I set out with the intention of writing six chapters on the “London Directory;” and, lo! I have reached the mystic seven. The worst of it is, that at the present rate of progress I shall have to transgress the editorial licence by at least four more before I can possibly bring my remarks to a close, consistent with the demands of my subject. Nevertheless, the Editor has only to say the word, and I will wipe,—not my tearful eye, but my goose quill, and bid my courteous reader adieu!
The other day I met a friend, and he greeted me with the remark, “Awfully dry.” Thinking he referred to the weather—it was the end of June—and feeling decidedly warm, I assented cordially, when I discovered that the statement was intended to be a less polite than concise criticism upon one or two of my later instalments to The Fireside, on the subject that heads these pages. My friend made several other remarks founded on the first, and went so far as to offer me some advice—a very dangerous thing, as everybody knows. It was to this effect: “Stick to your text.” What is my text? I asked, thinking to take him off his guard. “The London Directory,” he replied promptly.
Well, I must admit that in the last two papers I slightly wandered from my text. My excuse is this: baptismal names are in the London Directory as well as surnames; and the baptismal names of to-day are as different from the baptismal names of five hundred years ago as were the baptismal names of five hundred years ago from those in vogue five hundred years before that. This curious fact I wished to bring out and develop. At the same time I wanted to show that it was the English Bible that had caused the change. Whether I succeeded in so doing, I must leave to the reader to decide. At any rate, I can now turn, with such cheerfulness as my stern critic has left me, to the next class of English Surnames represented in the London Directory—that originated by Office, whether ecclesiastical or civil. I have got the Directory itself at my left elbow, not merely as a monitor to warn me, but also as a reference to support me. Looking to this mighty tome, then, for inspiration as well as illustration, I at once begin.
The Directory teems with relics of the feudal system. There is not a single office belonging to that formal and ceremonious age which is not commemorated within its pages. Whether it were service within the baronial hall or tenure without, all was held by a retinue who thought no office too mean or servile for acceptance. The feudatory, in fact, could seemingly do nothing; everything was done for him. He could eat and drink, ’tis true, and he did both to the great admiration of all beholders; but he had an officer to carve his meat for him; another to change his plate; a third to crack jokes for him, to aid his digestion; a fourth to extend a bowl to wash his fingers; a fifth to hand him a napkin to wipe them; a sixth to hold his wine-cup for him; and a seventh to taste each fresh dish set before him, so that in case poison had been put in the food, his taster might drop down dead instead of himself. Why the baron hadn’t an officer to wipe his nose for him, I can’t say; it has always been a mystery to me. One thing, however, is certain. As he sat and ate and drank, he had a little crowd of officers who thought it only too high a distinction to perform duties so menial, that a scullion in the present day, if asked to undertake some of them, would probably reply, “Is thy servant a dog, that he should do this thing?” At any rate, he would give you a month’s notice, to a certainty.
That all these officerships existed, the Directory still shows; for I have no hesitation in saying that the finest and most trustworthy records of the feudal age are to be found, not in the British Museum in Great Russell Street, nor the Bodleian Library at Oxford, but in that great red-backed tome which lies on the shelf in every London warehouse. Imagine our going to these dry and prosaic emporiums of merchandise for an account of a long past state of life, which, with all its barbarism, is well-nigh the most poetical era of English history. I mentioned seven officers who tended the baron at his meals. Taking the Directory, I find twelve Carvers, two Sewers, eleven Napiers and Nappers, six Ewers, one hundred and twenty-five Pages, not to mention our various “Cuppages” (i.e. Cup-page), Smallpages, and Littlepages, six “Says,” and twenty-four “Sayers.” ’Tis true there are no “Fools” in the Directory, though there may be plenty out of it; but once it was a very common name indeed, and denoted the officer, if I may use the term, whose duty it was to convulse the table with laughter by making the most ludicrous jokes he could invent, backing them up with all sorts of grimaces and contortions. He was a professed punster, too, and had free licence to make them at the expense even of his lord. Indeed, the fool could make a joke with impunity, which would have cost any other man his head. Of course he wore a fool’s-cap as the insignia of his office. The Napier, or Napper, set the napkins, once called “napes.” A curious and silly story has got abroad, that the Scotch Napiers got their surname from one Donald, whose prowess was so great in a certain battle, that the king said he had “na peer,” that is, no equal. His friends,—so the tale goes,—from henceforth styled him Donald Na-pier. The Scotch Napiers are, as Mr. Lower shows, of the house of Lennox, and owed their cognomen to the office I have described, held by their ancestors in the royal household. The Ewer carried the ewer of water in front of the Napier; and as they had no forks in those days, and used their left hand in a manner which would be now considered the reverse of polite, no wonder that between every course the napier and ewer would be busy indeed. Even the carver had no fork, and had to use his fingers very freely with the joints. In the “Boke of Kervynge,” an old manual of etiquette for young squires, there is a strict order to this effect:—“Sett never on fyshe, flesche, beest, nor fowle, more than two fyngers and a thumbe”! The young squire had early to learn this accomplishment; and therefore Chaucer, describing his Squire, made a point of saying in his favour,—
“Courteous he was, lowly and servisable,
And carf before his fader at the table.”
