blanks; two of the former were 10,000l. with one of 5, another of 4000l. a third of 3000l. and a fourth of 2000l. five of 1000l. ten of 500l. twenty of 200l. fifty of 100l. four hundred of 50l. and six thousand four hundred and ninety-one of 20l.

Besides the drawing for prizes and blanks, there was another for the course of payment, and each 1000 tickets was called a course. The payments to the receivers were on the 10th of November and 10th of December 1713. When the Tickets were drawn, they were exchanged for standing orders, and thus rendered assignable by endorsement; all the blanks were repaid the 10l. per ticket at one payment, in the order their course of payment happened to fall, and they bore an interest of four per cent. from Michaelmas 1713. The prizes were payable in the same manner: the first drawn ticket had 500l.; the last 1000l. besides the general chance; 35,000l. per annum was payable weekly from the Exchequer

to the Paymaster for the discharge of the principal and interest, and the whole funds of the Civil List were chargeable for thirty-two years for 35,000l. per annum .

To shew the difference between past and present methods, it may be worth while to insert a modern scheme.

"State Lottery begins drawing October 13, 1806, containing more Capital Prizes, and 5000 less Tickets, than last Lottery. The first drawn Ticket entitled to 10,000l.; all other Capital Prizes are afloat. Purchasers of Tickets and Shares will have the opportunity of obtaining all the Capital Prizes, provided they purchase before the drawing commences. The Scheme has equal advantages of 20,000l. Prizes, 10,000l. Prizes, 5,000l. Prizes, &c. &c. to former Lotteries of double the number of Tickets.

20,000 Tickets only, and no other State Lottery to be drawn this year."

BENEFIT SOCIETIES, &C.

The first mention of any thing of this kind I have met with is in the year 1708, under the name of the "Taylors' Friendly Society" for insuring the lives of Adults and Children male and female; which was held at the Cross Keys, Wych-street; and the Trustees met twice in each month, when 1500 persons had subscribed 5s. each, including policies, stamps, entrance, and first claim; and continued their payments three years. They became entitled to relief in case of illness or poverty, and their Executors after death to 200l. Another Society was connected with it, and termed the "Amicable Society," the terms 5s. 6d. and 2s. per quarter; for which relief was afforded, and 120l. paid at the decease of the Subscriber.

Another, called "The Fortunate Office," was intended to provide marriage-portions for the Subscribers, who paid 2s. per quarter for their tickets.

A sort of Tontine had its origin in 1709 under the name of "The Lucky Seventy, or the longest livers take all." It was declared to issue out of the Annuities granted or to be granted by Parliament for the term of 99 years; the sum subscribed 10l. or as many tens as the Subscriber chose. The income was immediate, tax free,

and payable half-yearly during the lives of their respective nominees. The office was held at Haberdashers Hall.

An office was opened in Theobald-road, 1710, which, if really answerable to the statement announcing it, promised great benefit to the lower classes of the community; and was highly honourable to the dignified Clergy, eminent Physicians, Surgeons, and Counsellors at Law, who founded and supported it. Those persons, taking into consideration the difficulty the poor laboured under of procuring medical and surgical assistance and legal advice, offered to afford prescriptions and opinions for one shilling on delivering a case, and one other shilling at receiving the answer, which payments they declared would be applied only to the actual expences of the office.

The success of these schemes sharpened the invention of the thrifty; and immediately almost every street in London abounded with Insurance offices, where policies for infants three months old might be obtained for short periods. From those they diverged into other ages and various descriptions of persons. Their reign, however, appears to have been but short; as I meet with very few advertisements of the kind in 1712. One specimen may be worth preserving: "By the United Friendly and Perpetual Society, at the Naked Boy, the corner of Battle-bridge, in Tooley-street, Southwark, on Thursday the 25th

instant, will be opened two offices on Marriages for three months, on Claims two, upon Births for two months, and two on Servants for three months on dividends." Another will verify the "Wisdom of Nations" in the adage of "Set a Thief, &c.:" indeed, the Gentleman writer lets us into the whole secret at once.

"From the antient and most reputable sale of Alphabetical Letters at the Golden Ball in Whalebone-court, Lothbury, fronting the end of Bartholomew-lane: Whereas several as well impudent as ignorant pretenders have of late erected offices of various methods, and under several denominations, proposing such prodigious profits, in making so many several returns of cent. per cent. for each principal sum paid into them, that it is even miraculous to those of the greatest capacities in these undertakings how or with what assurance they could ever pretend to publish the same; but now it is presumed every one who has any concerns in matters of this kind are thoroughly sensible of the difference between honest and well-regulated schemes (as this is ) and those chimerical ones which are only set up on purpose to be a glittering show of profit, where the end fails of the expectation. The failures of some of this kind, and the probability of all such methods taking the same course, has been the only motive of publishing this; the proposer hereof not having advertised in print these eight months,

though his sale has been of nine months standing, and has paid for re-bought letters to his subscribers out of the same upwards of 29,600l. never paying less than double for all money paid in, and that in a very short time. Proposals may be had gratis at the Sale aforesaid, all the books being now open for subscriptions. And on Thursday the 22d instant will be opened a subscription-book, where any person may subscribe what sum he or they please , and receive the principal and profit entire in three months, proposals of which will be delivered out the same day. This book is of the same nature with our other books; only in this, whatever sum is subscribed must be paid down with 12d. for each pound entrance, whereas in the other the money is paid weekly, which is a great trouble to those who cannot spare so much time."

I think I may congratulate my fellow-citizens on the improvement in our morals after their perusal of the following modest production:

"Observe well this Advertisement,

Which comes from the old and original Sale of the Queen's picture (Qu. the Guinea), the very next house to the George Inn, Coleman-street, London. There having been of late great discourse about offices, and I cannot but say great reason to suspect their honesty (some not designing any ), and others who knew not how to be honest, being they wanted experience , which business

requires a regular method to be observed, occasions me to satisfy the world that the sale of the Queen's picture has been maintained this three quarters of a year, the payment every Saturday paid honourably and justly, which thousands can testify, and which is a plain demonstration of its continuance; good payments being the only security in these cases. I have all along acquainted every single person concerned that I will maintain it as long as it is possible to be preserved; whenever it decays , I have promised them all from the very beginning to summon all my purchasers together, and to distribute what is left among them. This method I have taken; and I defy any one to say it is unjust , and I will surely perform it. Pray take good notice we begin this present Thursday to enter again, and shall continue until Saturday the 7th of June. On that day we shall also pay above 500l."

One of the schemes which preceded the Bubbles of 1720 was an Insurance-office for Lottery-tickets, opened at Mercers'-hall; and 120,000l. was actually subscribed on the following terms: for every ninety-six tickets insured the proprietors agreed to allow to the Company (after the tickets were drawn) 16s. per ticket, and 5 per cent. on such prizes as occurred to the ninety-six tickets, the Company returning the tickets, and in case the prizes did not amount to 288l. valuing the prizes at par ; the Company to make up the

money 3l. for every ticket. For every forty-eight tickets the proprietors agreed to allow 19s. per ticket, and 5 per cent. on the prizes as above; the Company making up the tickets 144l. or 3l. per ticket, and so on down to twelve tickets. The proprietors of the tickets to advance no money for this security; but, when drawn, to allow as above; the tickets to be deposited with the Company, and placed by them under seal in the Bank of England; if not called for in ninety days after the drawing, to be forfeited.

We have at length reduced these schemes to a few honourable Insurance-offices for Lives and Property; and Benefit Societies have been sanctioned by the Legislature.

CHAP. VI.

THE RELIGIOUS AND POLITICAL PASSIONS OF THE COMMUNITY ILLUSTRATED BY ANECDOTES OF POPULAR TUMULTS.

The first violent effervescence of party after the year 1700 originated from the intemperance of certain Sectaries, who omitted no opportunity of attacking the Established Church; one of the members of which, Sacheverell, equally intemperate, contrived to raise the Demon of Discord throughout the Nation by Sermons calculated to make all good Churchmen detest him. In these half religious, half political contests, the populace uniformly arrange themselves on the side of Liberty—that Liberty which prompts them to assume the reins of Justice, and to dispense it according to the best of their shallow judgments; but their whips are firebrands, and indiscriminate destruction is substituted for the terrors of the

Law; their Culprits are seized at the instigation of some infamous leader, and punishment is inflicted before passion subsides. While Sacheverell's trial was depending in 1709-10, the many-headed monster of this monstrous Metropolis thought proper to pronounce sentence on the harmless wainscot, pews, and other woodwork of Mr. Burgess's Meeting, near Lincoln's-inn-fields, whither they were conveyed and burnt. When this wicked exploit was accomplished, and they had contrived to kill a young man in their undistinguishing fury, they proceeded to Fetter and Leather lanes, and several other places in which Meetings were situated; and would probably have committed incredible mischief, had not the Queen's guards dispersed them, and seized several of the ringleaders; one of whom was tried and condemned, but afterwards reprieved. Some of those infatuated men stopped coaches in the streets, to demand money of the passengers, to drink Sacheverell's health; which occasioned an official communication from the Queen to the Lord Mayor. Her Majesty declared her knowledge of the riots, bonfires, illuminations, the assaults and stoppage of coaches to demand money, in opposition to her Proclamation, and in contempt of the proceedings of the High Court of Parliament; and that she was credibly informed that great part of those lawless proceedings were committed through the culpable inactivity of

the Magistracy; at which she expressed great displeasure; and concluded by charging the Mayor and City Officers, at their peril, to apprehend all persons exciting tumults and hawking seditious papers through the streets for sale. To the above letter the Corporation addressed an humble answer, observing that the insolent attacks on the Constitution and Her Majesty's Prerogative, by the publication of books and pamphlets intended to infuse Republican tenets in the minds of her subjects, had roused them to a consideration of their fatal tendency; they therefore declared their detestation of such doctrines, their determination to support the Protestant succession, and, in obedience to her commands, to suppress all riotous assemblies, and to oppose with undaunted vigour all attempts to disturb the peace of her reign, or the serenity of her Royal mind, at home and abroad.

The Queen addressed a similar complaint to the Magistrates of Middlesex; and received assurances of support from them, those of Westminster, and the Lieutenancy of London.

After these professions of prevention, riots occurred on the 14th of October, 1710, with the watch-word of "Sacheverell and High Church;" and the mob beat off the Constables with brands from the numerous bonfires they had lighted.

