Part 13

Another noted "Hercules Pillars" was at Hyde Park Corner, near Hamilton-place, on the site of what is now the pavement opposite Lord Willoughby's. "Here," says Cunningham, "Squire Western put his horses up when in pursuit of Tom Jones; and here Field Marshal the Marquis of Gransby was often found." And Wycherley, in his _Plain Dealer_, 1676, makes the spendthrift, Jerry Blackacre, talk of picking up his mortgaged silver "out of most of the ale-houses between Hercules Pillars and the Boatswain in Wapping."

Hyde Park Corner was noted for its petty taverns, some of which remained as late as 1805. It was to one of these taverns that Steele took Savage to dine, and where Sir Richard dictated and Savage wrote a pamphlet, which he went out and sold for two guineas, with which the reckoning was paid. Steele then "returned home, having retired that day only to avoid his creditors, and composed the pamphlet only to discharge his reckoning."

FOOTNOTE:

[34] Subsequently "Dick's."

HOLE-IN-THE-WALL TAVERNS.

This odd sign exists in Chancery-lane, at a house on the east side, immediately opposite the old gate of Lincoln's-Inn; "and," says Mr. Burn, "being supported by the dependants on legal functionaries, appears to have undergone fewer changes than the law, retaining all the vigour of a new establishment." There is another "Hole in the Wall" in St. Dunstan's-court, Fleet-street, much frequented by printers.

Mr. Akerman says:--"It was a popular sign, and several taverns bore the same designation, which probably originated in a certain tavern being situated in some umbrageous recess in the old City walls. Many of the most popular and most frequented taverns of the present day are located in twilight courts and alleys, into which Phoebus peeps at Midsummer-tide only when on the meridian. Such localities may have been selected on more than one account: they not only afforded good skulking 'holes' for those who loved drinking better than work; but beer and other liquors keep better in the shade. These haunts, like Lady Mary's farm, were--

'In summer shady, and in winter warm.'

Rawlins, the engraver of the fine and much coveted Oxford Crown, with a view of the city under the horse, dates a quaint supplicatory letter to John Evelyn, 'from the Hole in the Wall, in St. Martin's;' no misnomer, we will be sworn, in that aggregation of debt and dissipation, when debtors were imprisoned with a very remote chance of redemption. In the days of Rye-house and Meal-Tub plots, philanthropy overlooked such little matters; and Small Debts Bills were not dreamt of in the philosophy of speculative legislators. Among other places which bore the designation of the Hole in the Wall, there was one in Chandos-street, in which the famous Duval, the highwayman, was apprehended after an attack on--two bottles of wine, probably drugged by a 'friend' or mistress."

THE MITRE, IN FLEET-STREET.

This was the true Johnsonian Mitre, so often referred to in _Boswell's Life_; but it has earlier fame. Here, in 1640, Lilly met Old Will Poole, the astrologer, then living in Ram-alley. The Royal Society Club dined at the Mitre from 1743 to 1750, the Society then meeting in Crane-court, nearly opposite. The Society of Antiquaries met some time at the Mitre. Dr. Macmichael, in _The Gold-headed Cane_, makes Dr. Radcliffe say:--"I never recollect to have spent a more delightful evening than that at the Mitre Tavern, in Fleet-street, where my good friend Billy Nutly, who was indeed the better half of me, had been prevailed upon to accept of a small temporary assistance, and joined our party, the Earl of Denbigh, Lords Colepeper and Stowel, and Mr. Blackmore."

The house has a token:--WILLIAM PAGET AT THE. A mitre.--Rx. MITRE IN FLEET STREET. In the field, W. E. P.

Johnson's Mitre is commonly thought to be the tavern with that sign, which still exists in Mitre-court, over against Fetter-lane; where is shown a cast of Nollekens' bust of Johnson, in confirmation of this house being his resort. Such was not the case; Boswell distinctly states it to have been the Mitre Tavern _in_ _Fleet-street_; and the records by Lilly and the Royal Society, alike specify "in Fleet-street," which Mr. Burn, in his excellent account of the Beaufoy Tokens, explains was the house, No. 39, Fleet-street, that Macklin opened, in 1788, as the Poet's Gallery; and lastly, Saunders's auction-rooms. It was taken down to enlarge the site for Messrs. Hoares' new banking-house. The now Mitre Tavern, in Mitre-court, was originally called Joe's Coffee-house; and on the shutting up of the old Mitre, in Fleet-street, took its name; this being four years after Johnson's death.

