26 TEE MODEL MERCHANT 



" Children of Cheape, 



Hold you all still, 



For you shall have the 



Bow bell rung at your will." 

 The sound of Bow bell was much admired by others, whatever the 

 notions of the apprentices might have been as to its musical tone ; and 

 we find that John Dunne, mercer and parishioner, about 1499, left 

 two houses inBow Lane, for the maintaining of Bow bell. Whatever it 

 was that brought the young truant back, he returned with a steady 

 determination to stick to business, in spite of difficulties and the frowns 

 of the world. The trade which he entered appears to have been that 

 of mercer; and what that was in his day we learn from the Introduction 

 to the Chronique de London, published by the Camden Society: — 

 " The mercers, as a metropolitan guild, may be ti'aced back to A.D. 

 1 172; it was not until the fifteenth century that they took their station 

 among the merchants, and from being mere retailers became the first city 

 company. Towards the close of the fourteenth century, the mercers 

 monopolized the silk trade ; woollen stuff's having, prior to that period, 

 constituted their stajjle business, and up to which time they had been 

 only partially incorporated." 



Thus we discover that in Whittington's younger days the mercers 

 were mere retail dealers. " Mercery," says one writer ' on this subject, 

 " was originally pedlary, or haberdashery ; and it was not until the 

 reign of Henry YI. that they dealt largely in silks and velvets, and 

 turned over their previous trade to the haberdashers. There was, 

 doubtless, j)lenty of hard work to undergo before Whittington Avas a 

 proficient in the trade. He had, like many others since, to begin at 

 the lowest round of the ladder of success, before he could reach to the 

 top ; that he did eventually reach that high and distinguished position, 

 authentic history and the noble charities left by him, still extant, 

 leave no room to doubt. But how did he get the first start in life ? 



Here we must revert to the tale, and then we have to compare it 

 with genuine history and with contemporaneous events, so as to 



« Eistory of the Ttcclvc Companies of London, by William Herbert, Librarian to 

 the Corporation cf London, 2 vols, 8vo. 1837. 



Hie Sumptmry Act oi 37, Edward III. shows that the mercers then only sold 

 woollen, but not silk. 