The month of November teemed with the seeds of riot; but the vigilance of Government was

then excited, and secret means employed to discover those preparatives by which the mob were to be set in motion. Some of the emissaries employed on this occasion gave information that a house near Drury-lane contained certain effigies, intended to represent the Pope, the Pretender, and the Devil; this trio were accompanied by four Cardinals, four Jesuits, and four Monks, who were to have been exhibited in due state on the evening of November 17, the anniversary of Queen Elizabeth's accession, and then burnt, in testimony of the abhorrence entertained against the Head of the Roman Catholic faith, his engine for establishing it again in England, and his Majesty of the Infernal regions, together with the inferior instruments of the dissemination of his doctrines. Thus informed, Government preferred opposing such public support of their cause, and wisely intimated by their conduct that they were willing to rest it on the conscience of each individual of the community, rather than terrify wavering Protestants into their measures: in consequence, they issued orders to seize the figures; which being promptly obeyed, the Messengers and guards conveyed them in safety to the Earl of Dartmouth's office, by whose means the sentence of the mob was probably more privately performed, and the evening passed away without any particular occurrence. This event was eagerly seized upon by the partizans of the day; those of

Government discovering in it the stamina of a thousand horrors intended to involve the Roman Catholicks and the Established Church in one grand ruin; those of the Antimonarchical side deeming the intended procession a mere common occurrence, occasionally resorted to by the populace with the best motives. By us , who have known the infernal proceedings accompanying the cry of "No Popery," riots of any kind must be dreaded; and we cannot but approve the vigilance of the then Government in terminating the existence of an expiring habit, whose vigorous movements were marked in the following disgusting "Account of the burning the Pope at Temple-bar in London, the 17th of November 1679;" an account that compels us to hail with ten-fold reverence the auspicious Revolution of 1688, that defined the boundaries of the Sovereign's and the People's right. At the present period, praised be Heaven! a Jury of twelve men would make the instigators of such a procession tremble: and every Protestant in the City would fly from it with indignation; and yet with all our modern mildness the faith in question gains no proselytes:—a memorable memento of the liberality of the age[15:A]!

"Upon the 17th of November the bells began to ring about three o'clock in the morning in the City of London; and several honourable and worthy gentlemen belonging to the Temple as well as the City, (remembering the burning both of London and the Temple, which was apparently executed by Popish villainy[16:A]) were pleased to be at the charge of an extraordinary triumph, in commemoration of that blessed Protestant Queen, which was as follows: In the evening of the said day, all things being prepared, the solemn procession began from Moorgate, and so to Bishopsgate-street, and down Hounsditch to Aldgate, through Leadenhall-street, Cornhill, by the Royal Exchange, through Cheapside, to Temple-bar, in order following.

1st. Marched six whifflers, in pioneers' caps and red waistcoats.

2. A bellman, ringing his bell, and with a dolesome voice crying all the way "Remember Justice Godfrey."

3. A dead body , representing Justice Godfrey in the habit he usually wore, and the cravat wherewith he was murdered about his neck, with spots of blood on his wrists, breast, and shirt, and white gloves on his hands, his face pale and wan, riding upon a white horse, and one of his murderers behind him to keep him from falling, in the same manner as he was carried to Primrose-hill.

4. A Priest came next, in a surplice and a cope embroidered with dead men's sculls and bones and skeletons , who gave out pardons very plentifully to all that would murder Protestants, and proclaiming it meritorious.

5. A Priest alone, with a large silver cross.

6. Four Carmelite Friars, in white and black habits.

7. Four Grey Friars, in their proper habits.

8. Six Jesuits, carrying bloody daggers .

9. Four wind-musick, called the waits, playing all the way.

10. Four Bishops, in purple, with lawn sleeves, and golden crosses on their breasts, and crosiers in their hands.

11. Four other Bishops, in their pontificalibus,

with surplices and rich-embroidered copes, and golden mitres on their heads.

12. Six Cardinals, in scarlet robes and caps.

13. Then followed the Pope's chief Physician, with Jesuits powder in one hand and an urinal in the other.

14. Two Priests in surplices, with two golden crosses.

"Lastly, the Pope, in a glorious pageant or chair of state, covered with scarlet; the chair being richly embroidered and bedecked with golden balls and crosses. At his feet was a cushion of state; and two boys sat on each side the Pope in surplices, with white silk banners painted with red crosses and bloody consecrated daggers for murdering Protestant kings and princes, with an incense-pot before them censing his Holiness. The Pope was arrayed in a rich scarlet gown lined through with ermines and adorned with gold and silver lace, with a triple-crown on his head, and a glorious collar of gold and precious stones about his neck, and St. Peter's keys, a great quantity of beads, Agnus Dei's, and other Catholic trumpery about him. At his back stood the Devil , his Holiness's privy-counsel, hugging and whispering him all the way, and often instructing him aloud to destroy his Majesty, to contrive a pretended Presbyterian plot, and to fire the City again; to which purpose he held an infernal torch in his hand. The whole procession was attended with

150 torches and flambeaus by order; but there were so many came in volunteers as made the number to be several thousands. Never were the balconies, windows, and houses more filled, nor the streets more thronged, with multitudes of people, all expressing their abhorrence of Popery with continual shouts and acclamations ; so that in the whole progress of their procession by a modest computation it is judged there could be no less than 200,000 spectators.

"Thus with a slow and solemn state in some hours they arrived at Temple-bar, where all the houses seemed to be converted into heaps of men, women, and children, who were diverted with variety of excellent fire-works. It is known that Temple-bar since its rebuilding is adorned with four stately statues of Stone, two on each side the Gate; those towards the City representing Queen Elizabeth and King James, and the other two towards the Strand King Charles I. and King Charles II.: now, in regard of the day, the statue of Queen Elizabeth was adorned with a crown of gilded laurel on her head, and in her hand, a golden shield with this motto inscribed thereon, "The Protestant Religion, Magna Charta." Several lighted torches were placed before her, and the Pope brought up near the gate.

"Having entertained the thronging spectators for some time with ingenious fire-works, a very great bonfire was prepared at the Inner Temple-gate;

and his Holiness, after some compliments and reluctances, was decently tumbled into the flames; the Devil who till then accompanied him left him in the lurch, and, laughing, gave him up to his deserved fate. This last act of his Holiness's tragedy was attended with a prodigious shout of the joyful spectators. The same evening there were bonfires in most streets of London, and universal acclamations, crying, "Let Popery perish, and Papists with their plots and counter-plots be for ever confounded. Amen. "

Protestant Postboy, Nov. 20, 1711.

The brutal ferocity of the scenes just described appeared in a more matured state in the acts of an inconsiderable part of the populace in 1712: indeed, had their numbers or their courage equalled the fiend-like qualities of their souls, the consequences must have been dreadful to the publick. Fortunately, however, there were but fifty Mohawks , and their cowardice made them an easy prey to justice; but not before they had committed the most unheard-of excesses, of which the wounds they inflicted with their swords on the peaceable passenger of the streets at night were the least. They treated women in a manner too brutal for a man of the least spirit to repeat, and their exploits were marked in every other respect with the violation of decency: Modesty and Innocence became their victims, Impudence and Lasciviousness they patronized and protected.

The Queen issued a Proclamation on this hateful occasion pregnant with just resentment, and offered a reward of 100l. for the apprehension of any of the offenders. The Gazette of March 18, 1711, mentions that Sir William Thomas, Bart. had been apprehended (who was accompanied by two men then unknown) for assaulting a gentleman in St. James's Park between nine and ten at night on the 15th, and calls on the injured person to appear in evidence before the Secretary of State: but whether the charge applies to the above outrages is not discoverable from the notice. April 19 following the Gazette mentions seven men and seven women who had been assaulted.

At the Quarterly Sessions of that period the Justices had received orders to put the law in force against Vice and Immorality; and in consequence of a petition from the inhabitants of Covent-garden, complaining of the indecency and riots of the loose women and their male followers in the vicinity of the Theatre, they issued warrants for their apprehension. The execution of those were violently opposed; and the Justices were compelled to state to the Privy Council and the Lord Lieutenant of Middlesex, that the Constables were dreadfully maimed, and one mortally wounded by Ruffians aided by 40 Soldiers of the guards, who entered into a combination to protect the women.

In May, Lord Inchinbroke, Sir Mark Cole,

and some others, were found guilty on the charge of being principals in some or other of the above vile proceedings. After having complimented Government on the propriety of preventing the populace from publicly burning effigies, it would be injustice to the latter not to acknowledge they might have pleaded high authority for doing it. On the 5th of November 1712, the Queen's guards made a bonfire before the gates of St. James's Palace; into which the Pretender's effigy was thrown and shot at. Such is Human Nature! The Lord Mayor appears, however, to have done his duty, by requesting his fellow citizens to keep at home on the night of the anniversary of Elizabeth's accession.

One of the oddest occurrences I have yet met with under this head was a political contest between the Whig and Tory Footmen, who served the Members of the House of Commons. These worthy patriots had inviolably observed a custom, for many years previous to 1715, of imitating their masters in the choice of a Speaker, modestly conceiving themselves a deliberative body. Now, as the parties happened at this period to be nearly balanced, much animosity naturally ensued; and, not possessing the forbearance of their superiors, they had recourse to active hostilities, and severely beat each other, till the rising of the House compelled them to desist; but, on the following Monday, the battle was renewed, and the

Tories having gained the day by dint of blows, they carried their Speaker three times round Westminster-hall, and then, in pursuance of antient usage, they adjourned to a good dinner at an adjacent alehouse, and to expend their crown each in toasting their success.

The accession of George I. was celebrated, in the month of July of the same year, in the customary manner by the peaceable part of the community; but the more violent assembled, to the amount of several hundreds, at the Roebuck Tavern, Cheapside, where they burnt the effigies of the Pretender habited in mourning before the door, accompanied by a peal from Bow bells; and the populace were plentifully supplied with liquor. The same persons, joined by many young men and apprentices, busily employed themselves between the above date and October 22, the anniversary of the King's coronation, in preparing the effigies of the old Triumvirate for the same fate; but the Jacobin interest, then in full effervescence, contrived to drop printed bills, and to insinuate that those loyal persons meant to burn the effigies of the late Queen and Dr. Sacheverell. To repel such ideas, the Loyal Society deputed their Stewards to the Lord Mayor with a relation of their real intention, who forbid a procession, but permitted them to consume the effigies where they pleased. Thus privileged, they adorned their hats with cockades of white

and orange, and sallied forth with effigies of the Pope, the Pretender, the Earl of Man, the Duke of Ormond, and Lord Bolingbroke, accompanied by link-bearers, and precipitated them into a fire near Bow-church. Hence they went to Lincoln's-Inn-fields, and assisted at the hateful orgies of the same description ordered by the foolish Duke of Newcastle, whose power ought to have been exerted in a far different way, as the sequel will shew. The Jacobites, full of rage and disappointment, trod on their kibes, but were afraid to commit open violence. These processions and burnings were repeated again on King William's anniversary, and on the 5th of November; and, had the subject been less serious, the exhibition of the warming-pan and sucking bottle might have excited a smile. Some slight opposition occurred on these evenings; but the Loyal Society of the Roebuck routed the Jacobites on all sides. The day of the inauguration of Queen Elizabeth, November 17, shews the folly and wickedness of suffering the populace to exercise their brutal celebrations uncontrouled. The Loyal Society met at their usual rendezvous in Cheapside, whence they sent a deputation to examine a house near Aldersgate, where certain effigies were placed under the guard of a man with a hanger, said to be those of Cromwell, Ireton, Bradshaw, and Dr. Burnet, which the Jacobites intended to burn that evening. However, upon viewing the harmless

figures, they were found to be the representatives of George I. King William, Marlborough, Newcastle, and Dr. Burnet. The Deputies immediately seized them, and proceeded without opposition and no little triumph to the Roebuck. At 8 o'clock in the evening shouts of High Church and Ormond, &c. &c. announced the approach of the Pretender's friends, who poured into Cheapside from the neighbouring streets, proclaiming their intention of tearing the house to pieces. The attack commenced with stones and bricks, which soon demolished the windows; they then prepared for the assault; but the Loyal Society, thinking to terrify them, fired with powder only. The Jacobites, perceiving they had sustained no injury, renewed the attack, when a second volley, accompanied by ball, laid two of them dead on the pavement, and wounded several others. Then the Mayor made his appearance with the posse comitatus, and the Jacobites fled. Thus the Tragedy proceeded scene after scene; and in which way were either party benefited by the catastrophe? Rioters acting with a majority are like the officious bear who flattened his friend's nose in order to kill a fly that teased him; those on the side of a minority can expect nothing but disgrace and hanging: a well-ordered government should therefore suppress the turbulence of both. Another attempt was subsequently made upon the Roebuck, but the Trained

Bands prevented the accomplishment of its demolition. The Coroner's Jury returned a verdict of justifiable homicide on the two bodies.

