Anciently I have read that there were three principal churches in London
that had each of them a famous school belonging to it; and these three
churches are supposed to be—(1) The Cathedral Church of St. Paul,
because, at a general council holden at Rome, anno 1176, it was decreed,
“That every cathedral church should have its schoolmaster, to teach poor
scholars and others as had been accustomed, and that no man should take
any reward for licence to teach.” (2) The Abbey Church of St Peter at
Westminster; for of the school here Ingulphus, Abbot of Croyland, in the
reign of William the Conqueror, writes as follows: “I, Ingulphus, a
humble servant of God, born of English parents, in the most beautiful
city of London, for attaining to learning was first put to Westminster,
and after to study at Oxford,” &c. (3) The Abbey Church of St. Saviour,
at Bermondsey, in Southwark; for this is supposed to be the most ancient
and most considerable monastery about the city at that time, next to that
of St. Peter at Westminster, though there is no doubt but the convents of
St. John by Clerkenwell, St. Bartholomew in Smithfield, St. Mary Overy in
Southwark, that of the Holy Trinity by Aldgate, and other monasteries
about the city, had their respective schools, though not in such
reputation as the three first. Of these none are now existing but St.
Paul’s and Westminster, though perhaps on different and later
foundations. Yet other schools have been erected in this metropolis from
time to time, amongst which I find that called Merchant Taylors’ to be
the most considerable.
St. Paul’s School is situated on the east side of St. Paul’s Churchyard,
being a handsome fabric built with brick and stone, founded by John
Collet, D.D. and Dean of St. Paul’s, anno 1512, who appointed a
high-master, sur-master, a chaplain or under-master, and 153 scholars, to
be taught by them gratis, of any nation or country. He also left some
exhibitions to such scholars as are sent to the universities and have
continued at this school three years. The masters are elected by the
wardens and assistants of the Mercers’ Company, and the scholars are
admitted by the master upon a warrant directed to him by the surveyor.
The elections for the university are in March, before Lady Day, and they
are allowed their exhibitions for seven years. To this school belongs a
library, consisting chiefly of classic authors. The frontispiece is
adorned with busts, entablature, pediments, festoons, shields, vases, and
the Mercers’ arms cut in stone, with this inscription over the door:
INGREDERE UT PROFICIAS. Upon every window of the school was written, by
the founder’s direction: AUT DOCE, AUT DISCE, AUT DISCEDE—_i.e._, Either
teach, learn, or begone.
The founder, in the ordinances to be observed in this school, says he
founded it to the honour of the Child Jesus, and of His blessed mother
Mary; and directs that the master be of a healthful constitution, honest,
virtuous, and learned in Greek and Latin; that he be a married or single
man, or a priest that hath no cure; that his wages should be a mark a
week, and a livery gown of four nobles, with a house in town, and another
at Stebonheath (Stepney); that there should be no play-days granted but
to the King, or some bishop in person: that the scholars every Childermas
Day should go to St. Paul’s Church, and hear the child-bishop sermon, and
afterwards at high mass each of them offer a penny to the child-bishop:
and committed the care of the school to the Company of Mercers; the
stipends to the masters, the officers’ salaries, &c., belonging to the
school, amounting at first to £118 14s. 7d. 1ob. per annum; but the rents
and revenues of the school being of late years considerably advanced, the
salaries of the masters have been more than doubled, and many exhibitions
granted to those who go to the university, of £10 and £6 odd money per
annum. The second master hath a handsome house near the school, as well
as the first master.
The school at Mercers’ Chapel, in Cheapside, hath the same patrons and
governors as that of St. Paul’s, viz., the Mercers, who allow the master
a salary of £40 per annum, and a house, for teaching twenty-five scholars
gratis.
Merchant Taylors’ School is situated near Cannon Street, on St. Lawrence
Poultney (or Pountney) Hill. This school, I am told, consists of six
forms, in which are three hundred lads, one hundred of whom are taught
gratis, another hundred pay two shillings and sixpence per quarter, and
the third hundred five shillings a quarter; for instructing of whom there
is a master and three ushers: and out of these scholars some are
annually, on St. Barnabas’ Day, the 11th of June, elected to St. John’s
College, in Oxford, where there are forty-six fellowships belonging to
the school.
As to the charity schools: there are in all 131, some for boys, others
for girls; where the children are taught, if boys, to read, write, and
account; if girls, to read, sew, and knit; who are all clothed and fitted
for service or trades gratis.
I proceed in the next place to show how well London is supplied with
water, firing, bread-corn, flesh, fish, beer, wine, and other provisions.
And as to water, no city was ever better furnished with it, for every man
has a pipe or fountain of good fresh water brought into his house, for
less than twenty shillings a year, unless brewhouses, and some other
great houses and places that require more water than an ordinary family
consumes, and these pay in proportion to the quantity they spend; many
houses have several pipes laid in, and may have one in every room, if
they think fit, which is a much greater convenience than two or three
fountains in a street, for which some towns in other countries are so
much admired.
These pipes of water are chiefly supplied from the waterworks at London
Bridge, Westminster, Chelsea, and the New River.
Besides the water brought from the Thames and the New River, there are a
great many good springs, pumps, and conduits about the town, which afford
excellent water for drinking. There are also mineral waters on the side
of Islington and Pancras.
This capital also is well supplied with firing, particularly coals from
Newcastle, and pit-coals from Scotland, and other parts; but wood is
excessively dear, and used by nobody for firing, unless bakers, and some
few persons of quality in their chambers and drawing-rooms.
As for bread-corn, it is for the most part brought to London after it is
converted into flour, and both bread and flour are extremely reasonable:
we here buy as much good white bread for three-halfpence or twopence, as
will serve an Englishman a whole day, and flour in proportion. Good
strong beer also may be had of the brewer, for about twopence a quart,
and of the alehouses that retail it for threepence a quart. Bear Quay,
below bridge, is a great market for malt, wheat, and horse-corn; and
Queenhithe, above the bridge, for malt, wheat, flour, and other grain.
