In Praise of Ale

In Praise of Ale

tu Bratse of Ale SONGS, BALLADS, EPIGRAMS, & ANECDOTES RELATING TO BEER, MALT, AND HOPS WITH SOME CURIOUS PARTICULARS CONCERNING ALE-WIVES AND BREWERS DRINKING-CLUB8 AND CUSTOMS Coxtecrep anp ARRANGED BY W. T. MARCHANT ‘* There's many a clinking sony is made In honour of the Blacksmith’s traae ; Bat more for the Brewer may be said, Which nebedy can deny,” LONDON GEORGE REDWAY, YORK STREET, COVENT GARDEN 1888 vi Preface. Guildhall Library has laid me under lasting obligations, as has aleo the late Mayor of Dorchester, Alfred Pope, Esq. Last, but not least, a tribute of thankfulness from every book- maker and reader at the British Museum is due to the officials of that noble Institution, from the Head of the Staff to the youngest member thereof. I have been a reader for many years, and have always received the greatest courtesy and assistance from all, and this is the more marked, inasmuch as I am scarcely known, in- dividually, even by name to any one of them. All the virtues of this book, therefore, do not belong to me, though, unquestionably, the faults do. Trusting, therefore, that the public and my friends will— “ Be to its virtues very kind, And to its faults a little blind,” T launch the venture on the wave of public opinion to sink or swim on its own merits, Batuam, January 1888. P.S.—TJ began collecting material for the following work years ago; and in May 1884 commenced a series of articles in the “ Burton Chronicle.” This series ran about twelve months, and is embodied in the present work, During the time this book has been passing through the press, [ have seen from reviews that two scholarly books —‘* The Curiosi- ties of Ale” and “ Beers of the Bible”—have appeared, I[ have carefully avoided reading either of them. When three writers take up a similar subject, they must necessarily traverse the same ground to a great extent; and though I might have enriched my pages at their expense by “conveyancing,” I trust 1 have avoided any charge, or even suspicion of plagiarism. PREFACE. IME out of mind, Beer has been the National Bever- age, and its history, as embodied in songs and stories, will give a fair reflex of the manners and customs of the various periods at which they were written, I had intended originally to have classified my facts and fancies in a very severe manner, after the style of the Learned Smelfungus or Dryasdust, but I found objections to that plan. To have made my facts as bald as billiard balls, and have arranged them in parallelograms, would have deprived them of much of their charm. A book like this does not come under the hard and fast laws of editing, or the strict canons of criticism, but is rather like a song, without beginning or ending—a book to be taken up at odd moments, and opened at any page, without undue strain on the reader’s consecutive attention. When I write my great work on squaring the circle, the binominal theorem, and the hydrostatic parallax, I shall fit my facts and fancies with mathematical precision. At the same time, I do venture to hope that the most fastidious reader will find nothing to offend, but much that may amuse and perchance instruct. I have, it is true, had to leave out very much that is excessively witty but too robust for the present day. Asa rule, [ have carefully acknowledged the sources of my information in the body of the work. I must, however, express my deep sense of obligation to Notes and Queries, and the erudite and kindly contributors to that pre-eminently learned, chatty, and useful journal. Also to Mr Edward A. Hardy, M.A. Cantab., for his scholarly and kindly assistance; to Messrs Fred Whymper, Frank Price, John Stagg, and Robert Kempt, for many contributions. The courteous sub-librarian of the vi Preface. Guildhall Library has laid me under lasting obligations, as has also the late Mayor of Dorchester, Alfred Pope, Esq. Last, but not least, a tribute of thankfulness from every book- maker and reader at the British Museum is due to the officials of that noble Institution, from the Head of the Staff to the youngest member thereof. I have been a reader for many years, and have always received the greatest courtesy and assistance from all, and this is the more marked, inasmuch as I am scarcely known, in- dividually, even by name to any one of them. All the virtues of this book, therefore, do not belong to me, though, unquestionably, the faults do. ‘Trusting, therefore, that the public and my friends will— ‘ Be to its virtues very kind, And to its faults a little blind,”’ T launch the venture on the wave of public opinion to sink or swim oD its own merits, W. T. M. Batyam, January 1888. P.S.