Old and New London Part 60

It was long a depot in the metropolis for turtle; and in the quadrangle of the tavern might be seen scores of turtle, large and lively, in huge tanks of water; or laid upward on the stone floor, ready for their destination. The tavern was also noted for large dinners of the City Companies and other public bodies. The house was refitted in 1852, but has since been pulled down. (Timbs.)

Another noted Poultry Tavern was the "Three Cranes," destroyed in the Great Fire, but rebuilt and noticed in 1698, in one of the many paper controversies of that day. A fulminating pamphlet, ent.i.tled "Ecclesia et Factio: a Dialogue between Bow Church Steeple and the Exchange Gra.s.shopper," elicited "An Answer to the Dragon and Gra.s.shopper; in a Dialogue between an Old Monkey and a Young Weasel, at the Three Cranes Tavern, in the Poultry."

No. 22 was the house of Johnson's friends, Edward and Charles Dilly, the booksellers. Here, in the year 1773, Boswell and Johnson dined with the Dillys, Goldsmith, Langton, and the Rev. Mr. Toplady. The conversation was of excellent quality, and Boswell devotes many pages to it. They discussed the emigration and nidification of birds, on which subjects Goldsmith seems to have been deeply interested; the bread-fruit of Otaheite, which Johnson, who had never tasted it, considered surpa.s.sed by a slice of the loaf before him; toleration, and the early martyrs. On this last subject, Dr. Mayo, "the literary anvil," as he was called, because he bore Johnson's hardest blows without flinching, held out boldly for unlimited toleration; Johnson for Baxter's principle of only "tolerating all things that are tolerable," which is no toleration at all. Goldsmith, unable to get a word in, and overpowered by the voice of the great Polyphemus, grew at last vexed, and said petulantly to Johnson, who he thought had interrupted poor Toplady, "Sir, the gentleman has heard you patiently for an hour; pray allow us now to hear him." Johnson replied, sternly, "Sir, I was not interrupting the gentleman; I was only giving him a signal proof of my attention. Sir, you are impertinent."

Johnson, Boswell, and Langton presently adjourned to the club, where they found Burke, Garrick, and Goldsmith, the latter still brooding over his sharp reprimand at Dilly's. Johnson, magnanimous as a lion, at once said aside to Boswell, "I'll make Goldsmith forgive me." Then calling to the poet, in a loud voice he said, "Dr. Goldsmith, something pa.s.sed to-day where you and I dined; I ask your pardon."

Goldsmith, touched with this, replied, "It must be much from you, sir, that I take ill"--became himself, "and rattled away as usual." Would Goldy have rattled away so had he known what Johnson, Boswell, and Langton had said about him as they walked up Cheapside? Langton had observed that the poet was not like Addison, who, content with his fame as a writer, did not attempt a share in conversation; to which Boswell added, that Goldsmith had a great deal of gold in his cabinet, but, not content with that, was always pulling out his purse. "Yes, sir," struck in Johnson, "and that is often an empty purse."

In 1776 we find Boswell skilfully decoying his great idol to dinner at the Dillys to meet the notorious "Jack Wilkes." To Boswell's horror, when he went to fetch Johnson, he found him covered with dust, and buffeting some books, having forgotten all about the dinner party. A little coaxing, however, soon won him over; Johnson roared out, "Frank, a clean shirt!" and was soon packed into a hackney coach. On discovering "a certain gentleman in lace," and he Wilkes the demagogue, Johnson was at first somewhat disconcerted, but soon recovered himself, and behaved like a man of the world. Wilkes quickly won the great man.

They soon set to work discussing Foote's wit, and Johnson confessed that, though resolved not to be pleased, he had once at a dinner-party been obliged to lay down his knife and fork, throw himself back in his chair, and fairly laugh it out--"The dog was so comical, sir: he was irresistible." Wilkes and Johnson then fell to bantering the Scotch; Burke complimented Boswell on his successful stroke of diplomacy in bringing Johnson and Wilkes together.