During the rebellious year 1716 there were many violations of public decorum, which, if not really dangerous to lives and property, were alarming and extremely offensive to the quiet Citizens. One of those was the exploding a train of powder and nauseous combustibles within Shower's Dissenting Meeting in the Old Jewry in the midst of an evening service. The sudden flash, the smoke, and suffocation, put the audience into a most violent ferment; and the attempts on all sides to escape occasioned the only injury done by this stupid contrivance of a mischievous partisan, who probably congratulated himself on observing broken pews, bruised bodies, scattered shoes, wigs, scarves, and watches; a chaos begun and ended in smoke.

The anniversary celebrations which were usually accompanied by conviviality and pleasure seem in this turbulent year to have been authorised days for riot, fighting, and disorder, or stated times for the display of brutal courage. Were the circumstances more congenial to humanity, many instances might be given. The very focus of those mischiefs were the various mug -houses, as they were politely termed, or in other words Club-taverns. That of Salisbury-court was regularly assaulted in July, and the leader, a

Bridewell apprentice, was shot by the Master of the House, for which he was tried and acquitted; but five of the rioters were executed. The members of the Roebuck mug-house carried their loyalty into the street on the first of August, where they had an enormous bonfire, and a table near it, when they drank their glasses of wine, and pronounced healths, accompanied by the brazen lungs of the trumpet. Several of those gentlemen having heard that the Jacobites held religious meetings in various parts of the town, where they prayed for their lawful King without naming him, determined to distribute some of their numbers in each, and when the proper time arrived they exclaimed King George and their Royal Highnesses, &c.: to which others added Amen. This expedient served to confound if not to convince; but neither lenity nor punishment operated with the fiery Jacobites, who dared to bury two of the above rioters with grand funeral honours in September, and would have made a procession of young persons in pairs habited as mourners to pass every mug-house in the City, had not the officers of the Police interfered and apprehended several.

The gentry of the Roebuck attracted public notice on the King's return from one of his excursions to Hanover, by a fresh exhibition of obnoxious effigies, which they had prepared some time before, and shown for two-pence each

person. Those were dragged about till the thousand links that attended them were almost consumed, the persons who rode as Highland prisoners jaded, and the Man in armour who represented the King's champion sufficiently cooled (for it was January, good reader), when they halted at Charing-cross, and committed the inanimate part of the procession to the flames. As this folly was protected by three files of soldiers, the Jacobites remained perdu.

The months of May and June 1717 were war-like periods in Westminster, and marked by furious battles between the butchers of St. James's market and the footmen and valets of the same courtly City. After several actions the footmen solicited and obtained the assistance of the Bridewell-boys; to balance this accession of strength, the fraternities of Westminster, Clare, and Bloomsbury-markets were summoned, and joined the St. James's.

The Roebuck Society seem to have been exhausted by their exertions in the latter end of 1717, and determined to decline active hostility against the Jacobites; but I find them subsequently roused, and the assailants in a pitched battle and siege of Newgate-market. One of them describes the Society in the following lines—a paraphrase from Martial, lib. xiii. Ep. c.

"As Deer upon the rocks where Dogs can't go

Look down, and vex the noisy pack below,

So stands our Roebuck far above the spite

Of ill-look'd curs that growl but cannot bite;

And if they yelp against our Sun at noon,

'Tis but like puppies barking at the Moon."

The Nonjurors, unwilling to resign their pretensions and the Pretender, continued their secret meetings. Government, however, appears to have used summary measures with them. Mr. Hawes's meeting opposite St. James's was stormed in October 1717 by two Justices, two of the King's messengers, and a guard of soldiers, when an hundred persons were found within, to whom the Justices tendered the oaths; five accepted them, but the rest refused, and were dismissed after being compelled to declare their names and residences: the preacher escaped. Dr. Welton, the ejected or Nonjuring rector of St. Mary's Whitechapel, held the same kind of assemblies at his house in Goodman's-fields, which was visited in the same manner; but the Doctor thinking proper to resist, the door was broken open, and about 200 persons were discovered, all of whom except 40 refused the oaths. The Doctor not only rejected the oath, but acknowledged he did not pray for the Royal family. His escapes for a long time after furnished matter for paragraphs in the newspapers.

The year 1718 closed with a faint revival of the turbulence of party. In this instance the Bridewell-boys acted with hardened effrontery and

violence against the Loyalists. This period produced the long-required interference of the Civil Power to prevent the Roebuck processions; but this happy event was succeeded by the unjustifiable conduct of the Spital-fields weavers, who were injured by the too common use of foreign calicoes. These indiscreet persons, instead of applying for redress to the Legislature, proceeded to terrify the wearers into a compliance with their wishes, by throwing pernicious liquids on the gowns of females, and tearing them from their backs in the most brutal manner. The Police were compelled to interfere; but to little purpose, till they were fired upon, and several killed and wounded, and others committed to prison, whence some were conveyed corpses through the raging of a Gaol fever, and others to the Pillory; but it was a long time before the effervescence was allayed, and a paper war exhausted.

London was remarkably quiet from the above period till November 1724; but that year produced a thief that seemed calculated to perform successfully every scheme of desperation. He enjoyed a limited sway, and during the time he was at large the publick were in constant apprehension. Sheppard finished his career at Tyburn in the midst of an incredible number of spectators; and their conduct occasions this notice of him. The Sheriff's-officers, aware of the person they had to contend with, thought it prudent to

secure his hands on the morning of execution. This innovation produced the most violent resistance on Sheppard's part; and the operation was performed by force. They then proceeded to search him, and had reason to applaud their vigilance, for he had contrived to conceal a penknife in some part of his dress. The ceremony of his departure from our world passed without disorder; but, the instant the time expired for the suspension of the body, an undertaker, who had followed by his friends' desire with a hearse and attendants, would have conveyed it to St. Sepulchre's church-yard for interment; but the mob, conceiving that Surgeons had employed this unfortunate man, proceeded to demolish the vehicle, and attack the sable dependants, who escaped with difficulty. They then seized the body, and in the brutal manner common to those wretches beat it from each to the other till it was covered with bruises and dirt, and till they reached Long-acre, where they deposited the miserable remains at a public-house called the Barley-mow. After it had rested there a few hours the populace entered into an enquiry why they had contributed their assistance in bringing Sheppard to Long-acre; when they discovered they were duped by a bailiff, who was actually employed by the Surgeons; and that they had taken the corpse from a person really intending to bury it. The elucidation of their error

exasperated them almost to phrensy, and a riot immediately commenced, which threatened the most serious consequences. The inhabitants applied to the Police, and several Magistrates attending, they were immediately convinced the civil power was insufficient to resist the torrent of malice ready to burst forth in acts of violence. They therefore sent to the Prince of Wales and the Savoy, requesting detachments of the guards; who arriving, the ringleaders were secured, the body was given to a person, a friend of Sheppard, and the mob dispersed to attend it to the grave at St. Martin's in the Fields, where it was deposited in an elm coffin, at ten o'clock the same night, under a guard of Soldiers, and with the ceremonies of the church.

The Weekly Journal of November 21, 1724, gives a brief abstract of Sheppard's life, published at the time, which may amuse the reader.

"An Abridgement of the Life, Robberies, Escapes, and Death, of John Sheppard, who was executed at Tyburn on Monday the 16th instant, 1724.

"The celebrated Jack Sheppard, whose eminence in his profession rendered him the object of every body's curiosity, having made his exit on Monday last at Tyburn, in a manner suitable to his extraordinary merits, we hope a short summary of his most remarkable performances, before

and since his repeated escapes out of Newgate, together with his behaviour at the place of execution, will not be a disagreeable entertainment to our readers.

"He was born in 1701, and put apprentice by the charitable interposition of Mr. Kneebone, whom he afterwards robbed, to one Mr. Owen Wood, a Carpenter, in Drury-lane. Before his time was out he took to keep company with one Elizabeth Lyon, who proved his ruin: of her he gave this character. That 'there is not a more wicked, deceitful, lascivious wretch living in England.' The first robbery he ever committed was of two silver spoons at the Rummer-tavern, Charing-cross. He owned several other robberies, particularly that of Mr. Pargiter in Hampstead, for which the two Brightwells were tried and acquitted; in relation to which he often said jocosely, 'Little I was that large lusty man that plucked him from the ditch,' as Pargiter had deposed at Brightwell's trial. He was long comrade with Blueskin, lately executed, who, according to the account Sheppard gave of him, was 'a worthless companion, a sorry thief, and that nothing but his attempt on Jonathan Wild could have made him taken notice of:' afterwards he broke out of St. Giles's round-house, throwing a whole load of bricks, &c. on the people in the street who stood looking at him, and made his escape. After this he broke out of New Prison; then out of

the condemned hold in Newgate; but his last escape from Newgate having made the greatest noise, we shall insert the following particulars.

"Thursday, October the 15th, just before three in the afternoon, he went to work, taking off first his handcuffs; next with main strength he twisted a small iron link of the chain between his legs asunder; and the broken pieces proved extremely useful to him in his design; the fetlocks he drew up to the calves of his legs, taking off before that his stockings, and with his garters made them firm to his body, to prevent their shackling: he then proceeded to make a hole in the chimney of the Castle about three feet wide, and six feet high from the floor, and with the help of the broken links aforesaid, wrenched an iron bar out of the chimney, of about two foot and half in length, and an inch square; a most notable implement. He immediately entered the Red room, which is directly over the Castle, and went to work upon the nut of the lock, and with little difficulty got it off, and made the door fly before him; in this room he found a large nail, which proved of great use in his farther progress. The door of the entry between the Red room and the Chapel proved an hard task, it being a laborious piece of work; for here he was forced to break away the wall, and dislodge the bolt which was fastened on the other side: this occasioned much noise, and he was very fearful of being

heard by the master-side debtors. Being got to the Chapel, he climbed over the iron spikes, with ease broke one of them off, and opened the door on the inside: the door going out of the Chapel to the leads, he stripped the nut from off the lock, and then got into the entry between the Chapel and the leads, and came to another strong door, which being fastened by a very strong lock, he had like to have stopped, and it being full dark, his spirits began to fail him, as greatly doubting of success; but cheering up, he wrought on with great diligence, and in less than half an hour, with the main help of the nail from the Red room, and the spike from the Chapel, wrenched the Box off, and so was master of the door. A little farther in his passage another stout door stood in his way; and this was a difficulty with a witness; being guarded with more bolts, bars, and locks, than any he had hitherto met with: the chimes at St. Sepulchre's were then going the eighth hour: he went first upon the box and the nut, but found it labour in vain; he then proceeded to attack the fillet of the door; this succeeded beyond expectation, for the box of the lock coming off with it from the main post, he found his work was near finished. He was got to a door opening in the lower leads, which being only bolted on the inside, he opened it with ease, and then clambered from the top of it to the higher leads, and went over the wall. He saw the streets were lighted, the shops being still

open, and therefore began to consider what was necessary to be further done. He found he must go back for the blanket which had been his covering a-nights in the Castle, which he accordingly did, and endeavoured to fasten his stockings and that together, to lessen his descent, but wanted necessaries, and was therefore forced to make use of the blanket alone: he fixed the same with the Chapel spike into the wall of Newgate, and dropped from it on the Turner's leads, a house adjoining the prison; it was then about nine of the clock, and the shops not yet shut in. It fortunately happened, that the garret door on the leads was open. He stole softly down about two pair of stairs, and then heard company talking in a room, the door being open. His irons gave a small clink, which made a woman cry, 'Lord! what noise is that?' A man replied, 'Perhaps the dog or cat;' and so it went off. He returned up to the garret, and laid himself down, being terribly fatigued; and continued there for about two hours, and then crept down once more to the room where the company were, and heard a gentleman take his leave, who being lighted down stairs, the maid, when she returned, shut the chamber door: he then resolved at all hazards to follow, and slip down stairs; he was instantly in the entry, and out at the street-door, and once more contrary to his own expectation, and that of all mankind, a free man.

