this marvellous story plenty of signatures
are appended. First and foremost is that of
the parson of Crookhorn, then that of his
clerk, of two captains, and five country
gentlemen; and the editor states that the
original document may be seen at the Amsterdam
coffee-house.

This document has to us a solemn significance;
for this silly story, which was brought
so prominently forward on Monmouth's
second visit to the west, led many a devoted
but ignorant follower to his standard, and
not improbably was the cause of his fatal
error—that of allowing himself to be
proclaimed king, instead of appearing among
them simply as the champion of liberty. It
is, however, a strange thing to find such a
document in sixteen hundred and eighty—
to find, not country clowns only, but London
citizens, men who had lived under the
protectorate, and lived prosperously, evidently
believing the efficacy of the royal touch in
scrofula, and, more, believing that the
possession of this occult virtue was a sure
indication of the true prince.

Suggestive, however, as these passing
notices of what occurred more than a
hundred and seventy years ago may be,
perhaps the character of the times in reference
to domestic life is more vividly exhibited
in the advertisements, which, not in interminable
columns, but by twos and threes, are
squeezed in in small type at the end. These
are often curious, although they do not take
a very wide range.

Here, Castile, marble, and white soap, as
good as can be made, is advertised, and also
cordial drops, like all other cordial drops,
suitable for every ailment. Then we have
four pieces of tapestry-hangings to be sold,
full of silk and of lively colours, to be afforded
a great pennyworth. The days of dreadful
sacrifices, the reader will perceive, had not
yet arrived. The summer of sixteen hundred
and seventy-nine was disturbed by the stupid
and malignant Meal-tub Plot; so, soon
after we have the following announcement:
There is lately published a new set of very
useful buttons for shirt sleeves or ruffles,
there being described upon them some of the
most remarkable passages of the late horrid
plot! We have mostly been accustomed to
consider canary birds as not having been very
long introduced into England, but we find
here that there will be some hundreds of rare
canary birds to fee sold at the house of Mr.
James Dalton, the Three Tuns in Gracechurch
Street. This advertisement is from time to
time repeated.

Notices of houses to let are frequent.
There is Morton Abbey, containing several
large rooms, with gardens, fishponds, dovehouse,
brewhouse, woodhouse, and a very
fine chapel. Then, the house in which Sir
Thomas Davis, late alderman, lived, on Snow
Hill, is to be sold, with four rooms on a floor,
well wainscoted: a coachhouse, stables, and
two gardens. Gardens on Snow Hill! Yet
people were beginning to seek after the
country. Many a citizen cast a longing look
toward Islington: not the northern or
western extremities of that wide parish—for
Highbury and Barnsbury were complete
woodland then, while Holloway was only
known as being on the Barnet road, and
supplying the larger portion of London with
milk and cream,—but up by the pleasant
fields before you come to the Green; and
here were many schools, almost rivaling the
celebrated schools at Hackney. Among them
Mrs. Salmon's took perhaps the highest
place. Here is her daughter's advertisement:
would it had been more in detail, that
we might have learnt what the terms of a
genteel boarding-school were in the reign of
Charles the Second, and whether the silver
spoons and the towels were required then as
now: the silver forks we know were but just
coming into fashion, and then only for invalids.
"Mrs. Woodcock, Mrs. Salmon's daughter, who
has kept the school in Freeman's Court, Royal
Exchange, is now removing to a great house
at Islington, for the air, to keep a boarding-school;
but Mr. Hughes, the dancing-master,
will continue the school in Freeman's
Court." We have some subsequent
advertisements of Mr. Hughes and his dancing
academy; indeed, these were so popular at
this time in London that the narrator of the
travels of Cosmo, Duke of Florence, ten
years before this date, expressly tells us
that his highness was taken to see one of
them.

There are a tolerable number of losses
advertised: the most numerous relate to dogs
and horses. For an extraordinary small
spaniel a guinea reward is offered; and for
grey mares and bay nags, the reward is
always forty shillings. This is the sum offered
for a fat black boy, eighteen years old, in
grey livery lined with green serge, green
stockings, and a grey hat; a reward which,
we hope, was never paid. Here is a curious
bit of costume: On Sunday last, April sixth,
sixteen hundred and eighty, strayed, a child
three years old, in a red cap, striped gown,
orange petticoat, green stockings, and new
shoes.

When the description of the person is
added, the advertisement often becomes very
amusing. Thus, Nicholas Pricklowe, who has
run away from his master at the Royal Coffee
Mill, in Cloth Fair, is described as a squat,
thick fellow, with lank brown hair. Mary
Golding, who has taken French leave of her
mistress, the laundress, and with more than
belonged to her, is described as of middle
stature, brown hair, and low, broad forehead.
One Charles James is of middle stature, flaxen
hair, little curled pate, thin faced, and full
grey eyes. Notices of trampers, supposed to
have stolen goods in their possession, are
frequent, and sometimes a list of property
supposed to be stolen is published. Thus, in