by Lee Miller
Frederick, Duke of Wirtemberg1
A City of Water
London is a very old, walled city. So old, in fact, that in the sixteenth century Roman artifacts and ruins are frequently unearthed layers below the current street levels — much to everyone’s amazement.2 Mute testimony to the strata of human life long sustained here by the Thames. Along the southern edge of the city the river charts a smooth course, gliding past the Tower, the wharves, the ruins of Baynard’s Castle, the ancient monastery of Blackfriars by the western wall. Sweeping everything in. A history steeped in water.
Various streams, or bourns, once trickled down through the walled city, winding under bridges and along lanes, performing daily ablutions. Most are now vaulted over with brick and paved level with the street. The population grows rapidly, houses crowding so thickly upon one another that much of the drinking water is ruined and must be piped into the city through conduits of lead. The effect this has on the mind can only be guessed. Many thrill to the changes around them; others are critical and dislike what they see. And there are not a few who believe that the world is coming to an end.
Close to the Madding Crowd
Only recently has London come to be regarded as England’s true capital, thanks to Queen Elizabeth. Her reign rolls along on an overwhelming tide of popularity. On the anniversary of her ascension, bells peal from a forest of steeples above the old city walls. They are vastly fond of great noises that fill the ear, a foreign visitor notes, such as the firing of cannon, drums, and the ringing of bells; so that in London it is common for a number of them, that have got a glass in their heads, to go into some belfry and ring the bells for hours together for the sake of exercise.3
Of the fourteen royal residences, the twenty-four-acre palace of Whitehall in Westminster west of the London gate is by far the most spectacular, envied as the largest palace in Europe. An incredible 1,500 courtiers and retainers maintain a constant bustle about the Queen, keeping a well-ordered Whitehall humming with activity. The kitchen alone is cluttered with departments: for poultry, for dairy, for produce, for pastries and confections, for seasonings, for butter, for vinegar, for baking, each with its own separate staff. All this requires an enormous intake of supplies: spices; candles; linens and bedding; rushes and flowers; bottles and glass; cutlery; mountains of firewood; annually, 2,500 tons of ale and beer; 33,024 chickens; 13,260 lambs; 8,200 sheep; 1,240 head of beef; and 60,000 pounds of butter.4 Enough to keep an army of Londoners employed. Little wonder that gentlemen and merchants desert the country en masse and do fly to London.5 To earn a living.
As for retailers, therefore, and handy craftsmen, it is no marvel if they abandon country towns, and resort to London; for not only the court, which is now-a-days much greater and more gallant than in former times … is now for the most part either abiding at London, or else so near unto it, that the provision of things most fit for it may easily be fetched from thence.6
Inside the city walls, London pulsates with motion, with an incessant din of hammering and hawking, the clank and call of a multitude of craftsmen. Here are ranged the great trade guilds of the masons, the weavers, the coopers, and the like. Saddlers, glovers, tanners, perfumers, upholsterers, soapmakers, needlemakers, haberdashers. A welter of specialists, all with their own arms and ceremony. All with an eye on the Royal Exchange, a massive edifice of brick and stone accommodating hundreds of merchants who meet twice daily to transact business.7
From the Royal Exchange, past the Pissing Conduit and down into Eastcheap along the waterfront, the fishmarkets and butchers’ shambles are strewn, where more meat is sold in a day than Portugal consumes in a whole year.8 Where the stench is overwhelming, and the filth of offal is channeled down to waiting dung boats on the Thames.