"He passed directly by St. Sepulchre's

watch-house, bidding them good-morrow, it being after twelve, and down Snow-hill, up Holborn, leaving St. Andrew's watch on his left, and then again passed the watch-house at Holborn-bars, and made down Gray's-Inn-lane into the fields, and at two in the morning came to Tottenham-court, where getting into an old house in the fields, he laid himself down to rest, and slept well for three hours. His legs were swelled and bruised intolerably, which gave him great uneasiness; and having his fetters still on, he dreaded the approach of the day. He began to examine his pockets, and found himself master of between forty and fifty shillings. It raining all Friday, he kept snug in his retreat till the evening, when after dark he ventured into Tottenham, and got to a little blind chandler's shop, and there furnished himself with cheese, bread, small beer, and other necessaries, hiding his irons with a great coat. He asked the woman for an hammer, but there was none to be had; so he went very quietly back to his dormitory, and rested pretty well that night, and continued there all Saturday. At night he went again to the chandler's shop, and got provisions, and slept till about six the next day, which being Sunday, he began to batter the basils of the fetters in order to beat them into a large oval, and then to slip his heels through. In the afternoon the master of the shed, or house, came in, and seeing his irons, asked him, 'For God's sake,

who are you?' He told him, 'an unfortunate young man, who had been sent to Bridewell about a bastard-child, and not being able to give security to the Parish, had made his escape.' The man replied, 'If that was the case it was a small fault indeed, for he had been guilty of the same things himself formerly,' and withal said, 'However, he did not like his looks, and cared not how soon he was gone.'

"After he was gone, observing a poor-looking man like a Joiner, he made up to him, and repeated the same story, assuring him that twenty shillings should be at his service, if he could furnish him with a Smith's hammer, and a puncheon. The man proved a shoe-maker by trade, but willing to obtain the reward, immediately borrowed the tools of a blacksmith his neighbour, and likewise gave him great assistance, so that before five that evening he had entirely got rid of his fetters, which he gave to the fellow, besides his twenty shillings.

"That night he went to a cellar at Charing-cross, and refreshed very comfortably, where near a dozen people were all discoursing about Sheppard, and nothing else was talked on whilst he staid amongst them. He had tied an handkerchief about his head, tore his woollen cap, coat, and stockings in many places, and looked exactly like what he designed to represent, a beggar-fellow; and now concluding that Blueskin

would have certainly been decreed for death, he did fully resolve and purpose to have gone and cut down the gallows the night before his execution.

"On Tuesday he hired a garret for his lodging at a poor house in Newport-market, and sent for a sober young woman, who for a long time past had been the real mistress of his affections, who came to him, and rendered all the assistance she was capable of affording. He made her the messenger to his mother, who lodged in Clare-street. She likewise visited him in a day or two after, begging on her bended knees of him to make the best of his way out of the kingdom, which he faithfully promised; but could not find in his heart to perform.

"He was oftentimes in Spital-fields, Drury-lane, Lewkenor's-lane, Parker's-lane, St. Thomas's-street, &c. those having been the chief scenes of his rambles and pleasures.

"At last he came to a resolution of breaking the house of the two Mr. Rawlins's, brothers and pawnbrokers in Drury-lane, which he accordingly put in execution, and succeeded; they both hearing him rifling their goods as they lay in bed together in the next room. And though there were none others to assist him, he pretended there was, by loudly giving out directions for shooting the first person through the head that presumed to stir, which effectually quieted them, while he

carried off his booty, with part whereof, on the fatal Saturday following, being the 31st of October, he made an extraordinary appearance; and from a carpenter and butcher was now transformed into a gentleman; he went into the City, and was very merry at a public-house not far from the place of his old confinement. At four that same afternoon, he passed under Newgate in a Hackney-coach, the windows drawn up, and in the evening he sent for his mother to the Sheers alehouse, in Maypole-alley, near Clare-market, and with her drank three quarterns of brandy; and after leaving her drank in one place or other about that neighbourhood all the evening, till the evil hour of twelve, having been seen and known by many of his acquaintance; all of them cautioning him, and wondering at his presumption to appear in that manner. At length his senses were quite overcome with the quantities and variety of liquors he had all the day been drinking, which paved the way for his fate; and when apprehended, he was altogether incapable of resisting, scarce knowing what they were doing with him, and had but two second-hand pistols scarce worth carrying about him.

"From his last re-apprehension to his death some persons were appointed to be with him constantly day and night; vast numbers of people came to see him, to the great profit both of himself and those about him; several persons of

quality came, all of whom he begged to intercede with his Majesty for mercy, but his repeated returning to his vomit left no room for it; so that, being brought down to the King's-bench bar, Westminster, by an habeas corpus, and it appearing by evidence that he was the same person, who, being under a former sentence of death, had twice made his escape, a rule of court was made for his execution, which was on Monday last. The morning he suffered he told a gentleman, that 'he had then a satisfaction at heart, as if he was going to enjoy an estate of 200l. a year.'"

A tumult of a different description in some particulars, but originating from an execution, happened in May 1725, when the infamous Jonathan Wild expiated his numerous offences at Tyburn. The mob in the former case were willing to have rescued Sheppard, because he was a man utterly unfit to be at large ; but they would have torn Wild to pieces, because he was the means of ridding the publick of many villains, though one of the blackest die himself. Jonathan Wild was born at Wolverhampton in 1684, and commenced his active life as a buckle-maker, whence he migrated to London, where he became in a short period thief-taker general. In this office his body received a greater variety of wounds than the hardiest soldier ever exhibited;

his scull actually suffered two fractures; and his throat was scarred by the erring knife of a wretch hanged by his means, the companion of Sheppard. That the reader may fully comprehend this man's crimes, I shall insert an abstract of his indictment.

"That he hath for many years past been a confederate with great numbers of highwaymen, pick-pockets, house-breakers, &c.

"That he hath formed a kind of corporation of thieves, of which he is the director; and that his pretended services in detecting and prosecuting offenders consisted only in bringing those to the gallows who concealed their booty, or refused to share it with him.

"That he hath divided the town and country into districts, and appointed distinct gangs for each, who regularly accounted with him for their robberies. He had also a particular set to steal at churches in time of Divine service; and also other moving detachments to attend at Court on birth-days, balls, &c. and upon both Houses of Parliament, Circuits, and Country Fairs.

"That the persons employed by him were for the most part felons convict, who have returned from transportation before their due time was expired; of whom he made choice for his agents, because they could not be legal evidence against him, and because he had it in his power to take

from them what part of the stolen goods he pleased, and otherwise abuse or even hang them at his will and pleasure.

"That he hath from time to time supplied such convicted felons with money and clothes, and lodged them in his own house the better to conceal them, particularly some against whom there are now informations for diminishing and counterfeiting broad pieces and guineas.

"That he hath not only been a receiver of stolen goods, as well as of writings of all kinds, for near fifteen years last past, but frequently been a confederate, and robbed along with the above-mentioned convicted felons.

"That, in order to carry on these vile practices, and gain some credit with the ignorant multitude, he usually carried about him a short silver staff as a badge of authority from the government, which he used to produce when he himself was concerned in robbing.

"That he had under his care and direction several warehouses for receiving and concealing stolen goods, and also a ship for carrying off jewels, watches, and other valuable goods to Holland, where he has a superannuated thief for his factor.

"That he kept in pay several artists to make alterations, and transform watches, seals, snuff-boxes, rings, and other valuable things, that they might not be known; several of which he used

to present to such as he thought might be of service to him.

"That he seldom helped the owners to lost notes and papers, unless he found them able to specify and describe them exactly, and then often insisted on more than half the value.

"That he frequently sold human blood, by procuring false evidence to swear persons into facts of which they were not guilty; sometimes to prevent them from being evidences against himself, at other times for the sake of the great reward given by the government."

This consummate criminal, after dealing so widely and to an enormous amount, fell a sacrifice to a paltry theft of a little lace stolen from a window on Holborn-hill, when Wild's usual foresight so far deserted him as to enable the person he employed while he waited on the Bridge to turn evidence against him. His execution attracted the greatest concourse of spectators ever known to have assembled on a similar occasion; and an incredible number of thieves of every description attended, to wreak their vengeance on their general enemy. They shouted incessantly with frantic yells of joy, and threw stones at the miserable man as he rode, till his head streamed with blood; but, when he fell from the cart, the air was literally rent by reiterated cries of triumph. Wild had endeavoured to commit suicide; but the dose of laudanum

intended for the purpose, proving too great, his stomach rejected it in time to save his life. It, however, rendered him nearly insensible, and consequently prevented the anguish he must have experienced in his last moments from the conduct of his enemies and the brutality of the populace.

Several prosecutions were instituted in 1725, in order to prevent a shamefully indecent practice of the populace, which was the storming of hearses and tearing from them the various heraldic ornaments used at funerals.

A dissolute young man named Gibson, a Mercer, and one of the Society of friends, occasioned very serious riots in the summer of 1727 by persisting to preach in defiance of the elders of Gracechurch street meeting, and indeed of the whole posse of the Police, who were more than once compelled to convey him by force to St. George's fields, where he was permitted to hold forth unmolested. Gibson had a mob constantly surrounding him, which committed many extravagances.

He afterwards rented the London Assurance Coffee-house in Birchin-lane, before which he erected a sign representing a person extended on his back with the head bloody and a hat and wig near him. Several persons supposed to have committed the assault were shewn hiding under bushes. In another part of the design, the wounded person waded through a marsh

supported by crutches, and a friend assisted him towards a house on a hill. The other side represented him lying on his face, and again washing blood and tears from his features; a rising moon in each painting lighted the scene, under which was inscribed "Gibson from Gracechurch-street."—The aim of Gibson in this allegory was to introduce himself to the publick in a pitiable situation, to shew the Quakers in a disgraceful light as assassins, and to compliment the friend by whom he was placed in his new house.

