Capstan bar

“ So they turned into one of the Piccadilly bars, full of men and women, and ablaze with light reflected from a thousand glasses and mirrors. Mark had never set foot in a London bar at midnight. The roar of the voices, interpenetrated by the shrill laughter of the women, the clinking of glasses, the swish of silk petticoats, the white glare, the overpowering odours of the liquors and perfumes, the atmosphere hot on one's cheek—these smote him. ”

“ The wide-open front gave view of much of the barroom including even a section of the bar. Numerous figures moving about were easily discernible, while up above in the gambling rooms, the outlines of men were reflected upon the windows.
A hum of voices echoed out into the night, but the platform in front of the door was deserted. Occasionally some wanderer either entered or departed, merging into the crowd within or disappearing through the darkness without. ”

“ When I took on barman as a profession, I never lifted pot or glass again to my own lips, and have stood between many a young man and the last half pint. I tell you this to your face, Missis Northover. Not an hour ago I was at 'The Tiger,' to let Richard Gurd know the stable was ready, and in the private bar there were six young men, all drinking for the pleasure of drinking. If the younger generation only lapped when 'twas thirsty, half the drinking-places would shut, and there wouldn't be no more brewers in the peerage. ”

“ Again the loud voices of men in angry strife arose in the bar-room. I did not return there to learn the cause, or to witness the fiend-like conduct of the men, all whose worst passions were stimulated by drink into the wildest fervor. As I was entering my room, the thought flashed through my mind that, as Green was found there, it needed only the bare suggestion that I had aided in his concealment, to direct toward me the insane fury of the drunken mob.
"It is not safe to remain here." ”

“ Several men of his own class were standing by him, and though early in the day, groups of gin-drinking men and women had assembled in the four compartments into which the bar was divided. The floor had been swept and covered with sawdust, which gave it a [131] comfortable appearance, while its spaciousness and highly-varnished hundred-gallon hogsheads, the gilded frame-work of the plate-glass panelling, the bright rows of wine and spirit bottles, and the active movements of the landlord and two barmen, rendered the place attractive and pleasant to the miserably clad customers. ”

“ From the day the tavern was opened, and Frank drew into his lungs full draughts of the changed atmosphere by which he was now surrounded, the work of moral deterioration commenced. The very smell of the liquor exhilarated him unnaturally; while the subjects of conversation, so new to him, that found discussion in the bar-room, soon came to occupy a prominent place in his imagination, to the exclusion of those humane, child-like, tender, and heavenly thoughts and impressions it had been the mother's care to impart and awaken.
Ah! with what an eager zest does the heart drink in of evil. ”

“ God is watching over us," whispered Sister Kauffman as she walked me through a screen door and into that gaudy, low barroom, where were congregated a most deplorable mixture of degraded men and youth in various stages of inebriety. The place reeked with the vile odors of whiskey, beer, tobacco, uncleanliness of body, etc., so that my stomach revolted, and I felt as if I should be compelled to return to the fresh air; but Sister Kauffman, who had obtained permission from the proprietor (tending bar) , took me through another doorway, which led into a dance-hall. ”

“ A few early drinkers were already in the bar-room—men with shattered nerves and cadaverous faces, who could not begin the day's work without the stimulus of brandy or whisky. They came in, with gliding footsteps, asked for what they wanted in low voices, drank in silence, and departed. It was a melancholy sight to look upon.
About nine o'clock the landlord made his appearance. He, too, came gliding into the bar-room, and his first act was to seize upon a brandy decanter, pour out nearly half a pint of the fiery liquid, and drink it off. ”

“ In a little filthy side-room was a bar covered with bottles and glasses, behind which stood a large, red-faced man, with a big nose, and little ferret, fiery eyes, now grinning like a satyr, now scowling like a demon, dealing out burning liquors to his miserable customers. ”