There is an insatiable appetite for luxuries and fads in a city that boasts enough markets to supply anything under Christendom. Londoners delight in foreign goods. Novelties crowd shop windows. And for a lark we oft exchange our finest cloth, corn, tin, and wools for halfpenny cockhorses for children, dogs of wax or of cheese, twopenny tabors, leaden swords, painted feathers, gewgaws for fools, dogtricks for dizzards, hawks-hoods, and suchlike trumpery, whereby we reap just mockage and reproach in other countries.9
A Tourist Industry
Foreign princes travel to London just to see the sights. A voracious appetite for tour books keeps presses churning at an impressive rate. London is the capital of England and so superior to other English towns, raves a visitor sparing of pronouns, that London is not said to be in England, but rather England to be in London, for England’s most resplendent objects may be seen in and around London; so that he who sightsees London and the royal courts in its immediate vicinity may assert without impertinence that he is properly acquainted with England.10
London streets, relics of an earlier age, are narrow and twisted, overwhelmed by the recent congestion of carts and coaches, for the world runs on wheels with many, whose parents were glad to go on foot.11 For economy’s sake, it is easier on everyone to travel by way of the Thames. Wherries, London’s water taxis with comfortably upholstered interiors, line up along the bank in great crowds, vying for fares since customers are free to choose the ship they find the most attractive and pleasing, while every boatman has the privilege on arrival of placing his ship to best advantage for people to step into. When Swiss traveler Thomas Platter embarks on such a ride to see the sights, he is most astounded, not by the historic buildings but by the continuous line of boats on the Thames, extending the entire length of the city.12
The ever-popular St. Paul’s Cathedral is a famous tourist landmark, a must-see on any itinerary. A sea of booksellers’ stalls and printers’ shops, drenched by colorful signs, laps its base. And, skulking around, the usual assortment of knaves, pickpockets, and thieves. People-watching promises never a dull moment, for amid the jostling and jeering crowd you shall see walking the knight, the gull, the gallant, the upstart, the gentleman … the scholar, the beggar, the doctor, the idiot, the rujfian, the cheater, the Puritan, the cutthroat.13
After attending the service, a favorite pastime is to climb the three hundred stone steps to the cathedral roof, paved with lead. Couples stroll there along the promenade on Sunday afternoons, taking in sweeping views of the rushing crowds below, the writhing city of London with Westminster poised regally in the distance along the rolling Thames.
The roof has also become, sad to say, a popular haven for graffiti artists. By all means, mocks the satirist Thomas Dekker, visitors must not neglect to pay the admission fee to the roof in order to experience the pleasure of defacing it. Pay tribute to the top of Paul’s steeple with a single penny… Before you come down again, I would desire you to draw your knife, and grave your name… in great characters upon the leads… and so you shall be sure to have your name lie in a coffin of lead, when yourself shall be wrapped in a winding-sheet. And indeed, the top of Paul’s contains more names than Stowe’s Chronicle.14
Lead roofs appear to be irresistible for this kind of thing. In 1581, despite raging political turmoil, the ousted Portuguese king, Don Antonio, on official state business to Elizabeth, manages to find time to etch an inscription on the tower roof behind Windsor Palace: When Antonius the eloquent was compelled by war to seek help of the Queen, this inscription was made.15 Apparently the Eloquent enjoyed himself so much, he updated his autograph four years later.
The artistic pride of the city and a work very rare is London Bridge, its twenty graceful arches spanning the Thames. It is a marvel by night, spraying soft lights upon the dark river, water gurgling under the vaults below. Towering over it are expensive shops and wealthy merchants’ houses so that it seemeth rather a continual street than a bridge.16 The secretary of Frederick, Duke of Wirtemberg, waxed utterly rhapsodic about these splendid, handsome, and well-built houses dwelt in by merchants of consequence, stuffed with costly wares from around the world.17 Guarding one such house is a disagreeable, spitting, and very alive camel; an unexpected vis
itor bonus.
