Besides the standing Watches, all in bright Harness, in every Ward and Street in this City and Suburbs, there was also a marching Watch, that passed through the principal Streets thereof, to wit, from the Little Conduit by Paul’s Gate through West Cheap, by the Stocks, through Cornhill (etc., etc.), to Aldgate and up Grasse Church Street into Cornhill, and through into West Cheap again, and so broke up. The whole Way (measured) ... 3200 Taylors Yards of Assize. For the Furniture whereof with Lights, there were appointed 700 Cressets, 500 of them being formed by the Companies, the other 200 by the Chamber of London. Besides the which Lights, every Constable in London, in number more than 240 had his Cresset ... and every Cresset had two Men, one to bear or hold it, another to bear a Bag with Light, and to serve it: so that the Poor Men pertaining to the Cressets taking Wages, besides that everyone had a Strawen Hat, with a Badge painted, and his Breakfast, amounted in number to almost 2000. The Marching Watch contained in number about 2000 Men; part of them being old Soldiers, of skill to be Captains, etc., ... Drummers, Demi-launces on great Horses, Gunners with hand Guns, ... Archers in Coats of white Fustian, signed on the Breast and Back with the Arms of the City, their Bows bent in their Hands, with Sheafs of Arrows by their Sides, Pikemen in bright Corselets, ... Bellmen in Almain Rivets, and Aprons of Mail in great Number.
There were also divers Pageants, Morris Dancers, Constables, the one half of which was 120, on St. John’s Eve, the other half on St. Peter’s Eve, in bright Harness, some over Gilt, and every one a Jornet of Scarlet thereupon, and a Chain of Gold, his Hench Men following him, his Minstrels before him, and his Cornet Light passing by him: the Waits of the City, the Maior’s Officers, for his Guard before him, all in a Livery of Worsted or Sea Jackets, party-coloured; the Maior himself, well mounted on Horseback, the Sword Bearer before him in fair Armour, well mounted also; the Maior’s Foot Men, and the like Torch Bearers about him; Hench Men twain, upon great Stirring Horses following him.
In the Month of August, about the Feast of S. Bartholomew the Apostle, before the Lord Maior, Aldermen and Sheriffs of London, placed in a large Tent near unto Clerkenwell, of old time were divers Days spent in the Pastime of Wrestling; where the Officers of the City, namely the Sheriffs, Sergeants and Yeomen, the Porters of the King’s Beam, or Weigh House (now no such Men) and other of the City, were challengers of all Men in the Suburbs, to wrestle for Games appointed. And on other Days, before the said Maior, Aldermen and Sheriffs, in Finsbury Field to shoot the Standard, broad Arrow and flight, for Games. But now of late Years, the wrestling is only practised on Bartholomew Day in the Afternoon, and the Shooting some three or four Days after, in one Afternoon and no more.