The butchers here compute that there are about one thousand oxen sold in
Smithfield Market one week with another the year round; besides many
thousand sheep, hogs, calves, pigs, and lambs, in this and other parts of
the town; and a great variety of venison, game, and poultry. Fruit,
roots, herbs, and other garden stuff are very cheap and good.
Fish also are plentiful, such as fresh cod, plaice, flounders, soles,
whitings, smelts, sturgeon, oysters, lobsters, crabs, shrimps, mackerel,
and herrings in the season; but it must be confessed that salmon, turbot,
and some other sea-fish are dear, as well as fresh-water fish.
Wine is imported from foreign countries, and is dear. The port wine
which is usually drunk, and is the cheapest, is two shillings a quart,
retailed in taverns, and not much less than eighteen or twenty pounds the
hogshead, when purchased at the best hand; and as to French wines, the
duties are so high upon them that they are double the price of the other
at least. White wine is about the same price as red port, and canary
about a third dearer.
It is computed that there are in London some part of the year, when the
nobility and gentry are in town, 15,000 or 16,000 large horses for
draught, used in coaches, carts, or drays, besides some thousands of
saddle-horses; and yet is the town so well supplied with hay, straw, and
corn, that there is seldom any want of them. Hay generally is not more
than forty shillings the load, and from twenty pence to two shillings the
bushel is the usual price of oats.
The opportunity of passing from one part of the town to the other, by
coach, chair, or boat, is a very great convenience, especially in the
winter, or in very hot weather. A servant calls a coach or a chair in
any of the principal streets, which attends at a minute’s warning, and
carries one to any part of the town, within a mile and a half distance,
for a shilling, but to a chair is paid one-third more; the coaches also
will wait for eighteenpence the first hour, and a shilling every
succeeding hour all day long; or you may hire a coach and a pair of
horses all day, in or out of town, for ten shillings per day; there are
coaches also that go to every village almost about town, within four or
five miles, in which a passenger pays but one shilling, and in some but
sixpence, for his passage with other company.
The pleasantest way of moving from one end of the town to the other in
summer time is by water, on that spacious gentle stream the Thames, on
which you travel two miles for sixpence, if you have two watermen, and
for threepence if you have but one; and to any village up or down the
river you go with company for a trifle. But the greatest advantage
reaped from this noble river is that it brings whatever this or other
countries afford. Down the river from Oxfordshire, Berkshire, Bucks,
&c., come corn and all manner of provision of English growth, as has been
observed already; and up the river, everything that the coasts and the
maritime counties of England, Scotland, or Ireland afford; this way also
are received the treasures and merchandise of the East and West Indies,
and indeed of the four quarters of the world.
Carts are hired as coaches, to remove goods and merchandise from one part
of the town to the other, whose rates are also fixed, and are very
reasonable; and for small burdens or parcels, and to send on messages,
there are porters at every corner of the streets, those within the City
of London and liberties thereof being licensed by authority, and wearing
a badge or ticket; in whose hands goods of any value, and even bills of
exchange or sums of money, may be safely trusted, they being obliged at
their admission to give security. There is also a post that goes from
one part of the town to the other several times a day; and once a day to
the neighbouring villages, with letters and small parcels; for the
carriage of which is given no more than a penny the letter or parcel.
And I should have remembered that every coach, chair, and boat that plies
for hire has its number upon it; and if the number be taken by any friend
or servant, at the place you set out from, the proprietor of the vehicle
will be obliged to make good any loss or damage that may happen to the
person carried in it, through the default of the people that carry him,
and to make him satisfaction for any abuse or ill-language he may receive
from them.
The high streets from one end of the town to the other are kept clean by
scavengers in the winter, and in summer the dust in some wide streets is
laid by water-carts: they are so wide and spacious, that several lines of
coaches and carts may pass by each other without interruption.
Foot-passengers in the high streets go about their business with
abundance of ease and pleasure; they walk upon a fine smooth pavement;
defended by posts from the coaches and wheel-carriages; and though they
are jostled sometimes in the throng, yet as this seldom happens out of
design, few are offended at it; the variety of beautiful objects, animate
and inanimate, he meets with in the streets and shops, inspires the
passenger with joy, and makes him slight the trifling inconvenience of
being crowded now and then. The lights also in the shops till eight or
nine in the evening, especially in those of toymen and pastry-cooks, in
the winter, make the night appear even brighter and more agreeable than
the day itself.
From the lights I come very naturally to speak of the night-guards or
watch. Each watch consists of a constable and a certain number of
watchmen, who have a guard-room or watch-house in some certain place,
from whence watchmen are despatched every hour, to patrol in the streets
and places in each constable’s district; to see if all be safe from fire
and thieves; and as they pass they give the hour of the night, and with
their staves strike at the door of every house.
If they meet with any persons they suspect of ill designs, quarrelsome
people, or lewd women in the streets, they are empowered to carry them
before the constable at his watch-house, who confines them till morning,
when they are brought before a justice of the peace, who commits them to
prison or releases them, according as the circumstances of the case are.
Mobs and tumults were formerly very terrible in this great city; not only
private men have been insulted and abused, and their houses demolished,
but even the Court and Parliament have been influenced or awed by them.
But there is now seldom seen a multitude of people assembled, unless it
be to attend some malefactor to his execution, or to pelt a villain in
the pillory, the last of which being an outrage that the Government has
ever seemed to wink at; and it is observed by some that the mob are
pretty just upon these occasions; they seldom falling upon any but
notorious rascals, such as are guilty of perjury, forgery, scandalous
practices, or keeping of low houses, and these with rotten eggs, apples,
and turnips, they frequently maul unmercifully, unless the offender has
money enough to bribe the constables and officers to protect him.