In Come the Urbanites
Yet a change is coming over the citizenry. Unpleasant urbanites are sprouting up like mushrooms, whining cityfolk inured to none of the hardships of the countryside. Much to the profound disgust of their fellow countrymen. Londiners… are in reproach called Cockneys and, worse yet, eaters of buttered toast.18 Lest this seem an unfair castigation, let it be known that there is an overall disdain of those who shun the wholesome food of the countryside. They, with their nice, tender stomachs, which cannot handle such fare, would find it lying stinking in their stomachs, as dirt in a filthy sink or privy.19
Such fastidiousness is not confined to cuisine alone, but has extended to the whole atmosphere of dining. A veritable mantra of culinary ritual is developing. Not least in the curious affair of placement settings: Venetian glass, pewter dishes and silver spoons are a prerequisite. Wood will no longer do. Tapestries, silks, fine napery, and plate garnish the homes of even the lowest sort in London.20
Such are the London Cockneys. The term is new, begging definition. They are held to be embarrassingly gullible, half-baked dolts, utterly ignorant of husbandry or housewifery, such as is practised in the country, so that they may be persuaded anything about rural commodities. The ever-popular tale of the citizens son, who knew not the language of a cock, but called it neighing, is commonly known. Cockneigh.21
The name is generally fixed on such who are born within the sound of Bow-Bell Church, and are tender enough and sufficiently ignorant in country businesses. Weak, delicate, and silly folk.22
The cherished opinion of rural England places London at the farthest extreme of frivolity. Small lapdogs are all the rage, sought far and near to satisfy the nice delicacy of dainty dames and wanton women's wills.23
These sybaritical puppies, remarks an incredulous and alliterating Harrison, are meet playfellows for mincing mistresses to bear in their bosoms, to keep company withal in their chambers, to succour with sleep in bed and nourish with meat at board, to lie in their laps and lick their lips as they lie (like young Dianas) in their wagons and coaches.24
No surprise that a popular London saying is Love me, love my dog.25 One of the cleaner adages. The streets are rife with all sorts of irreverent witticisms and sacrilegious jests. Alongside somber and eloquent eulogies to the dead, one is just as apt to stumble upon inscriptions like the boisterous verse engraved on a locksmith’s tombstone:
A zealous lock-smith died of late,
And did arrive at heaven gate,
He stood without and would not knock,
Because he meant to pick the lock.26
Or the epitaph of the worldly Thomas Elderton:
Here is Elderton lying in dust,
Or lying Elderton; choose which you lust… ,27
It’s an unusual attitude. Yet, for all this jocularity, all that glitters is not gold. Or, to quote another London saying, it’s not all butter that the cow shits. 28
Self-indulgence
There are too many people in this city, and its effects are becoming evident in irritability and self-centeredness. Older forms of hospitality crumble. In the countryside, manors welcome visitors with a generosity as great on the day of departure as on that of arrival. Not so in London, where men oftentimes complain of little room; and in reward of a fat capon or plenty of beef and mutton largely bestowed upon them in the country, a cup of wine or beer, with a napkin to wipe their lips and a “You are heartily welcome,” is thought to be great entertainment; and therefore the old country clerks have framed this saying… upon the entertainment of townsmen and Londoners, after the days of their abode in this manner: The first is pleasant, and the second tolerable, the third is empty, but the fourth day stinks.29
If city people no longer lavish hospitality on visitors it is, in part, because guests increasingly demonstrate a marked lack of gratitude in return. A great housekeeper, it is said, is sure of nothing for his good cheer save a great turd at his gate.30
The rudeness is in keeping with an overall atmosphere of self-indulgence. A shirking of personal responsibility. The guiding words of the past lie open to the censure of the youth of our time, complains the historian Camden, who, for the most part, are so over-gulled with self liking, that they are more than giddy in admiring themselves, and carping at whatsoever hath been done or said heretofore.31
There is an alarming lack of discipline and self-control. Anger is allowed free rein; street brawls are common. Couples easily separate when tired of marriage. Even in the innocuous realm of cuisine, the swelling army oí pursy and corpulent citizens indicates an absence of self-denial. In the past one dish was felt sufficient, now tables groan under the weight and variety of courses. Not even the most devouring glutton or the greediest cormorant that is, can scarce eat of every dish in every course. Oh what nicety is this? What vanity, excess, riot, and superfluity is here? Oh, farewell former world!32
