Collecting as a Pastime

by Charles Rowed

Plate XXIII.

Conclusion

I have little more to say on the subject of old pewter generally, as the Tavern Measures are given an article on their own. Of course, I have left the photographs to do most of the talking, and I hope they have risen equal to the occasion. Next to the fascination of collecting comes the pleasure of exhibiting to an appreciative audience, and this brings to mind a delightful evening when a young witty Canadian went through my show, and at the conclusion, in the naïvest manner possible, said: “I have asked you a great many questions, sir, but as I am undecided in my mind I thought before I left I had better enquire, ‘does the pewter go with your daughter?’”

THE PEWTER POT

Half a century ago Winchester Cathedral in the winter was decidedly cold, and on occasions some of those small choir boys, who found little warmth and comfort from their white linen surplices, now and then collapsed during the services. Candles may have answered the purpose of providing all the illumination required, but they were hardly a flaming success for heating purposes. In the records of the deliberation of the Dean and Chapter at that time there would be a resolution to pay Mr. Edward Sheppard, of the Bishop’s Palace, a certain sum to provide each of the youthful songsters entrusted to his care with a pot of porter each day with their dinners. Which denotes there was no Pussyfoot in that Chapter. Mr. Sheppard, whose name I use with all respect, was most particular as to his pupils’ cleanliness, and every morning held a hand and neck inspection in the long hall by the entrance door. To illustrate that he had a mind for the internal as well as the external frames which filed past him he once a week, being provided with a bowl of brimstone and treacle, administered a tablespoonful to each boy. If Mr. Sheppard had given the same scrutiny to the big can in which the porter was drawn from the barrel there would have been no heel taps in our pewter pots, but as the can was rarely washed out, and the porter left from one day was frothed up when being filled the next, the result, so far as benefit to the boys was concerned, must have been flat, stale, and unprofitable.

No writer refers oftener to the pewter pot than does Charles Dickens, and he might have said of me, as he did of Master Micawber, “He was brought up to the Church.”

In the book of the chronicles of Pickwick the reader can easily find the text suitable for my discourse. That great and good man with his host of friends used the pewter pot with such effect that it would be a national scandal to allow it to be relegated to the lumber shop. Old Pickwick and old pewter are synonymous, and so let us keep his memory alive by preserving the main medium of his hospitable and generous nature. Time is changing everything so ruthlessly that unless some of us have a care the passing of the pewter pot will become an absolute fact. To guard against such a calamity, and to preserve models of a commodity which played so important a part in the episodes that made life in England all the brighter for its presence in past centuries, I have gathered together a representative array of old pewter pots, many bearing quaint inscriptions, which, if they could speak for themselves, would enable me to treat you to a chapter replete with true stories of adventure, love, crime, deeds of chivalry, and scenes of woe which no imagination could evolve.

What of the “70th Regiment” cup? What stirring episodes has that been through?—among others, probably the Afghan War of 1840. I do know that the “Shipwrights’ Arms’, Limehouse Hole,” pint took part in, and survived, the Indian Mutiny bivouacs and battlefields, as it was given by the then landlord to a soldier just before leaving home. I specially prize this; it has written on the front before the address the name, “D. Saul,” alongside which is the toper’s big initial, “K,” and the number of his peg or hook on which it hung, “55,” on the bottom. This number would be seen when looked up at from the floor.

If Pickwick has us in hand, we shun the battle and resort to the bottle, so let us look in at the “Windmill, Dartford,” and see what manner of men were there. Surely not smugglers on the banks of the Thames? Of about the same period, what was the “Wellington, Shepherd’s Bush,” like? Rather a swagger inn, probably, judging by the beaded pattern of the mug, which was supplied or made by “W. R. Loftus, 146, Oxford Street,” who has been, and will be, a long time dead. At the “Feathers” at Chiswick, and “Hope,” Islington, they must have had quite high-class callers, or why the lip on the tankards unless it were to pour the contents into beakers? The customers at all inns were so diversified in character that I see no reason why the same measure should not have done for the post-boy on his frequent calls, for the parish priest on duty bent, or later by the highwayman in a hurry, if they held it in the left hand and turned the lip of the pot skywards.

From London to the “Blackburn Arms,” Hale, situated on the Mersey, an old-time village, and home of the Ireland Blackburne family, was a long journey by road in those days, and the pewter pot would be in great request. I warrant this particular one was handed back many a time with a determination to “Have another, and dom the expense.”