The Press.
London, England, 1858-12-18 00:00:00

THE PRESS, DECEMBER 18,1858.

to Henry I. He was named }layer or Rahere,
and seems to have been a sharp fellow who made
to himself plenty of friends of the mammon of
unrighteousness in his carnal and jocund days.
But at last he 11.-:came converted, and, during an
illness, which 0.-curred during his pilgrimage to
Rome, vowed that if he recovered he would build
a hospital for poor men. He did recover, and
St. Bartholomew appeared to him in a vision and
commanded him to found a church in Smithfield
(i.e., Smooth-field), then a marsh, chiefly notable
as the spot where executions took place, but also
as being a great Friday cattle-market between
country and town. The King granted him pos-
session of the desired plot of ground in 1123, and
Bayer, to bring it into a habitable state, feigned
idiocy, and—as the old monkish biographer seems
to imply—induced the idlers to help him in
bringing stones and other materials to form the
first foundations. By some means or other, the
church and priory were built, and, by methods
which Rayer's juggling skill or worldly cunning
had taught him, abundant miracles were wrought
at the saint's shrine. The founder also took
good care to secure the tolls of the perspective
fair ; and in the twelfth year of his prelacy, 1133,
by pretending to have discovered a plot to assas-
sinate him, induced the King to grant his house
a charter of the most ample kind, and the usual
privileges to the frequenters of the fair. It is
clear that he prospered greatly, and that, as the
old chronicler expresses it, " the skin of his taber-
nacle dilated." lie died in 1143, and his tomb
may still be seen, having upon it what there is
good reason to suppose is a portrait statue, which
Mr. Morley copies for us, and which certainly,
by its expression of shrewdness and jolly good
humour, appears to tally in every respect with the
character we have received of the founder. His
policy seems to have been faithfully observed
after his death, and Mr. Morley fills several pages
with an enumeration of the miracles which St.
Bartholomew worked for the benefit of his priory.
None of them are sufficiently quaint or amusing
to quote, but all have a uniform tendency to
increase the wealth of the establishment, without
much scruple being shown as to whether the
offerings came from honest hands or the reverse.
The saint is represented as receiving the oblations
of extortionists, and as touting for custom, much
in the same manner that saints do at Naples at
the present day.
That there was great fun in West Smithfield
in the twelfth century appears from a MS. in the
British Museum containing the text of Gregory's
Decretals, with a commentary, illustrated by a
monk at a somewhat later period with all sorts
of caricatures—in which matters sacred and pro-
fane appear to be most amusingly blended. There
is a series forming a " Beast-Epic" (as the
Germans call it) like " Iteineke Fuchs "—another
representing monks engaged in all sorts of most
unspiritual exercises ; and many more, reflecting
no doubt the games which every year were car-
ried on outside the monastery gates. Here we
see boys whipping tops, playing at bat and ball,
bowls, and ninepins, men throwing dice on a
bench out of doors, a man beating a tabor while
he balances a child on his shoulder, wrestlers
and putters of the stone, a woman walking on
stilts while she holds an 'infant in her arms and
balances a jug of water on her head, and another,
—clearly an ancient Tumblerina,—who balances
herself to the music of tabor and pipes, head
downwards and feet in the air, by the palms of
her hands, upon two sword-points.

As to the general order and disposition of the
fair, there is reason to suppose that the solid
part of it,—the clothiers, woolstaplers, leather-
sellers, &c.,—held their stalls inside the priory
precincts, and that the pleasure-seekers, the
jugglers, and other ministers of amusement, be-
stowed themselves outside. As on the 2.lth of
August (St. Bartholomew's-day, old style) the
weather would be warm, many no doubt
bivouacked about the fields, and as there was in
Henry IL's time only one eating-house in
London, and that by the river-side, it is probable
tha: the custom of exposing cooked meat for sale,
—gradually developing into the feasts of "Bar-
tholomew Pig "—then took its origin.

