"Hawarden, Jan. 9/80.

"Sir,-It is the fact, as you have been informed, that in early life I spent some time in Gloucester. My father took a house at the Spa, attracted thither by Dr. Baron's reputation for the use of iodine, aud anxious about the health of his eldest daughter. I went there repeatedly from Eton to spend the holidays. I think in 1825 I recollect the hot summer, and the thermometer one day at 92 degrees in the shade. I knew pretty well the ins and outs of the town. Particularly I recollect the bore, the little shop of Mr. Wood's bank, a dry but learned or able clergyman named Maitland, the rolling thunder of the Bishop's voice in the Cathedral, an execution, and, I think, a Mr. Taylor, who said, 'I have just been to see those poor fellows turned off.' You will perhaps consider this sufficient evidence. I have not spoken of the noble Cathedral, which I have visited since, but I remember, as if it were this morning, my first view of the tower as I drove on the outside of the mail from Cheltenham.

"I remain, Sir,

"Your faithful Servant,

"W. E. GLADSTONE.

'Jas. Buchanan, Esq."

The "bore" mentioned is of course the phenomenon caused by the tidal wave in the Severn. The little shop," Jemmy Wood's bank in Westgate-street. The "dry, but learned or able clergyman," was the Rev. Mr. Maitland (afterwards Dr. Maitland, and librarian at Lambeth Palace), author of The Dark Ages and other essays on ecclesiastical history. The "Bishop's voice," that of Dr. Monk. And the 66 execution," that of Mark Whiting and James Caines, two young men who were hanged, August 11, 1825, for a murder at Bitton.

Some time ago the writer of this notice, sitting by Mr. Gladstone at dinner, mentioned to him the existence of the bank note plate with his father's name upon it, when Mr. Gladstone said, "I do not remember that my father was ever engaged in business at Gloucester, but he was of active business habits, and it is not at all improbable that during his residence in Gloucester he may have contemplated joining a bank, or instituting one, in the city." It is probably fortunate for Mr. Gladstone that his father did not do so; for shortly after that period a commercial crisis took place, which caused the suspension of many local banks, including some at Gloucester.

Other bank notes in the above-mentioned lot, No. 262, were notes (one for one pound, another for a guinea) on the bank of Evans and Jelf, countersigned "Thos. Powell." Sir James Jelf, who was mayor of the city in 1814, was father of Dr. Jelf, afterwards of King's College, and grandfather of Mr. Jelf, Q.C.; and Mr. Powell

was cashier of that bank; afterwards of the bank of Turner and Morris in Gloucester, and father of Judge Powell, of the County Court, Lambeth, and formerly M.P. for Gloucester.

SENEX.

1707.-THE SUPPRESSION OF VILLAGE FEASTS A CENTURY AGO. In a letter dated Gloucester, September 4, 1786, and published in the Worcester Journal, this statement appears::-The suppression of feasts held in the villages at this time of the year has been attended with so many good effects that the justices in the different parts of the county are bent on persevering in the use of means for the maintenance of good order. With this view they have adopted the resolution of prosecuting with the utmost rigour every person in the parish of Haresfield who shall presume to sell any exciseable liquor in that parish at the approaching feast without a license.

1708. "CIZITER" MOP.-The following paragraph from the Stroud Journal, October 10, 1885, deserves to be admitted:-The first of the annual statute hiring fairs or Michaelmas mops was held on Monday, and the event came, continued, and concluded with much of its ancient "glory" thick upon it. The day was somewhat unfavourable for a large influx of country cousins, and yet not more "draggle-tail" than what apparently pleased many of the attendants, the total of whom nearly came up to that of recent years. "Mop," indeed, is dying hard, even if it be dying at all; and after Monday's experience the much-invaded townfolk may well and easily conclude there is life in the fixture yet. Its business utility for the ladies may happily be said to have almost ceased, for very few servant girls are foolish enough to perform the risky feat of "standing mop," and the number of men and youths who thus get situations is decreasing yearly. In the business department we were informed comparatively little business was done. Probably the same cannot truthfully be said of the pleasure part of the fair where catchpenny, twopenny and threepenny attractions were as plentiful as blackberries even in this prolific fall. Among all these temptations to incipient profligacy the fair attendants took their choice of which "wonderment" should be seen, then paid their money, and saw it. The day passed with tolerable quiet and good order. J. G.