—TJ began collecting material for the following work years ago; and in May 1884 commenced a series of articles in the “ Burton Chronicle.” This series ran about twelve months, and is embodied in the present work, During the time this book has been passing through the press, I have seen from reviews that two scholarly books—‘ The Curiosi- ties of Ale” and “ Beers of the Bible”—save appeared. I have carefully avoided reading either of them. When three writers take up a similar subject, they must necessarily traverse the same ground to a great extent; and though I might have enriched my pages at their expense by “conveyancing,” I trust 1 have avoided any charge, or even suspicion of plagiarism. INTRODUCTORY HISTORY . CONTENTS. CHAPTER Ul, CAROLS AND WASSAIL SONGS . . CHAPTER IV, CHURCH ALES AND OBSERVANCES. WHITSUN ALES POLITICAL HARVEST SONGS GENERAL SONGS BARLEY AND MALT HOPS. CHAPTER V. PAGES 1-27 28-60 61-86 87-113 114-134 135-181 182-212 213-303 304-356 357-362 vill Contents. SCOTCH ALE SONGS . . . CHAPTER Xiil. TRADE SONGS ° CHAPTER XIV OXFORD SONGS . . . CHAPTER XV. ALE WIVES . . . ° . CHAPTER XVI BREWERS . ° . CHAPTER XVII DRINKING CLUBS AND CUSTOMS CHAPTER XVIII. ROYAL AND NOBLE DRINKERS . CHAPTER XIX. BLACK BEER . . . : CHAPTER XX DRINKING VESSELS . CHAPTER XXI. WARM ALE ° . ° . FACTS, SCRAPS, AND ANA 363-400 401-474 475-491 492-503 504-513 514-540 541-566 567-573 574-585 586-598 599-613 614-632 IN PRAISE OF ALE. CHAPTER 1. INTRODUCTION. “ Mine host was full of ale and history.” « There's many a clinking song is made In honour of the blacksmiths trade ; But more for the brewer may be said, Which nobody can deny.” Ir is a matter of surprise that no one has hitherto made a collection of the many rich, rare, and racy songs in praise of what certainly has been the National Beverage—together with its constituents, malt and hops—time out of mind, and long before the Christian era, Of merely Bacchanalian songs we have a superabundance; but barley belongs to Ceres more than to the drunken god and his noisy satellites,—at least s0 says Milton, and he knew; Phillips, another classical scholar, follows the same idea in his “ Cerealia.” Then let old Bacchus yield the prize, or both divide the crown. “Far hence be Bacchus’ gifts (the chief rejoin’d) : Inflaming wine, pernicious to mankind, Unnerves the limbs, and dulls the noble mind.” A 2 In Praise of Ale. ‘¢ All the hinds bend low at Ceres’ shrine ; Mix honey sweet for her with milk and mellow wine. Thrice lead the victim the new fruits around, And Ceres call, and choral hymns resound.” Beer, however, in conjunction with mighty roast beef, has made England what it is, or rather, what it was before the introduction of “ silent-stills,” Hambro’ sherry, prune wine, potato spirits, or chemically prepared “fizz,” which resembles the real article as * champagne Charlie”? does a gentleman. Accum in his day forcibly pointed out the evils of chemically prepared and doctored wines :— There is in this city a certain fraternity of chemical operators who work underground in holes, caverns, and dark retirements, to conceal their mysteries from the eyes and observations of mankind. ‘They can squeeze claret out of the sloe, and draw champagne from an apple,”—would it were nothing worse. Virgil seems to have had this calling in his mind’s eye when he penned that remarkable prophecy — “ Incultieque rubens pendebit sentibus uva.” Eclogue iv., 29. which Dryden renders— “The ripening grape shall hang on every thorn.” The complaint that I now make of the prevalence of inferior wines and spirits was made long ago by Smollett ; Squire Matt Bramble being his spokesman :—“ Well, there is no nation that drinks 90 hoggishly as the English, What passes for wine among us is not the juice of the grape. It is an adulterous mixture, brewed up of nauseous ingredients by dunces, who are bunglers in the art of poison-making ; yet we and our forefathers are, and have been, poisoned by this cursed drench without taste or flavour. The only genuine and wholesome beverage in England is London porter and Dorchester table beer; but as for your ale and your gin, your cider and your perry, and all the trashy family of made wines, I detest them as infernal compositions contrived for the destruction of the human species, But what have I to do with the human species? except a very few friends, I care not if the Introduction. 3 whole was ——.” It is, however, satisfactory to find that English brewers generally maintain their well-earned reputation abroad as well as at home. Possibly, says a modern writer, the excessive stolidity of the German beer-drinkers may arise from deleterious drugs used in its composition, for we learn that the Répertoire de Pharmacie pronounces it to be coloured with sulphobenzazodimetliylamin. This is certainly a good mouthful to swallow. “The glass enjoy’d by reason’s plan The sinking heart bears up : Heaven gave the gift for comfort— Man put poison in the cup.” Mr. Lecky, in his History of the Eighteenth Century, points out the evils which arose when beer, as the national drink, was partially discarded :—-*« When the distilleries were first allowed, the country passed, much to its injury, from a beer-drinking to a gin-drinking people; the births fell off, and the deaths, especially from dropey, greatly increased, In consequence of the excessive quantities of ardent spirits drank by the English working-classes in the reign of George I., a duty of twenty shillings per gallon was imposed on all spirits.’’