The rest of the poem, which is long, does not merit reproduction. This house is marked on Jean Roque’s _Map of Ten Miles round London_, published in 1741. The FALCON occurs three times, namely, at Southend, Littlebury, and Wivenhoe. Twenty years ago one of these figured in the list as the NEW FALCON, and sixty years since there was another in the High Street at *Braintree. A farthing token showing a bird holding a sceptre, and issued by “John Parker at the Falken in Wevenhoe,” is described by Boyne. Taylor (see p. 28) also mentions this Parker in 1636. As the sign of the FALCON still exists at Wivenhoe it is probably the same house kept more than two centuries ago by John Parker, especially as the same house is mentioned again in an advertisement in the _Chelmsford Chronicle_ for January 13, 1786. At the end of last century there was an inn with the sign of the FALCON close against the Cross at Waltham. Two illustrations of it, published respectively in 1787 and 1791, are preserved in Mr. Creed’s collection. They show the sign-board (a pictorial one, inscribed with the name of the landlord--Sibley) suspended from a beam which extends across the road. Above this beam is hung a bunch of grapes within an iron frame, as here shown. The sign has now been altered to that of the GREAT EASTERN. [Illustration: FALCON. (_At Waltham Cross in 1787._)] The OLD FALCON Inn, which formerly existed at Castle Hedingham, though now reduced to a mere beer-shop, was once evidently a very good house. Its beams and rafters are very massive, and bear the crest and badge of the Earls of Oxford, like not a few other old houses in the vicinity. The sign is probably identical with that of the HAWK, which occurs at Battles Bridge. Its origin may have been the ancient sport of hawking; but, more probably, it has an heraldic derivation. A _falcon volant_ forms part of the arms of the Stationers’ Company, and it was probably adopted by booksellers on this account. Both Edward III. and Richard II. used a falcon as one of their badges, and the FALCON HOLDING A SCEPTRE, which, as just mentioned, existed at Wivenhoe in the seventeenth century, was presumably derived from one of the badges of Queen Elizabeth, _a falcon crowned, holding a sceptre_. It is, however, by no means improbable that the particular instance of the sign of the FALCON in Falcon Square, Castle Hedingham (which happens to be _triangular_!), may be a relic of the ancient family of the Hawkwoods, who resided in the adjoining parish of Sible Hedingham. Sir John Hawkwood, the famous soldier who became so prominent in the Italian wars of the fourteenth century, was buried in Florence, but upon the beautiful crocketted canopy of the monument erected to him in the south aisle of Sible Hedingham Church, his badge (?), a Hawk or Falcon, is carved several times, with other devices. [Illustration: WHITE SWAN. (_The Badge of the De Bohuns._)]