1709.-APPROPRIATE SURNAMES.-In the Illustrated London News, August 2, 1884, this paragraph appeared :

"What's in a name" reminds me that in Gloucester we have some curious and appropriate names, the record of which may be of interest to your readers. By an extraordinary conjunction, there resides in Southgate-street a cooper named Fear, and next his shop is the Talbot Inn, kept by a Mr. Fright. It is, however,

only natural that Fear and Fright should come together. Amongst some well-named persons in trade may be cited Barkworth, timber merchant; Phillpotts, corn merchant; Rust, ironmonger; Baker, baker; and Wareing, tailor. Until very recently there was a butcher named Sheepway. We have Brown, Jones, and Robinson in the corporation.-W. R. WEST, Gloucester.

The foregoing may serve to elicit the mention of other and perhaps more striking instances of "appropriate" surnames.

J. G.

1710. THE MERCHANT VENTURERS OF BRISTOL.-The following description of this guild is from the pen of Miss Annie Wakeman, the American lady who made herself so popular when the National Association of Journalists visited Bristol last year (1888). It is not only interesting and ably written, but it lets us see ourselves as others see us :—

"And

BRISTOL, Eng., Nov. 8, 1888. "And whose extended field is this?" "It belongs to the Marquess of Carabas, sire." "And whose this mile-long orchard?" "The marquess', sire." whose this splendid palace?" "They all belong to the marquess, sire." I could not but think, as I drove through the ancient streets of the capital city of the West of England, of the old-time fairytale of "Puss in Boots," so gorgeously mounted at the Drury Lane pantomime last Christmas, by Augustus Harris. For there seems a sort of Marquess of Carabas here, though, like every kind of occupation, his, too, has been turned into a limited company.

"And to whom belongs this magnificent down?" I asked my driver, as we spun over a 500-acre plateau of turfy grass, inhaling ozone from the Severn chanuel, and feasting the eye on picturesque

scenery.

"To the city, mum. 'Twas give the city by the Society of Merchant Venturers." And he touched his hat, lapsing again into the profound coma of the British hackman.

"And whose handsome house is this?" I queried shortly after. Again the tip to the hat-"I dont know his name rightly, mum, but he was one year Master of the Merchant Venturers, I ric'lect." And who lives there?" I continued, pointing to another imposing dwelling.

A sharp awakening from approaching insensibility, again the finger to the hat, and again, yes, again I heard of the Merchant Venturers. "He be Master this year, mum, and a gent as I drove home from their hall, when they guv their midsummer dinner, said as how no such dinner had never been guv afore there; though you must mind, mum, they gives the best dinners in Bristol. I heered 'um say the peaches was stacked up in hundreds, and they was two shillings apiece at that time."

I became interested, despite myself, in this society that gave away land immensely valuable by the hundreds of acres, and dispensed

dinners reputed to be the best in a city celebrated throughout all England for its groaning tables, its splendid hospitality, its rare and generous old wines. We drove on through Bristol's charming "Who's lord of the manor here, do you know?"

suburb of Clifton.

I asked.

Galvanic hat tip and the reply, "I don't rightly know, mum, but I suspect it's the Merchant Venturers."

Determined to find something that this octopus had no tentacle upon, I waited until we got down into the city proper, and passing a tasteful and elaborate structure, evidently a great school, I securely asked what it was.

"The technical school, mum, 'twas built and everything put in it by the Merch-"

But I broke in hurriedly, "Can't you show me something the Merchant Venturers have nothing to do with, never had, and never will?"