—g Geo. I., c. 23. A modern versifier shows truly enough the evil effects of cheap, and, inevitably, nasty spirits on the poor, and the rich, too, for that matter : “ For the want of a drop of good beer Drives lots to tipples more dear, And they licks their wives And destroys their lives, Which they would not ha’ done upon beer.” Howell, writing about 1620, stated that some doctors and surgeons, during their attendance on an English gentleman who was diseased at Paris, discoursed on wines and other beverages ; and one physician, who had been in England, said :—“ The English had a drink which they called ale, and which he thought the wholesomest liquor that could be drank ; for whereas the body Aa 4 In Praise of Ale. of man is supported by natural heat and radical moisture, there is no drink conduceth more to the preservation of the one and the increase of the other than ale; for, while the Englishmen drank only ale, they were strong, brawny, able men, and could draw an arrow an ell long, but when they fell to wine and beer, they are found to be much impaired in their strength and age.”? And so the ale bore away the bell among the doctors. Another early writer thus descants on the virtues of English ale and beer :—* The usuall and naturall drink of the country is beer, 90 called from the French word Jeire, (for wines they have not of their own growing ;) which, without controversie, is a most wholesome and nourishing beverage; and being trans- ported into France, Belgium, and Germany, by the working of the sea is so purged, that it is amongst them in highest estimation, and celebrated by the name of /a bonne Beere d’ Angle- terre, And as for the old drink of England, ale, which cometh from the Danish word oela, it is questionless in itself, (and without that commixture which some are accustomed to use with it), a very wholesome drink.” The Quarterly (vol. xcvi. p. 485) states :—* That the porter and stout of the Metropolis have long been famous, the virtues of the latter drink are celebrated all over the world; and a Royal Duke, not many years ago, ascribed the great mortality of the Guards in the East to the want of their favourite beverage.” There always will be some men of perverted tastes who prefer coarse spirits to wholesome beer for the sake of keeping up appearances. Such men are only fit to drink potato spirits, d /a Punch’s recipe :— « A pound of potatoes come peel, peel for me, Give those who prefer it pure gin; — No matter what sort, 80 potatoes they be Divested with care of their skin. For oh, when the cares of the day are gone by, And a man is disposed to grow frisky, A pound of potatoes at once let him buy To make him a ‘go’ of good whisky.” Introduction, 5 To take a still more recent example from the Paris corre- spondent of Truth :—‘ Drunkenness used not to be a French vice; but what with the destruction of the vines by the phylloxera, the manufacture of brandy out of beet root and potatoes, the beer devoid of malt and hops which floods the cafés, and the drugged wine, the race is going to the dogs in the towns,” I am convinced that the evils of drunkenness have increased since the fashion of cheap “goes” of spirits came into general Vogue some years ago. It is 90 easy to order another round when it is “ only tappence ago.” If men would remember that good ale is far more whole- some and nutritious than cheap and necessarily inferior spirits or doctored wines, they would be better in purse, person, and animal spirits themselves, I would that I could also (even at the risk of being stigmatised as an apostle of Beer) induce all brewers to concoct the genuine beverage and discard such unknown compounds as hop or malt substitutes, I fear that many brewers have not always been free from blame. They should remember the dignity of their calling, as embodied in the following ancient epigram :— “Ap, M,. Brewer Meoicum. “ This phrase to drink a health is only trew Of drink which men of your profession brew.”” Of a similar character also is the following :— “Such maltsters who ill measure give for gain, Are not mere rogues, but also rogues in grain.” Before leaving this branch of the subject it may be as well to inquire what beer is, Mr. H. S. Carpenter, F.LC., F.C.S., of the Society of Public Analysts, answers this question compre- hensively in the following letter to the Times :-— “So much nonsense has recently been written about ‘hop- substitutes’ that I am tempted to write a few lines in the hope of clearing away some of the fog that prevails on the subject. 6 In Praise of Ale. “ First, then, What is beer? At the present time it can only be defined as ‘a fermented liquid containing some wholesome bitter.’ - “Te will be seen that this definition includes any form of saccharine matter, together with such» bitters as gentian, quassia, calumba, chiretta, &c., while such ingredients as picrotoxin, being notoriously pernicious, would be excluded. “The question to be decided, it appears to me, is whether it is fair to put the brewer who uses honest malt and hops on the same level as another who uses starch saccharified by acid and * hop-substitutes,’ “The public should decide this for themselves by insisting on finding out from their brewer what kind of a decoction he is supplying them with.” Sir Arthur Bass (Baron Burton), however, speaking on behalf of the firm of which he is the head, and also for all the Burton brewers, assured the French brewers that the excellence of the English beer was solely due to the quality of the malt, hope, and water, which formed the sole ingredients. If therefore I could persuade the public to revert back to the National Beverage, instead of coarse fiery spirit, I feel confident that I shall have done something towards promoting real temperance, and that in a natural and rational manner, “I think that some have died of drought, And some have died of drinking.”’ I know for certain, however, that the happy medium is the golden rule of life. I can and do honour those who abetain, from conscience’ sake, as an example to their weaker brethren; but I cannot look upon a reformed drunkard as the highest type of humanity, though I sincerely respect the motives that led to his new departure, I should be sorry indeed to write anything that would unsettle any man’s moral or religious convictions. It is far easier to sneer at and shake a man’s faith than it is to implant a newer and better one ; and the writer who attempts to do the former incurs a grave responsibility. I agree heartily with Mr. G. A. Sala, Introduction. 7 who wrote from Australia: —“I do not believe in total abstinence, nationally. I am inclined to fear lest a total abstaining nation should become a gluttonous, grasping, selfish, tyrannical, morose, and intolerably conceited nation; but I do believe in the prac- ticability of a traditionally hard-drinking nation—we have been drinking hard for twelve hundred yeare—growing gradually less drunken, and I hope to have ere long occasion to show that the habits tend very conspicuously indeed in the direction of modera- tion in the use of strong drink.” « An’ he that scorns ale to his victual Is welcome to let it alone ; There’s some can be wise wi’ a little, An’ some that are foolish wi’ noan ; An’ some are so quare i’ their natu’, — That nought wi’ their stomachs agree, But he that would liefer drink wayter Shall never be stinted by me.” I would allow every man the fullest license to please himeelf ; and this amount of toleration I claim from the abstinence party, —every one to his taste :— “Tis sweet the nectar of the gods to quaff, And very pleasant is the rosy wine, Refreshing is the taste of half-and-half, But of all drinks, cold water shall be mine.” Americans of the present day are showing themselves to be wiser than their immediate forerunners, since beer is rapidly replacing the fantastic “drinks” for which the United States have earned a reputation, and is in a fair way to become their national beverage. The quantity of beer now consumed is, in proportion to the population, eleven times as great as it was forty years ago. An author who writes with authority from the same country, states confidently that tobacco is silently and insidiously undermining the constitutions of more young men than liquor. 8 In Praise of Ale. Water drinkers are not free from danger ; even when imbibing the so-called pure and limpid element, there are— Dancers: “ And if from man’s vile arts I flee And drink pure water from the pump, I gulp down infusoriz, And quarts of raw bacteriz, And hideous rotatorz, And wriggling polygastrice, And slimy diatomacez, And hard-shelled ophryocercinz, And double-barrelled kolpodz, Non-loricated ambeedz, And various animalculz, Of middle, high and low degree, For Nature just beats all creation, Tn multiplied adulteration.” On the other hand, for those who sell adulterated beer, malt, or hops, no punishment can be too great. In the olden days, the hurdle and pillory swiftly overtook the evil doers, and the then *¢ Adulteration of Food and Drugs Act’? was quickly enforced in a telling manner. Joun Barveycorn.* « Those were the days of old, When Bnitain’s sons 80 brave and bold, Their noble hearts to cheer, © Could quaff John Barleycorn tax free, Scorning Souchong and black Bohea, They'd drink of the bright, the home-brew’d beer— There’s nothing 80 good the heart to cheer. No! ambrosia fine ’tis as good as wine, Clear, strong, and richer than good Rhine wine. Hurrah! nothing like beer, like old English beer, hurrah ! ® Printed by permission of Messrs, Ashdown & Parry, Hanover Square, Words by Mr. W. West. Introduction. 