This was written in the beginning of the century, when eighteen hundred was still in her teens. A considerable falling off may be observed in the following, contributed by a correspondent of William Hone :

66 SIGNS OF LOVE AT OXFORD.

By an Inn-consolable Lover.

She's as light as The Greyhound, as fair as The Angel,
Her looks than The Mitre more sanctified are;

But she flies like The Roebuck, and leaves me to range ill,
Still looking to her as my true polar Star.

New Inn-ventions I try, with new art to adore,

But my fate is, alas, to be voted a Boar;

My Goats I forsook to contemplate her charms,

And must own she is fit for our noble King's Arms;
Now Cross'd, and now Jockey'd, now sad, now elate,
The Checquers appear but a map of my fate;

I blush'd like a Blue Cur, to send her a Pheasant,
But she call'd me a Turk, and rejected my present;
So I moped to The Barley Mow, grieved in my mind,
That The Ark from the Flood ever rescued mankind!
In my dreams Lions roar, and The Green Dragon grins,
And fiends rise in shape of The Seven Deadly Sins,
When I ogle The Bells, should I see her approach,
I skip like a Nag and jump into The Coach.

She is crimson and white like a Shoulder of Mutton,
Not the red of The Ox was so bright when first put on;
Like The Hollybush prickles she scratches my liver,
While I moan and die like a Swan by the river."

But tame as this last performance is, it is "merry as a brass band" when compared with a ballad sung in the streets some twenty years later, entitled, "Laughable and Interesting Picture of Drunkenness." Speaking of the publicans, who call themselves "Lords," it says :—

"If these be the Lords, there are many kinds,
For over their doors you will see many signs;
There is The King, and likewise The Crown,
And beggars are made in every town.

There is The Queen, and likewise her Head,
And many I fear to the gallows are led;
There is The Angel, and also The Deer,
Destroying health in every sphere.

There is The Lamb, likewise The Fleece,

And the fruit's bad throughout the whole piece;
There is The White Hart, also The Cross Keys,

And many they 've sent far over the seas.

There is The Bull, and likewise his Head,

His Horns are so strong, they will gore you quite dead;

C

There's The Hare and Hounds that never did run,
And many's been hung for the deeds they've done.
There are Two Fighting Cocks that never did crow,
Where men often meet to break God's holy vow;
There is The New Inn, and the Rodney they say,
Which send men to jail their debts for to pay.
The Hope and The Anchor, The Turk and his Head,
Hundreds they 've caused for to wander for bread;
There is The White Horse, also The Woolpack,

Take the shoes off your feet, and the clothes off your back.
The Axe and the Cleaver, The Jockey and Horse,

Some they 've made idle, some they 've made worse;
The George and the Dragon, and Nelson the brave,

Many lives they 've shorten'd and brought to the grave.
The Fox and the Goose, and The Guns put across,
But all the craft is to get hold of the brass;
The Bird in the Cage, and the sign of The Thrush,
But one in the hand is worth two in the bush."

There is an unpleasant musty air about this ballad, a taint of Seven Dials, an odour of the ragged dresscoat, and the broken, illused hat. The gay days of signboard poetry, when sparks in feathers and ruffles sang their praises, are no more. Our forefathers were content to buy "at the Golden Frying-pan," but we must needs go to somebody's emporium, mart, repository, or make our purchases at such grand places as the Pantocapelleion, Pantometallurgicon, or Panklibanon. The corruptions and misapplications of the old pictorial signboards find a parallel in the modern rendering of our ancient proverbs and sayings. When the primary use and purpose of an article have fallen out of fashion, or become obsolete, there is no knowing how absurdly it may not be treated by succeeding generations. We were once taken many miles over fields and through lanes to see the great stone coffins of some ancient Romans, but the farmer, a sulky man, thought we were impertinent in wishing to see his pigtroughs. In Haarlem, we were once shewn the huge cannon-ball which killed Heemskerk, the discoverer of Nova Zembla. When not required for exhibition, however, the good man in charge found it of great use in grinding his mustard-seed. Amongst the middle classes of to-day, no institution of ancient times has been more corrupted and misapplied than heraldry. The modern "Forrester," or member of the "Ancient Order of Druids," is scarcely a greater burlesque upon the original than the beer retailers' "Arms" of the present hour