Mr. Wilkes placed himself next to Dr. Johnson, and behaved to him with so much attention and politeness, that he gained upon him insensibly. No man ate more heartily than Johnson, or loved better what was nice and delicate. Mr. Wilkes was very a.s.siduous in helping him to some fine veal. "Pray give me leave, sir--it is better there--a little of the brown--some fat, sir--a little of the stuffing--some gravy--let me have the pleasure of giving you some b.u.t.ter--allow me to recommend a squeeze of this orange; or the lemon, perhaps, may have more zest." "Sir--sir, I am obliged to you, sir," cried Johnson, bowing, and turning his head to him with a look for some time of "surly virtue," but, in a short while, of complacency.

But the most memorable evening recorded at Dilly's was April 15, 1778, when Johnson and Boswell dined there, and met Miss Seward, the Lichfield poetess, and Mrs. Knowles, a clever Quaker lady, who for once overcame the giant of Bolt Court in argument. Before dinner Johnson took up a book, and read it ravenously. "He knows how to read it better," said Mrs. Knowles to Boswell, "than any one. He gets at the substance of a book directly. He tears out the heart of it." At dinner Johnson told Dilly that, if he wrote a book on cookery, it should be based on philosophical principles. "Women," he said, contemptuously, "can spin, but they cannot make a good book of cookery."

They then fell to talking of a ghost that had appeared at Newcastle, and had recommended some person to apply to an attorney. Johnson thought the Wesleys had not taken pains enough in collecting evidence, at which Miss Seward smiled. This vexed the superst.i.tious sage of Fleet Street, and he said, with solemn vehemence, "Yes, ma'am, this is a question which, after five thousand years, is yet undecided; a question, whether in theology or philosophy, one of the most important that can come before the human understanding."

Johnson, who during the evening had been very thunderous at intervals, breaking out against the Americans, describing them as "rascals, robbers, and pirates," and declaring he would destroy them all--as Boswell says, "He roared out a tremendous volley which one might fancy could be heard across the Atlantic," &c.--grew very angry at Mrs.

Knowles for noticing his unkindness to Miss Jane Barry, a recent convert to Quakerism.

"We remained," says Boswell, writing with awe, like a man who has survived an earthquake, "together till it was very late. Notwithstanding occasional explosions of violence, we were all delighted upon the whole with Johnson. I compared him at the time to a warm West Indian climate, where you have a bright sun, quick vegetation, luxurious foliage, luscious fruits, but where the same heat sometimes produces thunder, lightning, and earthquakes in a terrible degree."

St. Mildred's Church, Poultry, is a rectory situate at the corner of Scalding Alley. John de a.s.swell was collated thereto in the year 1325.

To this church anciently belonged the chapel of Corpus Christi and St.

Mary, at the end of Conyhoop Lane, or Grocers' Alley, in the Poultry.

The patronage of this church was in the prior and canons of St. Mary Overie's in Southwark till their suppression. This church was consumed in the Great Fire, anno 1666, and then rebuilt, the parish of St. Mary Cole being thereunto annexed. Among the monumental inscriptions in this church, Maitland gives the following on the well-known Thomas Tusser, of Elizabeth's reign, who wrote a quaint poem on a farmer's life and duties:--

"Here Thomas Tusser, clad in earth, doth lie, That some time made the points of husbandrie.

By him then learne thou maist, here learne we must, When all is done we sleep and turn to dust.

And yet through Christ to heaven we hope to goe, Who reads his bookes shall find his faith was so.

Among the curious epitaphs in St. Mildred's, Stow mentions the following, which is worth quoting here:--

"HERE LIES BURIED THOMAS YKEN, SKINNER.

"In Hodnet and London G.o.d blessed my life, Till forty and sixe yeeres, With children and wife; And G.o.d will raise me Up to life againe, Therefore have I thought My death no paine."

[Ill.u.s.tration: JOHN WILKES. (_From an Authentic Portrait._)]

A fair monument of Queen Elizabeth had on the sides the following verses inscribed:--

"If prayers or tears Of subjects had prevailed, To save a princesse Through the world esteemed; Then Atropos In cutting here had fail'd, And had not cut her thread, But been redeem'd; But pale-faced Death; And cruel churlish Fate, To prince and people Brings the latest date.

