Page:Mediaevalleicest00billrich.djvu/55

 as shall be then necessary." Early in the following year the programme was repeated, a hundred and twenty bottles of wine and a hogshead of ale being specially ordered for the occasion. On the Coronation of George the Second, the Corporation again dined at the White Hart, and celebrated the event with wine "and as much ale as Mr. Mayor should think fit and necessary." When the Assembly Rooms were built in the Haymarket, the White Hart was found a convenient place for fashionable gatherings. After a morning concert, for example, which took place at those Rooms in 1770, two hundred gentlemen adjourned to dine at that inn. In 1779 the Court of Assistants established for the Stockingmakers of Leicester held its sitting in the same building.

A is mentioned as early as 15 18, standing near the High Cross. Later, a Bull's Head stood next door to the Green Dragon in the Market Place, "a better house, three stories high, built of red bricks." A "Bull" Inn is mentioned in 1590.

The, which stood opposite the great elmtree in the Market Place, was probably an Elizabethan building. "It had a gable front, and was white-washed in the last" (18th) "century. The sign was a swing one, and bore the representation of a dragon, painted green." This Inn acquired some notoriety in later days on acount of the murder of its landlord, Fenton, who lies buried, beneath a caustic epitaph, in St. Martin's Churchyard. This epitaph, which reflected on the purity of the law, gave great offence to the authorities, and the Spiritual Court ordered the stone to be removed ; but this order was never executed. The story of Fenton's murder is thus related by a contemporary, William Gardiner :— "Among many persons that were returning to France I met with M. Soulé, who in the year 1778 shot Fenton, the landlord of the Green Dragon in the Market Place, Leicester. This person was not the man upon whom the Frenchman sought to be revenged; but was the brother of the landlord who had insulted him; and as it was known he came to challenge him, he was rudely treated by the family. In thrusting him out of doors he drew from his pocket 31