Old Battersea Workhouse, which has long since been pulled down, was situated in the neighbourhood of Battersea Square. In the same neighbourhood is the "Priory," now the residence of Mr. Oakman. Not far from the Raven Tavern was the "Cage," in Surrey Lane, for the confinement of petty criminals. Near the Prince's Head Tavern was the Pound in which cattle were enclosed for trespass until replevied or redeemed. Also a wooden machine called the "Stocks" to put the legs of offenders in, for securing disorderly persons, and by way of punishment in divers cases, ordained by statute, &c., was erected without the gates of Battersea Churchyard, near the waterside. In the last quarter of the eighteenth century, writes Robert Chambers in his "Book of Days," there flourished at the corner of the lane leading from the Wandsworth Road to Battersea Bridge a tavern yclept "The Falcon," kept by one Robert Death--a man whose figure is said to have ill comported with his name, seeing that it displayed the highest appearance of jollity and good condition. A merry-hearted artist, named John Nixon, passing the house one day, found an Undertaker's company regaling themselves at 'Death's door,' having just discharged their duty to a rich Nabob in a neighbouring churchyard, they had ... found an opportunity for refreshing exhausted nature; and well did they ply the joyful work before them. The artist, tickled at a festivity among such characters in such a place, sketched them on the spot. This sketch was soon after published, accompanied by a cantata from another hand of no great merit, in which the foreman of the company, Mr. Sable, is represented as singing as follows, to the tune of 'I've kissed and I've prattled with fifty fair maids':-- "Dukes, Lords, have I buried, and squires of fame, And people of every degree; But of all the fine jobs that ere came in my way, A funeral like this for me. This, this is the job That fills the fob; Oh! the burying of a Nabob for me! Unfeather the hearse, put the pall in the bag, Give the horses some oats and some hay; Drink our next merry meeting and quackeries increase With three times three and hurra!"