Page:Notes and Queries - Series 12 - Volume 2.djvu/254

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NOTES AND QUERIES. [12 s. 11. SEPT. 23, uie.

twelve unnumbered Index folios. The volume is much dilapidated, especially the twelve folios of the Index.

4. [Hain 8543.] " ManipulusFlorumcompilatus a magigtro Thoma de Hibernia .... Impressum Venetiis per magistrum loannem Rubeum Ver- cellensem." C. 1494, 288 ff.

Copinger, ' Supplement to Hain,' i., 1895, p. 254, gives 1495 as the date of this book, but Proctor, ' Index to Early Printed Books in the British Museum,' 1898, p. 338, places it in 1494. M. ESPOSITO.

THE DICK WHITTINGTON : CLOTH FAIK. This old public-house, a familiar landmark in the intricate neighbourhood of the Priory Church of St. Bartholomew, is now being taken down. It has been the subject of many drawings, photographs, and sketches. The illustration in Mr. Hanslip Fletcher's ' London Passed and Passing ' is very useful; and of special interest are a drawing by Herbert Railton and sketches of detail by Mr. Barham Harris now before me. In a measure these give it a tinsel glory by reproducing its false ascriptions : " Esta- blished in the Fifteenth Century," and " The oldest licensed house in London." The modern windows, " gin-palace " shop- front, and plaster skin on the old timber-and- brick walls are not of importance to the artist unless he is also an archaeologist, but because of the wide publicity its frequent illustration obtained for the house some record of its demolition may be useful.

Its claims to a pre- Reformat ion existence and licence are false and impossible. The site was originally in the burial-ground of the Priory, and at a date inferred to be sub- sequent to 1540 it was occupied by booths " only let ten out in the Fayre time and closed vp all the yeare after " (Stow, 1603, p. 381). The Priory and all the ground within its enclosure were purchased, May 19, 1544, for 1,064Z. 11s. 3d. by Sir Richard Rich, and at the end of that century in place of the booths

" there bee many large houses builded, and the North Wall towards Long Lane taken downe, a number of tenements are there erected for such as will give greate rents." Stow, 1603, p. 381.

This, I submit, is ample evidence that the house and its licence did not exist before Stow's record, say 1598. The name " Ye Olde Dick Whittington " is probably quite modern an example of the late Mr. Andrew Tuer's old English, introduced here when the " antiente Fratemitie offe ye Rahere Almoners " was founded, March 7, 1881, and had a Chapter-House in Cloth Fair.

Even as a sign the Dick Whittington. would not be earlier than about 1670, when the legend was popularized by chapbooks. It is even preferable to assume that this was a shop converted into a drinking booth at fair time, and not continuously a licensed house until the eighteenth cent\iry.

Of greater importance and possible anti- quity was the Hand and Shears, standing on. the opposite corner until replaced by the public-house now bearing that name. There is a rather scarce engraving of the old house badly reproduced at p. 237 of Morley's 4 Memoirs of Bartholomew Fair.' Here, as early as the Commonwealth, was held the Court of Piepowder, and from it issued the leaders of Lady Holland's mob, who violently protested against the early attempts to restrict the fair to its legal term. The sign of this house supports the belief in its earlier origin, and its size and appearance give greater probability to the tradition than that hitherto belonging to its now demolished neighbour, the Dick Whittington.

ALECK ABBAHAMS.

AN ILLUSTRATED SPEECH FROM THE THRONE. The opening years of the- eighteenth century would seem to have been distinguished by the appearance in London not only of the first illustrated English novel (as shown by your correspondents, ante, pp. 90, 153), but of the earliest and, perhaps,, the only illustrated Speeches from the Throne. This was in the reign of Anne, when what Macaulay termed in Victorian times " that most unmeaningly evasive of human compositions, a Queen's Speech," was put to pictorial use.

The Daily Courant of April 18, 1710, advertised that

"This Day is Publish'd, Her Majesty's most Gracious Speech to both Houses of Parliament, on Wednesday the 5th of April ; with Her Picture curiously Engraven, with the lively Figures of Religion and Wisdom on her Right Hand, Justice and Moderation on her Left Hand. Printed in a very large Character, on fine Royal Paper, and Roll'd. Sold by J. King, Map and Printseller, at the Globe in the Poultry. Price 6d. Fram'd. 18d. N.B. At the same Place you may have the Queen's Speeches Painted extraordinary in. Frames and Glasses from 6s. to 14s."

ALFRED F. ROBBINS.

44 JOBEY " OF ETON. Letters concerning successive 44 Jobeys," from Lord Aklenham and others, are to be found in The Times,. Jan. 13, 14, 15, 1916. This note may anticipate future inquiry.

RICHARD H. THORNTON.