LON 
milted to their feats next the fi deboard, in right of chief 
butler of England. The parliament meeting on the day- 
after this folemnity, feveral ufeful and favourable laws 
were palled for the city of London, and feveral others, 
which were vexatious, entirely abrogated, 
Ancient hiftoriographers inform us, that, in the year 
14.09, the parilh-clerks afted a play concerning the Cre¬ 
ation of the World, which they repeated eight days i'uc- 
cellively at a place called Skinner’s Well, (which thence 
acquired the name of Ckrkenwell,') with great applaufe. 
On the fubject of thefe early dramas, called myfleries , we 
(hall enlarge in another place. _ 
At the death of Henry IV. his eldeft fon was immedi¬ 
ately proclaimed king by the name of Henry V. Soon af¬ 
ter, the dangerous conlpiracy of Whitlock, who pretend¬ 
ed that Richard II. was alive, took place. By the exer¬ 
tions of Thomas Falconer, mayor of London,’ Whitlock 
was apprehended with feveral of his confpirators, and fent 
to the Tower; but he efcaped by the connivance of the 
cooitable, and by the help of one of the wardens, who was 
executed as a traitor. 
The lord-mayor in the year 14.15 received, on the day 
of bis entering into office, the pleafing news of the king’s 
victory over the French at Agincourt, which was deli¬ 
vered to him by one of the king’s melTengers as he was 
riding to Weft mi after to qualify himfelf for the high of¬ 
fice. In his return from Weltminlier, accompanied by 
the bifhop of Winchefter, the lord chancellor, &c. they 
proceeded to St. Paul’s cathedral, and attended the Te 
Deum, fung with great folemnity ; and next day the queen, 
nobility, clergy, mayor, aldermen, and feveral guilds 
or fraternities, formed a folemn proceftion, and went on 
foot from St. Paul’s cathedral to Weftrninfter-abbey ; 
where this illultrious company made a great oblation at 
the fhrine of Edward the Confeffor, and returned in a tri¬ 
umphant manner. 
Two years after this, Holborn was firft paved, as ap¬ 
pears from an order in the Fxdera, in which Henry V. 
taking notice, “that the high-way named Holborn, in 
London, was fo deep and miry, that many perils and ha¬ 
zards were thereby occafioned, as well to the king’s car¬ 
riages palling that way, as to thofe of his fubjefts; he 
therefore ordained two velfels, each of twenty tons bur¬ 
then, to be employed at his expenfe, for bringing ftones 
for paving and mending the fame.” This lliovvs the gra¬ 
dual improvement of London and its fuburbs. About 
this time alfo the citizens of London began to have their 
town illuminated by lanterns, which every one was or¬ 
dered to fet up over his door, or at any part of the front 
of his houfe, for the fafety of the ftreets ; but this order 
does notfeem to have produced much effeft, for the light¬ 
ing of the ftreets did not become general till the feven- 
teenth century. See the article Lamp, vol. xii. p. 121. 
In the year 1419, fir Richard Whittington ferved the 
office of lord-mayor for the third time.. We cannot pafs 
by the name of Whittington, without noticing the llories 
which tradition has attached to it. In the firft place 
it mult be obferved, that, whenever antiquity has dropped 
her veil over the exillence of any worthy who by his good 
deeds has deferved the veneration of his contemporaries 
and of pofterity, imagination, enlivened by that very 
fenfe of admiration which always brings refpeft in the 
rear, generally contrives to eke out fome curious anec¬ 
dotes, feme prodigies, or myfterious faffs,, ftill more to 
raife the repute of, and increafe the confederation for, the 
objeft of her praife. In the 1 ’econd place, why ftiould we 
not take care left: time, the arch-deftroyer, Ihould make 
more havoc than he ought ? It is by the contemptuous ne- 
gleft of traditionary tales, as we ftyle the handing-down of 
faffs, that we lofe, too often, the chain of hiftorical events; 
and, as there is no danger in relating thofe unauthenti¬ 
cated ftories, when we note them down fairly as doubtful , 
why fnould they be condemned ftill to float on. or fink in 
the dream of oblivion ? 
