John Timbs

“ Baronets who date from the Conquest, and squires of every degree, care nothing for the unassuming character of the 'kitchen,' if the steak be hot and good, if it can be quickly and conveniently dispatched, and the tinkle of the division-bell can be heard while the dinner proceeds. Call England a proud nation, forsooth! Say that the House of Commons is aristocratic! Both the nation and its representatives must be, and are, unquestionable patterns of republican humility, if all the pomp and circumstance of dining can be forgotten in Bellamy's kitchen! ”

“ I think myself obliged to acquaint the publick, that the Lion's Head, of which I advertised them about a fortnight ago, is now erected at Button's Coffee-house, in Russell-street, Covent Garden, where it opens its mouth at all hours for the reception of such intelligence as shall be thrown into it. It is reckoned an excellent piece of workmanship, and was designed by a great hand in imitation of the antique Egyptian lion, the face of it being compounded out of that of a lion and a wizard. The features are strong and well furrowed. The whiskers are admired by all that have seen them. ”

“ Offley's, however, declined: the singing was discontinued; Time had thinned the ranks and groups of the bright and buoyant; the large room was mostly frequented by quiet, orderly persons, who kept good hours; the theatre-suppers grew few and far between; the merry old host departed,—when it was proposed to have his portrait painted—but in vain; success had ebbed away, and at length the house was closed. ”

“ Close to Tower-hill, and not far from the site of the Rose tavern, is a small tavern, or public-house, which received its sign in commemoration of the convivial eccentricities of an Emperor, one of the most extraordinary characters that ever appeared on the great theatre of the world—"who gave a polish to his nation and was himself a savage." ”

“ Every profession, trade, class, party, had its favourite Coffee-house. The lawyers discussed law or literature, criticized the last new play, or retailed the freshest Westminster Hall "bite" 37 at Nando's or the Grecian, both close on the purlieus of the Temple. Here the young bloods of the Inns-of-Court paraded their Indian gowns and lace caps of a morning, and swaggered in their lace coats and Mechlin ruffles at night, after the theatre. ”

“ Locket's, in Gerard-street, Soho, and Pontac's, were the fashionable taverns where the young and gay met to dine: and White's and other chocolate houses seem to have been the resort of the same company in the morning. Three o'clock, or at latest four, was the dining-hour of the most fashionable persons in London, for in the country no such late hours had been adopted. In London, therefore, soon after six, the men began to assemble at the coffee-house they frequented if they were not setting in for hard drinking, which seems to have been much less indulged in private houses than in taverns. ”

“ Whoever wished to find a gentleman commonly asked, not where he resided, but which coffee-house he frequented. No decently attired idler was excluded, provided he laid down his penny at the bar; but this he could seldom do without struggling through the crowd of beaux who fluttered round the lovely bar-maid. Here the proud nobleman or country squire was not to be distinguished from the genteel thief and daring highwayman. "Pray, sir," says Aimwell to Gibbet, in Farquhar's Beaux Stratagem, "ha'n't I seen your face at Will's Coffee-house?" ”

“ They show us how the tavern was the great focus of news long before the newspaper fully supplied the intellectual want. Much of the business of early times was transacted in taverns, and it is to some extent in the present day. According to the age, the tavern reflects the manners, the social tastes, customs, and recreations; and there, in days when travelling was difficult and costly, and not unattended with danger, the traveller told his wondrous tale to many an eager listener; and the man who rarely strayed beyond his own parish, was thus made acquainted with the life of the world. ”

“ One night, Garrick and Foote were about to leave the Bedford together, when the latter, in paying the bill, dropped a guinea; and not finding it at once, said, "Where on earth can it be gone to?"—"Gone to the devil, I think," replied Garrick, who had assisted in the search.—"Well said, David!" was Foote's reply; "let you alone for making a guinea go further than anybody else."
Churchill's quarrel with Hogarth began at the shilling rubber club, in the parlour of the Bedford; when Hogarth used some very insulting language towards Churchill, who resented it in the Epistle. ”

“ This noted tavern, of our day, enjoyed great and deserved celebrity, though short-lived. It was No. 23, on the south side of Henrietta-street, Covent Garden, and its fame rested upon Burton ale, and the largest supper-room in this theatrical neighbourhood; with no pictures, placards, paper-hangings, or vulgar coffee-room finery, to disturb one's relish of the good things there provided. Offley, the proprietor, was originally at Bellamy's, and "as such, was privileged to watch, and occasionally admitted to assist, the presiding priestess of the gridiron at the exercise of her mysteries." ”