The Mitre was Dr. Johnson's favourite supper-house, the parties including Goldsmith, Percy, Hawkesworth, and Boswell; there was planned the tour to the Hebrides. Johnson had a strange nervous feeling, which made him uneasy if he had not touched every post between the Mitre and his own lodgings. Johnson took Goldsmith to the Mitre, where Boswell and the Doctor had supped together in the previous month, when Boswell spoke of Goldsmith's "very loose, odd, scrambling kind of life," and Johnson defended him as one of our first men as an author, and a very worthy man;--adding, "he has been loose in his principles, but he is coming right." Boswell was impatient of Goldsmith from the first hour of their acquaintance. Chamberlain Clarke, who died in 1831, aged 92, was the last surviving of Dr. Johnson's Mitre friends. Mr. William Scott, Lord Stowell, also frequented the Mitre.

Boswell has this remarkable passage respecting the house:--"We had a good supper, and port-wine, of which he (Johnson) sometimes drank a bottle. The orthodox high-church sound of THE MITRE--the figure and manner of the celebrated SAMUEL JOHNSON--the extraordinary power and precision of his conversation, and the pride arising from finding myself admitted as his companion, produced a variety of sensations, and a pleasing elevation of mind, beyond what I had ever experienced."

SHIP TAVERN, TEMPLE BAR.

This noted Tavern, the site of which is now denoted by Ship-yard, is mentioned among the grants to Sir Christopher Hatton, 1571. There is, in the Beaufoy Collection, a Ship token, dated 1649, which is evidence that the inner tavern of that sign was then extant. It was also called the Drake, from the ship painted as the sign being that in which Sir Francis Drake voyaged round the world. Faithorne, the celebrated engraver, kept shop, next door to the Drake. "The Ship Tavern, in the Butcher-row, near Temple Bar," occurs in an advertisement so late as June, 1756.

The taverns about Temple Bar were formerly numerous; and the folly of disfiguring sign-boards was then, as at a later date, a street frolic. "Sir John Denham, the poet, when a student at Lincoln's-Inn, in 1635, though generally temperate as a drinker, having stayed late at a tavern with some fellow-students, induced them to join him in 'a frolic,' to obtain a pot of ink and a plasterer's brush, and blot out all the signs between Temple Bar and Charing Cross. Aubrey relates that R. Estcourt, Esq., carried the ink-pot: and that next day it caused great confusion; but it happened Sir John and his comrades were discovered, and it cost them some moneys."

THE PALSGRAVE HEAD, TEMPLE BAR.

This once celebrated Tavern, opposite the Ship, occupied the site of Palsgrave-place, on the south side of the Strand, near Temple Bar. The Palsgrave Frederick, afterwards King of Bohemia, was affianced to the Princess Elizabeth (only daughter of James I.), in the old banqueting house at Whitehall, December 27, 1612, when the sign was, doubtless, set up in compliment to him. There is a token of the house in the Beaufoy Collection. (See _Burn's Catalogue_, p. 225.)

Here Prior and Montague, in _The Hind and Panther Transversed_, make the Country Mouse and the City Mouse bilk the Hackney Coachman:

"But now at Piccadilly they arrive, And taking coach, t'wards Temple Bar they drive, But at St. Clement's eat out the back; And slipping through the Palsgrave, bilkt poor hack."

HEYCOCK'S, TEMPLE BAR,

Near the Palsgrave's Head tavern, was Heycock's Ordinary, much frequented by Parliament men and gallants. Andrew Marvell usually dined here: one day, having eaten heartily of boiled beef, with some roasted pigeons and asparagus, he drank his pint of port; and on the coming in of the reckoning, taking a piece of money out of his pocket, held it up, and addressing his associates, certain members of Parliament, known to be in the pay of the Crown, said, "Gentlemen, who would lett himself out for hire, while he can have such a dinner for half-a-crown?"

THE CROWN AND ANCHOR, STRAND.

