File:St. Nicholas (serial) (1873) (14781659224).jpg

Identifier: stnicholasserial31dodg (find matches)
Title: St. Nicholas (serial)
Year: 1873 (1870s)
Authors: Dodge, Mary Mapes, 1830-1905
Subjects: Children's literature
Publisher: (New York : Scribner & Co.)
Contributing Library: Information and Library Science Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Digitizing Sponsor: University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

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ing power in the commerce ofthe habitable globe. The fact is that the golden grasshopper of Sir 164 THE SIGNS OF OLD LONDON. (Dec. Thomas Gresham is of classic derivation, datingfurther back than the Roman era. It was thefavorite ornament of the proud Athenians, whoconsidered that the grasshopper cast a spell ofenchantment, insuring riches and good fortune.Lombard Street, noted in history as the greatLondon street for bankers, derived its namefrom the Longobards, a race of rich bankerswho settled there in the reign of Edward II,and whose badge, the three golden balls, taken street were revived for the recent Coronationfestivities, and Londoners of to-day were thusable to get an idea of how the crooked oldplace might have looked with its pendant signs,placed to guide a people who could not read— perhaps quite as sure a guide as the num-bering of to-day. For what man or boy couldnot find the sign of The Grasshopper, ThePhenix, The Black Boy, The WhiteRam, The Bunch of Grapes, The Car-
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THE LEATHERN BOTTLE. from the lower part of the arms of the Dukesof Medici, continues to this day to be the signof pawnbrokers — money-lenders. The balls onthe rich crest of the Medici were blue, and onlyduring the last half-century have they, in thepawnbrokers signs, been gilded. The positionof the balls is popularly believed to indicate thatthere are two chances to one that what isbrought there will not be redeemed. The fifteenth-century signs of this famous old AN OLD PAWNBROKERS SIGN. (SEE PAGE 165.) dinals Hat, The Cat and the Fiddle, TheAnchor ? • The Bull is a favorite English sign.Some have supposed that this fact gave theBriton his nickname of John Bull, thoughothers ascribe it to his favorite roast, or say thatit was derived from the ancient sport of bull-baiting. Thus bulls have figured on inn sign-boards as black, gray, pied, and even spangled. On one of these historic inns in Holborn, I9°3-1 THE SIGNS OF OLD LONDON. 165

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