Letter No. 28. Monday, April 2, 1711. Addison.
'... Neque semper arcum
Tendit Apollo.'
Hor.
I shall here present my Reader with a Letter from a Projector, concerning a new Office which he thinks may very much contribute to the Embellishment of the City, and to the driving Barbarity out of our Streets. [I consider it as a Satyr upon Projectors in general, and a lively Picture of the whole Art of Modern Criticism. [1]]
SIR,
'Observing that you have Thoughts of creating certain Officers under
you for the Inspection of several petty Enormities which you your self
cannot attend to; and finding daily Absurdities hung out upon the
Sign-Posts of this City, [2] to the great Scandal of Foreigners, as
well as those of our own Country, who are curious Spectators of the
same: I do humbly propose, that you would be pleased to make me your
Superintendant of all such Figures and Devices, as are or shall be
made use of on this Occasion; with full Powers to rectify or expunge
whatever I shall find irregular or defective. For want of such an
Officer, there is nothing like sound Literature and good Sense to be
met with in those Objects, that are everywhere thrusting themselves
out to the Eye, and endeavouring to become visible. Our streets are
filled with blue Boars, black Swans, and red Lions; not to mention
flying Pigs, and Hogs in Armour, with many other Creatures more
extraordinary than any in the desarts of Africk. Strange! that one
who has all the Birds and Beasts in Nature to chuse out of, should
live at the Sign of an Ens Rationis!
My first Task, therefore, should be, like that of Hercules, to clear
the City from Monsters. In the second Place, I would forbid, that
Creatures of jarring and incongruous Natures should be joined together
in the same Sign; such as the Bell and the Neats-tongue, the Dog and
Gridiron. The Fox and Goose may be supposed to have met, but what has
the Fox and the Seven Stars to do together? and when did the Lamb [3]
and Dolphin ever meet, except upon a Sign-Post? As for the Cat and
Fiddle, there is a Conceit in it, and therefore, I do not intend that
anything I have here said should affect it. I must however observe to
you upon this Subject, that it is usual for a young Tradesman, at his
first setting up, to add to his own Sign that of the Master whom he
serv'd; as the Husband, after Marriage, gives a Place to his
Mistress's Arms in his own Coat. This I take to have given Rise to
many of those Absurdities which are committed over our Heads, and, as
I am inform'd, first occasioned the three Nuns and a Hare, which we
see so frequently joined together. I would, therefore, establish
certain Rules, for the determining how far one Tradesman may give
the Sign of another, and in what Cases he may be allowed to quarter it
with his own.
In the third place, I would enjoin every Shop to make use of a Sign
which bears some Affinity to the Wares in which it deals. What can be
more inconsistent, than to see a Bawd at the Sign of the Angel, or a
Taylor at the Lion? A Cook should not live at the Boot, nor a
Shoemaker at the roasted Pig; and yet, for want of this Regulation, I
have seen a Goat set up before the Door of a Perfumer, and the French
King's Head at a Sword-Cutler's.
An ingenious Foreigner observes, that several of those Gentlemen who