“ Burgoyne Tavern.
Forty years later an aged man was swung precariously out with a violent jerk from a rampant trolley car in front of the Washington Hotel. He wearily entered the gaudy office, and turned thence to the bar. The barkeeper, a keen-eyed, lean old fellow of inscrutable countenance, glanced sharply at him, pondered a moment, then opened a remote closet, drew forth from its recess an ancient and dusty demijohn of apple-jack, and with boiling water and a dash of mustard compounded a drink which he placed unasked before the traveller. ”

“ It is difficult to think that we really believe in banking, as the solid serious profession we talk about, when our banks are not only nearly as numerous, but very like our public-houses. Both are more often than not glorified corner shops. There is the public bar and the private bar in each. The public bar is of any shape so long as there is sufficient counter space, and the private bar or manager’s room has the same mahogany and frosted glass. Externally, each shows, too, a nice taste in pink, polished granite. ”

“ As evening began to fall, the gambler's unsuccessful pursuers, one after another, found their way to the tavern, and by the time night had fairly closed in, the bar-room was crowded with excited and angry men, chafing over their disappointment, and loud in their threats of vengeance. That Green had made good his escape, was now the general belief ”

“ He passed a commodious-looking hotel, built of wood, typically western in style, with hitching posts at the side of the road, a broad sidewalk and a few steps up to a wide veranda which led into an airy and busy saloon.
For want of anything better to occupy his attention, Phil strolled in. He called for a glass of beer at the bar. While waiting service, he took in his surroundings.
Several men were lounging at the bar talking loudly, smoking, spitting carelessly and drinking. ”

“ This the Salle des pas perdus of the Scottish Bar. Here, by a ferocious custom, idle youths must promenade from ten till two. From end to end, singly or in pairs or trios, the gowns and wigs go back and forward. Through a hum of talk and footfalls, the piping tones of a Macer announce a fresh cause and call upon the names of those concerned. Intelligent men have been walking here daily for ten or twenty years without a rag of business or a shilling of reward. ”

“ A large proportion of those who made up the crowd of Green's angry pursuers were excited by drink as well as indignation, and I am very sure that, but for the maddening effects of liquor, the fatal shot would never have been fired. After the fearful catastrophe, and when "very mind was sobered, or ought to have been sobered, the crowd returned to the bar-room, where the drinking was renewed. So rapid were the calls for liquor, that both Matthew and Frank, the landlord's son, were kept busy mixing the various compounds demanded by the thirsty customers. ”

“ Lefever pointed out the unlucky gambler’s grave as he and de Spain rode into the canyon toward the inn.
Not a sign of any sort was displayed about the habitation. No man was invited to enter, no man warned to keep out, none was anywhere in sight. The stage men dismounted, threw their lines, pushed open the front door of the house and entered a room of perhaps sixteen by twenty feet. It had been the original barroom. A long, high, elaborately carved mahogany bar, as much out of keeping as it possibly could be with its surroundings, stretched across the farther side of the room. ”

“ He did not just relish my remark.
"Between quiet, thrifty, substantial farmers, and drinking bar-room loungers, are many degrees of comparison."
"Excuse me, sir!" Simon Slade elevated his person. "The men who visit my bar-room, as a general thing, are quite as respectable, moral, and substantial as any who came to the mill—and I believe more so. The first people in the place, sir, are to be found here. Judge Lyman and Judge Hammond; Lawyer Wilks and Doctor Maynard; Mr. Grand and Mr. Lee; and dozens of others—all our first people. No, sir; you mustn't judge all by vagabonds like Joe Morgan." ”

“ How badly his hand shook—so badly that he spilled the brandy both in pouring it out and in lifting the glass to his lips! What a shattered wreck he was! He looked really worse now than he did on the day before, when drink gave an artificial vitality to his system, a tension to his muscles, and light to his countenance. The miller of ten years ago, and the tavern-keeper of today! Who could have identified them as one?
Slade was turning from the bar, when a man? came in. I noticed an instant change in the landlord's countenance. He looked startled; almost frightened. ”

