Coach inn

“ In these times, when the blasted dust of the Dover road is the most noticeable feature, and a half-century has effected all manner of wonderful changes, tramps and their kin find no harbourage at the old house, whose invitation to cyclists and amateur photographers sufficiently emphasises its improved status.
In Great Expectations is found a notice of the “Cross Keys,” Wood Street, Cheapside, a coaching inn abolished in the ’70’s; but it is merely an incidental reference, on the occasion of Pip’s coming to London by coach from Rochester. ”

“ There are low-browed old rooms at the inn, with a cosy kitchen that is as much parlour; with undisguised oaken beams running overhead, rich in pendant hams that by due hanging have acquired artistic old-masterish tones, like mellow Morlands and rich Gainsboroughs. There is a capacious hearth, there are settles to sit easily in, and warming pans that have warmed many a bed for old-time travellers ”

“ The poor coachman drove on till he came to the foresaid inn, where he alighted and opened the door to let out his passenger; but seeing the coach empty, and a great hole in the backside of it, he cried out, he believed he had had the devil in the coach, and that he had taken away the backside of it with him. The people of the inn came all flocking about to see what was done, and then perceiving the lines on the inside of the coach, which the bishop came and read himself, they all concluded it to be done by George, but could make nothing of it ”

“ The whip and owner of the coach was a great friend of his, he proffered by way of explanation—a certain count who had a genius for friendship—one who also had an artist's talent for admiring the beautiful. He was among those who were in a state of perpetual adoration before the inn's perfections. He made yearly pilgrimages from his chateau above Rouen to eat a noon breakfast in the Chambre des Marmousets. Now, a breakfast served elsewhere than in this chamber would be, from his point of view, to have journeyed to a shrine to find the niche empty. ”

“ One exception is to be found at the Ostrich at Colnbrook, a beautiful old Elizabethan coaching inn, retaining near the middle of its long half-timbered and gabled front, above the yard gate, the platform by which “the quality” embarked on the coach. It is an ideal place for a ghost to take sanctuary, with many corridors and low-ceilinged chambers, all lined through with carved chestnut panelling and twisted pilasters. There is a Queen’s room, said to have been used by Queen Elizabeth while awaiting the repair of her coach which had lost a wheel crossing the ford. ”

“ THE PEACOCK, ISLINGTON—THE WHITE HORSE, ETON SLOCOMBE—THE GEORGE, GRANTHAM—THE GEORGE AND NEW INN, GRETA BRIDGE—THE KING’S HEAD, BARNARD CASTLE—THE UNICORN, BOWES—THE INN ON THE PORTSMOUTH ROAD—THE LONDON TAVERN—AND OTHERS
The first stop of Nicholas’s coach after it had left the Saracen’s Head was at the Peacock, at Islington, an inn of immense popularity in those palmy days when the north-country mail-coaches made it their headquarters. ”

“ The landlord of this hostelry was a jolly, honest man; his house spacious, and fit even to serve the Bishop. All things were cheap, good, and clean at this inn. If a person came in well pleased, he would find nothing to offend him, provided he did not create some offence to himself—which sounds just a little confused.
While our itinerant chronicler was noting down all these things, orders were given for departure, and so he had hurriedly to conclude.
And now, turning from wayside reflections, we get a description of the passengers. The coach, when it left Newcastle, was full. ”

“ I had just gained the steps of this tavern when a stagecoach came rattling along the pavement and drew up at an inn of more pretensions than that which we favored, situated within a few doors of the latter. As the coach stopped, my eye was caught by the Trevanion livery, which was very peculiar. Thinking I must be deceived, I drew near to the wearer of the livery, who had just descended from the roof, and while he paid the coachman, gave his orders to a waiter who emerged from the inn,—“Half-and-half, cold without!” ”