9 What is it that makes an Englishman brave, Sooner than spirits that send to the grave ? Barley drink divine ! Better than all your meagre wine, Weakening stuff your poor thin wine ; Then fill up a cup with hearty cheer, There’s nothing like beer the heart to cheer. - No! ambrosia fine ’tis good as wine, Clear, strong, and richer than good Rhine wine. Harrah! nothing like beer, like old English beer, hurrah |” We hear a great deal now of the degeneracy of the times, the dranken habits of workmen, and 80 on, as we hear, fer contra, of the good old days when George the IIT. was King, the Augustan Age, the Georgian Era, and the golden days of Good Queen Bess, &c. &c. Now, the golden age never leaves the world ; it exists still, and shall exist till love, health, poetry, valour, and patriotism are no more. The Victorian Age will shine as brightly in history as did ever any epoch of our country. We cannot always realise the fact, because we are in it and surrounded with the mists and turmoils of the present, which obscure our mental vision. We see the evil which exists, but we cannot fally realise the good. One thing I should like to see revived, and that is the patriarchal relationship which formerly existed between masters and men. Those were the times when both parties had bonds and sympathies in common ; and these mutual feelings existed almost to the present day, ere political economy set class against class, and severed the connection. The poor and rich, or rather the yeoman class, had their work and pleasures in common, Scott puts it :— «A Christmas gambol oft would cheer, The poor man’s heart through half the year; ”” but these reunions occurred much more frequently, There were Whitsun Ales, Sheep-Shearings, Hay Harvest, Harvest Home, Michaelmas, and other periodical rejoicings that lightened the labours of the poor. The writings of Tusser and Herrick abundantly prove this, and show how the enjoyments at different to In Praise of Ale. seasons were celebrated. On the other hand, the masters did not shirk their share of hard work ; they took their “nuncheons ” and “nammits” in common; and the mutual sympathy thus evolved, brought both classes closely together. “ They did not ride Blood horses as varmers’ wives do now, The daughters went a milken, and the sons went out to plough, Such as I have heard my parents say was ninety yeara ago.” Respecting the subject of feasts, fairs, mops, ales, and amuse- ments of the poor of a by-gone age. In the olden days these festivals had a religious element, and the reverence attached thereto kept their wakes and feasts pure. In latter times the reverence became a thing of the past, and license or unlicense succeeded harmless enjoyment and innocent fun. “Ye church-ales and ye morrises With hobby-horse advancing, . Ye round games with fine Jim and Sis About the May-pole dancing, Ye nimble joints, that with red points And ribbons deck the bridal, Lock up your pumps, and rest your stumpe, For you are now down cried all.” “ We hundreders of Nibley ”’ (in the Cotswold district), says old John Smith, whose writings are preserved in the Berkeley manuscripts—“ We hundreders,”’ and he was proud of the term, “are disposed to look on the cheerful side of things, and to countenance the hilarity of wakes and fairs and village festivals in opposition to Puritan dislike of these popular customs.” The custom of Cowley Pike, an eminence in his neighbourhood, was pleasant to him, “where to behold younge men and maids ascendinge and descendinge and boies tumbling down, especially on communion dais in the afternoones what times the resort is greatest, bringeth no small delight to many of the elder sort, also delightinge therein.”” Mr. Tom Hughes has ‘hit the right nail on the head in his inimitable work, “ Tom Brown’s Schooldays.” I prefer to quote Introduction. I! his words rather than my own, though I know the district to which he refers, and can heartily endorse every word he has written, Speaking of the annual “veast”’ and hiring, or “ Statty” faire in the Vale of the Whitehorse as held some forty years since : “They are much altered for the worse, I am told, I haven’t been at one these twenty years, but I have been at the statute fairs in some west-country towns, where servants are hired; and greater abominations cannot be found, What village feasts have come to, I fear, in many cases, may be read in the pages of Yeast (though I never saw one 90 bad—thank God!) Do you want to know why? It is because, as I said before, gentlefolk and farmers have left off joining or taking an interest inthem, They don’t either subscribe to the prizes, or go down and enjoy the fan. Is this a good or a bad sign? I hardly know. Bad, sure enough, if it only arises from the further separation of classes consequent on twenty years of buying cheap and selling dear, and its accompanying over-work ; or because our sons and daughters have their hearts in London club-life, or e0-called society, instead of in the old