way since I fought the famous boxing-woman of Billingsgate 29 minutes,
and gained a complete victory (which is six years ago); but as the
famous Stoke Newington ass-woman dares me to fight her for the 10
pounds, I do assure her I will not fail meeting her for the said sum,
and doubt not that the blows which I shall present her with will be
more difficult for her to digest than any she ever gave her
asses.--_Note._ A man, known by the name of Rugged and Tuff,
challenges the best man of Stoke Newington to fight him for one guinea
to what sum they please to venture. N.B. Attendance will be given at
one, and the encounter to begin at four precisely. There will be the
diversion of Cudgel-playing as usual.
Other advertisements about this time relate to cock-matches, sometimes "to
last the week," to bull-baiting, and, more cruel still, to dressing up mad
bulls with fireworks, in order to worry them with dogs. The brutal tone of
manners, which set in afresh with the Hanoverian succession, might be
alone gathered from the so-called sporting advertisements of the day; and
we now see that Hogarth, in his famous picture, had no need to, and
probably did not, draw upon his imagination for the combination of horrid
cruelties therein depicted.
The very same tone pervaded the gallantry of the day, and we print two
advertisements, one of the time of Anne, and the other of the age we are
now illustrating, in order to contrast their spirit. We give the more
polished one precedence:--
A gentleman who, the twentieth instant, had the honour to conduct a
lady out of a boat at Whitehall-stairs, desires to know where he may
wait on her to disclose a matter of concern. A letter directed to Mr.
Samuel Reeves, to be left with Mr. May, at the Golden Head, the upper
end of New Southampton Street, Covent Garden.--_Tatler_, March 21,
1709.
A certain courtly style and air of good breeding pervades this
advertisement, of which Sir Richard Steele himself need not have been
ashamed; but what a falling-off is here!--
Whereas a young lady was at Covent Garden playhouse last Tuesday
night, and received a blow with a square piece of wood on her breast;
if the lady be single, and meet me on Sunday, at two o'clock, on the
Mall in St. James's Park, or send a line directed for A. B., to Mr.
Jones's, at the Sun Tavern in St. Paul's Churchyard, where and when I
shall wait on her, to inform her of something very much to her
advantage on honourable terms, her compliance will be a lasting
pleasure to her most obedient servant.--_General Advertiser_, Feb. 8,
1748.
It would seem as though the beau had been forced to resort to a missile to
make an impression, and then felt the necessity of stating that his
intentions were "honourable," in order to secure an interview with his
_innamorata_. Imagine, too, the open unblushing manner in which the
assignation is attempted! We are far from saying that such matters are not
managed now through the medium of advertisements, for we shall presently
show they are, but in how much more carefully concealed a manner! The
perfect contempt of public opinion, or rather the public acquiescence in
such infringements of the moral law, which it exhibits, proves the general
state of morality more than the infringements themselves, which obtain
more or less at all times. Two of the causes which led to this low tone of
manners with respect to women were doubtless the detestable profligacy of
the courts of the two first Georges, and the very defective condition of
the existing marriage law. William and Mary, and Anne, had, by their
decorous, not to say frigid lives, redeemed the crown, and, in some
measure, the aristocracy, from the vices of the Restoration. Crown, court,
and quality, however, fell into a still worse slough on the accession of
the Hanoverian king, who soiled afresh the rising tone of public life by
his scandalous connection with the Duchess of Kendal and the Countess of
Darlington; whilst his son and successor was absolutely abetted in his
vicious courses by his own queen, who promoted his commerce with his two
mistresses, the Countesses of Suffolk and Yarmouth. The degrading
influence of the royal manners was well seconded by the condition of the
law. Keith's chapel in May Fair, and that at the Fleet, were the Gretna
Greens of the age, where children could get married at any time of the day
or night for a couple of crowns. It was said at the time, that at the
former chapel six thousand persons were annually married in this off-hand
way; the youngest of the beautiful Miss Gunnings was wedded to the Duke of
Hamilton, at twelve o'clock at night, with a ring off the bed-curtain, at
this very "marriage-shop." The fruits of such unions may be imagined. The
easy way in which the marriage bond was worn and broken through is clearly
indicated by the advertisements which absolutely crowd the public journals
from the accession of the House of Brunswick up to the time of the third
George, of husbands warning the public not to trust their runaway wives.