"That I can, mum," and he grinned a trifle sardonically, and pulled up before a building on which appeared the sign, "Headquarters Liberal Committee for Bristol." "There never was no Merchant Venturer as was ever anything but a Tory," said the hackman, "and there's one place (pointing) you won't never see none of them." And after this bit of humour he became torpid again.

I began to understand about this society. It was certainly a survival, a medieval relic; perhaps the only ancient guild in Bristol. Ability, and perhaps luck in its investments, had probably made it wealthy, and the judgment and splendour of its munificence had kept it alive. Its coevals, the other municipal guilds of the middle ages, had all been swamped in the river of time. The tylers, the plasterers, the lorimers, the merchant tailors, all have vanished; but the Merchant Venturers bloom in perpetual youth. "Tell me all about this guild," I said to a delightfully talkative Bristol friend, a mine of antiquarian lore, not drybones sort of stuff, but fresh and vivid when distilled through his genial heart and warm imagination.

"The 'Merchants'," said he-and I could note his inward delight at the prospect of a patient listener-" are our one surviving ancient guild. Some one or two others claim to live, I believe, but they are in the languor of extreme age. Of course, being the only survival, our society is prominent in Bristol. If we, like you in London, had 72 ancient guilds still in existence; if there were here a mercers' company and a drapers' company, with $400,000 a year each; if our companies had a total property, like the London guilds, of $75,000,000, with an income of $4,000,000, why our Merchants' would be overtopped. But they stand alone. Their beginnings are wrapped in mystery. There is a suggestion of a body to govern the shipping interests of the city as far back as 1314; but records are defective until a century and a half later,

when a complete organisation of the guild was undertaken, and it appears in a way to have had municipal functions, and to have been attached to the town council as a sort of committee on commerce." "Dear me," I thought, "what a flood I have evoked." But there was no stopping him.

"In 1552," he ran on, breathless, "the society was incorporated by royal charter under the name of the Master, Wardens, and Commonalty of Merchant Venturers of the City of Bristol, and under the auspices of the society an extended trade was carried on. Our stout old ancestors," rambled on my friend, "whose forefathers from time immemorial had been Bristolians, were permeated with a passion for adventurous trade. Their little vessels were seen in every accessible port of Europe, and carried our city's coat of arms to such far off and outlying places as Archangel, the Canaries, even Thule in Iceland; but not Ultima Thule to Bristol, for her indomitable mariners, led by Sebastian Cabot, and aided by the Merchant Venturers, soon passed beyond, and were the first to cast anchor by the mainland of the new continent."

Here was my chance to stem the tide. "I remember," I cried, "it was, I believe, at a 'Merchants' dinner that the following occurred: -An American travelling through Bristol was invited to one of these banquets, and was eager for information about all ancient things, which his kindly entertainers readily supplied. 'Did you know,' said one, that the discoverer of the mainland of the American continent was a member of the Society of Merchant Venturers?' 'No,' said our fellow-countryman, much interested; 'if I may I will just jot that down in my note-book.' And then the Englishman saw his guest write down, Columbus was a member of the Society of Merchant Venturers."

Its

"That is funny," said Antiquary, and then he remorselessly resumed: "The history of the guild is full of romantic association with America. Itowned large plantations in Virginia and New England. It imported tobacco from the one, codfish from the other. records contain extended regulations for the government of its plantations, and these prove conclusively how able were the brains that controlled the society during the stirring times of Tudor Henry and his despotic daughter. It goes without saying that so vigorous an organisation spent time and energy in the search for what was to the mariners what the philosopher's stone was to the alchemists-I mean the North-west passage. Privateering was a favourite and lucrative pursuit of the Venturers, and some fat galleons of Spain from the South Sea were diverted from their intended ports to enrich the coffers of the society. They contributed of their funds to suppress piracy; they made up purses to redeem British captives from the Algerine and the corsairs of Tripoli; they sent agents abroad to stimulate trade, and some of their letters of instruction to their representatives are models that might with advantage be literally copied and dispatched to-day."