English home duties ; because farmers’ sons are aping fine gentlemen, and farmers’ daughters caring more to make bad foreign music than good English cheeses. Good, perhaps, if it be that the time for the old ‘veast’ has gone by, that it is no longer the healthy, sound expression of English country holiday-making ; that, in fact, we as a nation have got beyond it, and are in a transition state, feeling for and soon likely to find some better substitute. Only I have just got this to say before I quit the text. Don’t let reformers of any sort think that they are going really to lay hold of the working boys and young men of England by any educational grapnel whatever, which hasn’t some bona fide equivalent for the games of the old country ‘veast’ in it; something to put in the place of the back-swording, and wrestling, and racing; something to try the muscles of men’s bodies, and the endurance of their hearts, to make them rejoice in their strength. In all the new-fangled comprehensive plans which I see, this is all left out; and the consequence is that your great Mechanics’ Institutes end in intellectual priggism, and your Christian Young Men’s Societies 12 In Praise of Ale. in religious Pharisaism. Well, well, we must bide our time. Life isn’t all beer and skittles—but beer and skittles, or some- thing better of the same sort, must form a good part of every Englishman’s education, If I could only drive this into the heads of you rising parliamentary lords, and young swells who ‘have your ways made for you,’ as the saying is—you, who frequent palaver houses and West End clube, waiting always ready to strap yourselves on to the back of poor dear old John, as soon as the present used-up lot (your fathers and uncles), who sit there on the great parliamentary-majorities’ pack-saddle and make believe they’re guiding him with their red-tape bridle, tumble, or have to be lifted off !” Then, again, the speech of young Brook, the cock of the school, to the boys, is one which older men, and especially youths, would do well to lay to heart :— “ Bullies are cowards, and one coward makes many ; 80 good- bye to the school-house match if bullying gets ahead here—(loud applause from the small boys). Then there’s fuddling about in the public-houses, and drinking bad spirits, and punch, and such rot-gut stuff. That won’t make good drop-kicks or chargers of you, take my word for it. You get plenty of good beer here, and that’s enough for you; and drinking isn’t fine or manly, whatever some of you may think of it.” Bravo, Mr. Tom Hughes! Those lines were written before the civilisation of the 19th century had evolved “the smart youth,”’ “the pushing young man,” the “cutting tradesman,” “the infant Stockbroker,” and other by-products of gin and bitters, “‘ Hambro’ sherry,” “ prune wine,” and such-like elements of demoralisation. The difference between the old and the new style of treatment are well expressed in the 2nd verse of the following song :— Tue Roasr Beer or Otp Encuanp. Leveridge. «When mighty roast beef was the Englishman’s food, Ie ennobled our hearts and enriched our blood, Our soldiers were brave and our courtiers were good. Introduction. 13 O! the roast beef of old England ! And O! for old England’s roast beef ! * Our fathers of old were robust, stout, and strong, And kept open house, with good cheer all day long, Which made their plump tenants rejoice in this song— O! the roast beef of old England ! And O! for old England’s roast beef ! “ When good Queen Elizabeth sat on the throne, Ere coffee, or tea, or such slip-slops were known, The world was in terror if e’er she did frown. O! the roast beef of old England! And O! for old England’s roast beef!” Possibly there has been too much dragooning and lecturing the poor, too much “ organising ”’ of their pleasures and charities, and above all, utilising them for political purposes; and the real bond of union between master and man has become weakened, if not severed entirely. The whole-hearted Christian and witty Canon of St Paul’s foresaw this when he penned these lines :— « What shall the poor drink? How shall they drink it—in pint cups or quart mugs—hot or cold—in the morning or the evening. Whether the Three Pigeons shall be shut up, and the Shoulder of Mutton be opened. Whether the Black Horse shall continue to swing in the air, or the White Horee, with animated crest and tail, no longer portend spirits within. All these great questions depend upon little clumps of squires and parsons gathered together in alehouses in the month of September—so portentous to publicans and partridges, to sots and sportsmen, to guzzling and game. There are two alehouses in the village, the Red Horse and the Dun Cow. Is it common sense to suppose that these two publicans are not desirous of gaining customers from each other ? —and that the means they take are not precisely the same as those of important inns—by procuring good articles, and retailing them with