London and Its Environs Described, vol. 4 (of 6): Containing an Account of Whatever is Most Remarkable for Grandeur, Elegance, Curiosity or Use, in the City and in the Country Twenty Miles Round ItAnonymous
History
London and Its Environs Described, vol. 4 (of 6): Containing an Account of Whatever is Most Remarkable for Grandeur, Elegance, Curiosity or Use, in the City and in the Country Twenty Miles Round It
Anonymous
London (England) -- Description and travel -- Early works to 1800; London (England) -- Gazetteers -- Early works to 1800
Thus regulated, the city barge was preceded by another mounted with
ordnance, and the figures of dragons and other monsters, incessantly
emitting fire and smoke, with much noise. Then the city barge, attended
on the right by the Haberdashers state barge, called the Bachelors,
which was covered with gold brocade, and adorned with sails of silk,
with two rich standards of the King’s and Queen’s arms at her head and
stern, besides a variety of flags and streamers, containing the arms of
that company, and those of the Merchant Adventurers; besides which the
shrouds and ratlines were hung with a number of small bells: on the left
was a barge that contained a very beautiful mount, on which stood a
white falcon crowned, perching upon a golden stump encircled with roses,
being the Queen’s emblem; and round the mount sat several beautiful
virgins, singing, and playing upon instruments. The other barges
followed in regular order, till they came below Greenwich. On their
return the procession began with that barge which was before the last,
in which were the Mayor’s and Sheriff’s officers, and this was followed
by those of the inferior companies, ascending to the Lord Mayor’s, which
immediately preceded that of the Queen, who was attended by the
Bachelors or state barge, with the magnificence of which her Majesty was
much delighted; and being arrived at the Tower, she returned the Lord
Mayor and Aldermen thanks, for the pomp with which she had been
conducted thither.
Two days after, the Lord Mayor, in a gown of crimson velvet, and a rich
collar of SS, attended by the Sheriffs and two domestics in red and
white damask, went to receive the Queen at the Tower of London, whence
the Sheriffs returned to see that every thing was in order. The streets
were just before new gravelled from the Tower to Temple Bar, and railed
in on each side; within the rails near Grasschurch, stood a body of
Anseatic merchants, and next to them the several corporations of the
city in their formalities, reaching to the Aldermens station at the
upper end of Cheapside. On the opposite side were placed the city
constables dressed in silk and velvet, with staffs in their hands, to
prevent the breaking in of the mob, or any other disturbance. On this
occasion, Gracechurch street and Cornhill were hung with crimson and
scarlet cloth, and the sides of the houses of a place then called
Goldsmith’s row, in Cheapside, were adorned with gold brocades, velvet
and rich tapestry.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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