Good wine and beer were formerly to be had at the Boar's Head, or the Three Tuns; but those emblems will not do now, it must be the "Arms" of somebody or something; whence we find such anomalies as the Angel Arms, (Clapham Road ;) Dunstan's Arms, (City Road ;) Digger's Arms, (Petworth, Surrey ;) Farmer's Arms and Gardener's Arms, (Lancashire ;) Grand Junction Arms, (Praed Street, London ;) Griffin's Arms, (Warrington ;) Mount Pleasant Arms, Paragon Arms, (Kingston, Surrey ;) St Paul's Arms, (Newcastle ;) Portcullis Arms, (Ludlow ;) Puddler's Arms, (Wellington, Shropshire ;) Railway Arms, (Ludlow ;) Sol's Arms, (Hampstead Row ;) the Vulcan Arms, (Sheffield;) General's Arms, (Little Baddon, Essex ;) the Waterloo Arms, (High Street, Marylebone,) &c. Besides these, a quantity of newfangled, highsounding, but unmeaning names seem to be the order of the day with gin-palaces and refreshment-houses, as, Perseverance, Enterprise, Paragon, Criterion.

Notwithstanding these innovations, the majority of the old objects still survive, in name at least, on the signboards of alehouses and taverns. Their use may still be regarded as a rule with publicans and innkeepers, although they have become the exception in other trades. Occasionally, also, we may still come upon a painted signboard, but these are daily becoming scarcer. Not so in France; there the good old tradition of the painted signboard is yet kept up. We get a good glimpse of this subject in the following: *" But it is the signs that so amuse and absolutely arrest a stranger. This is a practice that has grown into a mania at Paris, and is even a subject for the ridicule of the stage, since many a shopkeeper considers his sign as a primary matter, and spends a little capital in this one outfit. Many of them exhibit figures as large as life, painted in no humble or shabby style; while history, sacred and classical, religion, the stage, &c., furnish subjects. You may see the Horatii and Curiatii-a scene from the Fourberies de Scapin' of Molière-a group of French soldiers, with the inscription, A la Valeur des Soldats Français, or a group of children inscribed à la réunion des Bons Enfants,t-or d la Baigneuse, depicting a beautiful nymph just issuing from the bath; or à la Somnambule, a pretty girl walking in her sleep and nightdress, and followed by her gallant.‡

Mementos, Historical and Classical, of a Tour through part of France, Switzerland, and Italy, in the Years 1821 and 1822. London, 1824.

† Un bon enfant is in French "a jolly good fellow," as well as a "good child.' Taken from the Opera "La Somnainbula."

"In ludicrous things, a barber will write under his sign :

'La Nature donne barbe et cheveux,
Et moi, je les coupe tous les deux.'*
'A toutes les figures dédiant mes rasoirs,
Je nargue la censure des fidèles miroirs.'†

"Also a frequent inscription with a barber is, 'Ici on rajeunit.' A breeches-maker writes up, M, Culottier de Mme. la Duchesse de Devonshire. A perruquier exhibits a sign, very well painted, of an old fop trying on a new wig, entitled, Au ci-devant jeune homme. A butcher displays a bouquet of faded flowers, with this inscription, Au tendre Souvenir. An eating-house exhibits a punning sign, with an ox dressed up with bonnet, lace veil, shawl, &c., which naturally implies, Bœuf à-la-mode. A pastrycook has a very pretty little girl climbing up to reach some cakes in a cupboard, and this sign he calls, A la petite Gourmande. A stocking-maker has painted for him a lovely creature, trying on a new stocking, at the same time exhibiting more charms than the occasion requires to the young fellow who is on his knees at her feet, with the very significant motto, A la belle occasion." +

Though it is forty years since these remarks were written, they still, mutatis mutandis, apply to the present day. Even the greatest and most fashionable shops on the Boulevards have their names or painted signs; the subjects are mostly taken from the principal topic of conversation at the time the establishment opened, whether politics, literature, the drama, or fine arts: thus we have à la Présidence; au Prophète; au Palais d'Industrie; aux Enfants d'Edouard, (the Princes in the Tower ;) au Colosse de Rhodes; à la Tour de Malakoff; à la Tour de Nesles, (tragedy;) au Sonneur de St Paul, (tragedy;) à la Dame Blanche; à la Bataille de Solferino; au Trois Mousquetaires; au Lingot d'Or, (a great lottery swindle in 1852 ;) d la Reine Blanche, &c. Some of these signs are remarkably well painted, in a vigorous, bold style, with great bravura of brush; for instance, les Noces de Vulcain, on the Quai aux Fleurs, is painted in a style which would do no discredit to the artist of les Romains de la Décadence. Roger Bontemps is still frequent

"Nature provides man with hair and beard,
But I cut them both."

"I devote my razors to all faces,

And defy the criticism of faithful mirrors."

A sort of pun, "la belle occasion" implying the same idea that cur shopkeepers express by their "Now is your time," and similar puffs.

Similar instances may also be occasionally met with in London; for instance, the Corsican Brothers, (Coffee-house, Fulham Road.)