civility and attention. We really do not mean to. accuse English magistrates of ill-nature, for in general there is a good deal of kindness and consideration among them, but they do not 14 In Praise of Ale. drink ale, and are apt to forget the importance of ale to the common people. When wine-drinkers regulate the liquor and comfort of ale-drinkers, it is much as if carnivorous animals should regulate the food of graminivorous animals—as if a lion should cater for an ox, or a coach-horee order dinner for a leopard. There is no natural capacity or incitement to do the thing well—no power in the lion to distinguish between clover and cow thistles—no dis- position in the coach-horse to discriminate between the succulence of a young kid and the distressing dryness of a superannuated cow. The want of sympathy is a source of inattention and a cause of evil. The immense importance of a pint of ale to a common person should never be overlooked; nor should a good-natured justice forget that he is acting for Liliputians, whose pains and pleasures lie in a very narrow compass, and are but too apt to be treated with contempt and neglect by their superiors. Public- houses are not only the inns of the travelling poor, but they are the cellars and parlours of the stationary poor. A gentleman has his own public-house, locked up in a square brick bin: London Particular—Chalier 1802—Carbonell 1803—Sir Jobn’s present of Hock at my marriage ; bought at the Dukes sale—East India Madeira—Lafitte—Noyau—Maraschino. Such are the domestic resources of him who is to regulate the potations of the labourer. And away goes this subterraneous Bacchanalian, greedy of the grape, with his feet wrapped up in flannel, to increase, on the licensing day, the difficulties of obtaining a pot of beer to the lower orders of mankind !—and believes, as all men do when they are deciding upon other persons’ pleasures, that he is actuated by the highest sense of duty, and the deepest consideration for the welfare of the lower orders, In an advanced state of civilisation, there must be always an advanced state of misery. In the low public-houses of great cities very wretched and very criminal persons are huddled together in great masses, But is a man to die supperless in a ditch because he is not rich, or even because he is not innocent? A pauper felon is not to be driven into despair and turned into a wild beast. Such men must be, and such men must eat and sleep, and if laws are wise and police vigilant we do not conceive it to be any evil that the haunts of such men are Introduction, 15 known, and in some degree subject to inspection. What is meant by respectable public-houses are houses where all the customers are rich and opulent. But who will take in the refuse of mankind, if monopoly allows him to choose better customers? There is no end to this mischievous meddling with the natural arrangements of society. It would be just as wise to set magistrates to digest for mankind, as to fix for them in what proportion any particular wants of their class shall be supplied. But there are excellent men who would place the moon under the care of magistrates, in order to improve travelling, and make things safe and comfortable.” William King puts the foregoing in a neat epigram :— « Where love of wealth and rusty coin prevail, What hopes of sugar’d cakes or nut-brown ale.”’ Respecting the future consumption of the National Beverage, a writer in a well-informed Trade Journal remarks, that :— «There are some people in the ranks of the various self-styled Temperance Societies and Associations, who are 90 sanguine as to believe, or so foolhardy as to express the belief, that in some not very distant future the practice of beer-drinking in England will give way to the practice of water-drinking, or, at all events, that what they admit is now the National Beverage will some day be superseded, by one or other of the numerous deleterious concoctions, aérated and otherwise, which are now offered for sale at the coffee ‘palaces’ and other teetotal establishments, They profess to found their hope upon the undoubted falling off, during the first portion of the present year, in the consumption of beer, as proved by the Excise statistics. But an examination of these statistics will not, we think, lead an impartial observer to the conclusion that the brewing trade, if left to itself, will cease to be a profitable investment, or that Englishmen and women are prepared to abandon the wholesome stimulant at the dictation of those who, somewhat late in the day, have made the astounding discovery, that the beverage upon which our forefathers feasted and throve for centuries, is nothing more nor less than deadly poison.”’ 