“ Doubts have been cast upon the story of the bar surmounted by a woman’s sunbonnet, to which every customer respectfully lifted his glass before tossing off its contents; but the fact is substantiated by the eminent engraver, Mr. A. V. S. Anthony, who, as a young man, drank a glass of whiskey at that very bar, in the early Fifties, and joined in the homage to the sunbonnet. There is really nothing unnatural in this incident, or in that other story of some youthful miners coming by chance upon a woman’s cast-off skirt or hat, spontaneously forming a ring and dancing around it. ”

“ This resort was a hundred feet long by forty wide, well floored, and given over to drinking, dancing, and gambling. The sumptuous bar provided refreshment much desired in a dry alkali country; all the games known to the professional gambler were in full blast; women, often fair and well-dressed, were there to gather in what the bartender and faro-dealer missed. ”

“ I do not know whether Annie yielded then or later. But ultimately she learned to drink beer for the benefit of philanthropists who furnish dance halls rent free, and also to quench a thirst rendered unbearable by heat and dust. They seldom open the windows in these places. Sometimes they even nail the windows down. A well-ventilated room means poor business at the bar. ”

“ Then came the afternoon when I decided that Satan must have his way.
There is a hotel in New York of which I had many recollections because I had frequented its barroom in the days before I went altogether down. It is a somewhat expensive-looking barroom, with heavy mahogany, gilded cornices, and frescoes of hunting-scenes on the wall. Hanging over the bar at any time during the day or night can be seen all the types that are commonly known as sporting, from the dashing to the cheap. ”

“ An exception is the bar, which, of course, was a fixture and part of the inn structure. Our modern bar with its almost invariable ugliness, its row of vertical handles for drawing beer, and its aggressive [Pg 245] cash register, is a poor survival of the Jacobean bar, an example of which is still in existence at the Maid’s Head, Norwich. It is worthy of recollection that the high stools which enable one to sit at a bar are quite of modern origin. Bar lounging evidently did not become a habit until the nineteenth century. People sat down and had their refreshments at ease. ”

“ A spacious saloon bar flooded with glaring light, with modern furniture and appliances, is to take the place of the old rooms, coffee-room, billiard-room, and bar. In fact, it is to become a modern hotel. The change is quite enough to make the shade of Dickens arise. As John Forster has told us, the great novelist loved this old chop-house, and, after a ramble on the Heath, often adjourned here for a good, wholesome dinner. ”

“ On the right-hand side, nearest the door, is the bar, over which presides a genius of the male sex, whose chief attractions consists of a decided red head, and an immense paste breastpin, stuck into the bosom of a ruffled shirt. The bar is well furnished, and any drink called for, from beer to champagne, can be instantly obtained. ”

“ The gaslights shine brightly out from the gin-palaces, and great business is in course of being there carried on. Numbers go in and out, and the glass-doors are ever on the swing. Through these doors glimpses can be caught of crowds of men and women standing at the bar drinking, and waiting to be served ”

“ Frank, my son,"—the landlord spoke to the boy—"there's some one in the bar. You can wait on him as well as I can."
The lad glided from the room in ready obedience.
"A handy boy that, sir; a very handy boy. Almost as good, in the bar as a man. He mixes a toddy or a punch just as well as I can."
"But," I suggested, "are you not a little afraid of placing one so young in the way of temptation?"
"Temptation!" The open brows of Simon Slade contracted a little. "No, sir!" he replied, emphatically. "The till is safer under his care than it would be in that of one man in ten. ”

“ The space between the bar, which ran across one end of the room, and the billiard-tables, was the favourite nightly resort of the prominent politicians and gamblers. There, if anywhere, my questions would be answered.
On entering the billiard-room I was struck by the number of men who had come together. Usually only some twenty or thirty were present, half of whom sat smoking and chewing about the bar, while the rest watched a game of billiards or took a “life” in pool. ”