We may here take the opportunity of referring to the condition of the lower classes. In the country there was no middle class, such as we know by the term, excepting those who are represented in the Directory under the sobriquet of Yeoman, Yeomans, and Yeomanson. The peasantry were oftentimes little more than goods and chattels of their masters. We must not exaggerate, however, for although there are sixty-four “Bonds” in the London Directory, who represent such old entries as “William le Bonde,” the progenitors of this name were in no such abject servitude as is now understood by the word. That they were hard worked there can be no doubt:
“Of alle men in londe
Most toileth the bonde,”—
and how much freedom was valued may be guessed from the number of Franks, Franklins, Frees, Freebodys, Freemans, Freeds, and Freeborns, in the big tome we are discussing. We find even Free-wife and Free-woman in the older registers, but they are now obsolete—in the Directory, I mean, not in actual life, for very often the wife not merely “rules her house,” but her husband too, and a good thing for him if he only knew it! There are fifty-three “Frys” to be added to this list, the old form of “free.” How curious that the lady who so distinguished herself in toiling for the abolition of slavery should have borne the name of Elizabeth Fry! Who strove more earnestly to make the bond free than she? Truly Tom Hood meant jest for earnest when he wrote his ode to Dr. Kitchener:—
“What baron, or squire, or knight of the shire
Lives half so well as a holy Fry-er?
In doing well thou must be reckoned
The first—and Mrs. Fry the second.”
Again he says in jest and rhyme, with a sly hit in the last line at her Quaker garments:—
“I like you, Mrs. Fry! I like your name!
It speaks the very warmth you feel in pressing
In daily act round Charity’s great flame—
I like the crisp Browne way you have of dressing.”
If Hood had known the meaning of Mrs. Fry’s name, he could have made a better play than this upon it. The forms in the old rolls are Walter le Frie, or Roger le Frye.
The country police were represented by various terms, and as I turn the page of my book of modern reference I am reminded of them all. The Hayward guarded the fences; the Forester or Forster or Foster, the Woodward, the Parker, the Warrener or Warner, the Woodreeve, now found as Woodruff or Woodroff, all protected the covers wherein the beasts of the chase found harbourage. The Pinder, or Pounder, was engaged in locking up strayed cattle. Every village had its pound, and no doubt in a day when hedges and dikes and fences were less familiar sights than now, his office would be an important one.
It may be asked, Have we any relic in our Directories of any office in the large towns answering to our modern policeman, or “peeler,” as our street gamins so disrespectfully style him? We answer in the affirmative. Our somewhat common surname of Catchpoll, Catchpole, Catchpool, and Catchpoole are his representatives. They were so called because, as they walked their beat, they carried a somewhat formidable weapon, very like a pitchfork, the two prongs of which slipped round the neck, and formed a steel collar. The officer then had the criminal entirely at his mercy, and could either drag him, or shove him by the pole attached, which was from six to seven feet, in length. He was called a Catchpoll, because he caught his victim by the head or poll. We still talk of a poll-tax, or “going to the poll,” showing how familiar the word was in those days. The Malvern Dreamer, in his poem entitled “The Vision of Piers Plowman,” says of the two thieves crucified with our Saviour, that,—
“A cachepol cam forth,
And cracked both their legges.”