The Sewer brought in the viands; we still use the root in such compounds as en-sue and pur-sue. A sewe was any cooked dish or course of meat. Hence Chaucer, describing the rich feasts of Cambuscan, says, time would fail him to tell—
“Of their strange sewes.”
The Queen’s household still boasts, I believe, its six Gentlemen Sewers. The “Page,” of course, was a familiar spectacle, for he was here, there, and everywhere, at the beck and call of his lord. No wonder, therefore, he has so many representatives in our Directory. It is said that an elderly bachelor, bearing this name, became deeply attached to a young lady. Being bashful by nature, and unacquainted with the arts of courtship, he hung about the damsel for a long time, seeking vainly for courage and opportunity to declare the state of his mind. The golden chance came at last. At a party one night the fair lady dropped her glove. He rushed to pick it up, and presenting it to her, said,—
“If from that glove you take the letter ‘G,’
Then glove is love, and that I give to thee.”
She at once responded,—
“If you from Page should take the letter ‘P,’
Then Page is age,—and that won’t do for me.”
I believe he was taken ill and went home.
Knight, like Squire and Bachelor,—all relics of feudal days,—is largely represented in London. A would-be reader of the poets, it is said, went into a shop and asked to see a copy of “Young Knight’s Thoughts.” He was somewhat astonished to find that “Young” was not an adjective, but a surname. This reminds one of Southey’s story of the lady who, seeing a book advertised bearing the title “An Essay on Burns,” ordered a copy, thinking it treated of scalds, and might contain some remedies. Say, Sayer, Guster, and Taster—the last alone being now obsolete—all refer to the office mentioned above; the duty of the first bearers of these several names being to hazard their own lives for the preservation of their masters’. In a word, they stood behind their lord’s chair, and as every dish of meat or cup of wine was brought in, they assayed it (i.e., they took the first bite or sup); so that if either had been “drugged” by some conspirator in the kitchen, the baron might escape. It is right to add, to prevent misconception, that in some cases our Sayers owe their origin, like “Tester,” to another officership—that of examining money, to see whether it was full weight and of genuine metal. There are four or five “Testers” in the London Directory.
We may close this list with the mention of such surnames as Spencer or “Spenser”; Marshall, Chamberlain or Chamberlin, Warder, and Butler. All these represented important officerships.
We may here take the opportunity of referring to the condition of the lower classes. In the country there was no middle class, such as we know by the term, excepting those who are represented in the Directory under the sobriquet of Yeoman, Yeomans, and Yeomanson. The peasantry were oftentimes little more than goods and chattels of their masters. We must not exaggerate, however, for although there are sixty-four “Bonds” in the London Directory, who represent such old entries as “William le Bonde,” the progenitors of this name were in no such abject servitude as is now understood by the word. That they were hard worked there can be no doubt:
“Of alle men in londe
Most toileth the bonde,”—
and how much freedom was valued may be guessed from the number of Franks, Franklins, Frees, Freebodys, Freemans, Freeds, and Freeborns, in the big tome we are discussing. We find even Free-wife and Free-woman in the older registers, but they are now obsolete—in the Directory, I mean, not in actual life, for very often the wife not merely “rules her house,” but her husband too, and a good thing for him if he only knew it! There are fifty-three “Frys” to be added to this list, the old form of “free.” How curious that the lady who so distinguished herself in toiling for the abolition of slavery should have borne the name of Elizabeth Fry! Who strove more earnestly to make the bond free than she? Truly Tom Hood meant jest for earnest when he wrote his ode to Dr. Kitchener:—
“What baron, or squire, or knight of the shire
Lives half so well as a holy Fry-er?
In doing well thou must be reckoned
The first—and Mrs. Fry the second.”
Again he says in jest and rhyme, with a sly hit in the last line at her Quaker garments:—
“I like you, Mrs. Fry! I like your name!
It speaks the very warmth you feel in pressing
In daily act round Charity’s great flame—
I like the crisp Browne way you have of dressing.”
If Hood had known the meaning of Mrs. Fry’s name, he could have made a better play than this upon it. The forms in the old rolls are Walter le Frie, or Roger le Frye.
The country police were represented by various terms, and as I turn the page of my book of modern reference I am reminded of them all. The Hayward guarded the fences; the Forester or Forster or Foster, the Woodward, the Parker, the Warrener or Warner, the Woodreeve, now found as Woodruff or Woodroff, all protected the covers wherein the beasts of the chase found harbourage. The Pinder, or Pounder, was engaged in locking up strayed cattle. Every village had its pound, and no doubt in a day when hedges and dikes and fences were less familiar sights than now, his office would be an important one.