We have referred, in an early part of this paper, to the taste for
blackamoors, which set in the reign of Charles II., and went on increasing
until the middle of the next century, at which time there must have been a
very considerable population of negro servants in the metropolis. At first
the picturesque natives of the East were pressed into the service of the
nobility and gentry, and colour does not appear to have been a _sine quâ
non_. Thus we have in the _London Gazette_ of 1688 the following
hue-and-cry advertisement:--
Run away from his master, Captain St. Lo, the 21st instant, Obdelah
Ealias Abraham, a Moor, swarthy complexion, short frizzled hair, a
gold ring in his ear, in a black coat and blew breeches. He took with
him a blew Turkish watch-gown, a Turkish suit of clothing that he used
to wear about town, and several other things. Whoever brings him to
Mr. Lozel's house in Green Street shall have one guinea for his
charges.
The next advertisement we find also relates to what we must consider an
East Indian. The notion of property in these boys seems to have been
complete; their masters put their names upon their collars, as they did
upon their setters or spaniels:--
A black boy, an Indian, about thirteen years old, run away the 8th
instant from Putney, with a collar about his neck with this
inscription: 'the Lady Bromfield's black in Lincoln's Inn Fields.'
Whoever brings him to Sir Edward Bromfield's at Putney shall have a
guinea reward.--_The London Gazette_, 1694.
The traffic in African blacks, which commenced towards the end of the
seventeenth century, seems to have displaced these eastern servitors
towards the end of the century, for henceforth the word negro, blackamoor,
or black boy, is invariably used. No doubt the fashion for these negroes
and other coloured attendants was derived from the Venetian Republic, the
intercourse of whose merchants with Africa and India naturally led to
their introduction. Titian and other great painters of his school
continually introduced them in their pictures, and our own great bard has
for ever associated the Moor with the City in the Sea. In England the
negro boys appear to have been considered as much articles of sale as they
would have been in the slave-market at Constantinople. In the _Tatler_ of
1709 we find one offered to the public in the following terms:--
A black boy, twelve years of age, fit to wait on a gentleman, to be
disposed of at Denis's Coffee-house in Finch Lane, near the Royal
Exchange.
Again, in the _Daily Journal_ of September 28th, 1728, we light upon
another:--
To be sold, a negro boy, aged eleven years. Enquire of the Virginia
Coffee-house in Threadneedle Street, behind the Royal Exchange.
These were the overflowings of that infamous traffic in negroes, commenced
by Sir John Hawkins in the year 1680, which tore from their homes, and
transferred to Jamaica alone, no less than 910,000 Africans between that
time and the year 1786, when the slave-trade was abolished.
We have brought the reader up to the date of the final battle which
extinguished the hopes of the Stuarts and settled the line of Brunswick
firmly on the throne. The year 1745 witnessed the commencement of the
_General Advertiser_, the title of which indicates the purpose to which it
was dedicated. This paper was the first successful attempt to depend for
support upon the advertisements it contained, thereby creating a new era
in the newspaper press. From the very outset its columns were filled with
them, between fifty and sixty, regularly classified and separated by
rules, appearing in each publication; in fact, the advertising page put on
for the first time a modern look. The departure of ships is constantly
notified, and the engravings of these old high-pooped vessels sail in even
line down the column. Trading matters have at last got the upper hand. You
see "a pair of leather bags," "a scarlet laced-coat," "a sword," still
inquired after; and theatres make a show, for this was the dawning of the
age of Foote, Macklin, Garrick, and most of the other great players of the
last century; but, comparatively speaking, the gaieties and follies of the
town ceased gradually from this time to proclaim themselves through the
medium of advertisements. The great earthquake at Lisbon so frightened the
people, that masquerades were prohibited by law, and the puppet-shows, the
rope-dancing, the china-auctions, and public breakfasts henceforth grow
scarcer and scarcer as the Ladies Betty and Sally, who inaugurated them,
withdrew by degrees, withered, faded, and patched, from the scene.
The only signs of the political tendencies of the time to be gathered from
the sources we are pursuing, are the party dinners, announcements of which
are now and then to be met with as follows:--
To the Joyous.--The Bloods are desired to meet together at the house
known by the name of the Sir Hugh Middleton, near Saddler's Wells,
Islington, which Mr. Skeggs has procured for that day for the better
entertainment of those Gentlemen who agreed to meet at his own house.