The London inns, though they are as commodious for the most part as those
we meet with in other places, yet few people choose to take up their
quarters in them for any long time; for, if their business requires them
to make any stay in London, they choose to leave their horses at the inn
or some livery-stable, and take lodgings in a private house. At livery
stables they lodge no travellers, only take care of their horses, which
fare better here than usually at inns; and at these places it is that
gentlemen hire saddle-horses for a journey. At the best of them are
found very good horses and furniture: they will let out a good horse for
4s. a day, and an ordinary hackney for 2s. 6d., and for 5s. you may have
a hunter for the city hounds have the liberty of hunting; in Enfield
Chase and round the town, and go out constantly every week in the season,
followed by a great many young gentlemen and tradesmen. They have an
opportunity also of hunting with the King’s hounds at Richmond and
Windsor: and such exercises seem very necessary for people who are
constantly in London, and eat and drink as plentifully as any people in
the world. And now I am speaking of hired horses, I cannot avoid taking
notice of the vast number of coach-horses that are kept to be let out to
noblemen or gentlemen, to carry or bring them to and from the distant
parts of the kingdom, or to supply the undertakers of funerals with
horses for their coaches and hearses. There are some of these men that
keep several hundreds of horses, with coaches, coachmen, and a complete
equipage, that will be ready at a day’s warning to attend a gentleman to
any part of England. These people also are great jockeys. They go to
all the fairs in the country and buy up horses, with which they furnish
most of the nobility and gentry about town. And if a nobleman does not
care to run any hazard, or have the trouble of keeping horses in town,
they will agree to furnish him with a set all the year round.
The principal taverns are large handsome edifices, made as commodious for
the entertaining a variety of company as can be contrived, with some
spacious rooms for the accommodation of numerous assemblies. Here a
stranger may be furnished with wines, and excellent food of all kinds,
dressed after the best manner:—each company, and every particular man, if
he pleases, has a room to himself, and a good fire if it be winter time,
for which he pays nothing, and is not to be disturbed or turned out of
his room by any other man of what quality soever, till he thinks fit to
leave it. And as many people meet here upon business, at least an
equal-number resort hither purely for pleasure, or to refresh themselves
in an evening after a day’s fatigue.
And though the taverns are very numerous, yet ale-houses are much more
so, being visited by the inferior tradesmen, mechanics, journeymen,
porters, coachmen, carmen, servants, and others whose pockets will not
reach a glass of wine. Here they sit promiscuously in common dirty
rooms, with large fires, and clouds of tobacco, where one that is not
used to them can scarce breathe or see; but as they are a busy sort of
people, they seldom stay long, returning to their several employments,
and are succeeded by fresh sets of the same rank of men, at their leisure
hours, all day long.
Of eating-houses and cook-shops there are not many, considering the
largeness of the town, unless it be about the Inns of Court and Chancery,
Smithfield, and the Royal Exchange, and some other places, to which the
country-people and strangers resort when they come to town. Here is good
butcher’s meat of all kinds, and in the best of them fowls, pigs, geese,
&c., the last of which are pretty dear; but one that can make a meal of
butcher’s meat, may have as much as he cares to eat for sixpence; he must
be content indeed to sit in a public room, and use the same linen that
forty people have done before him. Besides meat, he finds very good
white bread, table-beer, &c.
Coffee-houses are almost as numerous as ale-houses, dispersed in every
part of the town, where they sell tea, coffee, chocolate, drams, and in
many of the great ones arrack and other punch, wine, &c. These consist
chiefly of one large common room, with good fires in winter; and hither
the middle sort of people chiefly resort, many to breakfast, read the
news, and talk politics; after which they retire home: others, who are
strangers in town, meet here about noon, and appoint some tavern to dine
at; and a great many attend at the coffee-houses near the Exchange, the
Inns of Court, and Westminster, about their business. In the afternoon
about four, people resort to these places again, from whence they adjourn
to the tavern, the play, &c.; and some, when they have taken a handsome
dose, run to the coffee-house at midnight for a dish of coffee to set
them right; while others conclude the day here with drams, or a bowl of
punch.
There are but few cider-houses about London, though this be liquor of
English growth, because it is generally thought too cold for the climate,
and to elevate the spirits less than wine or strong beer.
The four grand distinctions of the people are these:—(1) The nobility and
gentry; (2) the merchants and first-rate tradesmen; (3) the lawyers and
physicians; and (4) inferior tradesmen, attorneys, clerks, apprentices,
coachmen, carmen, chairmen, watermen, porters, and servants.
The first class may not only be divided into nobility and gentry, but
into either such as have dependence on the Court, or such as have none.
Those who have offices, places, or pensions from the Court, or any
expectations from thence, constantly attend the levées of the prince and
his ministers, which takes up the greatest part of the little morning
they have. At noon most of the nobility, and such gentlemen as are
members of the House of Commons, go down to Westminster, and when the
Houses do not sit late, return home to dinner. Others that are not
members of either House, and have no particular business to attend, are
found in the chocolate-houses near the Court, or in the park, and many
more do not stir from their houses till after dinner. As to the ladies,
who seldom rise till about noon, the first part of their time is spent,
after the duties of the closet, either at the tea-table or in dressing,
unless they take a turn to Covent Garden or Ludgate Hill, and tumble over
the mercers’ rich silks, or view some India or China trifle, some
prohibited manufacture, or foreign lace.
Thus, the business of the day being despatched before dinner, both by the
ladies and gentlemen, the evening is devoted to pleasure; all the world
get abroad in their gayest equipage between four and five in the evening,
some bound to the play, others to the opera, the assembly, the
masquerade, or music-meeting, to which they move in such crowds that
their coaches can scarce pass the streets.
The merchants and tradesmen of the first-rate make no mean figure in
London; they have many of them houses equal to those of the nobility,
with great gates and courtyards before them, and seats in the country,
whither they retire the latter end of the week, returning to the city
again on Mondays or Tuesdays; they keep their coaches, saddle-horses, and
footmen; their houses are richly and beautifully furnished; and though
their equipage be not altogether so shining and their servants so
numerous as those of the nobility, they generally abound in wealth and
plenty, and are generally masters of a larger cash than they have
occasion to make use of in the way of trade, whereby they are always
provided against accidents, and are enabled to make an advantageous
purchase when it offers. And in this they differ from the merchants of
other countries, that they know when they have enough, for they retire to
their estates, and enjoy the fruits of their labours in the decline of
life, reserving only business enough to divert their leisure hours. They
become gentlemen and magistrates in the counties where their estates lie,
and as they are frequently the younger brothers of good families, it is
not uncommon to see them purchase those estates that the eldest branches
of their respective families have been obliged to part with.
