Page:Chronicles of pharmacy (Volume 1).djvu/154

 ffor to slepe well Qwo so may not slepe wel Take egrimonye afayre del And ley it vnder his heed on nyth And it schall hym do slepe aryth For of his slepe schal he not wakyn Tyll it be fro vnder his heed takyn.

The development of pharmacy as a separate organisation was later in England than on the Continent, and was very gradual. In the Norman period the retail trade in drugs and spices and most other commodities was in the hands of the mercers. These were, in fact, general shopkeepers, deriving their designation from merx, merchandise. They attended fairs and markets, and in the few large towns had permanent booths. Under the Plantagenets a part of the south side of "Chepe" roughly extending from where is now Bow Church to Friday Street was occupied by their stores, and was known as the Mercery. Behind these booths were the meadows of Crownsild, sloping down to what it may be hoped was then the silvery Thames. Probably sheep and cattle fed on the pastures which Cannon Street and Upper Thames Street have since usurped.

But English traders were beginning to feel their feet, and other guilds were pushing forward. The Easterlings (East Germans from the Baltic coasts and the Hanse towns) brought goods from the East and placed them on the English market, and the Pepperers and Spicers distributed them to the public. The Easterlings, it may be mentioned, have left us the word sterling to commemorate their sojourn among us. The Mercers