“ Their way is to hire a horse and a man for twopence a mile; they ride on the horse thirty or forty miles a day, and the man who is his guide foots it beside him, and carries his luggage to boot.” The “change-house” was, of course, an inn; and from this custom, when every man’s house was an hotel, the Scottish inns long remained very inferior places.
Fielding throws a very instructive light upon the device hit upon by any two travellers who wished to go together and yet had only one horse between them. ”

“ This specimen was by no means the only one among the arrivals by the stage-coach. Every waiter in the house was pressed into the service of [Pg 14] these coxcombs,—some smoked,—some swaggered through the private rooms,—others adjusted their frizzled locks at the mirrors with brushes carried for the purpose,—and all together created a vast commotion in the quiet country inn.
As our two young southerns sat in the long piazza, eying these stage-coach travellers and waiting for breakfast, the same equipage which they had passed on the road, and containing our northern party, drew up to the door. ”

“ In short, the old “New” inn impresses the beholder with a very insistent sense of being a live institution, a “going concern.” Most ancient inns of this character are merely poor survivals; archæologically interesting, but wan veterans tottering to decay and long deserted by custom. Here, however, there is heavy traffic [Pg 106] down in the yard: the ostler is busy in his “Ostry” (the name is painted over the door) , bells are ringing, people and luggage coming and going; the big railway parcel-office is as full of parcels as it could have been when it was a coach-office ”

“ The wagon, which contained several persons, was driven into the stable yard, where it was unloaded of “drops” and “wings,” representing a street, a forest, a prison, and so on, while the stage coach, with a rattle and a jerk, and a final flourish of the driver’s whip, stopped at the front door. Springing to the ground, the driver opened the door of the vehicle, and at the same time two other men, with their heads muffled against the wind and rain, leisurely descended from the top. The landlord now stood at the entrance of the inn, a sour expression on his face. ”

“ They linger on in the hope that motorists may bring them a new popularity. Others, tired of empty [Pg 86] rooms and dwindling local trade have retired into private life. At Caxton, on the old North Road, the George, a very large inn of a lonely country village, is now a comfortable private residence, and the old gateway arch would hardly be recognized in the French window opening on the front garden.
Coach Gallery at the Bull, Long Melford
Gone are the old galleried yards. ”

“ The meaning was this; people come frequently with bundles and small parcels to those inns, and call for such carriers or coaches as they want, to carry them into the country; and there generally attend women, porters’ wives or daughters, ready to take in such things for their respective people that employ them.
It happened very oddly that I was standing at the inn gate, and a woman that had stood there before, and which was the porter’s wife belonging to the Barnet stage-coach, having observed me, asked if I waited for any of the coaches. ”

“ We do not know of one complete instance, except the little disused Coach and Horses in York Street, Westminster, which is neither large nor beautiful. Fragments of galleries exist at the old [Pg 87] George Inn in the Borough, where they are in several stories; at the George at Huntingdon; the Golden Lion at St. Ives, and the New Inn at Gloucester; but the finest remaining gallery is at the Bull at Dartford. The Bull at Long Melford owns a glazed gallery, running along the side of the yard next the inn, said to have served to facilitate the loading of luggage on the coaches. ”

“ In short, mediæval picturesqueness, Jacobean carved oak, commercial and coffee-rooms of the coaching age, and modern comforts conjoin at the New Inn, so that neither a wayworn pilgrim, were such an one likely to appear, nor a seventeenth century horseman, nor even a Georgian coachman, redolent of the rum-punch that was the favourite drink in coaching days, would seem out of place. ”

“ I have often heard it said that the touring cyclist has caused the revival of wayside inns. It may be so, but the touring cyclist seems to be very easily satisfied. Unless we are greatly deceived by the old writers, an English inn used to be a delightful resort, abounding in comfort, and supplied with the best of food; a place, too, where one was sure of welcome at once hearty and courteous. The inns of to-day, in country towns and villages, are not in that good old sense inns at all; they are merely public-houses. The landlord’s chief interest is the sale of liquor. ”

