N° 251. Tuesday, December 18. -Linguæ centum funt, oraque centum, Ferrea vox VIRG. En. 6. ver. 625. A hundred mouths, a hundred tongues, And throats of brass inspir'd with iron lungs. DRYDEN. THERE is nothing which more aftonishes a fo reigner, and frights a country 'fquire, than the cries of London. My good friend fir ROGER often declares, that he cannot get them out of his head or go to fleep for them, the first week that he is in town. On the contrary, WILL HONEYCOME calls them the Ramage de la ville, and prefers them to the founds of larks and nightingales, with all the mufic of the fields and woods. I have lately received a letter from fome very odd fellow upon this fubject, which I fhall leave with my reader without faying any thing further of it. ,, SIR, ⚫IA M a man out of all business, and would willingly turn my head to any thing for an honeft livelihood. I have invented several projects for raifing many millions of money without burdening the subject, but I cannot get the parliament to liften to me, who look upon me, forfooth, as a crack, and a projector, so that defpairing to enrich either myself or my country by this public-fpiritednefs, I would make fome propofals to you relating to a defign which I have very much at heart, and which may procure me a handsome subfist< ence, if you will be pleased to recommend it to the ci⚫ties of London and Westminster. The poft I would aim at, is to be comptroller-general of the London-cries, which are at prefent under no • manner of rules or difcipline. I think I am pretty well qualified for this place, as being a man of very ftrong lungs, of great infight into all the branches of our Bri⚫tifh trades and manufactures, and of a competent skill ⚫ in mufic. The cries of London may be divided into vocal and ⚫ inftrumental. As for the latter, they are at prefent un'der a very great diforder. A freeman of London has the privilege of difturbing a whole street for an hour together, with the twanking of a brafs kettle or a frying-pan. The watchman's thump at midnight startles us in our beds, as much as the breaking in of a thief. The fow-gelder's horn has indeed fomething musical in ⚫ it, but this is feldom heard within the liberties. I would therefore propofe, that no inftrument of this nature 'fhould be made use of, which I have not tuned and licenfed, after having carefully examined in what manner it may affect the ears of her majefty's liege subjects. • Vocal cries are of a much larger extent, and indeed fo full of incongruities and barbarifms, that we appear a distracted city to foreigners, who do not comprehend the meaning of fuch enormous outcries. Milk is generally fold in a note above E la, and in founds so exceeding thrill, that it often fets our teeth on edge. The chimney-fweeper is confined to no certain pitch; he fometimes utters himself in the deepest bafe, and fometimes in the sharpest treble; fometimes in the highest, and fometimes in the lowest note of the gamut. The fame observation might be made on the retailers of ⚫ finall-coal, not to mention broken glaffes or brick-dust. In thefe therefore, and the like cafes, it should be my • care to fweeten and mellow the voices of these itinerant tradesmen, before they make their appearance in our ftreets, as alfo to accommodate their cries to their refpective wares; and to take care in particular, that thofe may not make the most noise who have the leaft to fell, which is very obfervable in the venders of cardmatches, to whom I cannot but apply the old proverb of "Much cry but little wool." · Some of thefe laft-mentioned musicians are fo very loud in the fale of thefe trifling manufactures, that an honeft fplenetic gentleman of my acquaintance barI gained with one of them never to come into the street where he lived: but what was the effect of this contract? why, the whole tribe of card-match-makers which frequent that quarter, paffed by his door the very next day, in hopes of being bought off after the fame manner. It is another great imperfection in our London cries, that there is no juft time or measure obferved in them. Our news fhould indeed be published in a very quick time, because it is a commodity that will not keep cold. It fhould not, however, be cried with the fame ⚫ precipitation as fire: yet this is generally the cafe. A bloody battle alarms the town from one end to another in an inftant. Every motion of the French is