Part 83

The feudal tenures of the crown, such as knights' service, were converted into free socage. They were discharged of homage, reliefs, escuage, and aids. Charles relinquished purveyance, wardships, and forfeitures of marriage. In return, Parliament granted him a fixed yearly income of 100,000 pounds from excise tax on beer, cider, and tea.

Several hundreds of dissenter ministers and school teachers were ejected from their positions, but later those who were not Baptists were returned by statute of Parliament. (Baptists did not believe in an established church.)

Charles II was an easygoing and kindly man and hard to ruffle. He had a weariness in the folly of men and a cynical disbelief in human virtue. His wit and great sense of humor softened many a potentially tense situation. His restoration to the throne brought in a time of enjoyment of life in reaction to the Puritanism of before. At his succession, the elected Parliament was oriented toward royalty and the established church. He was voted an income of 1,200,000 pounds a year. He also sold many of the last crown lands. But he always had great debts, which he described as a "desperate but not serious" situation. This was in part due to his generous maintenance of several successive mistresses and more than about a dozen illegitimate children. His entourage also included physicians, surgeons, a librarian, a poet laureate, chaplains, painters, an historiographer, musicians, a royal composer, and an astronomer. Charles even joked on his deathbed that "I am sorry gentlemen, for being such an unconscionable time a-dying."

The day of Charles II's restoration and birthday was designated as a day of thanksgiving when all were to participate in prayers and the singing of psalms at some church or other suitable public place.

Charles initiated the return of Sunday afternoon wrestling, archery, music, and dancing. Theaters reopened with actresses playing women's parts, an audience only in front of the stage instead of around it, a drop curtain, and painted two-dimensional scenery. Actresses were allowed pursuant to royal proclamation so that plays should become "useful and instructive representations of human life" rather than "harmless delights". Charles went to plays regularly. Actresses were assumed to be mistresses of patrons in return for their jobs, but one fourth were actually chaste women married to actors. Comedies were the preferred plays. Courtesans were sympathetically and even admirably treated in plays, which mocked all restraints and glorified immorality with the exception of pornography, which was banned. Bad actors were hissed off the stage. Henry Purcell wrote religious music for churches, ceremonial music for the English court, and theater music for English opera. Opera made music a vehicle for human emotions. The gentry sang to the lute and danced to string instruments. Many owned and played musical instruments. Humble people had folksongs and instruments like the pipe and tabor for dancing. Singing in parts was popular in town and country. In 1672 John Banister started the first regular series of public concerts in his house. There were lovely formal gardens in which to walk, to see fireworks, and to buy the new ice cream. Charles did much garden and park planning and let the public enjoy the royal St. James Park. He loved hunting too and had the royal forests replenished with deer after poaching during the Cromwell era had greatly reduced their numbers.

Charles II introduced sailing and yacht racing for pleasure. He also participated in and promoted horse racing. The breeding of thoroughbred horses began with breeding to Arab mares. Gelding horses were now preferred over stallions. There were trotters, cart horses, and some "fast" race horses. Boxing (with no gloves nor ring) was a national sport. Ice skating with iron blades was popular. Valentine's day was celebrated. Italian puppet shows played in London.

Dress returned to elaborateness. Gentlemen wore Cavalier-style long wigs with curls, despite the church's dislike of wigs. This could hide the short hair of a former Puritan Roundhead. In 1666, Charles introduced a new mode of inexpensive court dress which was made entirely from English textiles. This gave rise to gentlemen's weskits to below the knee with a coat of the same length and full sleeves. Stockings and shoes replaced the long fitted boots. Charles set a court tradition of men wearing a scarf tied around the neck. Ladies often wore their hair in masses of ringlets with little corkscrew curls on each side of their heads, and later piled their hair up elaborately on their heads. They wore satin or silk dresses fitted at the waist with a pointed bodice, and full skirt. The shoulder line was low and the sleeves full and open at the front with fastenings of jeweled clasps. The only fast colors were reds, blues, purple, and yellow, but not green. They kept their hands warm in muffs. Women wore perfume, rouge, and face patches. Some women put on a lot of make-up. Many men dressed effeminately with rouge, face patches, heavily scented clothing, muffs, and many ribbons of many colors. The facial beauty patches were in shapes such as stars, crescent moons, and hearts; they diverted attention from the common smallpox scars. There were Oxford shoes, which laced up the front through eyelets. The members of the House of Commons dressed like the gentry and assumed their manners. There was exaggeration in all complimentary and ceremonial language.

