The latter part of the sixteenth and the first half of the seventeenth centuries seem to have been remarkable for a great excess of alehouses, having regard to the wants of the population at the time. In 1591 a report of the Queen’s Council on the state of Lancashire and Cheshire states that the streets and alehouses are so crowded during service time that there was none in church but the curate and his clerk; that alehouses were innumerable, and that great abuses prevailed. In 1639 the Justices of Middlesex made presentment to the Council that there were twenty-four alehouses in Covent Garden, and that most of their keepers were chandlers who had got licensed surreptitiously at general meetings, and that the said Justices had reduced the number of the alehouses to _four_. Old John Taylor, in _Drinke and Welcome_, gives evidence of the excessive facilities for drinking afforded at the fairs then so common. “Concerning the fructifying or fruitfulnesse of ale,” he says in his quaint way, “it is almost incredible, for twice every yeere there is a Faire at a small Towne called Kimbolton or Kimolton in Northamptonshire (as I take it), in which towne there are but thirty-eight Houses, which at the Faire time are encreased to thirty-nine _Alehouses_, for an old woman and her daughter doe in those dayes divide there one house into two, such is the operation and encreasing power of our English Ale.” Decker, writing in 1632, says that “a whole street is in some places but a continuous alehouse, not a shop to be seen between red lattice and red lattice.” This mention of the red lattice recalls the custom now extinct, but once well nigh universal, for the alehouses to have open windows to enable the guests to enjoy the fresh air. Privacy was ensured by a trellis or lattice, which was fixed in front of the window, and prevented a passer-by from seeing in, though those within could see out. Whether or not the red colour of the lattices was intended to harmonise with the noses of the frequenters may be considered a moot point; the page seems to have intended some such insinuation when he says of Bardolph, “He called me even now, my Lord, through a red lattice, and I could see no part of his face from the window; at last I spied his eyes and methought he had made two holes in the ale-wife’s new petticoat, and peeped through.” {189} [Illustration: A merry new Ballad, bothe pleaſant and ſweet, In praiſe of a Blackſmith, which is very meet. An Ale-Houſe Lattice. “Of all the trades that ever I ſee There is none which the Blackſmith compared may be.” _Roxburghe Ballads._ ] {190} So usual did the red lattice become that it was regarded as a distinctive mark, as shown in Marston’s _Antonio and Mellida_, in which occurs the passage, “As well known by my wit as an alehouse by a red lattice.” Green lattices were occasionally used, and the memory of them still survives in the sign of _The Green Lettuce_.