Yet spight of Death and Fate, Fame will display Her gracious virtues Through the world for aye, Spain's Rod, Rome's Ruine, Netherlands' Reliefe; Heaven's gem, earth's joy, World's wonder, Nature's chief.

Britaine's blessing, England's splendour, Religion's Nurse, the Faith's Defender."

The Poultry Compter, on the site of the present Grocers' Alley, was one of the old sheriff's prisons pulled down in 1817, replaced soon after by a chapel. Stow mentions the prison as four houses west from the parish of St. Mildred, and describes it as having been "there kept and continued time out of mind, for I have not read the original hereof."

"It was the only prison," says Mr. Peter Cunningham, "with a ward set apart for Jews (probably from its vicinity to Old Jewry), and it was the only prison in London left unattacked by Lord George Gordon's blue c.o.c.kaded rioters in 1780." This may have arisen from secret instructions of Lord George, who had sympathies for the Jews, and eventually became one himself. Middleton, 1607 (James I.), speaks ill of it in his play of the _Phoenix_, for prisons at that time were places of cruelty and extortion, and schools of villainy. The great playwright makes his "first officer" say, "We have been scholars, I can tell you--we could not have been knaves so soon else; for as in that notable city called London, stand two most famous universities, Poultry and Wood St., where some are of twenty years standing, and have took all their degrees, from the master's side, down to the mistress's side, so in like manner," &c.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE POULTRY COMPTER. (_From an Old Print._)]

It was at this prison, in the reign of Charles I., that Dr. Lamb, the conjurer, died, after being nearly torn to pieces by the mob. He was a creature of the Duke of Buckingham, and had been accused of bewitching Lord Windsor. On the 18th of June Lamb was insulted in the City by a few boys, who soon after being increased by the acceding mult.i.tude, they surrounded him with bitter invectives, which obliged him to seek refuge in a tavern in the Old Jewry; but the tumult continuing to increase, the vintner, for his own safety, judged it proper to turn him out of the house, whereupon the mob renewed their exclamations against him, with the appellations of "wizard," "conjuror," and "devil." But at last, perceiving the approach of a guard, sent by the Lord Mayor to his rescue, they fell upon and beat the doctor in such a cruel and barbarous manner, that he was by the said guard taken up for dead, and carried to the Compter, where he soon after expired. "But the author of a treatise, ent.i.tled 'The Forfeiture of the City Charters,'" says Maitland, "gives a different account of this affair, and, fixing the scene of this tragedy on the 14th of July, writes, that as the doctor pa.s.sed through Cheapside, he was attacked as above mentioned, which forced him to seek a retreat down Wood Street, and that he was there screened from the fury of the mob in a house, till they had broken all the windows, and forced the door; and then, no help coming to the relief of the doctor, the housekeeper was obliged to deliver him up to save the spoiling of his goods.

"When the rabble had got him into their hands, some took him by the legs, and others by the arms, and so dragging him along the streets, cried, 'Lamb, Lamb, the conjuror, the conjuror!' every one kicking and striking him that were nearest.

"Whilst this tumult lasted, and the City was in an uproar, the news of what had pa.s.sed came to the king's ear, who immediately ordered his guards to make ready, and, taking some of the chief n.o.bility, he came in person to appease the tumult. In St. Paul's Churchyard he met the inhuman villains dragging the doctor along; and after the knight-marshal had proclaimed silence, who was but ill obeyed, the king, like a good prince, mildly exhorted and persuaded them to keep his peace, and deliver up the doctor to be tried according to law; and that if his offence, which they charged him with, should appear, he should be punished accordingly; commanding them to disperse and depart every man to his own home. But the insolent varlets answered, _that they had judged him already_; and thereupon pulled him limb from limb; or, at least, so dislocated his joints, that he instantly died."

This took place just before the Duke of Buckingham's a.s.sa.s.sination by Felton, in 1628. The king, very much enraged at the treatment of Lamb, and the non-discovery of the real offenders, extorted a fine of 6,000 from the abashed City.

Dekker, the dramatist, was thrown into this prison. This poet of the great Elizabethan race was one of Ben Jonson's great rivals. He thus rails at Shakespeare's special friend, who had made "a supplication to be a poor journeyman player, and hadst been still so, but that thou couldst not set _a good face_ upon it. Thou hast forgot how thou ambled'st in leather-pilch, by a play-waggon in the highway; and took'st mad Jeronimo's part, to get service among the mimics," &c.