This famous tavern extended from Arundel-street eastward to Milford-lane, in the rear of the south side of the Strand, and occupied the site of an older house with the same sign. Strype, in 1729, described it as "the Crown Tavern; a large and curious house, with good rooms and other conveniences fit for entertainments." Here was instituted the Academy of Music in 1710; and here the Royal Society Club, who had previously met at the Mitre in Fleet-street, removed in 1780, and dined here for the first time on December 21, and here they continued until the tavern was converted into a club-house in 1847.

The second tavern was built in 1790. Its first landlord was Thomas Simpkin, a very corpulent man, who, in superintending the serving of a large dinner, leaned over a balustrade, which broke, when he fell from a considerable height to the ground, and was killed. The sign appears to have been originally "The Crown," to which may have been added the Anchor, from its being the emblem of St. Clement's, opposite; or from the Lord High Admiral having once resided on the site. The tavern contained a ball-room, 84 feet by 35 feet 6 inches; in 1798, on the birthday of C. J. Fox, was given in this house, a banquet to 2000 persons, when the Duke of Norfolk presided. The large room was noted for political meetings in the stormy Tory and Radical times; and the Crown and Anchor was long the rallying-point of the Westminster electors. The room would hold 2500 persons: one of the latest popular orators who spoke here was Daniel O'Connell, M.P. There was originally an entrance to the house from the Strand, by a long passage, such as was the usual approach to our old metropolitan taverns. The premises were entirely destroyed by fire, in 1854, but have been rebuilt.[35]

Here Johnson and Boswell occasionally supped; and here Johnson quarrelled with Percy about old Dr. Monsey. Thither was brought the altar-piece (St. Cecilia), painted by Kent for St. Clement's Church, whence it was removed, in 1725, by order of Bishop Gibson, on the supposition that the picture contained portraits of the Pretender's wife and children.

FOOTNOTE:

[35] See Whittington Club, Vol. I. p. 313.

THE CANARY-HOUSE, IN THE STRAND.

There is a rare Token of this house, with the date, 1665. The locality of the "Canary House in the Strande," says Mr. E. B. Price, "is now, perhaps, impossible to trace; and it is, perhaps, as vain to attempt a description of the wine from which it took its name, and which was so celebrated in that and the preceding century. Some have erroneously identified it with sack. We find it mentioned among the various drinks which Gascoyne so virtuously inveighs against in his _Delicate Diet for daintie mouthde Droonkardes_, published in 1576: "_We_ must have March beere, dooble-dooble Beere, Dagger ale, Bragget, Renish wine, White wine, French wine, Gascoyne wine, Sack, Hollocke, Canaria wine, _Vino greco_, _Vinum amabile_, and al the wines that may be gotten. Yea, wine of its selfe is not sufficient; but Suger, Limons, and sundry sortes of Spices must be drowned therein." The bibbers of this famed wine were wont to be termed "Canary birds." Of its qualities we can perhaps form the best estimate from the colloquy between "mine hostess of the Boar's Head and Doll Tearsheet;" in which the former charges the latter with having "drunk too much _Canaries_; and that's a _marvellous searching wine, and it perfumes the blood ere one can say, What's this?_"[36]

FOOTNOTE:

[36] We learn from Collier's _Roxburghe Ballads_ (_Lit. Gaz._ No. 1566) that in the reign of James I. "sparkling sack" was sold at 1_s._ 6_d._ per quart, and "Canary--pure French wine," at 7 pence.

THE FOUNTAIN TAVERN,

Strand, now the site of Nos. 101 and 102, Ries's Divan, gave the name to the Fountain Club, composed of political opponents of Sir Robert Walpole. Strype describes it as "a very fine Tavern, with excellent vaults, good rooms for entertainment, and a curious kitchen for dressing of meat, which, with the good wine there sold, make it well resorted to." Dennis, the Critic, describes his supping here with Loggan, the painter, and others, and that after supper they "drank Mr. Wycherley's health by name of Captain Wycherley."

Here, Feb. 12, 1742, was held a great meeting, at which near 300 members of both Houses of Parliament were present, to consider the ministerial crisis, when the Duke of Argyll observed to Mr. Pulteney, that a grain of honesty was worth a cart-load of gold. The meeting was held too late to be of any avail, to which Sir Charles Hanbury Williams alludes in one of his odes to Pulteney, invoking his Muse thus:--

"Then enlarge on his cunning and wit; Say, how he harang'd at the Fountain; Say, how the old patriots were bit, And a mouse was produc'd by a mountain."