It may be asked, Have we any relic in our Directories of any office in the large towns answering to our modern policeman, or “peeler,” as our street gamins so disrespectfully style him? We answer in the affirmative. Our somewhat common surname of Catchpoll, Catchpole, Catchpool, and Catchpoole are his representatives. They were so called because, as they walked their beat, they carried a somewhat formidable weapon, very like a pitchfork, the two prongs of which slipped round the neck, and formed a steel collar. The officer then had the criminal entirely at his mercy, and could either drag him, or shove him by the pole attached, which was from six to seven feet, in length. He was called a Catchpoll, because he caught his victim by the head or poll. We still talk of a poll-tax, or “going to the poll,” showing how familiar the word was in those days. The Malvern Dreamer, in his poem entitled “The Vision of Piers Plowman,” says of the two thieves crucified with our Saviour, that,—
“A cachepol cam forth,
And cracked both their legges.”
Another form, Catcherell, lingered on for a time in our nomenclature, but it is now gone, unless Cattrall be but a corruption. An old sermon of the fourteenth century speaks of the “devil and his angels” as the “devil and his cachereles”! Our “Waites” and “Waits” represent the night watchmen. As they both sounded the watches and gave the alarm with a trumpet or horn, it came to pass that any band of night serenaders acquired the name. We are all familiar with the Christmas “waits”! I see there are two “Wakemans” in the Directory. The wakeman was the North English form of “watchman,” just as kirk is North English for church, or dike for ditch, or thack for thatch. Thus, Wycliffe translates Mark xii. 37, “Forsooth, that that I say to you, I say to all, Wake ye,” where our modern translators have “Watch.” Strangely enough, in Psalm cxxvii. 1 they have employed both forms. “The watchman waketh but in vain,” should have been either “The wakeman waketh but in vain,” or “The watchman watcheth but in vain.” As it stands it is incongruous, for it gives the modern reader the idea that the watchman had been asleep, implying that he had been negligent, which, of course, is not in the original. When we remember, as I have shown, that “wake” and “watch” were but the same word with two pronunciations, one North English and the other South English, the difficulty is explained. [107] A north countryman, if he wants to say that his neighbour is a shrewd fellow, says, “Eh, but he’s a wak’ un.” I don’t know whether a Lancashireman or a Yorkshireman is the most “wak’;” but an old saying gives the preference to the County Palatine. If a Lancashireman wish to be ahead of a Yorkshireman, it says, he must be up at two o’clock in the morning; but if a Yorkshireman wish to be ahead of a Lancashireman, he mustn’t go to bed at all. We may surmise that a Lancashireman originated the saying. Both “Wake” and “Sleep” are in the London Directory. Brook, in his “History of the Puritans,” relates a story concerning these two names. It seems, by a curious coincidence, that Isaac Wake was University Orator at Oxford, in 1607, Dr. Sleep being a well-known Cambridge preacher at the same time. James the First, who not merely liked his joke, but was fond of listening to sermons,—both characteristic of a Scotchman,—used to say, “he always felt inclined to Wake when he heard Sleep, and to Sleep when he heard Wake”—i.e., he could not decide on the relative merits of the two. Wake and Sleep will both be nicknames—the ancestor of the one doubtless being a sharp shrewd fellow; the progenitor of the other, I daresay, being thought somewhat dull and stupid by his neighbours.
Speaking about “Sleep” and “Wake” reminds us of a name which has been a puzzle to many—that of “Gotobed.” The last time I was in the metropolis, I saw it over a door in Great Portland Street. The name has acquired additional interest since Mr. Trollope introduced it in one of his most able stories, “The American Senator.” One of our humorous poets had already played upon it in the lines,—
“Mr. Barker’s as mute as a fish in the sea,
Mr. Miles never moves on a journey,
Mr. Gotobed sits up till half after three,
Mr. Makepeace was bred an attorney.”
It is just possible it is a nickname, for it occurs in registers as Gotobedde since the days of Elizabeth. Besides, there is a like nickname in the Hundred Rolls in the case of “Serl Gotokirk,” a sobriquet given to the owner on account of his regular and frequent attendance at worship. Nevertheless, I believe it to be a baptismal surname. I doubt not it is a mere corruption of Godbert, once a favourite child’s name. When I add that I find it five hundred years ago entered as “Godeberd,” a little later as “Gotebedde,” and more recently “Gotobedd,” I think the question may be looked upon as settled.
