COUNTING OF HOB-NAILS, ETC.

The year 1235 is memorable for a little city incident, which has contrived to transmit its remembrance to our times, by means of an annual ceremony at swearing in the sheriffs, September 30, before the cursitor barons of the Exchequer, which is performed with much solemnity by one of the aldermen, in presence of the lord mayor, who goes into, and continues in the court covered. One Walter le Bruin, a farrier, obtained a grant from the crown of a certain spot of ground in the Strand, in the parish of Clement Danes, whereon to erect a forge for carrying on his business. For this the city was to pay annually an acknowledgment, or quit-rent, of six horse-shoes, with the nails appertaining, at the King's Exchequer, Westminster. The forge and manufactory exist no longer, but the acknowledgment, after a lapse of so many ages, continues still to be paid.

FEAST OF ASSES.

The feast of asses in France was held in honour of Balaam's ass, when the clergy, at Christmas, walked in procession, dressed so as to represent the prophets. Suppressed early-before 1445.

HOAXING.

The first hoax of a modern kind on record was practised by a wag in the reign of Queen Anne. -It appeared in the papers of that time :

"A well-dressed man rode down the king's road from Fulham at a most furious rate, commanding each turnpike to be thrown open, as he was a messenger conveying the news of the Queen's sudden death. The alarm instantly spread into every quarter of the city; the trained bands, who were on their parade, desisted from their exercise, furled their colours, and returned home with their arms reversed. The shopkeepers began to collect their sables, when the jest was discovered-not the author of it."

GOES OF LIQUOR.

The tavern called the Queen's Head, in Duke's Court, Bow Street, was once kept by a facetious individual of the name of Jupp. Two celebrated characters, Annesley Shay and Bob Todrington, a sporting man (caricatured by old Dighton, and nicknamed by him the "knowing one," from his having converted to his own use a large sum of money intrusted to him by the noted Dick England, who was compelled to fly the country, having shot Mr. Rolls in a duel which had a fatal termination), met one evening

at the above place, went to the bar, and asked for half-a-quartern each, with a little cold water. In course of time they drank four-and-twenty, when Shay said to the other, "Now we'll go." "O no!" replied he, "we'll have another, and then go." This did not satisfy the Hibernians, and they continued drinking on till three in the morning, when they both agreed to GO, so that under the idea of going they made a long stay, and this was the origin of drinking or calling for Goes; but another, determined to eke out the measure his own way, used to call for a quartern at a time, and these, in the exercise of his humour, he called stays.

TARRING AND FEATHERING.

This custom, which had grown into disuse until just prior to the old American war, when it was revived with great avidity, to the cost of our custom-house. officers on the other side of the Atlantic, takes its data or origin from the following:-Holinshed says, that in the reign of Richard Coeur-de-Lion, it was enacted, "If any man be taken with theft or pickery, and therein convicted, he shall have his head polled, and hot pitch poured on his pate, and upon that feathers of some pillow or cushion shaken aloft, that he may thereby be known as a thief, and at the next arrivals of the ships to any land, be put forth of the company

to seek his adventures, without all hope of return to his fellows."

LAW OF SHIPWRECK.

By the Act of 3rd Edward I., cap. 4, and 4th of the same king, cap. 2, it is enacted, that if a man, a dog, or a cat, escape alive out of any ship, such ship shall not be deemed a wreck. On the 6th December, 1824, the ship Dart, of Sunderland, drifted into Portsmouth without a soul on board; a live cat, however, being found in the cabin, she escaped becoming a droit of the Admiralty, and was given in charge of the sheriff, to be delivered to the owners.

SPITAL SERMONS.

These sermons, yearly preached at Easter, in Christ Church, Christ's Hospital, derive their name from the priory and hospital of our blessed Lady, St. Mary Spital, situated on the east side of Bishopsgate Street, with fields in the rear, which now form the suburb called Spitalfields. This hospital, founded in 1197, had a large churchyard, with a pulpit cross, from whence it was an ancient custom on Easter Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, for sermons to be preached on the resurrection, before the Lord Mayor, Aldermen, Sheriffs, and others, who sat in a house of two stories for the purpose, the Bishop of

London and the prelates being above them. In 1594, the pulpit was taken down, and a new one set up, and a large house for the governors and children of, Christ's Hospital to sit in.* In April, 1559, Queen Elizabeth came in great state from St. Mary Spital, attended by a thousand men in harness, with shirts of mail, and corslets, and morris-pikes, and ten great pieces carried through London unto the court, with drums, flutes, and trumpets sounding, and two morrisdancers, and two white bears in a cart.+ The Spital sermons were, after the Restoration, preached at St. Bride's, Fleet Street, but have been since removed to Christ Church, Newgate Street, where they are still preached every Easter Monday and Easter Tuesday, before the Lord Mayor and Aldermen.

LION SERMON.

A merchant of London,‡ about two centuries ago, went on a voyage to Africa; the ship was wrecked on the coast, and all perished save himself. Exhausted, and deeply impressed with his melancholy situation, he lay stretched on the shore, when to his surprise and fright he saw approaching him an immense lion! Petitioning the Almighty to spare

Sir John Gager, who was Lord Mayor of London in 1646.