The populace had not indulged in their favourite excesses for several years; but, an opportunity occurring in September 1729, they seized it with avidity. The King had been to Hanover, and, returning in safety, a party from Whitechapel chose to express their loyalty by breaking many hundreds of windows on each side of the way between that place and Charing-cross, under a pretence that the inhabitants should have illuminated them. The damage done by these desperadoes is said to have amounted to more than 1000l.; and it is remarkable that the King rode through the same street within an hour after the havock had been committed; no doubt, infinitely vexed that he was the innocent cause of so much injury to his peaceable subjects.

The public mind was greatly agitated in 1733 by the introduction of an Excise bill into the House of Commons, which experienced great

opposition, and was deferred till June in that year. The populace, highly elated, made effigies of the Minister, burnt them in various places, and demonstrated their joy by breaking numbers of windows. This excess was repeated on the anniversary of the above event with increased violence, when, in addition to breaking the Lord Mayor's windows, they broke his officers' heads; but several of the ringleaders were apprehended, and sent to different prisons.

On the 30th of March, 1734, a disgraceful tumult occurred in Suffolk-street, Charing-cross, occasioned by several young men whose situation in life ought to have produced far different conduct. They met at a house in the above street under the denomination of the Calves-head club, prepared a fire before the door, and after several indecent orgies appeared at the first-floor windows with wine and a calf's head dressed in a napkin cap, which they threw into the flames with loud huzzas. As the populace assembled round the fire were entertained with plenty of beer, they shouted at many of the toasts drank by the Club ; but, some being proposed that interfered with the Majesty of the People, they were considered as the signal for attack, which immediately commenced with so much impetuosity as to render it necessary for the founders of the feast to fly for their lives. The mob broke all the windows of the house, forcibly entered it, and demolished

every article in their way, to the amount of several hundred pounds. The royal guards put an end to the tumult. I have a print, published immediately after the transaction, which faithfully represents the wickedness and folly of it.

"The Hyp Doctor" observed on this occasion: "It is an honour to the Dissenters, that we do not hear of one of their body who belonged to this ingenious and refined cabal. It must not be overlooked, that if the report be right, the Calves-heads were bought in St. James's-market; the double entendre was intended to have wit prepense ; but methinks the emblem was wrong-headed ; for how can a Calf , which is a tame gentle creature , and incapable of sin , represent a supposed Tyrant, or a bad Monarch? Some of the parties concerned were, as the chronicles of Suffolk-street record it, sons of nobles of England, Scotland, and Ireland, besides Commoners; but the transaction was carried on , like Io in the farce , by a Bull rather than a Calf (by which it might appear to be more Irish than English), if you examine the criticism of the Shew . It was a sequel to Punch at the masquerade, putting his Opera bills into the hands of some too great for a familiar mention; but neither the Haymarket Punch, nor the Suffolk-street Puppet-shew took : one was acted but once, the other was not acted thoroughly the first time: the people were the criticks , the connoisseurs,

and corrected the play. We are now assured it had no plot ; the head had no brains , like Æsop's masks: this may be true, but no credit to a tragi-comedy: it only proved they were no Poets , and but indifferent actors . Was there none who bore a Calf's-head couped , as the Heralds speak, in his coat of Arms? The device of the escutcheon might be more significant than that of the Club . Such a proceeding might have been proper in a slaughter-house ; but, perhaps, they were replenished with the wisdom of the Egyptians, who worshiped Osiris in the form of a Calf : was it an Essex or a Middlesex Calf?—Baa be the motto of this speculation. The Gens Vitellia, the Vitellian family at Rome, were denominated from the like. This adds light from the Roman history."

The next disturbance of the public peace proceeded from the dregs of the people, who were exasperated beyond measure at the laudable attempts of their superiors to suppress the excessive use of Gin ; and their resentment became so very turbulent in September 1736, that they even presumed to exclaim in the streets, "No Gin no King :" in consequence, double guards were posted at Kensington, St. James's, Somerset-house, and the Rolls. Besides these precautions, 500 of the Grenadier-guards, and the Westminster troop of Horse-militia, were distributed as patroles, and in Hyde and St. James's Parks, Covent-garden, &c.

Many satirical and pleasant attacks upon that pernicious liquor appeared in the diurnal publications; two of which are worth preserving:

"To the dear and regretted memory of the best and most potent of cheap liquors, Geneva; the solace of the hen-pecked husband, the kind companion of the neglected wife, the infuser of courage in the tame and standing army, the source of the thief's resolution, the support of pawnbrokers, tally-men, receivers of stolen goods, and a long et cetera of other honest fraternities, alike useful and glorious to the Commonwealth. A Victor , fuller of fire than Bajazet, and who destroyed more men than Tamerlane in his numerous conquests. The bane of chastity, the foe of honesty, the friend of infidelity, the very spirit of sedition , through the inhuman malice of —— and ——, by the edge of an Act of Parliament, cut off in her prime September 19, 1736, anno regni Georgii secundi decimo. Her constant votary Nicholas No-shoes , in testimony of a friendship subsisting after death, erects this monument.

"Attend, my Sons, and you, my friends, draw near,

And on my last remain bestow a tear;

Your dear, dear Punch, must yield his nect'rous breath,

And ere to-morrow noon submit to death.

No hopes of pardon, no reprieve is nigh,

My death is sign'd: and must I, must I die?

It is resolv'd.—Then rouse your noble souls,

And crown this night with cheerful flowing bowls;

Let none but you, my friends, support my pall,

And bilk those fops who triumph in my fall[51:A]."

Numberless evasions of the Act were practised; and even Apothecaries were tempted to retail Gin under the specious name of a medicine or cordial.

The month of July 1736 afforded a singular popular explosion , contrived in the following strange manner. A brown paper parcel, which had been placed unobserved near the side-bar of the Court of King's-bench, Westminster-hall, blew up during the solemn proceedings of the Courts of Justice assembled, and scattered a number of printed bills, giving notice, that on the last day of Term five Acts of Parliament would be publicly burnt in the hall, between the hours of twelve and one, at the Royal Exchange, and at St. Margaret's hill, which were the Gin Act, the Smuggling Act, the Mortmain Act, the Westminster Bridge Act, and the Act for borrowing 600,000l. on the Sinking fund.

One of the bills was immediately carried to the Grand Jury then sitting, who found it an infamous libel, and recommended the offering of a reward to discover the author.

The labourers and weavers of Spitalfields were infected with a contagious mania at the same period, which led them to suppose that numbers of Irishmen had recently arrived in London, for the purpose of working at under-prices and starving

them. Influenced by a species of despair they assembled in crowds, and proceeded to Brick-lane, Whitechapel, where they immediately attacked a house supposed to contain Irishmen, and completely destroyed it, bearing away the furniture in triumph; but they lost one man, and had several wounded, by a musket discharged amongst them from the house. The neighbouring Magistrates, alarmed at this outrage, immediately attended at the scene of action, and read the Riot Act, but without effect, although the Tower Hamlet association and a party of the Tower guard were summoned to their assistance; nor did they desist till a company of Regulars dispersed them by force.

Several severe combats occurred between the English and Irish in other parts of the town, in which much mischief was done to each party. The cause appears to have originated chiefly through the parsimony of the person who contracted to erect the new church of St. Leonard Shoreditch, in employing no other than Irish labourers at five or six shillings a week, when the British demanded twelve shillings. These two affairs occurring nearly together led government to suspect the authors of the paper-plot, and the rioters, or at least their leaders, to have been connected in seditious if not treasonable designs.

An estimate was made in July 1738 of the numbers convicted under the Act for preventing the excessive use of spirituous liquors. Claims were entered at the Excise-office by 4000 persons

for the 5l. allowed to the informer from the penalty of 100l., 4896 such convictions having taken place. 3000 persons paid 10l. each to avoid being sent to Bridewell; and it was computed that 12,000 informations had been laid within the bills of mortality only. It is therefore not to be wondered at that the newspapers frequently mentioned the quiet and decency observed in the streets subsequent to these convictions; but in effecting them several informers were killed, and others dreadfully hurt, by the mob.

It sometimes happens that articles of information are so vaguely mentioned in the public papers, that, though they might be understood by their contemporaries, we are at a loss to comprehend them. An instance of this kind occurred in August 1757, when a number of riotous persons assembled before the Craven-arms, Southampton-street, with an intention to level it with the earth, and destroy the goods; but for what reason the papers are silent. The officers of the Police attended, but were beat off with stones; and it was two o'clock in the morning before two serjeants and twenty-four soldiers of the guards could disperse them; at which hour fourteen were apprehended, several wounded, and two were afterwards committed to prison. The following letter was sent on this occasion to Mr. Justice Fielding:

Christ-church, Surrey, Aug. 13, 1757.

"Sir,

"We beg leave to acquaint you, that the house known by the sign of the Craven-arms, in Southampton-street, belongs to a charity in our parish; and we therefore beg the favour of you to use what methods shall seem right to prevent the populace doing any farther damage to it: and as to any extraordinary expence which may happen on this account, the trustees will readily pay. A Committee of the Trustees of the Charity will be immediately called, and they will do themselves the pleasure of waiting on you. We are, Sir, &c.

Jackson, Rector,

Bartho. Payne, Churchwarden.

Henry Bunn, Secretary to the Trust[54:A]."

Nothing particular occurred for upwards of a year after the above outrage; but in October 1758, the brutality of the mob was excited by the interment of Mr. Wilson, an undertaker and pawnbroker, who had kept the Punch-bowl near Moorgate. The cause of their resentment proves that a British mob generally acts upon a noble principle; as the deceased was reported to have left a legacy of 200l. to be paid in groats to those persons who were then imprisoned at his suit, though he died rich. This malice from the grave justly exasperated all who knew of it; and their anger was properly inflamed by observing that a detachment of the Artillery company, to which Wilson had belonged, intended to pay him military honours on the way to Islington, where he was to be buried. Every mark of abhorrence and contempt consequently ensued from an astonishing number of persons, who severely hurt each other by collision; and it was with the utmost difficulty that the priest performed his office.

I am sorry to add that at the same time some miscreants in the middle rank of life, inflamed by dissipation, were in the practice of pretending to fight every evening on Ludgate-hill, for the diabolical pleasure of dealing blows indiscriminately on peaceable passengers; and, to use their own

words, "in order to see the claret run." These wretches who thus wantonly attacked the publick, broke the leg of a Constable, and bruised several watchmen, before they could secure two of them, who were committed till the Constable recovered.

Five years passed without producing a single offence committed by numbers acting under temporary impulse; at length an affray happened between certain Irish chairmen and sailors, who were all inflamed by liquor, drank in honour of the election held in Covent-garden March 1763. After they had abused each other with the usual language of vulgar irritation, a challenge was offered by a chairman to fight the best sailor present: this ended in the defeat of the Irishman, who was instantly reinforced by his brethren, when a general attack with pokers, tongs, fenders, &c. &c. commenced on the sailors; those, supported by a party of unarmed soldiers, drove their antagonists from the field, and immediately proceeded to demolish every chair they could find. These outrages continued till evening, and by that time a general muster of chairmen had taken place, who, exasperated to madness, beat down men, women, and children, in their progress to the scene of action, where a dreadful conflict was prevented by a party of Soldiers from the Savoy, whose exertions accomplished the capture of some of the ringleaders, but not before a Soldier and a Sailor, and three other persons, had been

dangerously wounded, and the King's-head ale-house almost demolished.