publifhed in fo great a hurry, that one would think the enemy were at our gates. This likewife I would take upon me to regulate in fuch a manner, that there should be ⚫ fome diftinction made between the fpreading of a victory, a march, or an incampment, a Dutch, a Portugal, or a Spanith mail. Nor muft I omit under this head thofe exceffive alarms with which several boifterous ruftics infeft our streets in turnip-feafon; and which are more inexcufable, because these are wares which are in no danger of cooling upon their hands. There are others who affect a very flow time, and are, in my opinion, much more tunable than the former; the cooper in particular fwells his laft note in an hollow voice, that is not without its harmony; nor can I forbear being infpired with a moft agreeable melan• choly, when I hear that fad and folemn air with which the public are very often asked, if they have any chairs to mend? Your own memory may fuggeft to you many other lamentable ditties of the fame nature, in which ⚫ the mufic is wonderfully languishing and melodious. I am always pleafed with that particular time of the year which is proper for the pickling of dill and cucumbers; but alas, this cry, like the fong of the nightingale, is not heard above two months. It would therefore be worth while to confider, whether the fame air might not in fome cases be adapted to other words. · It might likewife deferve our most serious confideration, how far, in a well regulated city, thofe humorists are to be tolerated, who, not contented with the traditional cries of their forefathers, have invented parti⚫cular fongs and tunes of their own: fuch as was, not many years fince, the paftry-man, commonly known by the name of the Colly-Molly-Puff; and fuch as is at this day the vender of powder and wafh-balls, who, VOL. III. if I am rightly informed, goes under the name of • Powder-Watt. 'I muft not here omit one particular absurdity which ' runs through this whole vociferous generation, and which renders their cries very often not only incommodious, but altogether useless to the public; I mean, that idle accomplishment which they all of them aim at, of crying so as not to be understood. Whether or no they have learned this from feveral of our affected fingers, I will not take upon me to say; but most certain it is, that people know the wares they deal in • rather by their tunes than by their words; infomuch that I have fometimes feen a country boy run out to buy apples of a bellows-mender, and gingerbread from a grinder of knives and fciffars. Nay fo ftrangely in'fatuated are fome very eminent artifts of this particular < grace in a cry, that none but their acquaintance are ⚫ able to guefs at their profeffion; for who elfe can know, that" work if I had it," fhould be the fignification of " a corn-cutter? 'Forafmuch therefore as perfons of this rank are feldom men of genius or capacity, I think it would be very proper, that fome man of good fenfe and found judgment fhould prefide over thefe public cries, who 'fhould permit none to lift up their voices in our streets, that have not tunable throats, and are not only able to overcome the noife of the croud, and the rattling of ⚫ coaches, but alfo to vend their refpective merchandifes in apt phrafes, and in the moft diftinct and agreeable founds. I do therefore humbly recommend myself as a perfon rightly qualified for this poft; and if I meet 'with fitting encouragement, fhall communicate some other projects which I have by me, that may no less 'conduce to the emolument of the public. C. I am, Sir, &c. RALPH CROTCHET. ABSENCE A. BSENCE of lovers, death in love, Number 241. Abftinence, the benefits of it, N. 195. Accompts, their great usefulness, N. 174. ACOSTA, his anfwer to Limborch touching the multipli- 213. No. Advertisement from Mr. Sly the haberdasher, N. 187. Ambition, by what to be measured, N. 188. Many Annihilation, by whom defired, N. 210. The most Apes, what women fo called, and defcribed, N. 244 Appetites, fooner moved than the paffions, N. 208. ARGUS, his qualifications and employments under Juno, ARISTENETUS his letters, fome account of them, N. 238. Atheists great zealots, N. 185. and bigots, ibid. Their BAUDY-HOUSES B. AUDY-HOUSES frequented by wife men, not out of Beggars, fir ANDREW FREEPORT'S opinion of them, N. 232. BOILEAU Cenfured, and for what, N. 209. Butts the adventure of a Butt on the water, N. 175. |