l the windows facing the street stood open, and there
was no lack of distinguished spectators. To quote Nicols:

Kings, great peers, and many a noble dame,
Whose bright, pearl-glittering robes did mock the flame
Of the night's burning lights, did sit to see
How every senator, in his degree,
Adorn'd with shining gold and purple weeds,
And stately mounted on rich trapped steed,
Their guard attending, through the streets did ride
Before their foot-bands, graced with glittering pride
Of rich gilt arms, whose glory did present
A sunshine to the eye, as if it meant
Amongst the cresset lights shot up on high
To chase dark night for ever from the sky.

By the Setting of the Watch on Midsummer Eve appears to have been meant
the stationing of these armed guards in various parts of the City, which
they were to secure from harm on that night only. In the thirty-first
year of his reign Henry VIII. abolished the Marching Watch, and
substituted for it a permanent watch maintained out of the funds which
had previously gone to support the great annual pageant. For harnessed
constables Londoners now had watchmen equipped with lanthorn and
halberd, whose duty it was to call upon the sleeping citizens to hang
out their lights, as required on dark wintry nights:

Lanthorn and a whole candle light.
Hang out your lights! Hear!

The next thing to be added was a bell. This institution was not popular
with all; and Dekker, satirically expressing the feeling of the
malcontents, defined the bell as "the child of darkness, a common
night-walker, a man that had no man to wait upon him, but only a dog;
one that was a disordered person, and at midnight would beat at men's
doors, bidding them (in mere mockery) to look to their candles, when
they themselves were in their dead sleeps."

Milton, on the other hand, makes grateful mention of the salutation as a
lullaby and prophylactic:

Far from all resort of mirth,
Save the cricket on the hearth
Or the bellman's drowsy charm
To bless the doors from nightly harm.

Having said something of the means employed to prevent crime and arrest
criminals, we must go on to refer to the punishments in vogue in the
event of conviction. And here it may be observed that, among other
interferences with commerce and the liberty of the subject, hostelers
were not allowed to make either bread or beer. The former they were
compelled by public enactment to buy from the baker, an