s a means of support.
There is a police also now, that exercises a strict vigilance over
beggars and vagabonds, and the passport is indispensable for ordinary
travellers. Constables are visible in the streets, and watch
the public-houses. At night a fire watchman is posted near the
council-house, and the warders of the towers by means of flags and
large speaking trumpets, give danger signals. The engine-house is also
kept in good order; clumsy fire-barrels stand beside the council-house
under open sheds, and above them hang the iron-cased fire-ladders. The
night watch are tolerably watchful and discreet; after the great war
they here and there sang offensive verses, when they called out the
hours, but now the pious parson has insisted upon both words and melody
being spiritual.

The artisan continues to work in the old way, each one adheres steadily
to his guild; the painters also are incorporated, and execute as a
masterpiece a crucifixion with the usual number of prescribed figures.
In the Roman Catholic districts they live by very moderate performances
of the pictures of the saints; in the Protestant, they paint shields
and targets, and the coats of arms of the sovereigns, which are to be
seen in numbers on public buildings and over the doors of artisans.
Most of the artisans adhere strictly to their old customs, and
especially to their guild rights. Any one who enters the guild not
according to artisan law, is treated as a bungler, and persecuted with
a hatred, the intention of which is to exclude him from their society.
Serious business is still transacted in front of the open shops;
apprentices are taken, fellows receive the freedom, quarrels are
accommodated, and the formula "By your kind permission," which
introduces every speech, sounds unceasingly at all the meetings of the
masters and the fellows; but the old colloquies and sayings of the
middle ages are only half understood, rough jests have been introduced,
and the better class already begin not to attach much value to the
guild; indeed there are those who consider the old constitution of the
guild as a burden, because it stubbornly resists their endeavours to
enlarge their manufacturing activity; such was the case with the
clothmakers and iron-workers. And the jovial annual feasts which were
once the joy and pride of almost every artisan have nearly ceased. The
processions in masks, and the old peculiar dances, are incompatible
with the culture of a time