From Chapter 8:
All's well that ends well; but one cannot help wondering what kind of tobacco it was that the Birmingham tradesman used, a half pipeful of which had such a deadly effect—but perhaps the effect was due to the salt, not to the tobacco.
In the year after that which witnessed Coleridge's adventure, i.e. in 1796, a tobacco-box with a history was the subject of a legal decision. This box, made of common horn and small enough to be carried in the pocket, was bought for fourpence by an overseer of the poor in the time of Queen Anne, and was presented by him in 1713 to the Society of Past Overseers of the parish of St. Margaret, Westminster. In 1720 the Society, in memory of the donor, ornamented the lid with a silver rim; and at intervals thereafter additions were made to an extraordinary extent to the box and its casings. Hogarth engraved within the lid in 1746 a bust of the victor of Culloden. Gradually the horn box was enshrined within one case after another—usually silver lined with velvet—each case bearing inscribed plates commemorating persons or events. A Past Overseer who detained the box in 1793 had to give it back after three years of litigation. A case of octagon shape records the triumph of Justice, and Lord Chancellor Loughborough pronouncing his decree for the restitution of the box on March 5, 1796. In later days many and various additions have been made to the many coverings of the box, recording public events of interest.

From Chapter 15:
Shop-signs were one of the most conspicuous features of the streets of old London. In days when the numbering of houses was unknown, the use of signs was indispensable for identification; and greatly must they have contributed to the quaint and picturesque appearance of the streets. Some projected far over the narrow roadway—competition to attract attention and custom is no modern novelty—some were fastened to posts or pillars in front of the houses. By the time of Charles II the overhanging signs had become a nuisance and a danger, and in the seventh year of that King's reign an Act was passed providing that no sign should hang across the street, but that all should be fixed to the balconies or fronts or sides of houses. This Act was not strictly obeyed; and large numbers of signs were hung over the doors, while many others were affixed to the fronts of the houses. Eventually, in the second half of the eighteenth century, signs gradually disappeared and the streets were numbered. There were occasional survivals which are to be found to this day, such as the barber's pole, accompanied sometimes by the brass basin of the barber-surgeon, the glorified canister of a grocer or the golden leg of a hosier; and inn signs have never failed us; but by the close of the eighteenth century most of the old trade signs which flaunted themselves in the streets had disappeared.