The gentry were beginning to be thought of as a "squirearchy". They owned about half the land of the country.

The population according to class was as follows:

Number of Social Ranks, Household Household Households Degrees, Titles size yearly income in pounds

160 Temporal lords 40 3,200 26 Spiritual lords 20 1,300 800 Baronets 16 880 600 Knights 13 650 3,000 Esquires 10 450 12,000 Gentlemen 8 280 5,000 Persons in greater offices and places 8 240 5,000 Persons in lesser offices and places 6 120 2,000 Eminent merchants and traders by sea 8 400 8,000 Lesser merchants and traders by sea 6 198 10,000 Persons in the law 7 154 2,000 Eminent clergymen 6 72 8,000 Lesser clergymen 5 50 40,000 Freeholders of the better sort 7 91 120,000 Freeholders of the lesser sort 5.5 55 150,000 Farmers 5 42.5 15,000 Persons in liberal arts and sciences 5 60 50,000 Shopkeepers and tradesmen 4.5 45 60,000 Artisans and handicrafts 4 38 5,000 Naval officers 4 80 4,000 Military officers 4 60 50,000 Common seamen 3 20 364,000 Laboring people and out-servants 3.5 15 400,000 Cottagers and paupers 3.25 6.5 35,000 Common soldiers 2 14 25,000 Vagrants, as gypsies, thieves, beggars

As can be seen, agriculture is still the most common occupation.

Great houses now had a central dining chamber [saloon] for dining, with sets of lodgings [suites], usually for couples, around it. Each lodging had an ante-chamber and/or drawing room, and then a bedchamber, off of which there was a servant's room and a closet [cabinet]. No longer did personal servants bed down in the drawing room or outside their master's door or in a truckle bed at his feet. The servant's room was connected to a back staircase for use by servants. Secret guests also used it. The closet room was the innermost sanctum for privacy and gave its name to the later cabinet of the government.

There were fewer servants and they were of a lower social status than before. They were often sons of merchants, clergymen, and army officers. Gentlemen no longer advanced by service to a great man, but instead through grammar school and university education, commerce, the law, or the armed services. This change came about because the state now maintained reasonable law and order. There were more female servants, who were paid less to cook and to clean as well as doing laundry and nursing. Servants were kept more in the background, preferably out of sight. The elaborate ceremonial ritual with sewer, carver, and cupbearer was gone. A butler replaced the yeomen of the buttery, ewery, and pantry, and footmen began to wait on the table at which the lord, his lady, and other couples sat. Servants no longer had meals in the hall, which now had a grand staircase up to the dining chamber. The highest servants, the officers: clerk of the kitchen, clerk of the check [comptroller], head cook, butler, and groom of the chambers, and female housekeeper ate in the gentleman-of the-horse's room, although at a separate table. The kitchen staff ate in the kitchen. The footmen, underbutler, porters, coachmen, grooms, stable-boys, gardeners, maids ate in a servant's room. The steward was no longer the chief household officer, but had a room near the kitchen. The bulk of the servants slept in the basement or subordinate wings of the house.

