One of the most striking things about this subject is the large number of companies which formerly existed in London. The following, from a MS. belonging to the Brewers Company, is a list of those which are now Jwellers Patnost' Orglemakers Kervers' (stone carvers) About the time of Edward II all citizens were obliged to be enrolled among the trade guilds proper to their own craft or mystery, and soon a distinction between greater and smaller companies was developed. Most of the guilds availed themselves of the licence reserved to them in the Acts against Livery, to use it, and they became, and are still, distinguished as the Livery Companies; a small number have no livery. The following is an interesting quotation from Sir Walter Besant's picturesque work "London" (Chatto & Windus. 1900): "At the period with which we are now concerned, the end of the fourteenth century, the companies were rapidly forming and presenting regulations for the approval of the Mayor and Aldermen. By the year 1363 there were thirty-two companies already formed whose laws and regulations had received the approbation of the King. Let us take those of the Company of Glovers. They are briefly as follows: (1) None but a freeman of the city shall make or sell gloves. "(2) No glover shall be admitted to the freedom of the city unless with the assent of the Wardens of the trade. 66 66 i (3) No one shall entice away the servant of another. (4) If a servant in the trade shall make away with his master's chattels to the value of twelvepence, the Wardens shall make good the loss; and if the servant refuse to be adjudged upon by the Wardens, he shall be taken before the Mayor and Aldermen. "(5) No one shall sell his goods by candle-light. (6) Any false work found shall be taken before the Mayor and Aldermen by the Wardens. (7) All things touching the trade within the city between those who are not freemen shall be forfeited. "(8) Journeymen shall be paid their present rate of wages. 66 (9) Persons who entice away journeymen glovers to make gloves in their own houses shall be brought before the Mayor and Aldermen. (10) Any one of the trade who refuses to obey these regulations shall be brought before the Mayor and Aldermen. Observe, upon these laws, first that the fourth simply transfers the master's right to chastise his servant to the governing body of the company. This seems to put the craftsmen in a better position. Here, apparently, is combination carried to the fullest. All the glovers in the city unite; no one shall make or sell gloves except their own members; the company shall order the rate of wages and the admission of apprentices; no glover shall work for private persons, or for any one, except by order of the company. Here is absolute protection of trade and absolute command of trade. Unfortunately, the Wardens and court were not the craftsmen, but the masters. Therefore the regulations of trade were very quickly found to serve the enrichment of the masters and the repression of the craftsmen. And if the latter formed " covins' or conspiracies for the improvement of wages, they very soon found out that such associations were put down with the firmest hand. To be brought before the Mayor and Aldermen meant, unless submission was made and accepted, expulsion from the city. So long as the conditions of the time allowed, the companies created a Paradise for the master. The workman was suppressed; he could not combine; he could not live except on the terms imposed by his company: if he rebelled he was thrust out of the city gates. The jurisdiction of the city, however, ceased at the walls; when a greater London began to grow outside Cripplegate, Bishopsgate, and Aldgate, and on the reclaimed marshes of Westminster and along the river bank, craftsmen not of any company could settle down and work as they pleased. But they had to find a market, which might be impossible except within the city, where they were not admitted. Therefore the companies, as active guardians and jealous promoters of their trades, fulfilled their original purposes a long while, and enabled many generations of masters to the work of their servants. grow rich upon Sir Walter winds up his account with the following interesting conclusion: وو "For my own part, I confess that this repression, this silencing of the craftsman in the fourteenth century, seems to me to have been necessary for the growth and prosperity of the city. For the craftsman was then incredibly ignorant; he knew nothing except his own craft; as for his country, the conditions of the time, the outer world, he knew nothing at all; he might talk to the sailors who lay about the quays between voyages, but they could tell him nothing that would help him in his trade; he could not read, he could not inquire, because he knew not what question to ask or what information he wanted; he had no principles; he was naturally ready, for his own present advantages, to sacrifice the whole world; he believed all he was told. Had the London working man acquired such a share in the government of his city as he now has in the government of his country, the result would have been a battlefield of discordant and evervarying factions, ruled and led each in turn by a shortlived demagogue. It was, in short, a most happy circumstance for London that the government of the city fell into the hands of an oligarchy, and still more happy that the oligarchs themselves were under the rule of a jealous and watchful sovereign.' The Livery Companies weathered some stern storms in the eighteenth century, but the increase in land values in the nineteenth placed many of them in a prosperous and unassailable position. Their duties to-day are largely charitable and hospitable. Most of them not only administer charitable funds but also promote the interests of their craft through technical education. A few still exercise influence on the old trades which they used to monopolize. For instance, the Fishmongers Company maintains two inspectors of fish at Billingsgate Market. The Goldsmiths, the Stationers, the Apothecaries, the Vintners, the Plumbers, the Fruiterers and the Gunmakers still take an active part in the trades they represent. The Liverymen meet in the Guildhall every June to elect the Sheriffs and every September, as stated in the preceding notes, to exercise their privilege of electing the new Lord Mayor of London. VI. ANTIQUITIES It is not realized that we approach the end of archeological excavation in London. The adventurous Roach Smith era is over! The next few years will reveal the last scrap of any treasure which may still lie beneath the |