forms a prominent charge in the arms of the Distillers’ Company. The _Sun in Splendour_, used as a badge by Richard II., is here shown. The engraving is taken from an illuminated manuscript in the Harleian Collection, wherein the badge is painted on the sail of a ship. Larwood and Hotten suggest that the RISING SUN was, perhaps, adopted as a sign “on account of the favourable omen it presents for a man commencing business.” The SUN at *Thaxted seems to have existed since the year 1786 at least, for it is mentioned in the _Chelmsford Chronicle_ for January 20th in that year. The SUN Inn at Romford bears the monogram “T. ^{W.} L.” and the date 1632. The SUN INN in Church Street, Saffron Walden, was once a house of note, but is now a private residence. It was probably built about 1625. The devices, more grotesque than elegant, which adorn its many gables, make it one of the best remaining Essex examples of houses adorned with parge work. In 1646, when it was probably the chief inn in the town, it lodged no less important an individual than Oliver Cromwell. His portrait, painted on the tiles at the side of a fire-place, was found during some recent restorations, and is now in the Museum. It was, doubtless, covered up at the Restoration.[92] Until about forty years ago there stood beside the main road to Colchester, just outside the parish of Kelvedon, an inn known as the SUN. It is still a curious old house, worthy of notice from the passer-by, but up to the date named it, and even the furniture it contained, exhibited all the characteristics of a sixteenth century house. Its carved woodwork, however, was sold and afterwards accidentally burned and its furniture scattered. The pictorial sign-board of the RISING SUN at Castle Hedingham is very grotesque. It is here represented [Illustration: RISING SUN. (_At Castle Hedingham._)] within the sign-iron of the BELL at the same place (p. 158). The RISING SUN at Salcot is many times mentioned in the Rev. Baring-Gould’s _Mehalah_. It is therein (ii. p. 4) thus described:--“At the end of the village stands a low tavern, the Rising Sun, a mass of gables. Part of it (the tavern drinking-room) is only one storey high, but the rest is a jumble of roofs and lean-to buildings, chimneys and ovens--a miracle of picturesqueness.” As previously stated (pp. 147 and 83) the sun enters into two very absurd combinations, a SUN AND ANCHOR at Steeple, and a SUN AND WHALEBONE at Latton. Both of these are, in all probability, impaled signs. The STAR appears on Essex sign-boards eight times. Its use is probably due to the fact that in mediæval times [Illustration: STAR.] [Illustration: MULLET.]