The materials for a work of this kind are not abundant. The notices of the fairs to be found in records of the earlier centuries of their history are slight, and more interesting to the antiquary than to the general reader. Newspapers of the latter half of the seventeenth century, and the first half of the eighteenth, afford only advertisements of the amusements, and of the showmen of the former period we learn only the names. During the latter half of the last century, the showmen seldom advertised in the newspapers, and few of their bills have been preserved. No showman has ever written his memoirs, or kept a journal; and the biographers of actors who have trodden the portable stages of Scowton and Richardson in the early years of their professional career have failed to glean many incidents of their fair experiences. All that can be presented of the personal history of such men as Gyngell, Scowton, Richardson, and Wombwell, has been gathered from the few surviving members of the fraternity of showmen, and from persons who, at different periods, and in various ways, have been brought into association with them. If, therefore, no other merit should be found in the following pages, they will at least have been the means of preserving from oblivion all that is known of an almost extinct class of entertainers of the people. CONTENTS. PAGE CHAPTER I. Origin of Fairs--Charter Fairs at Winchester and Chester-- Croydon Fairs--Fairs in the Metropolis--Origin of Bartholomew Fair--Disputes between the Priors and the Corporation--The Westminster Fairs--Southwark Fair--Stepney Fair--Ceremonies observed in opening Fairs--Walking the Fair at Wolverhampton--The Key of the Fair at Croydon--Proclamation of Bartholomew Fair 1 CHAPTER II. Amusements of the Fairs in the Middle Ages--Shows and Showmen of the Sixteenth Century--Banks and his Learned Horse-- Bartholomew Fair in the time of Charles I.--Punch and Judy-- Office of the Revels--Origin of Hocus Pocus--Suppression of Bartholomew Fair--London Shows during the Protectorate--A Turkish Rope-Dancer--Barbara Vanbeck, the Bearded Woman 18 CHAPTER III. Strolling Players in the Seventeenth Century--Southwark Fair--Bartholomew Fair--Pepys and the Monkeys--Polichinello-- Jacob Hall, the Rope-Dancer--Another Bearded Woman-- Richardson, the Fire-Eater--The Cheshire Dwarf--Killigrew and the Strollers--Fair on the Thames--The Irish Giant--A Dutch Rope-Dancer--Music Booths--Joseph Clarke, the Posturer-- William Philips, the Zany--William Stokes, the Vaulter--A Show in Threadneedle Street 36 CHAPTER IV.