Chapter V: Piscatory, Insect, and Reptilian Signs

... “Ye ale-house painted signs.”
SHAKESPEARE: _Titus Andronicus_, Act iv., Scene 3.

This class of signs--or rather combination of several small groups, taken together for the sake of convenience--is, naturally, very far from a large one. It contains, indeed, only four signs, all told.

The FISH AND EELS, which is a very strange device appearing at Roydon, is our only existing sign connected with fish, although TWO FISHES appeared on the tokens of the two William Wildmans (father and son) of Saffron Walden, issued in 1656 and 1667 respectively. The former spells the name Saffron Wallding. The sign, perhaps, originated in the arms of the Fishmongers’ Company.[77] Larwood and Hotten do not notice the Fish and Eels, although this house has displayed the sign since 1789 at least. It may be a meaningless impalement.

Only two signs occurring in the county are in any way connected with insects. These are the FLY AND BULLOCK, already described (p. 67), and the BEEHIVE, which occurs five times, namely, at Great Baddow, Witham, Horkesley, Ilford, and Lambourne. The sign is generally represented (as at Witham and Baddow) by an old straw hive, or skep, with a great many bees, _volant, counter-volant_ (as heraldic writers say), around it, probably to indicate that a busy trade is carried on within. It is recorded[78] in the Barking parish register, that in 1653, “Francis, the sonne of an Ethiopian, born at the BEEHIVE,” was baptised. Under this heading must be noticed a sign which, although it does not occur in Essex, is, nevertheless, connected with the county. This sign is the ESSEX SERPENT, which still exists in King Street, Covent Garden; and, when Larwood and Hotten wrote, there was also another example in Charles Street, Westminster. Those gentlemen think that it was, perhaps, originally set up “in allusion to a fabulous monster recorded in a catalogue of wonders and awful prognostications contained in a broadside of 1704,[79] from which we learn that ‘Before Henry the second dyed, ... a Dragon of marvellous bigness was discovered at St. Osyph in Essex.’ Had we any evidence that it is an old sign, we might almost be inclined to consider it as dating from the civil war, and hung up with reference to Essex, the Parliamentary General; for, though we have searched the chroniclers fondest of relating wonders and monstrous apparitions, we have not succeeded in finding any authority for the St. Osyph Dragon, other than the above-mentioned broadside.” Another reference to the same unwelcome visitor is, however, to be found in Dr. Howell’s _Ancient and Present State of England_ (1712), wherein it is recorded (p. 75) that “At St. Osyphs in Essex was seen a dragon of marvellous bigness, which by moving burned houses.” The dragon is also mentioned in Sir Richard Baker’s _Chronicles of the Kings of England_, published in 1684. It is, nevertheless, fairly certain that the sign has no reference to the St. Osyth dragon; for there is a much more likely origin. In the British Museum Library may be seen a highly remarkable tract of the year 1669, entitled, _The Flying Serpent, or Strange News out of Essex: being a true relation of a Monstrous Serpent which hath divers times been seen at a parish called Henham on the Mount, within four miles of Saffron Walden. Showing the length, proportion, and bigness of the

(_Facsimile of Original._)]

Serpent, the place where it commonly lurks, and what means hath been used to kill it. Also a discourse of other Serpents, and particularly of a Cockatrice killed at Saffron Walden_,” &c.[80] The truth of the statements contained in the tract is attested by the Churchwarden, the Constable, the Overseer of the Poor, and four Householders. The title-page bears no author’s name, and the imprint of the copy in question is partially destroyed; but there can be little doubt that it is one of the many curious productions of “Poor Robin,” whose _Perambulation from Saffron Walden to London_ has already been noticed (p. 66).[81] In addition to an awe-inspiring portrait of the beast, here reproduced, the tract contains a very amusing, though now highly absurd, account of the first discovery of the serpent, the nature of its habitat, the means taken to kill it, and other details, as set forth in the title. Doubtless the appearance of the tract caused sufficient talk and attracted enough attention to induce some enterprising publican or other tradesman to set up the ESSEX SERPENT as a sign; or perhaps some former GRIFFIN or GREEN DRAGON was rechristened under that name in order to attract customers. That it is a fairly old sign is certain. Gough, in his _British Topography_,[82] after alluding to the pamphlet just spoken of, says: “Mr. Oldys [who died in 1761] says there is a public-house in King Street, Covent Garden, called the Essex Serpent, and having a serpent painted on its sign.” Sussex had a “strange and monstrous Serpent (or Dragon)” in 1614, as may be learned from a very curious old pamphlet of that date, entitled _True and Wonderful_, republished in the _Harleian Miscellany_.[83] Essex can boast of a reptilian sign which probably exists nowhere else, a beer-house keeper at Ingatestone having, for some inscrutable reason, selected the VIPER--a device not noticed by Larwood and Hotten.