What liquor he loved I trow;

For he had before long “seven yeare,

Been of the towne the ale-conner.”’

[402]. The following entry appears in the Issues of Exchequer:—‘20l. paid to John le Discher, of London, for him and his companions to provide plates, dishes, and saltsellers for the coronation.’ (1 Ed. II.)

[403]. As an illustration of the use to which the art of working in pewter was put, we may instance one of the ‘Richmondshire Wills’ in which the following articles of this mixture are bequeathed: ‘iij basyns, ij uers, one doson plait trenchers, one brode charger, iiij potigers, xxtie platters, x dishes, and vj sausers.’ (Surtees Soc.)

[404]. We find this now well-known surname thus spelt in a statute passed in Elizabeth’s reign, in which are included the ‘lynnen-weaver, turner, cowper, millers, earthen-potters.’ (5 Eliz. c. iv. 23.)

[405]. In the Issues of the Exchequer we find a ‘Ric. le Cuver’ at one time providing three buckets, and at another working with other eight carpenters upon the outer chamber of the King’s Court. (43 Henry III.)

[406]. ‘John Busheler’ occurs in Valor. Eccles. Henry VIII. He probably made the old bushel measure, once in common use. ‘Is a candle bought to be put under a bushel?’ (Mark iv. 26.)

[407]. Mr. Way, in his valuable series of notes to the Promptorium Parvulorum, quotes a later Wicklyffite version, in which the ‘basket of bulrushes’ in which Moses was placed is termed ‘a leep of segg’ (sedge). An old list of words which he also quotes has ‘a lepe maker, cophinarius.’ (Cath. Ang.) I mention this latter especially, as I have not been able so far to light upon any instance of the sobriquet. I have no hesitation in saying, however, that if ‘Leaper’ and ‘Leapman’ be not manufacturers, they have, at any rate, as fish-sellers, originated from the same root. ‘And thei eeten and weren fulfilled, and thei taken up that that lefte of relifs sevene leepis.’ (Matt. viii. 8. Wicklyffe.)

[408]. Thus in the Trevelyan papers (Cam. Soc.) we frequently come across such a record as the following: ‘Item, to Edmund Peckham, coferer of the Kinge’s House for th’expenses and charges, etc.’