“ Offley's chop was thick and substantial; the House of Commons' chop was small and thin, and honourable Members sometimes ate a dozen at a sitting. Offley's chop was served with shalots shred, and warmed in gravy, and accompanied by nips of Burton ale, and was a delicious after-theatre supper. The large room at that hour was generally crowded with a higher class of men than are to be seen in taverns of the present day. There was excellent dining up-stairs, with wines really worth drinking—all with a sort of Quakerly plainness, but solid comfort. ”

“ Ward describes the barmaid as "all ribbon, lace, and feathers, and making such a noise with her bell and her tongue together, that had half-a-dozen paper-mills been at work within three yards of her, they'd have signified no more to her clamorous voice than so many lutes to a drum, which alarmed two or three nimble fellows aloft, who shot themselves downstairs with as much celerity as a mountebank's mercury upon a rope from the top of a church-steeple, every one charged with a mouthful of coming, coming, coming." ”

“ By joining you in discourse, by admiring what you say, by an officiousness to wait upon you, and to assist you in anything you want to have or know, they insinuate themselves into the company and acquaintance of strangers, whom they watch every opportunity of fleecing. And if one finds in you the least inclination to cards, dice, the billiard-table, bowling-green, or any other sort of gaming, you are morally sure of being taken in. ”

“ Here, likewise, we find this redeeming picture:—"The members of the little coterie, who take the dark corner under the clock, have for years visited this house; they number two or three old, steady merchants, a solicitor, and a gentleman who almost devotes the whole of his time and talents to philanthropic objects,—for instance, the getting up of a Ball for Shipwrecked Mariners and their families; or the organization of a Dinner for the benefit of the Distressed Needlewomen of the Metropolis; they are a very quiet party, and enjoy the privilege of their séance, uninterrupted by visitors." ”

“ At two, we generally go to dinner; ordinaries are not so common here as abroad, yet the French have set up two or three good ones for the convenience of foreigners in Suffolk-street, where one is tolerably well served; but the general way here is to make a party at the Coffee-house to go to dine at the tavern, where we sit till six, when we go to the play; except you are invited to the table of some great man, which strangers are always courted to, and nobly entertained. ”

“ Squire's was one of the receiving-houses of the Spectator: in No. 269, January 8, 1711-1712, he accepts Sir Roger de Coverley's invitation to "smoke a pipe with him over a dish of coffee at Squire's. As I love the old man, I take delight in complying with everything that is agreeable to him, and accordingly waited on him to the Coffee-house, where his venerable figure drew upon us the eyes of the whole room. ”

“ Spring Garden is named from its water-spring or fountain, set playing by the spectator treading upon its hidden machinery—an eccentricity of the Elizabethan garden. Spring Garden, by a patent which is extant, in 1630 was made a bowling-green by command of Charles I. "There was kept in it an ordinary of six shillings a meal (when the king's proclamation allows but two elsewhere) ; continual bibbing and drinking wine all day under the trees; two or three quarrels every week. ”

“ In the first number of the Tatler, Poetry is promised under the article of Will's Coffee-house. The place, however, changed after Dryden's time: "you used to see songs, epigrams, and satires in the hands of every man you met; you have now only a pack of cards; and instead of the cavils about the turn of the expression, the elegance of the style, and the like, the learned now dispute only about the truth of the game." "In old times, we used to sit upon a play here, after it was acted, but now the entertainment's turned another way." ”

“ A stranger or foreigner should particularly frequent the Coffee-houses in London. These are very numerous in every part of the town; will give him the best insight into the different characters of the people, and the justest notion of the inhabitants in general, of all the houses of public resort these are the least dangerous. Yet, some of these are not entirely free from sharpers. The deceivers of this denomination are generally descended from families of some repute, have had the groundwork of a genteel education, and are capable of making a tolerable appearance. ”

“ In those days a man could not go from the Rose Tavern to the Piazza once, but he must venture his life twice."
Women of a certain freedom of character frequented taverns at the commencement of the last century, and the Rose, doubtless, resembled the box-lobby of a theatre. ”

