The Mysteries of the Court of London — page 81: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

60 THE COURT OF LONDON This individual, we need scarcely observe, was the land- lord of the Beggar’s Staff; and though his name was in reality Stephen Price, as proved by the inscription on the sign in front of the house, his customers invariably denom- inated him “‘ the Big Beggarman.”’ He was assisted in his occupation at the bar by his daugh- ter, 2 young woman of eighteen or nineteen, and whose forbidding features contrasted strangely in their vixenish sharpness with the coarse and bloated countenance of her sire. She was dressed in a very slovenly manner; her flam- ing red hair was in such disorder that it looked for all the world as if she had been creeping through a bush, and her face and hands appeared to have had a desperate quarrel with soap and cut it accordingly. Her gown was open in front, displaying her scraggy neck and chest, for she was as flat in respect to bosom as one of the opposite sex. Her Christian name was properly Mary; but the sobriquet by which she was commonly known was either “ Carrotty Poll,” or plain ‘Carrots.’ - The wall behind the bar was arranged with shelves, whereon stood a variety of drinking vessels, bottles of ardent spirits, jars of tobacco, and plates and dishes, these last being for the accommodation of those customers who cooked their own meals at the huge fire blazing in the grate. Within the bar, and raised upon trestles of rough-hewn timber, were two vast barrels, one of porter, the other of ale; for the apparatus whereby malt liquor could be drawn from the cellar into the bar was not as yet invented. Over the little door which has already been mentioned as leading into the parlour was painted, or rather scrawled with a paint-brush, the ensuing doggerel: ‘¢ All them as comes to ask for beer, Must tip the ready rhino here: For pipes and bakker please to pay Afore you takes the things away ; — For bingo and blue ruin too Naught but the stumpy down will do: Short reckoning makes long-standing friends — While tick in strife and trouble ends. And when you go, I hope you'll not Walk off with glass or pewter pot.” Connicooolks