The hardy seamen, defenders of our island, are excellent subjects when on-board their respective ships, but they are very apt to be turbulent on shore; another instance of which succeeded the Covent-garden riot almost immediately, though the cause was different. The conduct of the Sailor is generally exceedingly thoughtless: low drinking-houses and women are their favourite sources of amusement; and the keepers of the former, united with the latter, never fail to make them repent, as far as their insensible minds are susceptible. The Police of the Tower Hamlets, aware of this, frequently sent peace-officers to houses of ill-fame, in order to apprehend the most obnoxious inmates; and in pursuit of this laudable custom several women and a few sailors were sent to the Round-house in March 1763. On the following morning they were taken before the Magistrates then assembled at the Black-horse near the Victualling-office for examination; there numbers of Sailors collected, and demanded the release of their comrades, which the Justices complied with; but, still dissatisfied, they insisted on the enlargement of the women. This presumptuous request was, however, positively refused, and the Magistrates, dreading the consequences, sent three different times for detachments of Soldiers to support their authority, and as an equipoise for the increasing numbers of the

Sailors, who assembled from all sides to the amount, it is said, of more than a thousand: the Riot Act was read no less than three times to no purpose, during which time the Sailors had obtained flags from the shipping, and having marshalled themselves in a line of battle, they bore down on the Soldiers drawn up to receive them. At the instant the commanding officer of the latter was about to pronounce the dreadful word Fire! a naval officer made his appearance in front of the Sailors, and intreated the order might be reserved till he had endeavoured to convince his brethren of the impropriety of their conduct. He then addressed himself to the Sailors, and said they would forfeit the favour of the King, who had promised to take off their R's; to which he added other arguments, and at length prevailed upon two-thirds of them to follow him to Tower-hill, where he dismissed them.

A Serjeant and twelve Soldiers were sent about four o'clock on the same afternoon to Clerkenwell Bridewell, as an escort to eight of the women who had occasioned the riot. Those were pursued by a party of Sailors, and overtaken at Chiswell-street. The instant release of the prisoners was demanded and refused, when one of the Soldiers fired, and wounded a Sailor and a Baker; but, as the assailants became more violent after this precipitation, the Serjeant wisely determined to resign his charge, rather than cause farther bloodshed.

The Weavers resident in Spital-fields were the next disturbers of the public peace. Those useful members of Society had long disputed with their employers respecting their wages; and at length a compromise took place, when printed papers of the various prices of their work were distributed, in order to prevent future disputes. Some avaricious master-weavers, however, thought proper to reduce the weaving of certain articles one half-penny per yard; and hence the riots, which commenced with the destruction of the looms belonging to one of the most active opponents of the journeymen, whose effigies they afterwards placed in a cart, hanged, and burnt. This conduct, though highly improper, was innocence compared with that now to be related, which originated in the strange folly and wickedness of Seamen almost at the same time. The narrative was compiled from the minutes of the Coroner's Inquest.

"On Thursday last an inquisition was taken in Holywell-street, Shoreditch, upon the bodies of Ralph Meadows and John Whitrow, two of the persons killed in the late riot before a public house, known by the sign of the Marquis of Granby's-head, in Holywell-street. The inquisition lasted six hours. It appeared in the evidence, that on Monday last, about one o'clock, a great mob assembled before and in the dwelling-house of Thomas Kelly the publican, committing outrages; that on application to two Magistrates,

they wrote to the Lieutenant of the third regiment of foot-guards, then on duty, with an Ensign and 100 men under his command, in Spital-fields, on account of a late riot there, acquainting him, that there was a great mob assembled in Holywell-street, Shoreditch, who had broke open a house in a violent and outrageous manner, to the terror of his Majesty's quiet subjects, and in breach of the peace; and desiring him to attend with a proper force to disperse the mob and stop their proceedings.

"The Lieutenant assembled as many of his men as the short notice would permit, before the passage door leading to the said public house, where he found a great crowd of people; and on going into the house with the Justices' order in his hand, he found some very desperate fellows in it, some in sailors' habits, who were cursing and swearing that they would not leave the house, but do what they pleased; one of them behaving in a very affronting manner to the Lieutenant, some of the soldiers led him out. About three o'clock, the Lieutenant prevailed on them to depart, and they went away quietly, leaving only a crowd of people standing before the passage door, who had gathered there out of curiosity. The Lieutenant then withdrew himself, leaving only a Serjeant, Corporal, and twelve private soldiers, which he did at the solicitation of the publican, who was afraid of a second attack. The Lieutenant then went to dinner, and informed the Serjeant he

would return in an hour. For about half an hour all was quiet; and then a gentleman came up to the Serjeant, and bade him take care of himself, as there was a body of sailors coming up the street, d—ing their eyes, declaring, 'they would clear the soldiers, and pull the house down.' The Serjeant seeing them advance, looked round to the soldiers, and said, 'There they come;' and ordered his men to stand to their arms, and he would meet the rioters, but bade them fix their bayonets. He approached about twelve yards towards the rioters, and pulled off his hat, and said, 'Gentlemen, I hope you do not come with any intent to make a disturbance.' They d—ned their eyes, and informed him, that 'they had got one man, and would have the landlord of the house.' The Serjeant, telling them 'that he was placed there by an order from the civil power to take care of the house and preserve the peace,' returned to his command. The sailors then advanced, and some of them mounted the sign-post, and to prevent their getting up, some of the soldiers gently struck them with their pieces; but the Serjeant, finding them resolute to take down the sign, ordered the soldiers to let them, and informed the soldiers, that he was then in hopes to disperse them without mischief. As soon as the sign was down, they gave a huzza, and some of them called out, 'Now for the landlord,' and in a riotous manner advanced with their sticks towards the passage which the soldiers were guarding.

The Serjeant informed them he could not admit them into the house upon any account: upon which they began to beat with their sticks, and press on the soldiers; and the serjeant ordered the soldiers to charge (which is fixing their musquets breast high) but it had no effect: they then assaulted the soldiers with pieces of brick, tile, and great quantities of mud, and forced two bayonets from the musquets, one of which was broke, and the other was taken up by one of the sailors, with which he made a full push at the Serjeant, but he happily warded it off with his halbert; and the sailors got between him and his men, and attacked them with such violence that they were forced into the passage which leads to the public-house, and thereupon a battle ensued, and the Serjeant used all his endeavours to come to his men, but he was prevented by the sailors, and received several blows. The men being thus pressed into the passage, were obliged to fire, and two pieces were discharged, which, from the faint report, and no mischief being done, and the sailors not giving way, the witnesses all declared, that they believed the pieces were loaded with gunpowder only. The sailors continuing to press violently upon the soldiers, and endeavouring to force the passage, the soldiers fired again, and two men, amongst the rioters, were seen to drop.

"The sailors now became very desperate, and most violently assaulted the soldiers with their sticks; and the soldiers were, through inevitable

necessity, in defence of their lives, and for the public peace, obliged to fire, and the firing continued till they cleared the passage and street before it, which was very soon done: upon which the Serjeant took the opportunity of running to his men, and cried out, 'For God's sake fire no more.' He then drew all his men out of the passage, and formed a square in the street, and ordered them to ease their arms, and on looking about him he saw three men lying dead in the street, two of which appeared to be sailors. Several of the soldiers' fingers were bloody from the blows they received from the rioters. In the riot two sailors jumped into a window belonging to a butcher's house, near the public-house, and one of them taking a chopper out of the shop, endeavoured to rush by the Corporal into the passage to the public-house, but was seized by the Corporal to prevent his going in, by which means the Corporal's hand was cut by the chopper to such a degree, that he was obliged to be sent to an hospital.

"The witnesses swore, that they verily believed the soldiers were obliged to fire in defence of their lives, as well as for the preservation of the public peace; and the Jury were well satisfied with the evidence before them.

"The Coroner, in summing up the evidence, distinguished between murder, manslaughter, and justifiable or excusable homicides, both voluntary

and involuntary; and chance-medley, or homicide by misadventure; under one of which classes, he informed the Jury, the present case must fall. He observed, that the soldiers did not come to that place wantonly to do an injury, but were called in, as the Lieutenant understood, and so called it (when he produced his authority) in his evidence, 'by an order from the civil power,' to suppress the rioters, and preserve the King's peace; and whether the civil power had taken the proper steps before applying to the military, or whether the notice sent to the Lieutenant was a legal warrant or order, or not, were not matters of their enquiry; for that, supposing a Justice of Peace should issue an illegal warrant, and an officer should be killed in the execution of it, in that case the party killing would be deemed a murderer; for the officer was obliged to execute his office: he is not supposed to be a judge of law; he is only a minister of Justice, and the party had a legal remedy, if he had been improperly arrested. The Coroner said, that the conduct of the military power upon that occasion was the immediate subject of their enquiry; that, if the Jury gave credit to the witnesses, the major part of whom were disinterested persons, the soldiers did not fire till they were pressed to it, by inevitable necessity, in defence of their own lives, and for the preservation of the public peace; and in killing any of the rioters, had done no more

than 'Justifiable Homicides' of inevitable necessity, for the preservation of the King's peace, and in defence of themselves; and added, that in such case, if any person was killed that was not concerned in the riot, but unfortunately hemmed in by the rioters, or was passing along at that time, in that case it would be chance-medley, or homicide per infortunium, that is, death by misadventure; and as it did not appear to the Jury that the persons upon whom they then sat were acting in the riot, the Jury found the special matter, and brought in their verdict Homicides by Misadventure.

"After the riot by the sailors was over, the people collected, and were so much enraged against the soldiers, that the Lieutenant was obliged to send to the Tower for a reinforcement to prevent mischief; and they continued under arms till near twelve at night, when he withdrew, leaving at the public-house a Serjeant, Corporal, and twenty private men, who, reporting the next morning that all was well, were ordered to their several quarters."

A third scene of popular tumult occurred before the close of the year 1763, and was caused by the execution of the sentence of burning Mr. Wilkes's celebrated Number 45 of the North Briton.

The 3d of December was appointed for this silly ceremony, which took place before the

Royal Exchange amidst the hisses and execrations of the mob, not directed at the obnoxious paper, but at Alderman Harley, the Sheriffs, and constables; the latter of whom were compelled to fight furiously through the whole business. The instant the hangman held the work to a lighted link it was beat to the ground; and the populace, seizing the faggots prepared to complete its destruction, fell upon the peace-officers, and fairly threshed them from the field; nor did the Alderman escape without a contusion on the head, inflicted by a billet thrown through the glass of his coach; and several other persons had reason to repent the attempt to burn that publicly which the sovereign people determined to approve, who afterwards exhibited a large jack boot at Temple-bar, and burnt it in triumph, unmolested, as a species of retaliation.