“ Cibber, in a letter to Pope, says:—"When you used to pass your hours at Button's, you were even there remarkable for your satirical itch of provocation; scarce was there a gentleman of any pretension to wit, whom your unguarded temper had not fallen upon in some biting epigram, among which you once caught a pastoral Tartar, whose resentment, that your punishment might be proportionate to the smart of your poetry, had stuck up a birchen rod in the room, to be ready whenever you might come within reach of it ”

“ Burn, the rainbow does not occur on any other tradesman's token. The house was let off into tenements: books were printed here at this very time "for Samuel Speed, at the sign of the Rainbow, near the Inner Temple Gate, in Fleet-street." The Phoenix Fire Office was established here about 1682. Hatton, in 1708, evidently attributed Farr's nuisance to the coffee itself saying: "Who would have thought London would ever have had three thousand such nuisances, and that coffee would have been (as now) so much drank by the best of quality, and physicians?" ”

“ Strype describes the Rents, or court, as running up to Gray's-Inn, "into which it has an entrance through the gate; a place of good resort, and taken up by coffee-houses, ale-houses, and houses of entertainment, by reason of its vicinity to Gray's-Inn. On the east side is a handsome open place, with a handsome freestone pavement, and better built, and inhabited by private house-keepers. At the upper end of this court is a passage into the Castle Tavern, a house of considerable trade, as is the Golden Griffin Tavern, on the West side." ”

“ The custom of placing a Bush at Tavern doors has already been noticed; we add a few notes:—In the preface to the Law of Drinking, keeping a public-house is called the trade of the ivy-bush: the bush was a sign so very general, that probably from thence arose the proverb "good wine needs no bush," or indication as to where it was sold. In Good Newes and Bad Newes, 1622, a host says:—
"I rather will take down my bush and sign
Than live by means of riotous expense." ”

“ The Apollo Club, at the Devil Tavern, is kept in remembrance by Apollo Court, in Fleet-street, nearly opposite; next door eastward of which is an old tavern nearly as well known. It is, perhaps, the most primitive place of its kind in the metropolis: it still possesses a fragment of decoration of the time of James I., and the writer remembers the tavern half a century ago, with considerably more of its original panelling. It is just two centuries since (1665) , when the Plague was raging, the landlord shut up his house, and retired into the country ”

“ The Green Man and Still should be a green man (or man who deals in green herbs) with a bundle of peppermint or pennyroyal under his arm, which he brings to be distilled.
Upon the modern building of the Bull and Mouth has been conferred the more elegant name of the Queen's Hotel. Now the former is a corruption of Boulogne Mouth, and the sign was put up to commemorate the destruction of the French flotilla at the mouth of Boulogne harbour in the reign of Henry VIII. This absurd corruption has been perpetuated by a carving in stone of a bull and a human face with an enormous mouth. ”

“ At the north-west corner of Covent Garden Market is a lofty edifice, which, with the building that preceded it, possesses a host of interesting associations. Sir Kenelm Digby came to live here after the Restoration of Charles II.: here he was much visited by the philosophers of his day, and built in the garden in the rear of the house a laboratory. The mansion was altered, if not rebuilt, for the Earl of Orford, better known as Admiral Russell, who, in 1692, defeated Admiral de Tourville, and ruined the French fleet. The façade of the house originally resembled the forecastle of a ship. ”

“ From a passage in one of the Letters from the Dead to the Living, we learn, that after Julian's death, and the madness of his successor, called Summerton, lampoon felt a sensible decay; and there was no more that brisk spirit of verse, that used to watch the follies and vices of the men and women of figure, that they could not start new ones faster than lampoons exposed them. ”

“ Moncrieff, the dramatist, used to tell that about 1780, this house was kept by his grandfather, Alexander Moncrieff, when it retained its original title of "The Rainbow Coffee-house." The old Coffee-room had a lofty bay-window, at the south end, looking into the Temple: and the room was separated from the kitchen only by a glazed partition: in the bay was the table for the elders. The house has long been a tavern; all the old rooms have been swept away, and a large and lofty dining-room erected in their place. ”

“ TOM'S COFFEE-HOUSE,
In Birchin-lane, Cornhill, though in the main a mercantile resort, acquired some celebrity from its having been frequented by Garrick, who, to keep up an interest in the City, appeared here about twice in a winter at 'Change time, when it was the rendezvous of young merchants. Hawkins says: "After all that has been said of Mr. Garrick, envy must own that he owed his celebrity to his merit; and yet, of that himself seemed so diffident, that he practised sundry little but innocent arts, to insure the favour of the public:" yet, he did more. ”