them, wrote a song in praise of Norman, two lines of which
are quoted by Fabyan in his "Chronicles;" and Dr. Rimbault, an eminent
musical antiquary, thinks he has found the original tune in John
Hilton's "Catch That, Catch Can" (1658).

The deeds of Sir Stephen Forster, Fishmonger, and mayor 1454 (Henry
VI.), who by his will left money to rebuild Newgate, we have mentioned
elsewhere (p. 224). Sir Godfrey Boleine, Lord Mayor, 1457 (Henry VI.),
was grandfather to Thomas, Earl of Wiltshire, the grandfather of Queen
Elizabeth. He was a mercer in the Old Jewry, and left by his will L1,000
to the poor householders of London, and L2,000 to the poor householders
in Norfolk (his native county), besides large legacies to the London
prisons, lazar-houses, and hospitals. Such were the citizens, from whom
half our aristocracy has sprung. Sir Godfrey Fielding, a mercer in Milk
Street, Lord Mayor in 1452 (Henry VI.), was the ancestor of the Earls of
Denbigh, and a privy councillor of the king.

In Edward IV.'s reign, when the Lancastrians, under the bastard
Falconbridge, stormed the City in two places, but were eventually
bravely repulsed by the citizens, Edward, in gratitude, knighted the
mayor, Sir John Stockton, and twelve of the aldermen. In 1479 (the same
reign) Bartholomew James (Draper) had Sheriff Bayfield fined L50 (about
L1,000 of our money) for kneeling too close to him while at prayers in
St. Paul's, and for reviling him when complained of. There was a
pestilence raging at the time, and the mayor was afraid of contagion.
The money went, we presume, to build ten City conduits, then much
wanted. The Lord Mayor in 1462, Sir Thomas Coke (Draper), ancestor of
Lord Bacon, Earl Fitzwilliam, the Marquis of Salisbury, and Viscount
Cranbourne, being a Lancastrian, suffered much from the rapacious
tyranny of Edward IV. The very year he was made Knight of the Bath, Coke
was sent to the Bread Street Compter, afterwards to the Bench, and
illegally fined L8,000 to the king and L800 to the queen. Two aldermen
also had their goods seized, and were fined 4,000 marks. In 1473 this
greedy king sent to Sir William Hampton, Lord Mayor, to extort
benevolences, or subsidies. The mayor gave L30, the aldermen twenty
marks, the poorer persons L10 each. In 1481, King Edward sent the mayor,
William Herriot (Draper), for the good he had done to trade, two harts,
six bucks, and a tun of wine, for a banquet to the lady mayoress and the
aldermen's wives