The rest can holy angels tell!....
“This will I carry with me to my pillow,” said Uncle Timothy. “My friends, good night.”
CHAPTER XII.
A chubby young gentleman, a “little Jack Horner eating his Christmas pie,” abutting from “The Fortune of War,” at Pie-Corner, marks the memorable spot where the Great Fire of London concluded its ravages. The sin of gluttony, * to which, in the original inscription (now effaced,) the fire was attributed, is still rife; a considerable trade in eatables and drinkables being driven, and corks innumerable drawn, in defiance, under the chubby young gentleman's bottle nose.
* “There was excessive spending of venison, as well as other
victuals, in the halls. Nay, and a great consumption of
venison there was frequently at taverns and cooks' shops,
insomuch that the Court was much offended with it.
Whereupon, anno 1573, that the City might not continue to
give the Queen and nobility offence, the Lord Mayor, Sir
Lionel Ducket, and Aldermen, had by act of Common Council
forbidden such feasts hereafter to be made; and restrained
the same only to necessary meetings, in which, also, no
venison (!!) was permitted.”—Stow.
Venison was also prohibited in the taverns and cooks' shops.
Our modern civic gourmands and gourmets, wiser grown! have
propitiated the Court by occasional invitations to take part
in their gluttony.
A Bartlemy Fair shower of rain overtook us while we were contemplating the dilapidated mansion of the Cock Lane Ghost; and, as it never rains in Bartle-my Fair, but it pours, we scudded along to the parlour of The Fortune of War, as our nearest shelter; where we beheld Mr. Bosky, though he beheld not us, bombarding his little body with cutlets and bottled beer, in company with a tragedy queen; a motion-master; and a brace of conjurors, Mr. Rumfiz and Mr. Glumfiz. Mr. Rumfiz was a merry fellow, who had fattened on blue fire, which he hung out for a sign upon his torrid nose; with Mr. Glumfiz dolor seemed to wait on drinking, and melancholy on mastication; for he looked as if he had been regaling on fishhooks and castor-oil, instead of Mr. Bosky's bountiful cheer.
“'Tis hard to bid good-b'ye to an old friend that we may never see again! Heigho! I'm sorry and sick; as cross and as queer as the hatband of Dick! Good-b'ye to St. Bartholomew.”
This was sighed forth by the lean conjuror, who, as he emitted a cloud of tobacco-smoke, seemed ready to pipe his eye, and responded to by the tragedy queen with a look ultra tragical!