Why not, the name of a public-house at Essington, in Staffordshire, seems to imply quite the reverse, and to have been adopted as the motto of a more sanguine landlord; unless it may be considered as a ready answer to the often-repeated question, before “popping in round the corner,” “Shall we have a drop?”
The Lame Dog is very common; but is particularly appropriate at Brierley Hill, near Dudley, the establishment being kept by a collier, rendered lame in a pit accident. Under a pictorial representation of a lame dog trying to get over a stile, the following appeal is made to the thirsty and benevolent public:—
“Stop, my friends, and stay awhile
To help the Lame Dog over the stile.”
Sometimes, as at Bulmer, Essex, we see a somewhat similar idea expressed by a man struggling through a globe—head and arms protruding on one side, his legs on the other—with the inscription, “[Help me through this World].” The same allegory might have been seen on a beer-house in Holland in the seventeenth century, but the inscription was different—“Dus na ben ik door de wereld,” (“Thus far I have got through the world.”) This sign is also called the Struggler, or the Struggling Man, and at Hampton, where the house is kept by a widow, the Widow’s Struggle. In Salop Street, Dudley, the struggle is represented by a man, with a dog beside him, walking against a strong head wind. The Live and let Live has a somewhat similar meaning; it occurs at North End, Fulham, and in many other places. To this class, also, the following seems to refer:—“A witty, though unfortunate, fellow having tryed all trades, but thriving by none, took the pot for his last refuge, and set up an ale-house, with the sign of the Shirt, inscribed under it, ‘This is my last shift.’ Much company was brought him thereby, and much profit.”[645] Nathaniel Oldham, the friend of Sir Hans Sloane, Doctor Mead, and the leading virtuosi of that time, himself a collector, as well as a sporting man, at last got so reduced in circumstances that he had to dispose of his curiosities and superfluities. He opened his house, therefore, as a curiosity shop, and wrote over the door, Oldham’s last Shift. Unfortunately, it was his “last shift,” for scarcely had he opened his shop when one of his innumerable creditors had him arrested and sent to King’s Bench Prison, where he died. J. T. Smith, in his “Cries of London,” tells a similar device of a sailor, maimed at the battle of Trafalgar, who used to go about town with a wheelbarrow of ginger nuts, which he called “Jack’s last shift.”
The uncertainty of success in trade is expressed by the sign of the Two Chances; and Hit or Miss, the good and the bad chance which innkeepers, as well as all other mortals, have to run in this transitory world. This sign occurs at Hannington, Northampton, and at Clun, in Salop. At Openshaw, near Manchester, a similar idea is expressed by a sign representing two men running a race, which seems to promise a dead heat, with the inscription, Luck’s all.
Others have a sort of satirical humour in them, such as the well-known [Four Alls], representing a king who says, “I rule all;” a priest who says, “I pray for all;” a soldier who says, “I fight for all;” and John Bull, or a farmer, who says, “I pay for all.” Sometimes a fifth is added in the shape of a lawyer, who says, “I plead for all.” It is an old and still common sign, and may even be seen swinging under the blue sky in the sunny streets of La Valette, Malta. In Holland, in the seventeenth century, it was used, but the king was left out, and a lawyer added; each person said exactly the same as on our signboards, but the farmer answered:—
“Of gy vecht, of gy bidt, of gy pleyt,
Ik ben de boer die de eyeren leyt.”[646]
The author of “Tavern Anecdotes” observes that he used to notice in Rosemary Street, the sign of the Four Alls, but passing that way some time after, he found it altered into the Four Awls; the sign painter who renewed the picture had probably found himself not equal to a representation of the four human figures. In Ireland, a similar corruption may be observed, the four shoemaker’s awls taking the place of the four representatives of society. Although having no connexion with the Four Alls, it may be mentioned that three and four awls constitute the charges in the shoemakers’ arms of some of the continental trade societies or guilds.
This enumeration of the various performances coupled with the word all has been used in numerous different epigrams: an address to James I. in the Ashmolean MSS., No. 1730, has:—
“The Lords craved all, The Queene graunted all, The Ladies of honour ruled all, The Lord-Keeper seal’d all, The Intelligencer marred all, The Parliament pass’d all, He that is gone oppos’d himself to all, The Bishops soothed all, The Judges pardon’d all, The Lords buy, Rome spoil’d all, Now, Good King, mend all, Or else the Devil will have all.”