In the following year the fair was resumed, and probably was of some service to the City in bringing people and money to it again. Pepys “the immortal” records under date 28th Aug. “went twice round Bartholomew Fair, which I was glad to see again, after two years missing of it by the plague.” It seems patent that Court people and ladies of all qualities were at home in the fair at this period. Pepys records how he took his wife in 1668 “and there did see a ridiculous obscene little stage play called ‘Marry Audrey,’ a foolish thing, but seen by everybody; and so to Jacob Hall’s dancing of the ropes—a thing worth seeing and mightily followed.”
Tolls.—1671. The Corporation of London was dissatisfied with the profits of the fair accruing from the arrangement then subsisting, and referred it to the Comptroller to let the ground for the City and report the tolls to the first court after the fair. This was done, and appears to have been satisfactory, as the Corporation continued to receive the direct proceeds down to 1685, when the tolls were leased to the Sword-bearer for three years at a clear rental of £100 per annum. At the expiration of two years it was reported that the tolls had not amounted to more than £68; they were leased to the Sword-bearer at this rental for twenty-one years.
1674. In “Poor Robin’s Almanack” for this year, in a catalogue of jests upon the purposes or features of fairs, is the following “Aug. 24 Smithfield for Jack puddings, pigs heads, and Bartholomew Babies.”
1678. The “Irregularities and Disorders” of this fair were brought under the notice of the civil authorities; and the question was referred to a Committee “to consider how the same might be prevented, and what damages would occur to the City by laying down the same.” This is the first hint of suppression by the City; “and its arising,” says Mr. Morley, “is almost simultaneous with the decay of the great annual gathering as a necessary seat of trade.” He adds, “There is no year in which it can be distinctly said that then the Cloth Fair died. Even at this hour, when the fair itself is extinct, there are in the street called Cloth Fair, on the site of the old mart, one or two considerable shops of Cloth-merchants, who seem there to have buried themselves out of sight, and to be feeding upon the traditions of the fair.”
Cloth Trade.—It is in connection with the woollen cloth trade that Bartholomew Fair most linked itself with commerce. It was not simply the great metropolitan cloth fair, but it was the greatest fair for woollen cloths held in England. For centuries wool had been the great staple of this country. Kings had taken its regulation under their own particular charge. The highest official in the land took his seat amongst the peers of the realm literally on a sack of wool. Cloth ranked first amongst the products of the nation’s industry. Among the fairs of the world English woollen cloth was an important article of commerce. The centre of this trade for several centuries was located in this particular fair. Other fairs had other specialities. But St. Bartholomew’s was the annual trade gathering of English clothiers and London drapers. The arms of the Merchant Tailors were engraved upon a silver yard—thirty-six inches in length and thirty-six ounces in weight,—with which century after century members of their body were deputed to attend at West Smithfield during the fair, and test the measures of the clothiers and drapers (See 1609). The “Hand and Shears” was a famous hostelry within the Close, where the cloth-merchants and the tailors fraternized. And here, too, the Court of Piepowder was long held when removed from the Abbey.
It remains to be stated in connection with the events of this year that there was a very grave question involved as to whether the City had any legal right to suppress the fair. The Cattle Fair was still very considerable (see 1715).
1682. There was published a new edition of “Wit and Drollery: Jovial Poems” (1682); there is contained the following epitome of the features of the fair (not contained in the edition of 1656):—
“Here’s that will challenge all the fair,
Come buy my nuts and damsons and Burgamy pears!
Here’s the Woman of Babylon, the Devil and the Pope,