February in the following year produced another description of outrage; and, as the mob arranged themselves on the side of Liberty in the above instance, they determined in the following to adopt the cause of Justice, though, as it almost always happens, they listened only to one side of the case; in short, they are generally a Jury who retire for a verdict when the evidence for the prosecution is closed. The Ambassador from the Emperor of Morocco resided in Panton-square, and had in his suite a female servant who was arrested for debt, and sent to a receiving or

spunging house. When the Resident heard of this violation of diplomatic privilege, he immediately demanded that the woman should be restored to liberty; and the officer in whose custody she was, knowing of the illegality of the arrest, complied. So far all was right; but the plaintiff (a chairman) despising the law of Nations, watched at the Ambassador's door, and as soon as he obtained a glimpse of his debtor claimed her as his wife , and under that claim compelled her to attend him to a public-house in the neighbourhood. Though the good lady strained every faculty in denying his assumed rights, her clamour, of no avail with the chairman, reached the ears of her fellow servants, who, melted with her distress, sallied forth, and manfully released the captive from the fangs of a number of the captor's brethren, whom he had wisely stationed at the public-house to assist him in his views. Thus defeated, the creditor adopted a most certain method to carry his point. He therefore assembled his posse in front of the Ambassador's house, and began his operations by loud complaints, intended for the ears of those who passed, that the servants of his Excellency had forcibly seized on his wife, and conveyed her for some very dreadful purpose into his mansion, where she was detained to his inexpressible grief and terror. A hint of this description is sufficient in the streets of London; curiosity soon collects a

crowd, and the idea of injustice or oppression flies like lightning from male to female, kindling in its progress the very essence of indignation, and an immediate resolve to execute summary justice. An hundred voices demanded the woman; an hundred arms were lifted at the same moment with hands grasping dirt and stones, which they hurled at the inoffensive windows without effect. At this moment a cry to burst the door was accompanied by a successful effort, and in rushed the mob; every thing that could be broken in the parlours was demolished, and used as weapons for forcing the besieged, now driven to the stairs head of the first floor, where they appeared, commanded by the Ambassador and a gentleman, armed with drawn sabres. Intimidated at the glances of the shining steel, the besiegers dared not ascend, but made a drawn battle of the affair. A cannonade of legs and arms of chairs, and other articles of broken furniture, succeeded, which no sooner reached the heads of those above than they were darted back with additional velocity. Captain Woolaston of the guards happened to pass through the square with a party of soldiers, on his way to protect the sufferers from a fire then raging in Eagle-street; and, attracted by the shouts of the contending forces, examined into the affair, and soon dispersed the rioters, several of whom were afterwards apprehended by Justice Welch, and committed to prison.

In May 1764 several footmen who had attended their masters to Ranelagh thought proper to attack certain gentlemen there for refusing vails to their servants; and, not contented with hissing and abusing them , proceeded to destroy the fences, break the lamps, and throw stones through the windows upon the company in the Rotunda. The ringleaders were as usual apprehended, and constables were afterwards placed at Ranelagh to preserve the peace; but the best part of the fact is that those worthy officers of Justice actually drank till they were intoxicated on a subsequent evening, and fought in the midst of the company .

We have now arrived at a period when riot and outrage was, to use a modern phrase, organized ; every real or imaginary evil led to extremities, and the quiet Citizen passed his days in constant apprehension. The year 1768 commenced with a fresh display of the turbulence of weavers, who went well armed to the houses of other journeymen in the same business, called single-handed Weavers, to revenge the injuries asserted to have been inflicted by them on the engine-loom Weavers, where they secured several, and conveyed them to a Magistrate; and it appeared on examination their complaints were well founded, as they proved the prisoners and their brethren had even fired into their windows. Others in April, armed with cutlasses, pistols, &c. and in

disguise, went at 12 o'clock at night to the residences of several journeymen in Spital-fields; and cut to pieces 16 looms, with their contents, which belonged to Messrs. Everard and Phipps. On a subsequent nocturnal excursion those miscreants narrowly escaped from a party of soldiers who had nearly surrounded them unperceived.

Influenced by the above pernicious examples, the Coal-heavers of the Metropolis entered into combinations before the end of April; and collecting in considerable numbers went through Wapping, and thence on board of colliers, where with weapons in hand they compelled their sable brethren to desist from working, and even dangerously wounded several. In this instance the military prevented greater outrages.

In May a large body of Sailors with drums and flags proceeded in two divisions to St. James's Palace, and presented a petition to the King, praying for an increase of their pay in consideration of the high price of provisions. On the 10th of the same month, and at four o'clock in the morning, many boats, manned by Sailors and Coal-heavers, entered upon a survey of the wharfs above Blackfriars-bridge, and compelled all they found at work to join them; others patroled the streets, and collected those who were at home and in public-houses; when they began their operations by forcing the drivers of carts and waggons loaded with coals, flour, and wood, to return whence

they came. After this operation had been completely accomplished, they marched in a body, increasing as they went, to Stepney-fields, whence parties of them proceeded to unrig such vessels as they chose to prevent from sailing. The fraternity of Sawyers, equally refractory, destroyed an excellent saw-mill then recently erected by Charles Dingley, Esq. almost at the same instant.

Government acted on this trying occasion with great lenity, or was under the influence of fear; and it plainly appears that the safety of the publick in their lives and property originated rather from the tempered madness of the rioters, than in any dread of resistance from the Police or the Military. We are told of the marching of troops, and of orders issued to Magistrates to be vigilant; yet the populace, inflamed by politicks, even ventured to chalk No. 45 on the coaches of the nobility as they passed through the streets. The cause of this irritation I hardly need inform my readers was Mr. Wilkes, whose conduct in attacking the Ministry had excited ministerial anger to a degree that alarmed all ranks of people lest arbitrary proceedings should be substituted for constitutional, to gratify that resentment; and some of the decisions of the Courts proved their fears to be well-founded. Thus far I have thought it necessary to state the cause, but by no means intend to enter into the merits of the case, which I shall conclude with Mr. Wilkes's address to the

Gentlemen, Clergy, and Freeholders of the county of Middlesex, in order to explain the origin of the subsequent bloodshed.

"Gentlemen,

"In support of the liberties of this country against the arbitrary rule of Ministers, I was before committed to the Tower, and am now sentenced to this prison. Steadiness with, I hope, strength of mind, do not however leave me; for the same consolation follows me here, the consciousness of innocence, of having done my duty, and exerted all my poor abilities, not unsuccessfully, for this nation. I can submit even to far greater sufferings with cheerfulness, because that I see that my countrymen reap the happy fruits of my labours and cruel persecutions, by the repeated decisions of our sovereign Courts of Justice in favour of liberty. I therefore bear up with fortitude, and even glory that I am called to suffer in this cause, because I continue to find the noblest reward—the applause of my native country, of this great, free, and spirited people.

"I chiefly regret, gentlemen, that this confinement deprives me of the honour of thanking you in person according to my promise, and at present takes from me in a great degree the power of being useful to you. The will, however, to do every service to my constituents remains in its full force; and when my sufferings

have a period, the first day I regain my liberty shall restore a life of zeal in the cause and interests of the county of Middlesex.

"In this prison, in any other, in every place, my ruling passion will be the love of England and our free Constitution. To those objects I will make every sacrifice. Under all the oppressions which ministerial rage and revenge can invent, my steady purpose is to concert with you, and other true friends of this country, the most probable means of rooting out the remains of arbitrary power and Star-chamber inquisition, and of improving as well as securing the generous plans of freedom, which were the boast of our ancestors, and I trust will remain the noblest inheritance of our posterity, the only genuine characteristic of Englishmen. I have, &c. &c.

John Wilkes.

"King's-bench Prison, May 5, 1768."

Some circumstances had induced the populace to suppose it was the intention of Government to remove Mr. Wilkes from the King's-bench to the House of Commons on Tuesday, May 10. Many idle and curious persons probably assembled near the gates to kill an hour by gazing at a man who had excited their attention, and many others doubtlessly attended for riotous and unjustifiable purposes, which Mr. Wilkes or any real patriot must have disapproved, though in the usual

blindness of zeal those purposes are generally disregarded as unworthy notice in the cause of liberty, when violent men choose to espouse her interest. A detestable incendiary, a successful villain, to whom I attribute the innocent deaths of those that fell on this fatal day, pasted certain doggrel lines on the prison walls which were read with avidity by the mob, and contributed to inflame their minds; they demanded the appearance of the prisoner with shouts, and at length several Magistrates and the military arrived, the paper was taken down, the riot commenced, the soldiers fired, and a young man named Allen fell under such circumstances as occasioned the following trial.

"Summary of the Trial of Donald Maclane, on Tuesday last, at Guildford Assizes, for the Murder of William Allen, jun. on the 10th of May last in St. George's Fields.

"Mr. Serjeant Leigh, Counsel for the prosecution, having opened the trial with a speech suitable to the purpose, proceeded to an examination of witnesses, and produced two, one Skidmore a discharged marine, and one Twaites a country lad, who had been about a fortnight in Mr. Allen's service as an ostler. These evidences swore positively to the identity of the prisoner, and were the only people on the part of the prosecution, who declared any knowledge of his

person. The latter, however, differed in his own accounts of the transaction; and the testimony which he gave before the Coroner was contradicted by the deposition which he gave into Court.

"The next witnesses, Okins and Brawn, swear that they were in the cow-house with Mr. Allen at the time he was shot; and the latter particularly says, that he was going to strike down the soldier's musquet, which was levelled at the deceased, but that another soldier seeming ready to present at himself, the care which he had for his own life, together with his terror at the situation of Mr. Allen, obliged him to retire. Okins says, that when he heard the soldier threaten Mr. Allen, he (Okins) fell down with an excess of apprehension; neither, however, though so near to the soldier, could swear to his identity; and what is the more remarkable, each was unseen by the other, Okins never once recollecting Brawn's being present, and Brawn being equally ignorant of Okins. Several other witnesses appeared for the prosecution, but as they prove nothing so material as the evidences already mentioned, and chiefly tend to clear up what is universally admitted, namely, Mr. Allen's being wholly unconcerned in the riots of the day, it is not necessary to take any particular notice of them.

"The evidence for the prosecution being ended, the prisoner's Counsel produced their witnesses; the first of whom, Samuel Gillam, Esq. declared, that on the 10th of May, having been previously applied to by the Marshal of the King's Bench prison for a guard, he came into St. George's Fields, where a detachment of one hundred men, properly officered, had been ordered. Here the mob were exceedingly riotous; and Mr. Gillam tells us, that he himself was several times struck with a variety of missile articles. A paper had been stuck up against the prison, which seemed the raving of some patriotic bedlamite, and in six lines, as stupid as they were seditious, talked about Liberty being confined with Mr. Wilkes, and desiring all good Englishmen to pay their daily homage, at the place where those invaluable blessings were lodged. This paper had been taken down by the Constables, a circumstance which gave the generous assertors of Freedom incredible offence, and they roared out, 'the paper, the paper, give us the paper.' Mr. Gillam answered, that if any person there would claim the property of the paper, it should be immediately restored, and gave it into Mr. Ponton's hands, before the rioters, to keep till somebody should be bold enough to make so particular a demand. This enraged the populace still farther, and a Patriot in two dirty red waistcoats, but without

any coat, distinguished himself in throwing stones at the Magistrates, and the Constables received orders to apprehend him; in this service they were assisted by Mr. Murray, the Ensign on duty, and five or six grenadiers. The fellow fled, and was pursued by the grenadiers; he escaped into a Cow-house, and shut the door after him, but the soldiers continued their pursuit, and in a little time the report of a musquet was heard; in a few minutes after they returned, and Peter Mac Cloughlan, with an air of great concern, and a tone of much distress, informed Mr. Murray that his piece had gone off accidentally, and that a man was killed—'Damn you,' replied Mr. Murray, 'Who gave you orders to fire?' 'Nobody,' answered Mac Cloughlan; 'it went off entirely by accident.' This circumstance Mr. Gillam deposed he took particular notice of, because the man testified every natural sign of concern and humanity.

