Upon that bastile to make an ende.
The wine-dealer and the publican formed another class in mediæval society who lived by fraud and dishonesty, and were the objects of satire. The latter gave both bad wine and bad measure, and he often also acted as a pawnbroker, and when people had drunk more than they could pay for, he would take their clothes as pledges for their money. The tavern, in the middle ages, was the resort of very miscellaneous company; gamblers and loose women were always on the watch there to lead more honest people into ruin, and the tavern-keeper profited largely by their gains; and the more vulgar minstrel and “jogelour” found employment there; for the middle classes of society, and even their betters, frequented the tavern much more generally than at the present day. In the carved stalls of the church of Corbeil, the liquor merchant is represented by the figure of a man wheeling a hogshead in a barrow, as shown in our cut No. 88. The graveness and air of importance with which he regards it would lead us to suppose that the barrel contains wine; and the cup and jug on the shelf above show that it was to be sold retail. The wine-sellers called out their wines from their doors, and boasted of their qualities, in order to tempt people in; and John de Garlande assures us that when they entered, they were served with wine which was not worth drinking. “The criers of wine,” he says, “proclaim with extended throat the diluted wine they have in their taverns, offering it at four pennies, at six, at eight, and at twelve, fresh poured out from the gallon cask into the cup, to tempt people.” (“Volume of Vocabularies,” p. 126.) The ale-wife was an especial subject of jest and satire, and is not unfrequently represented on the pictorial monuments of our forefathers. Our cut No. 89 is taken from one of the misereres in the church of Wellingborough, in Northamptonshire; the ale-wife is pouring her liquor from her jug into a cup to serve a rustic, who appears to be waiting for it with impatience.
No. 88. The Wine Dealer.
No. 89. The Ale-Wife.
No. 90. The Ale-Drawer.
The figure of the ale-drawer, No. 90, is taken from one of the misereres in the parish church of Ludlow, in Shropshire. The size of his jug is somewhat disproportionate to that of the barrel from which he obtains the ale. The same misereres of Ludlow Church furnish the next scene, cut No. 91, which represents the end of the wicked ale-wife. The day of judgment is supposed to have arrived, and she has received her sentence. A demon, seated on one side, is reading a list of the crimes she has committed, which the magnitude of the parchment shows to be a rather copious one. Another demon (whose head has been broken off in the original) carries on his back, in a very irreverent manner, the unfortunate lady, in order to throw her into hell-mouth, on the other side of the picture. She is naked with the exception of the fashionable head-gear, which formed one of her vanities in the world, and she carries with her the false measure with which she cheated her customers. A demon bagpiper welcomes her on her arrival. The scene is full of wit and humour.