Their character is that they are neither so much in haste as the French
to grow rich, nor so niggardly as the Dutch to save; that their houses
are richly furnished, and their tables well served. You are neither
soothed nor soured by the merchants of London; they seldom ask too much,
and foreigners buy of them as cheap as others. They are punctual in
their payments, generous and charitable, very obliging, and not too
ceremonious; easy of access, ready to communicate their knowledge of the
respective countries they traffic with, and the condition of their trade.
As to their way of life, they usually rise some hours before the
gentlemen at the other end of the town, and having paid their devotions
to Heaven, seldom fail in a morning of surveying the condition of their
accounts, and giving their orders to their bookkeepers and agents for the
management of their respective trades; after which, being dressed in a
modest garb, without any footmen or attendants, they go about their
business to the Custom House, Bank, Exchange, &c., and after dinner
sometimes apply themselves to business again; but the morning is much the
busiest part of the day. In the evening of every other day the post
comes in, when the perusing their letters may employ part of their time,
as the answering them does on other days of the week; and they frequently
meet at the tavern in the evening, either to transact their affairs, or
to take a cheerful glass after the business of the day is over.
As to the wives and daughters of the merchants and principal tradesmen,
they endeavour to imitate the Court ladies in their dress, and follow
much the same diversions; and it is not uncommon to see a nobleman match
with a citizen’s daughter, by which she gains a title, and he discharges
the incumbrances on his estate with her fortune. Merchants’ sons are
sometimes initiated into the same business their fathers follow; but if
they find an estate gotten to their hands, many of them choose rather to
become country gentlemen.
As to the lawyers or barristers, these also are frequently the younger
sons of good families; and the elder brother too is sometimes entered of
the Inns of Court, that he may know enough of the law to keep his estate.
A lawyer of parts and good elocution seldom fails of rising to
preferment, and acquiring an estate even while he is a young man. I do
not know any profession in London where a person makes his fortune so
soon as in the law, if he be an eminent pleader. Several of them have of
late years been advanced to the peerage; as Finch, Somers, Cowper,
Harcourt, Trevor, Parker, Lechmere, King, Raymond, &c., scarce any of
them much exceeding forty years of age when they arrived at that honour.
The fees are so great, and their business so engrosses every minute of
their time, that it is impossible their expenses should equal their
income; but it must be confessed they labour very hard, are forced to be
up early and late, and to try their constitutions to the utmost (I mean
those in full business) in the service of their clients. They rise in
winter long before it is light, to read over their briefs; dress, and
prepare themselves for the business of the day; at eight or nine they go
to Westminster, where they attend and plead either in the Courts of
Equity or Common Law, ordinarily till one or two, and (upon a great
trial) sometimes till the evening. By that time they have got home, and
dined, they have other briefs to peruse, and they are to attend the
hearings, either at the Lord Chancellor’s or the Rolls, till eight or
nine in the evening; after which, when they return to their chambers,
they are attended by their clients, and have their several cases and
briefs to read over and consider that evening, or the next morning before
daylight; insomuch that they have scarce time for their meals, or their
natural rest, particularly at the latter end of a term. They are not
always in this hurry; indeed, if they were, the best constitution must
soon be worn out; nor would anyone submit to such hardships who had a
subsistence, but with a prospect of acquiring a great estate suddenly;
for the gold comes tumbling into the pockets of these great lawyers,
which makes them refuse no cause, how intricate or doubtful soever. And
this brings me to consider the high fees that are usually taken by an
eminent counsel; as for a single opinion upon a case, two, three, four,
and five guineas; upon a hearing, five or ten; and perhaps a great many
more; and if the cause does not come on till the next day, they are all
to be fee’d again, though there are not less than six or seven counsel of
a side.
The next considerable profession therefore I shall mention in London is
that of the physicians, who are not so numerous as the former; but those
who are eminent amongst them acquire estates equal to the lawyers, though
they seldom arrive at the like honours. It is a useful observation,
indeed, as to English physicians, that they seldom get their bread till
they have no teeth to eat it: though, when they have acquired a
reputation, they are as much followed as the great lawyers; they take
care, however, not to be so much fatigued. You find them at Batson’s or
Child’s Coffee House usually in the morning, and they visit their
patients in the afternoon. Those that are men of figure amongst them
will not rise out of their beds or break their rest on every call. The
greatest fatigue they undergo is the going up forty or fifty pair of
stairs every day; for the patient is generally laid pretty near the
garret, that he may not be disturbed.
These physicians are allowed to be men of skill in their profession, and
well versed in other parts of learning. The great grievance here (as in
the law) is that the inferior people are undone by the exorbitance of
their fees; and what is still a greater hardship is, that if a physician
has been employed, he must be continued, however unable the patient is to
bear the expense, as no apothecary may administer anything to the sick
man, if he has been prescribed to first by a physician: so that the
patient is reduced to this dilemma, either to die of the disease, or
starve his family, if his sickness happens to be of any duration. A
physician here scorns to touch any other metal but gold, and the surgeons
are still more unreasonable; and this may be one reason why the people of
this city have so often recourse to quacks, for they are cheap and easily
come at, and the mob are not judges of their ability; they pretend to
great things; they have cured princes, and persons of the first quality,
as they pretend; and it must be confessed their patients are as credulous
as they can desire, taken with grand pretences, and the assurance of the
impostor, and frequently like things the better that are offered them out
of the common road.
I come in the next place to treat of attorneys’ clerks, apprentices,
inferior tradesmen, coachmen, porters, servants, and the lowest class of
men in this town, which are far the most numerous: and first of the
lawyers’ clerks and apprentices, I find it a general complaint that they
are under no manner of government; before their times are half out, they
set up for gentlemen; they dress, they drink, they game, frequent the
playhouses, and intrigue with the women; and it is no uncommon thing with
clerks to bully their masters, and desert their service for whole days
and nights whenever they see fit.