Upon the Tavern site was a Drawing Academy, of which Cosway and Wheatley were pupils; here also was the lecture-room of John Thelwall, the political elocutionist. At No. 101, Ackermann, the printseller, illuminated his gallery with cannel coal, when gas-lighting was a novelty.

In Fountain-court, named from the Tavern, is the Coal-hole Tavern, upon the site of a coal-yard; it was much resorted to by Edmund Kean, and was one of the earliest night taverns for singing.

TAVERN LIFE OF SIR RICHARD STEELE.

Among the four hundred letters of Steele's preserved in the British Museum, are some written from his tavern haunts, a few weeks after marriage, to his "Dearest being on earth:"

"_Eight o'clock, Fountain Tavern, Oct. 22, 1707._

"My dear,

"I beg of you not to be uneasy; for I have done a great deal of business to-day very successfully, and wait an hour or two about my _Gazette_."

In the next, he does "not come home to dinner, being obliged to attend to some business abroad." Then he writes from the Devil Tavern, Temple Bar, January 3, 1707-8, as follows:--

"I have partly succeeded in my business, and enclose two guineas as earnest of more. Dear Prue, I cannot come home to dinner; I languish for your welfare, and will never be a moment careless more.

"Your faithful husband," etc.

Within a few days, he writes from a Pall Mall tavern:--

"Dear Wife,

"Mr. Edgecombe, Ned Ask, and Mr. Lumley, have desired me to sit an hour with them at the George, in Pall Mall, for which I desire your patience till twelve o'clock, and that you will go to bed," etc.

When money-matters were getting worse, Steele found it necessary to sleep away from home for a day or two, and he writes:--

"_Tennis-court Coffee-house, May 5, 1708._

"Dear Wife,

"I hope I have done this day what will be pleasing to you; in the meantime shall lie this night at a baker's, one Leg, over against the Devil Tavern, at Charing Cross. I shall be able to confront the fools who wish me uneasy, and shall have the satisfaction to see thee cheerful and at ease.

"If the printer's boy be at home, send him hither; and let Mr. Todd send by the boy my night-gown, slippers, and clean linen. You shall hear from me early in the morning," etc.

He is found excusing his coming home, being "invited to supper at Mr. Boyle's." "Dear Prue," he says on this occasion, "do not send after me, for I shall be ridiculous." There were _Caudles_ in those days.[37]

FOOTNOTE:

[37] Lives of Wits and Humourists, vol. i. p. 134.

CLARE MARKET TAVERNS.

Clare Market lying between the two great theatres, its butchers were the arbiters of the galleries, the leaders of theatrical rows, the musicians at actresses' marriages, the chief mourners at players' funerals. In and around the market were the signs of the Sun; the Bull and Butcher, afterwards Spiller's Head; the Grange; the Bull's Head, where met "the Shepherd and his Flock Club," and where Dr. Radcliffe was carousing when he received news of the loss of his 5000_l._ venture. Here met weekly a Club of Artists, of which society Hogarth was a member, and he engraved for them a silver tankard with a shepherd and his flock. Next is the Black Jack in Portsmouth-street, the haunt of Joe Miller, the comedian, and where he uttered his time-honoured "Jests:" the house remains, but the sign has disappeared. Miller died in 1738, and was buried in St. Clement's upper ground, in Portugal-street, where his gravestone was inscribed with the following epitaph, written by Stephen Duck: "Here lie the remains of honest Joe Miller, who was a tender husband, a sincere friend, a facetious companion, and an excellent comedian. He departed this life the 15th day of August, 1738, aged 54 years.

"If humour, wit, and honesty could save The humorous, witty, honest, from the grave, This grave had not so soon its tenant found, With honesty, and wit, and humour crown'd. Or could esteem and love preserve our health, And guard us longer from the stroke of Death, The stroke of Death on him had later fell, Whom all mankind esteem'd and loved so well."

The stone was restored by the parish grave-digger at the close of the last century; and in 1816, a new stone was set up by Mr. Jarvis Buck, churchwarden, who added S. Duck to the epitaph. The burial-ground has been cleared away, and the site has been added to the grounds of King's College Hospital.