Of course, there was often not a little fraud,
riot, and other disorders and crimes in the fair;
so it had, like other fairs, its own special tribunal
of justice ;—the Court of Pie-poudre or Pie-
powders ; a name which has given rise to much
controversy, but which Mr. Morley, by Adducing

" Dustifnte" from the
with its definition,satis-
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Having thus seen the beginning and growth of
the fair, we must pass over with but cursory
notice the various remarkable points in its history
which Mr. Morley has investigated with most
praiseworthy diligence, and illustrated with a
great variety of well-selected documentary
matter.—ln 1305, on St. Bartholomew's Eve, the
first of the three fair days, the frequenters of the
festival were gratified with the spectacle of a
grand execution. Wallace had arrived in London
the day before, was tried and condemned at
Westminster the next day, and sent on to Smith-
field for instant execution. Dragged thither in
chains at the tails of horses, he was half-hanged,
then disembowelled, then quartered.—lt was in
the same century, too, if ever, that the custom
which according to some French writers still
continues, of selling women in Smithfield, was in
existence.—lt was also on the same spot where
the livelier portion of the fair was held that
martyrs were generally burnt in the fourteenth
and fifteenth centuries.—Of the performance of
miracle-plays at an early period at Bartholomew
Fair, Mr. Morley does not seem to have been
able to obtain direct evidence, but there can, of
course, be little doubt that its founder would take
care to include these among its attractions.
The tolls of the fair were probably always
very valuable, and though it is uncertain at what
time any right to them by others than the Priory
authorities was asserted, it seems that by the year
1445 the City of London had established a right
to those which arose from the assemblage outside
the I'riory Gate. From that date to nearly a
hundred years later, our historian's research does
not seem to have discovered any material fact
respecting the fortunes of the fair; but at the
dissolution of the monasteries in 1.539, the other
class of tolls—those levied on the traders inside
the Priory—passed into new hands. The Priory
and Hospital were then separated ; the City took
charge of the latter, and the former, with its
privileges, was sold to Sir Richard Rich (after-
wards Lord Chancellor), and became his town
mansion. He made the most of his powers.—
The first description extant of the fair is hom
the pen of l'aul lleutzner, the German tutor,
who travelled in England in 1598—the same man,
by the way, from whom we derive our only
precise account of the celebrated Nonesuch
House,—and who takes particular notice of the
English (!) custom of profuse tobacco-smoking.
Ile tells us of the sumptuously-attired mayor
and aldermen who onen the fair,—of the wrest-
ling, and the scramble for live rabbits, and does
not omit the pickpocket, who seems to have been
in all ages about the most permanent part of the
whole concern.

The comic aspect of the fair, and the scope it
afforded for broad humour, was taken advantage
of by Ben Jonson, of whose comedy, "Bartho-
lomew Fair," Mr. Morley gives us a necessarily
Bowdlerized edition,—showing clearly, however,
that what may be called its fundamental element
was the satire against Puritanism, represented
is Zeal-o'-the-Laud Busy, the Tartuffe of the
piece.—ln a more serious description, contained
in the oldest extant tract on the subject, pub-
lished in 1641, the year of Strafford's execution,
the Puritan again appears, buying a wooden
sword to destroy the religious pictures exposed
for sale in Christchurch cloisters. The pick-
pocket is not forgotten, nor the jugglers, mounte-
banks, and toysellers, and the Pig, who turns up
so often in Ben Jonson, is here also in great force.
The English taste for satire found the fair an
its
political place for a humorous expression of
political opinions. In 1649 a " Fairing "—five
acts, with a prologue in doggrel verse—set forth
the Royalist view of Cromwell's expedition to
Ireland against Ormond and Charles ll.'s forces.
The playhouses being silenced during the Puritan
ascendancy, the pasquinaders of the nation issued
their political pamphlets in the above or similar
forms, and.what fun there was, was to be had there.
About 1648-1655 occurs the first extant adver-
tisement of a wild-beast show; and about the