As to the ordinary tradesmen, they live by buying and selling; I cannot
say they are so eminent for their probity as the merchants and tradesmen
of the first rate; they seem to have a wrong bias given them in their
education; many of them have no principles of honour, no other rule to go
by than the fishmonger, namely, to get what they can, who consider only
the weakness or ignorance of the customer, and make their demands
accordingly, taking sometimes half the price they ask. And I must not
forget the numbers of poor creatures who live and maintain their families
by buying provisions in one part of the town, and retailing them in
another, whose stock perhaps does not amount to more than forty or fifty
shillings, and part of this they take up (many of them) on their clothes
at a pawnbroker’s on a Monday morning, which they make shift to redeem on
a Saturday night, that they may appear in a proper habit at their
parish-churches on a Sunday. These are the people that cry fish, fruit,
herbs, roots, news, &c, about town.
As to hackney-coachmen, carmen, porters, chairmen, and watermen, though
they work hard, they generally eat and drink well, and are decently
clothed on holidays; for the wife, if she be industrious, either by her
needle, washing, or other business proper to her sex, makes no small
addition to their gains; and by their united labours they maintain their
families handsomely if they have their healths.
As to the common menial servants, they have great wages, are well kept
and clothed, but are, notwithstanding the plague, of almost every house
in town. They form themselves into societies, or rather confederacies,
contributing to the maintenance of each other when out of place; and if
any of them cannot manage the family where they are entertained as they
please, immediately they give notice they will be gone. There is no
speaking to them; they are above correction; and if a master should
attempt it, he may expect to be handsomely drubbed by the creature he
feeds and harbours, or perhaps an action brought against him for it. It
is become a common saying, “If my servant ben’t a thief, if he be but
honest, I can bear with other things;” and indeed it is very rare in
London to meet with an honest servant.
When I was treating of tradesmen, I had forgot to mention those nuisances
of the town, the itinerant pedlars who deal in toys and hardware, and
those who pretend to sell foreign silks, linen, India handkerchiefs, and
other prohibited and unaccustomed goods. These we meet at every
coffee-house and corner of the streets, and they visit also every private
house; the women have such a gust for everything that is foreign or
prohibited, that these vermin meet with a good reception everywhere. The
ladies will rather buy home manufactures of these people than of a
neighbouring shopkeeper, under the pretence of buying cheaper, though
they frequently buy damaged goods, and pay a great deal dearer for them
than they would do in a tradesman’s shop, which is a great discouragement
to the fair dealer that maintains a family, and is forced to give a large
credit, while these people run away with the ready money. And I am
informed that some needy tradesmen employ fellows to run hawking about
the streets with their goods, and sell pennyworths, in order to furnish
themselves with a little money.
As to the recreations of the citizens, many of them are entertained in
the same manner as the quality are, resorting to the play, park,
music-meetings, &c.; and in the summer they visit Richmond, Hampstead,
Epsom, and other neighbouring towns, where horse-racing, and all manner
of rural sports, as well as other diversions, are followed in the summer
season.
Towards autumn, when the town is thin, many of the citizens who deal in a
wholesale way visit the distant parts of the kingdom to get in their
debts, or procure orders for fresh parcels of goods; and much about the
same time the lawyers are either employed in the several circuits, or
retired to their country seats; so that the Court, the nobility and
gentry, the lawyers, and many of the citizens being gone into the
country, the town resumes another face. The west end of it appears
perfectly deserted; in other parts their trade falls off; but still in
the streets about the Royal Exchange we seldom fail to meet with crowds
of people, and an air of business in the hottest season.
I have heard it affirmed, however, that many citizens live beyond their
income, which puts them upon tricking and prevaricating in their
dealings, and is the principal occasion of those frequent bankruptcies
seen in the papers; ordinary tradesmen drink as much wine, and eat as
well, as gentlemen of estates; their cloth, their lace, their linen, are
as fine, and they change it as often; and they frequently imitate the
quality in their expensive pleasures.
As to the diversions of the inferior tradesmen and common people on
Sundays and other holidays, they frequently get out of town; the
neighbouring villas are full of them, and the public-houses there usually
provide a dinner in expectation of their city guests; but if they do not
visit them in a morning, they seldom fail of walking out in the fields in
the afternoon; every walk, every public garden and path near the town are
crowded with the common people, and no place more than the park; for
which reason I presume the quality are seldom seen there on a Sunday,
though the meanest of them are so well dressed at these times that nobody
need be ashamed of their company on that account; for you will see every
apprentice, every porter, and cobbler, in as good cloth and linen as
their betters; and it must be a very poor woman that has not a suit of
Mantua silk, or something equal to it, to appear abroad in on holidays.
And now, if we survey these several inhabitants in one body, it will be
found that there are about a million of souls in the whole town, of whom
there may be 150,000 men and upwards capable of bearing arms, that is,
between eighteen and sixty.
If it be demanded what proportion that part of the town properly called
the City of London bears to the rest, I answer that, according to the
last calculations, there are in the city 12,000 houses; in the parishes
without the walls, 36,320; in the parishes of Middlesex and Surrey, which
make part of the town, 46,300; and in the city and liberties of
Westminster, 28,330; in which are included the precincts of the Tower,
Norton Folgate, the Rolls, Whitefriars, the Inns of Court and Chancery,
the King’s palaces, and all other extra-parochial places.
As to the number of inhabitants in each of these four grand divisions, if
we multiply the number of houses in the City of London by eight and a
half, there must be 102,000 people there, according to this estimate. By
the same rule, there must be 308,720 people in the seventeen parishes
without the walls; 393,550 in the twenty-one out-parishes of Middlesex
and Surrey; and 240,805 in the city and liberties of Westminster, all
which compose the sum-total of 1,045,075 people.
Let me now proceed to inquire into the state of the several great trading
companies in London. The first, in point of time, I find to be the
Hamburg Company, originally styled “Merchants of the Staple” (that is, of
the staple of wool), and afterwards Merchant Adventurers. They were
first incorporated in the reign of King Edward I., anno 1296, and
obtained leave of John, Duke of Brabant, to make Antwerp their staple or
mart for the Low Countries, where the woollen manufactures then
flourished more than in any country in Europe. The business of this
company at first seems to be chiefly, if not altogether, the vending of
English wool unwrought.