Dinner will be on the Table punctually at two o'clock.--_General
Advertiser_, Jan. 13, 1748.
Or the following still more characteristic example from the same paper of
April 12:--
Half-Moon Tavern, Cheapside.--Saturday next, the 16 of April, being
the anniversary of the Glorious Battle of Colloden, the Stars will
assemble in the Moon at Six in the evening. Therefore the Choice
Spirits are desired to make their appearance and fill up the
joy.--ENDYMION.
Within five-and-twenty years from this date most of the existing morning
journals were established, and their advertising columns put on a guise
closely resembling that which they now present. We need not therefore
pursue our deep trenching into the old subsoil in order to turn up
long-buried evidences of manners and fashions, for they have ceased to
appear, either fossil or historical; we therefore boldly leap the gulf
that intervenes between these old days and the present.
The early part of the present century saw the commencement of that liberal
and systematic plan of advertising which marks the complete era in the
art. Princely ideas by degrees took possession of the trading mind as to
the value of this new agent in extending their business transactions.
Packwood, some thirty years ago, led the way by impressing his razor-strop
indelibly on the mind of every bearded member of the empire. Like other
great potentates he boasted a laureate in his pay, and every one remembers
the reply made to the individuals curious to know who drew up his
advertisements: "La, sir, we keeps a poet!"
By universal consent, however, the world has accorded to the late George
Robins the palm in this style of commercial puffing. His advertisements
were really artistically written. Like Martin, he had the power of
investing every landscape and building he touched with an importance and
majesty not attainable by meaner hands. He did perhaps go beyond the
yielding line of even poetical license, when he described one portion of a
paradise he was about to submit to public competition as adorned, among
other charms, with a "hanging wood," which the astonished purchaser found
out meant nothing more than an old gallows. But then he redeemed slight
manoeuvres of this kind by touches which really displayed a genius for
puffing. On one occasion he had made the beauties of an estate so
enchanting, that he found it necessary to blur it by a fault or two, lest
it should prove too bright and good "for human nature's daily food." "But
there are two drawbacks to the property," sighed out this Hafiz of the
Mart, "the litter of the rose-leaves and the noise of the nightingales!"
Certainly the force of exquisite puffing could no further go, and when he
died the poetry of advertising departed. Others, such as Charles Wright
of Champagne celebrity, have attempted to strike the strings; and Moses
does, we believe, veritably keep a poet; but none of them have been able
to rival George the Great, and we yawn as we read sonnets which end in the
invariable "mart," or acrostics which refer to Hyam and Co.'s superior
vests. Twenty years ago some of the daily newspapers admitted illustrated
advertisements into their columns; now it would be fatal to any of them to
do so. Nevertheless, they are by far the most effective of their class, as
they call in the aid of another sense to express their meaning. All but
the minors of the present generation must remember George Cruikshank's
exquisite woodcut of the astonished cat viewing herself in the polished
Hessian, which made the fortune of Warren. But in those days tradesmen
only tried their wings for the flight. It was left to the present time to
prove what unlimited confidence in the power of the advertisement will
effect, and a short list of the sums _annually_ spent in this item by some
of the most adventurous dealers will perhaps startle our readers.
"Professor" Holloway, Pills, etc. £30,000
Moses and Son 10,000
Rowland and Co. (Macassar oil, &c.) 10,000
Dr. De Jongh (cod-liver oil) 10,000
Heal and Sons (bedsteads and bedding) 6,000
Nicholls (tailor) 4,500
It does seem indeed incredible that one house should expend upon the mere
advertising of quack pills and ointment a sum equal to the entire revenue
of many a German principality. Can it possibly pay? asks the astonished
reader. Let the increasing avenue of assistants, to be seen "from morn to
dewy eve" wrapping up pills in the "professor's" establishment within the
shadow of Temple Bar, supply the answer.[2] Vastly as the press of this
country has expanded of late years, it has proved insufficient to contain
within its limits the rapid current of puffing which has set in.
