arches or bows. As Stratford Bridge, first built by Matilda, wife of Henry 1., with arches, was called Stratford-le-Bow, for the same reason, and the names are still common to the bridge and church. A Court of Arches was formerly held here. As this church is of much celebrity, and as all are said to be Cockneys, who are born within sound of its bells, we shall enter at length into its history, which is more eventful perhaps than any other in the metropolis, except the metropolitan church, St. Paul's.

First, we read, that in the year 1090, 3d of William Rufus, the roof was blown off by a tremendous tempest, several persons were killed, and, says Stowe "foure of the rafters of sixe and twenty feet in length, with such violence were pitched in the ground of the high street, that scantly fouré foot of them remained above ground, which were fair to be cut even with the ground, because they could not be plucked out, for the citie of London was not then paved, but a moorish ground."

This savours somewhat of the marvellous, and is the more singular, inasmuch as the rafters must have penetrated the soil perpendicularly; but it was in an age of wonders, and must of course be credited, though we believe it a sample of pile-driving unparalleled in the annals of history.

In 1195, a most formidable insurrection occurred: one William Fitz-Osbert, alias Longbeard, a deformed man, and it is said, a lawyer, certainly a ranting demagogue, had permitted the hairy honours of his chin to grow to a vast length, partly from an affectation of gravity, and more especially in derision of the Norman mode of shaving the face, and by this and other means gained so considerably in the estimation of the mobocracy, that he was held a man of wisdom, worth and patriotic motive. The multitude are easily led..

It is allowed, however, by all, that Longbeard was a man of considerable fluency of speech, and had that ready command of language and idea which have great force with the lower classes. In fact, he was the Cobbett of his day, and by a pretended wish to ameliorate the condition of the poor, he gained much repute. He was the advocate of the citizens, and talked with much impudence and occasional success, which made him the demigod of the day, and

whom

the observed of all the observers of the humbler grades, over w he acquired an almost universal ascendancy.

Finding an increase of popularity, he assumed a proportionate increase of assurance, and boldly acted more openly, using all his rhetoric to incite the people against a certain tollage or aid to be raised for the public service. He argued that the tax was levied in undue proportions-that the poor, already overburdened, were to bear the whole of this levy, wrung from their toil and endurance, whilst the rich and idle were to be exempted from any portion of the payment. Such a theme in the hands of a fluent and disaffected man could not fail of effect on the ignorant and humble, whose passions are more easily moved than their judgment convinced, and who are more easily roused than appeased. The result of this demagogue's appeal was, a riot near St. Paul's Church, in which many citizens were killed.

Notice of this strife being speedily sent to Hubert, archbishop of Canterbury, the king's justiciary, he cited Fitz-Osbert to appear before him at a place and hour stated. Longbeard obeyed, but was attended with so large a band of followers, that the prelate, instead of seizing his person, contented himself with reproving his behaviour, pointing out his improprieties of conduct, and cautioning him not to appear in any unlawful assemblies hereafter.

The more respectable citizens, greatly alarmed at the proceedings of Fitz-Osbert and his party, at length resolved on capturing him, and for this purpose watched for a favourable occasion. One which they deemed well suited to their purpose soon presented itself. Fitz-Osbert was attacked with but few attendants, but so desperate was their defence, that they beat off their assailants, and possessing themselves of the church of St. Mary-le-Bow, in the west Cheap, (Cheapside), fortified and victualled it in the best mode they possibly could, fully resolved to defend themselves with desperation to the last.

The situation of Fitz-Osbert and his party being made public, the populace assembled from all parts, and a rescue was contemplated, but the magistrates possessing with eloquence or power sufficient to deter or dissuade them from the attempt, they dispersed without effecting the release of their idol.

The magistrates feeling that the matter had become one in which they must make a stand, or else render their authority but a name and a jest, determined to burn Lougbeard from his ecclesiastical strong-hold, by firing the steeple, or else suffocate him as he lay in the church. Fitz-Osbert and his men had thus no chance but to be burnt alive, or force their way through the flames, and fight for their lives, and this latter was their choice, as, if destroyed themselves, they would at least have some revenge, a quality inherent in low-bred and uneducated minds. They made a furious rush from the church, and being met by the magistrates at the head of their men, equally irritated and greater in numbers, they were eventually captured after a desperate struggle. Fitz-Osbert and eight of his adherents were conveyed to the Tower.