Great houses of nobles had more rooms, such as a chapel, library, parlors, dressings rooms, and galleries; there was a variety of architectural floor plans. The structure of a noble household of an earl was as follows: The chief official was the receiver general. He had financial responsibility for the household and prepared accounts for the household and for the tenants' estates. These were checked by an auditor. The receiver general was often the son of a country gentleman and had a salary of 50 pounds raised to 100 pounds with longevity. He had a servant and an assistant. If married, he had a house on the property. There was perhaps an attorney on retainer (paid for a certain number of hours per week or month). The gentleman of the chamber [privy purse] kept the accounts of the family and bought them apparel and toiletries. He was in close personal attendance upon the earl. His salary was 20 pounds a year. Besides the receiver general and the gentleman of the chamber, the tutor and chaplain had the closest personal contact with the family. The lady had a gentlewoman with a maid servant. The receiver general supervised most of the staff. There was a steward of 40 pounds a year. He supervised a clerk of the kitchen and a house bailiff of 20 pounds a year. The bailiff had responsibility for the produce of the estate, e.g. the gardens, the deer park, and the fish ponds. Under the clerk of the kitchen was the cook man and kitchen boys, the latter of whom were clothed and fed but not paid. The steward also supervised the 4 pound yearly porters, who kept the gates; the watchmen outside; and the head housekeeper, usually a woman of 2 to 6 pounds yearly. She supervised the laundry maid and general maids, who spent much of their time sewing. The steward was also responsible for the wine cellar. A dozen footmen belonged partly to the house and partly to the stables and received 2 to 6 pounds yearly. They waited on the lord and lady in the house and accompanied them in travels and did errands for them. The gentleman of the horse supervised the stables, coach, dogs, kennels, and 16 pound yearly huntsman. Boy pages also worked partly in the house and partly in the stables. They were clothed and fed, but not paid. The head gardener received 80 pounds for tending the flowers, vegetables, and fruit trees. He had casual workers as needed to assist him. The steward was also responsible for the London house. Here there was a housekeeper, a watchman, and a 40 pound a year gardener, all there permanently. When the lord was there, bargemen were employed for his barge. The salaries for the family estate totaled about 600 pounds a year. Sometimes married sons' or daughters' families stayed for months at the family estate; then they would pay for their part of the food.

Well-to-do people drank imported tea and coffee, sometimes from porcelain ware, and usually after dinner or supper. Most tea leaves were brewed first for the family and guests and a second time for the servants; then they were given to the servants' relatives or friends. Queen Mary encouraged the fashion of collecting Chinese porcelain. The rich had red or black and gilt lacquered cabinets and cupboards. Oak gave way to walnut, with its variegated surfaces. There were grandfather clocks. Some fireplaces now had cast-iron firebacks. Stuffing began to be upholstered to woodwork benches. Chairs were taller in the back. Ladies did needlework to cover them and also made patchwork quilts. Cane seats came into fashion.

>From the spring of 1665 to the end of 1666 there was a Great Plague, mostly in London. It was the last and worst plague since the Black Death of 1348. It lasted over a year and about one-third died from it. Households with a plague victim were walled up with its residents inside to reduce contagion, and then marked with a red cross. Church bells tolling their requiems clanged in ceaseless discord. The mournful cry "bring out your dead" echoed in deserted streets. At night groups of people shoveled the corpses into open graves. To prepare for this revolting task, they often first became drunk out of their senses. People acquired wild beliefs in hope of avoiding the plague. For instance, at one time it was thought that syphilis would prevent it, so maddened hordes stormed the brothels. At another time, it was rumored that the plague could be burned out of the air, and all one day bonfires blazed outside every door and people sweltered in the heat. Other localities posted sentries on the road to keep Londoners out of their areas to prevent the plague from spreading there. Since sneezing was thought to be the first sign of a person getting the plague, it became common to ask God to bless a person who sneezed. In London, statistics were collected on the number of plague victims and their places of death to try to determine the cause of the plague by correlation, a new method. This was a natural sequent to merchant John Gaunt's 1662 book "Natural and Political Observations Made upon the Bills of Mortality", which compiled yearly vital statistics from which to analyze, for instance, causes of death due to particular diseases. It reached conclusions such as that fall was the most unhealthy season; females had longer life spans than males; and infant mortality was very high.

In 1666 a fire destroyed three-fourths of the City of London. The blazing buildings were so hot that people with leather buckets of water, hand squirts, and manually operated water-pumping machines could not get near them. There was a lot of noise from falling buildings. Panic and desperation were widespread. There was a lot of crying out and running about distractedly. People saved some of their possessions by burying them or removing them from the fire's path as they moved to different lodgings. The streets were full of carts piled high with furniture and merchandise. The Thames River was thick with heavily laden barges. Melting lead from St. Paul's church ran down the streets in a stream. The Tower of London, upwind of the fire, was saved by blowing up surrounding buildings. Eventually the wind abated and the fire was put out. A Fire Court with royal justices was created to offer settlement terms about property that were free, fair, fast, and final. Army tents and supplies, and soup kitchens sustained the citizens in the fields.