Difpleafed with the treatment he had received at the 
DON. 67 
hands of his mailer, (the tradefman to whom young Dick 
Whittington had been bound an apprentice,) we are told 
that lie ran away from the fbop, and, fulking along the 
road towards Highgate, fat down upon a ftop.e, and began 
to ponder on his lituation.—Whether the irkfomenefs of 
travellingalone, or the fatigues of walking, already brought 
his mind to a better fenfe of lvis own intereif, cannot be 
known ; but tradition fays, that at that particular and cri¬ 
tical moment, a peal of bells was rung in fome part of the 
city (fome believe them to have been thofe of Bow-church), 
and that he interpreted their prophetic founds in the fol¬ 
lowing dillich: 
Come again, come again, Whittington, 
Thrice lord-mayor of London-town. 
Although he had a proverb again!! him, (unlefs he may 
have been himfelf the occafion of the faying ; “ As the bell 
chinks, fo the fool thinks;”) he however thought it much 
more wife to return to the fnop, and, by making proper 
apologies t,o his mailer, refume his place behind the coun¬ 
ter, and jog on as before. The Hone, upon which he fat 
when he took counfel within himfelf, has mouldered down, 
but has been fucceffively replaced by another; and one is- 
there ftill with the name of Whittington upon it. 
Fortune had not called him back to abandon him, and 
leave him in the drudgery of an obfeure Ihop, but pre- 
fented him with an opportunity of getting higher in the 
world.—It is reported, that the matter of a trading velfel 
on the point of leaving the river for foreign countries, 
being by accident at Whittington’s mailer’s houfe, alked 
the lad jocofely, whether he had a venturi co lend, as it 
was cuftomary at that time.—Dick was polfelfed of no¬ 
thing except a favourite cat ; he offered Pufs to the fea- 
faring chap, and Ihe was carried away. The velfel hap¬ 
pened to touch at a place where no member of the old fa¬ 
mily of Grimalkin had ever been before, and where rats 
and mice undifturbed enjoyed full liberty of plaguing the 
illanders. Pufs was foon put in requifttion, and did her 
duty moll amazingly. Gold, precious ftones, fire, were of¬ 
fered as an equivalent for the rat-and-mice deftroyer ; and, 
faithful to his charge, the captain bringing the price of 
poor Pufs to her matter, Whittington faw at once the Ikies 
clear up over his head. Induftry and attention to buli- 
nefs, oeconomy, and drift honefty, contributed foon to in¬ 
creafe both the refpeftability and wealth of Richard Whit¬ 
tington, who filled the civic chair three times, and left a 
name confecrated by the bleffings of his fellow-citizens ; 
thankful for the ufeful eftablilhments and foundations 
which he made, augmented, and protected, during his 
mayoralties. 
We find in Pennant’s London the following paflage t. 
His good fortune was not without parallel; for it is re¬ 
corded, “How Alp’nonfo, a Portuguefe, being wrecked 
on the coalt of Guinea, and being prefented by the king 
thereof with his weight in gold for a cat to kill their mice, 
and an ointment to kill their flies, which he improved, 
within five years, to 6000I. on the place, and returning to 
Portugal, after fifteen years traffic, becoming the third 
*man in the kingdom.” It is more than probable that the 
anecdote of our countryman may have given rife to the 
ftory which Mr. Pennant found in a “Defcription of Guin- 
ney ” pnblillied in 1665. 
After all, fome are of opinion that the ftory of Whit¬ 
tington’s Cat, like that of the Minotaurus and others, ori¬ 
ginated from the name of the velfel on-board of- which 
Whittington had failed in fearch of fortune and trade—• 
and indeed, in one of his farces, our comie writer and ac¬ 
tor Foote introduces this idea with a great deal of hu¬ 
mour and jocularity. 
The Hate of the coinage in this reign may be learnt from - 
Stow, who fays, that “in the year 1421 was granted to 
Henry V. a fifteenth, to he paid at Candlemas and at Mar¬ 
tinmas, of fuch money as was then current, gold or di¬ 
ver, not overmuch clipped or walhed ; to wit, that, if the 
noble were worth five Ihiliings and eight pence, then the 
king. 
