The Exchange is thus described by Strype: "In the place where certain old stables stood belonging to this house is the New Exchange, being furnished with shops on both sides the walls, both below and above stairs, for milleners, sempstresses, and other trades, that furnish dresses; and is a place of great resort and trade for the nobility and gentry, and such as have occasion for such commodities."[11]
The connection of the Earl of Salisbury with the New Exchange, and, incidentally, with the Durham House property, is somewhat curious. As already observed, there had been a fire in part of the buildings, in 1600, and, as Salisbury House was adjacent, the neighbouring ruins must have been an unpleasant prospect for the "crook-backed" and thrifty earl. So he bought the Strand part of the ground from Sir Tobie Matthew (1577-1655), who had secured from his father, Bishop Matthew, "an interest in certain outlying portions of Durham House and its purlieus, which was valuable enough to be purchased by Robert Cecil, in the year following the Bishop's translation to York, for the sum of 1200 L." This was in 1607, and, in 1609, he obtained a lease of the courtyard of Durham House, the rest of the property remaining in the possession of the see of Durham until 1630. Cecil, who had been created Earl of Salisbury by James I. in 1605, was in high favour with the King at this period, so that he was able to reply to the petition of the citizens against his building of the Exchange "that Westminster being the place where he was born and of his abode, he sees not but that he may seek to benefit and beautify it" (J. Chamberlain to Dudley Carleton). At the same time, he seems to have behaved fairly enough in another matter, for on September 25, 1609, the then Bishop of Durham, William James, wrote to Thomas Wilson, Lord Salisbury's steward, thanking the Earl for causing stables to be built for him at Durham House, and requesting the delivery of the key to his servant "in order that hay and straw may be provided there, against his coming up to Parliament."
The New Exchange was never a great rival of the old—the Royal—Exchange, and, in 1623, only fourteen years after its opening, there were rumours that it was to be converted into dwelling-houses. "Lady Hatton," it was stated, "is said to have bought Britain's Burse for £6000, and means to make the upper part her dwelling-house; the lower part lets for £320 a year." The rumour was wrong, however, for the place, although it fell into disrepute, existed until nearly the middle of the seventeenth century—until, as a matter of fact, 1737. Its most flourishing period was during the Restoration, when London had doubled in population as compared with the reign of James I., and Covent Garden was the fashionable quarter. There is hardly a dramatist of Charles II.'s time whose works do not contain some reference to it, while one of the playwrights, Thomas Duffet, had been a milliner in this very place before he took to burlesquing Dryden, D'Avenant, and the contemporary writers. The Grand Duke Cosmo gives an accurate picture of the place as it was in Charles II.'s time: "We went to see the New Exchange, which is not far from the place of the Common Garden, in the great street called the Strand. The building has a façade of stone, built after the Gothic style, which has lost its colour from age and become blackish. It contains two long and double galleries, one above the other, in which are distributed, in several rows, great numbers of very rich shops of drapers and mercers filled with goods of every kind, and with manufactures of the most beautiful description. These are for the most part under the care of well-dressed women, who are busily employed in work, although many are served by young men called apprentices."[12]
The stage has a great claim upon the history of the Adelphi, not only by reason of Garrick's residence here, but because the first edition of Othello was published within its precincts. This was in 1622, six years after Shakespeare's death, and a year before the issue of the first folio. The title-page of this quarto is as follows:
The
Tragœdy of Othello,
the Moore of Venice.
As it hath beene diverse times acted at the
Globe, and at the Black Friers, by
His Maiesties Servants
Written by William Shakespeare
London,
Printed by N.O. for Thomas Walkley, and are
to be sold at his shop at the Eagle and Child,
in Brittans Bursse.
1622.
A player and publisher of plays, Will Cademan, lived at the Pope's Head, in the Lower Walk. Samuel Pepys was a visitor to the New Exchange on several occasions. On June 22, 1668, the diarist went to the King's playhouse and saw "an act or two" of Dryden's comedy, An Evening's Love, or the Mock Astrologer, but "liked it not. Calling this day at Herringman's, he tells me Dryden do himself call it but a fifth-rate play." Henry Herringman, who was the principal publisher in London before Jacob Tonson, had his shop "At the Sign of the Blue Anchor" in the Lower Walk of the New Exchange. Here, in 1679, was published Horace's Art of Poetry, "made English" by the Right Hon. the Earl of Roscommon. Otway, in the character of Mrs Furnish, in The Atheist, or the Soldier's Fortune, first acted in 1682, gives a good idea of the cries in the Upper Walk of the New Exchange: "Gloves or ribands, sir? Very good gloves or ribands. Choice of fine essences." The Strand houses near the Exchange were let to "country gentlewomen newly come to town, who loved to lodge in the very centre of fashion." Pert, in Sir George Etherege's comedy, The Man of Mode (1676), says: "That place is never without a nest of 'em. They are always, as one goes by, glaring in balconies or staring out of windows." In another play by the same author, She Would if She Could (1668), and The Country Wife (1675) of Wycherley, scenes are laid in the New Exchange. Dryden, who was well acquainted with the place, makes Mrs Brainsick escape from her husband by pretending to call at her tailor's here "to try her stays for a new gown."
Such a place, in such an age, was bound to deteriorate. In Addison's day, the gallants of the town spent much of their time in lounging about the stalls and indulging in ribald talk. "I have long letters," he says in the Spectator, "both from the Royal and New Exchange on the" subject of the indecent licenses taken in discourse. "They tell me that a young Fop cannot buy a Pair of Gloves, but he is at the same time straining for some Ingenious Ribaldry to say to the young Woman who helps them on. It is no small Addition to the Calamity, that the Rogues buy as hard as the plainest and modestest Customers they have; besides which, they loll upon their Counters half an Hour longer than they need, to drive away other Customers, who are to share their Impertinencies with the Milliner, or go to another Shop."[13]
The rules for the conduct of the New Exchange are very curious. Under the heading of Orders for ye Burse, and dated November, 1609, they are printed in the State Papers.[14] They are as follows:—"Imprimis no shop to be lett within ye said new building to any art, trade, science, or mistery, other than these following or such as shal bee noe annoyance to ye rest of ye shopkeepers ther, and allowed by writting under ye hand of the right honble the Erle of Salisbury lord Treasurer of England, that is to say, Haberdashers of hatts, Haberdashers of smale wares, stockinsellers, Linen-drapers, Seamsters, Goldsmiths or Juellers but not to worke with hammer, such as sell china wares, Milliners, Perfumers, Si(l)ck-mercers, Tyremakers or Hoodmakers stationers Booksellers Confectioners, such as sell picktures, mapps or prints, Girdelers &c.
"Item no shopkeeper to open shop on Christenmas day the Purification of the blessed virgin Easter hollidaies Whitson-hollidaies The nativity of St Jo. Baptist the feast day of All saints nor upon any sabboth day throughe out ye whole yeare.