Stories of London

by E. L. Hoskyn

The Unicorn had sailed to the Barbary Coast of Africa. The King of this country was rich and great, yet he was most miserable and uncomfortable, for his kingdom simply swarmed with rats and mice. They were everywhere, even in the beds and on the King's table, where they ate the food which had been prepared for him. When the men of the Unicorn came to the Court to show the King the goods their ship had brought, fancy how surprised they were to see rats and mice here, there, and everywhere! "That cat we have on board," said they, "would soon stop this." "Then let the cat be sent for at once!" cried the King. So Dick's cat was brought, and now in the palace, as once in Dick's garret, she made fierce war on the rats and mice, and before long she had driven them all away. The King was so delighted that he bought the cat for ten times more money than he paid for all the Unicorn's rich merchandise.

When the ship came home, here was fine news for Dick,—no more kitchen-work for him; he was a rich man now. He became a merchant like his master, Hugh Fitzwarren, and by-and-by he married Mistress Alice; and, as Bow bells had promised him, he was made Mayor of London, not once, but three times. He was a good Londoner and a good Englishman, for the story says that when King Henry V. came home after he had conquered France, Whittington entertained him at a great banquet. Look at the picture of this which faces [page 41]; near the table a fire is burning, and Whittington is just going to throw something into it. How eagerly everyone is watching him, and well they may; for before the King went to France he had borrowed great sums of money from the City and its merchants to pay the cost of his wars, and now Whittington is flinging into the fire the papers in which the King had promised to pay back 37,000 crowns—that is, £60,000 in our money. Thus he set the King free from his debt, or, in other words, gave him all this money. Was not this a princely gift for the great merchant to give the great King?

Now I must tell you what the Chronicles and Records of London tell us about Richard Whittington. He was indeed born in the West of England, but he belonged to a good family. We do not know why and when he came to the City. In those days it was certainly no disgrace for the younger sons of good families to be London merchants; for the City was great and prosperous, able to raise large sums of money to help the King in his wars; and we read that at a council held at the Guildhall about this very matter, to which came the Archbishop of Canterbury and the King's brothers, the Lord Mayor was given the seat of honour above them all, so greatly was he respected because he was London's chief officer.

All the workmen, according to their trades, had to belong to companies called "guilds." Each guild had its own officers and made its own rules for looking after its members; and it had to see not only that these members knew how to do their work, but also that they did it properly and charged a fair price for it. We may still read the rules about all this made by the Guilds of the Blacksmiths, the Plumbers, the Glovers, and many others. Truly, the merchants and workmen of London were honourable and upright, and turned out good honest work. No wonder, then, that Richard Whittington became a London merchant.

He was a mercer—that is, he sold cloth and silk and velvet and such things; and so we hear of him providing velvet for the servants of that Earl of Derby who afterwards became King Henry IV.

Whittington became a great man in the City, was Alderman and Sheriff, and from June, 1397, until November, 1399, he was Mayor. Mayor for a year and five months? Are not Mayors appointed every year in October? and do they not rule only for one year, from November to November? Yes, but the Mayor chosen in October 1396 died during his year of office, and the King, Richard II., appointed Whittington to take his place; and at the year's end the Aldermen chose him to be Mayor again for the next year.

He was still carrying on his business, and when Henry IV. became King, and the Princesses, his daughters, were to be married, Whittington sold to them the cloth of gold and other things necessary for their weddings. He often lent great sums of money to Henry IV., and in later days to his son, Henry V., and in the reign of this King he was Mayor twice. He died in the year 1423; on his gravestone were carved some Latin words which mean that he was the Flower of Merchants. His wife's name was certainly Alice Fitzwarren, but she was the daughter of a Dorsetshire Knight.

So you see the real Richard Whittington was a very great and rich merchant. But many another has been as rich and great, yet no stories are told of them; what makes Whittington different from all others?

First of all, he was Lord Mayor three times, or, rather, may we not say three and a half times? And then he was very wise and generous; he gave, as I have already told you, a library to the Grey Friars; and he arranged that after his death a great deal of his money should be used to help London. His friends, who had to see to this, knew that good water is one of the things most necessary for a great city, so they arched over a spring to keep it clean and sweet, and they placed "drinking-bosses," or taps, in the conduits or channels and pipes which brought the water from country springs and streams into London. Newgate Prison was "feble, over-litel, and so contagious of eyre [air] yat [that] hit caused the deth of many men," so Whittington's money was used to rebuild it. It was also used to repair St. Thomas's Hospital, and to make a new hospital or almshouse where always thirteen old men should live, who were to pray for Dick Whittington's soul, and the souls of his father and mother and wife. These almshouses are no longer in the City; they have been moved out to Highgate, and stand not far from the stone which marks the place where Whittington heard the chime of Bow bells; and through them Dick Whittington's wealth is still doing good to the poor of London.