"The Cow-house has three doors or gates, one at each side, and another at one of the ends. The fellow in the red waistcoat got in at a side door, and is supposed to have escaped the opposite way; just at this unfortunate crisis young Mr. Allen, who was also in a red waistcoat, entered at the door out of which the rioter had fled, so that when the soldiers opened the door nearest to them, they found a person in a red waistcoat, and this person was shot by Mac Cloughlan, as he himself

confessed; but whether by accident, or design is not at all necessary to the present object of enquiry; the enquiry now is, whether Mr. Allen was shot by Maclane, or whether he was not.

"Mr. Gillam swears peremptorily that Maclane is not the man who made the confession alluded to; and Corporal Neale, with Serjeant Earle, Serjeant Steuart, and several private men, who were that day in St. George's-fields, and some of whom were likewise at the Cow-house, in pursuit of the rioter, either declare, that they heard Mac Cloughlan's own acknowledgment of the fact, or swear that Maclane did not enter the Cow-house at all. One of the private men particularly, James Hide, says he was in the Cow-house when Mac Cloughlan's piece went off, and adds, that there was at that time nobody in it but the deceased, Mac Cloughlan, and himself.

"Many of the military witnesses swear that they can easily tell, by looking at a musquet, if it has been newly discharged; and they express themselves with certainty, that Maclane's was not discharged at all on the 10th of May. To this they add, that Mac Cloughlan, from an apprehension of consequences, has deserted.

"The evidence for the prosecution, however, took notice, that Maclane's musquet was particularly examined, and that he was even ordered from the ranks, upon a presumption, as they imagine, that the officers themselves were satisfied

he was the person by whom Mr. Allen had been killed. But this circumstance is very well accounted for on the other side; where several of the witnesses prove, that after the accidental discharge which Mac Cloughlan mentions of his piece, and the unhappy consequence, Mr. Murray, the Ensign, observing Maclane's musquet on a full cock, reproached him with negligence, and took the piece out of his hand to look at; Maclane mentioned in his excuse, that his flint was too large, and that if he kept it upon a half cock, he should lose all the priming from his pan.

"Some persons seeing the transaction, and hearing Maclane reproached, concluded he was the person who had shot Mr. Allen; and they pointed him out as a murderer; the officer, therefore, thought it necessary, for the man's security, to remove him from the ranks; but, finding him more liable to danger then than when he was with the corps, he ordered him to his former station.—However, as he was positively sworn to, the military were forced to give him up, notwithstanding their consciousness of his innocence; and Mr. Gillam, as a Magistrate, was obliged to receive the charge, notwithstanding he was so perfectly acquainted with Mac Cloughlan's declaration.

"Such was the general scope of the evidence on this trial; after which the Judge summed up the evidence, declined saying much from

himself, as the question did not turn upon any difficult points; the Jury withdrew, and in about an hour returned with a verdict of Not Guilty . Mr. Wilkes, who was all the time at the Red Lion Inn, opposite the Court, was taken to town the moment the prisoner was acquitted. He was only examined a few minutes by the Grand Jury. He was brought back on Tuesday night to the King's-bench Prison.

"The Grand Jury dismissed the bills against the officer and the other soldiers.

"The above trial began about half an hour after seven in the morning, and lasted near nine hours. The counsel for the prosecution were, Mr. Serjeant Leigh, Mr. Lucas, Mr. Lade, and Mr. Baker; those for the prisoner were, Mr. Hervey, Mr. Cox, Mr. Bishop, and Mr. Robinson."

The lines alluded to in the trial were:

"Let * * * * * Judges, Ministers combine,

And here great Wilkes and Liberty confine ;

Yet in each English heart secure their fame is,

In spite of crowded levies at St. J—s's.

Then, while in prison Envy dooms their stay,

Here grateful Britons daily homage pay."

It is by no means necessary to trace the effects of the several balls fired upon this occasion; it will be quite enough to add that the innocent alone suffered.

To conclude the eventful story of poor Allen; his remains were deposited in the church-yard of St. Mary Newington, Surrey, where political friends honoured his memory with a handsome, if not a superb monument, thus inscribed:

North side:

"Sacred to the memory of
William Allen,
An Englishman of unspotted life and amiable
disposition,

Who was inhumanly murdered near St. George's-fields, the 10th day of May, 1768, by the Scottish detachment from the army. His disconsolate parents, inhabitants of this parish, caused this tomb to be erected to an only son, lost to them and to the world, in his 20th year, as a monument of his virtues and their affection!"

South side:

"O disembody'd Soul! most rudely driven

From this low orb (our sinful seat) to Heaven;

While filial piety can please the ear,

Thy name will still occur, for ever dear:

This very spot, now humaniz'd, shall crave

From all a tear of pity on thy grave.

}

O flow'r of flow'rs! which we shall see no more,

No kind returning Spring can thee restore:

Thy loss thy hapless countrymen deplore."

East side:

"O earth! cover not thou my blood. Job xvi. 18."

West side:

"Take away the wicked from before the King, and his throne shall be established in righteousness. Prov. xxiii. 5."

The unwarrantable inferences of the above inscription, and the spirit which dictated the exposure of it, removes the compassion that posterity would otherwise have felt for the parents of the innocent youth, whose situation was certainly not more pitiable than that of the relatives of the other persons killed on the same day. If we had a single doubt that the senior Allen became a tool of party after perusing the epitaph, the petition which he put into the King's own hands on the 5th of October will prove it beyond dispute. His cries for vengeance proceeded not from a broken spirit; such would have forgiven mankind long before a year and three months had elapsed.

"To his MAJESTY.

"The humble Petition of William Allen, the disconsolate father of William Allen, who was barbarously murdered on the 10th of May, 1768.

"Most gracious Sovereign,

"Your Petitioner thinks it his duty to lay before your Majesty, with great humility, a short account of the unprovoked and outrageous murder committed by a Scotch officer, and three soldiers

of the same regiment, upon the innocent body of your Petitioner's only son: a youth that, all who knew him are ready to attest, was perfectly sober, temperate, humane, dutiful to his parents, and a sincere lover and worshiper of his God. It was a murder of so complicated a die, and attended by so many barbarous and cruel circumstances, as can hardly be paralleled in any former age, and is a disgrace to the present, which was proved to a demonstration, before an honest impartial Jury summoned by the Coroner, and the officer and soldiers brought in guilty of Wilful Murder ; yet, by the powerful interposition of the great, and the artful and sinister means of some of your Majesty's Justices, who ordered the soldiers to fire, and suffered one of the murderers to make his escape, and the others have been screened from the punishment they so justly deserved; and, as your Petitioner has been informed, some of them rewarded for committing this most execrable crime.

"That if your most gracious Majesty, the father of your people, would permit your unhappy Petitioner to lay the whole state of his case before you, he is well persuaded your Majesty's fatherly heart would sympathise with the still bleeding agonies of the disconsolate parents of so amiable a child, snatched from them by the hands of ruffians in the bloom of youth and innocence; of a daughter who did not long survive the untimely

death of her beloved brother, and of a most afflicted mother, who (though still alive) incessantly moans and weeps over the cruel death of the best of children, and cannot be comforted. Your Majesty can never be offended with your most afflicted Petitioner for applying to your Majesty for justice against the cruel murderers of his beloved child, whose blood cries aloud for vengeance.

"Your Majesty's Petitioner has spent a very large sum of money in the prosecution of the perpetrators of this horrid crime; and though this prosecution was carried on in your Majesty's name, yet it is a notorious fact, that your Majesty's Counsel, Solicitor, and Agents for the Treasury, were employed against me, appeared publicly at the Assizes, and by all other arbitrary acts, rendered every effort of your poor Petitioner vain and insignificant, to the astonishment of all unbiassed hearers who attended that trial. Your Petitioner, therefore, has no hopes of justice but from your Majesty: he has, indeed, this consolation left, that he proved by incontestable evidence that his son was innocent, and that he was not in the fields that fatal day, neither had he given the least offence to any person whatsoever; that he was employed in his own business to the very minute of his being killed adjoining his father's own premises; that neither his natural temper, nor inoffensive behaviour, ever tempted

him to mix with ill-disposed persons in any private or public disturbance of any kind, and was so remarkably harmless and mild, that he hath in these particulars hardly left his equal; for the truth of which facts, your Petitioner appeals to all that knew him.

"It is humbly hoped, your Majesty will pardon the length of this Petition, laid before you by the most disconsolate father of a murdered child, who now, with tears in his eyes, and a bleeding heart, lies prostrate at your Majesty's feet, meekly and humbly imploring your compassion and justice, equally due to the meanest of your subjects.

"Your Petitioner, therefore, most humbly beseeches your Majesty, to take the premises into your royal consideration, and to issue out your proclamation for apprehending the perpetrators of this horrid crime, which may still be useful, though it is a year and three months since the commission of the fact, that they may be brought to a fair trial, when your Petitioner will be ready to prove what he has asserted, or in any other way or method that your Majesty in your great wisdom and justice shall think most proper; and your Petitioner shall for ever pray for the ease, happiness, and prosperity of your Majesty's Royal person and posterity.

William Allen."

Exclusive of the foregoing attempt to terminate the strange infatuation of the people, a Proclamation was issued in the ensuing words:

"George R.

"Whereas it has been represented to us, that divers dissolute and disorderly persons have of late frequently assembled themselves together in a riotous and unlawful manner, to the disturbance of the public peace; and particularly, that large bodies of Seamen, consisting of several thousands, have assembled tumultuously upon the river Thames, and, under a pretence of the insufficiency of the wages allowed by the merchants and others, have in the most daring manner taken possession by violence of several outward-bound ships ready to sail, and by unbending the sails, and striking the yards and topmasts, have stopped them in the prosecution of their voyages; and that these acts of violence have been accompanied with threats of still greater outrages, which have spread terror and alarm among those most likely to be immediately affected thereby; and it has been further represented to us, that some of the said dissolute and disorderly persons have audaciously attempted to deter and intimidate the civil Magistrates from doing their duty: we, having taken the same into our serious consideration, and being duly sensible of the mischievous consequences that may ensue from the continuance or repetition of such disorders, have thought fit,

by and with the advice of our Privy-council, to issue this our Royal Proclamation; hereby strictly requiring and commanding the Lord Mayor, and other the Justices of the peace of our City of London, and also the Justices of the peace of our City and Liberties of Westminster and Borough of Southwark; and of our Counties of Middlesex, Surrey, Kent, and all other our peace-officers, that they do severally use their utmost endeavours, by every legal means in their power, effectually to prevent and suppress all riots, tumults, and unlawful assemblies; and to that end to put in due execution the laws and statutes now in force for preventing, suppressing, and punishing the same; and that all our loving subjects be aiding and assisting therein. And we do further graciously declare, that the said Magistrates, and all others acting in obedience to this our command, may rely on our Royal protection and support in so doing.