same time began the curious illegal ceremony of
Lady Holland's Mob." The Bartholomew
tolls had passed through the Riches and the War-
wicks to the heiress of- Sir Walter Cope; and in
her time the Mayors of London attempted to
check the licence of the fair,—which was some-
times begun too early. Lady Holland, anxious
probably about her revenues, seems to have in-
stigated a number of riotous fellows to meet the
night previous to the proper day of opening, and
sally forth at twelve o'clock to proclaim the fair
commenced, by waking up every one in the
neighbourhood. After the Restoration, of course
the fair was merrier than ever. We read of
"monsters" and "curiosities," as well as every
kind of licence. By the era of the Popish Plot
of Titus Oates, the fair had become a recognized
medium of popular political expression, and the
favourite squibs were all directed against the
Pope. Mr. Morley transcribes a play, extending
to twenty-three of his pages, turning on a Popish
Plot for the assassination of Queen Elizabeth, in

which the Bishop of Rome is represented as a
seducer and murderer, and as finally meeting
with the fate of Dr. Faustus.—ln 1682-9 the
victim of Bartlemytide jesting was the Irish
nation ; "Brother Teague" took the place of the
obnoxious prelate; and King William's expedi-
tion, the rule of Tyrconnel in Ireland, and the
siege of Derry, are described from the Orange
point of view. The play is in five acts, and was
nearly the last of the political dramas of which
the fair was the theatre. A steady and con-
stant attempt was made after the Revolution to
discourage political satire in this form ; and its
most popular amusements were now monsters of
all sorts—lrish giants, clever mares, girls joined
together by the crowns of their heads, savages,
two bodies with one head, two heads on one
body', dwarfs, spotted boys, mermaids, " living
fairies" (what in Ireland would be 'Lepre-
chauns), people without arms, or without legs,
and varieties of animals. It was also—possibly—
the place where dolls first ' came out'—the
name, according to our author, being derived,
not from ' idol, or dol' (senseless), but from
"Dorothy." These articles were formerly called
"babies" or " poppets," and enjoyed great
repute.

But the most important characteristic of the
fair during the eighteenth century was the
drama in a tolerably legitimate form. Elkanah
Settle, who had been the Laureate of James 11.,
"became the Laureate of Mrs. Mynn," who also
"kept a poet."—ln 1707 she produced, per
Settle, "on a scale of unprecedented grandeur,
the Siege of Troy—thus anticipating the in-
genious Mr. Brough, who is going to travestie
the Father of Poetry at the Lyceum next Boxing-
night. This was, however, not such a let-down
for the Laureate as might be thought, for at
this period some of the best actors and actresses
used regularly to perform to the fair; and
some of the theatres closed their doors while it
continued. It was not more derogatory for
Pinkethman or Doggett to appear there than for
great Parliamentary orators in our own day
to delight provincial audiences with platform
oratory during the recess. The most steady
Bartholomew playwright, however, was a much
greater man than Settle. For nine years of
his life—a fact which biographers do not
seem to have noticed in its full extent—Henry
Fielding was regularly connected with the great
theatre in the George Inn Yard in Smithfield—a
booth proprietor who rented the same ground year
after year, wrote numerous plays for it, and
evidently looked to it as a source of regular
income. Mrs. Pritchard, " whose genius and
" virtue Churchill paused to honour amid the
" severities of his Rosciad," seems to have been
the great novelist's prima donna. Mrs. Cibber
also acted at the fair during one season.
During all this time, however, the vice of the
fair and the interruption to traffic, owing to its
fourteen days' extension, had become almost
intolerable, but, as long as there was any heart
in it, the efforts of the City to put it down were
unavailing. Its time was in 1750 reduced to the
original three days, but the restriction seems to
have been inoperative. Freedom from toll was
secured for the citizens in 1754, and the " pig and
pork" had been replaced by beef sausages—not to
the advantage of the consumers. Plays were inter-
dicted on various occasions between that date and
the commencement of the present century, but it
was not till '1827 that Lord Kensington's rights