The Sun.
London, England, 1826-04-28 00:00:00

COURT OP COMMON COUNCIL.

Yesterday a Court of Common Council was held.
Mr. STEPHENS presented a petition from the inhabitants of
Gracechurch-street, complaining of the great injury done to their
business, and the general nuisance, of the stand of coaches plartd
before their doors. He concluded by moving that it should be
referred' to the Committee for General Purposes, to inquire
'Whether the Court could not now exercise the power of remov-
ingAind regulating the coach stands, and if not, by what means
they had lost it.
The motion was agreed to. _ _

Mr HICK presented a similar petition from the inhabitants of
Cheapside: The stands narrowing the thoroughfare, gentlemen's
carriages could not be drawn up before the doors of shopkeepers
there without great ineonvenience and hazard.
Mr. S. Dixon. said, there was one thing often forgotten in such
applications--namely, to provide a place to which the inconve-
nience might be transferred. The coach-stands in Cornhill and
other places were found to he equally injurious by shopkeepers
who had, throughout the line of thoroughfares, an equal claim to
be relieved. But where were the coaches to be placed ? He re-
membered that when the inhabitants of Leadenhall applied to have.
the market for. skins removed, they were asked what other part of
the city was to be saddled with the nuisance ; they replied, ".oh,
we do not care who has it, so that we get rid of it."—(Laughter.)
Mr. !hex said that recesses from the main streets should be
formed for the reception of hackney coaches, as in Paris. There
no 'coaches were allowed to stand in the main thoroughfares, and
similar regulations might be adopted here. The space at present
occupied by Honey-lane market might be advantageously made use
of for the hackney coaches. to Cheapside, and the market, which
was not wanted there, done away with.
Alderman Woon said, that Members of Parliament, and others,
would go any way, rather than drive through Fleet-street, or
Cheapside, to get to the Bank. He considered that an Act of
Parliament would be necessary for the regulation of the stands, as
he believed the last Act took away the power formerly exercised
by the Corporation on the subject.
Mr. Deputy Hoorn, that some steps might be taken on the
subject moved that it should be referred to the Committee for Im-
.provernents, to inquire and report on the practicability of open-
ing a wide space for a coach-stand on the site of Honey-lane
market.
The motion was carried unanimously, and the petition was re-
ferred to the same Committee.
A number of publicans, residing in Smithfield market and its
vicinity appeared with 4 petition to the Court, praying them to re-
scind a resolution which had been passed at a former Court, for
the purpose of doing away with Bartholomew' Fair. The pe-
tition set forth that the entertainments of the fair, the interludes
and the wild beast shows, were for the innocent amusement of the
lower classes,; that the petitioners had paid high sums for the
leases and goodwills of their houses on the prospect of the profit
derivable from the concourse of persons brought to this chartered
fair ; that of late it had been well regulated, that no charge of
misconduct had been brought agairist`thern, and they prayed that
the ancient custom might not be abolished.
The former Resolution of the Court was then read. Upon an
inquiry, it was determined by the law authorities of the city, that
the Court had not the power to suppress the fair ; but that the
Committee for letting the City's lands might charge such a price
for the standing room as would preverit the ground being occupied
by booths, for the performance of interludes or wild beast shows,
and thus the attractions of the flair might be taken aw;ty. This
recommendation was then adopted by the Court.
One Member contended, that they were not in a condition to
receive the petition, as the Resolution could not be rescinded.
Mr. Dixon supported the petition. He would not join in the
systematic warfare against the amusements of the poor.—(Hear,
hear !) . ,2 • • •
Alderman Watrumax Raid that the Resolution which had been
adopted by the Court, went to strip the fair of the only rational or
harmless part of it—namely, the wild beast shows and the inter-
ludes, while the suttling booths would be left open for every spe-
cies of low riot and debatichery.
Mr. FavuLi. opposed the motion, and said the congregation of
multitudes of disorderly characters in the suburbs, bad been found
a most serious evil, and the benefit of the abolition of such places of
assemblage had already been experienced. The assemblage of such
multitudes in the heart of the City was equally mischievous. Mr.
Windham and others had advocated boxing and bull-baiting as es-
sential to the maintenance of national bravery, and as part of the
rights of the lower orders, but the advantage even to them was in
every respect doubtful.
One Member declared that the original object of the Pair was
trafie, which had been departed from, or superseded.
Mr. R. Tart.os. said it could be proved incontestibly that inter-
ludes and plays formed part ef the fair as originally instituted, and
that its ebject had in no way been departed from. Of late ad-
. !likable order had beetrantintained in the taittrllite saw no reason
for suppressing the carousing and ancient merrinient of the fair,
that would not go equally for the suppression of their dinners and
their feasts in the city.—(Cheers.)—Why should the poor be de-
prired of their jigs in the fair, whilst the Court of Aldermen had
their country-dances on board the City barge ?--(Hear, hear.)—
The sin of the amusements of Bartholomew Fair was an old com-
plaint, as they might learn from Ben Jonson's delineation of those
peraonages, Overdo, Zeal o' the Land, and Busy; whose cha-
racters were not obsolete. He remembered a passage, which
would show how old the tone was. Overdo eXclaimed, " Hark !
oh ye suns and daughters of Smithfield, and hear what malady it
dotIL the mind ;it causeth swearing—it causeth swaggering—it
eauseth snuffling and snarling, and now and then it causeth a
hurt." Busy—" The wares are the wares of devils, and the
whole fair is the shop of Satan."—(Much laughter.)
After much discussion;the motion for referring the petition to a
Committee was carried by a considerable majority.