The spirit by which the Smeddumites were actuated in ecclesiastical
affairs, was a type and taste of the great distemper with which all the
world was, more or less, at the time inflamed, and which cast the ancient
state and monarchy of France into the perdition of anarchy and confusion.
I think, upon the whole, however, that our royal burgh was not afflicted
to any very dangerous degree, though there was a sort of itch of it among
a few of the sedentary orders, such as the weavers and shoemakers, who,
by the nature of sitting long in one posture, are apt to become subject
to the flatulence of theoretical opinions; but although this was my
notion, yet knowing how much better the king and government were
acquainted with the true condition of things than I could to a certainty
be, I kept a steady eye on the proceedings of the ministers and
parliament at London, taking them for an index and model for the
management of the public concerns, which, by the grace of God, and the
handling of my friends, I was raised up and set forward to undertake.
Seeing the great dread and anxiety that was above, as to the inordinate
liberty of the multitude, and how necessary it was to bridle popularity,
which was become rampant and ill to ride, kicking at all established
order, and trying to throw both king and nobles from the saddle, I
resolved to discountenance all tumultuous meetings, and to place every
reasonable impediment in the way of multitudes assembling together:
indeed, I had for many years been of opinion, that fairs were become a
great political evil to the regular shop-keepers, by reason of the
packmen, and other travelling merchants, coming with their wares and
under-selling us; so that both private interest and public principle
incited me on to do all in my power to bring our fair-days into
disrepute. It cannot be told what a world of thought and consideration
this cost me before I lighted on the right method, nor, without a dive
into the past times of antiquity, is it in the power of man to understand
the difficulties of the matter.
Some of our fair-days were remnants of the papistical idolatry, and
instituted of old by the Pope and Cardinals, in order to make an income
from the vice and immorality that was usually rife at the same. These,
in the main points, were only market-days of a blither kind than the
common. The country folks came in dressed in their best, the schools got
the play, and a long rank of sweety-wives and their stands, covered with
the wonted dainties of the occasion, occupied the sunny side of the High
Street; while the shady side was, in like manner, taken possession of by
the packmen, who, in their booths, made a marvellous display of goods of
an inferior quality, with laces and ribands of all colours, hanging down
in front, and twirling like pinnets in the wind. There was likewise the
allurement of some compendious show of wild beasts; in short, a swatch of
every thing that the art of man has devised for such occasions, to wile
away the bawbee.
Besides the fairs of this sort, that may be said to be of a pious origin,
there were others of a more boisterous kind, that had come of the times
of trouble, when the trades paraded with war-like weapons, and the
banners of their respective crafts; and in every seventh year we had a
resuscitation of King Crispianus in all his glory and regality, with the
man in the coat-of-mail, of bell-metal, and the dukes, and lord mayor of
London, at the which, the influx of lads and lasses from the country was
just prodigious, and the rioting and rampaging at night, the brulies and
the dancing, was worse than Vanity Fair in the Pilgrim's Progress.
To put down, and utterly to abolish, by stress of law, or authority, any
ancient pleasure of the commonality, I had learned, by this time, was not
wisdom, and that the fairs were only to be effectually suppressed by
losing their temptations, and so to cease to call forth any expectation
of merriment among the people. Accordingly, with respect to the fairs of
pious origin, I, without expounding my secret motives, persuaded the
council, that, having been at so great an expense in new-paving the
streets, we ought not to permit the heavy caravans of wild beasts to
occupy, as formerly, the front of the Tolbooth towards the Cross; but to
order them, for the future, to keep at the Greenhead. This was, in a
manner, expurgating them out of the town altogether; and the consequence
was, that the people, who were wont to assemble in the High Street, came
to be divided, part gathering at the Greenhead, round the shows, and part
remaining among the stands and the booths; thus an appearance was given
of the fairs being less attended than formerly, and gradually, year after
year, the venerable race of sweety-wives, and chatty packmen, that were
so detrimental to the shopkeepers, grew less and less numerous, until the
fairs fell into insignificance.
At the parade fair, the remnant of the weapon-showing, I proceeded more
roundly to work, and resolved to debar, by proclamation, all persons from
appearing with arms; but the deacons of the trades spared me the trouble
of issuing the same, for they dissuaded their crafts from parading.
Nothing, however, so well helped me out as the volunteers, of which I
will speak by and by; for when the war began, and they were formed,
nobody could afterwards abide to look at the fantastical and disorderly
marching of the trades, in their processions and paradings; so that, in
this manner, all the glory of the fairs being shorn and expunged, they
have fallen into disrepute, and have suffered a natural suppression.