After the fire, buildings had to be brick or stone rather than wood, except for doors and windows. Also, more plaster and tile was used. All roofs had to be of tile or slate, rather than thatch. There was a general use of tile for roofing. About 1714, came slate for roofings. All buildings had to be at least two stories high, with flat facades rather than overhanging upper floors. They had to have wide brick walls around them to avoid the spread of fires. Many streets, squares, and alleys were professionally planned, after the example of Inigo Jones, who had continued his town planning with Lincoln's Inn field's open square surrounded by houses with iron balconies. Another example was Leiscester Square. Main streets had to be wide enough to stop a fire. The street selling that had caused so much congestion was removed to new market places. The massive rebuilding of London ended the monopoly of the building trade claimed by the Mason's Company. Astronomer and geometrician Christopher Wren designed and built a new St. Paul's Cathedral and many churches in London, thus becoming England's first architect. He worked up from a square base through all sorts of shapes to a circular double dome on top. The fire put an end to Whitehall as a royal residence and St. James Palace was used instead. But at least one fire hazard remained: the practice of lighting new fires by taking buckets of hot coals from one room or house to another. This was faster than the several minutes it took to use a tinder box to start a flame, i.e. striking a piece of flint upon a piece of steel making a spark which was dropped onto tinder and then blown upon. Matches were invented in this period, but expensive and unsafe.

Nicholas Barbon began fire insurance in the 1670s. If fire broke out on an insured premises, the insurance company's firemen would come with leather buckets and grappling irons, and later small hand pumps. Barbon also redeveloped many districts in London, tearing down old buildings without hesitation. He started the system of selling off leases to individual builders, who hoped to recover their building costs by selling their houses before they were completed and before substantial payments on the lease became due. Entrepreneurial master-builders subcontracted work to craftsmen and took a large profit or a large loss and debt. Aristocrats bought large parcels of land on which they built their own mansions surrounded by lots to be rented to building contractors and speculators like Barbon. The houses built on these lots were sold and the underlying land rented. These rentals of land made the mansions self-supporting. Barbon built rows of identical townhouses. Sometimes houses were built on all the lots around a square, which had gardens reserved for the use of those who lived on the square. Most of the new building was beyond the old City walls. Marine insurance for storms, shipwreck, piracy, mutiny, and enemy action was also initiated. Before the fire, e.g. in Tudor times, the writing of risks had been carried on as a sideline by merchants, bankers, and even money lenders in their private offices and was a private transaction between individuals.

London was residential and commercial. Around the outside were tenements of the poor. From 1520 to 1690, London's population had risen tenfold, while the nation's had only doubled. London went from 2% to 11% of the nation's population. In 1690, London's population was about half a million. After 1690, London's population grew at the same rate as the nation's. The first directory of addresses in London was published in 1677. Business began to follow the clock more strictly and many people thought of their watches as a necessity.

London coffee houses, which also sold wine, liquors, and meals, became specialty meeting places. They were quieter and cheaper than taverns; for a penny, one could sip a cup of coffee by the fire, read the newspapers, and engage in conversation. Merchants, stock jobbers, politician groups, soldiers, doctors and clergymen, scholars, and literary men all had special coffee house meeting places. Notices and letters of general interest were posted therein. Many merchants, brokers, and underwriters, especially those whose houses had been burned in the fire, conducted their business at their coffee house and used it as their business address. Men in marine insurance and shipping met at Lloyd's Coffeehouse, which was run by Edward Lloyd who established it for this purpose in 1687. Lloyd provided reliable shipping news with a network of correspondents in the principal ports at home and on the continent and circulated a handwritten sheet of lists of vessels and their latest movements at his coffeehouse. The patrons cheered safe arrivals and shared their grief over ships lost. They insured their own risks at one moment and underwrote those of their friends the next. Auctions of goods and of ships and ship materials which had been advertised in the newspapers were conducted from a pulpit in the coffeehouse.

French wine was consumed less because of heavy taxation and spirits and beer were consumed more. The streets were alive with taverns, coffee houses, eating houses, and hackney coaches past 9 p.m. at night. Coffee houses were suppressed by royal proclamation in 1675 because "malicious and scandalous reports" defaming his majesty's government were spread there, which disturbed the peace and quiet of the realm. But this provoked such an uproar that it was reduced to a responsibility of the owner to prevent scandalous papers and libels from being read and hindering any declarations any false and scandalous reports against the government or its ministers.

