The sign of the FLEECE occurs twice at *Colchester, once at *Coggeshall, and once at Brentwood. That of the GOLDEN FLEECE appears at Chelmsford and East Ham, although the former seems to have become golden only during the last forty years. There were also FLEECES at Halstead and Witham sixty years ago. Both forms of the sign are, of course, intended to represent Jason’s Golden Fleece, or Gideon’s, and their use commemorates the time when the woollen trade was one of the staple industries of Essex. The Fleece also formed the pendant of the Order of the GOLDEN FLEECE, which was founded in 1429 by Philip, Duke of Burgundy and Count of Flanders, “to perpetuate the memory of his great revenues raised by wools with the Low Countries,” as Ashmole says. Ancient encaustic tiles have been found, Mr. Elliot writes, both in Witham and Maldon (St. Mary’s) Churches bearing the arms of the Dukes of Burgundy, with their badge of flint, steel, and sparks in the upper and side spandrels, and the figure of the Fleece below. A fleece forms a charge in the arms of the town of Leeds,[63] now the principal seat of the woollen trade. Larwood and Hotten facetiously remark that “a fleece at the door of an inn or public-house looks very like a warning of the fate a traveller may expect within.” The STAR AND FLEECE is an odd combination, which does not appear to be noticed in the _History of Sign-boards_. It may simply be an impaled sign, or may represent the fleece of one of the mullets in the arms of Leeds. An example has existed at Kelvedon for over forty years, and another was in existence a few years since. Another emblem of the woollen trade is the WOOLPACK, of which, as already stated (p. 39), we have six examples, arranged in an almost straight line across the county, namely, at *Romford, Ingatestone, Chelmsford, Witham, *Coggeshall, and *Colchester. Three, at least, of these were in existence sixty years since, at which time there was another at Bocking. It is recorded in _Bufton’s Diary_[64] that on May 1, 1693, at Coggeshall, “Y^{e} soldiers set up a Maypole at y^{e} WOOLPACKE doore.” The WOOLPACK is a device which appears commonly on the tokens of the seventeenth century. It is met with at Billericay, Dunmow, Castle Hedingham (twice), Braintree, Bocking, Witham, and Colchester. The sign of the WOOLPACK, it should be noticed, is still, or was lately, to be seen at the three last-named places. The sign of the SHEARS, as pointed out elsewhere (p. 41), is another relic of the now departed woollen trade. From the middle of the seventeenth to the end of the eighteenth century, the spinning, carding, and weaving of wool formed the staple industry in most of the larger towns and villages of Eastern England. Several prominent families of the district in former days owed their wealth to this trade. In the neighbourhood of Hedingham it is said that several old houses, of which remnants only now exist, were once