Dekker thus delineates Ben:--"That same Horace has the most unG.o.dly face, by my fan; it looks for all the world like a rotten russet apple, when 'tis bruised. It's better than a spoonful of cinnamon water next my heart, for me to hear him speak; he sounds it so i' th' nose, and talks and rants like the poor fellows under Ludgate--to see his face make faces, when he reads his songs and sonnets."

Again, we have Ben's face compared with that of his favourite, Horace's--"You staring Leviathan! Look on the sweet visage of Horace; look, parboil'd face, look--has he not his face punchtfull of eylet-holes, like the cover of a warming-pan?"

Ben Jonson's manner in a playhouse is thus sketched by Dekker:--"Not to hang himself, even if he thought any man could write plays as well as himself; not to bombast out a new play with the old linings of jests stolen from the Temple's revels; not to sit in a gallery where your comedies have entered their actions, and there make vile and bad faces at every line, to make men have an eye to you, and to make players afraid; not to venture on the stage when your play is ended, and exchange courtesies and compliments with gallants, to make all the house rise and cry--'That's Horace! That's he that pens and purges humours!'"

But, notwithstanding all his bitterness, Dekker could speak generously of the old poet; for he thus sums up Ben Jonson's merits in the following lines:--

"Good Horace! No! My cheeks do blush for thine, As often as thou speakest so; where one true And n.o.bly virtuous spirit for thy best part Loves thee, I wish one, ten; even from my heart!

I make account, I put up as deep share In any good man's love, which thy worth earns, As thou thyself; we envy not to see Thy friends with bays to crown thy poesy.

No, here the gall lies;--we, that know what stuff Thy very heart is made of, know the stalk On which thy learning grows, and can give life To thy one dying baseness; yet must we Dance anticks on your paper.

But were thy warp'd soul put in a new mould, I'd wear thee as a jewel set in gold."

Charles Lamb, speaking of Dekker's share in Ma.s.singer's _Virgin Martyr_, highly eulogises the impecunious poet. "This play," says Lamb, "has some beauties of so very high an order, that with all my respect for Ma.s.singer, I do not think he had poetical enthusiasm capable of rising up to them. His a.s.sociate, Dekker, who wrote _Old Fortunatus_, had poetry enough for anything. The very impurities which obtrude themselves among the sweet pictures of this play, like Satan among the sons of Heaven, have a strength of contrast, a raciness, and a glow in them, which are beyond Ma.s.singer. They are to the religion of the rest what Caliban is to Miranda."

Ned Ward, in his coa.r.s.e but clever "London Spy," gives us a most distasteful picture of the Compter in 1698-1700. "When we first entered," says Ward, "this apartment, under the t.i.tle of the King's Ward, the mixture of scents that arose from _mundungus_, tobacco, foul feet, dirty shirts, stinking breaths, and uncleanly carcases, poisoned our nostrils far worse than a Southwark ditch, a tanner's yard, or a tallow-chandler's melting-room. The ill-looking vermin, with long, rusty beards, swaddled up in rags, and their heads--some covered with thrum-caps, and others thrust into the tops of old stockings. Some quitted their play they were before engaged in, and came hovering round us, like so many cannibals, with such devouring countenances, as if a man had been but a morsel with 'em, all crying out, 'Garnish, garnish,'

as a rabble in an insurrection crying, 'Liberty, liberty!' We were forced to submit to the doctrine of non-resistance, and comply with their demands, which extended to the sum of two shillings each."

The Poultry Compter has a special historical interest, from the fact of its being connected with the early struggles of our philanthropists against the slave-trade. It was here that several of the slaves released by Granville Sharp's n.o.ble exertions were confined. This excellent man, and true aggressive Christian, was grandson of an Archbishop of York, and son of a learned Northumberland rector. Though brought up to the bar, he never practised, and resigned a place in the Ordnance Office because he could not conscientiously approve of the American War. He lived a bachelor life in the Temple, doing good continually. Sharp opposed the impressment of sailors and the system of duelling; encouraged the distribution of the Bible, and advocated parliamentary reform. But it was as an enemy to slavery, and the first practical opposer of its injustice and its cruelties, that Granville Sharp earned a foremost place in the great bede-roll of our English philanthropists.