“ They had mostly been built after the same model, the gateway or door at the entrance being arched over and placed in the centre of the front of the hotel. Through this archway the coaches, with passengers and luggage, could pass in and out, a door on each side of the entrance leading into different sections of the inn. ”

“ The pinks stand about the inn door lighting cigars and waiting to see us start, while their hacks are led up and down the market-place on which the inn looks. They all know our sportsman, and we feel a reflected credit when we see him chatting and laughing with them.
"Now, sir, please," says the coachman; all the rest of the passengers are up; the guard is locking the hind boot.
"A good run to you!" says the sportsman to the pinks, and is by the coachman's side in no time. ”

“ Two or three gigs or chaise-carts were wheeled up under different little sheds and pent-houses, and the occasional heavy tread of a cart-horse, or rattling of a chain at the further end of the yard, announced to anyone who cared about the matter that the stable lay in that direction. When we add that a few boys in smock-frocks were lying asleep on heavy packages, [Pg 228] woolpacks, and other articles that were scattered about on heaps of straw, we have described as fully as need be the general appearance of the ‘White Hart’ inn, High Street, Borough. ”

“ When they were a general place of resort for all classes, including men of rank and fortune, they naturally lent themselves to the unexpected meetings and odd blunders which serve to make up a farcical plot. County, racing and hunting balls were all held in the principal inn of a town; just the opportunity for a needy adventurer to introduce himself by impersonation or otherwise. The details of the scheme are arranged in the Coffee Room; and landlord or waiter supply the necessary information enabling the lover to pose successfully as Simon Pure. ”

“ Age adds beauty to the one; it adds but a depressing gloom to the other.
PRE-RAILWAY TRAVELLERS
Right in front of us, at the top of the market-place, stood a fine example of an old coaching inn—a long red-brick structure whose ruddy front showed in pleasant contrast with the gray stone buildings around of earlier date: a plain but comfortable-looking hostelry, its many windows gleaming cheerfully in the sunshine, and having in the centre under the eaves of its roof a reminder of the past in the shape of a sun-dial with a legend upon it ”

“ At other times the stable-lofts of the inns formed their apartments. Landlords of reputable hostelries, mindful of the social gulf that (in the opinion of the insides) existed between the inside passengers of a stage-coach and those off-scourings of the country who rode on the roof or in the “basket,” did not commonly allow those belonging to that even lower stratum, the waggons, to sleep in their houses. A supper of cold boiled beef and bread in the kitchen, followed by a shake-down in the hay or straw of the stables, at an inclusive price of sixpence or ninepence, was their portion. ”

“ The hosteller remains as the ostler, who now usually confines his attention to four-footed visitors; the chamberlain has changed his sex (though only since the days of Sir Roger de Coverley) and has become the Chambermaid. In most old manor-houses provisions, wine and ale were served from a special department close to the porch and called the “bower,” from Norse Bür, meaning buttery. Frequenters of a modern inn resort for the same purpose to the “bar.” Lastly, the presiding genius in every hotel or tavern, no matter how humble, is invariably referred to as “the Landlord.” ”

“ Win his heart and he will divulge unexpected secrets, besides securing for you the most comfortable night’s lodging. His recommendation will prove a passport admitting into every grade of village society.
When the world proves unkind, when the [Pg 88] loneliness and disappointments of life press hard upon you—if Fortune has dealt you a humiliating rebuff—then, if you have a few shillings left, one night spent in an old wayside coaching inn will brace your system up and give you heart to face your troubles once more with a new courage. ”

“ The tiniest inn is always big enough for personality. The innkeeper is a person, the guest is a person, the cook, the boots, the hostler, they are all real persons. There is time for flavoring food with conversation. The chairs are friendly and inviting. The hearth leaps warm with welcome. But note well, one sometimes lives at a hotel, one often lives at a boarding-house, but one never lives at an inn, one merely stops. The reason why the welcome and the speeding of an inn can be so warm and genuine is that host and guest never have too much of each other. ”