Queen Elizabeth enlarged the trade of the Company of Adventurers, and
empowered them to treat with the princes and states of Germany for a
place which might be the staple or mart for the woollen manufactures they
exported, which was at length fixed at Hamburg, from whence they obtained
the name of the Hamburg Company. They had another mart or staple also
assigned them for the sale of their woollen cloths in the Low Countries,
viz., Dort, in Holland.
This company consists of a governor, deputy-governor, and fellowship, or
court of assistants, elected annually in June, who have a power of making
bye-laws for the regulation of their trade; but this trade in a manner
lies open, every merchant trading thither on his own bottom, on paying an
inconsiderable sum to the company; so that though the trade to Germany
may be of consequence, yet the Hamburg Company, as a company, have very
little advantage by their being incorporated.
The Hamburg or German Merchants export from England broad-cloth,
druggets, long-ells, serges, and several sorts of stuffs, tobacco, sugar,
ginger, East India goods, tin, lead, and several other commodities, the
consumption of which is in Lower Germany.
England takes from them prodigious quantities of linen, linen-yarn,
kid-skins, tin-plates, and a great many other commodities.
The next company established was that of the Russia Merchants,
incorporated 1st and 2nd of Philip and Mary, who were empowered to trade
to all lands, ports, and places in the dominions of the Emperor of
Russia, and to all other lands not then discovered or frequented, lying
on the north, north-east, or north-west.
The Russia Company, as a company, are not a very considerable body at
present; the trade thither being carried on by private merchants, who are
admitted into this trade on payment of five pounds for that privilege.
It consists of a governor, four consuls, and twenty-four assistants,
annually chosen on the 1st of March.
The Russia Merchants export from England some coarse cloth, long-ells,
worsted stuffs, tin, lead, tobacco, and a few other commodities.
England takes from Russia hemp, flax, linen cloth, linen yarn, Russia
leather, tallow, furs, iron, potashes, &c., to an immense value.
The next company is the Eastland Company, formerly called Merchants of
Elbing, a town in Polish Prussia, to the eastward of Dantzic, being the
port they principally resorted to in the infancy of their trade. They
were incorporated 21 Elizabeth, and empowered to trade to all countries
within the Sound, Norway, Sweden, Poland, Liefland, Prussia, and
Pomerania, from the river Oder eastward, viz., with Riga, Revel,
Königsberg, Elbing, Dantzic, Copenhagen, Elsinore, Finland, Gothland,
Eastland, and Bornholm (except Narva, which was then the only Russian
port in the Baltic). And by the said patent the Eastland Company and
Hamburg Company were each of them authorised to trade separately to
Mecklenburg, Gothland, Silesia, Moravia, Lubeck, Wismar, Restock, and the
whole river Oder.
This company consists of a governor, deputy-governor, and twenty-four
assistants, elected annually in October; but either they have no power to
exclude others from trading within their limits, or the fine for
permission is so inconsiderable, that it can never hinder any merchants
trading thither who is inclined to it; and, in fact, this trade, like the
former, is carried on by private merchants, and the trade to Norway and
Sweden is laid open by Act of Parliament.
To Norway and Denmark merchants send guineas, crown-pieces, bullion, a
little tobacco, and a few coarse woollens.
They import from Norway, &c., vast quantities of deal boards, timber,
spars, and iron.
Sweden takes from England gold and silver, and but a small quantity of
the manufactures and production of England.
England imports from Sweden near two-thirds of the iron wrought up or
consumed in the kingdom, copper, boards, plank, &c.
The Turkey or Levant Company was first incorporated in the reign of Queen
Elizabeth, and their privileges were confirmed and enlarged in the reign
of King James I., being empowered to trade to the Levant, or eastern part
of the Mediterranean, particularly to Smyrna, Aleppo, Constantinople,
Cyprus, Grand Cairo, Alexandria, &c. It consists of a governor,
deputy-governor, and eighteen assistants or directors, chosen annually,
&c. This trade is open also to every merchant paying a small
consideration, and carried on accordingly by private men.
These merchants export to Turkey chiefly broadcloth, long-ells, tins,
lead, and some iron; and the English merchants frequently buy up French
and Lisbon sugars and transport thither, as well as bullion from Cadiz.
The commodities received from thence are chiefly raw silk, grogram yarn,
dyeing stuffs of sundry kinds, drugs, soap; leather, cotton, and some
fruit, oil, &c.
The East India Company were incorporated about the 42nd of Elizabeth,
anno 1600, and empowered to trade to all countries to the eastward of the
Cape of Good Hope, exclusive of all others.
About the middle of King William’s reign it was generally said their
patent was illegal, and that the Crown could not restrain the English
merchants from trading to any country they were disposed to deal with;
and application being made to Parliament for leave to lay the trade open,
the ministry took the hint, and procured an Act of Parliament (9 and 10
William III., cap. 44) empowering every subject of England to trade to
India who should raise a sum of money for the supply of the Government in
proportion to the sum he should advance, and each subscriber was to have
an annuity after the rate of 8 per cent. per annum, to commence from
Michaelmas, 1698. And his Majesty was empowered to incorporate the
subscribers, as he afterwards did, and they were usually called the New
East India Company, the old company being allowed a certain time to
withdraw their effects. But the old company being masters of all the
towns and forts belonging to the English on the coast of India, and their
members having subscribed such considerable sums towards the two millions
intended to be raised, that they could not be excluded from the trade,
the new company found it necessary to unite with the old company, and to
trade with one joint stock, and have ever since been styled “The United
Company of Merchants trading to the East Indies.”
The company have a governor, deputy-governor, and twenty-four assistants
or directors, elected annually in April.
The East India Company export great quantities of bullion, lead, English
cloth, and some other goods, the product or manufacture of that kingdom,
and import from China and India tea, china ware, cabinets, raw and
wrought silks, coffee, muslins, calicoes, and other goods.
Bengal raw silk is bought at very low prices there, and is very useful in
carrying on the manufactures of this kingdom.
China silk is of excellent staple, and comes at little above one-third of
the price of Italian Piedmont silk.
The China silk is purchased at Canton, but their fine silk is made in the
provinces of Nankin and Chekiam, where their fine manufactures are
carried on, and where prodigious quantities of raw silk are made, and the
best in all China.
