Behold me, then, in the beginning of the year 1747 in the Service of his Sacred Majesty King George the Second. Behold me, further, installed in no common Barrack, mean Guard-house, or paltry Garrison Town, but in one of the most famous of his Majesty's Royal Fortresses:--a place that had been at once and for centuries (ever since the days of Julius Cæsar, as I am told) a Palace, a Citadel, and a Prison. In good sooth, I was one of the King's Warders, and the place where I was stationed was the Ancient and Honourable Tower of London.
Whether I had ever worn the King's uniform before, either in scarlet as a Soldier in his armies, or of blue and tarpaulin as a Sailor in his Fleets, or of brown as a Riding Officer in his customs,--under which guise a man may often have doughty encounters with smugglers that are trying to run their contraband cargoes, or to hide their goods in farmers' houses,--or of green, as a Keeper in one of the Royal Chases,--I absolutely refuse to say. Here I am, or rather here I was, a Warder and in the Tower.
I was bravely accoutred. A doublet of crimson cloth, with the crown, the Royal Cipher G. R., and a wreath of laurel embroidered in gold, both on its back and front; a linen ruff, well plaited, round my neck, sleeves puffed with black velvet, trunk-hose of scarlet, rosettes in my slashed shoes, and a flat hat with a border of the red and white roses of York and Lancaster in satin ribbon,--these made up my costume. There were forty of us in the Tower, mounting guard with drawn swords at the portcullis gate and at the entrances to the lodgings of such as were in hold, and otherwise attending upon unfortunate noblemen and gentlemen who were in trouble. On state occasions, when taking prisoners by water from the Tower to Westminster, and in preceding the Lieutenant to the outward port, we carried Halberts or Partisans with tassels of gold and crimson thread. But although our dress was identical, as you may see from the prints, with that of the Beef-Eaters, we Tower Warders were of a very different kidney to the lazy hangers-on about St. James's. Those fellows were Anybodies, Parasites of Back-Stairs favourites, and spies and lacqueys, transformed serving-men, butlers past drawing corks, grooms and porters, even. They had nothing to do but loiter about the antechambers and staircases of St. James's, to walk by the side of his Majesty's coach when he went to the Houses of Parliament, or to fight with the Marshalmen at Royal Funerals for petty spoils of wax-candles or shreds of black hangings. The knaves actually wore wigs, and powdered them, as though they had been so many danglers on the Mall. They passed their time, when not in requisition about the Court, smoking and card-playing in the taverns and mug-houses about Scotland Yard and Spring Gardens. They had the run of a few servant-wenches belonging to great people, but we did not envy them their sweethearts. Some of them, I verily believe, were sunk so low as, when they were not masquerading at court, to become tavern-drawers, or ushers and cryers in the courts of law about Westminster. A very mean people were these Beef-eaters, and they toiled not, neither did they spin, for the collops they ate.