On the day following they were led out to trial, and being condemned to death, were allowed one night only to make their peace with Heaven, and then, says our so often quoted authority, (John Stow)," he was by the heels drawne to the Elmes, in Smithfield, and there hanged with nine of his fellowes, where, because his favourers came not to deliver him, he forsooke Marie's son (as he termed Christ, our Saviour), and called upon the Devil to bless and deliver him! Such was the end of this deceiver, a man of evil life, a secret murtherer, a filthy fornicator, a polluter of concubines, and (amongst other detestable facts) a false accuser of his elder brother, who had (in his youth) brought him up in learning, and done many things for his preferment."

However, the execution of Fitz-Osbert did not terminate all the riots which his schemes and oratory had aroused. His body having been conveyed away, a wily and turbulent priest, a relation of Longbeard, spread a report that several miracles had been wrought at the place of execution. The power of the priesthood was then universal. The country was literally priest-ridden, and this class of men, who monopolized the learning of the age, used their knowledge as a means of imposing ou the credulous multitude, and instead of seeking to turn their thoughts to the real objects of religion, made their own power one of mundane consideration, and themselves noted in " flesh-pots," and sought after the mammon of unrightousness. Superstition, falsely called religion, was the

lever they used, and with which, in one sense, they fulfilled the saying of the ancient mathematician. He said, "give me standing ground, and I will move the world." The priesthood had standing ground in the estimation of the lower classes, and blind superstition was the lever with which they moved the whole universe, and a more potent instrument was never devised for effecting the lusts of tyranny, and disposing the ignorant and many for the controul of the instructed and few. Knowledge is power. But to the facts.

This priest stirred up many to visit the scene of the (so termed) martyrdom. Many collected, as consecrated relics, pieces of the earth on which the blood of the champion of the people had been spilled, while others passed the night in paying devotions on the spot where this man was executed, and were only dispersed by the arrival and interference of a military guard.

At length, as an effectual mode of quelling the troubled minds of the populace, Fitz-Osbert's life was made public. It was proved that he was a hollow-hearted pretender and a false-motived inciter to mischief. His relation, the priest, failed in his object, and was excommunicated for his attempts to abuse the understandings of the people, who, convinced of their mistake, returned again to their daily mode of gaining a livelihood.

In 1271, a great portion of the steeple of Bow fell down and killed several persons; and in the year 1284, one Lawrence Ducket, a goldsmith, and perhaps a Lombard merchant, whose calling was that of a money changer and lender on pledge, having been offended by one Crepin, severely wounded him in a quarrel, and fled for safety to the assumed sanctuary of St.-Mary-le-Bow. Crepin's party enraged, entered the church during the night, and killed Ducket, who had betaken himself to the belfry for refuge, and then hung up the body in such a manner that it might be seen, as if Ducket had perpetrated suicide, and such verdict was in fact returned.

The murdered corse was then drawn by the feet through the city, and buried in a ditch without the walls. A young boy, however, who had secreted Ducket from his pursuers, and slept with him, disclosed the truth. The murderers were apprehended; their names were Jordan Good-cheap, Ralph Crepin, Gilbert Clarke,

and Geoffry Clarke, and they, with a woman named Alice, who had been an active person in the affair, were burned, and sixteen men besides hanged and quartered, besides others, who "being richer, after long imprisonment, were hanged by the purse."

The church was then interdicted, the doors and windows stopped with thorns, till Ducket's body was taken up and buried in the church yard.

up

In 1465, John Ratham, citizen and taylor, gave a certain garden in Hosier-lane, to be a church yard, which continued so for nearly a century, but was afterwards built upon. The old steeple of this church was by degrees built afresh, and in the year 1469, it was ordained by a common council, that the Bow bell should be rung every night at nine o'clock.

Soon afterwards, one John Donne, in 1472, bequeathed two houses in Hosier-lane, then so called, to maintain the Bow bell to be rung as above decreed.

This was the signal for the young apprentices of London leaving off work. But they imagining that the clerk, whose duty it was to ring the bell, did not perform the duty with necessary punctuality, they resolved on giving the worthy functionary a hint which he could not fail to understand, and which they thought would stimulate him to regularity: with this intent they placed the following lines on the walls of the church:

"Clerk of Bow Bell,

With the yellow locks,

For thy late ringing,

Thy head shall have knocks."

The clerk, perhaps experimentally sensible of the summary mode with which the 'prentices defended club law, or anticipating favours which he was well content to be without, replied in verse in the same strain, and with metre almost as perfect as Sternhold aud Hopkins, who, perhaps, took him for their poetic model,

"Childrean of Cheape,

Hold you all still,

For you shall have the

Bow bells rung at your will.''