At the Black Jack, also called the Jump, (from Jack Sheppard having once jumped out of a first-floor window, to escape his pursuers, the thief-takers,) a Club known as "the Honourable Society of Jackers," met until 1816. The roll of the fraternity "numbers many of the popular actors since the time of Joe Miller, and some of the wits; from John Kemble, Palmer, and Theodore Hook down to Kean, Liston, and the mercurial John Pritt Harley. Since the dissolution of this last relic of the sociality of the Joe Miller age, 'wit-combats' have been comparatively unknown at the Old Black Jack."[38]

FOOTNOTE:

[38] Jo. Miller; a Biography, 1848.

THE CRAVEN HEAD, DRURY LANE.

This modern Tavern was part of the offices of Craven House, and the adjoining stabling belonged to the mansion; the extensive cellars still remain, though blocked up.

Craven House was built for William Lord Craven, the hero of Creutznach, upon part of the site of Drury House, and was a large square pile of brick, four storeys high, which occupied the site of the present Craven-buildings, built in 1723. That portion of the mansion abutting on Magpie-alley, now Newcastle-street, was called Bohemia House, and was early in the last century, converted into a tavern, with the sign of the head of its former mistress, the Queen of Bohemia. But a destructive fire happening in the neighbourhood, the tavern was shut up, and the building suffered to decay; till, at length, in 1802, what remained of the dilapidated mansion was pulled down, and the materials sold; and upon the ground, in 1803, Philip Astley erected his Olympic Pavilion, which was burnt down in 1849.

The Craven Head was some time kept by William Oxberry, the comedian, who first appeared on the stage in 1807; he also edited a large collection of dramas. Another landlord of the Craven Head was Robert Hales, "the Norfolk Giant" (height 7 ft. 6 in.), who, after visiting the United States, where Barnum made a speculation of the giant, and 28,000 persons flocked to see him in ten days,--in January, 1851, returned to England, and took the Craven Head Tavern. On April 11th Hales had the honour of being presented to the Queen and Royal Family, when Her Majesty gave him a gold watch and chain, which he wore to the day of his death. His health had been much impaired by the close confinement of the caravans in which he exhibited. He died in 1863, of consumption. Hales was cheerful and well-informed. He had visited several Continental capitals, and had been presented to Louis Philippe, King of the French.

THE COCK TAVERN, IN BOW-STREET.

This Tavern, of indecent notoriety, was situated about the middle of the east side of Bow-street, then consisting of very good houses, well inhabited, and resorted to by gentry for lodgings. Here Wycherley and his first wife, the Countess of Drogheda, lodged over against the Cock, "whither, if he at any time were with his friends, he was obliged to leave the windows open, that the lady might see there was no woman in the company, or she would be immediately in a downright raving condition." (_Dennis's Letters._)

The Cock Tavern was the resort of the rakes and Mohocks of that day, when the house was kept by a woman called "Oxford Kate." Here took place the indecent exposure, which has been told by Johnson, in his life of Sackville, Lord Dorset. "Sackville, who was then Lord Buckhurst, with Sir Charles Sedley, and Sir Thomas Ogle, got drunk at the Cock, in Bow-street, by Covent-garden, and going into the balcony, exposed themselves to the company in very indecent postures. At last, as they grew warmer, Sedley stood forth naked, and harangued the populace in such profane language, that the public indignation was awakened; the crowd attempted to force the door, and being repulsed, drove in the performers with stones, and broke the windows of the house. For this misdemeanour they were indicted, and Sedley was fined five hundred pounds; what was the sentence of the others is not known. Sedley employed Killegrew and another to procure a remission of the King, but (mark the friendship of the dissolute!) they begged the fine for themselves, and exacted it to the last groat."

Sir John Coventry had supped at the Cock Tavern, on the night when, in his way home, his nose was cut to the bone, at the corner of Suffolk-street, in the Haymarket, "for reflecting on the King, who, therefore, determined to _set a mark_ upon him:" he was watched; when attacked, he stood up to the wall, and snatched the flambeau out of the servant's hands, and with that in one hand, and the sword in the other, he defended himself, but was soon disarmed, and his nose was cut to the bone; it was so well sewed up, that the scar was scarce to be discerned. This attempt at assassination occasioned the Coventry Act, 22 and 23 Car. II. c. 1, by which specific provisions were made against the offence of maiming, cutting off, or disabling, a limb or member.

THE QUEEN'S HEAD, BOW-STREET.