So in Dekker's "Belman of London," 1616: "The theefe that commits the robery, and is chiefe _clarke to Saint Nicholas_, is called the high lawyer." And in "Looke on me London," 1613, sig. C: "Here closely lie _Saint Nicholas Clearkes_, that, with a good northerne gelding, will gaine more by a halter, than an honest yeoman with a teame of good horses." [23] This ancient fabric, which is now destroyed, was the seat of the Nevils, Earls of Warwick. It stood about a mile from Kingston-upon-Thames, near Wolsey's Aqueducts, which convey water to Hampton Court.--_Steevens._ [24] A cutter was, about the beginning of the last century, a cant word for a swaggering fellow. This appears in the old black-letter play entitled "The Faire Maid of Bristow," sig. A iij., where Sir Godfrey says of Challener-- "He was _a cutter_ and a swaggerer." He is elsewhere (sig. A 4) called a swaggering fellow.--_MS. note in Oldys's Langbaine._ [25] [Old copy, _rise_. The meaning seems to be that Randall had got up betimes.] [26] _i.e._, Alexander Bloodhound.--_Pegge._ [27] _i.e._, The reply of drawers when they are called. [28] [See "Popular Antiquities of Great Britain," ii. 247-8.] [29] It was formerly usual to celebrate Christmas, at the several inns of court, with extraordinary festivity. Sometimes plays or masques were performed; and when these were omitted, a greater degree of licence appears to have been allowed to the students than at other times. In societies where so many young men, possessed of high spirits, and abounding with superfluous sums of money, were assembled, it will not seem wonderful to find the liberty granted at this season should be productive of many irregularities. Among others, gaming, in the reign of James I., when this play was probably written, had been carried to such an extravagant height as to demand the interposition of the heads of some of the societies to prevent the evil consequences attending it. In the 12th of James I. orders for reformation and better government of the inns of court and Chancery were made by the readers and benchers of the four houses of court; among which is the following:--"For that disorders in the _Christmas_-time, may both infect the minds, and prejudice the estates and fortunes, of the young gentlemen in the same societies: it is therefore ordered, that there shall be commons of the house kept, in every house of court, during the _Christmas_; and that none shall play in their several halls at the dice, except he be a gentleman of the same society, and in commons; and the benefits of the boxes to go to the butlers of every house respectively."--Dugdale's "Orig. Jurid.," p. 318. In the 4th of Car. I. (Nov. 17) the society of Gray's Inn direct, "that all playing at dice, cards, or otherwise, in the hall, buttry, or butler's chamber, should be thenceforth barred and forbidden, at all times of the year, the twenty days in _Christmas_ only excepted."--_Ibid._ p. 286. And in the 7th of Car. I. (7th Nov.)