As for the maidens, they have their exercise of dancing and tripping until moon-light.

Fighting of Boars, Bulls, and Bears.

In winter, almost every holiday before dinner, the foaming boars fight for their heads, and prepare with deadly tusks to be made bacon; or else some lusty bulls or huge bears, are baited with dogs.

Sport upon Ice.

When that great moor which washeth Moor-fields, at the north wall of the city, is frozen over, great companies of young men go to sport upon the ice; then fetching a run, and setting their feet at a distance, and placing their bodies sidewise, they slide. a great way. Others take heaps of ice, as if it were great mill-stones, and make seats: many going before, draw him, that sits thereon, holding one another by the hand in going so fast, some slipping with their feet, all fall down together: some are better practised to the ice, and bind to their shoes bones, as the legs of some beasts, and hold stakes in their hands headed with sharp iron, which some

times they strike against the ice; and these men go on with speed as doth a bird in the air, or darts shot from some warlike engine: sometimes two men set themselves at a distance, and run one against another as it were at tilt, with these stakes, wherewith one or both parties are thrown down, not without some hurt to their bodies; and after their fall, by reason of the violent motion, are carried a good distance from one another, and wheresoever the ice doth touch their head, it rubs off all the skin and lays it bare; and if one fall upon his leg or arm, it is usually broken: but young men greedy of honour, and desirous of victory, do thus exercise themselves in counterfeit battles, that they may bear the brunt more strongly, when they come to it in good ear

nest.

Sport with Birds and Dogs.

Many citizens take delight in birds, as sparrowhawks, goss-hawks, and such like, and in dogs to hunt in the woody ground. The citizens have authority to hunt in Middlesex, Hertfordshire, all the Chilterns, and in Kent, as far as Gray-water.

In tumbling over these huge volumes, I met with an account of a very remarkable effect of fear, or rather of horror, which I shall insert for its astonishing singularity.

A person lately living in this hamlet (Poplar, a village on the Thames, adjoining Blackwall,) having a great concern for the safety of a ship that was like to break her back at Blackwall, had his blood and spirits set into such an extraordinary ferment, or ebullition rather, by the fear of her miscarriage, that by the violence of it, the tops of the nails of his hands and feet were cast off to a great distance from their natural situation, and so remained to his death.

The Survey of London was compiled with astonishing industry, and commonly with equal accuracy, from the most authentic records and historians. Stow was urged to the task (as hè says himself) by a general invitation of Mr. Lambard to several of the cotemporary antiquaries, to write the histories of their native counties. The work gives a view of the government of the city both ecclesiastical and civil-of the churches, hospitals, and religious houses, down to the fortieth year of queen Elizabeth. The

upon a bank boarded about under a tree, some one scholar hath stepped up, and there hath opposed and answered, till he were by some better scholar overcome and put down: and then the overcomer, taking the place, did like as the first; and in the end, the best opposers and answerers had rewards; which I observed not. But it made both good school-masters, and also good scholars, diligently against such times, to prepare themselves for the obtaining of this garland.

I remember there repaired to these exercises, amongst others, the masters and scholars of the free-schools of St. Paul's in London, of St. Peter's at Westminster, of sir Thomas Acon's hospital, and of St. Anthony's hospital; whereof the last named commonly presented the best scholars, and had the prize in those days.

This priory of St. Bartholomew being surrendered to Henry VIII. those disputations of scholars in that place surceased, and were again only for a year or two, in the reign of Edward VI. revived in the cloister of Christ's Hospital, where the best scholars then still of St. Anthony's school, howsoever the same be now fallen, both in number and estimation, were rewarded with bows and arrows of silver, given to them by sir Martin Bowes, goldsmith.

Nevertheless, howsoever, the encouragement failed; the scholars of Paul's, meeting with them of St.

Anthony's, would call them St. Anthony's pigs; and they again would call the others pigeons of Paul's, because many pigeons were bred in Paul's church, and St. Anthony was always figured with a pig following him; and mindful of the former usage, did, for a long season, disorderly in the open street provoke one another with, salve: salve tu quoque. Placet tibi mecum disputare? Placet. And so, proceeding from this to questions in grammar, they usually fell from words to blows, with their satchels full of books, many times in so great heaps, that they troubled the streets and passengers; so that finally they were restrained, with the decay of St. Anthony's school.

Out of this school have sprung divers famous persons; whereof, although time hath buried the names of many, yet in my own remembrance, may be numbered these following: viz. sir Thomas More, knight, lord chancellor of England; Dr. Nicholas Heath, sometime bishop of Rochester, after of Worcester, and lastly, archbishop of York, and lord chancellor of England. Dr. John Whitgift, bishop of Worcester, and after, archbishop of Canterbury.