Farquahar in his sprightly comedy _The Recruiting Officer_ describes the lively doings of the same "people of quality," and also of the more stolid burghers. "I have drawn," he says, "the Justice and the Clown in their _Puris Naturalibus_; the one an apprehensive, sturdy, brave blockhead; and the other a worthy, honest, generous gentleman, hearty in his country's cause and of as good an understanding as I could give him, which I must confess is far short of his own." Farquahar seems to have obtained a particularly good impression of the worthy Salopians. He dedicates his comedy to "All Friends round the Wrekin." "I was stranger to everything in Salop but its Character of Loyalty, the Number of its Inhabitants, the Alacrity of the Gentry in Recruiting the Army, with their generous and hospitable Reception of Strangers. This Character I found so amply verify'd in every Particular that you made Recruiting, which is the greatest Fatigue upon Earth to other, to be the greatest Pleasure in the World to me[201]." Shrewsbury was one of the gayest of those many provincial capitals "out of which the great wen of London has sucked all the life[202]." [Sidenote: _Shrewsbury Show in 17th century._] Farquhar may have seen the old Show, which the Restoration had naturally brought back, wend its noisy way to Kingsland. The procession itself was easily rehabilitated, but the arbours on Kingsland, where the day was spent in merrymaking, called for much attention. Great activity was evinced in their repair, for they had fallen into sad decay during the hard rule of the Puritans. Some of the companies adorned their arbours with gateways, arms and mottoes, "dyalls," and the like. Most of the gateways were of wood, but in 1679 the Shoemakers company erected a handsome stone portal, which a few years subsequently they adorned with figures of their patron saints, Crispin and Crispianus. As though the events of a century previous were still fresh in men's minds, the legend was painted underneath, "We are but images of stonne Do us no harme--we can do nonne."