16 In Praise of Ale. This consummation will occur when the following “News” is confirmed. These news items were retailed in 1660, and appear in Ritson’s collection, and are a fair specimen of the then humorous style. ‘* Now, gentlemen, if you will hear, Strange news as I will tell to you, Where’er you go, both far and near, You may boldly say that this is true. « When Charing Cross was a pretty little boy, He was sent to Romford to sell swine ; His mother made a cheese and he drunk up the whey, For he never lov’d strong beer, ale, nor wine. «* When all the thieves in England died, That very year fell such a chance, That Salisbury Plain would on horseback ride, And Paris-Gardens carry the news to France. « When all the lawyers they did plead, All for love and not for gain, Then ’twas a jovial world indeed ; The Blue Boar of Dover fetch’d apples out of Spain. « When landlords they did let their farms Cheap, because their tenants paid dear ; The weather-cock of Paul’s turned his tail to the wind, And tinkers they left strong ale and beer. « When misers all were grieved in mind Because that corn was grown so dear, The man in the moon made Christmas pyes, And bid the seven stars to eat good cheer. * But without a broker or coney catcher, Paul’s Churchyard was never free ; Then was my Lord Mayor become a house-thatcher, Which was a wondrous sight to see. Introduction. 17 * When Bazing-Stone did swim upon Thames, And swore all thieves to be just and true, The sumnors and bailiffs were honest men, And pease and bacon that year it snew. « When every man had a quiet wife, That never would once scold or chide, Tom-Tinker of Turvey, to end all strife, Roasted a pig in a blew cowes hide.” Those people who seek to lead the fashion by aping Royalty in dress, drinking, and eating, would do well to remember that good ale was erstwhile the staple beverage at royal and noble banquets, long before Autolycus gave currency to a then old proverb,— « A quart of ale is a dish for a king ;” and it was certainly a dish for a.queen too, in the time of Elizabeth, when she and her maids of honour had one quart each as their breakfast allowance ; and at what period of our history did fairer women or braver men exist? From the time of King Arthur downwards, history has recorded the names of kings who fought well and governed wisely, and yet loved their jolly good ale and old. King John is said to have died of a surfeit of new ale and peaches; but then he drank not wisely, but too well. Sir John Barleycorn was the strongest knight in the lists ; and the solitude of Mary Queen of Scots was solaced by a barrel of Burton, which was always kept on tap. In our own time we have the memory of that historic glass of bitter, which that deou ideal of an English gentle- man, the Prince of Wales, called for, and which formed the turning- point of his long and dangerous illness. Whereupon the mighty heart of the nation beat with an exceeding great joy. Drummond of Hawthornden cared not who made the laws eo long as his wise friend had a hand in the ballads, when the nation would be governed rightly. I know not whether Drommond drew the long bow or not, but I know that a collection of the songs of a country give complete and truthful B 18 In Praise of Ale. pictures of the various times in which they were written, and reflect the habits, manners, and modes of thought, then prevailing, and so form the true basis of history; and such a collection I have endeavoured to bring together. To quote the learned and accomplished Mr, Ebsworth, editor of the Bagshaw, and other collections of ballads— “ He who would trace the ages pass’d away, And see old English homesteads round him rise, Fill’d with the men and women of their day, Must list these echoes of their melodies,”’ As Drake very properly says of ballads in his “ Life and Times of Shakespeare,””-—“ If some little prejudice in favour of these compositions be given by the association in our ideas of their antiquity, if we connect some reviviscence and some increased force with expressions which were in favourite use with those who for two centuries have slept in the grave, the profound moral philosopher will neither blame nor regret this effect. It is among the most generous and most ornamental, if not among the most useful, habits of the mind.’’ Fielding and Smollett were both lovers of good beer, for, as a modern writer points out, beer overflows in almost every volume. There never was a hero who had a more healthy relish for a cool tankard than Tom Jones. There is an incident which all will recollect in the story of Booth’s Amelia, that positively elevates brown stout into the region of the pathetic. As for Smollett, the score which Roderick Random and Strap ran up with the plausible old schoolmaster, fancying all the while he is teaching them, is, perhaps, too rural an incident for our present purpose ; but the pot of beer with which Strap made up the quarrel with the soldier, after the misadventure which attended his first attempt to dive for a dinner, was of genuine London brewing. I take it that the first songs in praise of ale and the customs associated therewith were the early Christmas carols, This was only foll