N.B. The Doors will be open’d at Four, and the Masters mount between Six and Seven exactly. VIVAT REX.

Sutton does not seem to have made much but hard knocks by his desire to uphold the honour of pipemakers and Kentish men, for Figg is generally characterised as retiring undefeated, and Captain Godfrey, the great amateur of his day, makes reference to the defeat of Sutton in his “Treatise upon the Useful Science of Defence” (1747). Speaking of the Oxford professor, he says: “Fig was the atlas of the sword, and may he remain the gladiating statue! In him, strength, resolution, and unparalleled judgment conspired to form a matchless master. There was a majesty shone in his countenance, and blazed in all his actions, beyond all I ever saw. His right leg bold and firm, and his left, which could hardly ever be disturbed, gave him the surprising advantage already proved, and struck his adversary with despair and panic. He had that peculiar way of stepping in I spoke of in a parry; he knew his arm and its just time of moving, put a firm faith in that, and never let his adversary escape his parry. He was just as much a greater master than any other I ever saw, as he was a greater judge of time and measure.” Of Sutton the enthusiastic captain tells us that “he was a resolute, pushing, awkward swordsman; but by his busy intruding arm, and scrambling legs, there were few judgments but what were disordered and disconcerted. Fig managed him the best of any by his charming distinction of time and measure, in which he far excelled all, and sufficiently proved these two be the sword’s true foundation.” Figg was also a great bruiser, and was regarded as the champion of the boxers as well as the master of the swordsmen. He was a genial good-tempered fellow, and was the boon companion of many eminent authors and artists of his time.

So much for show and play bills, and the celebrities to whom they have introduced us. We will now turn to handbill and poster advertisements of various descriptions. Tickets and bills containing the information that apartments were to be let were set up over doors at least as early as 1665. In the “Pillulæ Pestilentialis” of the Rev. Richard Hingston, preacher, of St James’s, Clerkenwell, there is the following in reference to the Plague and the practice just mentioned:—

No Papers then o’er our Doors were set
With “Chambers ready furnished to be Let,”
But a sad “Lord have Mercy upon us” and
A bloody Cross as fatal Marks did stand.

At the end of a pamphlet, printed in 1673, entitled “An Essay to revive the Ancient Education of Gentlewomen, in Religion, Manners, and Tongues,” there is a postscript, containing an advertisement of a boarding school at Tottenham High Cross. This establishment was under the management of Mrs Makin, who had been tutoress to the Princess Elizabeth, daughter of Charles I., and who put forth part of her prospectus in the following manner:—

Here by the blessing of God, Gentlewomen may be instructed in the principles of Religion, and in all manner of sober and virtuous Education: more especially in all Things ordinarily taught in Schools for the other Sex; as in

Half the Time is to be spent in these Things, and the other half to be employed in gaining the Latin and French Tongues, and those that please may learn Greek and Hebrew, the Italian and Spanish; in all which this Gentlewoman hath a competent knowledge.

Gentlewomen of eight or nine Years old, that can read well, may be instructed in a Year or two (according to their Parts) in the Latin and French Tongues, by plain and short Rules accommodated to the English Tongue.

Those that will bestow a longer Time may learn the other Languages before mentioned, if they please.