Anne. Ay, indeed, sir.
Slender. That's meat and drink to me, now: I have seen Sackerson loose twenty times, and have taken him by the chain; but, I warrant you, the women have so cried and shriek'd at it, that it passed [passed description]; but women, indeed, cannot abide 'em; they are very ill-favoured rough things."
Sackerson was a famous bear exhibited at Paris Garden, a popular bear-garden on the Bankside in London, near the Globe Theatre. An old epigram refers to the place and the animal thus:—
"Publius, a student of the common law,
To Paris-garden doth himself withdraw,
Leaving old Ployden, Dyer, and Broke alone,
To see old Harry Hunkes and Sacarson;"
that is, neglecting Ployden and other writers on law for the sports at the bear-garden.
For the bear to get loose was a serious matter. We read in a diary of 1554 that at a bear-baiting on the Bankside "the great blind bear broke loose, and in running away he caught a servingman by the calf of the leg and bit a great piece away," so that "within three days after he died."
James I. prohibited baiting on Sundays, but did not otherwise discourage it. In the time of the Commonwealth Paris Garden was shut up, the bear was killed, and the amusement forbidden; but with the Restoration it was revived, and continued to be popular until the early part of the next century. In 1802 an attempt was made in Parliament to suppress it altogether, but the House of Commons by a majority of thirteen refused to pass the bill. It was not until the year 1835 that baiting was finally abolished by an act of Parliament, forbidding "the keeping of any house, pit, or other place, for baiting or fighting any bull, bear, dog, or other animal."