Mr. Sharp's first interference in behalf of persecuted slaves was in 1765.

In the year 1765, says Clarkson, in his work on slavery, a Mr. David Lisle had brought over from Barbadoes Jonathan Strong, an African slave, as his servant. He used the latter in a barbarous manner at his lodgings, in Wapping, but particularly by beating him over the head with a pistol, which occasioned his head to swell. When the swelling went down a disorder fell into his eyes, which threatened the loss of them.

To this a fever and ague succeeded; and he was affected with a lameness in both his legs.

Jonathan Strong having been brought into this deplorable condition, and being therefore wholly useless, was left by his master to go whither he pleased. He applied, accordingly, to Mr. William Sharp, the surgeon, for his advice, as to one who gave up a portion of his time to the healing of the diseases of the poor. It was here that Mr. Granville Sharp, the brother of the former, saw him. Suffice it to say that in process of time he was cured. During this time Mr. Granville Sharp, pitying his hard case, supplied him with money, and afterwards got him a situation in the family of Mr. Brown, an apothecary, to carry out medicines.

In this new situation, when Strong had become healthy and robust in his appearance, his master happened to see him. The latter immediately formed the design of possessing him again. Accordingly, when he had found out his residence, he procured John Ross, keeper of the Poultry Compter, and William Miller, an officer under the Lord Mayor, to kidnap him. This was done by sending for him to a public-house in Fenchurch Street, and then seizing him. By these he was conveyed, without any warrant, to the Poultry Compter, where he was sold by his master to John Kerr for 30. Mr. Sharp, immediately upon this, waited upon Sir Robert Kite, the then Lord Mayor, and entreated him to send for Strong and to hear his case. A day was accordingly appointed, Mr. Sharp attended, also William M'Bean, a notary public, and David Laird, captain of the ship _Thames_, which was to have conveyed Strong to Jamaica, in behalf of the purchaser, John Kerr. A long conversation ensued, in which the opinion of York and Talbot was quoted. Mr. Sharp made his observations. Certain lawyers who were present seemed to be staggered at the case, but inclined rather to re-commit the prisoner. The Lord Mayor, however, discharged Strong, as he had been taken up without a warrant.

As soon as this determination was made known, the parties began to move off. Captain Laird, however, who kept close to Strong, laid hold of him before he had quitted the room, and said aloud, "Then now I seize him as my slave." Upon this Mr. Sharp put his hand upon Laird's shoulder, and p.r.o.nounced these words, "I charge you, in the name of the king, with an a.s.sault upon the person of Jonathan Strong, and all these are my witnesses." Laird was greatly intimidated by this charge, made in the presence of the Lord Mayor and others, and fearing a prosecution, let his prisoner go, leaving him to be conveyed away by Mr. Sharp.

But the great turning case was that of James Somerset, in 1772. James Somerset, an African slave, had been brought to England by his master, Charles Stewart, in November, 1769. Somerset, in process of time, left him. Stewart took an opportunity of seizing him, and had him conveyed on board the _Ann and Mary_, Captain Knowles, to be carried out of the kingdom and sold as a slave in Jamaica. The question raised was, "Whether a slave, by coming into England, became free?"

In order that time might be given for ascertaining the law fully on this head, the case was argued at three different sittings--first, in January, 1772; secondly, in February, 1772; and thirdly, in May, 1772.

And that no decision otherwise than what the law warranted might be given, the opinion of the judges was taken upon the pleadings. The great and glorious issue of the trial was, "That as soon as ever any slave set his foot upon English territory he became free."

Thus ended the great case of Somerset, which, having been determined after so deliberate an investigation of the law, can never be reversed while the British Const.i.tution remains. The eloquence displayed in it by those who were engaged on the side of liberty was perhaps never exceeded on any occasion; and the names of the counsellors, Davy, Glynn, Hargrave, Mansfield, and Alleyne, ought always to be remembered with grat.i.tude by the friends of this great cause.