The Royal African Company was incorporated 14 Charles II., and empowered
to trade from Sallee, in South Barbary, to the Cape of Good Hope, being
all the western coast of Africa. It carries no money out, and not only
supplies the English plantations with servants, but brings in a great
deal of bullion for those that are sold to the Spanish West Indies,
besides gold dust and other commodities, as red wood, elephants’ teeth,
Guinea grain, &c., some of which are re-exported. The supplying the
plantations with negroes is of that extraordinary advantage, that the
planting sugar and tobacco and carrying on trade there could not be
supported without them; which plantations are the great causes of the
increase of the riches of the kingdom.
The Canary Company was incorporated in the reign of King Charles II.,
anno 1664, being empowered to trade to the Seven Islands, anciently
called the Fortunate, and now the Canary Islands.
They have a governor, deputy-governor, and thirteen assistants or
directors, chosen annually in March. This company exports baize,
kerseys, serges, Norwich stuffs, and other woollen manufactures;
stockings, hats, fustians, haberdashery wares, tin, and hardware; as also
herrings, pilchards, salted flesh, and grain; linens, pipe-staves, hoops,
&c. Importing in return Canary wines, logwood, hides, indigo, cochineal,
and other commodities, the produce of America and the West Indies.
There is another company I had almost overlooked, called the Hudson’s Bay
Company; and though these merchants make but little noise, I find it is a
very advantageous trade. They by charter trade, exclusively of all other
his Britannic Majesty’s subjects, to the north-west; which was granted,
as I have been told, on account that they should attempt a passage by
those seas to China, &c., though nothing appears now to be less their
regard; nay; if all be true, they are the very people that discourage and
impede all attempts made by others for the opening that passage to the
South Seas. They export some woollen goods and haberdashery wares,
knives, hatchets, arms, and other hardware; and in return bring back
chiefly beaver-skins, and other skins and furs.
The last, and once the most considerable of all the trading companies, is
that of the South Sea, established by Act of Parliament in the ninth year
of the late Queen Anne; but, what by reason of the mismanagement of its
directors in 1720, the miscarriage of their whale-fishery, and the
intrigues of the Spaniards, their credit is sunk, and their trade has
much decreased.
I proceed, in the next place, to inquire what countries the merchants of
London trade to separately, not being incorporated or subject to the
control of any company.
Among which is the trade to Italy, whither are exported broad-cloth,
long-ells, baize, druggets, callimancoes, camlets, and divers other
stuffs; leather, tin, lead, great quantities of fish, as pilchards,
herrings, salmon, Newfoundland cod, &c., pepper, and other East India
goods.
The commodities England takes from them are raw, thrown, and wrought
silk, wine, oil, soap, olives, some dyer’s wares, anchovies, &c.
To Spain the merchants export broad-cloth, druggets, callimancoes, baize,
stuff of divers kinds, leather, fish, tin, lead, corn, &c.
The commodities England takes from them are wine, oil, fruit of divers
kinds, wool, indigo, cochineal, and dyeing stuffs.
To Portugal also are exported broad-cloth, druggets, baize, long-ells,
callimancoes, and all other sorts of stuffs; as well as tin, lead,
leather, fish, corn, and other English commodities.
England takes from them great quantities of wine, oil, salt, and fruit,
and gold, both in bullion and specie; though it is forfeited, if seized
in the ports of Portugal.
The French take very little from England in a fair way, dealing chiefly
with owlers, or those that clandestinely export wool and fuller’s-earth,
&c. They indeed buy some of our tobacco, sugar, tin, lead, coals, a few
stuffs, serges, flannels, and a small matter of broad-cloth.
England takes from France wine, brandy, linen, lace, fine cambrics, and
cambric lawns, to a prodigious value; brocades, velvets, and many other
rich silk manufactures, which are either run, or come by way of Holland;
the humour of some of the nobility and gentry being such, that although
they have those manufactures made as good at home, if not better than
abroad, yet they are forced to be called by the name of French to make
them sell. Their linens are run in very great quantities, as are their
wine and brandy, from the Land’s End even to the Downs.
To Flanders are exported serges, a few flannels, a very few stuffs,
sugar, tobacco, tin, and lead.
England takes from them fine lace, fine cambrics, and cambric-lawns,
Flanders whited linens, threads, tapes, incles, and divers other
commodities, to a very great value.
To Holland the merchants export broad-cloth, druggets, long-ells, stuffs
of a great many sorts, leather, corn, coals, and something of almost
every kind that this kingdom produces; besides all sorts of India and
Turkey re-exported goods, sugars, tobacco, rice, ginger, pitch and tar,
and sundry other commodities of the produce of our American plantations.
England takes from Holland great quantities of fine Holland linen,
threads, tapes, and incles; whale fins, brass battery, madder, argol,
with a large number of other commodities and toys; clapboard, wainscot,
&c.
To Ireland are exported fine broad-cloth, rich silks, ribbons, gold and
silver lace, manufactured iron and cutlery wares, pewter, great
quantities of hops, coals, dyeing wares, tobacco, sugar, East India
goods, raw silk, hollands, and almost everything they use, but linens,
coarse woollens, and eatables.
England takes from Ireland woollen yarn, linen yarn, great quantities of
wool in the fleece, and some tallow.
They have an extraordinary trade for their hides, tallow; beef, butter,
&c., to Holland, Flanders, France, Portugal, and Spain, which enables
them to make large remittances.
To the sugar plantations are exported all sorts of clothing, both linen,
silks, and woollen; wrought iron, brass, copper, all sorts of household
furniture, and a great part of their food.
They return sugar, ginger, and several commodities, and all the bullion
and gold they can meet with, but rarely carry out any.
To the tobacco plantations are exported clothing, household goods, iron
manufactures of all sorts, saddles, bridles, brass and copper wares; and
notwithstanding they dwell among the woods, they take their very turnery
wares, and almost everything else that may be called the manufacture of
England.
England takes from them not only what tobacco is consumed at home, but
very great quantities for re-exportation.
