In 1302 one Thomas Bat, being haled before the Mayor on a charge of neglecting to put tiles instead of thatch on his houses, offered to indemnify the City in case of any fire happening by reason of his thatch. The offer was accepted on the understanding that the thatch was to be removed by a certain time. The naïveté of Mr. Bat in offering, and the City in accepting, an indemnity in case of fire is truly remarkable. What would Mr. Bat have done, how far would his personal estate have gone, if a quarter of the City had been burned down by reason of his thatch?
Some entries are very remarkable. In 1308 a “supervisor” of barbers was appointed. Why of barbers? In another place it is hinted that barbers allowed their shops to become places of assignation; and in another place they were ordered not to ply their trade on Sundays. Furriers are not to scour their furs in Cheapside. Turners who made the wooden measures are ordered to make no measures but those of the gallon, the potell (or half gallon), and the quart, and not to make any of the false measures called chopins and “gylles.” But why were the chopin and the gill false measures? White tawyers and megusers were not to flay horses in the City: were there, then, no knackers’ yards?
The paving of the City did not become general until the fourteenth century. Even then, in 1372, we find “the Pavement” before the Friars Minors in Newgate Street mentioned as if it were a distinguishing feature of that street. Perhaps the explanation is that the roadway itself was paved for the convenience of the poultry market there. Paving was required of every householder before his own house, but the middle of the street was paved by means of the tax called Pavage. By means of this tax, every cart that entered the gates paid a penny. But a cart carrying sand or clay paid 3d. a week, and a cart carrying corn and flour paid the same: a cart laden with firewood paid 1/4d., and a cart with charcoal paid 1d. But carts and horses carrying provisions for private consumption paid nothing.
In 1334 certain foreign merchants were exempted from the toll or tax of Pavage except before their own hostels. Riley thinks that the pavement for the Poultry Market in Newgate Street, and other open spaces used as markets, consisted of “rough layers of stones.” But the paviors formed a separate craft, and their pay was regulated at so much a toise (7½ feet) in length. This indicates some skill and knowledge, which certainly would not be wanted for “rough layers of stones.”
The dangers of the night were always present in the minds of the sober citizens. When the streets were without light—which was the case practically, in spite of regulations and ordinances, till the eighteenth century—and without a patrol, the way of the robbers and murderers was easy. The danger varied; sometimes, especially in time of foreign war, the streets were comparatively quiet; sometimes, especially when the soldiers returned, they were filled with violence, brawls, and robberies. A strong Alderman in a Ward suppressed disorders: indeed, it is most certain that it was easy to find out the character of every man in the Ward; a weak Alderman encouraged evil-doers: and it was always easy for a malefactor to get across the river in a boat and find safety in those parts of Southwark where the City had no jurisdiction. The worst time ever known in London for this kind of disorder was certainly towards the end of the twelfth century, unless, perhaps, it was a hundred years later, when King Edward suppressed the Mayor for twelve years.
As for the craftsman, on Saturdays work was knocked off at Vespers, that is, at 4 P.M. The shops stood open on the ground floor with wide windows, glazed at the top or not at all. The selds, of which we hear so much, were places for storage and warehousing first, and shops next. Thus North and South Shields are the north and south selds. One of the streets, as Broad Street, for example, had two kennels or gutters, the others only one. Many laws were passed about pigs, which were allowed to be kept within the house, one supposes in the garden or back-yard, but not in the streets.
The lawlessness that was continually breaking out in the streets is abundantly illustrated in the pages of Riley. Thus, there was the quarrel between the saddlers and the painters in 1327. It began with “contumelious” words between William de Karleton, saddler, and William de Stokwell, a painter: their friends arranged for the dispute between them to be settled by arbitration of six persons on either side, and a “day of love,” i.e. of reconciliation, was appointed to be held at St. Paul’s Cathedral. Unfortunately the painter went about making mischief and got together all the painters, joiners, loriners, and gilders in the City, so that they agreed to stand by each other, and in case of dispute or offence to close their selds until the case was adjusted. This was naturally followed by a fight in the streets, in which many were killed or wounded. The case was brought before the Mayor and Aldermen, by whom a Committee of Arbitration, consisting of six Aldermen, was appointed. The Aldermen heard the case on both sides, and chose six men of each trade, by whom articles of agreement were arrived at and a day of love was named.
The water supply of the City was in its early history abundant. There were wells, springs, and streams everywhere. Through the wall of the City flowed the Walbrook, fed by one spring at least within the City. This stream received half-a-dozen affluents before it reached the wall. Outside there were the springs of Clerkenwell, the Holy Well, Sadler’s Well, and others falling into the River of Wells or Fleet River: in the Strand there were small streams flowing down to the Thames from what is now the site of Covent Garden. And within the City there were many wells of pure water: in Broad Street, at Aldgate, at St. Antholin’s Church, at St. Paul’s Churchyard, at the Grey Friars, at Aldersgate, at many private houses; the number of these wells can never be discovered, because the Fire of London choked them, and they were built over and forgotten. When Furnival’s Inn was destroyed quite recently, old wells were found below the foundations. There was also the Thames water, which at certain periods of the ebb tide was tolerably pure, if it was taken some distance from the bank.
When the Walbrook became an open sewer, and the Fleet River defiled with every kind of refuse, it was necessary to obtain a supply of water from outside. In the reign of Henry III. (1236) a conduit of stone was erected at Marylebone for the reception of water from the Tyburn. (See p. 24.)
There were nine conduits or bosses set up in different parts of the City, but all on the western side of Walbrook. Three of these conduits were in Chepe, one opposite Honey Lane, another where Chepe becomes the Poultry, and a third, the Little Conduit, at the west end of Chepe, just east of the present statue of Sir Robert Peel. Another conduit stood in Snow Hill. It was repaired and restored in 1577 by one Lamb, who connected it with a spring on the site of the drinking fountain before the Foundling Hospital. The City on the east of Walbrook was supplied by wells, especially by a well opposite the future site of the Royal Exchange. The great conduit of Cornhill called the Standard was not set up until 1581. An earlier conduit, however, was that at Aldgate, which brought water from Hackney. The New River water was brought into the New River Head in the year 1613.