This notice of the Brewers’ Company, its foundation, its feasts, and {141} its troubles has taken us rather in advance of our tale, and we must hark back to the middle of the fifteenth century.
To judge from an entry in the City Records of the sixteenth year of Edward IV. the Brewers were sometimes openly resisted by force of arms. The actual occasion on which this was done is not specified, but it is recorded that Richard Geddeney was committed to prison for having said that the Brewers had made new ordinances, and that it would be well to oppose them, as had formerly been done, with swords and daggers, when they were assembled in their Hall.
Six years afterwards a petition was presented to the Lord Mayor and Aldermen by the Brewers, which is so good a specimen of the usual style of their supplications that some portions of it are given. It begins by “petieously compleynyng that where in tyme passed thei have honestly lyved by the meanes of bruyng, and utteryng of their chaffer as well within the fraunchises of the saide Citee as withoute. And hath ben able to bere charges of the same citee after their havours and powers as other freemen of the saide citee. Where now it is so that for lak of Reules and other directions in the saide Crafte they ben disordered and none obedience nor goode Rule and Guydyng is hadd within the saide Crafte to the distruction thereof.” It is therefore prayed—“That eny persone occupying the Craft or feat of bruying within the franchise or the saide citee make or do to be made good and hable ale and holesome for mannys body. . . and that no manner ale after it be clensed and set on yeyst be put to sale or borne oute to eny custumers hous till that it have fully spourged (worked).” That no brewer shall occupy a house or a “seler” apart from his own dwelling-house for the sale of his ale. That no brewer shall “entice or labour to taak awey eny custumer from a brother brewer,” or “serve or do to be served any typler (i.e., retailer of ale) or huxster as to hym anewe be comen custumer of any manner ale for to be retailed till he have verrey knowlage that the saide typler or huxster be clerely oute of dett and daunger for ale to any other person” . . . . . That every person keeping a house and being a brother of Bruers do pay to the Wardens of the Company a sum of 4s. yearly. “That no manner persone of the said crafte . . . presume to goo to the feeste of the Maior or the Sherriff unless he be invited . . that members of the crafte shall appear in livery when so commanded that is to sey gowne and hode . . . That the livery of the crafte be changed and renewed every third year agenst the day of the Election of the newe Wardeyns of the crafte . . .” That once a quarter the ordinances of the Company shall be read to the assembled brewers in {142} their common hall. That no brewer is to buy malt except in the market. That malt brought to market must not be “capped in the sakke, nor raw-dried malte, dank or wete malte or made of mowe brent barly, belyed malt, Edgrove malte, acre-spired malte, wyvell eten malte or meddled[46], in the deceite of the goode people of the saide citee, upon payn of forfaiture of the same.” No one is to buy his own malt or corn in the market, “to high the price of corn in the Market,” under pain of the pillory. No one is to sell malt “at the Market of Gracechurch or Greyfreres before 9 of the clock till market bell therfor ordeigned be rongen,” and at one o’clock all the unsold malt is to be cleared away.
[46] “Capped in the sakke” = probably with some good malt put on the top and defective malt beneath. Mowe brent barley = barley that has heated in the stack. Belyed = swollen. Acre-spired = with the shoot of the plant projecting from the husk. Wyvell-eten = weevil-eaten. Meddled = mixed.
All these rules and ordinances the Lord Mayor and Aldermen were graciously pleased to sanction and confirm.
The records contain many entries showing the difficulties the authorities had to contend with in keeping the brewers to the legal price and qualities of ale, a subject already touched on in Chapter V. The prices being fixed by law, and no allowance being made for the natural fluctuations of the market, it is not to be supposed that the brewers would give their customers any better ale than they were absolutely compelled by law to give. As old Taylor quaintly says:—
I find the Brewer honest in his Beere, He sels it for small Beere, and he should cheate, Instead of small to cosen folks with Greate, But one shall seldome find them with that fault, Except it should invisibly raine Mault.
Disputes arising between the officers of the Brewers’ Company and any members of the guild, were sometimes referred for settlement to the Lord Mayor and Aldermen. In 1520 there was “variance and debate in the Court of Aldermen between the Master and Wardens of the ale-brewers and Thomas Adyson, ale-brewer, concerning the making of a growte” by the latter. The parties having submitted their case to the Court, it was adjudged that Adyson should go to the Brewers’ Hall, {143} and there, before the Master and Wardens, “with due reverence as to them apperteynyng, standing before them his hed uncovered, shall say these words: ‘Maysters, I pray you to be good masters to me, and fromhensforth I promytte you that I shall be good and obedient to you . . and obey the laws and customs of the house.’”
Foreign brewers (i.e., brewers not members of the Company) were only allowed to sell ale within the City on paying 40s. annually to the use of the City, and in default of payment the Chamberlain “shall distreyne their carts from tyme to tyme.” There was also a duty called ale-silver, which had been paid from time immemorial to the Lord Mayor by the sellers of ale within the City.
Complaints of short measure were still common, and as it is shown that the barrels were delivered to customers without being properly filled, so that “thynhabitants of the City paye for more ale and bere than they doo receive, which is agenst alle good reason and conscience,” therefore the brewers were ordered to take round “filling ale” to fill up their customers’ casks.