London air was filthy with smoke from coal burning. In 1684 the streets were lit with improved lights which combined oil lamps with lenses and reflectors. Groups of householders combined to hire lighting contractors to fulfill their statutory responsibility to hang candles or lights in some part of their houses near the street to light it for passengers until 9:00 p.m., and later to midnight. In 1694 a monopoly was sold to one lighting company. In 1663 a body of paid watchmen was established in London. An office of magistrate was created and filled with tradesmen and craftsmen, who could make a living from the fines and fees. This was to supplement the unpaid Justices of the Peace. The public was encouraged to assist in crime prevention, such as being witnesses, but most policing was left to the parishes. Crowds punished those who transgressed community moral standards, threatened their economic or social interests, or offended their religious or patriotic beliefs. Often a crowd would react before the call of "stop thief" or the hue and cry from the local constable. Pickpockets would be drenched under a pump. Cheats would be beaten up. Dishonest shops and brothels would be ransacked or destroyed. The most common targets were promiscuous women and pregnant servants.

There were many highway robberies and mob actions in London. Mobs in the thousands would turn out against the Catholics, especially at times of unemployment and trade depression. Working people still saw demonstrations and violence as the best way to achieve their economic goals, since strikes didn't work. For example, the silk workers used street violence to get protective legislation against imports and mechanization in 1675. The manufacture of silk material had been brought to England by French workers driven from France. In 1697, three thousand London silk weavers demonstrated outside the Commons and East India House against the importation of raw silks by the East India Co., and a couple months later, they attacked a house in the city owned by a gentleman of the company. In 1701, heavy duties were imposed on the import of Indian silks and wearing of Indian silks was prohibited by statute. Sometimes mobs would break open the prisons to release fellow rioters or take action against strike breakers or informers. Parish constables elected by their neighbors could not control the mobs and stayed within their parishes. Dueling was still prevalent, even though against the law.

In London and Westminster, it was hard to enforce the requirement that inhabitants keep the street in front of their house clean and store the filth until the daily raker or scavenger came with cart and dung pot. So a commission was made responsible for paving and keeping clean the streets, making and repairing vaults, sewers, drains, and gutters, and removing encroachments. It compensated those with encroachments of over 30 years. It assessed inhabitants of such streets 16d. per square yard from the front of their building to the center of the street. Women continued to empty their pails and pans outside their doors and did their washing on stools in the streets. There was a penalty of 5d. for throwing filth in front of one's house, and 20d. for throwing it elsewhere in the streets. Scavengers and rakers could lodge their coal ashes, dust, dirt, and other filth in such vacant public places as the commission deemed convenient for accommodating country carts returning otherwise empty after their loads were sold.

However, this system did not work because people would not pay their assessments. So there was a return to the former system of requiring citizens to sweep and clean the streets in front of their buildings twice a week and keep the filth until a scavenger or raker came. The penalty for not doing so was 3s.4d., later raised to 10s. Any one throwing coal ashes, dust, dirt, rubbish, or dung onto the streets or lanes incurred a fine of 5s. There was a fine of 20s. for hooping or washing any pipes or barrels in any lane or open passage or repairing coaches, sawing wood, or chiseling stones in the streets. Pigs kept in or about one's house had to be forfeited.

One way that people traveled was to be carried in sedan chairs held up by two horizontal poles with one man at the front ends and another man in back. There were so many sedan chairs and coaches for hire in London that the watermen lost business. All hackney coaches in London or Westminster were required to be licensed and marked with their owner's distinctive mark so that complaints could be made. Their maximum rate was 10s. for a 12 hour day, and 18d. for the first hour and 12d. for every hour thereafter. Licensed coachmen were not allowed to practice any other trade. The coaches paid the commission 5 pounds yearly. Hay sold along the road brought 6d. per load, and straw 2d. per load, to the commission. There had to by paid 3d. for every cart load of hay sold at the hay market and 1d. for every cart of straw, to go towards paving and repairing the hay market street. Overall, agriculture improved. Fields that would have been left fallow were planted with new crops which restored indispensable chemical elements to the soil. At the same time, they supplied winter food for stock. The size and weight of animals for slaughter grew. There was so much stock breeding that it was more economical for a family to buy meat, milk, and eggs, than to maintain its own animals. There was an explosion in the growing of beans, peas, lettuce, asparagus, artichokes, and clover. The demand for food in London and other urban areas made enclosure for crop cultivation even more profitable than for sheep grazing. The government made no more attempts to curtail the enclosure of farm lands. The number of enclosures grew because copyholders were not successful in obtaining the legal security of tenure. But most land was not enclosed.