Aiding and abetting the decadence are the entertainments of the day. There are plenty who spend their Sundays, not at church in the quiet contemplation of God, but in dancing, dicing, carding, bowling, tennis playing, hawking, hunting, and such like.33 Admittedly, something is amiss when the city’s most impressive laborers are those souls of industry in the workshops of the Marshalsea Prison, diligently turning out false dice for gambling cheats.34
Dancing to express a joyous frame of mind is one thing, say the critics, but now it is done entirely in praise of ourselves, night and day without moderation, and in all manner of smooching and slobbering one of another, what filthy groping and unclean handling is not practised everywhere in these dancings? Yea the very deed and action itself, which I will not name … shall be portrayed and showed forth in their bawdy gestures of one to another.35
These criticisms are no mere complaints by a scandalized generation, but express very real concerns about a society which yields to every desire. No thought to consequences. There is a flourishing of sexual gratification without restraint, embarrassing in its irresponsibility. Mutual coition between man and woman, returns the flippant reply, is not so offensive before God. For do not all creatures (say they) … engender together? Therefore, they conclude, that whoredom is a badge of love.36
Bastard births, a soaring population, and pandemic venereal disease rank among the many products of this age. Seldom discussed. Still, the call for change is hardly helped by one reformer’s exuberant list of alternatives: the delights that cometh by meat and drink, and sometimes while those things be expulsed and voided, whereof is in the body over-great abundance. This pleasure is felt when we do our natural easement, or when we be doing the act of generation (with legal spouses), or when the itching of any part is eased with rubbing or scratching. 37
Drinking and drunkenness wash over England like a tide. Drowning souls. There was a time when public houses were few and far between. But now every town, village, and street corner overflows with an abundance of alehouses, taverns and inns, which are so fraughted with malt-worms night and day, that you would wonder to see them. Often they sit drinking and carousing a whole week together, as long as the money lasts. A world it is to consider their gestures and demeanours, how they strut and stammer, stagger and reel to and fro, like madmen, some vomiting, spewing and disgorging their filthy stomachs, other some… pissing under the board as they sit, which is most horrible, some fall to swearing, cursing. interlacing their speeches with curious terms of blasphemy to the great dishonour of God and offence of the godly ears present.38
A welter of graphic and irreverent nicknames attach themselves to such heady ale and beer: the huff cap, the mad-dog, father-whoreson, angels’ food, dragons’ milk, go-by-the-wall, stride-wide, and lift-leg, etc…. It is incredible how our maltbugs lug at this liquor. with such eager and sharp devotion as our men hale at huffcap till they be red as cocks and little wiser than their combs.39
Social Disintegration
A slow rot is seeping through the city; a disturbing underbelly of London’s wealth and power. A wildern
ess of slums. At Smart’s Quay, a thieves’ school instructs streetwise boys in the delicate art of pickpocket-ing. A way of survival, of keeping clear of vile debtor’s prisons. Pedestrians, passing these places of incarceration, are horrified by the pitiful cries of the inmates, lying in filthy straw and loathsome dung, worse than any dogs.40 As though dogs should be treated this way.
Examples of degenerate society prompt public outcry — unheeded — against the concentration of wealth into too few hands. Condemning the rich who expend great sums to nourish their sporting dogs while the poor go hungry. Begging for bread. Money is like muck, not good except it be spread.41
By way of proof, the depraved district of Southwark oozes like scum along the southern edge of the Thames. The repository of London’s human offal. Sights here include the infamous Clink, a clerical prison for the incarceration of Jesuits, thieves, and pirates; Paris Garden with its abhorrent bear-baiting arena; gambling dens; prostitution rings and a jumble of whorehouses, taverns, and playhouses. Not the least of which are the Globe Theater and the Hope. Places of ill repute. Filled to capacity even when the church of God shall be bare and empty.42 Theatergoers flock thither thick and threefold, asserting that the messages delivered in the plays are as good as any sermon.43
Better, at least, than Paris Garden. Better than the bear-baitings that take place on Bankside in the shadow of Lambeth Palace across the marsh. A putrid, vicious sport. In the middle of a lonely arena, a bear crouches, tethered to a stake. No one to help it. Spectators clamber onto risers for a better view of what is to come, eagerly placing bets as snarling mastiffs are released one by one on the terrorized animal. Cries of delight escape from the crowd as the bear hopelessly tries to ward them off. The dogs are specially bred for the purpose, champion prize fighters housed in a tenement of foul-smelling kennels behind the stadium, 120 in number. Too valuable to risk injury, the odds are stacked: the bear cannot bite — its teeth are broken short.44