OUR GRANDFATHERS.

Te Aroha News, Volume IV, Issue 165, 14 August 1886, Page 5

OUR GRANDFATHERS.

Mr John Aehton has issued a book which may be best described as a social sketch of the first decado of the present century.

Gas and. Matches. We owo tho introduction of gas into London to a German named Winzer, who Anglicised his name into Wiuzor. He took out a patent in ISO 4 ; but it was not till ISIO that the Ga3 Light and Coke Company obtained their character. In 1805, according to the " Morning Post," the shop of Lardner and Co , at the corner, of the Albany, in Piccadilly, was first illuminated with gap, and in 1810 Ackerman's picture shop,in the Strand, was illuminated in the same »way. We may add that not long after the grandfather of the present writer, a plumber in Shoreditch, lib hia shop with coal gas, and thereby attracted vast crowds to see the novel eight. To obtain a light the tinderbox was used — a flat, round box of iron, containing charred rag. A piece of flint waa struck by a piece, of steel over the box till a spark ignited the tinder, which in turn ignited a splint of wood tipped with sulphur. About 180S, however, the phosphorus match was beginning to be known, and in the "Morning Post " of December 27 of that year it is announced that " the success of the Instantaneous Light and Fire Machines daily increases, and the manufactory in Frith street, Soho, has become now the daily resort of persons of the first fashion and consequence in town, who express themselves highly gratified with the utility and ingenuity of these philosophical curiosities."

The Selling of Wives. Mr Aahton gives several newspaper quotations showing that wife-selling was not an uncommon practice. In 1302 a man at Chapel-en-le-Frifch sold his wife, child, and BOine furniture for eleven shillings. The same year a Hereford butcher gold his wife by auction for twenty-four shillings 1 and a bowl of punch. In 1806 a man exposed his wife for sale in the market at Hull with a halter round her neck, and she was purchased for twenty guineas. At Knaresborough in the following year a man disposed of his wife in a similar manner for sixpence and a quid of tobacco. At Sheffield a little while before a fellow sold his wife as a cow in the Market place. "What do you ask for your cow ?" eaid a bystander. "A guinea," replied the husband. . " Done !" cried the other, and im« | mediately led away his bargain.

Suicides. . Here is an extract from the "Morning Post," April 27, 1810:— "The officers appointed to execute the ceremony of driving a. stake' through the dead body of' James Cowling, a deserter from the London Militia, who deprived himself of existence i by cutting his throat at a public-house in. Gilbert street, Clare Market,*in consequence of which a coroner's jury found a verdict of • Self njurder '. very properly delayed>?thq business until 12 o'clock on Wednesday nigh^ when the deceased was buried in the cross roads at the end of Blackmoor-street, Clare Market. '^ This superstitious practice had its origin in the idea that the ghost of, the suicide . would thus be prevented „ from, wandering about. ' ■ The, last London Buxeida buried at a cross road was a man namejj Gritffihs,f who was interred, in 18?3, at^thoi, junction, of, Eaton, street and the King's Road. Mr Aehton's book abounds with > gossip ' of this' kind : and , presents a) very vivid picture of life in -Londoh 80 v yfcara ago. ■ ' ' " f- ■ ' '"'