1374. On the 28th July, 1374, Lawrence de Weston, Barber (Master of the Company in 1376), and Margaret his wife, mother of the said Alice, came before the Mayor, &c., and proved that the said Alice was dead, whereupon Gilbert Prince, the Executor of Nicholas the Barber’s will, was discharged, and the money paid to Lawrence and Margaret de Weston. (_Letter-Book G._ 244 and 317{B.}) Reverting now from individuals to the Company, we find that the Barbers existed as a Trade Guild, but unincorporated certainly from the year 1308, and that they were at first ruled by one Master, and later on (in 1376) by two Masters, appointed annually. This Company of Barbers was composed of two classes of Members--viz., those who practised Barbery proper (perhaps including phlebotomy and tooth drawing), and those who practised Surgery, and who were, for distinction sake, called Barber-Surgeons (in the City books they are spoken of as “Barbers exercising the faculty of Surgery”). For aught we know to the contrary, a perfect harmony and good understanding existed between these two sections of the Company, and it is probable that the ranks of the latter were continually recruited from the former. 1381. The earliest evidence of the existence of our Hall is to be found in Harl. MS. 541, which contains a list of Companies’ Halls in the City, temp. 5 Richard II, by which it appears that the Barbers’ Hall was then, as now, in the Parish of Saint Olave, Silver Street, and doubtless on the same site; the entry is, “Barbar hall y{e} p’yssh of Seynt Oluf in Sylverstrete.” In 1490 the Hall is _known_ to have been on the same site. 1388. In this year Richard II sent his writs all over the Kingdom to enquire into the nature and constitution of the several guilds and fraternities, religions, social or craft, and the returns to these writs, which must have been an immense number, were formerly kept among the Records at the Tower of London. Herbert, in his History of the Livery Companies, refers to his fruitless endeavours to discover these returns, and I have made diligent enquiry at the Record Office for them also, with the undoubted result that all of those which relate to the London Trading Guilds are lost. There are, however, a great number relating to London religious guilds and to trade guilds all over the country. Two of these concerning the Barbers of Norwich and of Lincoln are so highly interesting that I have preserved them in Appendix A.