Advertisements now overflow into our omnibuses, our cabs, our railway
carriages, and our steamboats. Madame Tussaud pays 90_l._ monthly to the
Atlas Omnibus Company alone for the privilege of posting her bills in
their vehicles. They are inked upon the pavement, painted in large letters
under the arches of the bridges and on every dead wall. Lloyd's weekly
newspaper is stamped on the "full Guelph cheek" of the plebeian penny; the
emissaries of Moses shower perfect libraries through the windows of the
carriages which ply from the railway stations; and, as a crowning fact,
Thackeray, in his "Journey from Cornhill to Cairo," tells us that Warren's
blacking is painted up over an obliterated inscription to Psammetichus on
Pompey's Pillar!
Having shown the reader the slow growth of the advertising column; having
climbed, like "Jack in the Bean-stalk," from its humble root in the days
of the Commonwealth up its still increasing stem in the succeeding hundred
years, we now come upon its worthy flower in the shape of the
sixteen-paged _Times_ of the present day. Spread open its broad leaves,
and behold the greatest marvel of the age--the microcosm in type. Who can
recognize in its ample surface, which reflects like some camera-obscura
the wants, the wishes, the hopes, and the fears of this great city, the
news-book of the Cromwellian times with its leash of advertisements?
Herein we see how fierce is the struggle of two millions and a half of
people for dear existence. Every advertisement writhes and fights with its
neighbour, and every phase of society, brilliant, broken, or dim, is
reflected in this battle-field of life. Let us tell off the rank and file
of this army of announcements. On the 24th of May, 1855, the _Times_, in
its usual sixteen-paged paper, contained the incredible number of 2,575
advertisements. Amazing as this total appears, we only arrive at its full
significance by analyzing the vast array. Then, indeed, we feel what an
important power is the great British publie. Of old the antechambers of
the noble were thronged with poets, artists, publishers, tradesmen, and
dependants of all kinds, seeking for the droppings of their favour; but
what lordly antechamber ever presented such a crew of place-hunters,
servitors, literary and scientific men, schemers, and shopkeepers as
daily offer their services to the humblest individual who can spare a
penny for an hour's perusal of the _Times_? Let us take this paper of the
24th of May and examine the crowd of persons and things which cry aloud
through its pages, each attempting to make its voice heard above the
other. Here we see a noble fleet of ships, 129 in number, chartered for
the regions of gold, for America, for India, for Africa--for every port,
in fact, where cupidity, duty, or affection holds out an attraction for
the British race. Another column wearies the eye with its interminable
line of "Wants." Here in long and anxious row we see the modern "mop" or
statute-fair for hiring; 429 servants of all grades, from the genteel
lady's-maid or the "thorough cook," who will only condescend to accept
service where two footmen are kept, to the humble scullery-maid, on that
day passed their claims before us for inspection. Another column is noisy
with auctioneers; 136 of whom notify their intention of poising their
impatient hammers when we have favoured them with our company. Here we see
a crowd of booksellers offering, hot from the press, 195 new volumes, many
of which, we are assured by the appended critique, "should find a place in
every gentleman's library." There are 378 houses, shops, and
establishments presented to us to select from; and 144 lodging-house
keepers, "ladies having houses larger than they require," and medical men
who own "retreats," press forward with genteel offers of board and
lodging. Education pursues her claims by the hands of no less than 144
preceptors, male and female; whilst the hair, the skin, the feet, the
teeth, and the inward man are offered the kind attention of thirty-six
professors who possess infallible remedies for all the ills that flesh is
heir to. The remainder is made up of the miscellaneous cries of tradesmen,
whose voices rise from every portion of the page like the shouting of
chapmen from a fair. In the midst of all this struggle for gold, place,
and position, which goes on every day in this wonderful publication,
outcries from the very depths of the heart, passionate tears, bursts of
indignation, and heartrending appeals, startle one as they issue from the
second column of its front page. Here the father sees his prodigal son
afar off and falls upon his neck; the heartbroken mother implores her
runaway child to return; or the abandoned wife searches through the world
for her mate. It is strange how, when the eye is saturated with the thirst
after mammon exhibited by the rest of the broadsheet, the heart becomes
touched by these plaintive but searching utterances, a few of which we
reproduce:--
The one-winged Dove must die unless the Crane returns to be a shield
against her enemies.--_Times_ of 1850.
Or here is another which moves still more:--
B. J. C.--How more than cruel not to write. Take pity on such patient
silence.--_Times_, 1850.
