MARKING STONES.
Plate X.
The rare wood-cut, from which the present etching was made, is one of the curious set of twelve figures engraved in wood of the time of James the First. Under the figure are the following lines:
“Buy Marking Stones, Marking Stones buy,
Much profit in their use doth lie:
I’ve marking stones of colour red,
Passing good,—or else black lead.”
The cry of Marking Stones is also noticed in the play of “Tarquin and Lucrece.” These Marking Stones, as the verses above state, are either of a red colour, or composed of black lead. They were used in marking of linen, so that washing could not take the mark out. Every one knows that water will not take effect upon black lead, particularly if the stick of that material, which is denominated “a Marking Stone,” be heated before it be stamped. The stone, of a red colour, was probably of a material impregnated with the red called “ruddle,” a colour never to be washed out. It is used by the graziers for the marking of their sheep, is of an oily nature, and made in immense quantities, for the use of graziers, at the Ruddle Manufactory, near the Nine Elms, on the Battersea Road. It was a red known in the reign of Edward the Third, and much used by the painters employed in the decorations of St. Stephen’s Chapel, Westminster.
About fifty years ago it was the custom of those persons who let lodgings in St. Giles’s, above the Two-penny admission, where sheets were afforded at sixpence the night, to stamp their linen with sticks of marking stones of ruddle, with the words “Stop Thief,” so that, if stolen, the thief should at once be detected and detained. For this, and many other curious particulars respecting the lowest classes of the inhabitants of St. Giles in the Fields, the writer is much indebted to his truly respectable friend, the late William Packer, Esq. of Charlotte Street, Bloomsbury, and afterwards of Great Baddow, in Essex, who was born, and resided for the great part of his life, upon the spot. For the honour of this gentleman’s family, it may be here acknowledged that his father, who was also a truly respectable man, was one of the promoters of the building of Middlesex Hospital, which, before the erection of the present building, was an establishment held in Windmill Street, leading from Tottenham Court Road to Percy Chapel, in Charlotte Street, Rathbone Place. The house which the Hospital occupied, standing on the South side of the street, has since been made use of as a French charity school.
