The Bath Road: History, Fashion, & Frivolity on an Old Highway

XLIV

OLD ADVERTISEMENTS

The advertisement columns of a paper just over a century old often afford amusement to those who come upon them. The manners and customs of those times and these are so different that the very quaintness of our forefathers’ attitude of mind brings a smile upon our faces, although those eighteenth-century forbears of ours were really very serious people indeed, and took life, for the most part, like a dose of medicine, while we are apt to go to the other extreme and take it like champagne. No doubt our great-great-grandfathers would think the most sedate of us not a little wild could they witness how we live to-day, while, in our turn, we look back upon their times, and think times and people alike brutal. We wonder what sort of people they were who could, in this England of ours, offer a “Black boy for sale—docile and obedient. Answers to the name of Peter.” Yet such advertisements were common on the front page of our newspapers once upon a time. Slavery was then a matter of course, and to have a black page for her very own was my lady’s hall-mark of “quality.” Sometimes such advertisements were embellished with little figures supposed to represent nigger-boys.

The race of African negroes has either improved in good looks since then, or else the engravers of that day were not very careful in portraiture. But, indeed, black pages were almost as common as pet dogs, and were advertised in very much the same way, and these blocks were not portraits at all, but just printers’ stock illustrations. The printer of a hundred years ago kept a curious little assortment of advertisement blocks. If a ship was about to sail for the colonies, it was advertised for weeks beforehand, and in a corner of the announcement was placed something that purported to be an illustration of the vessel. It generally looked like a Spanish galleon strayed from the Armada of two hundred years previously, and passengers would have been quite justified in not booking berths on so antiquated an affair.But perhaps the most amusing advertisements are the “Run away from his Home” and the “Stolen” varieties, also adorned with illustrations. It speaks very little for the morality of that age when we say that the ordinary newspaper printer also kept these blocks in stock.

And, indeed, they seem to have frequently been required. Here is one example out of many in the newspapers of that age:—

“Stolen
Out of the Stable of Robert Colgate,
The 24th instant August, 1780

A black horse, rising five years old, thirteen Hands and a Half High, Star in his forehead, small Ears, Mane stands up rough, being lately rubbed off, long Tail, hangs his Tongue out often on the Road, good Carriage; also a good Saddle, marked Barnard, with Spring Stumps.

“Whoever gives Information, so that the Said Horse may be had again, shall receive Two Guineas Reward.”

It would scarcely be possible to identify the stolen horse from the accompanying cut. He has no long tail, as described in the advertisement, and his tongue doesn’t hang out. Moreover, he is burdened with a quite imaginary thief, who has a property devil whipping him on. The “awful example” hanging from the gibbet appears to be made of bolsters, and to have had, not a drop too much, but scarcely enough.The party with hands bigger than his head, who is here seen striking a dramatic attitude, is not a Howling Swell, although he wears his hair parted in the middle. Appearances here (as usually was the case in the old advertisements) are deceptive, and so far from being a Swell, Howling or otherwise, he is really a Heartless Villain, for he is one of two labourers who have—

“Run Away.

And left their families chargeable to the Parish of Claverton,

Thomas Garner, Labourer, about five feet seven or eight Inches high; wears his own Hair, of a light Brown Complexion; hath lately, or is now belonging to the Militia.

“And Edward Browning, Labourer, about five Feet four or five Inches high, wears his own Hair, of a dark complexion; was one of Lord North’s Soldiers in the last War.

“Whoever will apprehend either, or both of them, and conduct them to the Parish Officers of Claverton aforesaid, shall receive Half a Guinea for each or either of them, and Threepence per Mile for every Mile they shall travel with them.”

History does not relate whether or no these gay deceivers were ever captured. If those who sought them relied upon the illustration, it would seem quite likely that they never were!

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