The most ghastly advertisement which perhaps ever appeared in a public
journal we copy from this paper of the year 1845. It is either a threat to
inter a wrong body in the "family vault," or an address to a dead man:--
To the Party who Posts His Letters in Prince's Street, Leicester
Square.--Your family is now in a state of excitement unbearable. Your
attention is called to an advertisement in Wednesday's _Morning
Advertiser_, headed, "A body found drowned at Deptford." After your
avowal to your friend as to what you might do, he has been to see the
decomposed remains, accompanied by others. The features are gone; but
there are marks on the arm; so that, unless they hear from you to-day,
it will satisfy them that the remains are those of their misguided
relative, and steps will be directly taken to place them in the family
vault, as they cannot bear the idea of a pauper's funeral.
Sometimes we see the flashing eyes of indignation gleaming through the
very words. The following is evidently written to an old lover with all
the burning passion of a woman deceived:--
It is enough; one man alone upon earth have I found noble. Away from
me for ever! Cold heart and mean spirit, you have lost what
millions--empires--could not have bought, but which a single word
truthfully and nobly spoken might have made your own to all eternity.
Yet you are forgiven: depart in peace: I rest in my
Redeemer.--_Times_, Sept. 1st, 1852.
Sometimes it is more confiding love "wafting a sigh from Indus to the
pole," or, finger on lip, speaking secretly, and as he thinks securely,
through the medium of cipher advertisements to the loved one. Sweet
delusion! There are wicked philosophers abroad who unstring the bow of
harder toil by picking your inmost thoughts! Lovers beware! intriguers
tremble! Many a wicked passage of illicit love, many a joy fearfully
snatched, which passed through the second column of the first page of the
_Times_ as a string of disjointed letters, unintelligible as the
correspondents thought, to all the world but themselves, have we seen
fairly copied out in plain if not always good English in the commonplace
books of these cunning men at cryptographs. Here, for instance, we give an
episode from the life of "Flo," which appeared in the _Times_ of 1853-54,
as a proof:--
Flo.--Thou voice of my heart! Berlin, Thursday. I leave next Monday,
and shall press you to my heart on Saturday. God bless you!--_Nov. 29,
1853._
Flo.--The last is wrong. I repeat it. Thou voice of my heart. I am so
lonely, I miss you more than ever. I look at your picture every night.
I send you an Indian shawl to wear round you while asleep after
dinner. It will keep you from harm, and you must fancy my arms are
around you. God bless you! how I do love you!--_Dec. 23, 1853._
Flo.--My own love, I am happy again; it is like awaking from a bad
dream. You are, my life; to know that there is a chance of seeing you,
to hear from you, to do things to enough. [There is some error here.]
I shall try to see you soon. Write to me as often as you can. God
bless you, thou voice of my heart!--_Jan. 2, 1854._
Flo.--Thou voice of my heart! How I do love you! How are you? Shall
you be laid up this spring? I can see you walking with your darling.
What would I give to be with you! Thanks for your last letter. I fear
nothing but separation from you. You are my world, my life, my hope.
Thou more than life, farewell! God bless you!--_Jan. 6, 1854._
Flo.--I fear, dearest, our cipher is discovered: write at once to your
friend "Indian Shawl" (P.O.), Buckingham, Bucks.--_Jan. 7, 1845._
The advertisement of January 7th is written in a great fright, and refers
to the discovery and exposure of the cipher in the _Times_ newspaper; for
whenever the aforesaid philosophers perceive that a secret correspondence
has arrived at a critical point they charitably insert a marplot
advertisement in the same cipher. The "Flo" intrigue was carried on in
figures, the key to which is as follows:--
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
y. u. o. i. e. a. d. k. h. f.
s. t. n. m. r. l. d. g. w. p.
x. c. b.
v.
The reader will perhaps remember another mad-looking advertisement which
appeared in the year 1853, headed "Cenerentola." The first, dated Feb.
2nd, we interpret thus:--
Cenerentola, I wish to try if you can read this, and am most anxious
to hear the end, when you return, and how long you remain here. Do
write a few lines, darling, please: I have been very far from happy
since you went away.
One of the parties cannot frame an adequate explanation of some delicate
matter clearly, as we find on the 11th the following:--