A History of Advertising from the Earliest Times.

by Henry Sampson

The Young Man, and his Mother, (Mary Daniel,) and his Brother and Sister (Joshua and Anne,) desire that all gifts of the above nature due to them, be returned on the said Day, and will be thankful for all favours granted.

Also, the Young Woman, and her Mother (Sarah Evans,) and her Grand-father and Grand-mother (John and Frances Evans,) desire that all Gifts of the above nature due to them, be returned on the above Day, and will be thankful with her Uncle and Aunt (Benjamin and Margaret Evans, Penrhywcoion,) for all additional favours granted.

The applications made by means of the notes which follow the advertisement show that the promise made by David and Ruth to repay all amounts when called upon is something more than a mere flourish. We should not like, though, to guarantee that these promises were always kept, and have no doubt that the concocters of the foregoing found, as so many others did before them, and not a few have done since, that kindness is generally obtained from the least expected, and often the least valued, quarter. This is a glorious dispensation of providence, and few people who have experienced misfortune, or have been in want of assistance, but have felt how compensating is the hidden power which guides our destinies. Yet writers who constantly rail about the insincerity of friendship make little or no mention of those truest friends, the friends who appear uninvoked, and do whatever has been asked in vain of others who may have promised freely, or who are in fact indebted to those they ignore in the moment of adversity.

Burly old Grose, the friend of Burns, in his “Olio” gives a curious specimen of composition, which he says was the effort of a mayor in one of our University towns, though which is not stated. It tells us that—

WHEREAS, a Multiplicity of Dangers are often incurred by Damage of outrageous Accidents by Fire, we whose Names are undersigned, have thought proper that the Benefit of an Engine, bought by us, for the better Extinguishing of which, by the Accidents of Almighty God, may unto us happen, to make a Rate to gather Benevolence for the better propagating such useful Instruments.

Some clever student of style may be able to tell, by a clue invisible to the uninitiated, whether this is Oxford or Cambridge. We are not learned in such matters, and so prefer to admire, without troubling ourselves to identify.

Poetical advertisements were not at all uncommon a hundred years ago and less. The demand for space, and the steam-engine rate at which we live now, have, however, destroyed not only the opportunity for them, but their use. Towards the close of the last century there lived in the Canongate, Edinburgh, one Gavin Wilson, a hard-working bootmaker, or, as his sign described him, “Arm, Leg and Boot maker, but not to his Royal Highness the Prince of Wales.” He was a singular fellow, and was the inventor of an art for hardening and polishing leather, so as to be workable into powder-flasks, snuff-boxes, drinking-mugs, ink-cases, and other articles of a similar kind. His genius did not stop at this rough work, but enabled him to form a German flute and a violin, both of leather, which, for neatness of workmanship and melodiousness of tone, were, friendly critics said, not a bit inferior to any fiddle or flute formed of wood. His greatest triumphs, however, were artificial arms and legs, also made of leather, which not only completely remedied loss of limb, but also closely resembled their human prototypes, being covered with skin, nails, &c. The unexampled success of his endeavours in this way was curiously illustrated by a person who, having lost both his hands by a cannon-shot, was provided with a new and useful pair by Gavin Wilson. This man expressed his gratitude in a letter of thanks, written with the artificial hands, which appeared in the Caledonian Mercury for 1779, along with an advertisement of the ingenious mechanic. Wilson had also pretensions to wit, and was occasionally a votary of what Foote once described as the Tuneful Ten. “Nine and one are ten,” said Foote one day to an accountant, who was anxious the wit should hear his poetry, and who commenced, “Hear me, O Phœbus and ye Tuneful Nine!” Having got so far, he accused Foote of inattention; but the latter said, “Nine and one are ten—go on,” which was too near the shop to be pleasant. The following advertisement may serve as a specimen of Wilson’s poetical attempts:—

G. Wilson humbly as before
Resumes his thankfulness once more
For favours formerly enjoy’d
In, by the public, being employ’d.
And hopes this public intimation
Will meet with candid acceptation.
The world knows well he makes boots neatly
And, as times go, he sells them cheaply.
’Tis also known to many a hundred
Who at his late invention wonder’d,
That polish’d leather boxes, cases,
So well known now in many places,
With powder-flasks and porter-mugs,
And jointed leather arms and legs.
Design’d for use as well as show,
Exempli gratia read below,[34]
Were his invention; and no claim
Is just by any other name.
With numbers of production more,
In leather ne’er performed before.
In these dead times being almost idle,
He tried and made a leather fiddle.
Of workmanship extremely neat,
Of tone quite true, both soft and sweet.
And finding leather not a mute
He made a leather German flute,
Which play’d as well and was as good
As any ever made of wood.
He for an idle hour’s amusement
Wrote this exotic advertisement,
Informing you he does reside
In head of Canongate, south side,
Up the first wooden-railed stair,
You’re sure to find his Whimship there.
In Britain none can fit you better
Than can your servant the Bootmaker.

Gavin Wilson.

Notwithstanding that their day is past, occasional poetical advertisements are to be found in the papers now. They are, as a rule, infinitely bad, and the following is so very different from the general run of them, that we cannot help quoting it. Perhaps it was written after taking a dose of “Lamplough,” which is said on authority to have so many beneficial effects, that power over writers of verse in general, and the writer of the following in particular, may easily be included among them. So all minor poets had better study this, which we extract from a “weekly” a year or so ago:—