Note 98 — A BOOK FOR A RAINY DAY

Cuper’s Gardens, a great resort. The Feathers Tavern at the end of Waterloo Bridge is the successor of the tavern originally in the gardens, the site of which is traversed by the Waterloo Road. They were closed in 1759, after which Dr. Johnson, passing them in a coach with Langton, Beauclerk, and Lady Sydney Beauclerk (mother of his friend), jokingly proposed, to Lady Sydney’s horror, that they should lease them: “She had no notion of a joke, sir; she had come late into life, and had a mighty unpliable understanding.”