“O sweet ale, how sweet art thou,
Thy chearing streams new life impart,
Esteemed by all extremely good,
To quench our thirst and do us good.”
Sometimes a female figure in flowing garments is represented holding the anchor, in which case it is called the Hope and Anchor. The Blue Anchor was painted of that colour as a “difference” from other anchors; it is a common sign; it was the trade emblem of Henry Herringman, of the “New Exchange,” the principal London bookseller and publisher in the reign of King Charles II., the friend of Davenant, Dryden, and Cowley. The Blue Anchor and Ball was the sign of a mercer’s shop near the Conduit in Cheapside in 1707, the ball being the usual addition to intimate the sale of silks. Other distinctions are the Sheet Anchor, at Whitmore, in Staffordshire; the Foul Anchor, a sign of two public-houses at Wisbeach, implying, no doubt, that the lotus-eaters, who anchor in that harbour, get so entangled in the luxurious weeds of pleasure, that it becomes impossible for them to leave; the Raffled Anchor, Swan’s Quay, North Shields; and the Rope and Anchor, which is very common, the anchor being generally represented with a piece of cable twined round the stem.
A few combinations also occur: the Anchor and Can, at Ross, and at Putson, Hereford, which seems to allude to the Anchor as a measure; the Anchor and Shuttle, Luttendenfoot, Warley, Manchester, the shuttle being added in compliment to the weavers; the Anchor and Castle, a quartering of two signs in Tooley Street, &c.
Sometimes instead of the ship, some peculiar vessel is chosen, as, for instance, the Sloop, or the Leigh Hoy, a sort of smack, which occurs amongst the trades tokens as a sign near St Catherine’s Docks, and is still to be seen in Church Street, Mile End; the Coble, a sort of fishing-boat, common in Northumberland; the Tiltboat, Sommers Quay, Thames Street, in the XVIIth. century, and still at Billingsgate. This last was an open passenger boat for Greenwich, Woolwich, Gravesend, and other places down the river. It took twelve hours to perform the voyage to Gravesend, and much more if the wind was contrary, and the boat had not arrived before the tide turned. The tiltboats were superseded by steamers in 1815. The Dark House, Billingsgate, was their starting-place, and passengers would probably patronise the tavern with this name in the immediate neighbourhood, as they go now for a glass of ale and a sandwich to the Railway, or Steamboat Inn, during the quarter of an hour preceding departure.
The Fishing Smack was a public-house formerly standing near St Nicholas Church, Liverpool. The sign represented a man standing in a cart loaded with fish, and holding in his right hand what the artist intended to represent as a salmon. Underneath were the following lines:—
“This salmon has got a tail,
It’s very like a whale;
It’s a fish that’s very merry;
They say it’s catch’d at Derry;
It’s a fish that’s got a heart,
It’s catch’d and put in Dugdale’s cart.”
This truly classic production of the Muse of the Mersey continued for several years to adorn the host’s door, until a change in the occupant of the house induced a corresponding change of the sign, and the following lines took the place of the preceding:—
“The cart and salmon has stray’d away,
And left the fishing-boat to stay,
When boisterous winds do drive you back,
Come in and drink at the Fishing-Smack.”[491]
The Old Barge was a sign in Bucklersbury: “When Walbrooke did lye open, barges were rowed out of the Thames, or towed up so farre; and therefore the place has ever since been called the Old Barge, of such a sign hanging out over the gate thereof.”[492] The Old Barge, or the Old Boat, is still frequently seen as a sign on the banks of some of the canals through which boats and barges are towed.
The Boat, an isolated tavern in the open fields, at the back of the Foundling Hospital, was the head-quarters of the rioters and incendiaries, who, excited by the injudicious zeal of Lord George Gordon, set London in a blaze during the “No Popery” riots in 1780.