British Commonwealth of Nations: Proud Fishmongers

To Billingsgate Market, London, the indigenous home of “Billingsgate,”* there came last week His Royal Highness Prince Albert Frederick Arthur George, Duke of York, second son to George V, R. I.

The Prime Warden of the Billingsgate Fishmongers Co., an institution which nourished in the days of Robert Bruce (three centuries before the birth of Shakespeare), proudly conducted the Duke of York to Fishmongers Hall.

There the Duke was entertained at luncheon, was made an honorary fishmonger. Responding to the royal toast he said: “My brother, the Prince of Wales, and I represent the fourth generation who have been members of the Fishmongers Company, and I earnestly hope that it will be my good fortune to see my daughter represent the fifth.”

Lusty fishmongers cheered, recalling that the newborn Duchess (TIME, May 3) had her name officially registered as “Elizabeth Alexandra Mary” last week. Despatches announced that at her subsequent state christening she would wear the iace christening robe donned in infancy by George V and Edward of Wales.

† British colloquialism for gutter slang and plebeian profanity.