and Seneca says of him: “Cato vinum laxabat animum curis publicis fatigatum;”[659] elsewhere he remarks: “Catoni ebrietas objecta est, at facilius efficiet quisquis qui objecerit honestum quam turpe Catoni.”[660] Seneca was certainly a biassed judge, for he says: “Habebitur aliquando ebrietas honor et plurimum meri cepisse virtus erit.”[661] Other tippling philosophers are enumerated in the following quaint Latin verses, the author of which is not known:—
“Tunc vix Democritus poterat compescere risum,
Riderent cum sibi vina labris.
Tergeret ut fletus contrarius alter amaros,
Sugebat lacrymas saepe, lagena, tuas.
Divinum ut Bacchi semper spiraret odorem,
Diogenes medii vixit in orbe cadi.
Dicitur ardentem cum sese misit in Æthnam,
Empedocles modico non caluisse mero.
[467] Teque ferunt veteres guttas, Epicure, Lyæi
Vel minimas atomis antetulisse tuis.
Talia ne dubiter potare exempla secutus,
Qui sapit ille bibit, qui bibit ergo sapit.”[662]
In Holland they have a curious practice, which the Spectator thus describes:—
“The Dutch who are more famous for their industry than for their wit and humour, hang up in several of their streets what they call the sign of the Gaper; that is, the head of an idiot dressed in a cap and bells and gaping in a most immoderate manner; this is a standing jest in Amsterdam.”
But the statement is slightly—probably wilfully—incorrect. Carved wooden busts of Gapers are still used at the present day in Holland, but are, and have always been, chemists’, or rather, druggists’ signs, to intimate that narcotics are sold within, as gaping or yawning is a precursor of sleep. The costume of these busts is generally somewhat Oriental, as Eastern nations were supposed to be not only expert in herbs and medicines, but also, because opium came from Eastern climes.
A very curious and rare sign is to be seen in the little village of Nidd, near Knaresborough; this is the Ass in the Band-Box. We find it mentioned in 1712 in Partridge’s MS. book of “Celestial Motions.”[663] In the month of October of that year he entered the following memorandum:—“At the end of this month the villains made the Band-box plot, to blow up Robin and his family with a couple of inkhorns, and that rogue Swift was at the opening of the band-box and the discovery of the plot. The truth of it all was: ‘—— in a Band-box.’”[664] It figured also as one of the signs in Bonnel Thornton’s signboard exhibition of 1762.[665] It seems to have originated from an extremely indelicate joke called “selling bargains,” with which the maids of honour amused themselves in Swift’s time, (see his “Polite Conversation;”) unless it be a vernacular reading of some crest, such as an antelope or a unicorn issuing out of a mural crown.
In the borough of Southwark is a sign on which is inscribed “The Old Pick-my-toe,” which, in the absence of any better origin, we may suppose to be a vulgar representation of the Roman slave who, being sent on some message of importance, would not stop to pick a thorn out of his foot, until he had completed his mission. Probably this was the same sign as that represented on the trades token of Samuel Bovery in George Lane, a naked figure picking one of its feet; but the name of the house is not given on the token. Jack of Both Sides, at Reading, is so named because the house stands at a point where two roads meet in the form of a Y, and the house being wedge-shaped, has an entry at each side. Such a house in London is often called by the vulgar a “Flat-iron.”
The Old Smugs is a sign on the trades token of Joseph Hall, at Newington Butts, 1667, representing a smith and an anvil; but whether John Hall himself was “old Smvgs,” or whether he kept a tavern frequented by blacksmiths, history does not inform us. This last is also the name of one of the characters in the “Merry Devil at Edmonton.” The Battered Naggin (sic for Noggin) is an Irish sign, it being in that country a figurative expression for a man who has got more than is good for him,—“he has got a lick of a battered naggin.” The Noggin, without the adjective, occurs at a few places in Lancashire and Yorkshire. The Tumbling Sailors, representing three seamen “half-seas-over,” and reeling arm-in-arm down a street, may be seen near Broseley, at Dudley, and in other places. The Cripple’s Inn at Stockingford, Warwick, is doubtless nothing more than a very “lame” attempt at comicality. The Hat in Hand, in Portsea, promises a polite host; but what can be expected of Old Careless, the ominous name of a public-house at Stapleford, Notts, of Spite Hall at Brandon, Durham, or of Old No, which occurs in Silver Street, Sheffield? Slow and Easy is the unpromising name of an ale-house at Lostock, Chester; let us hope that it may be meant for a version of the Italian proverb, “chi va piano va sano,” meaning that the landlord will be content with small and fair profits, and acquire fortune by slow and easy steps.
[627] The “goose’s foot” she obtained was most probably that at the corner of her eye—i.e., she became an old woman—for the French call patte d’oie—goose’s foot—that first attack of time upon beauty which we term the crow’s foot.