[*][Note from Brett: Abel Bowen (1790-1850) was Boston's first wood engraver and is perhaps most well known for his work on the "Farmer's Almanac.">[
[+][Note from Brett: Nathanial Dearborn (1786-1852) was with the Holland Printing Company and is perhaps most well known (in 2002) for the difficulty he had in setting plates for a 13 cent stamp used in Hawaii (second issue). He also was a printer and author of "The American Textbook for Making Letters." He would have been well remembered in Boston at the time of this book.]
[&][Note from Brett: "Chicket" is terribly obscure and the only reference I could possibly find was to a Mr. Chicket who was apparently murdered in a bar (the Brushmakers Arms) in Upham, New Hampshire and supposedly haunts the bar. Whether this has anything to do with the Chicket in the text is highly questionable, but would make for a great story.]
This question I have asked again and again, and no man and no woman has answered it. But the chances seem to be that we owe them also to Abel Bowen, the first wood engraver recorded among the engravers in the period after the Revolution. We have specimens of his work more in pictures of landscape or of buildings than in drawings of men and women. But there can be but little doubt that most of the blocks from which the Mother Goose of our childhood were printed were engraved by him, and there seems to be good reason to believe that the designs were by him as well. The pity is that no old portfolio can be found with other designs from his pencil. But, alas, the chances are that they have gone where so many other manuscripts have gone, which would delight the antiquaries.
Thanks to the publisher and editor of this book, the designs, of whatever hand, are now preserved for another generation.
I have said that I am not learned in the interesting genealogical discussion of the subject, but I like to call attention to the fact that the English Norwich was the birthplace and home of Fleet, and that it is possible that in the annals of that city light may be gained as to the history of the man in the Moon.
I have always thoughtt that the close connection of our maritime people with London had something to do with the names of our streets. The most striking instance is in the name of Cornhill, where this very Thomas Fleet had his book store, and where book stores have been an institution from that day to this. Our Cornhill in its relations to our water front occupies the same conditions which the London Cornhill had and has to the river front in London. The young reader should remember that Washington Street so far as it had one name was called the Main Street. Coming North from our Dover Street, the traveler passed through Orange Street, then through Newbury Street, next through Marlborough Street, which extended from Winter Street to School Street, and then through Cornhill northward to Dock Square. This is precisely as in passing east through what was the Main Street of London of those days, the traveler would have passed through the Cornhill of that thoroughfare. The London Cornhill retains its name. Ours was changed in 1824 to the all-conquering name of Washington, which is now applied to the whole of the "Main Street" and "the Neck" of the Fathers, as indeed, it is applied by local authorities many miles further.
But in familiar conversation, the old name Cornhill was retained for a generation, and indeed, would be understood to-day, if you were speaking to Boston people more than fifty years old. The name Cornhill is now applied to the Market Street of an earlier period.
Young readers should remember that Orange Street, Newbury street, and Marlborough Street were names given in honour of the Prince of Orange of the Puritan victory at Newbury, and of the Duke of Marlborough. All of them show what were the Whig and Puritan feelings of the people who gave them. All three of the names in our time have been transferred from the old localities.
We are all greatly obliged to Mrs. Harriet Blackstone C. Butler for the pains she has taken to rescue for popular use this interesting memorial of the education of the fathers and mothers of New England.