But I am falling into a snare. Methinks I hear my stern critic saying, “What has Gotobed to do with official surnames?—stick, Sir, to your text.” Well, the connection does certainly seem somewhat vague; but Wakeman was official, and it led me to Wake, and from Wake it was not very odd that I should pitch upon Sleep, and after all you can never sleep comfortably unless you go to bed. Still, to soothe my friend, I will hark back, and conclude this chapter by a reference to a few ecclesiastic surnames.
’Tis true that Henry the Eighth and others demolished our abbeys, monkeries—as Latimer styles them—priories, and other Romish institutions that had become objectionable to English morals. But one thing they could not do—uproot them from our registers. In the London Directory, if nomenclature goes for anything, they never flourished so vigorously as in the reign of Protestant Victoria! Apart from Westminster Abbey, there are at least five Abbeys in other quarters of the Metropolis, while no less than seventy-three Abbots reside in the same neighbourhood. Nor is this all. There are still left in London over fifty “Priors,” “Pryers,” and “Pryors,” over twenty “Fryers,” over thirty “Monks,” and nearly forty “Nunns.” Talk of the Papal aggression! Why, Mr. Newdegate should call the attention of the House of Commons, and through them that of the whole country, to the fact immediately. It is awful to contemplate what is thus going on under our very noses. It was only the other day that a Nunn appeared in a small house out of the Strand not more than a day old, if the register of births be correct. Talk of boy-bishops, this is simply intolerable!
It is almost as bad when we turn to names that are less Romishly suggestive. How can it be consistent with his more orthodox duties, for an Archdeacon to be a furniture-broker, a Dean to be a rag and bottle merchant, or a Bishop to be a tobacco and snuff manufacturer! If my stern critic doubts my word, I can only refer him to the London Directory. There, sir, I’m sticking to my text this time, surely! I know a “Priest,” too, who keeps a chandler’s shop Marylebone way, and a “Deacon” who employs his leisure hours in the delightful occupation of chimney-sweeping; he resides in the vicinity of Edgeware Road. Not that I blame them; for what better can you expect from either Priests or Deacons, so long as Bishops, Deans, and Archdeacons are guilty of such vagaries as I have stated?
There was a time,—now a long while ago,—when two personages contended for the honours of the Papal chair. There are no less than thirty-six Popes in London at this present moment; one is a greengrocer, by the way. I have not heard of their quarrelling; and so far, at least, this must be considered satisfactory. A good deal of blood was shed over the rival claims of the first two. When James the First came on a visit to Sir Thomas Pope, near Oxford, the Knight’s little daughter was introduced to his Majesty with these lines,—
“See! this little mistress here
Did never sit in Peter’s chair,
Neither a triple crown did wear,
And yet she is a Pope!
“No benefice she ever sold,
Nor did dispense with sin for gold;
She hardly is a fortnight old,
And yet she is a Pope!
“A female Pope, you’ll say, ‘a second Joan?’
No, sure, she is Pope Innocent, or none.”
An epigram, or a bit of wit, always pleased James the First, who was no mean punster himself; and no doubt this little entertainment at the entrance of the knight’s mansion helped materially to make his Majesty enjoy the hospitalities lavished upon him within.
One name I have never yet seen in the London Directory, which occurs in the old parliamentary writs—that of “Hugh Holy-water-clerk.” He dwelt at Lincoln, and was doubtless connected with the cathedral body. But the old “Paternoster” still exists hale and hearty, as anybody may see who will take the trouble to inspect the big book of reference which gives title to my pages. How many thousands there are who daily pass Paternoster Row, and never reflect that it derived its name from the fact that several tradesmen who strung beads dwelt there. They were called “Paternosters,” and found ample occupation and profit, no doubt, in selling their religious ware to the people as they entered the old cathedral to patter aves. That they bore this name Mr. Riley has shown in his “Memorials of London,” wherein not merely is “William le Paternoster” mentioned as dwelling there, but a Robert Ornel is described as following the trade of “paternoster.” What a history there is conveyed in such a registered name as “Sarah Paternoster, fishmonger, 336, Hackney Road”! For centuries, as the name has passed on from one generation to another, there has been handed down with it a memorial of a time which can never return,—at least, I believe it can never return,—a time when our more superstitious forefathers and foremothers thought they could win the favour of Heaven and the grace of God by a glib and unmeaning reiteration of a prayer carefully and solemnly framed by Christ Himself to express and comprehend all the needs of the human heart. It is neither the length of our prayers nor the number of our invocations that will save us. It is the peculiarity of the Gospel narrative, that those who received benefit at Christ’s hands were they who uttered very short prayers; but then they knew what were asking for, and from whom they were making request. Why, if grace depended on the quantity of prayer, then we could reduce the holiness of believers to a mere arithmetical ratio, and by the amount of their petitions demonstrate to so many fractions how much more saintly one Christian was than another.
But I had better stop, or my reader will think I am preaching a sermon. Wouldn’t my stern critic come down heavily on me then? And I should not know what to say in self-defence!