To Carolina are exported the same commodities as to the tobacco
plantations. This country lying between the 32nd and 36th degrees of
northern latitude, the soil is generally fertile. The rice it produces
is said to be the best in the world; and no country affords better silk
than has been brought from thence, though for want of sufficient
encouragement the quantity imported is very small. It is said both bohea
and green tea have been raised there, extraordinary good of the kind.
The olive-tree grows wild, and thrives very well, and might soon be
improved so far as to supply us with large quantities of oil. It is said
the fly from whence the cochineal is made is found very common, and if
care was taken very great quantities might be made. The indigo plant
grows exceedingly well. The country has plenty of iron mines in it, and
would produce excellent hemp and flax, if encouragement was given for
raising it.
To Pennsylvania are exported broad-cloth, kerseys, druggets, serges, and
manufactures of all kinds.
To New England are exported all sorts of woollen manufactures, linen,
sail-cloth and cordage for rigging their ships, haberdashery, &c. They
carry lumber and provisions to the sugar plantations; and exchange
provisions for logwood with the logwood-cutters at Campeachy. They send
pipe and barrel-staves and fish to Spain, Portugal, and the Straits.
They send pitch, tar, and turpentine to England, with some skins.
Having considered the trading companies, and other branches of foreign
trade, I shall now inquire into the establishment of the Bank of England.
The governor and company of the Bank of England, &c., are enjoined not to
trade, or suffer any person in trust for them to trade, with any of the
stock, moneys or effects, in the buying or selling of any merchandise or
goods whatsoever, on pain of forfeiting the treble value. Yet they may
deal in bills of exchange, and in buying and selling of bullion, gold or
silver, or in selling goods mortgaged to them, and not redeemed at the
time agreed on, or within three months after, or such goods as should be
the produce of lands purchased by the corporation. All bills obligatory
and of credit under the seal of the corporation made to any person, may
by endorsement be assigned, and such assignment shall transfer the
property to the moneys due upon the same, and the assignee may sue in his
own name.
There is at present due to this Bank from the £1,600,000
Government on the original fund at £6 per cent.
For cancelling of Exchequer bills, 3 George I 1,500,000
Purchased of the South Sea Company 4,000,000
Annuities at £4 per cent. charged on the duty on 1,750,000
coals since Lady Day, 1719.
Ditto, charged on the surplus of the funds for the 1,250,000
lottery of 1714
Total due to the Bank of England £10,100,000
Give me leave to observe here, that most of the foreign trade of this
town is transacted by brokers, of which there are three sorts, viz., 1st,
Exchange-brokers, 2ndly, brokers for goods and merchandise, and 3rdly,
ship-brokers.
The exchange-brokers, who are versed in the course of exchange, furnish
the merchant with money or bills, as he has occasion for either.
The broker of goods lets the merchant know where he may furnish himself
with them, and the settled price; or if he wants to sell, where he may
meet with a chapman for his effects.
The ship-broker finds ships for the merchant, when he wants to send his
goods abroad; or goods for captains and masters of vessels to freight
their ships with.
If it be demanded what share of foreign trade London hath with respect to
the rest of the kingdom; it seems to have a fourth part of the whole, at
least if we may judge by the produce of the customs, which are as three
to twelve, or thereabouts.
As to the manufactures carried on in the City of London; here mechanics
have acquired a great deal of reputation in the world, and in many things
not without reason; for they excel in clock and cabinet-work, in making
saddles, and all sorts of tools, and other things. The door and gun
locks, and fire-arms, are nowhere to be paralleled; the silk manufacture
is equal to that of France, or any other country, and is prodigiously
enlarged of late years. Dyers also are very numerous in and about
London, and are not exceeded by any foreigners in the beauty or
durableness of their colours: and those that print and stain cottons and
linens have brought that art to great perfection. Printers of books,
also, may equal those abroad; but the best paper is imported from other
countries.
The manufacture of glass here is equal to that of Venice, or any other
country in Europe, whether we regard the coach or looking-glasses,
perspective, drinking-glasses, or any other kind of glass, whatever. The
making of pins and needles is another great manufacture in this town, as
is that of wire-drawings of silver, gold, and other metals. The
goldsmiths and silversmiths excel in their way. The pewterers and
brasiers furnish all manner of vessels and implements for the kitchen,
which are as neatly and substantially made and furnished here as in any
country in Europe. The trades of hat-making and shoe-making employ
multitudes of mechanics; and the tailors are equally numerous. The
cabinet, screen, and chair-makers contribute also considerably to the
adorning and furnishing the dwelling-house. The common smiths,
bricklayers, and carpenters are no inconsiderable branch of mechanics; as
may well be imagined in a town of this magnitude, where so many churches,
palaces, and private buildings are continually repairing, and so many
more daily erecting upon new foundations. And this brings me to mention
the shipwrights, who are employed in the east part of the town, on both
sides the river Thames, in building ships, lighters, boats, and other
vessels; and the coopers, who make all the casks for domestic and foreign
service. The anchorsmiths, ropemakers, and others employed in the
rigging and fitting out ships, are very numerous; and brewing and
distilling may be introduced among the manufactures of this town, where
so many thousand quarters of malt are annually converted into beer and
spirits: and as the various kinds of beer brewed here are not to be
paralleled in the world, either for quantity or quality, so the
distilling of spirits is brought to such perfection that the best of them
are not easily to be distinguished from French brandy.
Having already mentioned ship-building among the mechanic trades, give me
leave to observe farther, that in this England excels all other nations;
the men-of-war are the most beautiful as well as formidable machines that
ever floated on the ocean.
As to the number of foreigners in and about this great city, there cannot
be given any certain account, only this you may depend upon, that there
are more of the French nation than of any other: such numbers of them
coming over about the time of the Revolution and since to avoid the
persecution of Louis XIV., and so many more to get their bread, either in
the way of trade, or in the service of persons of quality; and I find
they have upwards of twenty churches in this town, to each of which, if
we allow 1,000 souls, then their number must be at least 20,000. Next to
the French nation I account most of the Dutch and Germans; for there are
but few Spaniards or Portuguese, and the latter are generally Jews; and
except the raree-show men, we see scarce any of the natives of Italy
here; though the Venetian and some other Italian princes have their
public chapels here for the exercise of the Romish religion.